ThaFormula.Com - Last time we talked you had just about finished the album and were lookin' for a deal. Since then you've landed a deal with ABB records. How did that come about and what have you been up to?

Phonte - Basically, one of the guys over at ABB, I.D. (Ian Davis) heard a couple tracks on the web and was kind of lookin' out for us tryin' to find out who we were. He called one of our boys out here named Bumrush (a DJ and Promoter) and asked him what was up with these Little Brother cats. Bumrush called me and was like, "Yo ABB is lookin' for y'all, let me give you I.D.'s email address." So I emailed I.D. let him know who I was and gave him my number. I really didn't think anything was gonna come out of it, but he called me back the next day and from that day on we've talked everyday. At first they (ABB) were like "we'd like to do a single with you guys," and we told them, "well, we got an album done," so they decided to roll with the album.

ThaFormula.Com - Did you sign a deal for just this album or are you gonna be workin' on more with ABB?

Phonte - Nah, we got a couple. We got two more after this one.

ThaFormula.Com - Do you have a time frame for when you have to drop those? How exactly does that work?

Phonte - It's basically however we want to do it. Even though we have enough music for like 2 more albums right now, between all the projects we've been working on, we could just walk in there right now and be like here's our two albums.

Pooh - Holla! (laughs)

Phonte - (laughs) Yeah like "y'all hold it down, peace." Really though, I think that with our integrity as artists and our loyalty to our music we couldn't do anything like that. We ain't trying to be like the Jay-Z's of the underground where we drop an album like every six months. Because if every six months we're coming out with a Little Brother album, well then what's a Little Brother album? With each album we want to show each other that we've grown. Similar to Outkast and how every album they totally revamp their sound and change but at the same time stay true to who they are.

ThaFormula.Com - ABB brought you out to LA do a Showcase with some of your label mates, what was that like?

Pooh - That was all of our first times being out there to LA. It was an eye opening experience. I mean it was my first time on a plane! We got to meet Dilated Peoples, Defari a bunch of other MC's on ABB and the whole ABB family. We had a great time and enjoyed ourselves. I was out there for business but it was more like a vacation.

ThaFormula.Com - You also performed at the Knitting Factory in New York for another ABB showcase, what was that like?

9th Wonder - Phenomenal. The show itself, the city, everything. It was like a reward for all of our hard work. If you could have been in the car on the way up there, man! The laughs! Just making the trip to NYC and to perform there, all because we got together in this little ass apartment and recorded a record. It's amazing.

Phonte - I just felt blessed man. Just to be in the city, to see where hip-hop was born and to breathe some of the same air that some of the legends have we just feel really blessed. Just knowing that some of the guys we respect were chillin' right there on the corner when they were comin' up.

ThaFormula.Com - What was it like to see your vinyl on the shelves for the first time next to a Gangstarr record or a Pete Rock record or anyone for that matter?

Phonte - It's humbling. Like damn, it's really happening. You don't really believe it. It's one thing to like see people talk to you on the message boards and talk to you on the street but to actually see the vinyl: Little Brother/ABB Records/Whatever You Say, that's like the seal, like damn, it's really on.

9th Wonder - Just to see the name on the package, "Little Brother." Man, we spent hour's one day trying to think of a name for a group, and to see that name up there! wow. But some of the names we had, phew! Bad names.

Pooh - I remember one of them, "Flea Market Mannequins!" (laughs)

9th Wonder - 'Round Midnight was another one.

ThaFormula.Com - Alright I want to get into a couple of the songs from the album and what they're about. Who was "Away from Me" about?

Pooh - "Away from Me," 9th brought that to me one night. When he played it for me, I already knew what I wanted it to be about. I've got an older brother who is incarcerated and at the time we weren't really speakin' to each other because we had went through a little thing when he was out and we weren't as close as we used to be, so that's how the concept came about for "Away from Me." Then when I told Phonte what I wanted to do for that, he jumped on it and was like "I'm gonna do somethin' for my son." His son and his girl were living in Maryland so he wasn't seein' his son and had been away from him also.

ThaFormula.Com - The B-Side for "Whatever You Say," "Altitudes," how did that one come about because that's a little different from some of the stuff on your album?

