OCTOBER 9, 2009
LITTLEFIELD PERFORMANCE VENUE
PARK SLOPE, BROOKLYN
“Whats up! Its your girl, Raven THE BLAZIN Eurasian, representin’ BrooklynBodega.com and The Brooklyn Hip Hop Festival and Brooklyn Bodega Radio. I’m here with JOHNNY VOLTIK! You like how I yelled that out? I gotta yell it out because it sounds kinda like a superhero name. It does. We were just talkin’ about it. Right? Like you got like, cuffs and stuff. So tell me ‘bout your stuff. Tell me where you got your name and what you’re trying to do in the music industry. Why are you coming out as an artist? What is going on? Whats the deal?”
A blank expression takes hold of Johnny Vo’s face whenever he finds himself posturing for the press. Partly incredulous. Always contemplative. To the uninitiated, if only for the briefest of moments, possible frustration. On this night, however -- standing backstage in Littlefield’s (more-like-blueish) Green Room -- one specific expression subjugates the rest: fatigue.
Bold jail-striped black and white hoodie zipped to his chest. Hood pulled over a black skully hiding his drenched in sweat Huey Freeman-style “nappy afro.” Eyes low, focusing on the question. Seventy-three minutes following another high voltage performance, and Johnny Voltik can barely stand.
Its rare to see him this way. Relentless energy is a necessity for any artist attempting to successfully navigate through The Underground, and Johnny Vo packs it like ConEd. You see it when you see him running down Flatbush Ave leaving his day job (New York Sports Club), heading to his night job (the studio). You see it when you see him hand peddling a backpack loaded with fliers -- building new relationship after new relationship -- promoting his next live show. You most definitely see it when he’s on stage, the place where he’s always already home. So to see him spent to this degree, after this show, you know nothing was left on the table. There were no leftovers in Littlefield on this night. No room for desert.
AUGUST 24, 2009
JHU PRODUCTIONS STUDIO
KINGS HIGHWAY, BROOKLYN
A “do it yourself” mentality has taken hold of today’s generation. Labels started in dorm rooms. Classics crafted on laptops. At Home Emcees and PC Producers clicking while they work, honing the sound in tomorrow’s headphones, making magic out of minimal.
JHU Productions is located in the basement of a single family home off Brooklyn’s Kings Highway. Its a working class neighborhood. Fruit stands and bodegas and other family owned businesses line the main avenue. Second generation Americans migrate to Manhattan daily, a product possible only by the determination of the first. The Melting Pot personified.
Finally nearing the completion of his first full length LP, The Red Album, Johnny Vo is expectedly upbeat. Considering he’s spent the past year and change shaping and layering its sound, sharpening its potency with an absolute emphasis on the album’s overall feel -- now that the finish line is finally visible, he has reason to be excited.
Leaning forward on one of the two matching beige couches facing the production equipment and obligatory forty-something-inch flat screen TV equipped with XBox 360 and digital cable. Talking with his hands. Kool-Aid smiling. Animated, eager to preview his labor. Taking a cue from Voltik, J Hu swivels around in his producer chair to play lead single “Switch Lanes” -- a raucous, trunk thumping cypher cut featuring frequent collaborators Trife Reality and DJ Enki -- exclaiming “‘that shit’s retardo!”
“Remember that Masta Ace era when heads were just making beats for cars? Like “I got the woofers in my jeep” type shit? Remember when heads had battles? Who had the illest system? Thats what this is reminiscent of. Thats what the idea is.”
Voltik creates and engineers all aspects of his music, tinkering with the snares and strings and bass drums and acoustics until it all blends perfectly, conveying that exact emotion he wants the listener to experience. Thats what matters most to Johnny Vo. The Feel. He’ll quickly extend a hook, or croon a verse, or stretch out a track -- playing the beat backwards if need be -- just to include a trippy, chest rattling attack to the senses like the one heard on the psychadelic “Higher.”
“It became one of those things where less is more. I really try to let the music speak for a lot of things, you know what I mean? Which I think is important and a lot of artists don’t do so much. You get Emcees who come spazzing the fuck out on a song. But its about wielding it, you know? Busta Rhymes is a great example. When he first came out with [The Coming], the energy level on every song was like [off the charts]. Shit was dope as hell. But when you hear his second album, he’s like wielding his style now. So when you hear “Hand Where My Eyes Can See”, he’s like working the beat. Rather than just coming and spazzing the fuck out.”
