NYC Hip-Hop’s Next Wave: Statik Selektah & Termanology Talk “1982,” DJ Premier and J Dilla
Though originally from Boston, DJ/MC duo Statik Selektah & Termanology have been entrenched in the NYC hip-hop scene for years and collaborated with a variety of artists ranging from industry legends like DJ Premier to upstarts like XXL’s Freshmen 10 MC Freddie Gibbs.
Termanology and Statik Selektah
On their first collaborative full-length — the recently released 1982 — Statik and Termanology pay homage to hip-hop’s “Golden Era” with guests including NYC-native MC Styles P and veteran Wu-Tang Clan member Inspectah Deck. With lyrically conscious content punctuating tracks between street anthems and club-inspired hits, 1982 undoubtedly reminds of classic Gang Starr in its ability to relate to fans of all styles.
We recently had a chance to chat with these guys — talking to Statik about the resurgence of the DJ with respect to hosting mixtapes and his Brooklyn-based record label Showoff Records, and to Term about J Dilla’s influence, his relationship with the legendary DJ Premier, and his rise from part-time rapper to full-time artist.
Check out the interview below for all that and much more about their collaboration as “1982,” their recent self-titled full-length, and other collaborations.
You guys hail from Boston. How would you describe the difference between Boston and NYC in terms of the music business?
Termanology: That’s like the difference between a nun and a prostitute.
Statik Selektah: I mean NYC is the center of the world. Boston’s just a small city, there’s a lot of talent, but there’s no industry there. In New York there’s ten events every night, there’s every form of hip-hop going on whether it’s fashion or the labels or marketing companies, all that. Boston has shows once in while, maybe once or twice a week, but there’s nothing on the planet that’s like New York.
What was it like breaking into the NYC scene? Did you have a tough time getting into the scene, or was it just a matter of your showcasing your talent and letting that speak for you?
Statik Selektah: Nah, it wasn’t difficult because there’s like 15 different scenes in New York; you’ve got the Skyzoos and the Toraes, then the scene with the French Montanas and Fred da Gods, there are just so many scenes in New York hip-hop.
Do you think that’s just a product of New York, like you said, being the center of the world, or is there something greater going with the interconnected boroughs and industries?
Statik Selektah: It’s just the different styles of hip-hop (that exist throughout NY). You’ve got cats that want to rap like South Beach, cats that want to rap like Dipset, like Biggie, there’s just so many different styles that once in a while come together.
There are just so many different shows that everybody sees each other at some point. Out here there’s room for anybody. You can come to New York and do whatever you want to do; you can throw your own show. Somebody who lived here his whole life has the same access as someone who just came here. There are just so many clubs and so many places and different ways to do things. The thing about New York is that there are no excuses; if you get 100 people to come see you rap then you shouldn’t be doing this, you can’t network. New York is the easiest place in the world to network.
Termanology & Statik Selektah are known collectively as 1982.
Statik Selektah: The internet changed everything; the blogs took over with mixtapes where people now go to blogs to find out about new music as opposed to waiting for a DJ to put it together which takes longer. It made it so the music gets old really quick. It’ll be like “Yo, you heard that new Kanye featuring Pusha T? ‘Oh that’s old, that record came out two weeks ago.’” Back in the day, a record would be new for like 2 months.
One of the patterns I’ve seen the past few years with the internet age is that young rappers are taking established beats and going over them to prove that they can keep up with the established artists. What do you think about that?
Statik Selektah: 50 Cent started all that. People think that since it worked for 50 Cent it’s going to work for them, and it don’t.
Termanology: It’s cool, but only if you rip [the track].
So instead of taking an established beat, how do you guys go about building a track together? Do you build the beat first and then Term you take over?
Statik Selektah: Usually its just Term comes to me and checks out what I’ve been working on and he’ll pick a beat and claim it, and then we put it together. A lot of shit comes together pretty fast.
What kind of studio setup do you have in New York?
Statik Selektah: I have all the basic equipment with turntables, mixers, keyboard, etc. but I do everything in Pro Tools from the drums to the sample chop to everything else.
Are there any sound engineers or mixers that you work with regularly?
Statik Selektah: Not really, I do all of that myself. I mix, master. I don’t trust nobody with my mixes because the very few times I have let people work on it they’ve messed it up.
I read in a previous interview that 1982 is your Gang Starr. In what ways is the album reminiscent of Gang Starr?
Statik: You know, Guru had just passed away, and Term and I both knew Guru and Primo; Primo was like a big brother to us. It’s only right that we would pay tribute to Guru, the album is actually dedicated to Guru. We just grew up off Gang Starr and I hope that some day kids can grow up on the stuff we’re doing. There’s a message in the music; I mean there’s some ignorant tracks on there too, but Gang Starr had “Who Got Gunz?” they also had “Ex To The Next Girl.” We got that too. It’s all about touching different subjects and just having quality and substance in the music.
