Celebrating a decade in the game, Los Angeles’ People Under the Stairs return September - with Fun DMC, the 6th album by rapper/producers Thes One and Double K and their most fully-realized album to date.
As the title implies, the boys have a simple goal this time around:
“On our last album, Stepfather, we did a lot of thinking instead of just going in there and doing it,” says Double K. “Now we just going back to what we were doing on the first two albums, which was basically having fun and not caring about anything.”
After more than 18 months of near-constant touring, the pair hit Thes’ custom-built studio in February (more on that in a bit) to record Fun DMC and capture the spontaneous vibe of their live shows on wax. To accurately put the party back front and center, the duo went to the streets of South Central to record the sounds of weekend barbecues and parties, capturing a sound and atmosphere impossible to recreate in the studio.
“We wanted to get the ambience of the dudes playing dominoes, the meat sizzling on the grill, the planes flying by,” explains Thes One. “We just said, ‘Let’s try to get what our Saturday is like onto a record. Instead of making a record about Saturday, let’s actually go out and record Saturday.’ Our overlying goal on this record is to make sure that when you listen to it, there’s a geographical context for it like, ‘That’s a L.A. record.’”
As longtime fans know, though, when you hear a PUTS record, all the work, from the beats to the rhymes to the scratching to the artwork (Fun comes with a comic book written by the rappers themselves), is almost inevitably done strictly by the duo themselves. Instead of cashing in on hot outside producers or of-the-moment emcees, the pair has always been fiercely independent, with barbecue guests the only collaborators on the 20-track album.
“Wouldn’t no one like to work with us and we don’t like working with nobody else,” Double K bluntly says.
To that end, the duo holed up in Thes’s new home studio with no outside producers or engineers to work on Fun DMC. To achieve the sounds floating in their heads, Thes One designed and built a custom recording console to record and mix the album. (The console became so efficient that audio company Vintage King plans on selling versions of it console publicly.) Costing in excess of $50,000—“A lot of long talks with the wife,” he says, laughing—credit lines were maxed out, but the end result is the pair’s most intricate-sounding album to date.
One listen to Fun DMC and the musical growth is obvious. Sure, this is still a hip-hop album, but the productions and arrangements recall Phil Spector and Brian Wilson as much as Pete Rock and Dr. Dre. (Hell, Thes was bumping the Pet Sounds instrumental album nonstop on tour.) Credit a lot of that to Thes’s recent work on Street Dreams, a drama out this year on which he acted as music supervisor and worked with strings, horns and other live instruments extensively for the first time.
“The album’s still sample-based, but we used live musicians to augment what was there and implement more of a song structure to make it more accessible to everyone,” says Thes. “Before, we’d have these musical ideas in addition to samples and we just couldn’t do anything about it. Now, we have the understanding to sketch notes and melodies and everything available to us. It’s about looking at it more like an arrangement as opposed to just a beat.”
A major part of their longevity, Thes One and Double K have never tried to be anything they weren’t, choosing to rhyme about the realities of their lives over the fantasies some of their peers like to employ.
“A lot of these dudes is bullshit,” says Double K. “They’ll get on these albums and talk about stuff they’ve never done. When I tell ya I had to feed my dog and on this day, I ain’t got no money, I’m being real.”
Thes agrees. “Every record we’ve made, we’ve tried to be as real and age-appropriate about what’s happening in our lives. On our first album, we’re rapping about fake IDs and trying to get beer. We’re getting older now, so on this album, I’m rapping about anxiety about my wife being pregnant, but still keeping the overall vibe fun.”
Looking back on ten years—a lifetime—in the industry, Thes One succinctly sums up the group’s mentality:
“We’ve never been the darling of any era or publication,” he notes. “We were never the hot boys for any given period of time. We just roll with the punches and not get hung up in an era, cause those are the people that get dated and are gone.”
If that’s the criteria, People Under the Stairs should be around for a long time to come.
