LargeUp Interview: At the Instrument Zoo with Salaam Remi

Words by Jesse Serwer, Photos by Daison Osbourne—

“Most people didn’t even know I exist, and I don’t want them to,” Salaam Remi says. “‘Know my name if you gotta write it on a check’ has been my motto for a long time.” Readers of album credits know the low-key Remi as the guy who put the Fugees, Amy Winehouse, Jasmine Sullivan and Miguel on the map with career-launching hits, and as Nas’ most reliable collaborator for the last decade. The son of Trini-Bajan music producer and veteran promotions man Van Gibbs, Salaam is also behind the most artistically successful hybrids of hip-hop and reggae, from his 1992 remix of Super Cat’s “Ghetto Red Hot” to his recent work with Spragga Benz, and his sublime flip of vintage Super Cat track “Dance Inna New York” on Nas’ “The Don.” His catalog is stacked with remixes so definitive that the originals are no longer even a thought (see Ini Kamoze’s “Here Comes the Hotstepper,” a U.S. No. 1 single after Salaam got his hands on it).

Raised in New York City, Salaam has, since 2001, been based in Miami. He recently invited LargeUp to the private studio he calls Instrument Zoo for a rare look at the creative den where he laid the foundation for Back to Black with Amy Winehouse, and crafted the tracks that make up the heart of Nas’ Life is Good. Head over to Okayplayer for part two of our interview with Salaam, and check our latest Toppa Top 10 for the stories behind 10 of Salaam’s most classic records, from “Ghetto Red Hot” to “The Don.”

LargeUp: For someone who has produced as many major records as you have, you have been fairly anonymous. Or at least until recently. I know you’ve had to be something of a spokesman for Amy Winehouse since she died. But do you deliberately try to keep yourself in the background?

Salaam Remi: It’s my personality number one. I felt that when a record comes on and says, “hey, this is gonna make you dance,” then now you’re just cheating the record by saying it, rather than making emotion there. So my legacy and catalog of records from the beginning is things that people felt on the other side of the planet, who might not even speak the language the record was made in, but the emotion carried. Rather than me ever having to say, ‘Oh this is a make-you-dance,’ or, ‘This is a make-you-sad,’ or whatever type of song. Or even knowing who made it. Because I wasn’t selling me, I was selling the artist. The artists that I’ve worked with are recognized as artists, not as producer-driven robots.

Salaam recreating the Sleng Teng riddim on the Casio MT-40

I’ve moved past beat status probably around the Fugees. I made the “Fu-Gee-La” beat for Fat Joe, he didn’t use it, but what it became for the Fugees was helping them with artistry, and they became artists. The Fugees were all separate artists who then produced other artists. I’m doing a lot of film work now. When you’re [scoring] a movie you don’t wanna be like “oooh that song is on” and pay attention to the artist instead of the person’s story. The music is just a bed to enhance that and luckily when people look at my career they see I’ve worked with artists who are really recognized as artists, like a Lauryn [Hill], like a Amy [Winehouse], a Jasmine Sullivan, a Nas. Sometimes they know who did the production but the average human just wants the experience.

My dad was involved with loads of records that people had no idea he was involved in, so I came up understanding that it wasn’t about being up front in order to be successful. My success isn’t based on that. It’s based on what’s lasted this amount of time. I’ve lasted this long by doing what’s right to me. Except playing around in some some Spragga video, I’ve never actually been in a video. I went to the Fugees “Nappy Heads” video but got cut out. That’s just not my steez. I don’t even go to the clubs. But I know how to move a club, because I spent so many years on the DJ level. A good DJ understands what moves the club, and what emotions move people.

LU: Can you produce albums top to bottom often, or do you have to set aside years to do that right?

