#481 - Blu & Exile

Yo, what a world. This is Blu Blue, this is Exile and we're live on.

A bootleg keV podcast. Check us out, Yo, bootleg keV podcast. Man special guests in here. We got Blue and Exile in the building.

Well well oh yeah, ye years was up with a keV what's up? Manill it to you guys. I know recently, you guys just celebrated what year anniversary of Below the Heavens was it?

We just celebrated at the fifteenth, but it's I think it's the eighteenth now or seventeenth, seventeenth.

It's such a classic album, man, Oh good looks man? Yeah, all these years later. It's crazy because I just think I think about, like how like an underground classic, Like not a lot of people can say that, like the strength of like how amazing a project was like landing them on a like I feel like that Double XL cover was important because you were like a representation of like to me, like a like a demographic of hip

Oh let me see Asher Roth Mickey Fax.

That was that was like the second one.

Right, Yeah, that was the second one, yeap, yup, yup.

Yeah, that was like wile A was on it, right, wile A was on it, Cutty was on it.

Yeah, very blog era.

Yeah, definitely that time yup, Yeah, that's.

That was actually the cover that kind of like, uh made that ship because the first cover I feel like kind of came and went I think like Crooked I was on it, Joel was on it. But the second cover I feel like kind of really kicked off like the wave of that freshman class meaning.

Yeah, right, I feel that. I feel that. Yeah, that was dope. Man. It was an honor to be a part of that class man, you know what I mean?

Man, You guys, uh, obviously just put out a new album. What what was What was it about the timing to give the fans something that they've been asking for in twenty twenty four?

X always say, you know, we dropped it because I finally stopped dropping albums for so he had a little window to drop something. You know what I mean, I've been dropping so much lately.

You have you been super active? Yeah?

Yeah, man, you know what I mean, been going hard? Uh have my son Man and I just turned it up, you know what I mean?

Would you say, because sometimes it happens the other way. You'll have kids and then you'll be like, I'm gonna kick back.

Yeah for real, for real, you know what I mean. But you gotta pay those bills extra mouth to feed, man, you know what I mean.

So would you say that the having a kid motivated you to have more output musically?

Yeah, definitely. I just turned it up. I went an overdrive when my son was born.

Yeah.

You know, I recorded like, uh seven albums last year, that's you know what I mean.

Yeah, I was just telling you the album with Evidence is special. Man. Oh thanks, some real fucking you know, for anybody who's like a fan of like like early two thousands, late nineties, just La boombap shit gave me like real remnants.

Oh, word up, word up for sure. Yeah, definitely.

What's the difference between like working on with someone like EV and working with you know, one of the greatest to ever touch an NPC right now?

Man?

There's a lot of similarities actually, you know what I mean. Both of them are perfectionists in their own right, you know what I mean. But the difference. I always try to make the music different, you know what I mean, And the music is already different, you know what I mean, between Evan and Exile or you know Shaffique or you know Roy Royal with me, I tend to work with one producer on a project.

Which is important. I feel like it's the lost art form.

Yeah, man, it helps. It helps keep the consistency, you know what I mean. And a project. You know, I love that. I love the consistency of an album that you could just put it on and you get the whole vibe. You just listen to the whole tape, you know what I mean?

Uh X for you man? Like you? I feel like are somehow one of the more underrated producers in the game. What outside of working with Blue? Like, what else have you been working on? What else you got going on? Back recently? Uh?

Let's see uh uh. Me and Fashion have been starting to work a little bit more.

He's on the album right, Yeah, he's on the album as well.

Me and Blue still got a whole bunch more. We're still working a lot as well. Yeah, we got some more in store. I did an Exile radio album where I sampled everything off of like LA Radio Waves, the drums, the high hats, and I got.

A part two cooking wait when you say you sampled everything off of so you would like just listen to the radio and sample straight from radio de Yeah.

Wow yeah, yeah, yeah, it's a it's a slept on, it's a slept on, a gem of a It's all instrumental, yeah, instrumental. But my goal was to try to have like a real message with the music. So I was able to kind of like manipulate what I heard on the radio into a message that I stood by.

So well, I gotta check that out. Yeah, you know it's has anybody trying rapping over that ship?

Yeah? Actually Evidence did a full album to that.

Really, yeah, what he did.

But then at the same time, I was doing an album where I was getting different artists to wrap on it as well. I put it out It's called am FM, and I fucked it all up. I should have just I should have put that out because now I'm trying to.

Get it's not out.

We only used some of it.

