Features

ThaFormula.com - Let's start off with the "Quality Control" LP. How did everything turn out with that being your first full major label album?

DJ Numark - It was good. It was a lot of excitement and hype going into that record and it paid off. We didn't blow up on a major scale status but we just put the best record together that we could at the time and we were happy with the results. It was a fun release.

ThaFormula.com - Did the label push the record like you would have hoped or did you guys do most of the work for that album?

DJ Numark - As an artist you always want the label to work a little harder. I'd be frontin' if I said anything different. There is always something missed, everybody is human though. There is always some DJ that didn't get it or the higher ups don't wrap their heads around a project as much as you would want them to 'cause when they do it that means there is budget money put behind it, it means there's bigger video budgets and you know its just a big snowball effect. With 6 guys in the group it's kind of hard not to make criticisms about different parts of the campaign. There is always gonna be something wrong but if there wasn't then there would be something wrong anyway (laughs). If we didn't complain then we would be slippin'.

ThaFormula.com - When you guys signed this label deal did the contracts and all that turn out like it should have 'cause I know its got to be tough when there are 6 of you in the group and its got to be split 6 ways?

DJ Numark - Oh definitely but that was all stuff that we struggled with before hand. I've got to say we're a really lucky group 'cause we knew what we wanted going into this deal and we never had like contract problems if that's the question. We really sat with our stuff for a long time and we knew what we wanted out of a major label. It just so happens now that major labels aren't doing so good. It is what it is and all you could do is just keep your head down and keep working. The most powerful thing that we negotiated for was creative control so they could never take that away from us.

ThaFormula.com - That is without question the most important thing. Now you guys were one of the last groups to get on a major without having to do the same thing that everyone else was doing, nowadays it seems like in order to get down with a major you have to give up all creative control and do what's on the radio and TV. Do you feel like this about it?

DJ Numark - I don't know. It might have been a timing thing that we got in at the right time just because…and I can only speak about us 'cause I really don't know everybody else's situation, but when we got in it was because uh, we got stepped to by pretty much all the major labels. People were stepping to us 'cause they realized the capitol we were generating on the road and they wanted in on that action. Business people always see when someone's cutting them out of a piece of their neighborhood. It's just like selling drugs or anything else, like "oh these guys are making good money without a label, we should step to them." So we were cutting into Hip-Hop's profit margin at that point. We were starting to make a dent so we got stepped to at that point. So in that respect it was good timing because we had a lot of good buzz on us. But I always think that it's good and bad no matter what time it is. It's hard to get a job now and it was hard to get a job like 5 years ago, so I'm not sure if like the timing of the industry itself was any better or any worse at that time. I think it's always been tough to get a label deal. Shit, we have had A&R's say hey "how come you didn't put that song on the demo you gave me?" and it was on their demo! You kind of got to really knock on cats doors and people have to hear things 4 or 5 times to start liking it anyway so a lot of this has nothing to do with music. It has to do with buzz going into whatever campaign you go into.

ThaFormula.com - Do you still think that a group can build a buzz in 2004 in the underground as saturated as it is and get on a major?

DJ Numark - Yeah I do because it goes back to just regular street smarts. If you cut into that Hip-Hop profit margin, if it be your shows or your selling shit out that back of your van or truck, they are gonna realize that "hey, that should be some of our money man, why are these young independent cats getting our money?" and that's how the record label mentality is. They would be stupid not to do that. They are street savvy to a certain point but once they got you in their clutches (Laughs) then they got a lot of other shit that they are looking at than just you. They are always looking for the next thing 'cause their whole thing is quantity. They're trying to get as much catalog as possible that they think will generate them income so that can be a good or bad thing.

ThaFormula.com - Now the first album had built you guys a nice buzz and you guys with the sophomore album "Power in Numbers" It seemed like the push on that one weren't very strong, the singles seemed to drop very late?

