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 Baron
Samedi
Interview
interview 0236 added
19.09.04 words: Nikesh technical:
QED
BARON SAMEDI: Off The record
Baron Samedi is part of the Main Rock stable,
home to Cappo, Ironbridge and Apocraphe. He’s built up his own fanbase with a
dangerously good album called “Spit Happens” and various appearances here and
there. It wasn’t till “Theme Music”, his first release on Main Rock Records,
that he really consolidated the potential of his abstract conscious descriptive
lyrics and psychadelic, rocking and bouncy hip-hop beats. Now working on an
album and showcasing the Main Rock name all about the place (most recently at
Brixton’s MuffJam), Baron Samedi is ready to rip some yarns.
I couldn’t make it to MuffJam, due to some house moving issues. But I made sure
I pestered the Baron over email to drop some pearls… of wisdom for you UKHH lot.
Please introduce yourself and state for the record your favourite
James Bond villain?
 My name is Baron Samedi aka Dirk Slowdance aka Flowstorms aka Dave (for my dear
old mamma). Im 26 going on 27, live in London but Sicilian originally. I rap, I
produce and I make a fucking mean pasta bake. I had a muffin and a hot chocolate
for breakfast today, and I’m currently wearing a pair of blue Adidas trackies,
some beige airforce ones, and a grey t-shirt. I wear a shoe size 8 and a half,
and secretly listen to Natasha Bedingfield when no-one’s looking. Think that
covers everything... oh yeah, my favorite James Bond villain's gotta be Nick
Nack - he's a mean little motherfucker, he'll bite your ankles, and when hes
done causing mayhem, you can pack him away into your suitcase ready for next
time!
Where is Baron Samedi's head at the moment?
On the coffee table, next to the ashtray. It was gettin a bit heavy on my
shoulders earlier so I took it off. It makes smoking a lot harder though, I
gotta say.
"Off the Record" is a call and response between you and Dubya, how long did
that take to produce? What needs to be done to stop his re-election?
That was actually an idea I had kicking around for ages - initially I was gonna
use Tony Blair and George Bush, and have them interacting with each other, but
then I decided I wanted to rhyme on the tune as well, so I dropped Tony and
introduced myself. Once I'd got all the vocal samples of George it was just a
case of transcribing them onto paper, and picking out which parts I wanted to
use - writing my own ish to that was pretty easy once I’d decided what I wanted
to get George to say, and I’d had the beat for a while, so everything just kinda
fit together nicely after that, and although I could have spent five times as
long on that tune and made it five times better, I’m still pretty happy with the
end product. I achieved my aim, which was to drop something political, which I
felt strongly about, but which wouldn’t alienate people - If id made a serious
tune about the Bush administration then it would have gone over a lot of mans
heads, but humour's a great leveller - I guess that’s why guys like Michael
Moore and Mark Thomas get love off peeps, whilst most conspiracy theorists are
just dull nerdy paro freaks. Much as I love reading that shit, I cant help but
think I'd never wanna actually have a conversation with any of the people who
write it.
"...I try not to be influenced by current musical climates, cause I don’t wanna
follow trends, I wanna start my own..."
As for Dubya, I'd love to advocate taking up arms and shooting his entire
family, but in the real world the only way to stop people voting for him is to
give half of America brain transplants. I’m not anti-yank as such, but there’s a
hell of a lot of misguided folk out there who just eat crisps and watch chat
shows all day long - they haven’t got a clue and wouldn’t care even if they did.
Sadly Britain seems to be going that way too...
Do you produce all the music yourself?
I do, but that wasn’t through choice originally. When I started rhyming, there
wasn’t anyone around throwing beats my way, and I’m kind of impatient, so I just
taught myself. Now its reached the stage where I’m comfortable with my own
music, and I wouldn’t consider myself either an emcee who produces, or a
producer on the mic - Its all just Baron to me, and I wouldn’t wanna compromise
my sound just to work with other producers - sure there’s mans I’d love to cop a
beat off, but I couldn’t put out product with only other peoples beats on it -
it just wouldn’t feel right.