“Some mutherfuckers don’t use the beat, they just want to shine as much as a rapper can. But your music takes on a life of its own when you’re in it.”
OCTOBER 9, 2009
LITTLEFIELD PERFORMANCE VENUE
PARK SLOPE, BROOKLYN
“I got Post-Traumatic Syndrome, from Babylon shit pumping in my earphones. / But I love it. I be shaking when I spit poems. / Like a fiend trapped in a Her-ron (Heroine) dream.” -- “Turn Around”; The Red Album (continue after jump)
AUGUST 24, 2009
JHU PRODUCTIONS STUDIO
KINGS HIGHWAY, BROOKLYN
Voltik: “We need to add that ‘most beautifullest freestyle’ in the beginning?”
JHu: “What?”
Voltik: “We need to add that beginning chorus.”
With only six tracks rocked during this Red Album preview session, the stark differences between this project and his previous -- Missile Factory Vol. 2 -- are glaring to say the least. The growth is apparent. Where Missile Factory’s freestyled bars and uncooked lyricism carried most of its content, The Red Album tilts towards storytelling. Where Missile Factory’s riotous sound scape occasionally drifted too close to unruly, The Red Album is sonically more refined in its rambunctiousness. He’s wielding his style now. He’s wielding his sound.
But if one is to grow, one must not be afraid to change. Force change, if need be. In the eleven months since The-Quotable first sat down with The Illustrious, change has become synonymous with his journey. Not only has the name of Voltik’s band changed from The Blackbirds to The Technicoloreds to most recently The Red -- but the makeup of the band has changed almost completely. Last winter Johnny rocked with two backup vocalists, drummer, keyboardist, and bass player. This winter Johnny rocks with a different keyboardist, a different drummer, DJ, and a different backup vocalist.
“Its all about getting the right blend and building a core with a mutual respect for whats happening. With The Blackbirds it was like a raw respect and love that we had, but it wasn’t necessarily the right sound. I didn’t feel comfortable with it. With The Technicoloreds it was more like, you take the knob and you turn it all the way down and its not just right. And then you turn it way up and its not just right. Then you get that nice middle ground. And I think with The Red, with Enki and BamBam, its like I’m starting to get that nice middle ground where I can have the feel thats on the CD and then have the live feel. So its all about blending it just right.”
The biggest change since that first conversation is undoubtably Voltik’s decision to continue rhyming. To the dismay of those who appreciated The Missile Factory, Johnny Vo declared last winter that he’d tired of rapping and intended to exclude it from future music. Eleven months later, he’s regained a love for the art form and refuses to close any doors when searching for The Feel. “I think I was kind of done with the whole braggadocious sort of rhyming. Now its more for a purpose. Whatever comes to mind, whether its a rhyme or singing, however it happens.”
Perhaps the most potent example of this newfound love comes on the dreamy, snare heavy “The Most Beautifullest Freestyle.” Voltik’s train of thought delivery captures the internal frustration of the Indie Artist’s voyage through The Underground, blended perfectly with the affirming spirit of the Undeterred Emcee. A lonely journey. An alpha love.
“He’s uncouth. / Vandross, Luth. / A thousand kisses momma, see I love what I do.” -- “The Most Beautifullest Freestyle”
OCTOBER 9, 2009
LITTLEFIELD PERFORMANCE VENUE
PARK SLOPE, BROOKLYN
So tell me ‘bout your stuff. Tell me where you got your name and what you’re trying to do in the music industry. Why are you coming out as an artist? What is going on? Whats the deal?” -- Raven The Blazin Eurasian
Johnny Vo pauses for a second, grazing his right hand across his hood as he contemplates his answer. He tells Raven how ‘Johnny Voltik’ was one of a million nicknames his father gave him growing up. He tells her how ‘Voltik’ comes from volts and it stuck because he was a hyper child.
And then suddenly, as he begins to answer the final part of her question, his eyes brighten as if he’s answered that question a million times prior. As if that question was answered before he ever picked up an instrument. As if fatigue never existed
“I’m just trying to make some love in this whole shit.”
