Jay Electronica: Watch Closely

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“If you ask me about my day I’m going to tell you about the weather, my job, my financial condition etc., but when you get up under that, that’s where the real expression is. I just make sure whatever I’m experiencing I just try to get to that point of myself to experience it.” Jay Electronica

There has been so much a said about this individual that without sounding like a broken record this will be brief. Jay Electronica is not your average emcee. His methods are different and with the sounds of Madlib, the late Jay Dee and Mr. Porter, the New Orleans nomadic wordsmith who tends to move which ever way the wind moves him has arrived. With ancestral lyricism that is hypnotic, simple and complex simultaneously, the immediate acceptance from the people is a testament that good music is still sought after by the true hip-hop heads and fans of good music alike.

Scheme: What do you remember most about your childhood growing up in New Orleans?
Jay Electronica: I can’t really pinpoint the first thing that I remember. The first things I can remember was school or some type of event like the Mardi gras or something like that but I really can’t pinpoint the exact experience. I haven’t went that far back into my head yet.

Scheme: There’s been so many stories about you, it’s almost like Jay Electronica is an old wise man’s tale, you are clearly real but you know how kids make up stories of people like, “This kid beat this dude up and he was eight feet ten inches tall!” That’s what I feel like your image is and to me that’s bigger than having a “buzz”. So what’s that like to have people on the edge of their seats waiting for another track to drop?
Jay Electronica: Really, I guess it’s kind of different for me to look at too, but at the end of the day I’m just a guy born in New Orleans Louisiana raised by my mom and my grandmother. So it’s kind of weird and kind of exciting at the same time but one thing I do know is that it’s a good thing and a blessing that people are ready to anticipate an album but just a song, that’s an indication that in terms of music we’re getting to a good place. We come from a time when we would anticipate a song but now because of internet and accessibility to get things quicker and the rapid mass production of things on a large scale and we kind of lost our niche of taking a thing in and just appreciating it for what it is. I think it’s a good indication, I don’t think it’s people responding to me necessarily we just want to experience things as they are in the rapid gluttonous time we live in.

Scheme: Describe what it was like growing up with your mother and grandmother, what things stick out for you during that time?
Jay Electronica: The things that stick out in hindsight are really the sacrifices my mother and my grandmother made. I was born in New Orleans in hospital and when my mom was pregnant with me she left home for a hot second and she stayed at a nun convent called St. Vincent. When I was born I went from the hospital to the projects and I grew up back and forth from the Magnolia Projects with my mom who moved from the 17th Ward, I basically lived between those two places and I think in hindsight I just think about those sacrifices that my mom and my grandmother were making. My grandmother right now is seventy-eight years old and it was only a few years ago she stopped working twelve hour shifts and that’s all she did was work constantly non-stop. She really sacrificed her whole life so that she could provide things for me and my cousins, we all lived together.

My mom, it was the same thing because of the environment we were living in and her being a young mom herself, she had me when she was twenty-years old, she worked hard hours and I can remember her being very stressed and doing everything in her power to provide opportunities to be able to have me to go to a better school and those are the things that stand out for me. Those are the lessons to be able to sacrifice yourself for the sake of others and for loved ones.

Scheme: Talk about when you first met hip-hop and music in general and what the scene was like growing up for in New Orleans regarding that.
Jay Electronica: Well musically that was my moms, on the weekend I would spend time with my mom because during the week she was working hard and on the weekends my mom would wake up every morning and clean and she would play Steely Dan and Bob James, Prince, Teena Marie just everything and that’s my earliest memory of music. In terms of hip-hop, the first time that I knew that I wanted to be a rapper was when I heard LL Cool J’s Radio and that was the spark of it and from that day forth I had been writing and I used to break-dance as well and I had my little crew but it was really LL that made me say this is what I want to do.

Scheme: You started writing when you were ten years old, do you still keep any parts of that process and continue to use that in your writing now?
Jay Electronica: That’s an interesting question because of course when I was younger I was talking about Mickey Mouse meeting Mini [Mouse] at the store but that’s because I was coming from a comic book, television, cartoon and rap music time period so that’s what I was dealing. So my rhymes would be like that, super hero type of thing and I think today I still do because even as an adult I’m still heavily influenced by the idea and the principle type of thing. Not necessarily like the television show Heroes with the special human beings and special powers and that type of thing, but as humans in our lifetime we never really achieve our full potential. However, we have glimpses of it through our lifetime where we do extraordinary things in terms of somebody affecting a neighborhood or in terms of somebody affecting somebody’s life, so I think I still do keep it in my rhymes the superhero aspect.