DJ Numark - Yeah they were really late. The only reason why we put singles out was 'cause we rallied together and we got a deal with Up Above Records to put out our 12". What happened with "Power in Numbers" was that the first week sales was almost 3 times larger then the first week sales of "Quality Control" so out the gate we came out slammin'. We slammed "Quality Control" and we were killin' it. So it came out strong, they put out the single and then they didn't wanna work any other singles 'cause apparently I guess we spent too much money on the first single but no one bothered to tell us that we spent too much money (Laughs). Instead of saying "hey ration you're money on the first video." It was a miscommunication so I don't know who to blame for that. I don't know if it's their problem or our problem. It's not a contractual thing. It's a touch and feel thing like "oh we think we should spend this much on "What's Golden" and then we had 3 other singles I thought easily after that. Like "Power in Numbers" to date is my favorite album. Some people might say the label didn't push it hard enough. It would have been way better than "Quality" 'cause the first week was way stronger or you can say "oh it just wasn't as good of an album" or "yeah everybody liked the first single but they didn't wanna hear anything else." There is so many ways you can look at it so it's hard to say really what happened. What I would say is that if we would have had another single that dropped right when we wanted it to drop, then we would have easily been close to platinum or platinum by now.

ThaFormula.com - Yeah because I always wondered why the delay in the singles and why they dropped on Up Above?

DJ Numark - Yeah, I mean you have heard "What's Golden" on Cribs, VH-1 and Behind the Music with this artist and that artist or the Making of the Band with Puffy. I mean I get really nice checks from BMI 'cause "What's Golden" is played all the time and we got radio play on a lot of good stations. Not as much as we wanted but we opened the door for a lot of cats. Like they play Outkast on KROQ (Los Angeles Alternative Rock station) now. They never used to do that, they never used to play any black artists on KROQ so a lot of doors were opened with "What's Golden" and "Power in Numbers" so I'm really happy to date with what we have done. It feels like we are 3 for 3.

ThaFormula.com - Did "Power" do a lot better then "Quality?"

DJ Numark - It actually did slightly less but its creepin' up on it right now so it will probably break about the same.

ThaFormula.com - That's crazy 'cause you had a lot more singles on that album…

DJ Numark - I feel like that too but our whole shit is like all we have is ourselves. The next album that we're working on now we're about 3 songs deep into it but were constructing our whole marketing plan ourselves and in a way going back to how we started it kind of like everybody go out and market themselves. We're gonna do a lot more marketing ourselves and if Interscope wants to contribute to that, cool, but we're gonna really, really work this next record the way we wanna work it.

ThaFormula.com - How important is radio in this?

DJ Numark - Radio is what this whole shit boils down to. You can have your video played all the time it doesn't mean shit. Fuck the video, the video doesn't mean a damn thing. They could play your video all the time, it's the radio spins that give you your success, I'm convinced. Because we have had success at video, MTV played "What's Golden." Man we got a gang of love on our videos but that didn't equate to platinum sales. It equated to "oh these guys are for real," and we had good shows, but you know we think we deserve to get played on radio. I mean we grew up in the days of listening to KDAY (classic Los Angeles Hip-Hop radio station) and there is nothing wrong with radio spins to us. We grew up listening to Public Enemy and De La and NWA and all watched all those cats blow up on radio and we wanna blow up on radio as well, 'cause that's what we grew up listening to.

ThaFormula.com - As far as the group though, is everything cool?

DJ Numark - Oh yeah, we're straight 'cause like I said we've been through so much shit that its like we're ready to tackle whatever comes in front of us, so as long as we make good music we're happy, and as long as there is some (laughs) financial reward at the end of the rainbow we can keep doing it. But if things go downhill…then we can't make music. Just from a financial standpoint we need the people to embrace our music. We need people to stand up and say "yeah we wanna buy that J5 record or request on radio." I mean I would really be feeling bad right now if I put together "Power In Numbers" with like kind of a half ass artistic approach but the group really poured their heart and soul into that album. That was the one for us. That was like the one that everybody broke their back on so there is something to be said for, yeah it didn't get the push that we thought it would get, but damn we put some shit down. At the end of the day I feel good for some reason. I'm not as paid as I should be and I didn't get the spins that I should have got, but hey at the end of the day that was a good album and its fun to perform those songs.

ThaFormula.com - How do you see the DJ scene looking now in 2004 compared to say even just a couple if years ago?

DJ Numark - It's kind of tough, uh things are changing that's for sure. There was a big hype about the DJ a few years back and I started getting a little concerned 'cause people kind of started making it trendy. It sort of turned more into a trendy thing when hey; the DJ has been here since day one. Cut (Chemist) and I always talked about that back then like "yo this has got to slow down a little bit, people better relax." I dot think it's as prominent as it used to be but if you do something original people gravitate towards it, that's the bottom line. I've done a few shows where I just change the whole outlook of how I look at DJ'ing and it's really paid off. Not just dealing with turntables, like bringing my drum machine and bringing other sources of musical input into the show and you could feel the audience.

