There was a big blizzard that weekend, so she got trapped in Puerto Rico. Ma Dukes was supposed to come but she got snowed in. So, I started teaching about Dilla in my core Music History course, and that lecture was so successful that Jason King - now the chair of the Clive Davis Institute - suggested that we do a course on J Dilla, and maybe we take all the students to Detroit. And this is about the time that we’re about to see Kendrick album and Hiatus Kaiyote’s album. My wife is from Detroit, so Detroit became a second home.Ĭut to me teaching at NYU in 2013, 2014 - students loved Dilla. Nine years later was my second trip to Detroit, when I was doing research for The Big Payback, and also I met my wife’s family. I had known about him and loved him since ’95 but that trip to Detroit is where it started. That’s my first experience with him in a room. ⁰⁰On the penultimate eve of the release of Dilla Time, it’s time to talk about The Triptych, and what it means… ⁰ĭan Charnas: The real origin of the book is the trip that Chino XL and I took to Detroit in 1999 to work with Jay Dee. Some of you have seen this symbol on my Twitter page, and on the Dilla Time website. “This puts him in a whole other category in terms of his achievement.” I can put a grid in front of your face and help understand what straight time is, what swing time is, and what Dilla time is, and then you really understand we’re talking about something that’s centenary,” Charnas said. This clarity is why, ultimately, Charnas’ argument is a very convincing one. To make his argument, Charnas uses graphs and DIY instructions any musical novice could understand. He did it using his MPC, but he was so effective at it that live musicians soon adapted his practices. Dilla created his own time, which clashed both to create something disjointed, but also beautiful and purposeful. Before Dilla, musicians either played straight time or swing time. Dilla Time: The Life and Afterlife of J Dilla, the Hip-Hop Producer Who Reinvented Rhythm (out February 1st, via Macmillan) is a rigorous examination of the life and influence of one of the most important figures in music history.Ĭharnas’ book is presented as a biography but it’s really an argument. In the decades that followed, Charnas would go from being an early admirer of Jay Dee to teaching an entire course at New York University about the influence of Dilla’s methods to writing the definitive biography of the legendary producer. That initial meeting - which resulted in the deep album cut “Don’t Say a Word” - sparked a 20-plus year journey for Charnas. “Chino has his arm around me and tells Dilla, ‘Yo, you don’t understand, this little kid right here, you’re his favorite.’ But I didn’t know he was John Coltrane at that time.” record executive working on Chino’s sophomore album, I Told You So, said. “It was Jay Dee, Common, and me,” Dan Charnas, who at the time, was a Warner Bros. They met the young producer at his makeshift studio - aka the basement of his house - which was located in Conant Gardens, the neighborhood Jay Dee, who would later switch his moniker to J Dilla, grew up. In the summer of 1999, Dan Charnas and pugnacious rapper Chino XL traveled to Detroit to work with a burgeoning producer named Jay Dee.

Photo Credit: Gregory Bojorquez/Getty Images We spoke to Dilla Time author Dan Charnas about his extensive new book, J Dilla’s complicated relationship with Q-Tip, and why he wants to recenter Slum Village and Fantastic Vol.

Before J Dilla, musicians either played straight time or swing time.

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