“…when I’m rhyming it’s the same thing it’s like decorating a room, you can go into a room and say let me put the curtains here, the coffee table here, this and that here and then when somebody walks into that room they get the clear picture. That’s how it is with me rhyming because more time and care goes into it.”

Scheme: You’re a practicing Muslim…
Jay Electronica: Yes, Islam is a word and it means Longing, Striving and Submitting to the will of Allah. Allah is just a term for God or Supreme Deity so in the true definition of what the word is, yes I’m practicing it, in the true definition of Judaism I practice it, you understand what I’m saying? I’m not necessarily a subscriber to ritual and organized ideology that is not rooted in the principles of what the thing really is.

Scheme: So are you more of a spiritual person versus a religious person?
Jay Electronica: I don’t know those are all heavy adjectives, I’m just a person, I’m learning, growing, I’m striving to be a better person and to build with everyone come into contact with and I fail a lot of times, so at this stage of my life I’m just a person striving. Am I a Muslim? Yes I’m a Muslim, also am I a Christian? Yes, I’m a Christian.

Scheme: You mentioned your slight stutter when you speak, but when you get behind a mic everything flows freely, why do you think that is?
Jay Electronica: That’s an interesting thing because I stutter but it’s not where I’m struggling to get a word out, I’m talking really fast and I’m fishing for the words that I’m trying to say at the same time. It’s kind of like driving with two feet, brakes and gas all at the same time and moving the clutch shift and gears all at the same time, but when I’m rhyming it’s the same thing it’s like decorating a room. You can go into a room and say let me put the curtains here, the coffee table here, this and that here and then when somebody walks into that room they get the clear picture. That’s how it is with me rhyming because more time and care goes into it.

Scheme: You went through a rough stint during your senior year of high school and freshmen year of college is that what lead you to leave New Orleans?
Jay Electronica: I got a bus ticket to go to New York, but when we got to Atlanta on the layover it was the year of the Olympics and there was a lot of now hiring signs, so I decided to get off the bus and get a job. When I got off in Atlanta I met a lot of different people that were like angels to me that would help me in my growth and development. At that time period if my life if this was a book this would be chapter two and it would be a short six month period in Atlanta.

Scheme: Today for youth of color faith is a hard thing to come by. For you, after everything you witnessed in New Orleans at the tender age of eighteen or nineteen where did you gain the faith and will to decide to get on a bus and believe that you were going to change your life living a very nomadic lifestyle at that time?
Jay Electronica: It comes from my grandmother and my mother. My grandmother made her place in New Orleans like the command post and that’s where my whole family sprung from and she was like the rock. She always would listen to gospel music and church was like the mainstay in her life and that kind of got rooted in my life. Now my mother was the type to get the Bible and define all of the Word. So my faith that if I continue to move forward things are always going to work out for the better if that’s what I’m striving for I… I get it from my mom and my grandmother.

Scheme: So what happened when you finally got to New York?
Jay Electronica: I came to New York and I was homeless but it was at a time when cats were on the corner and you could rhyme in ciphers with them. I was working little odd jobs here and there. It was more of like a learning experience and it really didn’t bare any fruit musically at that point of my life. Even though I was striving for music at that point of my life I was young and I was battling a lot of different things.

Scheme: Throughout your constant transitioning how did you find the space and time to hone your emceeing?
Jay Electronica: Along the way, I’m always writing and I’m always rhyming but the rhythms and the cadences that I use, all of that stuff is really home all that stuff plus the sounds I seek for are all rooted in New Orleans culture.

Scheme: Your tracks are very clip heavy, you usually have a clip introducing the song or ending it. Correct me if I’m wrong but is your purpose for doing that for the people who may have missed your message in the lyrics?
Jay Electronica: Usually I’ll have a clip from a song or a clip from a movie because when I’m writing that’s usually the tone that I’m in and I’m adding little bits to keep the tone consistent. In my rhyming I could be dealing with something but in MY way but the clips are like foot-notes that means there are further explanations at the bottom.

Scheme: Your delivery is unconventional in that you’re not the sixteen bar eight hook type of emcee, similar to your travels you kind of go where you go with a verse and stop where you want and let it breathe. Where did that style develop?
Jay Electronica: How I used to write, I used to just write and I would say my rhymes but when I started meeting people and going to the studio people would ask for the sixteen and eight but you can’t confine my communication to that but if what I’m trying to express I’ll give it to you that way. If it’s just thirty-two bars of me rhyming and a quote from Willy Wonka it that’s how I felt that’s how I want you to get it.

