Chance The Rapper has made a huge impact on the music scene for independent artists. Last year he became the first independent artist to perform on Saturday Night Live. He recently released his third mixtape Coloring Book exclusively on Apple Music, which has earned him a Top 10 spot on the Billboard 200 charts based on streamings alone. As the first artist to do so, this is an incredible achievement.
It’s needless to say he and Zane Lowe had a lot to discuss in a new interview. While the full interview won’t be available until tomorrow, the previews have been released providing glimpses into the very real chat the two had together.
One of the topics was his collaboration with Kanye West, giving listeners some insight into his recording techniques and what it’s like to be in the studio with him:
“Ye says, ‘Pull out the MPC.’ They bring out the MPC almost like in the gold suitcase in Pulp Fiction. He records drums in a way I’ve never seen before he does everything live off the MPC. As it plays now the drums aren’t mixed separately, all the kicks all the hi-hats are the same level. He does it literally in one take from top to bottom. He just stands there and goes through it and plays all the drums that you hear on the track as you hear now. Less than five seconds after he does that one take through he goes through and freestyles over it.”
He also spoke about music streaming and its impact on artists and the industry after being questioned about his decision to not sell his mixtape:
“The charts are already changing, they’re including streaming. I still don’t necessarily agree with how they – it’s something like every thousand streams is a sale or something. I don’t know – I don’t really care about that but at least they’re making that move and I think the Grammys started making the move I think about a year ago they started voting on it – I don’t know because I’m not on the Grammy board anymore.”
“Because of this timing I think it was important to have these mixtapes be trilogized and be a thing that existed regardless of how the revolution goes. I know that I was not on the bus when everything was changing — I was like, ‘Fuck it, I’m still dropping mixtapes.’ Now whatever is next I don’t really know. I’m a little turned off from making music right this second cause I’m still sick and shit and I just did a whole project but I know I did the three projects exactly how I wanted to and they were mixtapes and that’s where I came from.”
Stay tuned for the full interview tomorrow on Apple Music. For now, you can watch the previews and listen to his latest guest verse on Joey Purp‘s single.
Image: Stereogum