I felt that the collaboration album between producers was relatively rare. How did you proceed with the recording?

Jansport J : I’ve always wanted to do a producer collaboration album similar to how J Dilla and Madlib made “Jaylib” together. It’s empowering for Producers to put out their own projects, which is something both BudaMunk and I do. It made sense to link up and do something together, and to show music has no real language barriers. If it sounds good, it feels good.

Budamunk : Well, we would start with picking the sample together and decide who chops the sample, and the other will do the drums. We both work to a certain point, then switch and repeat. During the process we would add sounds and make edits as we work along. Once we felt that we had something good, Sport would use his MASCHINE to make drop-outs of the drums and samples. At the same timing I would add effects with my SP404 and record into Logic. Since we both use MASCHINE to make beats, the work flow was very smooth.

Did you feel any difference in the Japanese flow and the English flow when you put the rap on the beat, or did you have any consciousness when making the beat?

Budamunk  : For this album we have lots of songs with English and Japanese verses. How we chose the featuring artists was from listening to the beat and figuring out who would vibe well and sound dope together.

Jansport J : The main difference was me not being able to understand every single word that the artist was rapping, but that made the music even more exciting. As a producer, I like to rely on feel. We paid more attention to the flow of the rappers, how the tone of their voices match the record. It all felt good.

In this album, there are many songs in which Japanese and American rappers are mixed in one song, and the combination is very suitable and it was very comfortable to listen to. How did you decide on a guest MC to rap on each beat? Do you usually check Japanese artists?

Jansport J : Thanks to my trip out there, and Chily-T & BudaMunk recommending artists, I was able to start to see and learn about more local Tokyo artists in person. We got to see ISSUGI rock a crowd. We got to sit in the studio with Kojoe and work on a song from the very beginning. So the more knowledge I had of the Japanese talent, BudaMunk and I were able to start to suggest who would sound good on what song, and what American artists could mesh well with them.

Listening to this album, I felt that the two grooves matched very well. What was the experience with the session with BudaMunk? Please tell us the differences you felt, what you thought was something new, and conversely, what you thought was common.

Budamunk : To a certain degree we have similarities with our production sound, but we both have our original groove. So I think that blended well for us. While we make music, it’s always fun to watch how the other producer makes the beat and we also get to teach one another tricks and learn about new plug-ins, etc…

Jansport J : It was fun seeing BudaMunk’s process and mine colliding. I think the first day was really just about us finding a groove and a workflow that made sense. I might start an idea in Maschine. Then Buda would come over and add basslines, warp the drums to make them sloppier and groovier, run through the SP-404 for effects. We just kept trying different things. It felt like a fun science experiment.