What was your personal relationship like with Abel during this period? Would you say you were friends?
We were just trying to work on music. We were also partying a lot. We became pretty good friends, hanging out every day. At first it was working pretty well, but then I don’t know if it was a change in his heart or the people around Abel trying to guide him, but he was starting to push for doing club tracks and I didn’t really want to [do that]. We started as a group; it was he and I, and we called ourselves “The Weekend.” I came up with that name, by the way.
How did the “e” get dropped?
Well, I left. He dropped the “e.” But he was pushing for some things I didn’t want to do, and it got to the point where he wouldn’t respect my opinion. He wanted me to produce for him without any of my input. And I was like, “Well then, what’s the point of being a group?” and he was like, “You can just be my producer,” and I said, “Are you going to pay me?” Then [I realized he was] not going to pay me. That’s why I backed out. I was like, “You can have those three or four tracks, I’ll give you the stems, just take ’em, but I don’t want to work with you anymore.” I was really congenial about it, but I told him, “Just make sure that you give me credit,” and that’s where things went sour.