Little Brother’s reunion was an unexpected surprise for Hip Hop heads, but many fans wondered why 9th Wonder wasn’t involved in their new album May The Lord Watch. During an appearance on The Premium Pete Show, Phonte and Rapper Big Pooh finally cleared the air on their former member’s absence.
Pooh started off addressing the topic by stating, “There’s no issue.” But when 9th’s public support of the album was noted, Phonte made it clear the trio wasn’t on the same page by any means.
“That was bullshit,” he said. “That was the get-in-front-of-it story.”
Phonte then proceeded to explain how 9th went from initially being part of their reunion to entirely out of it. Tigallo started by detailing what happened after the trio unexpectedly reunited at the 2018 Art Of Cool Festival.
“The three of sat down — what do you want to do? How do you feel about it? You wanna do a record? Cool,” he recalled. “9th says, ‘Yo, cool. I’m with it. I wanna be a part of everything. I wanna be part of this time. If we’re gonna do it, I wanna be a part of everything, every show. I wanna be a part of it all.’ OK, cool. We’re with it. Let’s do it.
“So, we start recording. Just to make a very long story short: we start recording and we get into it, and the beats he was sending just really weren’t speaking to us. And I’ll never go on record and say the beats were bad. It’s art. It’s subjective … So, I go to him and I have a conversation. And I say, ‘Look, man, I want us to bring other producers in on this project. He’s like, ‘Nah, I don’t wanna do that.’ And I’m just like, ‘OK.’ [9th says] ‘Cause if the album is called Homecoming, what am I’m coming home to?’ In my mind, I’m like nigga, you coming home to the home that we maintained while you was AWOL. But, I just let it sit.”
Next, Phonte broke down how 9th’s expectations conflicted with their group dynamic.
“So, I call him back and I say, ‘Listen, man, I just wanna have a conversation about this,'” he recalled. “I say you not wanting other producers on this album pisses me off and let me explain to you why. I said in the best analogy I can give, it’s like say your dad leaves the family … Now, it’s 15 years later and your pops wants to come back to the family and that’s fantastic. The family is great about it. They’re like, ‘Word up, welcome back. As long as you understand you’re coming back to a different family.’
“The family you left is not the same family you’re coming back to … You coming back tryna tell the stepdaddy how many seats he can have at graduation, nigga get the fuck outta here … You can come back and participate, and you can come back and we can figure out what this new framework looks like together but fuck outta here with this, ‘Alright kids, be home by midnight’ shit.”
The breaking point for Phonte and Pooh came when 9th tried to be less involved in their tour plans. For Little Brother, it was a sign things hadn’t changed since they originally became a duo.
“He didn’t want other producers on the album,” Phonte noted. “Then it became a thing of ‘Well when we tour, what if I just do the festival dates and [DJ] Flash do the regular dates?’ I was just like, ‘Dude, no.’ If we’re gonna do this, either you’re all the way in or all the way out. And if there’s any reason why you can’t do that or won’t, let’s talk about it. But this is the exact same problem we ran into 10 years ago when we became a duo.
“And for me, it just became a very simple thing of — look, for something to happen twice the exact same way, one time is a glitch. Two times is a feature. I see you. I see your authentic self. I see what you’re about. I see who you’re about, and I can accept that. And in my acceptance of that, I feel comfort in walking away from you completely and leaving that alone ’cause I just don’t need that narcissistic energy in my life.”
According to Pooh, they made it a clean break. Instead of trying to hold onto some of the tracks they’d done with 9th, they opted to begin anew on May The Lord Watch.
“And once we decided to start over, we told him, ‘You can take your beats back,'” Pooh said. “We’re gonna actually start over.”
Phonte added, “We had gotten like three songs in. We had did like two or three records with him and once that happened, once we saw where he was with it, we was just like nah. We’re not doing this again. You take your beats, do whatchu do, but we ain’t doing this no more.”
Tay also broke down the differences between his past issues with Pooh and their disagreement with 9th.
“With me and Pooh, when we had problems, it was based on misunderstandings and miscommunication,” he declared. “With us and 9th, the decision to just totally part ways with that, it was the exact opposite. It was based on a complete and total clear communication.”