Phonte - That was done after we finished "The Listening" in like May or June of 2001 before we went out to LA. We in the car and Ninth was playin' some tracks and it just came to me right there, somethin' about flyin' high. Me and Pooh wrote it a couple days after that and that was pretty much it. It was pretty much an extended metaphor for the record business. One line comes to mind, "sky's the limit/nobody's fly they rely on gimmicks" or something like that.

ThaFormula.Com - There was a great skit you removed from the album due to some samples, you think that will ever make it to a B-Side or something later on?

Phonte - (laughs) I'd like to get it out there somehow, maybe give it away on some promo shit like Madlib does on the Stevie joints. We ain't gonna try and sell it or nothin.'

ThaFormula.Com - Speaking of samples, how hard is it to get away with using them when you're a new independent group maybe a little under the radar?

9th Wonder - Well, the label handles all of that but we're pretty much under the radar. I mean cats ain't really fuckin' with you until you make some real money. As far as using them, I mean don't do no dumb shit like jacking the first 8 bars of "Thriller" and expect not to get caught, that's just stupid, I mean if you sample "Purple Rain" Prince is gonna come after you. And the shit we chopped is pretty obscure so it ain't really no big deal.

ThaFormula.Com - You've been able to meet a lot of other artists since you've been out touring, what's the feedback been like from them?

Pooh - We've been getting pretty good feedback since we've been out there, mostly we're hearing that it's like "a breath of fresh air," that this is what hip-hop needs.

Phonte - Yeah, I would just say to cosign with Pooh, that pretty much everyone has been saying that it's a "breath of fresh air, real refreshing." Probably one of the biggest compliments that I got outside of Guru and Premier pullin' me and Pooh to the side buildin' with us, tellin us things like "yo man, y'all are doin it, y'all are leaders, y'all are doin this shit," was when right before we went on-stage in New York. Beni B (founder ABB records) pulled us all in a huddle and he was like, "yo I just want to thank y'all for coming out man," he was like "I've never told y'all this before, but you niggas made me love hip-hop again."

Pooh - That was the biggest right there.

Phonte - I was like, "damn, niggas make you love a whole genre and shit!" It's like "you know I never fucked with French Classic movies, but I saw your joint niggas and I fuck with them now" (laughs) That was probably the biggest compliment right there. To hear somebody say "yo, you made me love hip-hop again," you feel blessed and it's kind of breath taking.

ThaFormula.Com - Especially from someone like Beni who has been in this business for so long.

Phonte - Really! That guy, he knows everybody.

ThaFormula.Com - There's been a lot of tracks floating around that were solo tracks from either Pooh or Phonte, and 9th has his "Mr. Dream Merchant" albums and "Art of Remixes," do any of you plan releasing some "official" solo stuff in the future?

9th Wonder - I think down the road, but right now we're focused on ourselves as a group. I think what makes us so great is that we're so different in personality, but we all blend together pretty well. We're all strong enough to step away, as opposed to a lot of the early 90's groups. When it was like, "if this group breaks up, blah, blah, blah is gonna fall off." I really can't say that if we turned our back and walked away, that any one of us would be weak. I mean if Pooh went off a did a joint, I would do a track, Nicolay would do a track, Khrysis would do a track and if Phonte did one it would go the same way, and they would still have a dope record. Then if I go out and do a joint, I'd get Phonte to rhyme, Pooh to rhyme and some other cats that I think is nice and I would still have a dope record.

Phonte - Me personally, I'm not really interested in being a solo artist, I don't know, I wouldn't want to listen to myself for a whole album.

9th Wonder - If Phonte drops an album, trust me it ain't gonna be no rap album (laughs) it gonna be rock.

Phonte - I'll drop a bluegrass album on niggas (laughs). Nah, I mean we got a couple of things goin.' Pooh got a couple of EP's goin.' I got my somewhat solo album, I call it "Tiggalo Must Die" and it's kind of like my version of "Welcome to Detroit." It's kind of a total 180 from "The Listening." I'll pretty much be sharing the mic with a bunch of other MC's and it'll just be a lot of fun. I started it pretty much after "The Listening," me and Pooh started our solo projects around the same time. It's really just an outlet for us to get creative space from each other. Kind of like in between Gangstarr albums when Guru does "Jazzmatazz," he knows his bread and butter is Gangstarr and it's the same way with us too. Also we got some stuff with Nicolay (www.nicolaymusic.com).

