After their intimate set at the Barbary last night I was able to sit down with Adam Drucker, A.K.A. Doseone, arguably one of the most talented MC’s to date and one of the men responsible for the creation of the Anticon record label, a collective of artists who have cornered the avant-garde hip-hop market. Aside from a successful solo career, Drucker has been a part of Themselves, cLOUDDEAD, Greenthink, Subtle, and 13th and God.
Drucker and Jeff Logan, who goes by the name JEL and is the producer and beat maker for Themselves, have taken an almost ten year hiatus from their rap duo and only recently came back onto the scene with the release of their mixtape, The Free Houdini. This is what Drucker had to say about Anticon, Themselves, and what he expects The Free Houdini to do to the rap community.
Phrequency: When did you start Themselves and the Anticon label?
Doseone: 1999 was the year of Anticon and its inception and making it happen, because first we made music and we were like, well, no ones going to like this. So, we’re going to have to make a label, and that is when that happened. Hey, do you want to know something interesting that no one knows yet? Sole and Pedestrian came up with that name. When they moved out to Oakland they called everyone and were like, hey do you like this? I remember them calling me. Independently of that, Years before that Afrika Bambatta, we just found this out, Afrika Bambatta said Anticon on a song.
Phrequency: Really?
Doseone: Yeah, they didn’t know it. We didn’t know it. I forgot the name of it. We were listening to it on an Ipod. Then it froze so we couldn’t check the name. He just says it out of nowhere. It’s just a string of adjectives and then he says Anticon. It’s not a word. It was totally eerie; I was like, what the fuck is that? Then the Ipod froze.
Phrequency: What do you believe Anticon means?
Doseone: You know we were young when we thought of it, so it had a lot of meanings. I think now it means exactly what we are, and that’s like a delightfully ambiguous group of people tied deeply to their art with enough wits to underscore that with business practices. We’re guys who never wanted our careers to just go the fuck away, like everyone who preceded us. You know, like all of our heroes and all the people we met. Especially bands that have blown up instantly and just disa-fucking-pear a year later, never get a second record off. And we were like, Wow this is not us, we love our music. So we formed a label so we could have, I wouldn’t say it brought us luxury in our careers, but it brought us freedom of interest.
Phrequency: So Anticon gives you the ability to control all aspects of your art?
Doseone: Yeah, and we can make what we want and not give a shit about it, you know? You have to deal with the ramifications of your decisions. Like if you change your group name a bunch of times like I have. See I was a collector, and the collector has left, or shrunk in the bloodstream of music. In the early 90’s the collector was running the show. You know, like everybody would be like, what are you listening to steve? And, he would be like, I like Boards Of Canada, and some girl or guy who doesn’t really like music would go out and listen to Boards Of Canada and go out and buy Boards Of Canada. Its not really like that anymore. With file sharing I think its more diffused, it’s interesting. I see the change. I would say it gradually becomes an amplification with all these choices swelling to create a lack of choice.
Phrequency: So you don’t think people are sharing what they’re listening to anymore?
Doseone; No, I think that actually is what’s going on, but the passion is missing. Like saying track four at a Notwist concert, they have seven records, and you aren’t loving it like you should be. That’s the only thing I get really worried about when I think about the future of music. I’m like, woah that is never going to result in something positive. Taking passion out of listener will take passion out of performer, which will take passion out of the ball blast. I just don’t think that should happen. I think you can regulate, make music cheaper, make more outlets, and share MP3’s a different way, and all of this stuff is honky-dory and fashionable and modern, but its weird to take away album covers. Those are some of the little things, I sound like an old kook when I talk about this, but I also sound respectful, you know?
Phrequency; Yeah, it makes sense. There is a good and a bad with the Internet. You released your mixtape, The Free Houdini, via the Internet didn’t you?
Doseone: Yeah, that’s a good. Distribution in general about the Internet, it got music to places it wasn’t getting and that’s awesome. Period. You can’t knock that. Whether its fucking Moscow or Cleveland, it’s getting out there.
