Hi-Tek

Hi-Tek played a major role in the highly admired golden-age revivalist sound affiliated with the Rawkus Records collective, crafting many of the label's initial breakthrough releases. While Hi-Tek's production style owes a debt to New York's finest beat-makers from the early '90s -- <a href="spotify:artist:6GEykX11lQqp92UVOQQCC7">DJ Premier</a>, <a href="spotify:artist:3BeQqzKdlARoOd6y30kCO2">Pete Rock</a>, <a href="spotify:artist:01nVIuD8YZsnFH6x6Cc9rX">Large Professor</a> -- the producer actually arose from Cincinnati's low-key hip-hop scene rather than the streets of Brooklyn. Local mentors such as Ravi T, J-Fresh, and Sen Sai showed the aspiring youth how to craft beats, and by 1992 he had crossed paths with <a href="spotify:artist:2u2XHKuu3IWZvTvzXiciqu">Mood</a>, one of the Midwest city's premier hip-hop groups. Hi-Tek collaborated on the song "Hustle on the Side" and helped the group score a record deal. Years later, the producer befriended <a href="spotify:artist:0lEssBAxQl2In4RpaB1C2Y">Talib Kweli</a>, who was in town working with <a href="spotify:artist:2u2XHKuu3IWZvTvzXiciqu">Mood</a>. This affiliation eventually spawned the <a href="spotify:artist:6vwJ3e6KaQAhLEpBPxCMBC">Reflection Eternal</a> duo, one of the first acts to put the Rawkus label on the map. But it was Hi-Tek's work with <a href="spotify:artist:0lEssBAxQl2In4RpaB1C2Y">Kweli</a> and <a href="spotify:artist:0Mz5XE0kb1GBnbLQm2VbcO">Mos Def</a> on the milestone album Black Star (1998) that first made the producer a hot commodity. He next collaborated exclusively with <a href="spotify:artist:0lEssBAxQl2In4RpaB1C2Y">Kweli</a> for Reflection Eternal (2000), an album that crossed over from the b-boy camp to the mass market and became a critically championed coast-to-coast success. Then came Hi-Tek's solo spotlight on Rawkus, Hi-Teknology (2001), which featured a broad range of up-and-coming MCs, including some of his Cincinnati peers. Between releases he produced tracks for a broad array of rappers, including such notables as <a href="spotify:artist:7hJcb9fa4alzcOq3EaNPoG">Snoop Dogg</a>, <a href="spotify:artist:42Np3r8zXnaKcjLQsQSjyG">Blackalicious</a>, and <a href="spotify:artist:6g0Wah2YFtb1rFgKhUktlo">Raphael Saadiq</a>, all the while shopping around for labels to issue his second solo album, finally settling on Babygrande. Hi-Teknology 2 (2006), which included verses from <a href="spotify:artist:20qISvAhX20dpIbOOzGK3q">Nas</a>, <a href="spotify:artist:3ZotbHeyVQKxQCPDJuQ4SU">Q-Tip</a>, <a href="spotify:artist:1YfEcTuGvBQ8xSD1f53UnK">Busta Rhymes</a>, and of course <a href="spotify:artist:0lEssBAxQl2In4RpaB1C2Y">Kweli</a>, was followed by a much less star-studded Hi-Teknology 3 late the next year. ~ Jason Birchmeier, Rovi