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Blueprint What's up Print? Blueprint: Not much man. Just trying to stay busy, as usual. First off, tell us about your Blueprint vs. Funkadelic project coming out in April.   Blueprint: Well, a couple years back I did an EP called Greenhouse vs Radiohead. It was basically a product of me being a huge Radiohead fan, so while I would be listening to their albums I would be noticing things in their music that I could sample. The Radiohead project wasn't something that we took particularly seriously so we just took a weekend or two and recorded it, but when we let other people hear it they encouraged us to put it out. All the feedback we had was really positive and the record did well--particularly in Columbus. So around the same time I did the Radiohead project I was discovering Funkadelic's album and in one weekend I started working on the same type of project with their music; putting original rhymes to it. I would've put it out around then but I didn't feel like I had the interludes to bring it together like I did with the Radiohead one, plus I was working on the last Soul Position album at the time. Then luckily about a year ago I started stumbling on some great audio clips and interviews from Funkadelic that really helped me bring it together; quotes from Bootsy Collins and George Clinton. That's when I decided that it could be a pretty solid thing to put out. So I tightened it up a little bit and here we are! Is this an internet-only release or will it be available on CD? Blueprint: It will be a little of both. I plan on making the MP3 version completely free for people to download on a few websites.  Hopefully one of them is Art of Rhyme! As far as the CD's go I'm only going to get 500 of them. The CD version will come with all the instrumentals and an 11x17 poster when people order it from our online store. There will probably only be 4-5 shops in America that have the actual CD version, the rest I'll sell at shows. I'm not really as concerned with sales of this record because to me it's just something I did for fun and not a real album, and also because legally you can only take a record called "Blueprint vs Funkadelic" so far before you get a cease and desist order. Were you a big Funkadelic fan growing up? Blueprint: My parents didn't have any of their albums so I really wasn't up on them growing up. My uncle gave me his record collection a few years back and then I started to get into them more, so I borrowed all of their albums from my DJ, Rare Groove, and that's when i did the project. We also heard that you're in the studio working on a more experimental album. What can you tell us about that? Blueprint: Yeah, my next solo album is definitely not a traditional rap album. It's actually completely done. It's still me talking about the same things before but the way it's presented is completely different than what people are used to hearing from me. At the same time, I don't completely think it's out of nowhere. I think it's just me doing what I wanted to do and not giving a fuck what people thought and coming out with something that sounds really unique. I got into writing melodies more, but not just playing them. I would write them then have some musicians play them, then rearrange them as though they were samples to give it a little more of an edgy feel. There's some of it that sounds straight-up Hip Hop, and other parts of it sound more electronic or rock influenced. What would you say the musical influences for this project are? Blueprint: Off hand I'd say Outkast, Talking Heads, TV on the Radio, The Neptunes, Urythmics, maybe Radiohead plus all the Hip Hop op I've grown up on. It's hard to say because it encompasses so much. Is there any release date or time table for it? Will you put it out on your own label? Blueprint: It's actually supposed to come out on Rhymesayers Entertainment later this year if all goes well. I'm not sure right now about a date but I hope to know sometime this month. I'd like it to be released this fall. How do you think old Blueprint or Soul Position fans will react to it? Blueprint: So far the people I've let hear it haven't been too freaked out.  They've all said it sounds completely different than what they expected, but in a good way. The thing that i think some people may not realize is that a lot of my fans listen to all types of music, you know? They got 1988, but they'll also listen to something like TV On The Radio, Arcade Fire, Gnarles Barkley or Outkast. I think that overall all fans of underground Hip Hop have listening tastes that are more diverse than a lot of artists give them credit for and far more diverse then they used to be. Some of them are younger kids that are the products of the Ipod era, not the era that we grew up on which may have been the vinyl era or the CD era, so musical diversity isn't something they really get freaked out about. Speaking of changing gears, what did you think of RJD2's The Third Hand? Blueprint: I personally like it, but I know it caught a lot of people off guard because it was such a huge departure. But musically I admire him for having the balls to risk everything he had built to do what he wanted to do, and what was his natural progression. You've done projects like Soul Position which put you in touch with a much larger fan base, and you've also done more low-key projects for your hardcore fan base. Do you have any preference? Does it feel good to go on the Soul Position tour and have such a big response all over the country? Blueprint: I'm not sure if I have a preference really. I love doing music on every level and get just as much joy out of doing smaller projects and tours as