1. The First Record I Bought:
The first music I can recall purchasing with my own money was Minor Threat’s First Demo Tape on CD when it came out in 2003. I was 13 and devouring punk records given to me on burned CDs by my uncle Bill… Minor Threat smacked me in the face, the music was powerful and immediate, and made everything, especially my peers’ obsessions with Eminem, seem hollow and unimportant.
2. The Last Record I Bought:
I use iTunes to buy individual tracks here and there, but the last physical recording I bought was probably Watch The Throne. I was walking by the pop-up shop in NYC where they were selling physical copies, and I always try to buy every Kanye record and financially support him as much as possible. He is the only rap artist I will do this for. The album had dope moments, secretly I wanted them to get weirder with it.
3. The First Thing I Recorded:
A tape called ‘Noah sings and plays drums, 9/93’. I guess I was three-years-old. It was a duet with my dad. In high school I was assistant engineering on a lot of jazz records (the best one being Sunny Murray & Odean Pope’s Plant Life). Then I recorded my friends’ rock bands. Then I got into rap, started producing Theodore Grams, which lead to Chiddy Bang, Big Sean and all the rap stuff.
4. The Last Thing I Recorded:
The last thing I recorded was Ellie Goulding’s cover of the alt-J song ‘Tessellate’. She was playing a show in Philly and I showed up to where they were staying and recorded all the vocals in like an hour. Then we emailed it back and forth for a couple of months till it was done. I also did an EP for this really wonderful Brooklyn band called Wet.
5. The Record(s) That Changed My Life:
In the span of one week when I was about 15, hip hop just descended upon me. I think someone gave me Midnight Marauders, along with Beanie Siegel’s The B. Coming and Clipse’s Lord Willin’ – all in the same three day period.I listened to those records every day – to and from school – for about a year.
Xaphoon Jones playChinese Laundry on Saturday July 27.
