When I tell Knxwledge that he is our decade’s J Dilla, he doesn’t quite know what to say. It gets a little awkward while I wait for a response. “That is a crazy statement,” he chokes out finally. But is it really that unfathomable a comparison?
Like Dilla before him, Knx lives and breathes hip hop, making countless beats a week (according to FlyLo, Knx “makes a million tracks a day; it’s insane, keep up if you can”) and producing for the illest cats in the game. Both artists are key members of the Stones Throw family – even after Dilla’s passing in 2006, posthumous releases were still brought out though the label – and both are incredibly prolific. Knx’s Bandcamp discography is evidence alone: since 2009, he’s released more than 70 mixtapes, albums and EPs. Dilla and Knx a “crazy” comparison? Perhaps not.
Fusing hip hop, soul and jazz, Knx provides the perfect soundtrack for those late-night feeds and early morning car rides. Put simply, his music is very cool and very West Coast. Like Knx’s music, the Los Angeles sound is epitomised through the iconic Stones Throw label, founded in 1996 by Peanut Butter Wolf. After Knx made the move from Philly to LA in 2009, it didn’t take long for Wolf to snatch him up.
“I was playing a Boiler Room session,” Knx says. “Wolf came up to me while I was playing a Charizma remix and we had a meeting a few days after that. I’d met him back in Philly when I lived there a few times. We’re family now. Wolf is an incredible human being.
“With Stones Throw, I can do whatever I want,” he continues. “I can release whatever I want. It’s also an incredible thing to be a part of a label that is all about vinyl. If you make something that’s sufficient enough, it’s going straight to wax.”
Raised in New Jersey, Knx’s childhood was full of music. Not only was his house full of instruments, but the church he belonged to was a goldmine as well, stocked with an array of instruments that he would eventually inherit.
“My parents used to clean the church that I was a part of, so every Saturday I’d go and clean the church with them and play the instruments – I could pretty much be alone with all of the instruments. “They got a lot over time, and that’s how I built my foundation for musical appreciation.”
After establishing skills on a bunch of those instruments, Knx turned to production and sampling – he would even record snippets of church sermons to tape and then loop them.
“I was always trying to record,” he says. “I was playing everything from scratch. In the beginning, everything was primarily keys and drum-based. I bought a Roland SP-303 – that was my first piece of hardware I could get my hands on. I wasn’t able to have a computer yet.”
Before moving to LA, Knx lived briefly in Philadelphia, where he attended university and continued working on his music. There, he met his good friend and current labelmate Ringgo Ancheta, AKA Mndsgn. But it was at a show at San Diego University where Knx got his first taste of the Californian music scene.
“Halfway through college I was booked for a show,” Knx explains. “It was me, DJ House Shoes, The Gaslamp Killer, Samiyam and Danny Brown.” After that, he couldn’t stay away – “I had to move for the music.”
The ensuing years have been fruitful to say the least. An impressive discography and numerous production credits have awarded Knx ubiquity on the West Coast. His recent collaboration with crooner Anderson Paak is scheduled to arrive any day now. Working under the name Nxworries, they have already released ‘Suede’, a very sexy single that fuses Knx’s smooth and mellow production with Paak’s suave vocals. Knx looks forward to their forthcoming full-length.
“It’s gonna be a good one. I’m just getting the artwork done and we’ve just done a video for ‘Suede’. It’s coming out soon,” he says.
Speaking of collaborations, only last year Knx’s fellow Californian resident Kendrick Lamar was chilling in a car with the renowned photographer and filmmaker Eric Coleman, doing a cover shoot for Complex magazine. Knx’s Anthology tape was in the cassette player, and Lamar liked what he heard on the instrumental track ‘So[rt]’.
“He texted me immediately and it was on,” Knx explains. The ensuing track, ‘Momma’, ended up on Lamar’s number one album, To Pimp A Butterfly.
While Knx says the rest of 2015 will undoubtedly see even more collaborations and mixtapes, the producer is also midway through an Australian tour. So how does such a prolific artist with a huge back catalogue decide what to play in a single set?
“That’s a good question,” he says. “I actually don’t ever plan anything when I play. It’s kind of weird, but less stressful that way. I just like mixing it up and playing whatever. I’ll either drag something in or I’ll just stop everything and ask somebody in the crowd what they want me to play. My computer is full of songs – I’ll just play whatever.”
Presented by Red Bull Music Academy, Knxwledge plays Goodgod Small Club on Saturday August 8, with Katalyst, B Wise, Klasik.1, Prize and Bustlip.
