“When was the first time you fell in love with hip-hop?”
After my deep love for funk, Charlie Wilson, Michael Jackson, neo-soul and 10-piece harmonies, comes production and sound engineering. Growing up, I listened to soul and Dilla era hip-hop, NWA and 2 Live Crew.
Hearing Missy Elliott go bar for bar on Tigga in the “Basement” and watching Ma$e and Diddy dominate “106 & Park” every evening during the top-10 countdown influenced the kind of music I grew to appreciate and prefer.
However, in contemporary terms, production value, synthetic instrumentation use and the importance of polyrhythms and silence on a given track have all dissipated out of music making. Yet, there are still producers who are dedicated to their musicianship and sound crafting for dynamic track building.
Here are the decade’s most celebrated producers that made me fall in love with hip-hop:
8. Dre & Vidal
Don’t recognize the pair? Well, I didn’t either until I got curious about who produced Marsha Ambrosius’ “Your Hands.”
Andre Harris and Vidal Davis have been main producers for Jill Scott and Glenn Lewis, as well as some of the most successful artists in the music industry, period: Alicia Keys, Charlie Wilson, Usher, The Game, Destiny’s Child, Monica, Chris Brown and Michael Jackson.
The list practically scales all the way up to the heavens. As multi-Grammy Award winners, I have the highest level of respect for these two masterminds.
7. Dr. Dre
Having already mentioned my shameless joy for gangster rap in my youth with NWA, Mobb Deep, Dipset and G-Unit, Dre is an obvious pick for one of the top producers.
My first impression of Dre came via his work with Aftermath Records. It was a thrill to watch him build an empire and create his Frankenstein that would eventually lead him to sign one of hip-hop’s most lethal lyricists: Eminem.
Aside from being a savvy businessman and a smart engineer, Dre remains to be an industry gem in the ways he develops his artists. He’s been a little quiet in the past year; though, we all know he’s probably up to something incredible and will release his gold into the airwaves sooner than we think.
6. Pharrell Williams
Virginia Beach’s Skateboard P and father of the “Neptunes sound,” Pharrell is probably the most iconic on this list. Williams has produced practically every rapper and singer that I have idolized since childhood.
From Clipse to Snoop Dogg, Jay Z, J. Lo, Madonna, Daddy Yankee, Daft Punk, Travis Barker, Cam’Ron, Ma$e and Kanye, his catalog extends to a vast point.
We all remember being delinquent to “Drop It Like It’s Hot” in the summer of ’04, back when Pharrell was the Kanye of music before Kanye was Kanye, melting everything he touched into a multi-platinum record.
5. The Dream
Despite being remembered for Jay Z publicly humiliating him on stage at this year’s Grammy Awards, The Dream is one of the most respected creatives in music making.
I recently listened to “IV Play” and realized how brilliant this guy is. From his work on “Cruel Summer” to chart-topping singles from Rihanna (“Umbrella”), Beyoncé (“Single Ladies”) and Brittany Spears (“Me Against the Music”), to his own records that featured some of the industry’s top artists like Mariah Carey, Kanye West, 2 Chainz, Jay Z, Kelly Roland and Gary Clark Jr., he has killed it on every track he has touched in the past 10 years.
Nothing less than incredible, The Dream surely has a very long career still ahead of him.
4. Kanye West
Everybody knows that ‘Ye was a producer before he started rapping and was signed to Roc-A-Fella Records as an artist who had already done amazing work with the label’s charting artists.
Best known for playing a key role in the production and success of Jay’s classic album, “Reasonable Doubt,” Kanye is also praised for his eclectic sound and ingenious work with artists like Common, Slum Village and Talib Kweli, along with others who have appeared on his albums: John Legend, Kid Cudi, Alicia Keys, Beyonce, Paul Wall, Dwele, Jamie Foxx, Rihanna, DJ Khalid and Lily Allen. His laundry list of artists with whom he’s worked is so extensive.
Kanye is clearly a musical genius — someone who isn’t afraid to be dissonant if it will make for a dynamic beat. His label, G.O.O.D. Music, is a crystalized manifestation of such a claim. “Sanctified,” his latest feature on Rick Ross’ “Mastermind,” was deemed an instant classic by listeners.
3. Just Blaze
I don’t think I’ve heard a track made between 1999 and 2006 that didn’t feature “JUST BLAZE!” blare out of the speakers before the beat dropped.
Hailing from Paterson, New Jersey, Just Blaze is one of the most iconic producers of hip-hop. With his brilliant percussion and careful crafting of beats for the first two ”Blueprint” albums, as well as for Jay Z’s record he claimed would be his last, “The Black Album,” Blaze has literally taken the industry by storm. This man has transformed tracks into diamond mines with his engineering.
2. Timbaland
Timbaland is unmatched in his production, sound and overall creative genius. After hearing “Are You That Somebody?,” I figured out that one of the main instruments he uses in his beats are vocals, which instantly converted me into a loyal fan of his sound.
Infamous for his work with Aaliyah on her most successful album and Missy Elliott’s “Supa Dupa Fly,” Timbaland is a veteran to this industry. His list is way too long to outline but his top 10 artists worth mentioning are the following: Genuwine, Nas, Boys II Men, Janet Jackson, Ludacris, Alicia Keys, 50 Cent, New Kids On The Block, Jay Z and of course, Justin Timberlake.
Apparently, he will be producing Missy Elliot’s newest project, as well as Kat Dahlia’s “My Garden.” Get ready for a good year of music.
1. J. Dilla
Last but not least, we have J. Dilla, the number one iconic producer in hip-hop history. He literally ushered in a new sound that no one was using or attempting to develop in the 90s, when gangster rap and pop music production were streaming farther away from real instrumentation and musicianship.
The God Father of soul-hop, the Dilla-era hip-hop was one of the most legendary in music history. It created community in the industry where feuds were escalating out of control.
Everything from A Tribe Called Quest to De La Soul, Busta Rhymes, Erykah Badu, MF Doom, The Roots, The Pharcyde, Common, Talib and Mos Def, Dilla made music for the soul that he produced and engineered with a love rooted deep within the veins of hip-hop.
Dilla’s spirit clearly lives on and manifests within the gutless nostalgia of my generation that longs for the hip-hop we heard growing up, full of soulful hooks and beats. He was unmistakably one of the best to ever do it!
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