FEATURE:
U-Love
Remembering the Great J Dilla at Fifty
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THERE are a few features…
I want to come to, as they look at the genius and legacy of J Dilla. Born James Dewitt Yancey in Detroit, Michigan on 7th February, 1974, many see this incredible producer and Hip-Hop genius as one of the most influential of his day. We sadly lost him on 10th February 2006 at the age of thirty-two because of complications related to lupus. Even though he died very young, he left behind this immense legacy and influence. Posthumous albums have been released. People perhaps know him best for the 2006 album, Donuts. There are weird parallels with David Bowie, in the sense of a career-best album was released both close to his birthday and the day he died. In J Dilla’s case, Donuts was released on 7th February, 2006 – his thirty-second birthday. Three days later, J Dilla died. Heartbreaking that he did not get to see how Donuts was received and celebrated, we are glad that he left behind an incredible body of work. J Dilla emerged during the mid-1990s underground Hip-Hop scene in Detroit. He was a member of the group Slum Village. He was also a member of the Soulquarians. They were a musical collective during the late-1990s and early-2000s. I will come to a book that was written about J Dilla and his impact on the world. First, AllMusic provide some biography about the great J Dilla:
“Frequently and rightly placed in the same context as DJ Premier, Pete Rock, and Kanye West, J Dilla (aka Jay Dee) built and sustained a high standing as a producer's producer while maintaining a low profile. When Pharrell Williams appeared on BET's 106 & Park in 2004, he excitedly declared that Dilla was his favorite producer and told an audibly stumped crowd that it had probably never heard of the man. At the time, Dilla had been active for well over a decade and had netted enough beats -- including the Pharcyde's "Runnin'," De La Soul's "Stakes Is High," Common's "The Light," and several others with production teams the Ummah and the Soulquarians -- to be considered an all-time great. Dilla never produced a mainstream smash and, in many cases, his presence has to be confirmed with a liner notes scan. (And even then, that might not help; he occasionally went uncredited.) He never marked his territory like Just Blaze ("Just Blaze!") or Jazze Pha ("This is a Jazze Phizzle produc-shizzle!"), and he never hogged the mike like P. Diddy. He let his music, and its followers, do the talking. Rather than provide immediate (or fleeting) thrills, he was hooked on working the subconscious as much as the neck muscles. He was so focused on his work that it took a severe toll on his health.
Born and raised on the east side of Detroit, Dilla -- James Yancey -- was forced by his parents to become involved with music, and he was a record fanatic at a young age, absorbing funk and rap singles and jazz albums, from Slave to Jack McDuff. He learned to play cello, keyboards, trumpet, and violin, but drums got him like nothing else. He tried his hand at producing tracks on a tape deck by using the pause and record buttons, and he also took up MC'ing. In 1988, he formed Slum Village with Pershing High School friends Baatin and T3. It wasn't until 1992, after receiving some valuable guidance from fellow Detroiter Amp Fiddler, that his talent really began to take shape.
A session keyboardist who had worked with Prince, Parliament, and Enchantment, Fiddler taught Dilla how to use the MPC drum machine. To say that Dilla was a quick study would be an understatement. Fiddler introduced his protégé to A Tribe Called Quest's Q-Tip, who heard some of Slum Village's material, liked it, and helped get the word out. Following sessions with First Down (a collaboration with Phat Kat, another Detroiter), Little Indian, and alternative rocker Poe, Dilla's production career reached full flight. In 1996 alone, he worked with Busta Rhymes, De La Soul, and the Pharcyde, all the while playing a major role in the Ummah with Q-Tip and Ali Shaheed Muhammad. (He did extensive work on Tribe's last two albums.) Before long, hardcore hip-hop fans began to know Dilla for his steady wobble, which was unfailingly musical and rich in details -- shuffling hi-hats, oddly placed handclaps, spacious drum loops with drastically reshaped samples of tracks both obscure and obvious.
Through the remainder of the '90s, Dilla quietly racked up more output, including Janet Jackson's "Got 'Til It's Gone" (for which he did not receive credit), additional tracks for the Pharcyde, and collaborative work with Q-Tip on all of 1999's Amplified. Largely upbeat and filled with boisterous energy and thick sounds, Amplified is one of many pieces of evidence against the argument that Dilla was about one sound and one style. During the producer's steady rise, Slum Village remained a priority. Fantastic, Vol. 2 and Best Kept Secret (the latter credited to J-88, an SV pseudonym) were released within weeks of each other in 2000. However, the producer would only contribute a few tracks to the group from then on, as his schedule became increasingly tight. As a core member of the Soulquarians, with James Poyser and the Roots' Ahmir "?eustlove" Thompson, Dilla worked on Common's Like Water for Chocolate, D'Angelo's Voodoo, Erykah Badu's Mama's Gun, and Talib Kweli's Quality. Through 2005, he continued to work with past associates while dipping his toes deeper in R&B. A favor was returned on Fiddler's 2004-released Waltz of a Ghetto Fly, and a couple dynamite tracks -- Steve Spacek's "Dollar" and longtime collaborator Dwele's "Keep On" -- were released the following year.
