AIRBORN AUDIO ///
INTERVIEW JACLYN MARINESE ///
SOUTH 2ND STREET, BROOKLYN ///

It's a new chapter for High Priest and M. Sayyid of the hip-hop group Airborn Audio. Since their Ninja Tune debut release Good Fortune, these former AntiPop Consortium members have been vigilant about redefining their sound in a way that allows them to graduate from the ties they have to their former musical collective. While APC showed the world that hip-hop can thrive outside the typical boom-bap, sample-heavy equation of the '90s sound, Airborn says they are attempting to elevate that notion through a new, more humble approach to the sound-and to life in general. Aside from their first LP and a mix tape of new songs they released in February of last year, the duo also just finished a stateside tour with Bright Eyes and the Faint and are gearing to release a new LP as well as a "Live in Japan" EP. 'Sup recently caught up with these guys who, for the first time, have been able to talk candidly about some of the issues of their former band and what their hopes are for current and future projects.

How did you meet?
We met from the downtown open mic scene in New York-Time Caf?© is where we met-and we just kept building through AntiPop up until now. High Priest: Going back seven or eight years.

What is it like to still be working together after all you've been through, with AntiPop and everything?
High Priest: For me, knowing each other from one point in our lives to now has been a good experience. And bringing that energy into the beats, having that familiarity, really just communicates into the work. M. Sayyid: It's definitely like telepathy. When you know somebody for a long time, there's a certain kind of unwritten thing that goes on when you're working on things.

When you were with AntiPop, your music was pretty progressive at the time. Did you feel like an alien in the culture then, approaching the music the way you did when everything else had such a different aesthetic?
High Priest: I'll say for me that I did sort of go through that because there wasn't really any reference point of anything else to gauge it against. But after a little while, one of the things that helped us develop was just to make music that we wanted to hear. And that was the sound that we were always working toward developing. And now with Airborn doing different things lyrically as well, it still keeps it challenging. At first it was just like, O.K., the game is this way, in thinking outside of the box we have to do it this way. We did that when the challenge was just to make something different that was still hot. We did that, and now the challenge is just to make something hot and not have any hang-ups about it internally. M. Sayyid: I think that what happened was-and this is the first time we've ever really spoken about this-we got to a point with APC where everyone was like, 'Well, what's wrong here? What's the problem?" As producers and artists and writers, we saw for ourselves that to be able to continue doing what we're doing and feel good about it, we need to switch things up. And I think that the one thing that can never be minimized is going from one thing that is successful and moving as a machine and then saying, "But do I really want to continue to go through the game like this?" People would say, "What are you talking about Sayyid? You're being crazy." Maybe I am. The agenda for myself and for Priest was to move things in a direction that was still us but a different direction.

And it's so easy to feel like you need to stay in one spot when you find success in something, like you guys were getting with AntiPop Consortium.
High Priest: Absolutely. It's the type of thing that. Just because we are making hip-hop, it has a different connotation. Like, if we were fashion designers and we were at Gucci, and we said O.K., working at Gucci's cool, but we are gonna start the new label, it would just be, O.K., that's the new label. M. Sayyid: Yeah, and we are one of the only groups that has been able to switch up and come back with new management, a new label, a new release, and that's something to be really proud of. And a lot of people who come up to me say they totally understand why we had to do this, it makes it sweeter that a lot of people have been supporting us. We have been insulated by a lot of positive people.

Was it a pain to go through all the questioning about the break up?
High Priest: Yeah, that's the first thing that people would ask us about. That's what interviews are, really-just reinforcing different aspects that people know or don't know or are curious about. That's all par for the course. Moving forward, the main thing we want to make clear is that we're not running from the things we did in the past. This is just a developmental step based on the foundation. We're in no way like, "Fuck the old band" or rock-star shit like that. We just have a certain sensitivity of knowing that there's a curiosity about it, but we don't want to capitalize off of that. M. Sayyid: That's why we are bringing it up now when we didn't talk about it much before. And in reference to what it is that we do, I'm just mad happy about being able to do this. Switching over the name took time, and it took a little minute to be able to understand that this is where we're going. And after doing the album, we flipped over to the mix tape, Close Encounters.

What was it that drew you to the more electronically synthetic sounds?
High Priest: For me personally, that was just me connecting with the things that inspire me in other people's music. Not so much dance music, but club [music] more so. There's a certain sound that makes those tracks come through the speakers the way that they do. We wanted that dynamic, but not necessarily to stimulate dance. That connected us to the electronic music side of things and exposed me to it as far as them being our contemporaries. But it wasn't a matter of us so much being part of that community, and the technical exposure to certain equipment allowed us to put our stamp on those sounds. M. Sayyid: And even going back before that, people like Afrikka Bambaattaa, all the early hip-hop had that. We weren't the pioneers of it, but we sort of took it in our own direction on a late '90s level, in a non-dance-focused way.

