Evidence is a breath of fresh air for hip-hop. As a talented producer and rapper he has crafted great music for years. As part of the Dilated Peoples along with partner in rhyme, Rakaa, he has released classic material.

Earlier this year, Evidence finally released his highly anticipated solo debut, The Weatherman. The album has received critical acclaim from every angle and solidified Evidence’s spot as a hip-hop heavyweight. We sat down with Evidence recenlty to discuss everything from his early career to his growth as an artist.

You were involved in graffiti and break dancing, which are important aspects of hip-hop culture. Do you feel like kids today are missing the whole experience?

I think most kids today when they hear the word hip-hop they think of a rapper. I think that’s because the media is misinforming the kids.

I grew up in Venice beach so I saw the culture first hand at the time. I saw break dancing first hand.

What got me into hip-hip hop was all the dance movies, Breakin’, Beat Street, Wild Style, Krush Groove. That’s what brought me into the culture. Later on,  I became a graffiti artist and eventually ended up a rapper and a producer but I just feel fortunate when I came up in a time when the whole culture was being represented.

"Raised in Santa Monica til' the divorce/six years old/I couldn't see what was coming of course/the plan/ Mom bounced on Old Man/ then we moved to the Venice sand/ A young youth seen gangs first hand/ fake address for school/ two educations/ rich friends then back to my land, "Born in LA". I always loved that line. Was it a problem for you having rich friends but then having to go home to the “bad” neighborhood?

You said you can relate to that line and I could to. That’s why I quoted it because for me personally at the time I didn’t really realize what it was. When you’re young you have a tendency to adapt easier than when you get older, its human nature.

My mother felt like we were taking a step down but to me it was almost more interesting like I was saying I pulled up to my new house and I seen this kid Eric who became my best friend riding home with groceries in both hands on a unicycle. Shit like that, you just didn’t see it. People were making due with what they had around my way. It inspired me if anything.

You’ve said QD3 has had an influence on you, how profound was that influence on your career?

He’s probably my biggest influence of all time. Up until that point I didn’t know how rap music got made. I just heard the finished product but when I moved next to QD3 in Venice he invited me to his studio and I saw rappers come over and the whole creation of a song. I saw it from conception to the end result.

The only thing I couldn’t understand is why he didn’t want to be famous.I couldn’t understand how he was just happy with being behind the scenes. That’s what he told me he said, “This is what I do, I stay behind the scenes”. I wanted to be a rapper of course. He organized my mind to think like a producer even though I didn’t realize it.

What music inspired while you were growing up?

Most of the stuff that inspired me in the early days it was more the music than the raps. It was later on that I got into the raps. I got into Rakim, KRS, [Big Daddy Kane] and Juice crew. Later after that came the native tongue movement and the most powerful thing to me was De La Soul, Tribe [Called Quest], it was like I found my calling.

After that came Gangstarr and DJ Premier and after that they pretty much been my favorite of all time.

You’re a lyricist, is that a lost art today?

Kind of, I think it’s more about the hooks and not about what you put in between which is kind of crazy, like you got the instrumental with the chorus already built in, its kind of disgusting if you ask me.

Its cool but it limits your creativity, you just throw in a little 16, a 12 and everything is laid out for you already. Dilated Peoples we did both, we weren’t just battle rappers, we were songwriters. There is a medium but for the most part its kind of crazy.

When you and Dilated got into the game, did you guys have a plan to put out solo records?

Definitely, that was our main intention. When I met Rakaa I was running around the city with a QD3 beat that I had trying to find somebody who could be on my page. I knew I wasn’t ready to record by myself. I basically was looking for somebody to get down with.

When I found Rakaa I knew that was it. We had a mutual respect for each other from the graffiti, for people around our city. We shared the same ideology even though he’s older than me. I knew he was the dude. We always had plans to be solo artists.

We signed our contract but when we checked out the fine print, we could put out our solo album but basically Capitol had first right or refusal for our solo albums which meant that if I wanted to sign to them as a solo artist, I would have to sign a 5 album deal on top of the 5 album deal that I already had.

Signing anywhere for ten years is nothing I would recommend for any artist. That’s your whole career basically so I patiently waited my deal out. Then I jumped in the studio and did the solo album I've been waiting my whole life to do. 

How does it feel to do production for multi-platinum selling artists?

It’s an amazing feeling to be honest with you. Sitting at a console and doing something for somebody like Kanye West where I got the opportunity to co-produce "Last Call" off the College Dropout or "H! Vltg3" with Linkin Park featuring Pharoahe Moch, or Beastie Boys, the "Alive" remix. It feels incredible but to be honest I get the same satisfaction from bringing somebody new out or producing Planet Asia or Dilated Peoples. The same energy goes into it. I don’t put in more because it's gonna be a bigger check or because it's gonna reach more people I put the same 110 percent regardless.

You’re a producer and a rapper. Do you have a preference?

