Artist: Z-Trip Album: "Shifting Gears" Record Label: Hollywood Records Rating: Three and half stars out of five stars
You may not think the word "mash-up" has the potential to anger anyone. But if your artistic career has been completely dictated by your ability to effectively blend two unlikely genres of music into an innovative composition of your own creation, then the tendency to have said career pigeonholed is highly likely.
For years, though, since the early days of hip-hop, pioneers were tinkering with the culture's genetic code, exploring the fringes of each of its four elements. When it comes to the blending of music, if your definition for a mash-up is derived from Bambaataa's "Planet Rock," Run DMC/Aerosmith's "Walk This Way," Public Enemy/Anthrax's "Bring Tha Noize" or even Jay-Z/Linkin Park's "Ultimate Mash-Up," the intention is to look at hip-hop as a form of music that transcends all boundaries and predispositions. This mentality is what has made renowned DJ Z-Trip such an important figure to the creative evolution of hip-hop.
With his collaboration with like-minded colleague DJ P, Z-Trip's first taste of success came in 2001 with the release of "Uneasy Listening Vol. I," an underground smash that illustrated P and Z-Trip's knack for effective musical blending and turntable trickery. From there, Z-Trip has been relentlessly touring the world over, showcasing his penchant for creating quality hip-hop and doing what DJs have been doing since the movement's formative years - rockin' the party.
The Daily Texan had an opportunity during this year's SXSW Music Festival to sit down with Z-Trip to discuss his major label debut album, "Shifting Gears," his role in Doug Pray's (Hype!) sequel to the critically acclaimed hip-hop film "Scratch" and exactly why he has such a distaste for the word "mash-up."
Daily Texan: Can you recall your first experience with DJing?
Z-Trip: I guess, hearing Marley Marl when I grew up in NYC.That's when I first heard hip-hop on the radio. I would listen to that stuff religiously. Marley Marl was playing songs I had never heard before and doing things to these songs I had never heard before. I became interested and wanted to find/hear more of it. I would literally take the cassette I recorded the night before to the record store and play it for someone. I would ask them, 'what is this?'
DT: Can you remember the first set of turntables you beat up?
ZT: My mom's set at the house. At first, we didn't think it would mess up our parents' equipment. While other kids on the block were getting new bikes, I worked an entire summer and saved up to get my own set of decks. I got turntables before I could drive or anything. I bought my first turntables off of a guy who played country music. All he would do was play records and flip the dust cover back down. I had never seen such a pristine pair of tables like that before. I bought them, took them home and proceeded to beat the shit out of them.
DT: How did your environment foster your understanding of hip-hop elements?
ZT: I didn't just grow up in New York, I was raised in Arizona as well. I was going back and forth due to my parents' divorce, so in NY, I was learning about hip-hop, but in Arizona, I was becoming more familiar with the rock side of things. Listening to my brother's records opened up a lot of ideas and doors for me and the way I approached my music.
DT: Do you receive a lot of flack for creating the types of blends you do?
ZT: Now, I don't care. A while ago, I just made mix tapes in my bedroom for my friends who were like-minded. But the second you take that to a club, you'd get clowned. They would clear the floor and make you look pretty ridiculous. Slowly, I would throw it out there. Sometimes, I would play a hardcore hip-hop set and have some people come up to me afterwards and ask 'yo, what was that Van Halen thing you did?' It was all about serving it correctly.
DT: Do you notice a lot of DJs biting what you do, and if so, how does that make you feel?
ZT: Creative and interesting DJs will always strive to do that on their own, but DJs who lack the creative skills early on will continue to bite, but biting is also a form of flattery. I know I've influenced a lot of people doing what I do, but I want those people to influence me back.
DT: What type of impact did "Uneasy Listening" have on indie hip-hop?
ZT: I can definitely say that it opened a lot of doors. The way I look at it, I knew that what DJ P [collaborator on "Uneasy Listening"] and I were doing was way different, but I didn't realize that it was going to be so revolutionary to the game. When it started getting bootlegged and copied, it took on a cult following.
Now I look at it a little bit deeper. If that opened up the door to get me signed, and now I have the ability to take the DJ and push it a bit forward, more from a party-rocking, club-type DJ standpoint, and crack open doors for other artists, then I'm satisfied. Sorta like Bambaataa, Jazzy Jay and Kool Herc did for me. It's not like mixing rock records is a completely foreign thing. They were doing it way before me yet in a different way.
DT: What is your personal view on the DJ as a reputable artist in the current music scene?
ZT: I'm trying to push very hard to be the DJ respected every time I go onstage. When you're on a bill with, like, eight other bands and you're a DJ, most promoters have a tendency to put you in the corner and have you spin between the bands. I'm trying to actually BE a band. Like Run DMC's take on "rockin' without a band." I'm trying to do everything and be a one man band. Sadly, people just aren't ready for a concept like that yet.
DT: What are you setting out to accomplish with your new record?
ZT: I think everyone was expecting me to bring another "mash-up" record to the table. It sucks because that's what I've been pigeonholed as. I hate labels more than anything. That's the whole thing about hip-hop. Hip-hop never had labels on anything. Now, all of a sudden, everything you can imagine has a classification. And then there's the term "mash-up." "Mash-up" isn't even a fucking word. It was just mixing and blending records.
I had to make sure that the record I came with was the complete opposite of what people were expecting me to bring. To a degree, also, I wanted to show that I can write and produce music and that I'm not some hack. Look at people like Premier and Dre. These are people who have turned their DJ skills into careers. I'm just following by example every day.
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