Amazingly, from 2001 on, Dilla was also a prolific solo artist. A couple singles and the Welcome 2 Detroit album came out in 2001, and a number of low-key instrumental compilations and incidental 12" singles followed shortly thereafter. Rarely praised for his mike skills, he was often assisted by the likes of Phat Kat, Lacks, and Frank-n-Dank. Wooed by a Madlib mixtape that featured the rhymes of Oxnard's finest over his own beats, Dilla forged an alliance with his admirer for 2003's Champion Sound, released under the name Jaylib. It was around this time that his health took a sharp decline. For over two years, he had to use a dialysis machine. Despite having to perform in a wheelchair, he was still able to tour in Europe during late 2005.
Donuts, an album of instrumentals that Dilla completed during one of his extended hospital stays, was released on February 7, 2006, his 32nd birthday. Three days later, while staying at his Los Angeles home with his mother, Maureen "Ma Dukes" Yancey, he passed away, a victim of cardiac arrest. While reflecting on the tremendous loss, close colleague and friend Thompson (an authority if there ever was one) compared the producer's level of genius to that of jazz giant Charlie Parker. Karriem Riggins, a close associate, put the final touches on another album, The Shining, which was released six months later.
A dizzying quantity of posthumous albums, EPs, and singles, most notably a greatly expanded edition of the Ruff Draft EP, were issued throughout the decade that followed. In 2014, Dilla's mother, who was involved in many of those releases, donated her son's MPC and Minimoog Voyager synthesizer to the Smithsonian's National Museum of African American History and Culture. The Diary of J Dilla, which originated as an early-2000s project for MCA, saw release in 2016. MCA had signed Dilla for his reputation as a beat maker, but Dilla confounded the major label by switching to MC mode and enlisting the likes of comrades House Shoes, Waajeed, Madlib, and Pete Rock as producers. After an extended period that entailed major legal obstacles and the recovery of recordings, the album was released in 2016 on the reactivated Pay Jay label through Mass Appeal. Yet another poshumous release arrived in 2017. Titled Motor City, that set consisted of previously unreleased instrumentals selected and sequenced by Maureen Yancey”.
There is a book you can buy here called Dilla Time: The Life and Afterlife of J Dilla, the Hip-Hop Producer Who Reinvented Rhythm. Written by Dan Charnas, it was released in February 2023. Pitchfork provided details of a must-read book for any fans of J Dilla’s work:
“After his untimely death from lupus-related complications in 2006, just after his 32nd birthday, J Dilla became recognized as one of the most important producers in hip-hop history. Born James Dewitt Yancey to an opera singer and a jazz bassist, the Detroit native started rapping and beat-making as a kid, forming the rap trio Slum Village with his high school friends, and eventually working with the likes of A Tribe Called Quest, the Roots, and Erykah Badu. With his meticulous knowledge of records and wily command over drum machines, he created intricate, sample-based productions that defied the rigid structure of the grid and altered how musicians of all stripes thought of time. “What Dilla created was a third path of rhythm,” writes journalist, record executive, and professor Dan Charnas in his upcoming biography of the artist, resulting in a “new, pleasurable, disorienting rhythmic friction and a new time-feel: Dilla Time.”
Charnas’ book, Dilla Time, is a fascinating, immersive look at Dilla’s impact both during his lifetime and beyond: the producer’s relationships and upbringing, his musical interventions, and the contentious dispute over who gets to control his posthumous legacy. Below, we have an excerpt from Dilla Time (out February 1) about how mentorship from A Tribe Called Quest’s Q-Tip led to Dilla’s first big production credits and the formation of the musical collective the Ummah”.
There is another article, this one from The New York Times that dives into that book. Because we are approaching what would have been J Dilla’s fiftieth birthday – on 7th February -, I am ending with a selection of his best work. With a heavy dip into Donuts. I hope that there is celebration of the amazing and peerless J Dilla closer to his fiftieth birthday. It is strange to think that Donuts came into the world nearly eighteen years ago. It still sounds so fresh and immediate to this day:
“Listenership and the breadth of Dilla’s influence have grown exponentially since his death. There are now annual Dilla Day events around the world, and his music has been celebrated by institutions like Lincoln Center and the Detroit Institute of Arts. His MPC3000 is displayed behind a glass case at the National Museum of African American History and Culture in Washington, D.C. Charnas teaches a course about Dilla, which is how the book originated, as an associate professor at the Clive Davis Institute of Recorded Music at New York University.