Pooh - We just got a whole lot of things brewin' right now. Once we're ready to do this, where this (hip-hop) is all we have to do, man!

9th Wonder - Man, when we recorded "The Listening" we had a whole lot of shit going on. Pooh was in school, Phonte was workin' eight jobs, it was a lot of shit. We're just waiting for the day when this is all we have to do.

ThaFormula.Com - After having all the control recording the album, what was it like to hand over all that hard work to someone (a label) and let them run with it?

Phonte - The situation with ABB was cool. I mean if it was somebody like Def Jam where we turn over our stuff and they're like "well we like these tracks right here, but we're gonna take Phonte's singin' off and get Jaheim." (laughs) If it went down like that then I would have a problem with it, but with ABB they felt the vision and they didn't change one note of it. The one skit that we did take of that was actually our call because before that they're were gonna roll with it. I think the project is in good hands but we've just got to stay on them. Everyday we're in contact with them like "yo what's goin on? What's the deal? When is the vinyl comin' in? Is it gonna be in this store? How can we get in here? It's just an everyday hustle. It's kind of a two-way thing. It helps to keep them on their toes and it gives us a better understanding of the business. A lot of people say that they want the "big deal" right off the gate, but I kind of like it this way because I get to have a hands-on on my project. One thing that we always say among ourselves (all three of us) is that we try and treat this like we're not even signed to a label. We look at it like if we don't get out here and hustle it, it ain't gonna move. It's not like niggas is on Def Jam or Universal and we have an assembly line of people that just go out and flood the streets. It's a smaller label so we get our hands dirty too.

ThaFormula.Com - I've been hearin' some buzz about this old project called "Unheralded Semantics," what's that all about?

Phonte - Ahh man, people still talkin' about that shit? Wow. "Unheralded Semantics" is an album I did with my man Eccentric. I guess it was like early 2000, I had just fell out with a label that I was workin' on a solo album with. I was probably like six or seven joints into it and I wasn't signed at the time but they were developing another artist that they decided to get behind and I was just kind of out there so I was like "fuck it, I gotta do somethin'." It was me and Eccentric just clownin' on there. It was like a parody album about two rappers who were tryin to get put on but every label they went to, the label was trying to make 'em sound like somebody else. So it was basically me imitating other rappers. I sold a couple copies of it for a little while, it put a little paper in my pocket then we threw it up on-line and people were just wylin' over it. It was a freestyle album straight up, I mean I didn't write no lyrics. We had fun doin' that.

ThaFormula.Com - Ninth, what's it like when you dig up a sample and before you can get it out there you hear another producer sample the same track?

9th Wonder - Man, it happens a lot to tell you the truth. On Talib Kweli's album there's a joint, two actually. There's a song we did called "Speed" and a joint I did for my man Legacy and they sampled that too, but they sampled a different part of the song. Also on Scarface's album "The Fix" on that joint "Heaven," I used that before. It just let's you know you're on the same level or close to it, as some of these guys. At first your upset but then it's like if I knew that was the last dope beat I would ever make in life then I would be upset, but I know that's not the case. Now if Little Brother put out a joint with the same sample someone else happened to use, best believe we're gonna put it out and may the best man win! (laughs). I used this one sample on a track I did for Edgar Allen Floe called "Righteous Way to Go," and another producer has used the same sample but another part, like a couple of chords or something. I let him hear the way I flipped it and he and a lot of other people have told me "man, I've been hearing that song for years but I never would have thought to flip it that way!"

Phonte - I'll tell ya. A lot of producers are going to hear "The Listening" and are gonna be like "dammit, I got that record, I've heard it a million times but never like that." I mean a lot of the joints he samples I'll listen to a lot of Pete Rock's samples or JayDee's samples and they sample a sample from a really dope song that's great on it's own, and I might be like "damn I would have sampled that." That's one thing I got to day about Ninth, he'll sample anything. I mean like cheesy ass 80's records some corny shit, but it's all in the presentation. How you hear it and how you interpret it.