Yeah, he did a whole album just to that. He did. What in the world in which Evidence is not rapping as much as I'd like him too. That sounds amazing.

Yeah, yeah, you can hear some of it. It's called AMFM. Exile AMFM, So.

There are some of the evidence, but he did a whole project.

He did it was dope. Man. I was just like so involved in the project I was already doing. I'm like, oh man, I'm already doing this, but I always kind of kicked myself for it and let that one drop Blue.

I'm curious like your Oh, I guess both of you guys growing up in southern California. I would say you guys were kind of like the generation. I mean, you guys are like blog era, Yeah, very much so right, And prior to you guys, there was like dilated people's in J five and Freestyle Fellowship and all that. What were some of your bigger inspirations in terms of just like the southern California hip hop scene that I feel like doesn't get enough shine.

Everybody that was coming out man, J five, self scientific.

Self scientific for sure, come on.

Man, the Stone Store, Roster, Oh no, Med you know what I mean, Mad Lib Man there from the Bay, Yes, and I from the Bay.

King T and DJ Pooh. That's kind of one of my first inspirations to want to do a full production album.

Actually really shout to the Liquid crew man, Yeah, yeah, serious. Yeah, even all that like era or right before I'm talking about just like like the I feel like there was like such a dope underground scene in La. Oh yeah I was.

I was a teenager standing out in front of the club selling tapes out of my backpack, mixtapes and that's what got me and Alo popping off. We had a group called Eminon and one tape would be a mixtape of everybody that we fucked with, and the other side would be all of our songs. So I'd be like, Yo, buy this tape. It's got all these cats, and then they were able.

To listen to the other side.

Yeah, this is this is a pre you know, internet era. So we went viral by our you know, the tapes being dubbed and dubbed and dubbed, right, and those are the days now.

Alos on the album, right, Alos on.

The album as well. Yeah. But back then, yeah, you know, Project blowed living legends. You know.

I just remember like as a kid going to Fat Beats. I grew up in Phoenix, so we can't we drove out here to go to uh. I think it was the ex Oh yeah, it was the Dilated People's Expansion Team released like week and we went to Fat Beats and I went to Fat Beats for the first time and it was like fucking I was like, this is the greatest place on earth. And there was very much like I remember, like dudes selling like their ship like to the people in line, like that was like a real thing.

Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, those are the days, man. I would I would easily press the button to get rid of Internet and just slank tapes out of the backpack. Again, No, I don't know.

Well, for I wonder too, could you guys have kind of seen different sides of the music industry in terms of just kind of evolution of how it's being monetized, right, like streaming and you kind of hear streaming obviously it's a little predatory in the way you get paid. But there is like less of a barrier between fans and artists now, like you could just hit upload, I guess, you know, as opposed to like we got to press up CDs and we gotta press up vine and all that.

For me? The first the first album we did below the heavens. Right when it dropped, they told us, you know, iTunes was just getting popping, you know what I mean.

It was like, oh seven right.

They put up they put our tape on on uh on iTunes. I don't even think it was.

And our album leaked, so it was actually like the blog era that really saved us and championed us, Like our album leaked and okay player chat rooms is really.

Yeah, blue and bus up.

Like we we were on the road touring before the album even dropped, and there was cats who knew the word the lyrics to the songs we were doing, and me and me and we were bugging out.

Yeah, we were debuting the songs and.

You were thinking that you guys were doing it for the first time and people know.

The lyrics exactly exactly.

The whole tour message boards were crazy. Yeah yeah, yeah, no, that's how like my name Bootleg keV I got it because I was I would go on those message boards download mixtapes because it was like the mixtape era. I would just with little money I had go buy some CDs, burn them.

I go to the spot that's that face to face energy like g UNIT radio and like that.

That's all that fifty ship and even.

Oh yeah that's oh yeah, fifty cents.

It's crazy. So yeah, because for people who don't know, okay player was, it was kind of like the I would say, like the most important hip hop site for like a decade, because like I feel like when I was a little kid and we had internet access to school, we go to okay Player.

Mm hmm yeah. I would go to okay Player on Stone Store. That was it, man.

And then like I even feel like you could. I feel like we used to chat with people on okay Player, like you could chat with other people, which was like weird because like I never chatted with nobody, but you could go in there and talk with motherfuckers about like whatever. Yeah, that was the roots site.

Right, yeah, that was the roots.

Yeah yeah, damn, that's crazy because I'm trying to think. So O seven was like I feel like the blogg error really started to crack and like eight on nine, huh because O seven was still pretty early, like you said, that was more like more message boards, like you know, still hand to hand mixtapes and shit like that, and like people were had like bear share and like what LimeWire.