Over the years, there has been almost a deification of Dilla; Charnas’s book takes great efforts to humanize him. Though he is sympathetic to his subject’s struggles — particularly his misfortunes as an artist in the major label system and his deteriorating health — Charnas does not shy away from describing his imperfections.
Dilla had a temper and could become jealous, those closest to him said to Charnas. When he was frustrated, his quietness would break as he lashed out at them. But the same people who told Charnas these unflattering stories continued to care about Dilla unconditionally.
“He was private, and there’s still things I don’t talk about,” said Frank Nitt, Dilla’s close friend since middle school whose music he later produced as part of the group Frank-n-Dank. “But on the flip side, being who he was and how he’s being perceived by the people at this point, there’s a lot of misconceptions.”
One of the foundational Dilla myths is how he arrived at his signature sound, in which the rhythm can feel off, different or just wrong. Some have said it was a failure to quantize his compositions, a feature in digital recording that eliminates human error and puts the timing of drum beats in their “correct” place.
Charnas explains that Dilla’s process was more complex and that he took multiple steps to purposefully accentuate the sonic effects of error. The result was a fresh rhythmic feel that Charnas labels the titular “Dilla time” — differentiating it from straight time and swing time, the two rhythmic patterns that defined Western music. Dilla’s explanation for his innovation? He would just say that’s how he nodded his head.
Charnas traces Dilla’s influence beyond hip-hop and soul, as it extended to pop, electronic music and jazz. His imprint can be found in songs by artists like Michael Jackson, Flying Lotus, the 1975 and Robert Glasper. (“Dilla Time” reveals that Dilla blew off potentially working with ’N Sync, twice.) Sometimes Dilla’s impact has been circuitous. He inspired young Los Angeles jazz musicians like Terrace Martin and Thundercat. Then Kendrick Lamar had those artists work on and expand the palette of his landmark 2015 album, “To Pimp a Butterfly.”
Charnas also clarifies the story around “Donuts,” an instrumental album that Stones Throw Records released right before Dilla’s death that has become a key entry point for new generations of fans. It’s been said that Dilla recorded “Donuts” in the hospital, embedding messages for loved ones in his compositions as the end approached. In reality, “Donuts” was born from one of the many beat tapes he had made. It was largely edited and extended by Jeff Jank, who worked at Stones Throw, and completed months before Dilla died.
Though he settled on J Dilla around 2001, he was alternately credited under names including Jay Dee, Jaydee, J.D. and Jon Doe. For much of the mid-90s into the turn of the century, he was part of two production collectives, the Ummah and the Soulquarians, alongside more famous members.
In the book, Charnas relates how during the making of D’Angelo’s 2000 opus “Voodoo,” D’Angelo and Questlove called Dilla and Prince their “two North stars.” Dilla was around for many of the recording sessions at New York’s Electric Lady Studios, but none of the songs he initiated were completed. In the end, when he received his copy of the record, he was disappointed to realize that his name was nowhere in the liner notes.
“The main theme for James in this story is credit, being seen,” Charnas said, “and he’s struggling to be seen.” Even on Common’s “The Light,” the biggest hit Dilla ever produced, he’s listed as “The Soulquarian’s Jay Dee for the Ummah,” leaving him, as Charnas said, “smothered in brotherhood.”
PHOTO CREDIT: Gregory Bojorquez/Getty Images
Charnas’s main reasons for writing the book are not only to make Dilla’s contributions to music known but to also explain that the devotion from fans is justified. “Ultimately it’s really about me saying to everybody who loves Dilla: ‘You were not wrong. Your affection was not misplaced,’” he said. “He is special, more special than many of you all even know”.
On 7th February, it would have been J Dilla’s fiftieth birthday. There has been controversy regarding posthumous releases and bootlegged stuff. The estate having to seek legal advice and act. It is sad that it has slightly muddied the waters. I have included as much as I can. Material that demonstrates J Dilla’s brilliance, though I know that there are E.P.s and albums that perhaps the estate of J Dilla are not happy with. Releasing three studios albums in his lifetime – 2003’s Champion Sound was with Madlib (J Dilla’s moniker was ‘Jlib’) -, there is a lot to explore when it comes to this much-missed genius. A true music and production original, when you look at artists and talent that has arrived since J Dilla’s death in 2006, it is clear that there are…
FEW like him.