Los Angeles based DJ and Producer, Bobcat, has had quite an amazing career in Hip-Hop over the last 25 years. Starting off as a member of the groundbreaking and iconic DJ crew Uncle Jamm’s Army in the early 80’s, Bobcat was able to turn that in to career as a record producer. He was also instrumental in creating some of LL Cool J’s biggest records. After his stint with LL, Bobcat also laid down beats for Ice Cube’s Death Certificate album, which many consider to be his greatest to this day. It didn’t stop there. DJ Bobcat also played a very important role in the early career of Tupac Shakur, serving not only as a mentor and a big brother, but  helping to shape the sound of his 2nd album, Strictly For My N.I.G.G.A.Z. AllHipHop.com caught up with the legendary DJ Bobcat, who shared some very interesting lessons about the music industry, working with a top artists and his private musical library. AllHipHop.com: You came up under the legendary DJ crew, Uncle Jamm’s Army. Tell us about your involvement in that whole movement. DJ Bobcat: For those that don’t know, Uncle Jamm’s Army was a legendary concert and party promoters that was responsible for pioneering the West Coast hip-hop scene – along with The Wreckin’ Cru. There were a lot of party promoters but Uncle Jamm’s was number one and the reason why is because they were able to do dances at the Los Angeles Sports Arena with 15,000 people showing up. This was all done without a concert or performing headliner. The DJ’s were the headliners. This was all the brainchild of Rodger Clayton, rest in peace. The Egyptian Lover was the star DJ and he was there before I came along. I ended up joining and I brought my own style to the crew because I was scratching much different than Egypt and the rest of them. I had a faster style because I was younger. How old were you when you joined Uncle Jamm’s Army? I was around the age of 14. I was still in middle school when I started to DJ. When I played at the Los Angeles Sports Arena, they had to give me milk crates to stand on so that I could reach the turntables. I know that I’m the old O.G. now but back then I was the little shrimp who was a DJ and people would say, “Look at the little kid mix!” I was a fast Scratcher but The Egyptian Lover taught me how to be precise. Rodger Clayton also taught me how to blend records and program. The art of programming is knowing what records to play and the way that you play them at certain stages of a party. I started the California Cat Crew which also included DJ Battlecat and I did that because I was doing up to 3 party’s a night and I needed someone to fill in at some of the gigs. [youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oVDfyc2lh4Q&w=420&h=315] Not long after that, you made the transition from DJ to Record Producer. How did you manage that transition? I always tell producers that you always want to do a song in the same vibe of the song that you love. When I made “I Need Love” for LL Cool J, a lot of people don’t know that I was doing my own version of “Secret Lovers” by Atlantic Starr. Snoop Dogg and Mack 10 thought that I used a sample for Mack’s “Backyard Boogie.” I didn’t use one. That’s just me playing music. Producers like myself, DJ Pooh, Battlecat, Daz, Dre, Quik, Johnny J (Rest in Peace), after a while we have whatever type of music in us. It’s like, “You want something like this? Ok. Let me make something like this.” The tracks that I did for 2Pac originally came from the stuff that I was doing for Ice Cube; that whole Bomb Squad/Public Enemy sound. If you listen to “Peep Game” by 2Pac and Deadly Threat, you can take Pac off of there and easily replace him with Chuck D or Ice Cube. As a matter of fact, on that same album I did put Cube on there with Pac and Ice T. [youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EFGOCybDrGQ&w=420&h=315] You mentioned “I Need Love.” That song took LL and rap to new heights because it was a different type of a hip-hop song at the time. How did you develop that sound and convince LL this was the direction he should take? At a young age I was blessed with the opportunity to meet Leon of the family singing group, The Sylvers. My sister Pam took me to their studio and their engineer began to teach me how to EQ sounds and other things. I was learning about songs just sitting around and listening to them. As it relates to me and how “I Need Love” was conceptualized, I would be at Uncle Jamm’s Record Store where Rodger Clayton had keyboards, fooling around on the Casio’s and the DX100. It was originally a song that I wrote called “Friends by Day, Lovers by Night.” I flew out to New York as part of The L.A. Posse to work with a Def Jam artist named Breeze. It was myself, Big Dad, Muffla and DJ Pooh. Breeze was supposed to be the up and coming LL, so Russell Simmons signed him. Just to throw this out there, we were the ones that also developed Nicky D and got her signed to Def Jam. So we were working with Breeze and doing such a great job, that Russell asked us if we were interested in doing pre-production on LL’s next album. We said yes and started working on records with LL. I developed a friendship with him and started going over to his house every day and we became like cousins. One day we had a discussion about ballads and I told him to take his music to another level by having something with […]