Erick the Architect's Solo Debut (Listening Party)
( Photo Credit: Ellington Hammond )
[music]
Matt Katz: This is All Of It. I'm Matt Katz, filling in for Alison Stewart. My next guest, Erick the Architect, has been designing new soundscapes and hip hop over the last decade with his group, Flatbush Zombies. Now, the Brooklyn native has dropped a solo debut titled, I've Never Been Here Before. Here's the track, Instincts.
[MUSIC - Erick the Architect: Instincts]
Follow my instincts
Monday to Wednesday
Life is a mystery
What do my friends think?
Some cowards kneel, but
They never feel us
They almost killed us
And I'm still here, bruh
Follow my instincts
Monday to Wednesday
Life is a mystery
What do my mans think?
Some cowards kneel, but
They never feel us
They almost killed us
And I'm still here, bruh
Why you even pay rent, when you don't get out the bed?
Tryna own my problems, mostly 'cause I live in my head
Matt Katz: I've Never Been Here Before runs 16 songs long and spans many of the influences Erick the Architect grew up hearing in his Flatbush home. It also features a generationally wide roster of contributors like James Blake, Joey Bada$$, Lalah Hathaway, and even funk legend, George Clinton. Joining me now for an All Of It listening party is Erick the Architect. Welcome to All Of It.
Erick the Architect: Hey, man. What's going on? Thanks for having me.
Matt Katz: Oh, yes. Thanks for being here. We know you're a Brooklyn native. You're out in LA now, so appreciate you waking up in the morning and coming on the show.
Erick the Architect: [laughs]
Matt Katz: When you announced the album online, you wrote, "I can confidently say this is the most I've cared about anything I've made." What makes this such a personally important album for you, a milestone of sorts?
Erick the Architect: I think mostly because music to me as a kid, watching award shows or MTV or VT, Yo! MTV Raps. Those were my heroes, man. I looked up to all these people on television, they were this box. You'd flip the channel, and you're able to watch all these heroes save the day in their way. That always inspired me to make music, even when there was no traction or hope. I think that just feeling like I could save one person's life meant the world to me.
Of course, I released music as a band member. I've done production for other people and helped people with their albums. This was special because I never was able to do it for myself in this capacity. I wanted to say something profound, but also to make that little kid happy and proud of who I became now, and to nourish that imagination I had when I was a kid, and to make something that I feel like that kid would be proud of. It's a little different this time around.
Matt Katz: Yes, for sure. Then the album just dropped this week, you think that little kid would be proud of you if he-
Erick the Architect: Oh, yes.
Matt Katz: -can see what was happening right now?
Erick the Architect: Yes, man. It was just on Friday, so I'm still buzzing. I still feel like I want to jump up and down. Yes.
Matt Katz: [laughs] Amazing. Some of the songs on the album were recorded, or at least started, as long as five years ago. Were you thinking about a solo album from back then, or did that just come into fruition more recently as you were writing more songs?
Erick the Architect: I think even then I had the vision. It wasn't as clear as the final product, but I definitely knew that I was going to do something individually because I've had a lot of songs in the tuck waiting for a moment. We had COVID, I had me moving from Brooklyn to Los Angeles. There were a lot of factors that made it more difficult for me to do it as soon as I wanted to originally, but I'm glad I waited because this is exactly how I feel now, and I still have those songs from five years ago that captivate how I felt then.
That's enough time to figure-- that's half a decade. I was 30 years old when I recorded that music. Not to age myself, but it's just-- You think definitely when we get 30 years old, and it's great to have a piece of music, a piece of art really that you can look back and say, "That's what I was feeling five years ago, and I'm not too far away from that." That's what you get. That's the reward you get from continuing to create and never stopping.
Matt Katz: This is the first time you've created a solo album. I'm just wondering if you had a different kind of anxiety building up to this moment than you might have when you're working on a project with a bunch of other people, or on somebody else's album, or with two other guys you have been for so many years?
Erick the Architect: No, man. I was ready for this, I was ready. I've been making music since I was 15 years old. Since I graduated from high school, it's been a upward trajectory of learning to produce, and play piano, and all the things that came with being the hero that I was talking about. Although I still offered my talent to others and to a group, I was ready for the moment to apply that knowledge to myself.