The duo would like to acknowledge Gary Shider as the major spiritual influence on this album.
As the title implies, the boys have a simple goal this time around:
“On our last album, Stepfather, we did a lot of thinking instead of just going in there and doing it,” says Double K. “Now we just going back to what we were doing on the first two albums, which was basically having fun and not caring about anything.”
After more than 18 months of near-constant touring, the pair hit Thes’ custom-built studio in February (more on that in a bit) to record Fun DMC and capture the spontaneous vibe of their live shows on wax. To accurately put the party back front and center, the duo went to the streets of South Central to record the sounds of weekend barbecues and parties, capturing a sound and atmosphere impossible to recreate in the studio.
“We wanted to get the ambience of the dudes playing dominoes, the meat sizzling on the grill, the planes flying by,” explains Thes One. “We just said, ‘Let’s try to get what our Saturday is like onto a record. Instead of making a record about Saturday, let’s actually go out and record Saturday.’ Our overlying goal on this record is to make sure that when you listen to it, there’s a geographical context for it like, ‘That’s a L.A. record.’”
As longtime fans know, though, when you hear a PUTS record, all the work, from the beats to the rhymes to the scratching to the artwork (Fun comes with a comic book written by the rappers themselves), is almost inevitably done strictly by the duo themselves. Instead of cashing in on hot outside producers or of-the-moment emcees, the pair has always been fiercely independent, with barbecue guests the only collaborators on the 20-track album.
“Wouldn’t no one like to work with us and we don’t like working with nobody else,” Double K bluntly says.
To that end, the duo holed up in Thes’s new home studio with no outside producers or engineers to work on Fun DMC. To achieve the sounds floating in their heads, Thes One designed and built a custom recording console to record and mix the album. (The console became so efficient that audio company Vintage King plans on selling versions of it console publicly.) Costing in excess of $50,000—“A lot of long talks with the wife,” he says, laughing—credit lines were maxed out, but the end result is the pair’s most intricate-sounding album to date.
One listen to Fun DMC and the musical growth is obvious. Sure, this is still a hip-hop album, but the productions and arrangements recall Phil Spector and Brian Wilson as much as Pete Rock and Dr. Dre. (Hell, Thes was bumping the Pet Sounds instrumental album nonstop on tour.) Credit a lot of that to Thes’s recent work on Street Dreams, a drama out this year on which he acted as music supervisor and worked with strings, horns and other live instruments extensively for the first time.
“The album’s still sample-based, but we used live musicians to augment what was there and implement more of a song structure to make it more accessible to everyone,” says Thes. “Before, we’d have these musical ideas in addition to samples and we just couldn’t do anything about it. Now, we have the understanding to sketch notes and melodies and everything available to us. It’s about looking at it more like an arrangement as opposed to just a beat.”
A major part of their longevity, Thes One and Double K have never tried to be anything they weren’t, choosing to rhyme about the realities of their lives over the fantasies some of their peers like to employ.
“A lot of these dudes is bullshit,” says Double K. “They’ll get on these albums and talk about stuff they’ve never done. When I tell ya I had to feed my dog and on this day, I ain’t got no money, I’m being real.”
Thes agrees. “Every record we’ve made, we’ve tried to be as real and age-appropriate about what’s happening in our lives. On our first album, we’re rapping about fake IDs and trying to get beer. We’re getting older now, so on this album, I’m rapping about anxiety about my wife being pregnant, but still keeping the overall vibe fun.”
Looking back on ten years—a lifetime—in the industry, Thes One succinctly sums up the group’s mentality:
“We’ve never been the darling of any era or publication,” he notes. “We were never the hot boys for any given period of time. We just roll with the punches and not get hung up in an era, cause those are the people that get dated and are gone.”
If that’s the criteria, People Under the Stairs should be around for a long time to come.
The duo would like to acknowledge Gary Shider as the major spiritual influence on this album.
