Chief Xcel On ‘The Craft’ Recording Process

The process of recording Blackalicious’ new album ‘The Craft’ stretched the duo creatively. “With this record everything starts with the drum machine and I sketch out a general idea that I’ll bring the guys, and they’ll pretty much replay what I did verbatim and then take it their own directions,” Chief Xcel tells Time Off magazine. “And then I’ll take that inspiration back and synthesize it back into song format and then give it to Gab to write to. That was pretty much how everything went down on this album.”