ThaFormula.com - What are your thoughts on mix tapes that come out now with nothing but screaming over every track?

DJ Numark - Personally and this is just me, I don't wanna hear a DJ talk a whole lot when I get a mix tape. If I wanna hear a DJ talk I will just turn on Power 106, but if I'm buying a mix CD from Aaron's (Records) Amoeba (Records), or Fat Beats, I wanna hear either some shit that I haven't heard in along time or I couldn't from a while ago, or some brand new stuff and I just want to hear the record. I wanna hear the artistic value of the song but I could care less what the DJ has to say about it 'cause that's why he's a DJ. Vocally he doesn't mean shit to me, I wanna hear what he can put down on the turntables and that's it. It's just a preference though. Like for me I don't prefer the screaming but a lot of people love it. A lot of people love hearing people yell over mix tapes or else they wouldn't buy them.

ThaFormula.com - Do you see vinyl lasting…

DJ Numark - Yeah! You don't even have to end that question cause were making good money off of the vinyl right now, and you see how late we are with them. Like the Up Above singles, man they report to us on time, good company, and we see good money from vinyl. We're like "damn!" and even we underestimated it and that was the craziest part about it. We were like "yeah most of our shit is from CD's," but then we start seeing some of the money coming in off of the vinyl and we're like "damn man, this is still such a positive source of media."

ThaFormula.com - Now many people go back and forth about the CDJ, what are your thoughts on that?

DJ Numark - I look at the CDJ like, for me its more of a production tool and its a good stage tool because like when we do big shows like 15,000 people like Smokin' Grooves, the way they design those stages is they put the bass bottoms underneath the stage so if your rocking a show with turntables your gonna get nothing but feedback and that's really important to have a banging ass show so the CDJ's are prime for that, and you can control the pitch versus like having a Instant Replay where you can't really control the pitch and blend it in and out, so I think its a good tool.

ThaFormula.com - When you're known as a great DJ is it hard to be accepted as a producer as far as when you try and shop your beats?

DJ Numark - It depends on how good your beats are. If your beats are slammin', there is no two ways about it. They got to pick that beat. But if your beats are medium and they think they can get another medium track with a bigger name like, if it was a choice between like a good DJ like Q-Bert... okay lets say Q-Bert gave a medium beat, but Swizz Beats gave another medium beat, I think the person will pick Swizz Beats depending on what they are going for, but I'm talking 'bout commercial shit right now because people go with the name. It's all buzz. This whole industry is buzz. It has very little to do with quality every now and then. If you have quality records the people love 'em and live by them, but as far as sales goes people want the buzz.

ThaFormula.com - Now you got a new project coming out on Sequence Records man, what's that about?

DJ Numark - The Sequence project is called "Hands On" and it's a mix CD. It's just a bunch of different artists. I have a international section where I give light to French rappers, Japanese rappers and German rappers and just a whole international section in there which the states never even seems to do. You know you go to Germany and they're playing American music all day long but you come out to the states and you won't hear no German music so I wanted to do some German MC's and you know have a little section like that. So that's coming out real soon, like early May is what they are shooting for and I got a single out right now with Charli Tuna on one side and J-Live on the other. The Charli Tuna song is called "Comin' Through" and J-Lives song is called "Brand New Lives," so that's out right now to promote the mix CD.

ThaFormula.com - So is the mix CD your production over these MC's? DJ 

Numark - No it's gonna be other peoples songs but I will have some of my production in there as well.

ThaFormula.com - Now are these the same Japanese MC's that were on the De La album?

DJ Numark - Yeah they are the same cats that were on the "Buhloone Mind State" album. Hopefully we can get it cleared. I'm trying to get that shit cleared but I'm having trouble. Ain't that a bitch? I make the beat and I can't even clear my own song (Laughs). They wanted to do a remix for them years back and so I did it for them and now I wanna use it for my mix CD.

ThaFormula.com - So to finish this up Numark, what other projects can we catch you on in the future?

DJ Numark - There is an independent project that is just beats that I'm doing. It's called "Blend Crafters" and that's coming out around the same time like May or so. It's just an EP of beats so make sure cats check that out. So between "Blend Crafters," Charli Tuna's solo album, J5's album, my mix CD and shopping beats that's where I'm at right now and where my main focus is.

Be  sure to join the over 300,000 Industry Heads that have signed up to our exclusive mailing list!!  Click here to join and receive exclusive interviews only available to members. Leave contact info ( name & email address) at info@thaformula.com and we will contact you to confirm your membership.