John “Blu” Barnes and Alec “Exile” Manfredi are one of the all-time great emcee/producer duos. The pair, based in Los Angeles, have built up a catalogue of work that’s put them in the echelon of legends like Pete Rock & C.L. Smooth and Gang Starr. With their legendary debut Below the Heavens (2007), they put together one of the best hip-hop coming-of-age albums ever made. Through their music, they’ve created songs that examine themes of growth, loss, respect, and the overall celebration of great music.
Now the duo are teaming up for their fourth album, Love (the) Ominous World. It’s also the fourth project that Blu has been a part of this year. All four have been one emcee/one producer collaborations, and all four are love letters to Los Angeles.
Coming after their sprawling, ambitious double album Miles (2020), Love (the) Ominous World is a tighter endeavor, but it does not lack for ambition. Along with lauding the greater Southern California area, Blu & Exile celebrate the era that raised them on “Undisputed” and the people who influenced their lives on “Homies.” Blu also showcases his storytelling skills on “Suge,” where he gives an in-depth recounting of his meeting with the notorious record industry mogul Suge Knight, back when he still ran Death Row Records.
Blu & Exile also enlist a whole host of guests on the album, including some old friends (Aloe Blacc, Fashawn, and Cashius King), some Southern California legends (Kurupt, RBX, and KXNG Crooked), and some new up-and-comers (talented vocalist Ahmad Anwar). Although a wide range of talented artists get to display their skills, the emcee and producer remain the stars of the show.
I had the opportunity to speak with the pair as they prepared to release Love (the) Ominous World independently through the Dirty Science imprint. They spoke to me about the philosophy that shaped the new album, enjoying the success of their peers, and the magic of working together in the studio.
What’s the break down on the album’s title, Love (the) Ominous World?
Exile: We wrote something for this:
To not give up on a dying world.
To maintain love in your heart no matter what. To stand for what’s Godly.
The world is ominous because death is certain.
To love such a sad ending takes deep appreciation.
It also takes acknowledgment to see how lucky we are to have ‘life.
I love the ominous world by being the opposite, optimistic.
And with all the world’s turmoil set for you to endeavor at any given moment, we still love life.
Our life, our world.
This Ominous, one day we are all going to be dead, world
That’s dope. Anything else you want to elaborate on about the title?
Exile: Yeah, it’s basically about being thankful for what you have, and don’t let the troubles of the world make you jaded. Make your heart believe that you can still stand for what’s right.
What do you both do to stop being jaded with everything that’s going on now?
Exile: Just by reminding myself what I’m thankful for and reminding myself what I love, and reminding myself what goals I have accomplished that I hold dear to my heart. And a lot of that has to do with hip-hop, but also beyond that, just life in general, just reminding yourself what you love so you can put yourself in that position to get more of that. If you don’t know what you love, you’re going to get more of what you don’t love.
Blu: I just try to stay optimistic as much as possible. Optimism, that’s my path right there.
Listen to the Album:
Is it tough staying optimistic these days?
Blu: No, it’s very easy, man. You just got to open your eyes and see all the peace around you. All the good that’s happening every second, as opposed to all the negativity that you see. If you open your eyes right now, you don’t really see nothing negative going on. It’s mostly like that. So if you stay optimistic like that, you should be good.
Exile: It’s almost like if we’re going to be taken out through the nuclear missile, keep that love in your heart. Fuck it. I’ve had that image in my head of where I’ve gotten to a place to where I’m just accepting of everything that I’ve been through, and how that shaped me to who I am at this moment, and trying to keep that feeling in my heart from my last moment.
If the nuclear bomb’s coming just like I could see it, and I’m about to be taken out, just love for the whole experience, but that’s part of Love the Ominous World because we’re reaching some questionable moments in the world, but at the same time, Love the Ominous World also means to stand up for what’s right in this world. We’re not going to be so preachy to tell you what to do, but I think deep down as humans, we know what’s right when we’re facing unjust wars and whatnot, and greed in the world.
How long have you two been working together?
Exile: 2003.
Blu: Yeah, 2003.
So how would you say your working relationship together has grown over two decades? Because you’re both very prolific artists, but this is the fourth time you’ve returned to this dynamic. Plus, Exile produced some of The Color Blu (2021).
Exile: We have definitely changed, but we continue to stay learning from each other, and I think that role just changes with the dynamic of our friendship and our creative partnership.
Blu: I think it’s the same, man, and it’s just a great space that we revisit from time to time. And it’s about that season right now.
So what is it about the partnership that you’ve built that’s led you to keep returning to it?
Blu: It’s Exile’s beats, man. I can’t get enough of them beats, dude.