ThaFormula.Com - It sounds like Phonte and Pooh got a lot going on right now, what are you workin' on Ninth?

9th Wonder - The thing with me is. I make joints for Little Brother, I make joints for the Justice League, and then I make beats for other people that just come by and check 'em out, that's like three sets of beats. I mean sometimes J, I'll head over to Tay's crib and play him like 10 joints and he'll say, "man I'm feelin' all of these," now what am I gonna do? I gotta go in and make 10 more. So I just stay makin' tracks because if I don't the next man will. Because if I fall off makin' beats, Little Brother goes on! (laughs) The show must go on. So if I want to stay a part of this shit, then it starts with me, I've got to put out the dope tracks and they work out the hooks and everything else. You know, Phonte and Pooh never come up to me and tell me "man, you gotta sample this joint".

Phonte - Make me hot P! (laughs)

9th Wonder - You know, no "can you sample this '87 'Ready for the World?'" They trust me to come to them with 3 to 4 to 5 to 8 bangers.

Pooh - I was just tellin' him (9th) this. I appreciate the fact that now it has gotten to the point where 9th can bring over a track and already know, "Tay is gonna like this one" and "Pooh's gonna rip this one." When he brings tracks over he don't even have to ask me anymore "yo Pooh what do you think of this?"

ThaFormula.Com - What kind of equipment did you use to record the album Ninth? I know that you kind of just got by with whatever you could, but what specifically?

9th Wonder - (everyone laughs) Let the record show, as far as how we hooked it up, it was a damn computer, an old Gemini mixer, and two little mono speakers. As far as a lot of the stuff you hear on "The Listening," I had to "guesstimate" a couple of trial runs to really get the stereo effect. What else? An old ass amp like the Ohio Players used (laughs) from the '74 "Love Roller coaster" tour. We really used archaic equipment. The only thing we really used that was new was the computer and the mic. I mean, we didn't even have a booth. It's not like some studio where you know you're on one side and you have to hit a button to talk to Phonte in the Booth, "yo take it from the top 'Tay!" Nah. It was more like "okay now, everyone in the room gotta be quiet!" When we recorded "The Way You Do It" and "The Yo-Yo," it was like D-12 up in there with so many people. Everyone had to be still and be quiet. I'll hear some cat's like, "I got this studio and this big board," and I'm like "Why?!"

Phonte - I mean, if you've got the money more power to you, but the equipment is only as good as the people behind it. If you make wack beats on the SP, then you're gonna be wack on the MPC. If you can't get it done on a 4-track, you ain't gonna get it done on a 100 track? It's just giving you more ways to fuck up. I liken it to the difference of putting a drunk driver behind the wheel of a '72 Ford Pinto or a 2003 Corvette. You put a drunk nigga behind the wheel of the Pinto and he ain't gonna cause that much damage, but you put him behind the wheel of the 'Vette? It's over, get the children off the street. You got these niggas messin' with pro-tools and all these effects, and their album sounds like a damn train wreck.

ThaFormula.Com - What led you to start creating beats on the computer Ninth?

9th Wonder - A friend of mine, a good friend of mine by the name of Leroy, (Yorel) he's a Justus League member. We used to argue a lot about who was better, DJ Premier or RZA. I'd say Primo, he'd say RZA, whatever. One day Leroy was like "Yo come down, I'm makin' beats on the computer!" I'm like "why not" so I went down there to his room to check it out. So I'm clickin' around and the first joint I make is garbage, terrible. So I walked away from it came back later. After that I think one of the first joints I made was called "Paper Lines," a joint me and Phonte did a looong time ago.

Phonte - Yeah, like '98 or so.

9th Wonder - It was cool so I ran with it. I mean, I really wanted to learn on a SP or MPC or whatever but I thought, Little Bother has got to revolutionize. But come on man, the MPC is really just a computer in a box!

ThaFormula.Com - A little smaller with a bigger keyboard.

9th Wonder - I mean what's the difference, you may beat a couple pads on the MPC, but I might be clickin' on a mouse. A lot of niggas think because I make beats on the computer that it's gonna sound digital or high tech and futuristic, but I can make my shit sound as dirty as 1991 if I wanted to. I love makin' beats on the computer, I learn new things about it everyday.

