thaFormula.com - What happened to the album you were gonna drop between "Way 2 Fonky" and "Safe & Sound?"

DJ Quik - Actually it was 2 albums. It was the 2nd, 2nd II None album and one of my albums. It was called "Compton Style." most of it was rehashed and more then half of it became "Safe & Sound," but there is another half that I ain't released yet. I'll probably put it out sometime. I just never wanted to give it to Profile.

thaFormula.com - How did the Penthouse Players Clique album come about?

DJ Quik - We was a group before I went solo. It was like that was my first group and I promised them like I think most good muthafuckaz do, that if I blew up, I would go back and look out for them. So I left the group to pursue my solo shit and it made it a little easier to get them in the door because they were different.

thaFormula.com - Who exactly were the members of PPC ?

DJ Quik - PPC used to be Tweed Cadillac, Playa Hamm, and me. The funny thing about PPC was that PPC was a conglomerate to where AMG was at any point a part of PPC. 2nd II None was, and it was like a group that when we all got together it was a clique.

thaFormula.com - Now that album didn't do well at all, but the production on that album was nearly flawless. It was a whole different type of production style when compared to the DJ Quick albums?

DJ Quik - Yeah, but when I look back at it I think it's kind of my fault it didn't do well. It's a classic album. It's classic work. I think it didn't do too well, one, because it didn't have that classic sound. Back then I was really just learning how to mix records and I took a chance and mixed it myself and it didn't have the dynamics that it would have had if I would have mixed it today.

thaFormula.com - But what I always wondered was what made you switch up your production like that. That work was like nothing that has ever been done?

DJ Quik - Because that was the sound that I was doing with PPC. See how hard it was for that record to sell. That's what Penthouse was about. It was a complicated group and if I would have came out with the kind of music that I wanted to do on PPC on my first album, I probably would never have had the success that I have had.

thaFormula.com - How come you didn't do the production on the Playa Hamm album?

DJ Quik - I was going through some bullshit with my record company where they wouldn't let me guest on anybody's shit because of the contract that I signed when I was a kid. So I couldn't do shit on Playa Hamm's album because I wasn't in that mind frame. I couldn't even think about music. I was thinkin' about business, at 27 years old I was getting in the business. I'm not gonna be an artist forever. I'm not gonna be young and vital for too much longer so I started doing business. I missed Hamm's record because I was caught up in record company bullshit. I wanted to perform and produce the whole album anyway. But they probably wouldn't have gave me the clearance to be on the album anyway.

thaFormula.com - How come you never dropped the track, "Inside Out?"

DJ Quik - It may still drop. We just got to revamp it and it may be on Suga Free's second album.

thaFormula.com - Did you do any songs for or with Eazy that never dropped?

DJ Quik - We did a couple of songs that myself and Yella produced tha never came out. We did a couple of tracks and gave them to Eazy and then he was gonna go redo the vocals with somebody else.

thaFormula.com - So what ever happened to those tracks?

DJ Quik - I have no idea.

thaFormula.com - You never got to keep a copy of the tracks or masters?

DJ Quik - Nope. Most of the times back in that day, you did a master reel and the reel stayed at the studio. We did it under Ruthless Records so they own the masters. I didn't make tape copies and take them with me. I didn't do that.

thaFormula.com - Why do you feel you have never gotten the props you deserve after so many years of puttin' in classic work. Do you think what you said about the Source magazine, and the East Coast back in the day had something to do with it?

DJ Quik - I know for a fact it was because I was never marketed and promoted. I was always an automatic sale. My music was always great, and Profile didn't have to spend a lot of money to make money on me. So if they didn't have to spend money to push or break even, or if they put out some shit and people would buy it anyway, why promote it? Why put him on a big tour, why do all this shit and that shit? Why pay him? They wanted to make as much as they could by spending as little as they could. I mean that's the game and I understand it, but it's like I didn't really know the business. I just knew the music and back in the day, I could fuck anybody up in music because I was always doing real music. Shit that will last, you understand me. But I didn't know shit about the business. It wasn't till I got like 23 or 24 that I really started learning the business and now I'm in the position to be bigger then I have ever been only because this new album that I just did is a new style of music. It's the greatest shit I have ever heard in rap. There are records that set precedents in rap and this new record of mine dog, with the help of my east coast constituents like Pharaoh Monch, we will negate all that bullshit I said about the East Coast on "PS Fuck U 2," and we will start from here. Even with the Source I got a relationship with the Source. I'm the record company now and I'm not grey haired and fucked up, I'm not sprung on cocaine or got a million kids. I'm out here still having fun, break dancing, riding motorcycles, and chillin', but at the same time I'm up in the office doing business.

thaFormula.com - Is that why you hooked up with Pharaoh and Talib, to try to reach out to the East?

DJ Quik - No, I got at them because I love them niggaz. I respect their work and I knew that I would give them music that will compliment their style.

thaFormula.com - People think that your just into gangsta rap, but I know that you are into all types of music...