Yeah yeah, and all that Twitter and ig started cracking around eight on nine too.

For sure, yeah, oh nine for Twitter, Yeah yeah, no, it was definitely uh, it was definitely a time. But fast forward now, Like for you guys, you guys have very few people can say they have like a classic body of work. You guys have a classic body of work that I feel like, you know, if we look at the way that Illmatic has been like repackaged and put out every time, it's like a university timestamp.

U huh.

I thought it was dope that you guys put out like new hard copies and tapes and new merch for the album. Oh yeah, for you guys, like, how has the business change being like an underground quote unquote hip hop artist in twenty twenty four as opposed to seven?

You know, the streaming game is what changed everything. That's the biggest change, just the streaming, you know what I mean. It's like, uh, you you you learn all these tools to like sell your merch, you know what I'm saying, and all of a sudden, your music is just being you know what I mean, right almost for free ten dollars a month.

Because you're really not making much money off of streams. For people who don't know, like a million streams is like thirty eight hundred dollars on Spotify yep. So it's like you got to kind of do everything else around the music. The music is kind of like the commercial for the shirt or the hoodeah or real the vinyl exactly exactly.

The music is starting to play the backdrop, you know what I'm saying. But we try to keep it in the forefront though, you know what I mean.

That's dope.

Man.

What are you guys most excited about with this new album and the fans been loving it?

The fans have been loving it, man, I'm really really excited to hit the roll with it because of how much they're loving it, you know what I mean, how much impact we're getting, how much like a input we're getting already from the album. Yeah, I mean, people are telling us it's just amazing, bro.

Yeah, it's a dope album. I listened to it last night. Great album. Oh good, love my workout, great great body of work for.

Sure Ward it up, Ward it up. Yeah. Man, excited to rock those joints, you know what I'm saying. Yep, that's me.

Are you guys putting it tour together?

Yeah? We were leaving this Friday.

Oh so how many yeah? Shit, how many dates?

About like seventeen dates? We're doing a Frisco October four, San Francisco.

Nice.

Yeah, then yeah, just going all across the country. You know, go look up the dates on Dirty Signs, Ohrecords dot com or just hit the link in our bio XIL.

I'm curious. You're one of the goats when it comes to like just working an NPC. How have you, if at all, changed, because technolog I feel like with DJ's like DJ's got Serrado and then shit just kind of changed for everybody. And then now we got controllers, where before it was like we had a turntables and the mixer and now there's just one piece of equipment. Have you switched up your process and making beats at all over the years or is it still just the same.

Well, as far as the live show, I do live NPC, you know, no loops or anything, just like live per cushion.

It's fine type shit.

And I'm still lugging around the heavy ass NPC two thousand uh for tours. As far as production, I still use the NPC two thousand XCEL, but I have started messing around with a little bit of DOS just to help me work with live musicians and whatnot.

I was talking to my dude Bugs the Beasts, who's a big producers and a lot of stuff for Kanye and he works exclusively. He used to be an NPC two thousand. He works exclusively off of the the NPC that has the speaker in it.

Yeah, you know, I want to get that. I need to get that.

He's like, dude, He's like, I take this ship with me everywhere. He's like, and I'm making beats on it. But the best part is it is like I could plug in in whatever session and everything I have right there.

And it's about, you know, three fourths less the weight of NPC.

And I and it's got a battery. Yeah, so you don't have to have you don't have to have a power.

I'm sleeping. I gotta do it. I gotta Getah.

There's no power outlet, right, so it's like, if it's charged, you could make take that bitch anywhere.

Yeah.

So yeah, no, what what what you said? You do some of the digital ship, Like what do you what do you use?

I mess around with Serado.

Sample samples home. Yeah, yeah, yeah, I know a lot of people love Ableton. Yeah, Ableton looks crazy though.

Yeah, I've made a couple of beats on that I don't you know, I can't.

Yeah, Uh, for you guys, man, who I mean being your guys's taste and what you guys are into and kind of what we know you guys to be making. Is there any artists from the newer generation that you guys are fans of that you guys are checking for you kind of man?

All the new artists I check them out and they already got twelve albums out, bro, So I don't know if they knew or not. I'm thinking like Code of the Friend, He's hard, Navy blue, you know what I mean. The Russell L Russell.

Russell's got a lot of albums.

Yeah, you know what I'm saying. It has been out for a minute. I feel like, you know, I just get hip to him and I'm like they new to me.

