Photo courtesy of Ground Beef Records
Canadian emcee Self the Bluest Eye of The Liberators and Dutch producer Propo’88 of Da Shogunz collaborated to create an EP titled “Rhymes in Old Speak.” The 5-track project has a mid-90s feel with its boom bap drums, chopped samples, scratched choruses, and complex yet relatable lyrical wordplay.
Rhymes in Old Speak comes to us courtesy of Ground Beef Records and is produced entirely by Propo’88.
Propo’88 and Self the Bluest Eye spoke to The Real Hip-Hop about their shared love of books, people’s complacency when it comes to Capitalistic crimes, and their new EP, Rhymes in Old Speak.
TRHH: Why’d you title the new EP Rhymes in Old Speak?
Propo’88: It’s a reference to a classic book “1984” by George Orwell. We believe that there is a lot of shit going on in the world with disinformation and all kinds of radical right kind of thinking. People are being manipulated and being misled into negative stuff worldwide. In the book 1984 there’s a big political message which is also talking about that. In the book 1984 there is a Newspeak which is a new language that the government is building to push people in the mind frame that they want to be in. But Oldspeak is the original language that people were speaking before the regime was taking over their minds, so to speak. So, we are saying there’s a lot of stuff happening in the world but we want to promote critical thinking, we want to stay self-taught and we rhyme in old speak. So, that’s a little bit of the philosophy behind it.
Self the Bluest Eye: Exactly, man. It’s one of my favorite books and it was written in the 40s I believe, or maybe even the 30s.
Propo’88: Forties, yeah.
Self the Bluest Eye: So, it speaks a lot in parables. I think that he was able to predict aspects of government and aspects of society that would be eventually controlled and manipulated to kind of create almost like a hive mind, where everybody thinks the same, they do the same things, they perform the same actions, and it’s all for the glory of kind of the party. Everybody lives for that. That becomes their entire means of life — supporting that aspect of it.
TRHH: That’s just prophetic, man.
Propo’88: The book has definitely has been seen as prophetic for decades.
Self the Bluest Eye: He also wrote another one too called “Animal Farm” which was kind of talking about Communism and things like that and the Soviet Union as well. I think that came out before 1984 and again very full of parable, full of kind of like prophecy almost, and just how either it way doesn’t matter which side you kind of go down, there’s negative aspects and there’s lots of control, manipulation and just power-hungry people that are trying to guide nations and guide individuals, even if you have or don’t have those same ideologies or beliefs.
Propo’88: Like a warning for Communism, right? That’s basically what it is?
Self the Bluest Eye: Yeah.
TRHH: How did you two get together to decide to do Rhymes in Old Speak?
Self the Bluest Eye: Well, Propo and I have known each other for years. We’ve never met in person. We’ve been off and on working for over a decade — I’d say even probably close to like 15 years. There’s a homie in my city named Kickback and me and him had been working together and then he linked up with Propo and Da Shogunz and he went out to live out there for a while.
He kind of just put me on to them and we met, and we talked, and we did a few tracks together. Eventually 13-14 years later we’re like, “We have to do a project. It’s been long enough.” We’ve had enough collabs, but now it’s time to do something that’s not full length, but a feature project together. It just fell into place. He provided the beats, I provided the rhymes, and the rest just took itself.
Propo’88: Yeah, it was really spontaneous, right? I had a beat and I was like, “Maybe I should send it to Self?” And another beat. I was in a flow and in a couple of weeks that I was making certain kind of beats and they just fit him, so, I just kept sending them to him. He just kept on writing and was in the flow, too. And then after a few songs he was like, “Should we do an EP then?” and that was it.
TRHH: On the song “Dreams” you speak about how the poor are treated like criminals while politicians who commit crimes that affect millions are never brought to justice. Do you foresee the people rising up with all of the corruption that’s going on in the world?
Self the Bluest Eye: I think that would be like the ideal form of thinking, but if I’m thinking literally and I’m thinking I guess what I picture realistically, I honestly don’t see it. I think we’re at a point now of, I don’t know if it could be called like critical mass, but we’re at a point now where it could go one way or it could go the other way. I feel like it’s leaning to go the other way, where everyone is just so connected with the thing that we’ve already been ingrained with, that it would take radical change for anything like that to actually happen.
I don’t feel that the new generations that are coming up and have been brought up in this lifestyle and this way of living have the means to, or the want, to get out of it. I think it’s tricky. I think if it takes a wrong turn it’s going to go really wrong, but I also think that there are people out there that would rather fight and die to maintain this level of control that we’re already experiencing, than to actually fight and die for a bit of freedom that we kind of remember, or the past generations kind of remember.
TRHH: Propo, the melody in that song, is it played or sampled?
Propo’88: Ah, yeah. that’s a good one. It’s played. It’s all samples, but the melody that we hear is a sample that is one stab and I made a melody out of it.
TRHH: So, it’s one stab?
Propp’88: Well, there are different layers to the beat, but the main melody is one note sampled and just by MIDI made a melody out of it.
TRHH: What’s in your production workstation?
Propo’88: I work mainly with hardware so, I use vintage samplers and this kind of thing. It’s what I’ve been into always. Right now, which ones I’m using?
TRHH: Yes.
