URB: When I was listening to the new Mos, that was the perfect word to describe it: free. It’s empowering.
PM: What’s dope about that is in hip-hop, I always liken it to jazz, and we was at Rawkus and working on records collectively and you know watching Common and Mos and Black Star and me coming and Talib and me and Mos, it was just like Damn, these are some prominent artists, and it reminds me of Miles and Theloneous and Coltrane and so on and so forth. Even now, with these records, I’m starting to see influences like how classical musicians influenced a lot of jazz and you can hear the influences in them. Even with the arrangement of the album, how it’s fragmented, I could tell there’s a lot of inspiration there from Georgia Anne Muldrow. Not a very well known artist, but you’ve seen her appear with Erykah and you see her with Mos, that lets you know how much she’s influencing them.
URB: It’s great that the influences go so deep. I love hearing that Coltrane and people like that can do that. I wanna know, who’s new to the game, more or less, not even in rap but in general that you are respecting right now and enjoying?
PM: I like this kid Blu. There’s a difference between when someone is heralded and placed in a position to be the next and then there’s a difference when someone just has “it.” I don’t know what he looks like, I’ve never seen him perform, I just heard the song and I’m like Kid’s special. I’m excited about his career in the sense of a fan, like I wanna purchase the music like back in the days ‘n shit and pick it up and support him. I’m looking forward to purchasing this shit, like a young fucking kid again. There’s a lot of new dope artists.
URB: Is that a goal for you? Like what you just said, to feel like a kid again and go out and buy the record - do you have that in your head when you make music? Is that what you want people to do for you?
PM: Right, that’s something that I’m definitely trying to do. If you do get a physical copy, that’s great. I remember Will.I.Am told me they bought the Stress album follow up to the Organized album and they went in the room and turned out the lights and put a red shirt over the lamp and smoked and put the shit on and everyone was like ‘Quiet! Shut up!’ I do want shit to be an experience where if you’re on the train, you’re looking at the album cover, the artwork, and you’re looking at who’s involved, that’s what I loved about rock music and soul music and diggin for albums, all the shit I didn’t know. You know, David Axelrod produced this record as well as another range of records and Lou Rawls and shit. What the fuck, you discover that shit and it’s still important to do that for me. Or at least to make people feel like that and it’s not just disposable, even though I know that music is very disposable right now. I didn’t feel that way when I bought Erykah’s album or Georgia Anne Muldrow’s or Mos’ and I think that Blu is gonna make me feel that way as well. I’m gonna wanna see who did the music and so on and so forth. There’s a disconnect between the young and the veterans when there needs to be a forum for these types of conversations because I think people more so than ever now recognize that even when you have some talent, when you’re being selfish about it, no matter what an artists is talking about if they’re being selfish they’re out to obtain something rather than give the audience something. Whatever it is, it doesn’t seem like a fair exchange anymore.
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