I'm not going to put my music up on some little corner of the Internet or give it away for free. What does that do? That's just giving up. I'm not giving up, ever.
I was a rapper. The reason I stopped rapping was because I realized that people wanted guys like Puff Daddy. That's not what I do. I quit. That was it. I had to sacrifice for my choice. I said, 'Forget it. I'll be a producer.' Nobody was going to make me do anything.
There's the way modern music is produced, which is, 'Here's a piece of music, and I'm the producer, so pay me and make sure my credit is right and get me my splits.' But I'm trying to go backward. Now, it's more like 'What's the texture? What's the over-arching story?' There are more things to pay attention to than 'Is this the right snare?'
I take a lot of pride in helping people become great. I think that's an element of being a producer that people don't always take in: They want to be great for themselves, whereas I'd like to be recognized as having helped the most people get over the hump.
Hit records create slang, and if you create slang, you get into a broader conversation level.