Exile: I think it’s Blu’s work ethic. He’s still excited about the music and he displays that, and by just being excited to work and doing it, finishing shit. And also the way we communicate back and forth about a goal of a song or a goal of a beat or that he might want for an idea of a song, and how we communicate with each other about that. The willingness to be able to be open to how we’re going to approach something, it makes it a good dynamic, and then also the ideas that we have actually working.
So how did you come up with the concept for Love (the) Ominous World?
Blu: This is a deep one.
Exile: This is the beginning. We have some things we don’t want to give out just yet, but this is the beginning of a bigger project.
Blu: You could give that out. This is the beginning of a bigger project.
Can you reveal when the next phase of the project is coming?
Exile: Next year.
Blu: Conceptually, it was more so the theme of the album is more West Coast, more like a Sunday evening in LA. On the West Coast, it could be in San Diego. It’s just got that vibe.
Blu, Love (the) Ominous World is your fourth project this year. And while a lot of your music is about LA, it just seems like a lot of the projects this year have very much been focused on Southern California in general. Is that a conscious decision?
Blu: This was a turn-up LA year. The LA banner year. We just went real heavy with the West Coast themes all year.
The last project you guys worked on together was Miles, which was an ambitious double album. This one’s shorter. It’s a 12-song album. Was that a conscious decision to keep it a little shorter this time, or is that something that kind of happened during the recording process?
Blu: Well, it’s hard to say. With Miles we went the extra, extra yard, the extra length and beyond with that album.
Exile: The extra mile.
Blu: We had long songs on there with extended breakdowns with musicians playing, and with this album we have bigger songs, so with the bigger songs it was like we didn’t need to do 20 songs again. We had these huge records and it was like, “Yo, it’s about time to rap. We got hits right now.”
I wouldn’t say that this album is more “commercial,” but it does seem a little more accessible than some of your other projects together. Was that a conscious decision?
Exile: I think we just wanted to show range, and we’ve always had range, especially with Below the Heavens. We had songs that were something that you could hear on the radio. For instance, “First Things First” with Miguel, and I think we still had some joints that were still accessible, but maybe not as big as that joint with Miguel. And that’s a part of what Blu and Exile does, and we just wanted to showcase that in a way that is still within the roots of what Blu and Exile is.
Blu: Yeah, traditional to our sound. We still keep it traditional, update our formulas.
So what’s the background on “Suge?”
Blu: We’ve talked about it in interviews before. But it’s gotten a little like people are familiar with the story.
Exile: He was on Drink Champs telling the story and I’m like, “Yo! You got to make this a song. You got to tell the story, and come on man, please. You got to do it.” And the next thing you know, he came with it. Yeah, extra detailed. Just getting in on his “Art of Storytelling” steez right there.
Blu: Yeah, the whole scoop right there. The whole experience.
With “Undisputed,” it seems like a throwback to a late ‘80s LA song. You got the recognizable break beat and then you got the hard Zapp-type stuff thing there. Was that what you were going for?
Blu: Definitely, man.
Exile: It kind of felt like King Tee and DJ Pooh with that one. Yeah, definitely some LA Posse shit. That was definitely in mind when creating that record.
Blu: It made the album because a lot of the album has that West Coast feel to it.
Exile: To be honest, one of my childhood dreams of actually being a producer for an emcee and producing the full album definitely started with King Tee and Pooh. Them as a duo for me was like number one. So as a kid, with my imagination of wanting to do that and doing that with Blu, that’s like the seed of that dream, and for me, this song is kind of like a nod to that, for sure.
What was your favorite part of recording this album?
Blu: Always writing and recording for me. I love writing to a beat. You get that batch of Exile beats, man? It’s a wrap right there. That’s my favorite part of the process, because it’s the most creative part of the process. You’re crafting the song in your mind on paper. The execution is fun as well: recording and then rocking it live. But when you’re creating it, that’s my favorite part of the process.
Exile: For me, it’s like once a beat gains that momentum to the point to where you hear it and you’re like, “Oh, yeah, this one’s going to be crazy. Blu’s going to fuck with this,” and you get that excitement, and sometimes he’s in the room while I’m doing it too, of course. And then getting it to Blu and then being in the studio, and he’s like, “Yo, I got one for this. Check it out.” Just when he raps it to me in person and I hear it connecting. That’s one of my favorite parts of the creative process, for sure, is just hearing it all connect together.
During the recording process for this album, Exile was there ever a beat for you where you heard it and you were like, “Oh, this beat’s going to be insane. Blu’s going to kill this shit?” And then Blu, was there a particular beat that you heard for this album where you’re like, “Oh, I’m just going to murder this shit right now?”
Blu: Oh, man. I feel like Ex didn’t want to give me “Hello LA” for a minute. He said it was all good, but I feel like he was like, “Nah.” I love that “Hello LA” beat, man.