Phrequecy: We talked about the naming of Anticon, so what’s the story behind the name Themselves?
Doseone: We were called Them, and we just thought of that when we were recording our first music together in Cincinnati and we were like, oh lets name it Them. Then later on we realized, fuck it, there already is a Them, some fucking stupid rappers. Then we got a little cease-and-desist kind of, don’t call yourselves Them, thing in the mail and we were like, okay, Themselves is better anyway. It seems like, where Them was ominous and left question marks Themselves was a little more what Jeff and I are, always were, and were trying to become which is two guys who weren’t outsiders, but were getting the outsider treatment, that were making some very insider personal music.
Phrequency: You haven’t been dormant for the last seven years, but you haven’t been releasing material as Themselves. What have you been doing?
Doseone: We did Subtle with all our hearts, and that was full-on art with a band. We were working with musicians who loved doing that and had a knack for that. It was a full opening of us. So, the reason we can even come back and play as two people is because Subtle made us musicians, before that we were just Rapper and DJ.
Phrequency: Excluding people familiar with the Anticon label, reviews of Subtle were very mixed. How do you feel after putting so much of yourself into that project?
Doseone: I will chalk this up to being a symptom of the greater ill we were hitting on earlier. The world did not want totally insular, related, ongoing, concept art, music that asks you to like it, and listen to it, and spend time it. That rewards you one hundred times more than “I’m a barbie girl, living in a barbie world” or whatever the Indie equivalent of that is. There was nothing trite, disposable, or temporary about Subtle, but the world wanted it only temporarily. Now, to discredit I have to footnote all of that with, all of those we had people on the cover of the Subtle record and all of the amazing fans we have fucking loved it and would have it for a million years, and they’re who I care about and who I will take on the spaceship with me in 2012. But I think in general though, we couldn’t pick a momentum up that was outside of cLOUDDEAD fans, people already attracted to the music. Which I realize is one out of every ten kids in a bizarre Magnet School classroom or something. There is a ratio of seeker to stumbler. We are for seekers. There is a lot of music like that. It’s like stick to your ribs kind of music, takes a couple of listenings to, doesn’t dissolve in all waters… So, Subtle was just kind of making us all broke and things were getting difficult, and we are real people so instead of being whiney and quitting, doing anything that’s not what we are anyway, we were like, okay we can take a break and Jeff and I are going to go and fucking say “Fuck You” to everybody for a little bit. That’s what this set is about, it’s not guarded, the language isn’t as gilded. It’s more like, okay this is us.
Phrequency: On the mixtape you say, “This ain’t a mixtape, it’s a I don’t give a fuck tape” What pushed you to be more upfront on this album?
Doseone: No, it is, that’s been there to the whole time with Subtle. That’s why we went so full on with the art and made sure it will still fucking be there for 20 years from now. It just isn’t the time; it wasn’t the time for that. It wasn’t the time for Themselves when we started doing it. There has never been a Themselves feature in a magazine ever, there was never one when we put music out, we only got reviews. We stopped doing music, started doing Subtle, and people only wanted Themselves. That’s the way it is, and that is something that only we noticed. Our diehard fans are just as wonderfully connected and disconnected as we are. Unfortunately, doing this when you add duration, which is something we are concerned with. Ultimately, we are not “of the moment” and we are not “lifestyle” music. So it’s like, we actually only care about duration.
There is an identity crisis that is slowly subsiding in hip-hop fans. If rap is going to make it another 10 of 15 years, it’s because it’s going to shock its identity crisis. When I used to go to rap shows as a young person I was the only white kid. Now if you’re a black gentleman and you go to a rap show, you’re probably the only person of color. I don’t have a fucking problem with this. I never did, but rappers do and audience members just don’t talk about it. I spoke to a really nice musician who I won’t name and he was like, I love your music, but when I listen to rap I don’t want to listen to you. I want to listen to the ideal that I have. I want to listen to Lil’ Wayne fucking talking about crankin’ grape juice or whatever. Then it hit me and I was like, that’s a grown ass man who has great taste in music, who’s not going to listen to me, because he wants to get his thing on, and I’m not going to deny people that. I love certain shitty music too. It just so happens that my battleground, my righteous indignation is on this plate of passing and crisis in general. I really do believe if rap is going to make it in a bunch of years and become a form of music that is viable in its third decade is to shock that identity crisis. The only positive about whack-ass Kayne West is that he is helping people relax about the rap ideal.