How do you define the sound of 1982?
Termanology: You can’t really define the sound because every song is different. You got the first song “100 bars” is all bragging and then the next song is all crazy shit with people doing drugs, and then a couple songs later you got “Going Back” which is straight raw shit, etc. Every record is different, and that’s what makes it so dope too.
How is 1982 different from the previous work you guys have done together?
"1982" dropped in October on Showoff Records.
Statik Selektah: It’s an album. Making a real album is a lot different than making songs randomly.
What goes into making an album that’s different from something like a mixtape?
Statik Selektah: An album you have to make it flow; the energy changes on every song. You have to make sure that it keeps the listener entertained. There are a lot of different emotions and concepts with it. Doing a mixtape is just taking a bunch of records and putting it together and throwing it online.
Does a mixtape then lose some of its significance because people just take the leftover records that didn’t fit in with the album or weren’t good enough?
Statik Selektah: Yeah. Well it depends: there’s some mixtapes that are made because people have a bunch of leftover songs and there’s some mixtapes that are designed a certain way. It really depends.
Term, I know that you did the J Dilla tribute album. Can you tell me about what kind of impression J Dilla had on you?
Statik Selektah: Well I know that J Dilla really changed my life. I know that people got t-shirts that say that on them but he really did [change my life]. The first record I ever bought when I started DJ-ing was Pharcyde’s “Running”; I was always the biggest A Tribe Called Quest fan, and when he started working with them — when Beats, Rhymes and Life came out — I really loved it. I know that a lot of traditional Tribe fans were kind of confused, but I was always a huge fan of Dilla’s production. He was just ahead of his time when they first started presenting him with that sound.
Termanology: I mean Dilla just inspired me so much; I only did 17 or 18 joints, but really there were like 400 beats that I had that were all Dilla and if it were up to me I’d make like 5 albums on all those beats, it was just crazy. But to tell you the truth, I was a big Dilla fan back in the day, and I didn’t even know what work he had done. I liked the beats but I didn’t know who made them, and it took for me chilling with Statik a lot to put me onto knowing that ‘Oh Dilla did this or Dilla did that,’ and I was like ‘wow, this dude is out of this world.’
Did you find it challenging trying to go over those kinds of beats?
Termanology: Nah not really, it was actually kind of easy. His beats go all over the place, they just flow. So when it came time to do a song on them, we just split it up and it was just kind of easy to do. If you were trying to do a kind of regular format like ‘hook to 16 (bars)’, then that could be weird, but I just grabbed the beat and spit a hundred bars on it or do 40 or whatever. When you’re rocking like that you don’t really care about conforming or actually making a regular song with three verses and a hook. Even the songs that were like that were easy because I just chopped them up, but I didn’t really want to touch them so I just left them how they were.
What do you think the role of the DJ is now; there’s DJs putting out and hosting their own albums. Is there a revitalization of the DJ?
Statik Selektah: I mean the producers are doing that because there are fewer lanes for true school producers to get creative and have fun with it. Back in the day there’d be whole albums produced by Dre like Doggy Style and whole albums produced by Primo, with some consistency to it. Now a’ days that doesn’t really happen as much, so that’s why cats like Alchemist and Jake One and myself do that.
What prompted you to start Show Off Records?
Statik Selektah: Just putting out dope music really. I was putting out a lot of mixtapes and came across some dope artists like Term and Reks and everybody else and was like “why not?” That kind of happened by mistake really; I was putting out bootleg vinyl of remixes I was doing, and I already had Show Off Marketing going, so I decided to open up Show Off Records, that’s really how it started.
Term, how did you first get hooked up with Primo for your track, “Watch How it Go Down”?
Termanology: I met him a few years before [the track], and just got cool with him, and kept harassing him for a beat. Eventually him and Statik were just hanging out in the studio and he showed the beat to Stat, and he asked if I could have it; they got me on the phone and it was just a go from there.
How has the success of that track changed the trajectory of your career since then?
Termanology: I’m just a whole different person now you know? I didn’t try to get paid off rap before, and now all I do is rap, so it changed my life and I owe all that to Premier.
And finally, what else can we expect from you guys in the future?
Statik Selektah: Term has the album with Lil Fame coming out called Physiology, that’s coming out at the top of the year. And I’m basically on everybody’s album from Nas to Sheek Louch to Styles P, I’ve just been getting a lot of placements on my own.
– Alex Edelstein
Statik Selektah & Termanology’s new album 1982 features artists Bun B, MOP, Freeway, Saigon, Reks & more. Click to download from iTunes. For more on Showoff Records, visit http://www.showoffhiphop.com.
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