SR: It depends on the chemistry and if the stars align where there’s a project that really is there. At this point I’m 40 years old, I’ve been doing this since I was 17 professionally, and had records out since I was 14. Coming from the background I come from, I understand how to crack whatever the code is. There’s a lot of things I contributed to greatly with one session. Miguel came here for two days, recorded “All I Want is You,” and a song that’s probably gonna be the single off his new album, in one session. What “All I Want is You” meant to Miguel, it wasn’t the number one record, but it was the record that got the car started. I get with the artist, we figure out something then, boom here’s your song. I understand how to do that in one go. Those things mean as much as doing different records for different artists. I don’t have anything I’m going all the way in on now outside of my own projects that I’ll be rolling out by next year.

LU: What are those projects?

SR: Mostly instrumental stuff, then a few artists that are incubating right now. I’m working on my new infrastructure of how to drop projects ’cause there needs to be a whole ‘nother motion on how to do it. I see a generation of people that are getting bored, listening to the same stuff over and over. My goal is to maintain what I’ve been doing up til now— when you see my name and you know it’s something of quality, it might be any genre or any type of artist, but it’s gonna stick in your head and make you go wow, that was different. However that materializes, its not really about a particular artist or project, or genre. Whatever inspires me, I’ll start vibing out, and it will become what it needs to become.

LU: What is more rewarding, taking a veteran artist that’s got a lot of expectations riding on them, like a Nas, or taking a new artist that’s raw and making them into a career artist?

SR: I can’t say which one is more rewarding, but what has happened most often is I’ll work with artists from zero, negative zero, and help them become a brand artist. Nas is probably the only artist I work with that had a legacy already before we started working together. With the Fugees, I was really the pilot light that set it off and then their own artistry and talent was able to take it further. A big part of my goal is not to produce every record, my goal is to have it where they can produce themselves, and become producers for other artists. CJ Hilton will be a producer like Lauryn and Wyclef. They will be writers and producers of many artists to come throughout their career, so that’s important to me.

LU: Let me take you back a little bit. Tell me about your father, and who he is.

SR: My father is Van Gibbs. He was a musician in the Queens College scene, then he came up through the disco era, did Broadway, the Jazzmobile, then he worked on Tanya Gardner’s Work that Body album and a lot of pre-rap, NY scene disco records. He also arranged what became “Heartbeat.” That came 360 for me when I used it for [Ini Kamoze’s] “Here Comes the Hotstepper.” He was a New York promoter in the early 80’s— he was the first person to take Doug E. Fresh in the studio. He was cool with Sly and Robbie, so he pulled them together for a couple of records he was working on. He put the contest with radio together where they discovered the Fat Boys, and wound up producing the Fat Boys, Kurtis Blow. Up to now, he’s still a manager, managing Alison Hinds. He started managing Chuck Chillout, and Funkmaster Flex was a part of that crew. He used to help Flex out when Flex was just getting into radio. Then he used to produce the reggae show at WBLS with Pat McKay and Bobby Konders.

LU: So that’s where you linked with Bobby?

SR: I’d see Bobby in—rest in peace—Hal Jackson‘s records all the time looking for breaks. Bobby knew where everything was in the library, and he was also doing remixes. He had a day job at WBLS, and he was on the air. When people came into the station to give us records, most likely you gave it to Bobby because Bobby knew where all the music was. We were all at WBLS doing different stuff and through my dad I had known Marley Marl.

During the summers I spent with my dad as a kid, I saw hip-hop moving firsthand. My dad came into school with a Beat Street jacket on, driving the Knight Rider car and my friend was like, “Oh, he’s a muscle man, look.” Being he was a musician and my uncles were musicians, I understood that was a profession and what could happen. I could literally play a basic disco beat on drums, around ’75. Once I got out of high school running around at night with Flex or Bobby, I’m in the clubs seeing what’s happening first hand, from 89 forward. Bobby would call and say come to the studio and do a remix with me, I’ll throw you a G, and as a college kid at 18 I’m like “What!?!” I would take whatever [breakbeats] were just used in hip hop or I couldn’t have as exclusive breaks—’cause in hip hop nobody wants to use the same breaks somebody else has used—and put them into the reggae [remixes] with Bobby.

LU: That’s how that whole remix style started?