Phonte said they never intended to reveal all these details but when DJ Premier expressed disappointment about 9th’s lack of involvement, he felt like he needed to tell the true story.
“We made every effort to do this shit right, to do this together, the three of us,” he noted. “We made every effort to be amenable and kind and open. We made every effort to do it with him. But once we saw that it wasn’t gonna be able to be done that way — and I stress this 100 percent — I say this loud and clear: there is no beef, there’s just clarity.”
To close out the discussion on 9th, Pooh clarified the Jamla Records founder’s role in the group.
“Tay and I, we never really talked about how Little Brother was able to function,” he said. “You just saw Little Brother and you assumed or presumed whatever it is you thought how it happened. But the truth of the matter is Little Brother has, for all intents and purposes, been Tay and I since during The Minstrel Show — not after, during. And the real producer of Little Brother post-The Listening has been Tay … We’ve been A&R’ing them projects … People had this idea that [9th] was the executive producer. That was us, bro.”
Listen to everything Little Brother had to say about 9th starting at the hour and seven-minute mark of their Premium Pete Show appearance.
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they were mad I stopped using the same snare on every beat
No wonder Phonte and Big Pooh kicked me out of the group…I guess I really am a shitty producer!
Phonte always makes me laugh when he describes some shit, lol. You can’t be coming back to the family telling the stepdaddy how many seats and shit at graduation, lol.
THe album was missing 9th wonder they had it right if they was gonna do it do it for real…their individual projects were reallly dope but together they needed 9th it’s like hey man i like cereal (phone) separately sometimes and I like to drink milk (big poop) 9th was the two put together when it comes to “Little Brother”
Phone and Big Poop.
Nicolay can be a better replacement then 9th Wonder
Please…they better off without 9th. That dude bit me, Dilla, and RZA’s whole Steez and then microwave popcorned the sh*t out of it.
Have you heard about influence? I’d say 9th was influenced by Pete Rock, Preemo and Dilla, which is true for many beatmakers who started making beats in the 2000’s.
Even Kanye was influenced by these producer giants, or Illmind, etc, etc. 9th is maybe the closest thing to them, but at the same time he is unique. He developed his own style. You definitely can say what beat is produced by him.
Listen here young blood, this PR talking to you right now. I have every right to point out that he bit all our sh%t. Secondly, who asked you to give a Ted Talk about influence? Incel, be gone. Soul brotha signing off.
I disagree. Why make it a Homecoming, if other producers are involved? And he’s just a producer, who cares about him being around on tour?
Cause they’re a GROUP. Would a GangStarr show be a GangStarr show if it was just Guru and another DJ?
Would a Gangstarr album be a Gangstarr album if it was Guru on the mic and Pete Rock on the boards.
Yes but Primo is doing all of the beats
The album’s dope, it’s less boring an repetitive then when 9th did it.
It wasn’t rapsody’s Eve though. Lol
You’re right- Rapsody’s joint is dope, but LB’s album is better
I hope 9th Wonder doesn’t feed into this negativity. Y’all can rap on all the songs, but 9th Wonder (who did all the beats on your best album) can’t produce the entire album.
I hope 9th Wonder doesn’t feed into this negativity. Y’all can rap on all the songs, but 9th Wonder (who did all the beats on your best album) can’t produce the entire album.
Phonte is acting like a diva. He still salty about 9th leaving the group to grow his career. This move is all about payback. Nothing else.
You sound like a gossiping female. If they ain’t want him apart of it, they wouldn’t have reached out in the first place. Everything don’t have to be about drama, beef, or “payback”. A grown man can have an issue with you and still be cool
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Little Brother did just fine without 9th on this project, it was amazing. 9th is a genius, but I’ll go ahead and take Tay’s words for it. I don’t know them personally, I’ll just go with the finished product and how amazing it sounds, knowing that 9th wasn’t involved at all. The father analogy was great.
I’m with Phonte on this one, even though it’s my first time hearing of him. Y’all remember when Jay had 9th make a beat as per his instructions just to have the “Prod. by 9th Wonder” tag on his Black Album? What a ho move.
