Interviews

Interview with Moodswing9

If you think of hip-hop artists from Maine, you must think Moodswing9. A member of the digging crew 1200 Hobos, Live Poets (the first true hip-hop group from Maine), and an original and former member of the indie-label anticon. WPB chats with the Maine legend on past, present and future projects, as well as his new venture into the graphic design world.

WePushButtons.com: Could you tell us what you thought of the Maine hip-hop scene back when you lived here, and what you think of the scene nowadays.

Moodswing9: I was involved with the hip hop scene in Maine from 1987- 1998 (In 1998 I moved with sole and pedestrian out to Oakland). During that time in Maine, there really wasn’t much of a scene. There was only a handful of people creating hip hop music in Portland at the time. In addition, there were little to no places to do shows. I can’t speak much on the scene now because I haven’t lived in Maine for 10 years. However, I’ve been impressed with I’ve seen when I come back to visit and what I hear from my friends that are still there.

WPB: You’ve lived in Oakland for over 10 years now. Do you have any plans to move back east?

Moodswing9: Not at the moment.

WPB: You’ve been a hard-core record collector for some time know. Do you still go digging?

Moodswing9: Yes, but not as much as I used to. I put in a great deal of the legwork before the market got saturated with beat diggers. Its much harder to find records nowadays. I went on 10-11 cross country record digging trips over the past 10 years, so I had a chance to stock pile some goodies. Now I mostly trade with other collectors if I want anything.

WPB: What artists are you listening to these days?

Moodswing9: Wow, way too many to list… For new music, I’ve been listening to Caribou, Half Handed Cloud, Why?,joey beats. Old music; Lloyd Miller, Quarteto Em Cy and a ton of others.

WPB: It’s been a while since we’ve seen a Moodswing9 release. Do you have any new material in the works?

Moodswing9: As far as a full length album, not anytime soon. I miss making music, but its been hard to find time to do it.

WPB: you were directly affiliated with the anticon label back in the 90s, how were you involved, and are you still?

Moodswing9: Before anticon, Sole, jdwalker and I ran a label called 45 Below. In the summer of 1998,a group of us involved with the Portland Hip hop scence attended Scribble Jam. It was here (and slightly before, during the recording of the deep puddle dynamics album) that we connected with WHY?, Buck 65, Sixtoo, Jel, Sluggo, Dose, Mr. Dibbs, DJ Signify etc. Many of these people joined us in the beginnings of anticon. After the formation of anticon, the base of operations was switched from Portland, Maine to the Bay Area. I moved out there in the fall of 1998. At this point, I was strictly doing production. This included music for many of the names above. I continued to be involved with anticon till the end of 1999. Since then I have been more involved with the world of design then music.

WPB: You recently started the graphic art website “Grain Edit.” Could you give us some background on how this came about?

Moodswing9: I first became interested in design in the late 90s. Initially it was related to the design of album covers but eventually grew into other areas including posters, labels, book covers etc. Going on my various record trips, I would start to pick up design related material. Over time, I built up a library of reference material. Grain edit is my outlet to share some of that material and give back to the design community.

Grain edit features vintage design books, modern stamps and interviews with designers.

WPB: Would you like to give any shout outs?

Moodswing9: Many thanks to Moshe for considering me for the interview, Crazy plump shout outs to the whole gang back there in Maine..including.. Bren, Chris, Rpm, Jarvis, Scribe, Kgb, jdwalker, nomar and anyone else I might of forgot.

For more information on Grain Edit visit the website here:
www.grainedit.com

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