SR: That’s how it started being authentic ’cause people did hip-hop reggae before but I was able to make it the authentic hip-hop track you would have gotten for what whatever was happening then. I was taking that little hip-hop track and putting it on this other music. [Grand] Puba used James Brown for “Who Can Get Busy,” then I literally took it and put it on [Supercat’s] “Don Dada” remix and threw [Kool and the Gang’s] “Chocolate Buttermilk” underneath it. “Ghetto Red Hot” that was based on [De La Soul’s] “Bitties in the BK Lounge.” Brand Nubian’s “Punks Jump Up to Get Beat Down” wasn’t even out yet. It was like I’m gonna use this for hip-hop now. [I had my] stack of move it to reggae records. I was literally using everything going on in hip-hop and making it strong for that. I was also in the DJ booth with Bobby. Bobby at that time was one of the DJs I really looked up to. Bobby was great at that time at back spinning the house music into the reggae music into the R&B music, into the Hip Hop, or whatever was going on.

LU: I don’t really remember too many hip-hop remixes of reggae before that…

SR: You started getting that Kenny Dope stuff which was more loops off of the current hip-hop records put under reggae, and then the real official yard vocals on top of that. The biggest thing with me with remixes was I made sure everything was in key so it felt like the original record. Usually my remixes took over whatever the original was. Ini Kamoze’s “Here Comes the Hotstepper” was not done to “Heartbeat,” I put that on there. After that phase, I got bored and left it alone but I was still doing hip-hop, and other types of records. I decided to come back to reggae after being in the clubs again. I’d be in the booth with Flex, playlisting with him almost like the selector and the soundman. I had gotten bored with doing reggae the way we were doing it, cause you started getting records that weren’t really that good, and once you get those I back off. Then I was like I’m gonna start doing [reggae with] the [R&B] classics, cause we were doing the classics section in the club. That’s where [Mega Banton’s] “Soundboy Killing’ came from, with the Barry White. When Jack Scorpio came up and we were working on the Mega [Banton] album, I flipped the remix, and made that work, and then Ini had “Heartbeat,” Super Cat on “South Central” remix had [The Gap Band’s] “Outstanding.” I did “Rising to the Top” that Shabba put out, then Shabba came back with [a sample of Dennis Edwards’] “Don’t Look  any Further” on the “Let’s Get It On” remix.

I was intentionally making songs there for a playlist for, now if you’re playing your classics you can go into your [hip-hop sample] reggae, then go into your other reggae, then back out, rather then playing your classics and now you gotta get into hip-hop and move it around. It was before it was even a trend in hip hop. Before Mary’s ‘My Life.’ When I was doing Super Cat’s [“South Central”] Puffy came in the studio like “heyyy yo, what are you doing?” Ini Kamoze’s “Here Comes the Hot Stepper” was the first No. 1 pop record with that 80’s thing. After that, everybody was would just take another 80’s record and throw it underneath there, but I get bored, and I didn’t really feel that in hip-hop. My hip-hop energy is like what you hear me do now. I wanted stuff that was gonna make you drive faster or make you wanna jump somebody. That energy of hip hop. And that’s what [Nas’] ‘A Queens Story’ is. I want you to speed when you hear that, you know doing doughnuts in a car with skirts on it.

LU: There was a lot of hip-hop back in the ’80s inspired by the Caribbean, but almost never authentic enough probably to pass the Jamaica test. With your father being West Indian in the music business, were you around producers in the 80’s that were making real reggae and dancehall?

SR: If someone asked me at that time if I was West Indian, I might have thought about it and said, “oh yeah, my dad’s from Trinidad, his father is from Barbados.” I know what a good roti skin tastes like and what a bad roti skin tastes like, but musically it wan’t something that I was necessarily applying until when I was working with Bobby, cause that was part of his thing. He had a house record with Mutabaruka called “The Poem.” My sound is authentic to whatever my goal is. If I want to do a jazz record, it feels like jazz, if I do a hip-hop record it feels like hip hop. Nas always said, “that’s your thing, feeling.” It’s all about trying to capture emotion sonically. Being able to transmit that to people who’ve never seen me, or  know I exist. It’s a remote control thing, inspiration, to be able to move people that you’ve never even seen or touched. With the whole reggae hip hop thing, Bobby brought the real yard vocals, and I brought the real hip-hop and I was able to put it together, to the point where I was making my own tracks doing you know. One of the uncovered, undiscovered records that I did most of is Mega Banton’s One Million Megawatts album. I did my version of the Sick rhythm with “Combination Part 2” on there. I started building rhythms for Patra, and people never never knew I did it.

