Dilla Time: The Life and Afterlife of J Dilla, the Hip-Hop Producer Who Reinvented Rhythm

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But even when trying and failing to cast aside my nostalgic biases, this is a pretty dope book. What Dan Charnas has penned here is at once a beautiful celebration of the music of J Dilla, approaching it with the scholarly vigor, technical analysis, and musical history it so sorely deserves. The book consistently stunned me with the extent of theory and musicology it delved into, thoroughly describing the methodology behind a traditionally crafted pop song compared against J Dilla's offkilter productions. There are charts inviting readers to beat their knees in time, and then again in 'Dilla time', making for a uniquely engaging reading experience. I found the alternating spotlight on traditional craft versus J Dilla's rule-breaking ways incredibly compelling, and I don't think it's any exaggeration to posit that J Dilla himself would have loved seeing his art presented in this way. Jeff Peretz's contributions deserve a great deal of recognition for imbuing the work with a structure worthy of Dilla's genius, especially because things get noticeably sloppy once that structure falls away. This book is a must for everyone interested in illuminating the idea of unexplainable genius.” (QUESTLOVE)

Exceptional… Charnas has done well to untangle the ever-evolving skein of art and money and family and friends [Dilla’s] legend encompasses … A rich read… Deeply and vividly reported’– Robert Christgau, Observer He wasn’t known to mainstream audiences, and when he died at age thirty-two, he had never had a pop hit. Yet since his death, J Dilla has become a demigod, revered as one of the most important musical figures of the past hundred years. At the core of this adulation is innovation: as the producer behind some of the most influential rap and R&B acts of his day, Dilla created a new kind of musical time-feel, an accomplishment on a par with the revolutions wrought by Louis Armstrong and James Brown. Dilla and his drum machine reinvented the way musicians play. Get a behind-the-scenes look at the making of Megadeth’s iconic record, Rust in Peace, from the band’s lead vocalist and guitarist.

Dilla Time

While you may use the same brain regions to hear all music, what I meant was that harmony lends itself to interpretation better. There is much more you can analyze with harmony. For example, the final chord of “Javert’s Suicide” from Les Miserables is D-Eb-Ab-C-D. Is it an Ab major triad with D in the bass? Is it a D half diminished seventh chord missing the third with an added ninth? Is it better analyzed as a tone cluster than as an actual chord with harmonic function? The previous chord is an A major triad, so it could easily be analyzed as an incomplete tritone substitution (Instead of A7-Ab, like a normal tritone substitution, the 7th is missing from the A chord and the bass still resolves to the expected D whereas the tritone substitute is played on top of that). Damn, that’s crazy,” James replied. “I’m surprised.” Something about this gesture didn’t compute for James: a producer promoting someone who could potentially be competition. But Q-Tip was from a different school of thought: brotherhood.

I look at J Dilla as a man who redefined the word ‘innovative.’ This book makes you feel like you traveled his journey every single step.” —DJ PREMIER After they left Q-Tip’s crib with the beat tape in hand, Tre got suspicious. Q-Tip is pushing us onto some mysterious, new producer that nobody’s ever heard of, from a city that hardly any hip-hop has come out of, but the beats are banging and sound just like Q-Tip’s stuff? This intimate, honest profile is the definitive J Dilla tome, an illuminating, intoxicating, and sobering sojourn into a man’s life, legacy, artistic contributions and musical revolution by way of groundbreaking productions, prolific output, ever-loving communities, and the seemingly-infinite reverberations of his genius.J Dilla turned what one generation deemed musical error into what the next knew to be musical innovation. In this splendid book, Dan Charnas offers an uncanny mix of research and vision, documentation and interpretation, plenitude and momentum. Dilla Time is definitive. And exhilarating.” As the two bandmates’ chests heaved from exertion and fury, their hair and clothing ruffled, James tried to defuse the situation. In Dilla Time, Dan Charnas chronicles the life of James DeWitt Yancey, from his gifted Detroit childhood to his rise as a sought-after hip-hop producer to the rare blood disease that caused his premature death. He follows the people who kept Dilla and his ideas alive. And he rewinds the histories of American rhythms: from the birth of Motown soul to funk, techno, and disco. Here, music is a story of what happens when human and machine times are synthesized into something new. In that regard, I found Dilla Time to be nothing short of a holy scroll, a bold, brilliant testimony, a clinic in dot-connecting, musical-mapping, and hip-hop nerd sh*t. The story woven within is a profound portrait of a confounding pioneer, a thorough education, rumination, and stimulation, a game-changing historical document and love letter to a lost prophet.

There are some rhythmic things that I find interesting, but harmony is way more important, at least to me. (This is a big part of the reason I don’t really listen to rap. Alice in Chains, for example, did a lot of cool stuff with meter (having sections of the same song in different meters, using exotic time signatures like 7/8, etc…) Before this book I knew and loved Jay Dee, but I didn’t realize quite how deep his influence reached in the music I love. Dilla Time has existed across genres since I first began getting serious about music in high school, so while I’ve always thought of him as one of the best - I didn’t realize he was also the original. This engineering/technological minutia is delivered in layman’s terms. Dan drops the science like it’s scalding, and does so in a language that just about anybody can easily understand. One of the best music books ever made and an instant hip-hop classic. Dan Charnas demystifies the iconic producer (and underrated emcee) J Dilla who has sometimes been posthumously deified as a virtuous underground beatmaker when his reality was much more complicated and unstable.

The persistent negativity and conflict in the wake of his death are almost a bit too much to bear, but now fans—and even his friends—are able to better grasp the fissures and disconnects that have occasionally drowned out the air-horns and accolades that deserve to rain down on Dilla unabated. Schwartz, Daniel (24 August 2017). "A Professor's Journey to Discover the Greatness of J Dilla With His Students". Complex . Retrieved 9 March 2023. As a father/romantic-partner/brother/son/responsible human being, Dilla left much to be desired, and left a legion of pain in his passing. It's important to memorialize those elements of people as well because it's real. We live in the real world. It is what it is. However, the respect that Dan Charnas gave all these narratives was commendable. It never felt like a side was taken, and I respect that so much. He even eviscerated the toxic fan culture around J Dilla, the beat-loving culture vulture bros that ruin things with their "J Dilla Saved My Life" T-Shirts when "they don't know who Slum Village is". I'm not a purist, and I don't know it all. However, if I had a dollar for every time I've rolled my eyes as some dude tried to explain Dilla to me, I'd have a lot of money. I'm glad that he pointed out the toxic bro culture, BIG daps to Charnie for that! That was awesome.