Mr. Hudson: Straight No Chaser | Hypebeast

Is Kanye producing the entire album?

It’s more of a collaboration. His role was that of an executive producer. I tried not to make too many demands at the time because he’s got a huge amount of people asking him for beats and vocals. He would basically be involved when he could and when he wanted to, that way it would be more of an experience and not an obligation.

Straight No Chaser. Can you give us some detail behind the meaning of the title?

I guess it was approached with directness, like kicking it in the nuts. I didn’t want to have all the intros and outros and make it too indulgent. I wanted it to be more straightforward, not shallow but to have a lot of weight behind the punch. It was still like Bam!, a knockout with one punch… you know what I mean? When you listen to the record your gonna know what your listening to, it’s not just background music.

That’s one of the characteristics that makes Kanye so original. He doesn’t hold back. You know it’s his sound when you hear it.

Definitely.

While listening to A Tale of Two Cities, I can draw so many musical influences. What artists/music did you listen to growing up?

I was into everything. When I was a kid I was into American Pop, acts like Paula Abdul, MJ, the New Kids on the Block, and Madonna. But in my teens I was into very metal stuff because my brothers were into that and I was in my big brother’s band playing drums. I was into Helmet and Metallica, stuff like that. Later, I kind of got into the Lemonheads and more of the Guns style. I kind of fell out of love with new music. When everyone else was listening to this trippy acoustic stuff I thought that mainstream was a bit brainless, not really brainless but no one had anything to say anymore, this was about 10 years ago after Brit Pop. I wasn’t excited by new music, so I went back and started listening to Bowie, Neil Young and Marvin Gaye, getting back and back into the older days. Then I suddenly realized in about 2003-2004 that maybe I should see what hot new music is out there and that is when I got into Hip-Hop and R&B. I started listening to old soul records like Bobby Womack and stuff, and that’s when I was ready to appreciate music from Kanye and Outkast.