LU: What were some of the things you did for her?

SR: I pretty much remixed all the singles, and then on the second album I did “Banana,” “Wining Skill.” There’s probably a good 15.  I produced and remixed “Think.” Most of her singles. Vivian Scott was a good friend of mine. She gave me my first remix ever, then she signed Patra.

JS: What was your first remix?

SR: Leotis’ ‘Ooh Child,’ a Kid Capri mixtape version of the Five Stairsteps’ classic, with some breakbeats underneath it. That was July of 89, I just got out of high school. Vivian Scott also signed Lil Vicious, Shabba and Patra to Epic back then and she was a big supporter of mine and I ended up working extensively with them. I was in Midtown, I was easy to deal with, and when they gave me a record that’s raw from Jamaica, I could make it work in radio here. It was ok,  now we need a radio mix, who could do it, OK, Salaam’s here, when can I have it, okay it’s Thursday I’ll give it to you Monday. Cool, here’s a reel, here’s you check, come back you got your work, play it for the marketing meeting. And I’m locked in with the DJs, and the records were good and they were fitting into the playlist, so I’m doing two, three records a week [snaps fingers].

LU: Were you working directly with artists from Jamaica? There was a compilation you did with Bobby Konders…

SR: NYC Badmen. Bobby recorded most of the vocals. Rev. Baddo “Bop Scutchie,” that’s one of my favorite records that I actually sing to people and they be like, “what the hell are you saying,” and laugh. Bobby recorded them on his reggae riddims, then I came in and threw beats under there and remixed that stuff. Shabba, Patra, Vicious, the Epic artists, I was working with in the studio. I linked with Spragga when he was on Capitol. We did “Hardcore Loving,” on his first Capitol album. Certain ones would come to New York, and I would actually deal with them like Mega Banton and Mad Cobra.

After the being-a-reggae-artist-signed-to-a-major-label album thing passed, I started my own labels, doing colored vinyl 45’s. In the mid 90s to the late 90’s, I probably did around 11 rhythms that I put out on my own. And those artists would come out to NY and work with me. Jah Snowcone was my right hand man. It would be like who in town? Yo, Elephant Man in town, Future Trouble in town. Sean Paul would be in my studio a lot. It was almost like the yard vibe when you go to Jamaica. and there’s artists and selectors in the studio. My studios in NY were like that. You’d see Crazy Richie, Baby Wayne Movements, Twitch, Jack Sowah, a whole bunch of selectors, then you’re seeing artists, Wyclef and Sean Paul. Spragga was a fixture in the studio, Red Rat. I’d usually have a reggae session going on one side, and a pop section on the other side, so everybody was there mingling. You hang around me you might see anybody.

LU: When did you leave New York for Miami?

SR: I left NY 2001, or 2002.

LU: Why?

SR: It was just time. I outgrew it. 2001 was a rough year for me, my mom passed, my grandfather had passed. I needed a break and I came here to do [an] album, and when I got here, I just felt relaxed.

LU: I have heard that you and Amy Winehouse made a reggae album at some point in St. Lucia. Can you tell me anything about that?

SR: We were there recording and stuff but there was never an album done like that. That was just people talking.

LU: Are there other records on ice like the “Our Day Will Come “cover that has that feel?

SR: We had versions of other songs and we would flip reggae versions. There’s a couple but none of them are finished. There’s not a reggae album coming out. I could make one but it’s not like it would be recorded to make a reggae album. That wasn’t done. “Our Day Will Come” wasn’t recorded as a reggae record, originally. I just thought about what she was singing. We actually did two versions, one with the reggae. And when her family heard that they were like, “That sounds like Amy.” They just felt her spirit was in the room when they listened to that. That’s why that was the single for that album, and it starts the album. Because they just felt, wow, this feels like her.

