Dilla Time: The Life and Afterlife of J Dilla, The Hip-Hop Producer Who Reinvented Rhythm
All Of It - A podcast by WNYC
It's Valentine's Day, and nothing says love like a J-Dilla produced beat on loop. The producer, born and raised in Detroit, was widely considered to be a musical genius. He popularized off-beat drum rhythms thought of as "drunk drumming", and produced for the likes of D'Angelo, Erykah Badu, and Tribe Called Quest. But J Dilla was also notoriously quiet, so we don't know much about the full story of his life. Dan Charnas, author, journalist, and arts professor at NYU, has told the complete story of J Dilla in the first biography of the producer, called, Dilla Time: The Life and Afterlife of J Dilla, The Hip-Hop Producer Who Reinvented Rhythm. Charnas is with us to discuss the book.