ThaFormula.Com - I think a lot of people are gonna change their minds and flip after they hear this album.

9th Wonder - Exactly, it's like whoever the first motherfucker was to use Pro-Tools, now Pro-Tools is everywhere and everyone uses it.

ThaFormula.Com - Yeah, like Rodney Jerkins, that guy owes his career to Pro-Tools.

9th Wonder - Yeah, I can do the same thing. As long as Phonte and Pooh believe in me, and what I can do on the computer, then we should fuck everybody up.

Editor's Note:

After completing this interview, Little Brother appeared on Pete Rock and Marley Marl's radio show, "Future Flavors." We caught up with Phonte to discuss how that came about.

ThaFormula.Com - How did your (Little Brother's) appearance on "Future Flavors" come about?

Phonte - It came about through this cat named Daryl Powell who works at "Up Above Records," this record label in New York. They do a lot of work with our label, ABB. Basically Daryl got a copy of the album, loved it, and gave a copy to Grap Luva. From there, Grap gave a copy to Pete Rock who also said he loved the album. So from then on, we would be talking on the phone with Grap on 3-way on the regular for a while and just bug out. One day Grap was like, "Yo man, I talked to my brother and he said that whenever y'all are ready to make a move, just let him know." It was getting' kind of close to the holiday's so we were like, "let's see if we can do it now before the end of the year comes." We knew that January was going to be a hectic month for us, and that Pete is trying to get the album out in the Spring so we didn't want to be missin' the deadline to jump on there.

ThaFormula.Com - You don't want to run the risk of not getting there at all right?

Phonte - Exactly, you know if Pete messes around and goes over budget before we could jump on, we need to get on while the money's still there! (laughs) So basically that was it man. We had a show Friday night in Charlotte, and Saturday morning we left there and stopped in Maryland to pick up Grap and went from there to Pete's crib. It was just love man, Pete was real cool and real generous, he just played beats, just all fuckin' night!

ThaFormula.Com - Ahh, man. So you were just chillin' in his studio all day and night listening to his new stuff?

Phonte - Yeah, well he really don't have a studio at the crib as far as recording, he just had his equipment for making his beats. He had like two Fender Rhodes keyboards, a little CD burner, and a couple DAT machines, you know just the basic stuff, but not really recording equipment. That's how you know he's just really true to just making beats, he just has his equipment and tons of records, records just everywhere. It took a while for it to set-in. It was like, "Yo man, we are in Pete Rock's crib, damn we're really here in the basement." We just did little stuff while we were there, nothing major. He just played tracks and I was freestylin' over some of them while he threw on some little ad-libs. It might turn up on E-Bay (laughs) We'll probably bootleg the shit and throw it up on E-Bay like 5 or 10 years from now!

ThaFormula.Com - You should have snatched up a piece of the carpet and threw that up on E-Bay, "Carpet from Pete Rock's basement" (laughs) You never know what some of these people will pay for! (laughs)

Phonte - Yeah, straight shags and shit! Nah, he was just playin' tracks and pullin' out sample records like "Yo this is the sample that so-and-so used for so-and-so," we just had a good time man. Saturday he just played beats the whole night, then on Sunday, we woke up and Pooh and I worked on a song.

ThaFormula.Com - So he invited you to stay at the crib?

Phonte - Yeah, we just all stayed over and slept in the basement on the floor. It was love man. So that (Sunday) morning we just woke up, Pooh and I were working on a song and that was pretty much it for Sunday. Pete just stayed in the basement working on tracks until it was time for him to do the show (Future Flavors). Then he called us up and was like "y'all want to ride with us to the show?" So were like "yeah, let's do this."

ThaFormula.Com - It wasn't like, "nah that's all right Pete, we're just gonna head back to NC right now" (laughs)

Phonte - (laughs) Yeah, "you and Marley just do your thing" Hell nah, I ain't missin that shit! (laughs) So we went and did the show, and freestyled for a bit on the air.

ThaFormula.Com - Yeah, I heard that man, you and Pooh did your thing on there, that was nice.

