Ski Beatz : Back To The Future

Uploaded by SoulCultureMedia on May 8, 2011

Even the most casual of Hip Hop listeners should be aware of Ski Beatz as, at the very least, the producer of iconic Hip Hop anthems on Jay-Z's 1996 debut, Reasonable Doubt, and several albums for Camp Lo, having also gone on to produce for Lil Kim, Foxy Brown, Fat Joe and others.

15 years on and the digitally inclined will have caught last year's excitable wave of activity leading up to the release of the North Carolina hailing producer, DJ and former emcee's own album, 24 Hour Karate School, released in September 2010, which saw Ski working with a mouthwatering spread of Hip Hop talent established and new, including Curren$y, Smoke DZA, Jean Grae, Jim Jones, Jay Electronica, Joell Ortiz, The Cool Kids, Stalley, Tabi Bonney, Ras Kass, Camp Lo and Wiz Khalifa.

On a mission to find out more about the man behind the beatz, SoulCulture TV sat down with Ski Beatz at Damon Dash's creative base of operations in New York, DD172, and asked the producer about his beginnings in Hip Hop -- as a rapper first.

Watch below as Ski talks us through his journey from the mic to the boards, from getting jaded by the industry and moving home to North Carolina to more recently returning to New York to work with a new breed of emcees and how his initial passion for rapping gives him the edge when producing for top rappers.