thaFormula.com - Are you the type of producer that's in the studio 24/7 making beats or is it only when you are feelin' it?

Evidence - Well I got 2 studios. I got a studio where the recording goes down and I've got my crib studio. I usually just like making beats in my house. I just like the environment you know like keeping the TV on in the other room. Not necessarily having to get dressed, just waking up right out of bed. I like diggin' through the crates and doing all that shit in my crib. Just because that's how I came up in my mothers house in the back room just doing stuff. Now I'm a grown man and I got grown man responsibilities but I still like to hold on to that energy. So most of my music beat-wise gets created in my crib. When I feel like I've got something I get in the car and get dressed then I come over here and let it be serious.

thaFormula.com - Are you a quick beat maker or are you a perfectionist as far as being the type that will sit working on a track forever?

Evidence - I'm quick to assemble the idea, but once I really feel like this is something I wanna do or someone else tells me they are interested, then I start moving things around and that's usually the process that takes the longest. Like adding the subtle instruments and other set of nuances that really make a record. A lot of people don't realize how much extra work goes into a record to make it complete. A lot of people think you just got the beat, the drum and the loop and that's it. With me I like to start with that as the base you know I might send that out on a beat CD or something, but if somebody takes the track or I feel like it's something I wanna keep, that's when I really go in. So it's funny how the main structure of the track will usually get assembled real quick, but then all the little extra shit is what takes the most time . 

thaFormula.com - Does the extra shit really make that big of a difference to you?

Evidence - Subliminally it does. People just wanna enjoy music, they don't care if you recorded it outside, they just wanna like it. But there is so many sets of things that affect that psyche from the mix to the sequence to the length of the record, to the levels that are put to the vocals relative to the beat, to the little sprinkles as I call it that come throughout the track that keep it from being repetitive. You might have a one bar loop but you keep having all these little extra things that keep popping up maybe once or twice in a track and it really makes you look forward to that subliminally. Even if you're not realizing it, it is affecting your psyche.

thaFormula.com - When you hear a track for the first time from someone else, what is the first thing that your are listening for?

Evidence - I just wanna like it. Some producers pick apart things like "oh that snare is too loud, or whatever." I still have the ability to still hear music the way I heard it as a kid in one piece. I'm still blessed with that. A lot of my friends like Alchemist and Joey Chavez pick shit apart immediately. Basically I look at it like this, if you did your job, I can hear it as one piece. If you did it properly, I'm gonna hear it as one piece of music, if you didn't do your job properly and the mix is wrong or this is rushed or that wasn't done properly, then I'm gonna hear those things and they are gonna reveal themselves to me. So when I hear production from like a Timbaland or Alchemist or Hi-Tek, I hear it as one because they take the time to make sure that's how it's presented. It's something that inspires me when I hear music as one.

thaFormula.com - So would you say that it's more than a name that you are paying for when getting a producer like Timbaland?

Evidence - Yeah because they are not just beat makers. They are producers. They see a record from its conception to its master and that's something that so many people don't understand. Once in a while you can send a beat CD out and the rapper if he's real good he'll take it and send it back to you when it's all finished. That happens few and far in between. For the most part when you pay somebody like say Kanye West like when we did "This way," I really seen what production is. It's not just making the beat. The beat is the first element but there is so much more. Vocal arranging, vocal coaching, knowing when your overproducing, knowing when to fall back, how is this record mixed, who is gonna master it, all these things definitely come into play and as I get older and as I get more experience I really realize how to implement those understandings into my production. There is people who break that rule though. Like you will get a beat CD from Madlib and he'll be like "I don't wanna track that shit out, just rip it off of my CD and do what you do." But he's known for that raw sound and a lot of people don't have that ability, they are not funky like him. So there is people who can break the rules but it just doesn't happen everyday.

thaFormula.com - How important is engineering and mixing to a track?

