Kanye the Producer

Kanye West is many things. Rapper, diva, designer. Icon, author, activist. Award show crasher, paparazzi thrasher, George Bush basher. But, above all, Kanye West is a producer. Through his dynamic and innovative beats, Kanye has shown again and again that hip hop is always capable of evolving in new directions. So, in honor of tomorrow’s release of his latest album, 808s and Heartbreak, this post will examine this video clip of Kanye making a beat in his studio.

Kanye begins making the beat by playing the song from which he will ultimately pull samples. But, as this video makes abundantly clear, Kanye doesn’t just listen. He sings along. He dances. He enjoys the song on its own terms, not simply as vessel for the sample he is looking for.

In this case, the song is Shirley Murdock’s “Go On Without You.” Murdock is a real crooner – she sings her heart out right from the beginning and never tones it down. Though certainly a remarkable feat of endurance, Murdock’s song does not scream out to be sampled by a famous hip hop producer. It is slow, sad, and written in a 6:8 time signature, rather than hip hop’s essentially universal 4:4.

Nevertheless, Kanye senses something about “Go On Without You.” Murdock has great lyrical moments in the song, Kanye feels, and it’s his job to pull those moments together into a brand new beat. Indeed, one of Kanye’s unique contributions to hip hop has been his uncanny ability to incorporate the human voice into the fabric of his songs (see: Heart of the City, Stronger, and basically every song on Late Registration).

Kanye slices Murdock’s song into many little pieces. (Interestingly, at the 0:50 mark, Kanye notes that he deliberately uses equipment that makes this slicing process more efficient). Though we only catch a brief glimpse of it, Kanye begins experimenting with various ways of piecing together his samples. At the 1:04 mark, Kanye struggles to match a metronome to the tempo of Murdock’s original song, and we can start to see how difficult, time-consuming, and frustrating hip hop production can be. There is serious music being made here, and that requires serious work. Thankfully, Kanye assures us at 1:30 that he’ll come through: “No matter how much work, no matter ... how many hit records … this motha’ fucka’s from the Chi, [and] we gonna figure something out.”

Then, at 2:13 we suddenly hear the product of Kanye’s efforts. From Murdock’s sad, doleful ballade, Kanye has created an upbeat, eminently danceable party song. The emotional devastation of Murdock’s vocals has been rechanneled into a soulful, suave sexiness. The beat is absolutely seductive. As Kanye dances along to his new creation – and, perhaps, you do, too – it’s easy to forget that all Kanye did was chop up a song from the 80s and give it a drum beat. The final product feels like so much more – and that, in a sense, is the magic of hip hop production.