Is it possible 9th’s beats were not up to par for what they were trying to accomplish? It’s possible. Maybe they felt 9th’s beats were lacking something, flat out not good or felt like throwaway beats. 9th could’ve welcomed the competition and stepped his game up, but no. I don’t think Phonte and Pooh are lying or jealous, they’ve gone on to do things without him. 9th started acting flaky and they seen that movie before so they decided to bail before the movie started. There’s nothing wrong with learning from past issues and saying “I’M GOOD” and moving on.
That’s not what they’re saying. They wanted some 9th production, they just wanted other influences as well because they grew and got more mature and discovered other influences in addition to 9th. That’s what they’re saying.
9th is not a good person. Local rappers from North Carolina talked about him 7 years ago on Youtube. Raooers like Jozeemo and Kaze. It got so bad dudes wanted to put hands on him.
Stfu
I think 9th Wonder has a point that if they didn’t want him to produce the whole album like he did for The Listening and The Minstrel Show….what’s the point of him being there and joining the group!? And 9th produced 5 or 6 songs off Rapsody’s new album Eve….and all the songs he produced are fire! Honestly, this is the weakest Little Brother album production wise! Separate But Equal, The Minstrel Show, and The Getback are ALL way better than this new album!
I have to disagree with you there. I think Phonte makes an excellent point. If the two members want you to be reunited back in the group (which is what they wanted), understand that they’re going to want other influences as well. I also see where 9th is coming from as well because with him handling production 100% Little Brother got major buzz. I think Phonte and Pooh recognize that which is why they wanted to talk to 9th about everything and how do we fix this. Instead 9th walks away. Personally, I see both sides but more on the side of Phonte and Pooh. It’s not 2005 anymore you know. I love 9th Wonder though. He makes heat. I’m really digging this new Little Brother album as well to.
That’s ridiculously not true. Phonte has had success with not only his solo album but with Foreign Exchange as well. What Phonte is saying make sense and I can see 9th side as well. But Phonte nor Pooh as flopped. That didn’t happen.
9th Wonder wasn’t driving no Uber to make ends meet. He’s good off his Destiny’s Child royalties alone.
Phonte sounds kinda resentful of 9th if we’re being honest, and I don’t really understand why. If y’all sat around a table at the festival and all agreed that this was going to happen with 100% involvement from 9th, why are you so surprised when the guy reacts negatively to you changing the plan on him all of a sudden? Of course 9th was going to say he can’t fully commit to this if he’s not playing the full role on the production side, cause that was not the assumption you gave him in the first place! It’s a shame cause it just sounds like Phonte is still salty about him leaving the group a decade ago, and let that get in the way of the music. Album was still decent, but this was a huge missed opportunity.
What Phonte and Pooh should have kept in mind is that, Little Brother has been recognized with 9th Production touch so they would have let 9th Handle all the Production maybe just tell him to incorporate their new ideas.
How the fuck is this gonna be Little Brother if 9th doesn’t handle (all) the production??? All the great producer/emcee groups in history work that way. I can see how Phonte’s suggestion could be legit offensive to 9th.
Cause the group has been a duo longer than its been a trio. Even though he produced almost all of The Minstrel Show, apparently he wasn’t really around even during the recording sessions of it, as well as missing shows and group meetings. He had other stuff going on of course, but if he couldn’t be there for group commitments, it only makes sense to move forward as a duo as to not slow down the group. I love 9th and was at first disappointed he didnt have any beats on the new album, but I’ll admit, his recent stuff is not as good as his older beats, and I can see why Te and Pooh just werent feeling some of his beats.
Personally I like the records without Wonder.
The new album is great without 9th and I think its would be better with him because 9th has The Soul Council and probably they would help him with new/different Sounds as was phonte and pooh’s wishes.
Thats the thing, according to Phonte, 9th didnt even want the Soul Council involved, he wanted to do all beats by himself.. At least thats what 9th mentioned in the Ambrosia For Heads interview.
I like that 9th is not on MTLW. I’m a big fan of his, but it would’nt have been right if it was forced. The project is dope!