I wanted to ask you to go through the story of this album.
M.Sayyid: I think the overall story of the Good Fortune album is never say die. The overall story is get it as good as you can get it, finish it, and move on to the next one, or else you will never finish an album and have a photograph of a certain era of time.

It was interesting that you are not purposefully making non-danceable music when we seem to be in an era where if you don't have some kind of dance-related hit, with the exception of some artists and genres, the mainstream tends to over look it.
High Priest: For me, I make a distinction between dance music and club music. For me, when I think of dance, I think of four-four beats. And club music just has a certain level of compression that you can play in a club. Certain joints are automatic dance tunes, and there is a certain art form in that, but I don't want cats getting confused thinking that we're any relation to that side of the culture because the sounds tie together. We're all using the same equipment, but the intention is different. We're lyricists who are spitting different things. It's different dynamics.

I guess every artist has to deal with criticism a lot when they put work out there for people to take in. With your album just hitting, how has criticism affected you guys?
High Priest: I've gotta say, I watch a lot of those documentaries on other artists, and when there's a period where critics weren't feeling them, you can often see how it affects them. In watching that, I can say to myself, I can't believe they let that criticism affect them like that. But when looking at myself, and knowing the intention I put into my work, as well as how self-critical I am, it's different. Watching someone who is paid to do it and who comes from a separate place, attaching their agenda to the work is hard. Initially it gets at you, but you have to be able to have that distance from it and realize it's just part of the business. Because I'm just as much a fan of the work as much as I am an artist, I see myself on the outside looking in. I don't feel that sense of entitlement. M. Sayyid: That's a really good point, because so many cats are like, "Oh, my shit is so hot, my music is so hot." And it's definitely O.K. to talk a little shit, but to carry yourself like that-and flossing like that-in front of other people really has nothing to do with the work. The only energy I think you should be having should be put into the work. All that Hollywood stuff-you know, I don't really have any more goals man as far as the music industry. The only thing that matters is finishing a joint and saying to myself, "Yo, this is hot. I can't wait to play it for Priest.

What would be your ideal success story?
M. Sayyid: One of the biggest hazards we have as artists is feeling like, Yo, people have to feel me. I'm never ever going to go down that road again. I've been down that road and had that self-entitlement. There are things I've learned. I learned it from the University of AntiPop, and I'm a proud graduate. And I'm not trying to fuck with any self-entitlement things. All I'm trying to do is get better and better and keep it moving. I mean, sitting around, thinking about myself, thinking about what I deserve-that just works against you. When you're working on things and you have that self-entitlement, it really fucks with the work. And this has nothing to do with self-confidence. I'm just saying that the world is not coming into the studio with me. High Priest: Yeah, it's not determined by all of these outside situations, because nobody has to feel nothing. If it's not hot, nobody's going to feel it. People are definitely going to feel something that's honest. But don't let criticism, or the trends, or your own self-absorption with wanting to blow taint your agenda, because the music industry got people on some scientology, got people on some Dianetics talking about all these positive affirmations like, "Yes, it's about the art of War, or I'm the new Donald Trump, or I'll do anything to blow," and all that. It's like a real reality TV mentality. It's O.K. if you want to go at it like that. It's fine, but don't bring that to my thing.

Yeah, egos can really affect the direction of people's careers sometimes.
M. Sayyid: And we've seen a lot of people come and go from this music thing. High Priest: Yeah, and when it's too ego-driven, that's not positive and it's going to drain you. Overall, it's about having a positive relationship with your work. When I come home and the house is quiet, I'm like the cat who makes coffee mugs in his garage. Just come home, up a little-incense-go into the basement and make some beats, you know. I don't want to fuck that up. We could do that forever and live comfortably; I could sleep well at night. M. Sayyid: Exactly, you know we got a good life. We both own homes. We both got our paper. We're keeping things moving, so you gotta be thankful. We got little kids running around, so that's why I'm glad we calibrated ourselves and took it slow. But up until this point we were just calibrating. We've also been insulated with a bunch of people in the music industry that have been so supportive, so we are lucky in that sense. I recently got a letter from a fan in South Africa with just a note that said, "Thanks for not giving up!" I was just like, Wow. For me, stuff like that is the definition of success. ///