DJ Quik - They get to see us now. They get to hear the "Inside Out's." Now I can release them myself. Now they will get to hear some of my "Compton Style" album. The shit that never got released. They get to hear a bunch of shit. The one thing I don't want to do because it's just meritless, and stupid, is a "greatest hits." I don't have to because it's not time yet. I'll do a greatest hits maybe in about ten years. When I'm forty somethin' and I'm completely out of the business, but right now I'm just starting.

thaFormula.com - Why did it take over ten years for you and Dre to finally hook up and record a track together?

DJ Quik - Because there was too many fucking haters in between us. It was always people in my camp that would come tellin' me, "Nigga Dre and them over there talkin' about you", and I would get pumped up and be like, "Yeah, fuck Dre, fuck Dre". Then people would go over there and tell Dre I said this and that. Then Dre would be "Yeah, yeah whatever, fuck him."

thaFormula.com - It's funny because Dre would always give you props in interviews.

DJ Quik - And I have always given him props. It was always them negative people in between us that kept us apart because they were straight haters, but they getting' exactly what they deserve right now.

thaFormula.com - Did you produce with Dre and Mel-Man or just Dre?

DJ Quik - Just Dre.

thaFormula.com - What was it like to finally get in the studio together after so many years?

DJ Quik - It was the most fun I ever had. You all will hear it though. We're doing a whole bunch of new shit with The Truth and other things. We about to shit on the world.

thaFormula.com - Now is it true you are doing a track with Eminem and Dre?

DJ Quik - Not yet. I mean it's not etched in stone because Dre is working on Em's album now. I guess it's not untrue because whatever Dre needs me for, I'm gonna give it to him.

thaFormula.com - How was it working with King Tee on the "Thy Kingdom Come" LP?

DJ Quik - King Tee is the shit. King Tee's "Act A Fool" album got me sparked and open on a new style of music. It was a new style with DJ Pooh. The production was a new style and I was like "Dammmn!" But with Dr. Dre, when I heard NWA, I quit my job! When I heard the NWA shit with Eazy, that's when I knew I had to be a part of music.

thaFormula.com - Do you ever make Mix Tapes anymore like the swap meet mix tapes you used to make back in the day with 2nd II None, AMG, and HI-C?

DJ Quik - No, but I'm thinkin' about doing one. I got a couple of the tapes that we did release back then with 2nd II None, HI- C, AMG, and all that underground shit that I might let out. But right now I got to concentrate on doing high end production.

thaFormula.com - I remember seeing you on MTV with a stack of records in your hand. Do you still DJ?

DJ Quik - Yeah, I got to man. I'm a DJ man and it's still the most fun. I'm a record collector and I usually look for old rare shit. Shit that I could borrow ideas from to produce new music. I use those records to recycle. Too keep that soulful sound out there that makes people happy when they listen to it. That makes people wanna smoke a blunt instead of shootin' at muthafuckaz. That makes people wanna party instead of fight. That make muthafuckaz wanna fuck!

thaFormula.com - I remember the '95 Source awards when you did that dope set with the Death Row Camp in the jail cells, it seemed like you and Death Row were on top of the world. What was that time like for you?

DJ Quik - It's funny. I wasn't happy. I felt like dying in a gun battle. Tupac was locked up, it was a whole lot of tension between the East Coast and the West Coast. It was just a fucked up time in life dog.

thaFormula.com - Do you think that everything that is said about Suge is exaggerated or are all the stories true?

DJ Quik - I don't know. I mean the Suge I know, or the one that I kicked it with was a no holds barred kind of executive and the one thing that I remember him sayin' and I'll leave it here. He said, "Quik, don't spare no feelings," "This ain't no business for being nice to muthafuckas." I was like, "that's big!" That's where it ends. He just never took no shit from nobody, and he reserved that right to not kiss nobody's ass.

thaFormula.com - So would you ever to production for Death Row again?

DJ Quik - If the price is right. I mean not that I could be bought, but if I hear something that's really the shit over there, where I just gotta be down with it, I ain't even got no problem with it.

thaFormula.com - Were you surprised with what Kurupt did?

DJ Quik - I wasn't shocked or surprised. I just thought he had it all together, but evidently his business must not have been right for him to do that. If he's happy it was a smart move.

thaFormula.com - Would you have done it?

DJ Quik - What? Go to Death Row? No. Why go backwards when you can keep going forward?

thaFormula.com - So with "Under the Influence" , what were you hoping for and what will make you happy?

DJ Quik - That people recognize that out of all the shit that I have been through, that watching my homies die and shit, I just hope muthafuckaz appreciate the fact that I'm still alive and above ground nigga. Not bones and dust and maggot food. To make a muthafuckin' record that's still impressive with a new sound of music and new EQ that could only be topped by muthafuckaz like Dr. Dre. That I'm still the best, and I'm still alive!

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