Evidence - It really is the key man. Sometimes, I'm not gonna lie, there is something dope about a raw Hip-Hop track because Hip-Hop is the only music where your pager can go off while you are rappin' and you can keep that shit. You can't do that on a Celine Dion song. That's what's so dope about Hip-Hop. A lot of it is incorrect to begin with and that's why a lot of these kids just come up and end up making dope beats right away because they don't have this classically trained ear for this or that. They just do what they feel is right and it goes off of emotion. Sometimes a mix can fuck shit up but if you have an understanding of a mix and you understand it from the beginning while you're making the track, it could really be the key. A lot of behind the scenes people really haven't got the credit they deserve and the engineers are definitely some of the most overlooked people in this aspect of the game.

thaFormula.com - Do you have an example of a track you had that maybe wasn't that great but the engineering made it great?

Evidence - I'm not gonna say it wasn't that great, but "Worst Comes to Worst" by Alchemist is a perfect example. It was a raw, dirty beat he made. It was a kick, snare, hat, a loop and maybe a subtle bass undertone. That was it, but we took it to D&D Studios in New York City. Premier and Eddie Sancho mixed it for us and they really beefed the shit out of it. They knew how to make the drums sound right, the kick and the snare and the hat fit at perfect levels in relation to each other. Then when they got all the music perfect and vocals sank in it was amazing. It's just some things like that, you don't really think about it you just like the song, but subliminally it's affecting you. That's one thing I always wanted to do with my production 'cause I come from a school of a lot of people. Like DJ Lethal, QD III, and DJ Muggs. All these people really concentrated on production value and that's one thing I bring to the table that a lot of the new kids don't necessarily understand. They came up in the Pro Tools era. They never knew about 2-inch tape or SSL consoles or things like that where I was blessed to be around people who understood and cared about those techniques so I still apply a lot of that to my tracks. Where a lot of these kids might be funkier then me or technically better but they just don't understand the bigger picture sometimes and that's where I might excel and they might fall back.

thaFormula.com - Were you taught by anyone as far as the basics goes production wise or is it something you just learned yourself?

Evidence - It was me just watching. While I was in the studio smoking all that weed I was really zoning everything out and zoning in on the people. I didn't take any sessions for granted. I was really there to study where a lot of people in there partying calling chicks going in the back room and doing what they were doing, I was really just like "ok I'm gonna be in here like a sponge." That's why when I got my ASR-10 I will never forget the first night I got it I told Rakaa "yo I'm gonna make you a beat tonight," and Rakaa was like "yeah ok, whatever man." I called him an hour later and I had a track done and he was like "you made that?" I was like "yeah man, I been sitting watching Alchemist and Joey Chavez do this shit the last 3 years." So the second I got it I already knew what to do. It wasn't like I had to pull out the manual and really figure it out. It was just something that I was doing and that was from me paying attention.

thaFormula.com - What's the word on the new album and did you do all the production, engineering, mixing on this album?

Evidence - Well my upcoming album is called "The Weatherman" first and foremost. It's my first solo album and something a lot of my fans been waiting for. Inside of "Expansion Team" in 2001 I wrote in the liner notes look out for our solo albums coming soon, it just so happens that Capitol was gonna try and sign me to a 5 album solo album deal. Now I just was really looking forward to getting off of the label versus tying myself re-up for another 5 years over there. So I waited 'til our contract was finished which was last year and the second it got done I went right into the lab. This is a really focused piece of work. I think people are gonna be overly surprised with what I'm coming out with. I'm really coming out of my skin on this one. I think by March 20th of this year when this shit drops, people are gonna have a whole new respect and a whole new outlook on Evidence. Something that was important to me on this project was to focus on my rhymes because when I told a lot of people I'm making a solo album, they were like "that's dope, are you making the beats? Who are you featuring on there?" I'm like "no, no, no, this is my solo album." I'm rappin' on every single song for the majority of the album. I have a lot of shit to say, I've been through a lot these last years and I'm definitely a grown up man now. I've been through trials and tribulations like losing my mother and going around the world and just dealing with a lot of hardship and just a lot of stuff that I really couldn't address on a Dilated record. So it was really on some "yo I need to get this off and express myself." So what I did is I produced 6 songs that I love and I fell back for the rest of it and focused on the rhymes and I got Alchemist on this record doing 5 joints, I got Babu doing 2 joints, Jake One doing 1, Khalil doing 1, Joey Chavez doing 3. It's gonna be a family affair. But what I wanted to do is make sure that I mixed the whole record with my guy Eddie Sancho who is responsible for all of the Premier records. With this whole D&D era and everything Premier ever did I want to make sure that I set a solid example for the new underground. Because I'm coming out on ABB records but I don't want the misconception out there that just because I'm coming out independently and I'm an underground artist, that sonically I'm gonna be fucking with the best of them. So that's one thing that I'm really taking into consideration on this album is making sure that when my record comes in it blends in with the Dre record, it blends in with the Khalil record, it blends in with the things that I look up to so I can set the new bar for the underground and let a lot of these new cats know that they need to step their game up.