“We’re totally disconnected from that and in my mind I think with the governing of a people government is supposed to help us sustain a peaceful environment to live in and that we as human beings have the basic necessities of life, and at the very basic level experiencing life. I think that politics and government fail in those areas and I think that that’s one of the major flaws of modern government.”

Scheme: People like to categorize things, when it comes to your music, you have music floating out there and at times it can be a little confusing as to what goes with what or was this just a track. We’re aware of Act I and Act II but if you can where is all the music in between?
Jay Electronica: All of the Dilla [R.I.P. Jay Dee], Madib stuff, that is more recent and when I say recent I mean like the last eight years. What I’ll do is write out songs and then I’ll just do some songs to the beats and then I’ll get tracks that touch me in a certain way and I just want to write to the mood of that track. So if I have a collage of songs and I don’t feel like they fit into an album I’ll just let them circulate any kind of way that they can circulate. Act I is me sitting down writing a complete project and when Act II: Patents of Nobility comes out it’s going to be the same way one file and there’s going to be a video along with it as well. You can hear songs and tell what time periods there from. Like the some of the Dilla tracks you can hear when you hear the tone of my voice and the cadences being used.

Scheme: How did you meet and work with Madlib, Jay Dee and Erykah Badu?
Jay Electronica: I met Madlib through Erykah and the Jaylib poject. I went to LA with Guilty [Simpson] and Denaun “Mr. Porter” and Guilty was telling me he had some beats he needed me to check out and get on and use and that was my first introduction to Madlb’s music in depth to get into the mind of Madlib and the feel of what Madlib is doing. I feel very comfortable over Dilla’s beats and I felt like they were good conveyers of the energy I was trying to get out and after Dilla had passed I revisited a lot of those tracks over and over again and Madlib’s music gives me that same type of energy. In terms of Erykah everyone knows the story now, I met her during the weekend of the Dave Chappelle’s Block Party and I met with her later that week and she drop some jewels on me about the industry.

Scheme: Talk about the other things that you do outside of the music regarding photography and graphic design, Ms. Erykah referred to you as a Renaissance man.
Jay Electronica: I’ve always loved photography, I actually learned photography from some brothers of mine Sadiq and Understanding Allah. I learned about lighting and framing and different things like that but I’ve always been fascinated with film, photography and visual arts. I’m a see it and hear it kind of person. At some point I would like to have a coffee table book of something where I’ll have photos but little short stories under each one.

Scheme: You have many clips on your tracks that refer to Donald Rumsfeld and Vice President Dick Cheney. What is your opinion on the Presidential campaigns that are occurring and politics in general?
Jay Electronica: All you can really hope for is at the end the day the people you vote for are looking out for the best interest of the people. As far as politics in general I think we need to look politically how we approach things. I understand structure and understand how certain things must be in place for policies to stay in place but I think at the same time all across the world we’re missing out on the human experience and missing out on everyday life. We’re totally disconnected from that and in my mind I think with the governing of a people government is supposed to help us sustain a peaceful environment to live in and that we as human beings have the basic necessities of life, and at the very basic level experiencing life. I think that politics and government fail in those areas and I think that that’s one of the major flaws of modern government.

Scheme: What’s your opinion on the term Nigger and the re-appropriation of the word?
Jay Electronica: My grandmother still uses the word to this day. My mom might hear me use the word outside and I might get a whoopin for that, I understand that past and the history of the word and the significance of it but at the same time it’s a word. If you want to bury the word, that’s fine but that’s not addressing the problem because when the cab-driver sees me holding my hand up and but chooses to drive past me the principle is still there and I think we have to worry about those things.

Scheme: Finally on the song Eternal Sunshine of a Spotless Mind, you talk about infiltrating the machine i.e. MTV, BET etc… I’ve talked to a lot of artists who have said as long as there heard whether it’s the preacher’s choir or not, they just want to be heard. You are the last artist to challenge that notion and what to be heard by all.
Jay Electronica: I’m not a member of conscious society, I’m not a member of ignorant society and I’m not a member of Christian society or religious society I’m a member of the human family and if I’m doing something that I want to express to the human family and if TRL and MTV and VH-1 and BET and these are the avenues and to me I want to reach as many people as I can and experience the human family on a larger scale.