Propo’88: I am using different machines and different setups throughout the years, but this EP, most of the beats I made with MPC 2000XL and SP-404SX. I’ve been working with an EPS 16+ by Ensoniq for a while and I tweak some sounds around in there, but the main sequencing and all the main programming and drum sampling is 2000XL by Akai.
TRHH: The one thing that stood out to me about this project was the drums. I dabble with production, I have the 2000XL as well; how do you get your drums to have that punch?
Propo’88: The punch?
TRHH: Yeah.
Propo’88: How do you get the punch in the drums? There’s different ways of getting punch, of course. Like just the MPC 2000XL itself has a punch, but it’s also in where you get your drum samples from. What I noticed is that if you download drum sample libraries that are commercially being sold on the market they are so mastered, they are so compressed that all the punch is out of them. With like mainstream music, pop music, and any like popular music nowadays that’s very good, because you want everything flat and as loud as possible. But the punch goes down if you do that, so, you need to keep dynamics. I like to sample drum breaks from old records. I find my own records and add my own drum samples on it and they have more dynamics because compression was different. There was a different standard with the compression and the mastering back in the days in the 70s and 60s, which is my favorite era to sample drums from.
It’s recorded analog, it’s tape recorded, there’s more dynamics, so there was a certain saturation, certain distortion, there’s a dynamic to it. And if you sample it in the right machine you get a certain outcome. This is why the MPC’s, and Ensoniq machines, and E-mu samplers and all these kind of samplers from the 90s are particularly popular for boom bap style Hip-Hop, because they just have that response with the drum samples from the 70s to 60s records, which is like the boom bap tradition. So, yeah it’s that formula, basically. There is a lot of stuff more that we can say about that. I think an important basic is to dig for records and drum breaks and use those vintage machines if you want that vintage punchy drum sound. It’s definitely essential.
TRHH: You have a song called “Read All Night” that might be a Hip-Hop first. I don’t know if there has ever been a song dedicated to books. What made you decide to write that song?
Self the Bluest Eye: It was an idea that I’ve had for a while. Me and Propo connect on a lot of levels about books and about philosophy and things like that. We have long discussions about different things that we’re reading. I’m personally a very heavy reader — I love science fiction, I love fantasy books, I also love like ancient history and philosophy and things like that. So, it’s something that I’ve had kind of on the back burner and when he sent that beat just the whole vibe of it kind of fit those old dusty used bookstores. So, I kind of had some ideas already that I was playing with and how I wanted to make certain references and certain descriptions of what you feel in those bookstores.
It’s the same feel as when you go into one of those old dusty record shops and if you’re Propo you’re searching for samples, and if you’re a guy like me you’re searching for Hip-Hop singles, and Jazz music, and Blues and stuff like that. You get that same kind of enclosed, encapsulated feel and it’s a whole vibe that it brings. I realize that it’s a pretty niche song, there’s not going to be a lot of people that kind of get it or understand the things that maybe I’m saying or referencing. But it was just something that I felt had to be done just for our love of books.
TRHH: On the song “Level Up” you say “There were low points where I thought tapping out would be the move to make/But instead I chose to level up my strength.” Explain that rhyme and what gave you the strength to not tap out?
Self the Bluest Eye: Even just a couple days ago Propo and I were talking about this project as it was getting completed and all that stuff and I’m at a point now where I have a son, and I’ve got a small family, and I work and all that stuff, so, it was getting to a point where maybe this is the end? Like, this is as far as I can go with it, it doesn’t bring a lot of bread, it doesn’t bring a lot of money, so I’m doing it more for the passion than anything. That’s something that I will always continue to do, but pushing for projects and all that stuff is kind of tapering off and winding down, so to speak. Level Up is very reference heavy of my love anything nerdy really — video games, and board games, and Dungeons and Dragons and all that stuff. We talk about charisma, dexterity, constitution, all those different things that you would find on like a Dungeons and Dragons character sheet.
So, the whole tapping out was kind of me just saying, “Maybe this is it, maybe this is what we’re doing. I’ve got to continue with life and all that stuff can be put on the back burner.” But the strength is finding that will to keep going and creating it and pushing out art because the whole idea of the project is that it’s old speak. This isn’t being done anymore. You have to keep it going, even if you don’t want to, you have to find that strength to provide that for the folks that do hear it.
TRHH: Who is the Rhymes in Old Speak EP made for?
Self the Bluest Eye: Whoa, I would say it’s for anyone that’s meant to hear it. One of the lines in the songs is, “Invest in self, not me though, because my name is Self, but I mean you/And this message wouldn’t reach you if it really didn’t need to.” So, it’s for those folks that might find themselves in the same predicaments, in the same lifestyles, in the same understanding of society, and maybe have the same thoughts and the same critical thinking and they’re looking for something different.
I find that music and art nowadays is very generic, and it’s AI generated, and it’s full of clickbait and rage bait, and this is something that I tried to, from start to finish, just find pure artistry. And have each song as unique, and full of meaning, and just out there for the right person. All the people that I’ve shown it to, or have listened to it, they all have different interpretations of the project and they all have their own favorites, and they have their own favorites for a reason. I think that’s really cool to see and to hear that people pull from different aspects of each song the things that are relevant to them.
Purchase: Propo’88 & Self the Bluest Eye – Rhymes in Old Speak