The Electronic Age of J Dilla: "Dillatronic #34" Lifted from Dil Withers' Latest Electro-leaning Posthumous Release, Dillatronic (Vintage Vibez)
"Now, the vocal album – that is something that I know [J Dilla] had a desire to see out, as he did Ruff Draft and, oddly enough, an album he'd made of noodling improvised keyboard lines over drum breaks (one of those made it to The Shining album)," Now-Again Records founder and former Stones Throw General Manager Eothen "Egon" Alapatt revealed when asked about Dilla's planned post-Donuts releases; to the best of my knowledge, Vintage Vibez Music Group's sprawling 41-track Dillamatic album isn't in fact said "improvised noodling keyboard lines over drum breaks album." It is however, being billed as The Electronic Age of J Dilla, which was seemingly preceded by his "hard-edged, synth-heavy tracks crafted fro Busta Rhymes, Jaylib [with Madlib], Oh No, and Phat Kat." Detroit's finest neck-snapping rapper-producer James "J Dilla" Yancey aka Jay Dee is still somehow releasing mass amounts of posthumous music from beyond the grave. During his all-too-brief Lupus-stricken lifetime, the Soulquarians affiliate worked alongside the likes of The Roots, stand-up comic Mos Def, D'Angelo, Guilty Simpson, Frank N Dank, Jay Electronica, Ghostface Killah, Janet Jackson, A Tribe Called Quest, and his own Detroit-bred group, Slum Village. "J Dilla's music was impacted by the diverse musical history of Detroit – the birthplace of Techno and one of the most important cities in the history of Electronic music," reads a fragmented chunk of Vintage Vibez's Dillatronic-promoting press release.
"You can hear it in songs like "Raise It Up" for Slum Village or "Make It Hurt" for Busta Rhymes... The Detroit influence is part of what gave him and edge in his production," says Young RJ (Dilla's protégé and a member of Slum Village). Ma Dukes & Dilla's Estate unleashed a second orchestral-leaning preview of Dillatronic, following "Dillatronic #7," simply titled "Dillatronic #34," which was previously used by enigmatic emcee Jay Elecrtonica on his leaked War with The Dragon loosie "B*tches & Drugs." Electronica's sampled and looped root track "And I Wanna Escape" seems to come from J Dilla's heavily shared three-volume Beat CD '05, which single-handedly manages to in turn sample, 1960's girl group The Cake, Whodini, Mantronix, and Daniel Vangarde. Dilla's love for Electronic music even manages to shine through on his German-released Ruff Draft EP/Chrome Children single, "Nothing Like This," which boasts its own unique Hip-Hop and Detroit Techno-blending drum-laden stomp. Dillatronic is currently available for your streaming pleasure ahead of its soon forthcoming October 30th world-wide unveiling; in preparation of Dilla's latest posthumous release, Vintage Vibez have readied "three different deluxe packages [including] limited-edition Glow-In-The-Dark packaging and colored vinyl, while supplies last. Deluxe items include a cassette, T-shirt, poster, record bag, and Moog Mini Voyager USB flash drive."