A Quote by Jim James

When people are recording, and they're like, 'I want to get the drum sound of the Beatles,' I hate that. — © Jim James
When people are recording, and they're like, 'I want to get the drum sound of the Beatles,' I hate that.
It just annoyed me that people got so into the Beatles. "Beatles, Beatles, Beatles." It's not that I don't like talking about them. I've never stopped talking about them. It's "Beatles this, Beatles that, Beatles, Beatles, Beatles, Beatles." Then in the end, it's like "Oh, sod off with the Beatles," you know?
I know when I started I would have been happy to sound like the Beatles or Joe Tex or whoever. You want to sound like most bands, you want to sound like their records and that's how you learn your chops.
In the late '80s and early '90s, there was a slightly retro drum sound that was popular in hip-hop music called the 808 bass drum sound. It was the bass drum sound on the 808 drum machine, and it's very deep and very resonant, and was used as the backbone as a lot of classic hip-hop tracks.
The modern recording studio, with its well-trained engineers, 24-track machines and shiny new recording consoles, encourages the artist to get involved with sound. And there have always been artists who could make the equipment serve their needs in a highly personal way - I would single out the Beatles, Phil Spector, the Beach Boys and Thom Bell.
If it was up to me, I'd get more oil tanker drivers drunk. I don't value music much. I like the Beatles, but I hate Paul McCartney. I like Led Zeppelin, but I hate Robert Plant. I like the Who, but I hate Roger Daltrey.
The left's propulsion is hate, and they have to have an outlet for the hate. They hate so much. They hate many elements of America. They hate people that don't think the way they do. It's not just that they disagree, they hate, and this energy requires action. People on the right, they don't hate anybody. We want everybody to get along, when you get right down to it. We're Rodney King types, actually.
So to compare the Beatles, obviously the Beatles are the Beatles, but in hip-hop terms, Tribe is the Beatles. Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five are the Beatles. Big Daddy Kane is Jimi Hendrix. It means that much to people that grew up with it.
I was in about in the 8th grade when I started recording R&B, so much of what was on was the Motown sound, and The Beatles had pretty much come over and taken America by storm.
The likes of Bob Dylan and David Bowie and probably Elvis Presley or any of the Beatles, none of them would have got through Pop Idol, because they're not conventional. They're not what people think is popular now. I like the individuality in people. I don't want everyone to sound the same.
I strive to create drum samples that have a variety of engineering and capturing options in order to build a unique drum sound.
There's so much to be said for making your guitar sound like a synthesizer and try to make your drummer sound like a drum machine.
I have a lot of creative control, so I can decide what I want to wear, what I want my brand to look like, what I want my songs to sound like, so I don't sound like some fake artist that people can't relate to.
I loved the idea of recording. The idea of sound-on-sound-recording captured me as a young kid, and once I realized what it was I had an epiphany. Before I was even playing the guitar, I would create these lists of how I would record things and overdub them, like Led Zeppelin song, 'I could put this guitar on this track...' and so on.
A lot of the Beatles albums were very various, and we did it on purpose: We didn't want the next track to sound like the last one.
As an artist you're looking for universal triggers. You want it both ways. You want it to have an immediate impact, and you want it to have deep meanings as well. I'm striving for both. But I hate it when people write things that sound like they've swallowed a f... dictionary.
I hate re-recording. I like singing, but I don't like recording a song over and over, making it too perfect.
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