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Slum Village seems to have an uncanny ability to thrive amidst the chaos. These mysterious music men from Detroit have overcome various delays and industry restructuring, bootlegging and the loss of beatmaster, Jay Dee from the group, to produce a fine follow up to their 1999 debut album Fantastic Volume 2.
Their latest album, Trinity: Past, Present And Future has already spawned one of the summer's anthems, "Tainted!" which features hot new neo-soulman, Dwele. The album itself, seeks to establish linkages with all the sides of the Slum Village sound including contributions from behind the boards from Jay Dee while pushing forward with a variety of new producers and more importantly their newest member, Detroit rapper, Elzhi.
Slum Village is back. But then again, they never really left. They've just continued to stay grounded, kept touring and making their own post-modern brand of hip hop music.
Slum Village will headline the sixth annual Toronto Urban Music Festival on Sunday, August 25th at the CNE Bandshell with special guest Dwele at the all-day music celebration. WORD Magazine caught up with Slum Village's T3 to get the low down on the group's return to the spotlight.
WORD> How would you describe the difference between Trinity and Fantastic Vol. 2?
Slum Village< They are in totally different classes. On Volume 2, the concept for that album was, musically female friendly hard core. That was the concept of that album. This Trinity album is a lot different. What we did was we broke it up in three sections: Past, Present and Future. And that has a lot of significance because that's how we labeled the songs on our album.
What we did with the past sound of Slum, that's from, basically what we did was the Vol. 2 type of songs. The songs that remind you of Vol. 2 like "Tainted." And then you had the Present with was a lot different joints like "Get Live" and "Slumber" and a couple of other joints...those joints represented more like the present vibe...and then the future vibe — it's more like a retro funk, soul, mix it all together. We're kinda alternative too and that's why the future sounds like that. I mean, just that alone, was different from the Vol. 2. Also, you got the new addition, Elzhi. He brings a lot to the table you know, he comes from a freestyle battle type back-ground. He kinda brings that element to Slum Village, which we really didn't have. We were freestylin' emcees but not really freestyle battle and he kinda brings that element to the table, which just refreshes what we already had. Which (serves to) bring new listeners to the table.
WORD> You guys have always had very loyal fans. So loyal, I hear that you were probably one of the most bootlegged artists out there. How has that affected Slum Village?
Slum Village< Yeah. Well...right now we're getting a lot of love man. Fans, we couldn't have had a lot more fans — more in the industry I would say. Like, AJ on BET's106 & Park, he just labeled us as one of his favorite groups of all time. You know what I'm saying...that's just like, you can't even expect someone on live TV to say that without you talking to him or knowing this guy, you know what I'm saying? But we get a lot of love from people in the industry. All this love is kinda different, either you love us or you just hate us. You either got to be with it or you just don't get it. (laughs)
WORD> But, has the bootlegging situation slowed you down, do you think?
Slum Village< No, no. We didn't go through this with the Trinity
album. We didn't go through it that much, it was good. You know, the bootlegging situation helped us out. When Vol.2 got bootlegged, it helped us out. Because then we had fans, we were able to do shows. So when we performed, they knew the songs, before we came out. So, we may have lost a little money, but we got a lot of loyal people.
WORD> Tainted right now is resonating with a lot of people. And I'm just wondering if that track surprised you in the way people kinda embraced it and had it become this cross-over hit. We're now hearing it on many different radio formats.
Slum Village< Yeah, it's definitely surprising, but I mean I just always felt that we had songs, we just didn't have the proper push, that's all. You know what I'm sayin' we had romantic funk like that, off of the last album like "Tell Me" and "Climax" and things like that was on that same type of vibe, you know what I'm sayin'. It's just, I think it's all about timing, it's all about hooking up with the right labels and getting the right type of promotion so we can really get out there in the world. Thanks to our label now, we can really push it out there, on a big scale.
WORD> Q-Tip on your previous record said that the future of hip hop is now in Slum Village's hands. Was that a lot of pressure?
Slum Village< It was a little bit of pressure, you know what I'm sayin'?
That was a lot of love, you know what I mean. We definitely respect those guys for giving us that support because we didn't really have get a lot of it at home. Now, we're getting a lot of love now, but you know we had to earn it. But, that gave us the love right off the bat, like WOW.
WORD> I noticed that there are a lot of producers on your latest album. Can you talk about some of these people, that maybe the casual Slum Village fan won't know about?
Slum Village< These are all Detroit, mostly 75% of them are all Detroit up and coming.
WORD> Really?
 Slum Village< Well, Kareem Riggins who did our single "Tainted!" is from Detroit, and he did three other songs on the album. You got Waajid who did three songs on the album, you got me and my partner young RJ — I think we did three; You got Black Milk, he did two on there and you got S-Man he did one, and you got Jay Dee, he did three, and only two outside producers were used, Scott Sorch and Hi-Tek. We just wanted to make it more diverse. And I mean, the Detroit sound has still got a bit of a soul element in it. And this album's really base-line heavy if you listen to it.
It's not as melodic as the other album, as Vol. 2, but I think it's a lot more diverse in how things' going. This album is definitely a beat-maker's album, we really took time in choosing them. To where you could really say there's something special about each one of those beats. It's not just normal beats, we got something where the beat changes three times, the beat slows down or the beat is just constantly changing. You know what I'm sayin', we really focused a lot on the production on this album. And some of the lyrics but I'll say this is a producer's album.
WORD> How is it that you've been able to maintain a relationship with Jay Dee as he's now focusing on his beats while still having a hand in Slum.
Slum Village< Well, Jay Dee's really focusing on his solo album. And he's trying to finish that up. And basically, he left so that he can establish himself as an emcee. He was so well-known as a producer. To let people know about that part of Jay Dee. Somehow when people listen to his album — I heard some tracks — a lot of the stuff he didn't produce!
WORD> Really that's a surprise.
Slum Village< It's rapped y'all. You know what I'm saying. He wanted to focus on the rhyme. He really wanted to bring that across.
WORD> Now you also have a compilation project.
Slum Village< The District.
WORD> Can you talk about that, what was the idea?
Slum Village< That was like a basement album for up and coming rappers. We just wanted to give them a chance to get their stuff out. You know, wanted to make it real dirty and grimy and to keep that kind of element to it, and just bring that rawness across. Because our album is so diverse, it has elements in it but it's not as raw.
WORD> And I hear that it is doing well man.
Slum Village< A lot of people thought that was our album man! It was supposed to be Slum Village presents the Dirty District, so people thought it was our album. So they jumped all over it for that.
WORD> So what's ahead for you guys. What's next?
Slum Village< Man, we're working with our band and we're coming with an album called the S-Band. And that's featuring a girl named Tamia, she's on the bonus track on the album. That and Phat Kat coming through, look for that. Those are the two major things we're working on.
WORD> Is there anything else you want to say to your fans?
Slum Village< I would just tell the fans to expect us to keep pushing the limits and keep coming with new innovative music. We will always come with something different and to just, you know, keep an open mind about it because it will keep changing.
Interview by Phil Vassell
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