Exile: For me it was “Precipitation.” I actually told Blu like, “I want you to write a song called ‘Precipitation,’” and that’s all I said to him, and in my head, I knew it was going to be “Dancing in the Rain, Part 2,” (from Below the Heavens]. I felt like we really accomplished that, but in a way that is completely different than “Dancing in the Rain.” I feel like it’s a long song, but I had to let Blu air all of that out because I feel like the length of his lyrics and where he goes with it allows the listener and definitely allows Blu to achieve this spiritual or mystical place with what he’s talking about of the human condition in relation to rain in that way.
Blu: Yeah, that was a fun one, man.
Is there a song that you’re particularly feeling or that you have on repeat when you’re listening to this album right now?
Exile: Right now, “Gold,” man. There’s replay value for our fan base, but this one has crazy replay value for us as the creators of the music.
What gives that song such replay value for you?
Exile: Everything: the beat, the hook, and the rhyme and the scratches, the whole shit. And the mix. And the mastering. It goes hard on the car test.
Blu: It’s like a throwback classic to me. The strings on there? It’s so classic.
How did the recording process work? Are you making beats with him there in the studio? Are you sending him stuff, like emailing him stuff when you’re done? Are you guys recording together in the studio? Or it’s now everybody has their own studio and it’s all done remotely?
Exile: It’s pretty much all of those things.
Blu: Yep.
Exile: Some of it I’m recording, I’m making while Blu’s there. Sometimes he’s there while I’m doing the scratches. Most of the album I recorded with him. He also did some in Mike West’s studio. But, for the most part, we were creating this together, and conceptualizing it together, and going over beats and the whole nine.
Blu: I say we collabed more on this album than any other album. Like the collaboration and the creative process. We were both really hands-on on every aspect of building the project. It wasn’t like a lot of me at home writing by myself or Exile making beats on his own, and giving me a batch of 50 to [write to]. The second album was like a batch of 50 that we made. This album, we really went in.
So some of the people you work with on this album, like Aloe Blacc and Fashawn, and other people that you’ve worked with since back on Below the Heavens, like Miguel, have gone on to do big things. Exile, you have been working with Aloe Blacc going all the way back to the Emanon days. What’s it like for you guys to see Aloe Blacc and Miguel be so successful now?
Blu: Oh, man, I had a perfect analogy for that and I forgot it. They’re great, man. It’s just like fam. It’s like you out there. You feel like it’s you out there. Their success is our success.
Exile: It’s amazing, man, because I’ve been working with Aloe since he was 16 years old, and he came out the gate rapping like 16-year-old O.C. from D.I.T.C. He was so amazing. He still is. And just to think about the days of me just selling tapes out of a backpack as a teenager, and then Aloe making platinum records, and then meeting Blu and Miguel, and then Miguel blowing up as a platinum artist is just like, “Wow. It’s crazy.”
It’s almost like we were destined to do this because we knew these cats when we were younger, and then to see them succeed is an amazing thing and you definitely feel attached to that. And then we just still have to and do feel thankful to be able to still connect with fans as well, and people who enjoy our music, and also remain thankful that we still enjoy making it, and that we are still finding ways to honor this music that we’ve held dear to our hearts since we were kids.
So this is not related directly to the album, but on Vince Staples’ Dark Times, y’all get a shout-out for how Below the Heavens changed his life on the song “Radio.” What’d you guys think when you heard it?
Exile: I’m like, “Man, this dude has almost consistently shouted out Blu & Exile and Below the Heavens every year, and then he did it on the album. I’m like, “Yo. Alright, man. It’s time to jump on a track.
Blu: Yeah, we got to get that collab going, man.
So have you reached out to him?
Exile: Yeah, fingers crossed.
So maybe, maybe not for the project that might or might not be coming next year?
Exile: Hey, I can’t say too much, man.
We always ask everyone we interview to share their five favorite albums of all time. It could be any genre.
Blu: Any genre? Nas’ Illmatic, Dr Dre’s The Chronic, Ice Cube’s Death Certificate, Miles Davis’ Blue Haze, and Stan Getz and Joao Gilberto’s Getz/Gilberto.
Exile: The Pharcyde’s Bizarre Ryde II The Pharcyde, Freestyle Fellowship’s Inner City Boundaries, Biz Markie’s Goin’ Off, Ice Cube’s Death Certificate, and Ice-T’s Rhyme Pays. Oh, and I gotta add number 6: King Tee’s Act a Fool. There you go. And Anita Baker.
Rapture?
Exile: (Laughs) Yeah.
Anything else you guys want to add about the project?
Exile: We are revealing secrets about a piece of the puzzle, and we’ll see if people catch on, but yeah, that’s about it.
Editor’s Note: This interview has been edited from the original transcript for length and clarity.
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