http://www.hardknock.tv Nick Huff Barili of Hard Knock TV, in collaboration with www.GRAMMY.com sits down with the legendary Chuck D for in-depth interview. In part 1, Chuck talks writing process, bomb squad, artists leaving major record labels + More. Transcript below: NICK HUFF BARILI: "There's a lot of talk these days about major artists leaving record labels, but you're actually one of the first to do it, in the late '90s when you left Def Jam. Can you talk about why it was important for you to do so?" CHUCK D "In 1998, it was just time. Time to leave. Rick Ruben had left in '89 and Russell and everybody had ventured off to somewhere else, and we saw no way to grow and also be part of the new phase, which is, the internet. We started PublicEnemy.com in 1998, the longest-running internet situation for a rap artist. Beastie Boys started before us, and I think that's it. You can do something innovative, but if you don't have people on the other side to be able to present it and catch it with the technology, then you could be, you know, on you mark get set go, but you're in the desert, so to make that long story short, we left Def Jam in 1998, but we put things in place to ease us into the transition of the millennium and knew that the big companies would try to seize that, 'cause they felt that it cannibalized their industry, and now it's, you know, it's, it's an afterthought when people say, oh, yeah, I'm gonna get online and, I'm part of this thing and I'm with iTunes and all of that and, so it's just, like, second-nature, especially artists that have grown up in it. But with us, we had to figure out, where we were gonna be, where we came from and how would that also gel with the thing that we do, and that's physically being live in front of an audience. At the end of the day, your recording is a business card for your performance. It has to advertise who you are. So we are not gonna be defined by a recording. We're gonna be defined by us making the recordings, and that's one thing we had to totally flip into after 1999. We will make this recording. This recording won't make us, but we had 10 years under our belt, too, in our favor." NICK HUFF BARILI: "I heard that, your writing process starts with you thinking of the title of the song and then create (a song). Can you, elaborate a little bit more about the process of writing a song is for you?" CHUCK D (LAUGH) "You just said it. (INTERVIEWER LAUGHS) You know, come up with a title. It's like a road map. You know your destination. See, sometimes it might work where you say, oh, I've got this idea, but I don't know what this idea is, so I'm gonna write. I don't waste words. There's not a lot on the cutting room floor when you come up with a title. You should talk about a song before you write it. Can we have a conversation of what the hell you're talking about, and then can you put it into words, and then can you put it into a song? And then if there's--it's truncating and editing, 'cause, you know, sometimes you might have an idea and this is why it's key to work together with producers and work together with somebody who is gonna have the governing, um, authority to make a song out of it. You've got to make a song out of the lyrics and music, then, uh, so that's where it starts. It starts from the idea. Sometimes you could write aimlessly and end up in a place, but that's a waste of time to me. It's, like, wow. We're gonna talk about this, find a great title and let's try to, figure out how you bread crumb people into listening. Uh, you know." NICK HUFF BARILI "One of my favorite, lines of yours is, I don't rhyme for the sake of riddling. Can you speak about writing with purpose?" CHUCK D "Well, I feel that when you're writing a song, you better write about something. I'm not opposed to people that make singles, because a single is what hits your mind, so you're gonna go about it. If you're commissioned to make an album, you can't talk about the same thing over eight songs. I mean, you can, and you have artists that do it, but just because you can get away with it doesn't mean you should do it, 'cause it's lazy and it's gonna cut into your artistry. Some people could get away with it. Very few could get away with it. Most people can't. So when it comes down to, writing a song that means something, I think every song should be able to nail its subject, even if you're writing about, shoot, you're writing about booty, be good at writing it. (INTERVIEWER LAUGHS) I mean, yeah, I mean, (LAUGH) it's--doing it over 10 songs, you better be a connoisseur, you know? (LAUGH). Check out full transcript at www.hardknock.tv Make sure to subscribe to www.youtube.com/hardknocktv for our latest videos. You can follow us at www.facebook.com/hardknocktv and @Hardknocktv @NickHuff on twitter.

• published: 18 Apr 2014
• views: 18710