thaFormula.com - Speaking of the underground scene, it seems like muthafuckas look at the underground scene like they are ashamed to be apart of it. People used to take pride in it. Why do you think that changed?

Evidence - I just think they are scared. I think a lot of people aren't happy with who they are and they wanna be followers, they don't wanna be leaders. It's something that I embrace and that I love and when the train goes away and it's not popular I'm still gonna be what I love. I'm not gonna switch just because everyone else is and then the next year when you got Kanye West saying "I'm a backpacker," and everyone else jumps up on it, I'm gonna be right here where I never left saying "fuck y'all." That's just the bottom line. I will give it up that it became an over flooded, overcrowded market for a period of time 'cause all you really had to do was buy Pro Tools and get a thousand dollars and you could put out your own vinyl, but on the other side mainstream rap is worse than it's ever been. I'm more proud to be underground right now then I am to listen to a lot of the bullshit, and I'll definitely say this right now and please quote this, "an underground record with emotion and feeling that's mixed terribly is always gonna beat a polished piece of shit, always." Emotion wins over a mix anytime. You could have some record that's mixed in the best studio with all the best engineers and all that shit but if the emotion isn't there its just a clean piece of shit.

thaFormula.com - Is the emotion in a track more on the MC or the producer?

Evidence - It's just a feel. When you listen to Doom and Ghostface and that shit is raw or you listen to Madlib like I was talking about before, and that shit is raw, it's raw. There is nothing you can say about it except it's got a vibe and that doesn't happen everyday. A lot of people look at those examples and will be like "I'm gonna do that too," but if they don't have the emotion and the soul then you can't capture it and soul and emotion is just something you cant put into words, you can't try to mix it, you can't do anything about it. You've got it or you don't have it. My favorite personally is when you got soul and emotion and you can mix it properly. Somebody like a Dre or a Jay-Z or somebody that's spillin' their heart raw with it but then also knows how to make it overly presentable. When you can capture all of those elements, then you're definitely hard to be touched.

thaFormula.com - Would you say that you have graduated from beat maker to producer?

Evidence - I would say that I have. People that hang out with me know that I see a record from beginning to end. I'm at the mastering studio with Bernie Grundman. I'm there when muthafuckas are tracking the shit to make sure that everything is maintaining the original levels that we had coming out the box. I'm there to make sure that the vocals are compressed properly and recorded properly, I'm there to make sure that I get the best performance out of the MC. When he's kicking me the rhymes in the chair before he goes in the booth and I really like it and he gets on the microphone and he changes everything I'm there to say "yo fall back, do it like you were telling it to me right there in the chair or you know what, I'ma bring the chair in there, sit the fuck down and kick this rap." I do that and I'm very vocal about. I definitely try to bring the best out of the artist. At the end of the day the beat should not out rap the vocalist. The worst thing that can ever happen is to get out rapped by the instrumental. What you need is to try to make the vocalist shine and make him the star. When I make beats I try to make the tracks complex enough but simple enough to where I leave plenty of room for the vocals. I hear instrumentals all the time that are crazy but its like "where are the vocals gonna go? Did you even think about that there was gonna be a rapper on this song or you just trying to be selfish as a beat maker?" That's why Dre still shines 'til this day or Premier. It's their simplicity that allows the vocalist to shine. A lot of people just don't think about that anymore.

thaFormula.com - Do you use vinyl to sample more or are you into the instrumentation and keyboards now?