Also, doubling down and being a graphic designer, that's what I went to school for, so all the visuals, and the vision for my project came to be because I actually had my hands on it. It's hard to do that when you work with other people because you have to consider what they want too. This is all about me, so it's actually easier in a way.
Matt Katz: Yes. I read somewhere that you had said that you didn't want people then who worked on the project to give you feedback as it was coming out, you were ready, you wanted to feel that you loved it, and then let the world hear it.
Erick the Architect: Yes. I feel like that's important, especially with social media. We look at numbers and metrics to validate how much we love something. It's innate because we're almost conditioned to feel that way because there's like this ledger of how good you are based on how much people like you on the internet.
I just come from the old school where, like I said, those characters on TV, the Stevie Wonders and Herbie Hancocks and Babyface and Quincy Jones. These are guys that-- there was no internet, so the only way for them to tell how good something was is to put it out and actually talk to people. That makes more sense to me than to be validated by the internet. Most of my close friends didn't hear my album until last week. [laughs]
Matt Katz: I got to ask you about this because we just did a segment on people's favorite neighborhood spots. You're from Brooklyn, you and your friends formed the rap group, Flatbush Zombies in 2010, that's named after your neighborhood. You got a spot in Flatbush that you want to shout out, or is there a place about-- Is there something about you that would tell me you're from Flatbush? When you're out there in LA in the sun, when you're thinking about Flatbush, what do you think about? [chuckles]
Erick the Architect: It's the number one thing, got to be the food. The food here is-- As a Jamaican man, it's really hard to find a really good beef patty, it's really hard to find good oxtail jerk chicken. Flatbush, I would even go to Bake & Things on Flatbush. It's Trinidadian, so they make good roti, but that's a spot. I'm sometimes on a tarmac coming down from LA trying to place an order, so when I get there, it's already hot and ready to go.
Matt Katz: [laughs] Oh, it's amazing.
Erick the Architect: It's just not existing in LA. If there is, maybe somebody hearing this that's on the West Coast could send me the address, but the culture of New York City is so prominent in the food. Flatbush is its own diaspora of Caribbean influence. It's every store. I shout out that specific store, but you could go to any store in Flatbush and find some of that.
Also, just hair products and lotion. I like cocoa butter and shea butter. I got to go to a whole different neighborhood [crosstalk].
Matt Katz: [laughs] Man, I love that as soon as you get back to New York, you have to have that beef patty. Otherwise, you're not home yet.
Erick the Architect: I don't feel right. Yes, I don't feel right.
Matt Katz: On Friday, when the album dropped you had posted on Instagram about growing up in Flatbush, and you talked about listening to different music in different rooms of your house with different relatives. Now, on the track, Mandevillain, you name-drop Biggie and the Foo Fighters in the same line. Can you describe that a little bit, growing up in your home in Flatbush, and the way all these different sonic influences were mixed together?
Erick the Architect: I'm so happy you noticed that line because I said that I was skinny, but Biggie influenced me. It's a play on words, obviously, but hip-hop was introduced to me through-- Initially, my mom has showed me, Rapper's Delight, which is clearly a hip-hop classic, but then I have my oldest brother-- and both my brothers really, they showed me hip-hop music, and I know I wasn't supposed to be hearing some of the stuff that I was hearing from Wu-Tang, to Big, to Nas, to Jay-Z. I was definitely a young guy. They're old enough to be listening to grown people music, and I'm a kid.
I didn't really listen to Barney and Sesame Street. That was too normal for me. I'm listening to real raw stuff, and they knew I was responsible and mature enough to listen to it and not repeat it or whatever. That was my initial introduction to hip-hop music, but my mom was really the foundation for the soul music. The James Browns and Sam Cookes, all the stuff they would say, I say is the golden era of Black music. Then rock, I would say my mom bought me The Beatles 1 CD. It had all the number-one hits from The Beatles [crosstalk].
Matt Katz: I remember that album, yes.
Erick the Architect: Oh my God, it was so good. It had Paperback Writer and Help!. She was like, "These guys are from UK and they're just one of the best of all time." That probably was the inception of me yearning to hear live music played with instruments. Obviously, Dave Grohl, you got-- this is the 90s, so you got Smashing Pumpkins and Nirvana and all these bands were coming out.