I do larger projects and tours. It's more time consuming to do my own stuff because I have to produce it as well, but the trade off is that you feel more ownership and pride with it when it's successful, as opposed to being in a group where you're only a part of the reason it's successful. Are you working on any more Soul Position projects or was that it? Blueprint: I'm not sure really. Me and RJ are friends so we talk a couple times a week anyways, just not about that. So far the cycle has been for us to do solo records in between the Soul Position albums, so really it's my turn to put out my solo thing, which I think is really important for me. I can't say either of us have said whether there will be more Soul Position albums, but we haven't closed the door on it either. With us I think it just depends on what's going on with our solo releases and whether there's a window to do one or not. Hell, the last one that came out wasn't planned out that far in advance either but then one day we spoke about it and just decided to do it. I really wasn't sure we would be doing any more records after 8 Million Stories either, but you never know. What's the plan for your label Weightless in 2008? You're pushing Zero Star and Envelope, are there any other artists in the fold? Blueprint: Right now we've got a new Envelope album called "Shark Bolt" coming out July 8th. I produced that entire album.  After that we've got a new Illogic album called "Diabolical Fun" produced by Ill Poetic that will be out this fall, probably late September. This year we're going to get back into the habit of putting out one album every quarter again. Zero Star is featured heavily on our site, how did you hook up with him? Blueprint: I met him many years ago through the Columbus music scene way back in like 1998 or 1999 I think. I moved to Cincinnati for a while, and when I moved back in 2004 he was starting to do some stuff locally. Then I think we just kind of became drinking buddies. We would be at the bar going hard on the alcohol and just became friends that way. I liked what he was doing so naturally it made sense for us to start working together. Zero Star posted an animal fighting blog on AOR not too long ago stating he could take out some of the world's toughest beasts. Do you think he could really take out a cheetah? Blueprint: Hell no. Dude cannot beat a cheetah at all. Cheetahs are like 3 feet tall at the back, over 4-5 feet long, and can be over 100 pounds. He aint beatin shit. You two are working on an EP together, what can you tell us about that? Will you be producing it? Blueprint: I have no idea who's producing it--all I know is that I'm not gonna be producing it because I just wanna rap!  Sometimes it's so much easier to just write than it is to write and do beats. We're probably going to just get some beats from some good local producers that have some heat. There's a few cats that are coming up on the production right now that need to get more burn like this cat K81 and another cat named Seance. I like what I've heard from them. So is Greenhouse Effect officially done, and are you still working with Illogic at all? Blueprint: We were going to dead Greenhouse but me and Illogic both decided about a month ago to do the Greenhouse thing together now. We started working on a record about a month ago and have about 6 or 7 songs recorded so far that I feel really good about. We're going to get back to doing Greenhouse tours as well once we finish the record. Who else can we expect to hear over Blueprint production this year? Blueprint: Well I'm going to remix the last Atmosphere single "Shoulda Known" that came out. I've also been talking to Hangar 18 about producing their next project. The Envelope album coming out in July is a project I feel really good about. Columbus has been responsible for a lot of successful independent Hip Hop artists in the past, what's the scene look like now? Is there still a lot of untapped talent? Blueprint: The scene has had its gaps in talent, but I think its starting to show some more promise. The first school of cats were the MHz with Copywrite, Camu, Jakki, and RJD2 and Weightless with me, Illogic, and Greenhouse. Then you also had Spitball and DJ Przm's crew who were doing stuff at the same time. Out of all those cats the only people still doing strong local stuff is the Weightless cats. In the meanwhile everybody has been kind of wondering if the next era of cats will be able to make their mark and keep the scene strong that we built up. So far the cats I think have that potential are Intricate Suns, Zero Star, The Catalyst, Thought Set, Envelope and Fly Union.  Those cats are younger cats but I think if they stay at it they have the potential to do what Weightless, MHz, and Spitball did for the Columbus scene. So do you get a lot of large women approaching you ever since you recorded "Big Girls Need Love Too"? Blueprint: Oh yeah. Most definitely. I get both love and hate for that song. Less hate than I used to get but that shit seems like a classic now so I guess its a good thing. Would you take 1988 over 1994 when it comes to Hip Hop output? Blueprint: That's a tough one. Both years had some classics. Only difference is that Hip Hop as a whole was bigger in 1994 so there might be more choices that year than in 1988. I can't make a choice on that one. Anything else you'd like to add? Blueprint: I'd just like to thank everybody who's supported me over the years, and let them know that the music is going to start coming out at an alarming pace now, and to keep their eyes on www.weightless.net for updates and to keep aware of whats coming out. I'd also like to tell them to check out Blueprint vs Funkadelic. Andy