S. Samuel
Grand Hustle's B.o.B. recently let fans in on what type of non-rap music he has been getting down with as of late and offered his take on the music industry.
Admitting he currently co-signs electronic music, B.o.B. said techno and house music are beginning to takeover.
“I’m really into electronic music right now, you know, with all of the beeps and boops and that kind of thing,” B.o.B. said in an interview. “I listen to a lot of James Blake‘s older stuff and this song “Wildfire” by SBTRKT that I just can’t get enough of. I’m also a dubstep fan, which is funny because if you went up to someone five years ago and say “whomp, whomp,whomp,” they’d have no idea what you’re talking about, but it’s such a big part of music today…Even though I rapped about it, I don’t really hate or despise the radio. House and techno music is starting to get huge lately, and I think that there’s a move as artists to make the best music that we can. When artists are lazy with songwriting, album sales drop. It’s a cycle, with supply and demand of albums based on our relationships with fans. I think that right now fans have built up enough trust to start buying albums again, and it shows.” (The Daily Orange)
Not only a fan of electronic music, B.o.B. revealed his interest in working on a country album in the near future.
“I want to produce a country album for a country singer,” B.o.B. explained in an interview. “I feel like country music has a certain kind of pocket. It all sonically [comes together]. Are you ready to get satisfied sonically? And then I want to do an album that is completely meditation music — It’s going to be like a little project. It won’t just be for people who like to sleep to it, meditate or are into yoga. It’ll be like even if you weren’t into all that, you’ll be listening to it and thinking: ‘Man this is dope, yeah!'” (Today Online)
Last fall, soulful singer Erykah Badu blasted hip-hop artists for fully embracing techno.
“How y’all gone stand by and let our music turn into pop techno cornball a** music. We don’t own our music no more. Come to think of it, did we EVER own it? when I say own our music , I’m not talkin bout the artist I’m talkin bout the people … let me be quiet. I wanna hear from the young people? easy for me to complain about this techno-pop cause i have a taste for something else. but how do u feel? These rappers ought to be shame of they damn selves, I’m talkin bout the mc’ s rappin over this pop techno music. I believe in pimpin the system but got D*MN! not like this #pop-technosongs.” (Underground Charizma)
Music video director David Rousseau previously talked to SOHH about the chemistry between electronic and dance music with hip-hop.
“Keep watching me because we’re surprising people. This whole Benny Benassi and T-Pain video is big because Benny’s one of the biggest deejays in the world. This guys packs stadiums. I mean, a hundred thousand people go out to see this dude. People like T-Pain are coming out to see him and working with him. So I think this video is important because of what it does for hip-hop. Now hip-hop is starting to get into the whole dance hip-hop thing with David Guetta. And it’s moving hip-hop to a whole different direction. People in Europe, South America, through songs by David Guetta and Benny Benassi, are discovering these hip-hop artists. So watch that because there’s going to be a whole lot more artists and deejays who are going to get more involved with hip-hop artists and that’s going to be a trend coming up in 2011 where you’re going to see hip-hop diversify more into that.” (SOHH Guest Star)
Check out some past B.o.B. interview footage down below:
