by Scott Thill

Any fan of the turntable and its various creative applications -- the scratch, the mix, the juggle, the beat, the utter nirvana -- knows who Rob Swift is. We're just waiting for the rest of the world (read: mainstream media) to catch up. Most have already: Swift has worked with everyone from the all-decks All-Stars known as the X-ecutioners and jazz legends like Bill Laswell and Herbie Hancock to contemporary studs like Cornershop and avant-garde weirdos like the Blue Man Group. Hell, he's even graced Gap commercials and ESPN with his scratch skillz. But even though the pop landscape is lately loosening it's bubblegum tourniquet, the world is still not ready to deal with a guy who scratches salsa, jazz and hip-hop over JFK, freestyle fanatics like Supernatural, and interviews with superheroes like Colored Man, all found on Swift's latest solo release, Sound Event. You figure they would be, considering that Rob won the 1992 DMC East Coast turntable championship at the tender age of 20 -- in other words, he's been doing this his whole life. Which is probably why he kicks so much ass.

Scott Thill: As cool as it might have been working with the X-ecutioners, did you dig being able to roll solo on Sound Event?
Rob Swift: Yeah. It was done my way. To me, that's the thing about Sound Event that helped me create such an album. All the reviews and the comments I've been getting have been positive and genuine, and I think it's reflective of the state of mind I was in when I was working on the album. I got to work out of my house for the first time, whereas when I did The Ablist, I'd have to go to the studio and be conscious of how many hours I was there. Everything that went into this album was patient and pure. It was just an all-around good feeling.

ST: Supernatural is all over Sound Event.
RS: Yeah, definitely. I've been such a big fan of his since I first saw him at the New Music seminar in '93. So being able to work on that interview with Colored Man and the album intro and seeing him freestyle on the spot without writing anything down was just amazing.

ST: That Colored Man interview is awesome. Where did you find that record?
RS: That's a secret, but it's a record that I found in my crate, man. I was listening to it like, "Yo, I could build such a dope song around like this interview with this superhero." Then it was just a matter of getting the right person to fit that character, and who better than Supernatural? And then you listen to it and it's like, "Damn!"

ST: It comes across, especially when you read the liner notes and realize he just came up with this shit off the top of his head. Are you excited to finally collaborate with these people and get your solo work out there?
RS: Yeah. An album like Sound Event is such a mixture of different styles of music; the range of it is wide. And with the coverage and support I've been getting from magazines and people who have followed me with the X-ecutioners, hopefully I'll help make a little bit of dent, you know what I'm saying? I'll strike a balance. That's really all I've been trying to do all these years, just give people more of an option when they go to their record store, so they don't just have one form of music.

ST: Right, not just the bling bling stuff. Speaking of diversity, I know you mentioned something about this in the liner notes, but what for you are the similarities between jazz and turntablism?
RS: I think the similarities between jazz and turntablism is that both are just expressive forms of music. Your personality is going to be reflected in the instrument you use, the way you play. And it's the same thing with DJing, you know? Your personality reflects the music that comes out of those speakers. A lot of that is improv, on the spot, whatever comes out. Whatever you feel.

ST: Some of the songs on Sound Event are super potent, but my favorite track is "The Ghetto." We're spinning that on Morphizm Radio. I think that it's just an amazingly emotional tune.
RS: Cool. Yeah, it's reflective of what's going on. I wanted to make a song that captured how I felt when I'd go meet at a friend's house to practice and stuff, and some of these areas that I'd find myself in weren't the best areas to be in. But I was so eager to just practice with my friends, learn how to DJ and build that I wouldn't care. I'd just go. And the way I felt is reflected on that song. The thing about that song is that someone could have easily written a rhyme that matches the way you hear me scratch all those different verses, but I chose to express that through researching different records and picking out the best quotes to fit my feelings. That to me is the art in that song, you know? It's about three and a half minutes long, but it took months to put together. And the thing about that also is if you really listen, a lot of it rhymes. Almost like you could save it, repeat the words back like you wrote a rhyme out. But it's actually me scratching.

The X-ecutioner's weapon. "I'll strike a balance. That's really all I've been trying to do all these years, just give people more of an option when they go to their record store, so they don't just have one form of music."

ST: Yeah, I think many people who don't know what you do would figure that it was someone rapping. And that JFK quote at the end is really an enlightening way of spreading that social idea of how to go about fixing everything in the ghetto.
RS: Yo, you know man, it makes me feel good that you scienced and studied the record that way because that's the kind of reaction I want from people. Throughout the song, there's this guy talking about how he feels in the ghetto and how you gotta carry the gat, but at the end I wanted to give people the other side of the coin. And not necessarily promote either side but just say, "Yo, here's your options." That's something that I want to do in any album that I make. I'm always going to try and take the time out, although I'm not a rapper or someone like Chuck D or KRS-One, who's going to pick up a mike and try to spread knowledge; I do it through scratches. That's why there are songs on there like "The Program" and "The Ghetto". I figure, hey man, I might as well take five or 10 minutes out of the album to say something that makes people think, not just flood it with amazing scratches. You know what I'm saying?

ST: Yeah, because people like Chuck and KRS-One take their rhymes and push them out to the world, whereas a lot of the rap nowadays is people looking at themselves and nothing else. Until something like Jam Master Jay's death happens, and then everyone looks up and around again. What are your thoughts on Jay's passing?
RS: What can you say? Legend. Help put Queens on the map, not just for hip-hop but for DJs too. Before Jam Master Jay, there weren't really any DJs coming out of Queens that made such a statement worldwide. Coming from a Queens DJ like myself who looked up to Jam Master Jay, it's just a fucked up feeling, man. And it's sad, because he did so much back then and he was doing a lot now. He was teaching a class at a DJ academy here in New York on Broadway. Spreading the wisdom, and for someone like that to go out that way, to be murdered, man…it hasn't happened since Scott La Rock, and that was so long ago. So we lost another one, you know? To me, Jam Master Jay is like a martyr, man; people should see him that way. He really did a lot to project the art form. You know, we used to see Run DMC on the mike, but Jay played such a major role in that group. And it's typical for the DJ to kinda be in the background and just be cool and everything, you know what I'm saying?

ST: Yeah, in most of their songs both DMC and Run would be giving props to Jay, versus now hardly anyone says anything about the DJs.
RS: Right, exactly. Jay basically paved the way back then for what I'm doing with Sound Event and what we've done with the X-ecutioners. So we're the offspring of Run DMC; all these groups out now are the offspring of Run DMC. For that to happen is fucked up.

ST: And not just hip-hop, but alternative music too. Guys like Limp Bizkit and Korn? That all started with Run DMC.
RS: That's totally true. That started with Run DMC and Jam Master Jay and we have to all make sure to etch that in the history, make that known in the record book, so people don't forget.

BUY SOUND EVENT HERE

ST: I don't know if you were near a TV at the time, but it was blowing up with shit about Tupac and Biggie, even though Jay's murder was an isolated incident and had nothing to do with those two.
RS: Exactly. My whole thing is this -- OK, he got shot in the studio. Things like this happen every day. After what happened last year with the Twin Towers, you could be anywhere and some crazy shit could happen to you. So people gotta be really cautious about just linking violence to hip-hop. You could be walking to the corner store and have a stray bullet hit you. Or you could be in your house in fucking Oklahoma and have some psycho come inside and rob you. Shit happens, you know what I'm saying? Just because it was Jam Master Jay who makes hip-hop music doesn't necessarily link the two.

ST: On Fox, they had a reporter on the scene and she's like, "So far there's no connection to the East Coast/West Coast rap rivalry."
RS: Aw, man. See, that's just for ratings, man, and it's fucked up. It's good that people like yourself that can help balance out that perception. As artists and writers, we need anyone that follows and loves hip-hop to do their part to make sure that the story doesn't get turned into something that it's not.

04 February 03