It wasn't until I got to college that I really started to appreciate live music, like the Foo Fighters and The Shins and I'm just all over the place with my music taste, but it was really because of the house I was in.
Matt Katz: Very cool. I mentioned Mandevillain, I think I'm saying that right, and this is a new alias for you. It's the name of a track. Your tour is called the Mandevillain Tour. This is named after your father's hometown, is that right?
Erick the Architect: Yes. Mandeville Jamaica.
Matt Katz: Who is Mandevillain?
Erick the Architect: Originally, I was going to Jamaica last summer. I was just ranting about how disappointed I am sometimes in music and just people's complacency of music. Sometimes I go on a tangent just about how different today's times are with how we consume music through the internet. I was told basically that I'm in my villain era and I was like, "Wow, really?" He is like, "Yes. You have profound feelings about how people are just lazy and just undetermined and they lack charisma. They lack drive."
Then I thought about most of my favorite movies and even artists, they have a side to them that's untapped and kind of-- I wouldn't say the word evil, but even in a comic book sense, you have the Joker or you have Jack Nicholson in The Shining. I love those movies. I started to take on this character that helped me fight when I felt insecure. If I ever feel insecure about something, I tapped into this part, the Mandevillain that's like, "Yo, I don't care." Just be yourself. Be unapologetically yourself and ask for forgiveness later.
It's not a way that you cannot feel like be every day or every moment of the day, but it does help when you feel insecure especially how much distractions we have in the world. Just be distracted by watching other people succeed because of social media. This was my way to battle that, is like, "I don't care about that."
Matt Katz: Yes. I love it. We got to listen now. Let's listen to a little bit of Mandevillain.
[MUSIC - Erick the Architect: Mandevillain]
You play your politicians, you be snitchin' like you Paul Revere
Man, I love this rappin' shit, I hope you never disappear (okay)
I was still a kid, I pulled my first rhymes from thin air
Skinny nigga, but believe that Biggie really brought me here (uh-huh)
Inspired by The Foo Fighters, if you quit, then you tired
And you liars could get a whole drum, and a new wire
Blood in my hands
The wrong nigga to get caught in a jam with
I don't understand how we can defeat this famine, too many starvin'
Untap these ruthless artists, dispelled these Reaganomics
Too much champagne make you vomit
I'm at the peak, funny rappers at my feet
Only accurate if you can say you mastered what you teach
Matt Katz: That was Erick the Architect, and that was Mandevillain from his new album out now.
I got to talk to you a little bit about Flatbush Zombies, and we can hear maybe a little bit in that track. You became known with Flatbush Zombies for experimenting, pushing boundaries sonically, the phrase psychedelic hip-hop was thrown around in relation to you guys. How do you think about those sounds and the difference between that work and what you're doing now?
Erick the Architect: I think primarily because I wore the hat as the producer 100% of the time, I was heavily influenced by the things that we enjoy together, which is great movies, great video games, wrestling, cartoons, especially wrestling. The music that we consumed together, I feel like was really representative of the energy that we had growing up as kids. We were always very unique.
What brought us together was just our friendship. It wasn't the music. I didn't even know these guys wanted to make music, but they knew I did from, I was 13 years old making beats and trying to make it happen. They have a real untapped potential that I knew would foster into becoming like what it is. I think that with that, being a teammate, I was able to play a role of, I would say, team captain, but because of that, I think that I would allow myself to put an individual story to the side because I want to tell a universal one.
It'd be like, "Well, what do we all agree on or how do we all feel today?" As opposed to maybe my part of the track is how I feel, but that's 16 bars. That's like a minute of a record. When I'm working by myself, I have this whole plate that's completely empty. It's like, "Well, how do I feel today?" If I could figure out how I feel today, I don't even necessarily have to produce the record. I can actually voice those feelings to another producer. Then they're constructing it. Then now after they've constructed it, then I can actually co-produce it too, or arrange it or compose or add or call in another producer.
One of my songs Breaking Point, I wrote it with Baby Rose and my friend, RÜDE CÁT, and Jacob, Pale Jay. When we wrote the song, everybody that kept hearing the song that I played it for, it was only a select few, was like, "Oh, I want to play on this. Do you need a lap steel?" Like, "Yes, sure, let's do that." Then it's like, "Oh, you want a live string section? Let's get that."
