With yesterday marking the rapper’s 46th birthday, today Complex News released a new Big Daddy Kane interview filmed from Philadelphia’s Made In America festival earlier this month. Speaking about the experience of performing at the festival as well fronting a live band, the Juice Crew emcee also spoke briefly about his upcoming album.
When asked about a younger Hip Hop artist he’s taken an interest in, Kane pointed to Rick Ross before asking if the MMG founder qualifies.
“Of the new batch would probably be Rick Ross,” he said. “I don’t know, is he young? I would probably give it to Rick Ross.”
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Detailing his experience at the festival, he said, “Well this is wonderful, to get on stage and do your thing for a big massive audience.”
“The way this is set up where you get the chance to not only share the stage with other Hip Hop artists but you’re sharing the stage with artists from different genres of music, this is wonderful man,” he added. “I feel like I’m in my own little Woodstock in this new millennium, you dig?”
Asked about the key to successfully utilizing a live band in a Hip Hop show, Big Daddy Kane explained trying to satisfy fans who want to hear renditions close to the original.
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“Well, that’s the key, successfully performing with the band. A Hip Hop fan, there is a [tendency] to really just wanna hear the track. So with a live band, if you don’t have the right drummer and the right instruments it can be real ugly. We make sure that we go back and get that old Ludwig Black Oyster or Starlight drum set that they used from the songs that we used to sample back in the days…Well, before me, I’m not gonna say no names, I’ve seen about three different artists try to use bands on stage and it just didn’t look right. Once I finally linked up with a great band, I figured out a way to really make that whole thing work the right way. Where the sound is full and it’s accurate and you feel like it’s the track.”
Kane also spoke about his next album and how it will be different from 2013’s Las Supper album .
“The last project that my band did, Las Supper, where we went with basically vintage 60’s type of music with all live instrumentation. We’re not gonna keep it vintage, we’re gonna do some modern stuff as well. We’ll still have some vintage cuts, but we’re gonna do some modern stuff as well.”
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Addressing his view of the current state of Hip Hop, B.D.K. was also asked if he thinks the genre is stronger or more watered down from previous years.
“Both,” he said. “It’s definitely stronger than ever but it’s very much watered down. But it is stronger than ever. I think, if I’m correct, I believe Hip Hop is probably the strongest genre of music and the most lucrative at this time.”
Recalling his ambitions to become an emcee, Kane was also asked if he was motivated to be “the best” early on.
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“That’s all I wanted to be,” he said. “This is nothing that I got into to become rich and famous. Anything else that came along with it was cool but I got into this to be an emcee.”
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