"...I did sample a Slayer tune fairly recently....... okay, I’ll get my coat..."
Your music has quite a psychadelic tinge to it, what other influences than
hip-hop do you throw into the pot?
 To be honest the only hip-hop influence I throw in musically is the bottom end,
the drums and the bass. If you’re using samples you ain’t gonna be sampling
hip-hop anyway, plus I listen to a lot of other music in my spare time, a lot of
jazz, reggae, rock, world music, soul, plus weirded out shit like Tom Waits and
Wesley Willis – I guess it all subliminally shapes you as an artist.
How did you hook up with Apoc the Main Rock?
He'd copped one of my first projects, the Mandroids CD which I did with a London
emcee called Shotslinga, and was feelin it hard – I’d seen him around on message
boards and was into his shit too, and we linked up at a jam he was organising -
we've been tight ever since. Before he met me we'd spoken on the phone, and
cause I’ve got a deep voice when I speak (plus I used to rhyme in a deeper voice
than I do now), he was expecting to meet some 6 foot 8 brick shithouse - i think
he was kinda surprised to see this shortarse skinny white bloke waiting for him
at the bus station! When he started the label, I was one of the first people he
approached to be down, so I’m grateful for that, and he knows I’ve always got
his back.
Out of your UKHH peers, who inspires you to make music at the moment?
Well, there’s lots of dope shit starting to happen in the country, but I
wouldn’t say any of it inspires me to make music. Maybe 2/3 years ago I would
have listened to someone’s new shit and been like 'oh my god, I need to step up
my game to compete', but now I know that I'd still be doing what I do regardless
of anyone else, and I’m a lot more comfortable with my own identity - I couldn’t
stop making music if I chopped my arms off. Having said that, as well as people
I work with directly, there’s a lot of crews and emcees I’m really feelin at the
moment, like Paragon, Cappo, Ironbridge, Logan, Spitfire Rec, Frontline,
Antiheroes, Ammo, Troy Scalpels, the Same Brain Collective, Essa, Universal
Soldiers, TF, Foreign Beggars.... shit, loads more. There’s definitely plenty of
substandard shit making its way onto the radar too though, and that’s the
problem. Established figures who can’t cut it anymore still releasing records
(naming no names), and lots of dry, mid-nineties boom-bap with no substance or
passion still makes up a lot of the product in stores, and most of it bores me
to tears.
"...are you really gonna tell me Chino XL is a better rapper than Jay Z?? Fuck
off!..."
Who do you look up to as the MC's MC?
Hard question, cause most of my favourite emcees are my favourites because
they’ve got charisma and have managed to cross over that line of just being an
emcee's emcee - rappers like Redman or Masta Ace, to be honest I couldn’t care
less how multisyllabic or complex they get on their ish, I just love listenin to
them. I find it a little bit nerdy to just sit there analysing and comparing
lyrics to see who’s got the most skills - I love hearing some complex new shit
thats off the metre, but are you really gonna tell me Chino XL is a better
rapper than Jay Z?? Fuck off!
 What got you into hip-hop originally?
I think the first hip-hop record I was feeling was 3 Ft High and Rising, but
other than that shit like P.E. and a lot of the early gangsta stuff from the
west coast, cause I was into rock and metal as a youth, and hearing those hard
hard beats I felt the same kind of energy as I did from rock music. Slowly I
stopped listening to rock at all, and these days the only heavy rock id still
listen to is Black Sabbath and Faith No More - going back to the other shit I
listened to when I was 12/13, its embarrassing how bad it all really was. Having
said that, I did sample a Slayer tune fairly recently....... okay, I’ll get my
coat.
Describe your sound and what draws you to beats?
