Here's 6 key moments from Metro Boomin's new Apple Music 1 Q&A
It’s a celebration for Metro Boomin right now. Fresh from putting out his new Heroes & Villains studio album, the hip-hop hitmaker chops it up with Apple Music 1’s Ebro Darden to dish on everything from his new project to where his relationship with Hollywood icon Morgan Freeman stems.
The conversation is epic so here’s six key moments from the chop up session.
Metro Boomin Tells Apple Music ‘Heroes & Villains’ Is The Second Part of a Trilogy That Started with 2018’s ’NOT ALL HEROES WEAR CAPES’…
Exclusive right here. This is the second out of a trilogy. It's going to be a trilogy. (Ebro: Now, is the third piece coming soon, or are you just going to see how this flow?) I'm going to see how this flow, because I really want to shoot a lot of videos to this one, and I've put a lot of time into this body of work. So I really want to stretch it, and not just throw out the third one.
Metro Boomin Tells Apple Music Why He Didn’t Have Any Production Credits on Future’s ‘I NEVER LIKED YOU’…
None, but let me tell you why. Let me tell you why; he actually finished most of the album at my studio in LA, the one you came to. That's my brother, but we working on some things. At first, we were going to put a couple songs with me and him on the album, but I had asked him, we had took them off, because I had talked to him, and I was like, "Look, the last time anybody's really heard a song from me and you was ‘Mask Off,’ you know what I'm saying?" So instead of us randomly throwing this one or two songs we did on here, we got to wait and just give them a joint.
Metro Boomin Tells Apple Music About Producing The Track “More M’s” for Drake and 21 Savage’s Album Her Loss…
This song called ‘More M’s,’ I remember we was in the same studio I'm talking about in LA, where I do everything at, Savage was in the front room. He had told me they were working on a project, so he's always like, "Man, I need beats. Beats, beats, beats," so I was making some beats one day, and it's crazy, that beat that went straight on there, it's like when I was making it, I cooked it on the MP 2000 XL, just like I said about that trust, it's just knowing him, and what he likes, and what he don't like, and what kind of bounces, and what kind of drum sounds, even sub sounds, is going to make him do what, and what tempos. I just had all that in mind, and I made a beat, and the next day, I played him like eight beats, and he had picked a few of them out, but when he heard that one, that was the one he just pulled up instantly, and then I went back in the other room. Then he was like, "Come in the room and listen to this." He was really vibing with that song hard, real hard, and he ended up sending it the Drake, and he did his part, and sent it back, and there we go.
Metro Boomin Tells Apple Music How He Got Morgan Freeman To Narrate SAVAGE MODE II…
I had the idea of somebody narrating it, because I was like, "Okay, it's Savage Mode II. It's been a while for both of us. It has to be a movie." I love movies. My love for music is through the roof, and movies is right there with it. So I was like, "Man, we need a crazy iconic voice to narrate this thing," and we were thinking of some things; I had thought about DMX. Rest in peace to X, for sure, and me and my manager, Cash, were talking, and then we were just like, "Yo, what if we got Morgan Freeman on this?" Just ambitiously. We had no line on him, just anything. It was like, "What's the craziest thing we could think of?" "Man, if Morgan Freeman did this, that would just be insane," and we ended up just connecting the dots, man. I talked to Savage about it, and he was like, "Yeah, that would be crazy.” We ended up reaching out, and shout out to Big Rube, first off, I want to say Big Rube, Dungeon Family, he wrote the whole script, everywhere. His voice is crazy, and on the original demos, when they was voicing everything in there, it was crazy still. You know what I'm saying? Shout out to Rube for putting that together and coming through, man. But Morgan, actually, he had really liked the script, and what it was saying, and the values, and certain things in it, and he felt like it was important for young people to hear those things, and the lessons.
Metro Boomin Tells Apple Music About Sampling Mario Winans and Enya on “Creepin” and How He Ended Up Contributing To Album Production…
I'm big believer in just letting the music make itself, kind of, you know what I'm saying? So once again, me and Cash were talking one day about what songs that me and Abel were going to do for the album, and he had told me before, he was like, "Do you know he's always wanted to liked or kind of of flirted with the idea of touching [‘I Don’t Wanna Know’]?” And I let him know I love that song. That's one that was a no-brainer for me. Growing up, who didn't love that song at the time? And at the same time, I have a great relationship with Mario Winans. He's like a big brother/mentor type figure. So I had started working on the idea for the song, and I came to Abel like, "Yo, let's try to redo..." I didn't tell him that Cash told me already. I was like, "Yo, what you think about redoing it"? And he was like, "Yeah." He was already into it, so I was like, "Cool." Man, it just came together crazy. Mario, actually, production-wise, he helped with some of the other songs on the album. He's crazy with it. Just a little ear candy here and there, he just put in there. You know what I'm saying? So me and him were talking about doing that as well, or I had told him that I was starting on it, and he helped me out with a lot of things on it. He actually did backgrounds, a lot of backgrounds under Abel on there.
Metro Boomin Tells Apple Music a So Icey Boyz Project with Southside is Coming…
That's my twin, man. So Icey Boyz, that's our production duo inspired by the whole Neptunes concept. We were like, "Man, we got to call it, we're the So Icey Boyz as a title. We're going to do a project, a So Icey Boyz project, and yeah, Southside, man, that's my twin forever. That's one of them things. I got a lot of stuff lined up, like this HEROES & VILLAINS, after the hiatus. I spilled the beans, but yeah, man, So Icey Boyz, that's going to be incredible.