What we always did was on her first album, I introduced her to “Moody’s Mood for Love,” which was a jazz record I knew because Frankie Crocker on  WBLS would close every show with it. She learned it in a couple days and I was like you know what, let’s do a reggae version just to have a different swing of it. So that became the reggae version on that album. Then “Just Friends,” was really a jazz type song when we originally did and she said let’s make this the reggae song, like we did with the other one. So I flipped the arrangement, and we had that on the second album. And of course she had other songs that she was starting to record where we would flip reggae versions. We just knew we could do that with songs, like turn it on it’s head, let’s just do it that way with the same music. With the musicians we were working with, it was just easy. I’d change the bassline and flip the drums around and next thing you know it starts feeling like the reggae version. And that’s just something that she liked. She was into that type of music. She was into West Indian culture in general. All of her security were Jamaicans. Most of the people she had around her had some type of core West Indian element to it.

She was comfortable with it. When we were in St. Lucia she was writing but relaxing, not being in the cold anymore with Paparazzi chasing her around—they had to stay far in the bushes out there—and figure out what was next.

LU: I remember seeing you say on Twitter about a year ago that you’ve finally made a song that matched “Ghetto Red Hot.” I have to presume you were referring to “The Don.” 

SR: I took a picture of “Ghetto Red Hot” and Nas’ “Made You Look” next to each other. The two records are right there. I was just saying that I was able, for me, “Ghetto Red Hot” was 20 years ago and “Made You Look” was 10 years ago. Sometimes people say, “what was your first hit,” and I’m like I don’t know. Because before “Here Comes the Hotstepper,” which was cool for what it was, I think “Ghetto Red Hot” was a hit. I think.

LU: It’s a classic, but was it a hit?
SR: There’s hits in different lanes. Bush Babies’ “Remember We” was on the radio all the time, but in this area at that time. So I’ve been able to hit different pin points. That whole situation with the classics and going into sections that was all planned, this goes with that. Even on “A Queens Story” I put that “You all know how the story GO!” [Run-DMC sample]. It was too many nights in the booth with Flex and he’s catching “Peter Piper” longer than the people dancing wanted him to, and he’s catching that line 100 times in the club. I still think like a DJ. I can create any record from scratch, with an orchestra and a drum machine, but I’m thinking like a DJ. What if everything was shut down right now, what can I make right now that will shut down the whole place, and make everybody be like yes. If I arrive at the club and everybody’s played all night and they think they’ve played every song, what can I draw from my hat that would make the place be like “yes, I wanted to hear that.” That’s how I think when I’m making music. Right now I’m already thinking into next summer, what’s gonna actually sting.

LU: What’s going to sting next summer?
SR: I don’t know yet. I mean I feel it, cause I been here before. This is similar to ’91, ’92 to me, that’s how I feel.

LU: Why is that?
SR: Cause there are a load of dance records from people that you will never see in three years. And they’re big records now, seem like they rule the whole world off that buzz. And that’s how it was. You know C + C Music Factory, Snap, Black Box, Technotronic. Which is great. I might do one or two of those records from that era just for fun, just to play with it. I understand that after this large electronic barrage that people fiend for the simplest organic sound that tickles the emotion to come back into it, more than being technically sandblasted. That’s the experience of being around the block a few times, you see what’s happening. We’re back at that point now.

What’s gonna happen in 2013? The same thing that’s happened in ’93. People are just fiending for something that actually feels like cooked food. I know McDonalds isn’t real food but I eat it when I’m in a rush, but where’s cooked food, where’s things I can actually live with? I feel like New York needs its musical identity back, and I like that. When it works in New York, and it is New York’s energy, it works in Paris, it works in London, it works in Rome. If it’s got NY energy, it will work nationwide when it’s done right, not something that’s recently NY. It’s the same thing in Jamaica. There hasn’t been that many records, for the amount of records recorded—as a city, Kingston having more studios per capita then anywhere else—the quality of music with no visa, it doesn’t make sense. Not from where I know it to be, the quality of what can happen, you need a leader, someone who is keeping the standard high that everybody else can siphon a little bit off of. When that stuff is good and on point, then everybody eats. The quality has to raise back up, for NY’s hip-hop and Jamaica’s reggae.