It's like almost auditioning the songs to see how many people's energy can contribute to it to make it do better. I think as a group member, it already has already so many ideas. It sometimes can be too crowded to add all these components, even though I felt I did a fair share of that too.
Matt Katz: There's a lot of other producers also on this new album, but correct me if I'm wrong, I think you're the sole producer on just one track, Jammy Jam. Is that right?
Erick the Architect: Yes.
Matt Katz: What's the story behind that track?
Erick the Architect: Ironically, that song was about an ex-girlfriend. Us guys, we have times where you can think about somebody that you may have loved or cared about, and then when you move on, it's almost like you have this part of you that maybe still wonders if they're all right. Then you got to move that part out your head and make space for a new person. This song exemplified that even if I'm over it, I'm hoping that she isn't. It's petty in that way. I may be over it, but she's still calling to try to get on the guest list for your new show. That's the irony of it.
Matt Katz: Let's hear a little bit of Jammy Jam.
[MUSIC - Erick the Architect: Jammy Jam]
Ayy, your smile is pretty, plus it match your purse (match your purse)
It's hard to pay attention when you're hurt (when you're hurt)
If I ain't chilling with ya then it's worse (then it's worse)
If love is real you know we make it work, okay?
Loving you is easy, ayy
We could take it where you wanna be at (wanna be at)
You wanna drive the Lambo or the FIAT? (Or the FIAT?)
All a nigga want is you to be happy (that's right)
Loving you is easy, ayy
We could take it where you wanna be at (wanna be at)
You wanna drive the Lambo or the FIAT? (Or the FIAT?)
All a nigga want is you to be happy (okay)
I done walked this road with my ex-chick
She don't know her place so I exit (I'm outta here)
Why I'm still getting texts for the guestlist?
Yeah, I'm still getting texts for the guestlist
Got a new nigga, but he know not to test this
Matt Katz: Man, I love that track, man. It's a banger.
We only have a couple of minutes left and I want to talk about one more song, the last song on the album. It's called Liberate, features Lalah Hathaway. Was there a reason why that came last? Was there any genius behind the sequencing here?
Erick the Architect: Shout out to Daud, man. Shout out to my man, Romeo. Shout out to Lalah. Originally, when I had made this song, I wanted it to be the intro of the album, and I was actually playing it for James Blake, and he was like, "My god, man, this song is like--" I didn't say anything, I just played it for him. He just like, "This song just is, it's like the end sequence of a movie." I was like, "End? I thought it was the beginning." He's like, "No, man, this is the curtain close. This is the one when you heard this, you want to play the first song again." I was like, "Oh, okay. Yes."
Going into music sometimes, even if my intent was for it to be the beginning of the album, it still feels like that to me, it still feels like the beginning of something new. It's ironic that it became the word liberate, and I know the real term should be liberation. That's liberate. I know how to speak English, but I just thought the song Liberation is really just, it's almost like saying you freed yourself from whatever had to have been the oppression versus liberate means that's the action of actually doing it. I thought, "Let me take that."
Matt Katz: Yes, that's powerful.
Erick the Architect: Yes, that's more powerful.
Matt Katz: [crosstalk] More powerful, totally.
Erick the Architect: Dude. That's really what it came to be because it felt like the ending of the beginning and the beginning of the end. I'm so proud of the record and I was able to really get-- Lalah's a legend, man. She's incredible. She's a great person. She's a great person in the studio. We had a great time and I can't imagine the song without her contribution. I thank her for coming over and talking about video games and singing with me.
Matt Katz: Amazing. Awesome. I thank you for coming on All Of It. Erick the Architect's new album, I've Never Been Here Before. It's out now. Erick, man, it's been a pleasure talking to you. Congratulations on all the success.
Erick the Architect: Likewise. Thank you. Thanks for having me.
Matt Katz: We're going to go out on Liberate.
[MUSIC - Erick the Architect: Liberate]
Time ticks by, six, seven, eight
Gotta slow it down, gotta change your fate
I see the God in everyone, on a center stage
That's liberate, that's liberate (liberate)
Time ticks by, six, seven, eight (seven, eight)
Gotta slow it down, gotta change your fate (change your fate)
I see the God in everyone, on a center stage (center stage)
That's liberate (liberate)
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