It's okay to not be working all the time and to be gentle on yourself when you're not. When it feels like you're losing that inspiration - or you're in a rut, not making stuff, and your head gets all weird - be gentle on yourself. Just ease into things naturally. But you still have to ease into it: you still have to sit in the chair.
Flying Lotus
It's the old-school jazz mentality that I connect with the most. I dig the idea of the seeker, the guy who's always trying to figure out why he is doing music and trying to understand and make sense of his instrument in a world which deals with rigid instruction.
The first beat that I ever made that I thought was actually worth a damn was called 'Toilet Paper Nostrils,' and I made it when I had a cold. I had the worst cold ever. And I had toilet-paper nostrils making music, but it was really reflective of how I felt. It was a really sad trumpet sound.
I love my Fender Rhodes. It's been a part of my family since that keyboard came out, and I've had it reworked so that it's in the best condition it's actually ever been in. That is my baby.
I feel like part of my journey as a filmmaker is to tell different stories, whether they are just a black perspective on things that aren't necessarily hood movies, or Tyler Perry movies or Ava DuVernay movies. Love all those people, but that whole thing has been sowed up already.
It's tough when you're an artist because you get to go around the world and make a lot of friends, but guess what? One day, all these people that you love are going to die, from DJ Mehdi to DJ Dusk to J Dilla to Austin Peralta to DJ Rashad.
Whenever it gets a little cold in L.A., it gives me an excuse to light my fireplace. You could stare at that joint for, like, a cool two hours. It's entrancing.
Childish Gambino - him and I are the same age, and I really like him.
The Internet makes it possible for everyone to collaborate.
I was first inspired to make music by my cousin Oran. He was making music on an old Mac II by himself in his little lab, and I just started taking up after him. He was the first person to put a machine in front of me to work on. He was like my big brother, someone who I looked up to.
I'm not much of a coffee person, but when I wake up and the sun is shining through the window, I'll get a lil' bit of green tea and get to work.
I go through phases when I'm super into my anime stuff.
People don't really care to be around you when you're going through tough times.
Takashi Miike is definitely one of my top five, you know?
We're all trying so hard to be beautiful, but the people in 'Kuso' are trying so hard to be disgusting.
I've been working with Thundercat forever.
Part of what I like to do with Brainfeeder is to get the younger kids hearing jazz, because they don't know where to go to really hear it. Brainfeeder gives me a platform to put out people like Kamasi Washington or Austin Peralta.
The producer role attracts introverts. Making music on your computer is so appealing to someone who just sits in their room all day.
I am a big cinema nerd! I've absorbed a lot of films.
I grew up in the San Fernando Valley, which doesn't feel like L.A. It's a bit different. It's still L.A. County, but it's not the same, it's not the kind of place where they embrace you for being a weirdo. You were just left alone with your Nintendo, and that was my life.
I feel like my music has a reputation for being pretty serious or whatnot, but I like having fun.
I found so many reasons to call it 'You're Dead!' - not just because I wanted to make this album about the journey through death. I was watching the music scene that I came up with kind of go stale and watching the lights go out on a lot of my friends.
I always feel like the past informs my present musically.
I first was introduced to really, I guess, underground electronic music when I was in middle school.
My music divides people!
I like Philip Glass. I think he's made some really great contributions to his field. I love his style of playing - it's very loop-style.
'Cosmogramma' is basically the studies that map out the universe and the relations of heaven and hell.
I don't have a great story, but I love Boards of Canada. I didn't get into it when it was happening; I got into it later on.
Truth be told, I think jazz is a mind-set. It's not necessarily, like, this guy picked up a horn and did this or whatever.
Before saying, 'This track is so dope; it's gonna go on the album,' I like to take some time away from it and see how I feel about it in a few months. If it's gonna get released, I gotta love it - it's gonna have my name on it forever.
I actually really liked the music to the 'Friday the 13th' Nintendo game. I still listen to it all the time. I sampled it in a couple records, too. It's hypnotic and dark but also really pretty.
I wish I could write music notation. Even if I couldn't play it, I wish I could just write it.
I had a little Walkman, the worst Walkman ever. It was the yellow one, that underwater Walkman. Like you need to take a Walkman under water.
I believe there's more than this - that maybe, when we die, our brains conjure up some kind of shutdown experience, and that's what people try to sum up as the afterlife.
When I was in middle school, that's when I first started making beats. I was maybe 14, 16, something like that.
I'm so thankful that I had music to turn to in the dark times and be able to understand myself through it.
I took to the synthesizer. My cousin had some synthesizers, and I'd always make stuff on those things.
I played saxophone for a while when I was a kid.
Thundercat put me on to George Duke.
If I have to be 'the experimental guy' or whatever, then I'll roll with it.
I'm not the kind of person who's always out at the club if I don't have to be. I like chilling. I think that comes across in my music.
Thundercat, specifically, is insane. I'm always surprised at the things he comes up with when we're jamming out together. I gotta try to keep up with him and his ideas, be able to respond without speaking, and come through with some more music. He challenges me to keep it musical and not so computer.
I definitely learned to communicate with other musicians better. I used to feel so intimidated by guys who can read notes, like, 'Oh my God, they're gonna think I'm not even gonna be able to sit at the table.' But I've come to see that a lot of these musicians don't know how to read music either, and that made me feel good.
I wouldn't want to get involved with a game that's a stinker - I can smell one of those a mile away.
I know what it's like listening to Aphex Twin driving down the beach.
I'm a geek, man.
I had the whole 'Ghostbusters' toy set with the firehouse and the car and everything. Sometimes I'd use my grandpa's camera and make little stop-motion cartoons with those toys - I was definitely a weird kid.
I was a real big fan of Lil Wayne when he first came out.
In high school, I was that guy who was trying to be cool with everybody, but I never really had a core group of friends.
If I work with Bjork, then I'll be a happy soul, man.