LU: They are kind of the same place. NY is in a little bit of a better position.

SR: Jamaica, all it takes is someone to bring in the right level of music. There hasn’t been production and artist development, it’s the same for everything else the music business. You can’t keep signing people off of game shows and YouTube expecting them to know how to make great albums.

LU: Have you interacted with Super Cat since you made “The Don”?

SR: Cat knows I was looking for him, and eventually I’ll see him at some point. I’ve sent some people around to talk to him. He knows it’s there, people have gone up and talked to him about it, but the biggest thing is honor and respect, Don Dada, as long as you know I’m not trying to move no way and do something with your material without talking to you first, I know you. If I found that I’m working on a Nas record and there is a Chuck D sample of his a cappella from something, I’ll call Chuck D and be like this is what we’re doing. That’s just how I move, with ultimate respect and honor for people that I know I can access who have actually given me something that inspired me.

LU: I was really hoping Super Cat would be in “The Don” video…

SR: We had hoped so too, but a long time ago, not for this, somebody called Cat and asked him to make an appearance and Cat said, “Right now, mi ah make a disappearance.”

LU: He’s disappeared for like six years. That’s the last time he’s been heard from.

SR: It’s respect and honor. He knows about it, and the last thing I heard anyone say [he said] is, yo tell me sum’n how you get me fi say Nas? [Laughs]. Cat knows of it, he’s the Don Dada and that was enough for us to know that we had reached out and tried to put him to it. Whenever he’s ready, just holler at me or Nas, I’m here boss. Different people have different motivations to do different things.

LU: What are you doing next? I heard you are directing a documentary…

SR: I have several documentaries coming out on different subjects. We still have another six videos from [Spragga Benz’s] Shotta Culture, that’s coming out. [Shottas director] Cess Silvera did five or six of them. We did videos for most of the album. And then we have the Shotta Culture documentary which is a full, 90-minute story documenting  Spragga’s life, his son being killed and the events after, up to now. Cess started it but my partner Fatima Curry ended up directing it.

LU: Do you have a cut of that yet?

SR: Yeah but we’re still deciding how we want to, not even end it, cause it doesn’t have an ending, because the case, the police pretty much got off, the jury never had a chance to deliberate. At his son’s murder trial they just made them watch the trial and the judge let them off, and that leads to other suspicions, Spragga staying out of Jamaica… It’s got a little controversy on it. But it’s also Spragga’s real life. You star in a movie, and your kid’s in the movie and then he gets murdered, and your like this is kind of weird, and then people are let off without even questioning it. It has some real tension. It’s the reality of the Shottas movie we’re showing.

I’m scoring movies and TV shows. I just finished scoring Sparkle. I’m the composer. I didn’t do the songs on that, I just strictly did the score, and that score was a big step for me. It’s a major motion picture where I’m doing my Quincy Jones, Hans Zmmer on. I also did a TV show called Being Mary Jane starring Gabrielle Union, I scored and supervised that. It’s actually BET’s first show on a level like an HBO show or a movie. G.E.D. is done, I scored and executive produced that. Cess directed that, and it stars Lunch Money. We’re looking for the right distribution, cause it is a certain type of movie. It’s a hood movie,  like a Friday meets something else..

LU: What about the “ass movie” I’m hearing about.

SR: We’re doing a documentary on butts. My production company Remi-Fa that’s producing it, and my partner Fatima is directing it.

LU: Tell me about that.

SR: I don’t want to go too deep into it now, but it is a documentary on the history of butts, from Africa to people being in love with it, to the sad tragedy of how people are going to the extent of getting shots and killing themselves to now have an ass and it’s not even a real ass. It’s doing more damage then good. Everyone can relate cause everyone’s got an ass and they have a feeling about their ass.