QN5 Music

So the CunninLynguists were at Yale today!

I’m a student here, so I thought I’d write up a bit of a recap for those curious. Basically, another student here emailed Kno and asked if he’d come by to talk to some students. Kno agreed, so he, Deacon and Natti all came by today to chat with like 15 of us. We set up in the common room of one of Yale’s residential colleges (Trumbull, for anyone curious), relaxed in cushy chairs, played some songs, talked a bit, and ate some tasty brownies.

The session focused mostly on Kno and his production. He talked a lot about his early experiences with drum pads progressing to eventually dropping out of college (after reading the URB review of Southernunderground in class). We played a few specific songs and Kno talked specifically about the production techniques that went into them. He also spoke about the equipment he uses, which is now primarily computer software.

Some cool specific things Kno said:
—he spoke about how artists begin to make bad music when they ‘try’ to make their music something specific, ie. “I’m gonna make a rock song with rap in it!” when instead they should just let their creative side go and make the music they want to make. When he listens to music, he doesn’t wanna hear someone ‘trying’.
—He also talked about sampling, and how although he knows that it is technically “stealing”, he only samples when he feels what he’s doing with the sample is something with artistic merit—then, if he doesn’t release the song with the sample, he’s in a way preventing a new work of valuable art from existing. Sounds good to me.

NEW MUSIC UPDATES:

Chico & The Man (!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!)
When I asked about this project, Kno’s initial response was “Ask Tone!” Apparently the ball is completely in his court at this point. The project is intensely conceptual, very much like APOS; Kno said that Tone is literally doing research in the library on the “topic” (he couldn’t specify) and that every verse he’s writing is layered with triple meanings. Kno said he can’t even understand everything that is going on when he listens to Tone’s verses (but in a good way). Three or four songs are completely written, and Tone is slaving away as we speak. Kno said that the way he sees it, if the album isn’t out this summer, it’s never coming out, so he’s pushing Tone as much as he can to have it out by then.
So…CATM SUMMER ‘09!!

Strange Journey (I think that’s the title?)
The new CunninLynguists project. Kno described it as a “mixtape” of all original music. When I asked if it was Sloppy Seconds 3, he said kind of but not quite. They’ve already filmed a video for the “Brownie Song” (I don’t think that’s the official title) which we should be seeing soon. 9th Wonder’s apparently supposed to do some remixes for it, and I think he said J-Zone produces a song on it as well. It sounds like the ‘Lynguists may be going back to their funny side, at least for this project. Kno actually spoke about people being frustrated with the ‘Lynguists for being so “serious” as of late, saying that they’re gonna make lots of albums, and essentially the more serious style just fit with those recent albums.

After the initial talk we moved downstairs to jam for a bit in the music room. Kno played the drums while I played the keyboard, another student played synth, Deacon played another keyboard, and one of the other students free-styled. Yes, I jammed with the CunninLynguists!

All in all, it was an awesome hour or so. Kno, Deacon, and Natti were unbelievably chill and friendly. Deacon was filming throughout the whole thing, so we should see a video-blog post of it all in the near future.

Sounds like a sweet time! I’m definitely counting on CATM to be released so that shit better be on the shelves by Summer…Strange Sounds sounds awesome…any word on if sos would have a few verses on it? I imagine he would…

wow, i’m jealous

Awesome post man, that’s everything QN5 fans like to hear

That’s amazing, I would have wanted to jam with them, haha.

wow.

not everyone’s so real, u know? it sounds inspiring.

and chico… quadruple wow.

damn fam, thanks for putting this info up. i wish i had thought of setting something like this up last year while i was still at school, im sure my uni would have been willing to cough some money out of their coffers for a discussion! DAMN! im jealous, and pissed at myself for not thinking of this. so plenty of ppl at yale are down with cl? that refreshing… i went to colgate uni in upstate ny and i sometimes couldnt get anyone to drive 1 hour with me to cornell to see cl perform! when i was a soph they had a qa session with cl, tone, and pack before the show but i missed out on the first half. i cant wait to the see video deacon recorded… in the meantime, you think you could elaborate on a few things that you mentioned in the first post?

-could you go a little more in depth about what kno said regarding when using a sample has artistic merit?

-im not surprised to read that he sticks primarily with software these days. imo, some nice midi controllers (mpd32 + something with weighted keys) and fruity loops allows you to accomplish everything you need if youre making sample based music. i remember reading a thread a few years back where he said he used a 2000xl. what has he changed since then?

finally, for what songs did yall discuss prod techniques? could you give a little more info on this?

thanks so much. peace

Sounds awesome!