My sound? That kind of depends on my mood - some weeks I’ll be hyper and just
write party tracks, sometimes I’ll smoke too much, get moody and do some
depressing shit, so its hard to define what my 'sound' is, but put it this way,
although I’m not a straight up battle rapper or party emcee, you’re not gonna
get any Anticon type stuff from me. My only criteria is that I keep shit varied
- I can have a laugh, feel sad, happy, angry or friendly as a human being, so
why not reflect that in my music? Some people base their image so much on one
aspect of their personality it can get dry after a while. I guess Jehst is the
classic example - great lyricist, but people have started stereotyping him as a
hippy rapper who only ever chats about mysticism, smoking weed and watching
Countdown. Beats-wise, doing my own production is definitely an advantage, cos I
can tailor the beats to suit my mood - every tune you'll hear from me'll be a
snapshot of where my mind was at the time I wrote it.
What inspires you lyrically?
When I was younger it was definitely all the new stuff hitting the streets, and
all the heavy emcees bubbling under the radar who I was privileged enough to
hear, but these days, the finished article is more important to me than just the
words alone – there’s plenty of dope brers who can spit heat for days, but not
so many that can do it and make good music too, i.e. more than just 2 verses of
battle-spits with a shouty hook in between. I suppose these days I’m mostly
influenced by random bits of information I pluck out of the ether, and I just
let my mind fill in the gaps - I love coming up with odd imagery or crazy
stories, but those ideas may have just come from one word or phrase I read in a
magazine - I try not to be influenced by current musical climates, cause I don’t
wanna follow trends, I wanna start my own.
"...I’m mostly influenced by random bits of information I pluck out of the ether..."
What's next for you?
Well, I’ve got my fingers in a lot of pies right now, which isn’t comfortable,
cause the filling's very hot and its blistering me. Other than that, I’m working
on my new album, which is gonna be called Ripping Yarns and which (touch wood)
will drop this year or early next on Main Rock. I don’t wanna give too much away
about it at the moment, but for people who have heard me before on my 12" or
Spit Happens (my first CD only album), expect the unexpected, cause I didn't
wanna make Spit Happens Part 2, or try and make more tunes like Off The Record.
Its gonna be dope though of course! I’m also putting the finishing touches to my
crews E.P. – that’s me and my boy Lixx, together we go by the name Undercurrent,
and the EP’s called Pirate Radio - its six tracks deep, and all the tunes are
loosely themed around the concept of water. Trust its heavy, and the man like
Lixx is real nice with his for folks who ain’t heard him. That'll be out soon,
and hopefully big tings, but we'll see!! After that, fuck knows, but I'd like to
do something really off the wall and dark, possibly under a different name. That
all depends on how well the album does though, so (blistered)
fingers crossed...
 Any final shout outs/shameless plugs?
Of course!!! Firstly big up man like Apoc the Main Rock, putting in the grind to
make this all possible - so far we've had his EP, my single, CAPPO's EP and the
new Ironbridge EP, so the futures looking bright for Main Rock Records. Major
shouts to my man Lixx, always coming correct with his, and to my girl G for all
the support, patience and hot meals. Also big up Troy, Redmaster, Conflix, Rap
6, Jiff, Slinga, Mista Serve, Angel, Ghost, 563 and Disorda for supporting the
single, Dise, Lady Paradox, CAPPO and all Main Rock familia, Same Brain,
Spitfire, Beat Butcha... I’m gonna stop now before I forget too many people and
offend them - put it this way, if you deserve a shout, you know who you are. Go
pick up my first album, Spit Happens, and pick up my single Theme Music,
available from all good hip hop outlets and direct through
www.mainrockrecords.com.
Watch out for Ripping Yarns and the Undercurrent e.p. Pirate Radio, both coming
soon, and hit up
admin@mainrockrecords.com for more info and bookings. Big yourself up Nikesh
for the interview and remember: dont do druuuuugs, druuugs are baaad, m'okay???
I suppose that makes me a hypocrite, but fuckit... PEACE!!!
“Ripping Yarns” is coming and Main Rock is building up a bank of artists who
will hopefully be bursting on to the scene imminently. In the meantime, get on
suspect packages and order Baron’s single now. It’s a beautiful thing.
Peace and lovely,
-
Nikesh Shukla
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