Evidence - Nah, I'm the digger definitely the digger. Nowadays a lot of it is off of the computer, you might not even go to the record store anymore. But I'm always still sampling from sources. My point is that I'm definitely a simplest but I have learned to incorporate the musician, have him play and sometimes we end up taking the sample away because we play so much on top that we actually create something brand new. One thing I definitely do now is keep the piano always near me when I'm sampling because when you start pitching a record up and down sometimes your not thinking about it but you actually end up pitching a record in between keys and what that does is make it real difficult for a musician to come in and play behind you because he's got to tune his guitar or tune his keyboard in between B and C or D and E and sometimes its not as cohesive as it could be if it was in the actual key. So when I sample now, I make a conscious effort to always keep it in a key so that when I bring musicians into the fold they have an easy time playing along with it. Even a vocalist to come sing, she or he can really lock into the groove versus being some weird in between key shit. But I will say this, that's the beauty of Hip-Hop too. You got muthafuckas who aren't trained classically so they put a record between 45 and 33 and plus 4 and they don't know that they are not in a real key and sometimes that's what makes Hip-Hop so dope you know. There is no real rules.

thaFormula.com - With Hip-Hop changing so much every year man, do you ever feel the pressure of keeping up as you get older?

Evidence - Well I got a lot of responsibility as far as being a home owner, having bills and all that kind of shit but if anything that's just more incentive. Like Babu got 2 kids. If anything he's like "I support their private schools or whatever the fuck off of this rap shit, I don't even have time to sleep no more." It's not all fun and games like it was back in the days sometimes but if anything its more reason for me to grind. I got another ten years of hard grinding ahead of me and I love every second of it. I feel blessed that I don't have to go out and put on a suit and tie everyday and I don't take that lightly. I wake up early with the sun, I go get my coffee and do what I do and I go to work in my studio. It's what I love to do.

thaFormula.com - How did you feel about the work you did on Planet Asia's album man production wise?

Evidence - I love it, I ride to that shit myself man. I love everything about it I really do. It's got a consistent vibe to it. You know I pulled a lot of favor cards. I got Prodigy from the Mobb on it, Black Thoughts from The Roots, I made sure that we had the right guests on it. He did the same gettin' Jonnelle on it, Rasco, etc. I just felt like we did a great project.

thaFormula.com - What was your main reason behind releasing your "Yellow Tape Instrumental's" and "Another Sound Mission?"

Evidence - It was just some downtime basically. "Yellowtape" was just basically some instrumentals sitting around that weren't gonna go nowhere so I put the shit out. I got "Red Tape Instrumentals" coming next almost done. That one is definitely more elaborate than the first one. "Another Sound Mission" was just a bunch of previews and stuff that was gonna all come out. Everything that was on that has already dropped so it means it worked. I got "Another Sound Mission Part 2" coming. It was just keepin' my name out there. The main focus right now is the "Weatherman" LP, my new album. I got my single out right now "Mr. Slow Flow" with the B-side "Hot N' Cold." It's creating a lot of buzz right now. I'm doing these shows and people are singing every word so I couldn't have asked for more. Hopefully by the time March 20th comes around everyone knows about this record and if you don't I'm gonna be out there touring my ass off letting everybody know.

thaFormula.com - How important is a Manager to an artist?

Evidence - I'll put it like this. I had 4 albums on a major label. I had 1 booking agent, 1 business manager, 1 lawyer, 1 label, 4 managers. Managers in our group just didn't work for some reason because we were so focused on what we wanted to do that a lot of these dudes weren't working as hard as we were and taking 20 percent. That's not gonna cut it. You can't just hire somebody, call them a manager and because they know what a marketing plan is or they know how to deal with the president of a label and expect it to be all hunky dory. It's not like that. A lot of these managers sell the world to you but when their actions don't speak louder then their words then it's time to fire the muthafucka. So l got love with everybody that's ever been involved with Dilated, no disrespect to anyone intentionally but for my new project I basically hired a dude named Brock who basically thinks like me and comes from the same element I come from. He's my manager but really what he is actually now is an extension of me. He basically comes to me and says "do you wanna do this or are you feeling this?" or when somebody wants a beat, you call him and he will hit me directly versus hiring a manager to say "yeah you should be doing this," or "no my guy ain't gonna do that." Don't ever let anyone take the liberty of telling an artist what they should or shouldn't do. An artist should always have an option at the end of the day and that's my bottom line. I think you should just have a liaison or an extension of yourself just like an engineer.

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