Kool Keith

The major label record industry has been biting Kool Keith’s styles for years. The problem is, he doesn’t hold on to one specific style long enough — and he doesn’t care to, either — to ride the wave that he often generates to fame. So they keep biting, but Keith is always one step ahead, leaving the industry to feed like buzzards on the carcass of something that, to him, has already been done.

"They still trying to catch my innovation," Keith says from a Los Angeles recording studio, where he’s working new material for what he calls his new "super album." "It’s funny, in 1999 everybody was still in the ‘70s, and when the ball dropped, everybody was laughing at me with my future music, but I was advanced, and okay. But now, everybody’s trying to do what I’ve been doing for years…just now. Everybody’s got weird records with computers on them, and sounds that are spaced out and stuff. Now everybody’s trying to make a record with sounds of different new wave, galactic-type drum programs running through them. But I’ve been doing this. Everybody got my stuff now, all of a sudden they got a new wave trend going on. If you look at certain groups on pretty much all the big labels, everybody has the new wave trend. Over night, everybody all of a sudden turned future, which is funny because they’re still trying to keep all that retro stuff alive too, but we’re going too far ahead to go retro."

As a member of the influential Ultramagnetic MCs through the mid-1990’s, Keith’s style became a center of the group, and as a solo artist, he’s gained renown as one who constantly moves and changes, staying ahead of the game by working with as-yet-unknown producers and rappers, and keeping away from the traditional music industry as much as possible. Keith’s disdain for major labels is no secret. His rocky history includes problems at DreamWorks stemming from his refusal to tour for the Dr. Octagon album, and there are stories about his tense relationship with Sony / Columbia during the Black Elvis period. The rapper says that his relationships with major labels — which are often one-album deals with few strings attached — don’t work out because they just don’t understand how he works, and the dilatory fashion in which most major labels do business can’t keep up with Keith’s innovation.

"A lot of the major labels don’t understand what I’m trying to do, and the majors move to slow," claims Keith. "When I come up with ideas, they’re not quick enough. And they’re more praying on finding an artist who can be like me than actually signing me."

It’s likely that Keith’s unpredictability and eccentric nature is what keeps the majors steering clear of him, but it’s not like he suffers being an independent artist. As an independent throughout his whole career, Keith’s records sell in large amounts, and are often instant underground classics because Keith is a naturally unique individual, and try as they might, the corporate entities who capitalize on trends can’t catch up to Kool Keith. His music is as unique as he is.

"I always look for distinctive bass lines that no one else is using — the trendy part of the industry, know what I’m sayin? I think I’m always trying to make something brand new because everybody sounds the same, and I pick themes of distinctiveness," he explains. "My whole thing is to go into the studio and make something distinctive from what I made before. I mean, all my songs are distinctive, because all my albums are distinctive."

That may be true — and there is a reason Keith keeps using the word "distinctive" — but it’s not like all of Kool Keith’s albums are even similar to each other. In fact, the bi-coastal rapper is known for not only switching up his personalities and assuming multiple alter egos, but he changes his lyrical and aesthetic themes within the music, even though he does, like most producers, have a signature sound.

"You know, Dr. Doom will never be Black Elvis, Black Elvis will never sound like Spankmaster, Spankmaster will never sound like Ultramagnetic, Ultramagnetic will never sound like Dr. Octagon — everything is constantly different, and I like it that way," says Keith, who says his ability to change styles sets him apart from the pack as well as his previous work. "But the interesting thing is that I make distinctive albums from within my distinctive albums, whereas the industry makes all their records sound alike. Instead of me making just one sound away from the industry, I make a different sound from all of my own albums."

Ever since the album that brought Keith mainstream recognition, Dr. Octagon, dropped in 1997, Keith has enjoyed a status as one of the most unique rapper of the genre, whose predilection to push boundaries by just being himself has landed him in a class all alone, but it’s a class not recognized by the glitz and glamour of mainstream hip-hop.

"I’m like the Dallas Mavericks of the music industry, because people suspect me to not be in the playoffs," explains Keith. "I feel like a lot of rappers are jealous because I do my own beats, and I feel the vibe of my own music. It’s not like I got some big producer letting me pick one out of his 30 tracks that he’s gonna sell to someone else right after me," says Keith. "I’d be pickin’ out a basket that Keith Sweat picks out of, and TLC picks a track, and next Mack 10 wants a track, then Ice Cube picks a track — it’s a big basket of tracks that producers have for anybody to pick outta they grab bag. What’s the matter with custom-made songs? If I worked with other people, I would be more exclusive and say ‘Yo, I made exclusive tracks for people,’ instead of me making tracks that I just build up for anybody to pick out the grab bag."

The rapper with a dozen personalities obviously has no problem saying exactly what he thinks of the music industry, rappers, women, real life, etc. His latest release, Spankmaster (Overcore Records) is a straight-up diss record in the vein of Keith’s last release, Matthew (Funky Ass Recordings). Though Keith is careful not to use names in his songs, it’s pretty obvious who he’s calling out—from specific personalities to the clichéd manifestations that populate the mainstream rap industry.

"I have to tell the truth, man, the honest truth," says Keith. "I mean, my records are funny but the funny things about the lyrics be true. People write about the fantasizing stuff all day long, but to say the truth, it’s hard. A lot of guys can’t rap the truth. Like, I say the truth about girls — like everybody’s all, ‘I love you, I care about you, I need you in my heart,’ but that’s all just a line. I’ll write a record, ‘Can I fuck you tonight?’ That’s all they really saying, but everybody puts in, ‘I care for you, I want to hold you, I want to squeeze you. Can I walk you to the store? Can I take your coat? Can I be your gentleman?’ All everybody’s saying is, ‘I wanna fuck you.’ It’s the same simple shit, just get it over with. Stop singing, ‘I need your heart, I smell your hair…’ I want to fuck you. Just say that."

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