J Dilla was renowned as a virtuoso in his field, crafting timeless pieces for both himself and fellow artists, including R&B anomaly Erykah Badu.
During an appearance on Sonos’ Radio Hour series in 2021, Badu reminisced about working with J Dilla during the making of her 2000 album ‘Mama’s Gun.’ During her visit to the basement studio of the esteemed late musician in Detroit, he imparted the skill of sampling on an MPC 2000 to her.
“He has this massive record collection, and he told me to go and flip through the records, and I pulled out this one record by Tarika Blue. I didn’t know who that was or anything. I just pulled out the record, put it on the turntable, put it on the first song, and the first song was called ‘Dreamflower’…I told him, ‘Dilla, this is the part I wanna sample,’ and he goes, ‘Okay, well, sample it.’
“He showed me how to do that. How to quantize — he’s not a real quantizer, you know? He plays all the drums live, generally, but he showed me how to loop these parts.”
Blue’s “Dreamflower” ultimately served as the foundation for Badu’s single “Didn’t Cha Know” and earned a nomination in the Best R&B Song category at the 2001 Grammy Awards.
