Extensive interview with Lord Digga. His “The High Plains Drifter EP” is available for pre-order at One Leg Up Records. Thanks Haj. Link
So how exactly did the connection start? How did you end up in the mix with Masta Ace and the whole Juice Crew family?
That right there happened really on the connection from the football team. Ace was on the football team at one point when he was in high school. Then, you know, he used to come back from college and visit the school and get to know the younger players and know me or whatever, and from that time we was on some hangin’ out shit. One of his peoples that also went to the school had brothers that were almost in the same age group as me so they were in school still and they were comin’ back to watch us play, so that’s how the connection got started. Eventually I was goin’ to a couple shows that he had and then it went from that to hangin’ around Kane, Craig G, all of them.. It was crazy. You know that’s the shit as a kid you dream about. Like cause you look at Video Music Box and all the shit that was poppin’ and you be like “Damn, son!” and you see somebody downtown like “That’s this dude! Yo, son I seen the nigga T.J. Swan..” You know, little shit like that you dream about as a fan. Not to say that I’m a groupie, but I’m a rap fan first before I was even an artist. I went through every phase of hip hop, that’s the way I feel. Other than graffiti and that aspect or whatever, the stages that I took to get to this point I feel I paid all of those dues. From being a fan, like standin’ next to these dudes.. “Symphony” part 1 video shoot.. “Symphony” video 2.. It’s just shit you dream about.
You guys ended up producing a chunk of tracks on Notorious BIG’s classic “Ready To Die” album. How did y’all end up landing that production gig?
I’m gonna say it was great hustle and a pretty good assist to make it all conect. It was mainly due to my hustlin’ with our product up to The Source magazine and being recognized in an Unsigned Hype column with the first artist I ever produced for, which was Sir Essence Don.. and Matt Life, Matty C.. was the spearhead of Unsigned Hype. So I had a repoire with him and I just had an open door to be with The Source magazine which was another time in my life and in my travels in hip hop that I felt was significant. You know, that was a major, major, major hip hop source.. Literally.. Givin’ fans a lot of information and great pictures and just a lot of crazy shit. You know, a good magazine for its time, until it got fucked up! But anyway, I’m up at The Source and chillin’ with the editors and walkin’ around with one of my good friends Kierna Mayo, that’s my homegirl. I used to be up there with Matty and fuckin’ around with them and you know, bringin’ tapes.. just tracks all the time to Matt.. Just bringin’ shit, all the time.. One of those days I left one of them shits with him and then he goes and plays it for Big. He played it for Big and Big picked it.
Ahh, so that’s how the beats landed in Biggie’s hands…
Yup. Big would say, “I want it!” and it wasn’t even finished, like “I want that NOW!” (laughs) It was just crazy, man. Like at the time, I don’t think any of us knew. Like me and Norm didn’t know that it was gonna really be some crazy shit like it was. We knew the shit was ill and the dude had mad talent, but we never imagined it would be what it is today.