To truly set your own pace you got to leave people at the corner. It’s just the fucking nature of shit, anybody that tells you anything else it’s not a shogun, it is not how you set your own pace, you do not look behind you. You have one or two people who are the motherfucker that keep your pace; they set your pace when you’re tired. That’s the nature of friendly competition and artistic covalence, that’s how it fucking works. When you’re out that person fills you and we’re people rich at Anticon, and that’s what’s fantastic. I think The Free Houdini is full of hunger. I won’t say anything about how I think it is as a work that’s for other people to do, but we made that shit out of stomach stones. It’s because we still have them, and a lot of my contemporaries it’s so not the case. We’re here to be the real thing for rap.
Phrequency: So you made The Free Houdini to change the face of rap?
Doseone: Yeah it’s all we can do. No self-righteous first Anticon titlings, I don’t have any speeches, just come fucking see me and we’ll put it the fuck on you. Kayne, Murs, all these guys, they don’t do it. Everybody makes money, they talk about battling and rapping, and like 10% of these people do that. That’s even an exaggeration; none of these people are from having to rap for your crown. It’s not what they do. Their beats are not like that. Their beats didn’t get dope because no one wanted them. These guys, it’s like they’re in the luck pot sucking the fat cock.
The least I can do is make fucking music and really put shit on the table. I did a record 10 years after doing a rap record and we pushed it; I pushed everything I could. Every rap I did on this record was difficult for me to get nasty and that was the way I wanted it. So we did that; we put down the time and the music. We put that in the earth forever and the rest is going to show and prove. So you know we’re going to do shows and battle. I did an open called The Battle and I’m battling a bunch of guys in Atlanta. I’m going to go do some major circuit battles and I’m going to be at Coachella looking for people just to be like, do you rap? I think that’s all I can do for rap. I can’t go and be the 9th member of The Roots, they’re not going to let me in. I knew them when I was here and they were fucking punking me, cause I wasn’t what they wanted out of rap. But, I can go do my live rap with Jeff that we fucking love. That was the thing at SxSW, I saw a lot of bands and I saw Anathallo, an Anticon band, and they were fucking phenomenal.
Phrequency: I saw Anathallo here in Philly like 4 years ago when they played at the TLA. Was this your first time getting to see them live?
Doseone: I didn’t know, I had only heard the record, I hadn’t seen them live yet, and I don’t believe the hype until I’ve seen a band live, and they loved the music. I just saw it, people making songs they love and I didn’t fucking see that the whole fucking time. That’s what Jeff and I are trying to do, to enjoy and cut loose. Because touring is a brutalizing of your most precious affects. It’s like birthday on repeat. We’re back to being what we always were.
Phrequency: In The Free Houdini you tell people to come to 15 21st Ave. Apt. 1 Oakland, CA. to insult you. Is that your real address?
Doseone: Yeah, Hopefully that won’t get out of hand. Really, I just want people who need to get served to come by, but hopefully I don’t get too many strange knockings; we will see what happens, hopefully people are respectful. Everyone is very self-important these days, as am I. Hopefully only the good guys will go knocking on that door.
Phrequency: There is a fine line between being self-important and being egotistical.
Doseone: I agree, it’s a new world. I’ve always met people as Adam, that’s important to me. A lot of people don’t do that anymore, whenever they come up they’ll be like, yo, you gotta meet me. It’s like, kind of, we should try it the human way and then maybe I’ll check that Myspace out.
Phrequency: On The Free Houdini you worked with artists like Aesop Rock, Atmosphere, Buck 65, Busdriver, and others, why did you bring them onto the album?
