Madlib Quotes

My dad was a musician who went to Berklee, and he made me learn piano when I was five.

Coming from my bedroom in San Antonio to this big world and going from singing covers off my laptop to making music in this nice studio, making professional-sounding music - it's just weird.

Nowadays, I really like playing in studios.

I am a lover of all sorts of different music. I love blues and every piece of music that I have listened to has become an influence.

Dr. Dre, my oldest brother, he paved the way for me and Snoop to get a chance to get into the studio. I asked him to show me how to work the MPC-60... I was about maybe 17, 18, right around there.

I started writing when I was around 6. I say 'writing,' but it was really just making up stuff! I started writing and doing my own thing. I didn't really know what a demo was or anything like that, so I started getting interested in studio gear and started learning about one instrument at a time. My first instrument was an accordion.

The Hadley Street Dream is a tribute to making a vision come to life. My father built a compound on a dessert city block, he saw something in that space we couldn't see. It was years later the album was born right there on Hadley St. He built the studio I started recording the album at.

My parents were big music fans, and my dad plays music, so I grew up with Madonna, Frank Zappa, the Beatles, Alice In Chains... it was all over the place. I had a Third Eye Blind record, but I also had Korn, Courtney Love, and Shania Twain.

That's when we was makin this video stuff. They went all over the place makin it. And they was wantin to know, at the college, how I got started playin and how do I do everything - you know, all that.

My dad was a musician. He was a singer and he played the guitar, so music was always around.

I'm a huge fan of music in schools and music education because that's how I grew up.

Each father wants their sons to be just like them, really.

My old man was a musician - that's what he did for a living. And like most fathers, occasionally he'd let me visit where he worked. So I started going to his recording studio, and I really dug it.

I've often thought that my background in rock 'n' roll has gone to waste in film work. My background was that I was a rock 'n' roll drummer and I don't think I used drums in my first ten years of film scoring.

I still don't understand the music industry that much. Everything I learned was from hanging out with rock musicians in studios. I certainly have respect for those who make music their livelihood.

One thing I love to do is produce. I've produced a couple of bands. I mean, nothing ever really happened with 'em, but I enjoy getting a young band into the studio and guiding them, and making them feel at ease.

I was listening to music long before rock 'n roll.

I've loved musical theater ever since I was a kid. My mother's a pianist, and my grandfather was an amateur theater director and stand-up comic. And I was an only child. And I loved attention. So from an early age, my family was teaching old musical songs.

Being a musician has actually surrounded and immersed me in pop culture and youth culture from a very young age. But even before I was singing in bands and creating any kind of art, I was always fascinated by pop culture.

My parents were involved in the record industry, so I was exposed to the arts very early.

I grew up seeing my sister in the studio. I would go to recording sessions and take notes.

I never went to music school.

I would say growing up in Nashville has been a huge influence in my music. Growing up with my dad being a 2-time Grammy-winner, BMI songwriter of the year for five consecutive years in a row, and having the legacy he has is definitely a huge influence, too.

That's where I get my whole music theory from, my pops and my grandfather.

I had aunts who played piano and sang and also were entertainers, so music was very much a part of my life.