But you know, no, he's a new artist. But he's also got like yeah, oh yeah, sixty projects or something.

Man, that's going hard bro.

Yeah, I mean you know what's about him is he does it's very similar to you. Is he'll work with like a producer, for a whole album, yeah, or an artist.

Yeah, you know, so.

You should you should tap in with the Russell. I think you guys should have some ship.

Yeah, that'd be do I'm down, Yeah, that'd be hard.

Is there anybody you want to work with us, like Younger that you kind of checking for? Yeah?

Yeah, Huey brissh Nana, who's on our album.

Not a dope, who's dope as dope?

Hell yeah?

And uh, the cat Mugs worked with its crazy too.

Oh Ross Fresco Ros Fresco.

Yeah, the Mugs been on his ship man just quietly just putting.

Out he he's low Keith to got man Like, is this longevity in the game?

And I just ran into Mayhem Lorent at the fucking Rouse by my house, which is right by Mugs studio in Burbank. How's the funk are you doing? Is I'm working on album? Bugs?

Oh yeah, yeah, that's my idol.

I'm curious for you.

Blue.

Like the Freshman covers always like a weird thing because it kind of sets up these like expectations for people commercially, did you feel like there was like a gift in a curse to kind of like being on that cover at that time.

Yeah, nah, I was love, you know what I mean. I always felt I was just mad love. They were just showing, you know what I mean, Like I'm underground, you know what I'm saying. So I wasn't like trying to be commercial or anything. We just got a Warner Brothers deal at the time, so it was like it was fitting, you know what I mean. But you know, we still kept it true to being underground.

He was extra underground with it, extra artsy. He did his back turned to the camera and history for the double XCEL. I loved this though.

Who was it? I wonder because I don't remember all the way back then did the ciphers? Was everybody together? Because I know now they split.

Out an interview for the interview.

But the cipher like did like who did you wrap with for your cipher?

You No, I wasn't even a cipher. They just had us.

Everyone did an individual rap.

Yeah makes such yep.

It's a long time ago, fuck man. Yeah, Yeah, it's crazy because like I feel like the music industry can have like its ups and downs. Do you guys feel like you've ever been through like a point in time in your careers where like you were thinking about maybe giving up or quitting music, just maybe moving on.

Yeah, man, I was actually thinking about becoming a producer back in the days, and then my studio ended up getting robbed, bro, So I had like had this studio twenty fifteen, man, you know, And it was weird because I was transitioning into like being a DJ and a producer, and then all my equipment got jack so then it was just me and the raps. That's all I had left, you know what I'm saying. So I had to step right back into it.

You know what I'm crazy.

Yep. I felt it was like it was a weird divine intervention right there, you know what I'm saying.

It like a fork in the road, almost like Verse telling you, like, no, you gotta still wrap. Yeah you're not done yet. Yeah you're too good man looks yeah. Man, all right, So tours come in, people can go. You guys. I'm sure you guys are gonna be going overseas too.

Yeah.

We have a Europe tour in December, and the dates and the tickets a up for sale right now in our bio.

So go support that, go get the album. I'm sure there's vinyls and all that.

Yeah, we got the vinyls and everything. Yeah, Dirty Science Records dot Com. You can go to Exile Radio on Instagram.

Blue her favorite color. You know what I mean, go follow these guys.

We're gonna have Blue do what he does best. Yeah, did you make this beat compilation that's about to pop off?

Is this was?

Hey?

Yeah? You know it's just it's just me on the decks, you know, giving Blue some some classic beats. Flip says, he's got this freestyle that's crazy.

Let's get right to it, man, we're gonna have that's a separate YouTube video. But yeah, make sure you go follow these guys. Man. You guys are fucking amazing. Man. So I'm glad you guys put out a new album and apparently there's more new music on the way.

Yep, yep.

How much unreleased Blue and Xile is like on hard drives?

Do not even ask? Oh?

Yeah, over one hundred joints for sure. Wow, But I think about like, yeah, we got about seventy that's gonna be coming up.

Is there any other music blew out? I mean outside of working with Xile, do you have anything else on the way.

I'm gonna say it is the same way we hit this year, We're trying to hit next year, so it's gonna be stacked.

You and Evidence got more shit coming.

Me and Evidence. We're talking about it about bringing up you know what I mean.

You know what you should since you kind of wanted to be a producer, you should say fuck it and flip flip the script the next album. Huh your beats his wraps. I like it there it is. Man. Appreciate you guys.

Oh yeah, appreciate you. Mall in xile Connor to be here, bro Boom