Doseone: That’s a great question. It’s everyone that I’ve shared closeness with ever, excluding a few tiny people, but I felt like I wanted to be real and I’ve never paid anyone to be on a song. I won’t ever, that’s not what I do. It’s a free record, everyone did it for free, not a drop of dollars exchanged hands, and everyone really stepped up. I was like, guys we’re doing a mixtape, and everyone was on it. So, all I did was tell everyone that everyone was on it. Another great thing was we finally did our Anticon posse record. It took a long time and two people sitting down making it happen, because it’s difficult.
Phrequency: It seems like you have reached a point where you have fans and credibility, but you still have the dedication of a group of teenagers in their garage trying to make it big.
Doseone: Yeah, I can go into a coffee shop and the girl in there will be like, are you Dose?” And I’ll be like, yeah thank-you, and I’ll pay for my coffee and leave, but there is no stardom. That’s why the music still has to be fucking nasty, because there is no icing. There is nothing but the reason we’re here, and that’s the fucking music. Shit is a wick. Without a doubt, life is a wick and I am all too aware of that, and now all I want to think about is that it’s a wick.
I’m having to hustle and make music for other avenues to make money. I decided that I can work with kids, because I’ve been working with kids teaching them how to freestyle. I decided I can do videogame music. I can do music for cartoons. I had to make a decision. I was like, well where can I get my hustle on? I can do kids. I fucking like kids.
Phrequency: What video games and cartoons have you done work for?
Doseone: I did this really cool online game for tweens. It’s all my own music; electronica, rap, rock, you know weird video game music. I did some Transformers episodes and this Friday I’m pitching a cartoon to Adult Swim. Everyone raps, I do all the voices, and everyone is battling all the time, it’s weird. It’s three cosmonauts and a white ninja. The cartoon is because I want to do a cartoon really bad, cause I love that shit. But doing music for the other things is out of opportunities that arose and I was like, Music is definitely not paying the bills, so I’m going to do these things, and I had to do things that didn’t compromise with the music that I am doing.
The Notwist are really intense about that. They turned down this huge amount for a phone ad. They were like, You know what, I could do some stuff with that money and that song could sell some phones, but the switch it hits in 50 of my fans is a switch that you can never fix. You can never go back and undo that Super Bowl blowjob that you gave. When I heard them say that, cause this was years ago, I was just like, fuck. That is the whole spine of that.
I want to have a personal affect, not a global one. Fuck it, I’m over it. I wanted to blow up when I was fifteen, but it’s another thing. To think about that to long you’re either going to become a Kayne or you’re going to die a sorted, twisted man scratching on his walls. You might get taken up and you got it, but so much of that is timing and management. Management is about people seeing you in the right light; sometimes they polish a turd and sometimes they just sell a shell that’s beautiful. It’s an industry, but we got into this industry with art on our hearts and our minds and we want to stay that way. The other thing that we’re dealing with is we want to make this rap, because we really fucking do it. This is our shit, but this isn’t adult music. So I try very hard to communicate clearly with and be very nice to Pitchfork, because it’s one of the only avenues to reach our fans. When they review rap it’s like Atmosphere and Lil Wayne and they treat them the same way. Lil Wayne plays one guitar note on stage and they’re like, hey cool, it’s rap, but the rap editor likes that. So, I have to say, hey I’m making music for modern adults and you’re one of the only avenues to get that across. Any description of our music is the tip of the iceberg, listening is the endeavor and the iceberg itself.
I’ve never cursed on an album in the history of my career. I’ve never taken the time to slow it down and give it the effects tawdry of the world around me. With this record I was like, you know what? I’m going to do it once and I’m going to do it right, because that’s how you make a rap record; you address whoever the fuck was saying your name wrong. So I did it in my language and I do it about being a good person and a great rapper. Not anything else. I’m not saying I’ve got this much more money, I’ve got this much more neighborhood, I’ve got this many more peoples, it’s really the same logic and the same language that applied to Subtle applied to a rap effort. You can only teach by example, especially with rap.
