jacked from Rolling Stone:
DIRTY STORIES
The lowdown on the making of Ol' Dirty b*stard's masterpiece
BEING THE WU-TANG CLAN'S RESIDENT wildman isn't an easy job, but Ol' Dirty b*stard fulfills the role with gusto and then some: Thanks to his tabloid shenanigans, the controversial MC has racked up more arrest records than musical ones. In the past two years alone, he's been arrested for shoplifting, for making terrorist threats at L.A.'s House of Blues, for wearing illegal body armor and for possessing crack cocaine. With true ODB bad luck, just a month before the release of N***a Please, his second solo album, he was sent to rehab for a lengthy stint. Still, he left behind one of the strangest, funniest, funkiest, most compelling albums of 1999. Below, the behind-the-scenes story of the making of ODB's masterpiece.
RZA, producer and Wu-Tang mastermind: "It took a while for N***a Please to happen. The main struggle was having Dirty focus on his shyt. Dirt was going through so many trials and tribulations: He got arrested; he had personal problems, court dates; he's got a lot of children, a lot of women, a lot of people against him; and he's got a conspiracy in his head. Keeping him pinned down is a struggle. He might be in my house; I might wake up at twelve, he might've woken up at nine and left. I might find out he's locked up in L.A. But around February '99, we got serious, and Dirty's label, Elektra, got very serious. [Elektra president and CEO] Sylvia [Rhone] has a lot of love for ODB -- I think the label sees him as one of its children."
BUDDHA MONK, producer: "He wanted to go with more of a rock feel. Dirty just loves rock, period! Most of the tracks are extremely loud, and the vocals are screaming at you. At the same time, Dirty loves Gladys Knight and the Pips, the Four Tops, the Chi-Lites: music that's really about soul. Dirty was like, 'I've got all of this in me; now I have to bring it up to date.'"
RZA: "Musically, ODB wanted people partyin' and not to come so hardcore and raw. That's why he brought in those outside producers: to catch up to music trends. But when it came time to assemble the album, we listened to a lot of old Blowfly and Richard Pryor tapes, just buggin' out. I told Elektra that ODB wants a Grammy, but fukk going for the hip-hop Grammy; this shyt is funny -- let's go for the comedy Grammy!"
IRV GOTTI, producer: "I think Dirty's label gave him ten, twenty, thirty, maybe fifty thousand [dollars] every time he came to the studio -- to entice him."
RZA: "Dirty wanted $20 million to do this album. He was definitely pushing the buttons for green."
SYLVIA RHONE: "He does that [asks for money], but that's just Dirty. I never had to pay him to go into the studio. He was really anxious to do this album, really focused."
PHARREL WILLIAMS, the Neptunes: " 'Recognize' [the opening track] is a pimp song. We wanted to go with a pimp theme, because that's what Dirty does: He pimps this whole industry and all the bullshyt people assume."
BRIAN STANLEY, engineer on "Recognize": "We had already thought of a chorus for 'Recognize,' but Dirty didn't like it. Then Chris Rock happened to be working in the studio downstairs; he came by to say what's up to Dirty. Chris told Dirty he wanted him on his album, and Dirty said, 'Well, you do something for my album, I'll do something for your album.' Chris was like, 'Cool, call me whenever.' And Dirty was like, 'The mike's hooked up. Just go in there and do whatever you want.'"
KELIS, singer on "Got Your Money": "They had security downstairs because they had a little problem booking the session; I think Dirty has a reputation in New York now. When Dirty showed up, he was wearing two different shoes: one Timberland, one rubber boot. Overalls over sweat pants, one pair of eyeglasses and one pair of sunglasses. He was totally out there -- he lived up to his reputation, at least visually. He was having issues with the label. He stole the tape reel; no one could find him -- it was drama. That's why everybody loves him. No one knew what he was going to do, there was no beat on, and he just went in and started singing, 'Baby, I'll eat the shyt right up from out your ass.'"
RZA: "Elektra was very finicky about the album's being so vulgar. Sylvia Rhone is the president of the company, a strong black woman in the industry, and Dirty is all-out offensive to women. I told them that's how that man lives; that's the artistry of what he is."
RHONE: "I have my own opinions, but I have a responsibility to the artists to let them do their art. I've got to let Dirty be Dirty."
GOTTI: "Dirty did 'I Can't Wait' fast, in two or three hours. And he doesn't have nothing written: He just goes in and basically ad-libs the whole song. But it works. He goes line by line, overlapping tracks like he's two different people. It's all his personalities coming out, but it's all Dirty."
MONK: "At one session I was at, we were really off our motherfukkin' rockers -- we were high as hell. I was seeing twins, I was so drunk. And we'd go to the bathroom, and somebody would be in there sniffin' coke! And Dirty always has women at his sessions. We're all ready to do the song, and this girl wants to get on the album. We put the track on and let her start singing. Then Dirty was in there, fukking her in her ass while the track was rolling. He was hitting her head against the drum --that's why you be hearing funny sounds on the track!"
STANLEY: "One time, ODB and Pharrel were talking about loving people. Dirty was saying he loves everything and that everything on earth breathes air. He picked up a paper bag off the table and was like, 'This paper bag on the table breathes air. How'm I gonna leave this little nikka out? I love him.'"
RZA: "Last summer, after he got shot, Dirty ran out of the hospital, and I found him at his father's house. I picked him up and said, 'Hang out with me for a month.' We just drove through Ohio, through Boston; we had no destination. He still had his bandages on, and he had a Natalie Cole tape in his pocket that had 'Good Morning Heartache' on it. He put it in and started singing along. There was a van full of us, and tears were coming from all of us. We could feel the heartache that he goes through. He feels like he can't turn nowhere for that love that every man needs. We must've listened to that song a hundred times during our travels. I said to him, 'I need you to do this song on your album -- I need people to feel how you felt going through this.' I wanted him to do it with his room. He didn't want to do that, so we got a studio singer with a nice voice. It adds a nice mood to the album. It takes you out of the comedy and puts you right into the world of his pain."
ALLI TRUCH, vice president of creative services, Elektra Records: "When I met with Dirty to talk about his concept for the album cover, he told me that he wanted to look like Rick James because he was doing a cover of [James'] 'Cold Blooded,' and he thought it would be funny. All he asked me for was a Rick James outfit and a Donna Summer outfit. He ended up wearing the Donna Summer wig with the Rick James outfit; as you know, Dirty is very creative."
RZA: "Rick James got into a lot of trouble. He kept a lot of bytches up in his crib, he had a problem with drugs, but he was a funky motherfukker. Just like ODB. You hear about the great brothers that we lost in the hip-hop industry like Tupac and Biggie, but Dirty's still here with that pain. He's a living example of it. They've got him in a place where he's got no access to things that keep your mind clouded --I think he's going to snap into a better reality. Nobody I've ever met is as strong as him to have survived the shyt he's survived: falling off roofs, getting shot and stabbed, constantly in some kind of trouble. He looks new every few months; I think he's a mutant."
BIG BABY, producer, Flavahood Productions: "A lot of people don't take the time to listen to him, so they don't understand -- they think he's a fool. But he's far from a fool. Sometimes it's the court jester that's actually controlling the court."
Chinese Democracy was like the Detox of Rock music. Seemed like every 3 months it was supposed to drop in 3 months.