They’re just different energies. Being a rapper is about promotion, being a producer is about being behind the scenes. My biggest battle is weed because when I'm home creating music,  I get in my high zone but when I’m on tour I gotta put the weed down and promote.

It takes me a minute sometimes to readjust back into it. It’s like living two different lives but I enjoy them both so much and I tell people right now that I'm 65 % more a rapper than a producer. But as time goes on and I get older it’ll change my ambition.

Now is to jump in crowds and fly around the world, those numbers will probably switch but for the next 5 years I’m really gonna go hard with the rapping thing

You had a line that said sometime you feel like you do this in vein. How is it to have such a critically acclaimed album knowing you’re not going to have big sales?

The Weatherman LP was definitely the biggest reflection of that. With Dilated Peoples it’s been like that middle ground. We have Expansion Team, it's about to go gold soon.

The Neighbourhood Watch album is  at about 200,000 copies. Those are respectable numbers but putting out the Weatherman LP I got all this critical acclaim and I'll never sell 100,000. It showed me a lot, but at the same time it didn’t discourage me.

The public knows Dilated Peoples but they don't know me as an individual. They know the group, like that’s the guy with the afro, that’s the one who jumps into the crowd and that’s the DJ.

They don’t really know us as individual people so I’m basically saying I’ve done so much, I’ve achieved so much with my group but do they know me as a person, as Evidence. And that’s why I put out this solo album because even if I don’t sell those records, I really established my identity.

I put more of myself into the solo record than I have all 4 of the Dilated records because I wanted people to know about me as a person.

What are some of the differences in being a white rapper today and back in the day?

See when I started to rap I kind of wanted to rap with someone who looked like me because it would gel more. Alchemist probably woulda been my choice but he was already in a group called The Hooligans and they were signed to B-Real.

I couldn’t find a white rapper or someone who looked like me. They just weren’t around like that at the time. The only ones there were MC Serch, Everlast, they were already established. I stopped thinking about the race card thing after a while and was just like let me find the right person and that’s when I found Rakaa, who ironically looks nothing like me.

It was different for me because I’m not like blonde hair and blue eyes, people would wonder is he Middle Eastern, is he Spanish? So I didn’t really have as much trouble.

How are the overseas fans different from the U.S fans?

The fans are real different overseas. My partner Rakaa always was real adamant about us going to Europe and I didn’t understand it. I was like, "yeah, lets go to Europe and fuck European bitches". I didn’t really understand what he was setting up.

He was setting up something for our future. He always said our fans at home forget about us but the ones overseas won't. Jimi Hendrix didn’t blow up in America; he blew up in Europe and was like an import. Recently we witnessed that with The Black Eyed Peas because we were in Europe so much and they kind of got hot over there.

The European audiences are just not as concerned with American politics and the and radio like we are. They don’t judge it like that. If you do a good show and you put your heart into it they come back and we’ve been nurturing that for a long time.

Do you feel like any mainstream artists have stayed true to the underground?

I do but at the same time I find it very difficult to find out what the definition of this is. Like Talib Kweli is outselling some of them major artists, but does that make him a pop act this year because he’s on TV?

He just stayed true to what he does. I like to say that you can be underground and be as big as anybody else as long as you hold onto that energy. That was the thing with Dilated Peoples, I always said too small to push too big to drop. That’s been like a summary of our career. They couldn’t drop us because we’re generating money but they couldn’t put all their money into us because we’re not quite pop enough. It’s an interesting spot to be in but I wear the shoe that fits.

Some guys are satisfied being on independents and eating off their tours and whatnot. How do you feel about these types of artists?

That could be smart because honestly nobody is making money off record sales right now.

Money is in ticket sales right now. Anybody who is generating a lot of money off their record sales is going multi platinum and you can look at Soundscan, no one is doing that right now. That’s not a bad mentality to have but I would never want to limit myself and just say I’m gonna be that. I’ve always had lofty goals to be as big as possible, just on my terms not somebody else's.

Alright man, tell me what’s in the future for Evidence.

First and foremost I’m still working The Weatherman LP. I’m on tour with Little Brother, a U.S tour, it’s been amazing. Normally when I perform with Dilated we were the headliners but that’s not the case, I’m the opening act.

I’m trying to prove myself as a solo artist and it’s going really well. People come up to me at the shows and tell me, "damn I didn’t know you could do it like that solo", so I want to work this for another year. I’m also going to shoot a video for "All Said and Done", off the album and I’m doing a video for "Chase The Clouds Away".

The next priority is Dilated Peoples, the new album, in a perfect world it’ll be out in 2008, we don’t have a home for it yet. A lot of labels have been calling but were not calling back because we want the right business deal.

It’s gonna be a different experience, we're making it on our own dollar, its really back to independence again. Also I have a project with Khrysis called The Layover. Basically we’re just gonna put the songs on a server and let people download it; they can make a donation or whatever. It’s similar to what Radiohead did.