Phonte - Thanks man, it went good. We had a great time. We were actually trying to get together to record while we were up there but we couldn't get it worked out in time. I was a little disappointed because I really wanted to record but you know, Pete gave us some tracks said to do 'em back home and send them to him, so it was cool, we had a real good time. That shit was just monumental. Pete is the god man, word up.

ThaFormula.Com - How was the stuff that Pete gave you? Do I even need to ask?

Phonte - Ahh man! Ridiculous man. One of the joints he had only done like a couple of days ago, he had did it like three days before hand. Then another joint he gave us, he wants to get me and Vinija Monica to sing on.

ThaFormula.Com - That would be dope to get to work with her.

Phonte - Hell yeah, I'd love to work with her. And he gave us a couple more that were real dope. His consistency is just, whew! That man is incredible. You know if anyone was ever wondering if he still has it, he's that nigga dog, word up! I'm not saying that just because I stayed at his house, or as a starstruck fan that's ramblin', but that motherfucker's the truth bruh.' As far as from a beat standpoint, from just that of a traditional producer, not that Dr. Dre or Quincy Jones type producer, just that type of producer that's goes from just a record and a beat machine, that guy's incredible. We just sat there and watched him make beats right in front of our face, the shit that he does is just incredible. Jaydee is the only cat that I could see maybe giving him a run, even though I'm not too fond of some of the stuff he's doing right now, I still know that Jay got some heat that will slap niggas silly. But Pete is just that man. He just emptied out a bag of discs all over the floor. We were loading them in the SP like "yo man, what's this? What's this?"

ThaFormula.Com - Pete was like, "Oh those are just left over 'Main Ingredient' and 'Mecca and the Soul Brother' stuff."

Phonte - (laughs) Man, some of them joints, I don't know how old they were. I mean some of them were stuff he did like a week ago, some if it was stuff from '95 and they all sounded brand new.

ThaFormula.Com - That's the thing with Pete's music, it's hard to say "Oh that's '94 Pete" or "that's '98 Pete," he's just so consistent and on top of things.

Phonte - Yeah, really. Judging from the joints that he let us hear off of "Soul Survivor 2" man, I don't know what else he has planned for the project, but he's off to a great start. He even played a couple of tracks that other producer's gave him, and he even picked out a couple of Ninth's tracks.

ThaFormula.Com - Oh word? I was gonna ask if Ninth slipped him a beat disc.

Phonte - Yeah, he picked a couple of Ninth's that he wanted to rhyme over so hopefully that will happen too. From what I heard so far, c'mon! He's about to set niggas up next year with this one.

ThaFormula.Com - What kind of feedback did Pete have about "The Listening?"

Phonte - Oh man, he loved it man. He was just like "Yo man, classic material, it's a classic album man." He said "it's just straight up beats and rhymes." He was lovin' the singin,' he was just like "I love this album man." It was dope. He really appreciated the shout out we gave him on "Nighttime Maneuvers."

ThaFormula.Com - Oh yeah, with the T.R.O.Y. horns.

Phonte - Yeah, with the horns, and the line I had, "drink some Peach Schnapps', and doze off to Pete Rock." He was just like "yo man, that really meant a lot to me." He just praised the album, really praised Ninth's beats. He asked Ninth "What do you do your beats on?" Ninth told him "a computer," and Pete was just like "Word? Just keep doin' what you're doin' man."

ThaFormula.Com - That's dope to hear something like that especially from Pete, because I know a lot of people try to front on producers that use a computer. You know, if he told Ninth to keep doing his thing, then that's like a seal of approval. He didn't tell him, "you know, you need to give this SP a whirl."

Phonte - Yeah, you know what I'm sayin? Like Pete man, this nigga up until like a year and some change ago, hadn't even touched the MPC yet. It was just really inspiring to hear him giving us praise. He's a real cool cat.

ThaFormula.Com - That's dope man, it must have taken a while to set in. Like on the way back home in the ride, you'd be like "man, we were just all up in Pete's refrigerator!"

Phonte - (laughs) Yeah, man. Drinkin' up all his tea and playin' video games. For real man, that guy s just a master, cats lookin' for just that straight up no frills hip-hop, he's one of the last men standing. 

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