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Alex Da Kid Interview
RnB/Hip Hop | Wednesday 23rd November 2011 | Osh
The young UK producer has made his name on the other side of the pond big time. We had a chat with him to find out a bit about his past, present and future in the hip hop music business.
You were a professional football player and played for Bristol City, what was that like?
Yeah I mean I didn’t play in the first team, I was just a youth player but yeah it was good man, when I was at school I wanted to be a football player. I played for Bristol City, I played for Barnet for a little bit, I played semi-pro a bit. Yeah man, that’s what I thought I was going to be.
So why did you make that change from football to music?
I got injured a lot and at Barnet I started falling out with the manager. I started to fall out of love with it to be honest, I started going out a lot and just started falling out of love I suppose.
So you’ve got a Bachelor’s degree in audio technology, we take it that you’re very clued up when it comes to your music. You’ve obviously achieved a lot since leaving the UK?
The thing about going to university was that I didn’t do it for the degree, I did it really to learn and I wanted to be around people that love music as much as me and make it a full time occupation. So that was my main goal and I started getting good grades and stuff and I managed to get a 1st so that was kind of cool, but I really wanted to learn really that was my whole thing.
That’s a good success story to tell the youth of today in the UK no doubt.
Yeah!
You have worked with some amazing artists from Rihanna to Nicky Minaj, Diddy Dirty Money, Skylar Grey, TI, the list goes on really. Who’s the most memorable you’ve worked with and why?
I’d say the most memorable was Dre’s first single for ‘Detox’ called ‘I Need A Doctor’ and me and Skylar went to Detroit because Em[inem] was helping him mic some of the stuff for ‘Detox’ and that’s one of the first things we played and Em fell in love with it straight away and Dre loved it. Em started writing some stuff and Dre started writing some stuff, over a couple of days it kind of got finished and when it got finished it was emotional because he’d been working on it for so long and he’s such an icon as well as one of my heroes. Everybody that was in the room, there was a lot of people because he travels with a lot of musicians, everybody that was in the room had been working on it for like ten or eleven years and for him to finally say that like “that’s a single”, everyone was just so happy because he’s a perfectionist and people I look up to, it was great.
That must have been an amazing experience and a sense relief as well once it was all completed and accepted?
It obviously affected me a lot, I could see it in everybody’s faces that they’ve been around him for so long and they’ve been doing this for ten years that it meant so much more to them. I came into it for two weeks and they were doing it for ten years, everybody just being there, and that was also on my birthday as well.
Excellent! You can’t ask for a better present than that can you?
It was kind of crazy, Skylar started crying, it was deep!
Are there any UK artists you would like to work with?
There’s loads I respect, I mean I love what Tinie’s [Tempah] doing, I love what Wiley’s doing, I love what Wretch 32 is doing, Scorcher, Chipmunk, there’s loads, I’m also looking to sign people, that’s my whole thing now, I’m not working with a lot of people who aren’t signed to me. I’m super open to all of that, since I left England, it’s really moved on now and now American’s know who Tinie is. I’m excited, I’m actually coming back to England soon in couple of weeks and I’m going to meet some of them, sit down, play some music and see what’s up.
Can you give an exclusive of who you’re going to collaborating soon?
I’m working with the same people that I worked with before and I’ve been working with Em. Everybody who I have been working with I’m trying to take their stuff to another level. I recently did some stuff with U2 for the Spiderman play. Bono is one of my musical heroes, so I worked with him and we spoke about doing some stuff for the new album because they have an album coming out soon. I want to do big epic things.
If you could be in charge of a country for a week, which one would it be and what three laws would you implement?
I would probably be in charge of Brazil. I would make them put like statues of me everywhere and like just pray for me. I’d make all the women have to wear bikini’s 24/7 and all the songs on the radio have to be mine!
You can catch up with what Alex is doing and has to say on Twitter @alexdakid
You were a professional football player and played for Bristol City, what was that like?
Yeah I mean I didn’t play in the first team, I was just a youth player but yeah it was good man, when I was at school I wanted to be a football player. I played for Bristol City, I played for Barnet for a little bit, I played semi-pro a bit. Yeah man, that’s what I thought I was going to be.
So why did you make that change from football to music?
I got injured a lot and at Barnet I started falling out with the manager. I started to fall out of love with it to be honest, I started going out a lot and just started falling out of love I suppose.
So you’ve got a Bachelor’s degree in audio technology, we take it that you’re very clued up when it comes to your music. You’ve obviously achieved a lot since leaving the UK?
The thing about going to university was that I didn’t do it for the degree, I did it really to learn and I wanted to be around people that love music as much as me and make it a full time occupation. So that was my main goal and I started getting good grades and stuff and I managed to get a 1st so that was kind of cool, but I really wanted to learn really that was my whole thing.
That’s a good success story to tell the youth of today in the UK no doubt.
Yeah!
You have worked with some amazing artists from Rihanna to Nicky Minaj, Diddy Dirty Money, Skylar Grey, TI, the list goes on really. Who’s the most memorable you’ve worked with and why?
I’d say the most memorable was Dre’s first single for ‘Detox’ called ‘I Need A Doctor’ and me and Skylar went to Detroit because Em[inem] was helping him mic some of the stuff for ‘Detox’ and that’s one of the first things we played and Em fell in love with it straight away and Dre loved it. Em started writing some stuff and Dre started writing some stuff, over a couple of days it kind of got finished and when it got finished it was emotional because he’d been working on it for so long and he’s such an icon as well as one of my heroes. Everybody that was in the room, there was a lot of people because he travels with a lot of musicians, everybody that was in the room had been working on it for like ten or eleven years and for him to finally say that like “that’s a single”, everyone was just so happy because he’s a perfectionist and people I look up to, it was great.
That must have been an amazing experience and a sense relief as well once it was all completed and accepted?
It obviously affected me a lot, I could see it in everybody’s faces that they’ve been around him for so long and they’ve been doing this for ten years that it meant so much more to them. I came into it for two weeks and they were doing it for ten years, everybody just being there, and that was also on my birthday as well.
Excellent! You can’t ask for a better present than that can you?
It was kind of crazy, Skylar started crying, it was deep!
Are there any UK artists you would like to work with?
There’s loads I respect, I mean I love what Tinie’s [Tempah] doing, I love what Wiley’s doing, I love what Wretch 32 is doing, Scorcher, Chipmunk, there’s loads, I’m also looking to sign people, that’s my whole thing now, I’m not working with a lot of people who aren’t signed to me. I’m super open to all of that, since I left England, it’s really moved on now and now American’s know who Tinie is. I’m excited, I’m actually coming back to England soon in couple of weeks and I’m going to meet some of them, sit down, play some music and see what’s up.
Can you give an exclusive of who you’re going to collaborating soon?
I’m working with the same people that I worked with before and I’ve been working with Em. Everybody who I have been working with I’m trying to take their stuff to another level. I recently did some stuff with U2 for the Spiderman play. Bono is one of my musical heroes, so I worked with him and we spoke about doing some stuff for the new album because they have an album coming out soon. I want to do big epic things.
If you could be in charge of a country for a week, which one would it be and what three laws would you implement?
I would probably be in charge of Brazil. I would make them put like statues of me everywhere and like just pray for me. I’d make all the women have to wear bikini’s 24/7 and all the songs on the radio have to be mine!
You can catch up with what Alex is doing and has to say on Twitter @alexdakid
