BY JAKE PAINE / MARCH 7, 2018

Approaching 30 years since EPMD released Strictly Business, Erick Sermon is in the midst of a creative renaissance. Last month, the Green-Eyed Bandit secured more than $60,000 of crowd-funding for his upcoming ninth solo album (now titled Vernia). As E-Double gets underway on that release promised to feature Method Man, Ghostface Killah, AZ, and more, Keith Murray recently announced that he and Sermon are at work on The Most Beautifullest Thing In This World Part 2. Meanwhile, EPMD say they are recording a Roc Nation concept album, Dynamic Duos: Big Business, featuring Black Star, Mobb Deep, Salt-n-Pepa, M.O.P., Capone-N-Noreaga, and more. It is a busy season in Long Island’s Def Squad Studios.

Appearing on the latest episode (#233) of The Cipher Show, Sermon devotes some time to promoting another album entirely. Def Squad’s founder discusses Redman’s upcoming Muddy Waters Too, a sequel to his gold-certified 1996 Def Jam LP, for which Erick executive produced and provided many sounds. Ahead of the 38:00 mark, Sermon tells host Shawn Setaro, “To me, Muddy Waters Too will be classic Redman, because it will be done by me. For the last three or [more Redman] LPs, it wasn’t done by me. There’s nothing wrong with that; people stay apart. [Dr.] Dre only did one [full album] on Snoop [Dogg]. Sometimes you get to a point where…I happened to do five [Redman] albums. People don’t work that long. I don’t think Missy [Elliott] and Timbaland [did that]. They had broke [away] too before they came back. For you to do five albums with somebody in your crew, it doesn’t happen all the time.” Released between 1992 and 2001, those five albums contain some of Red’s most beloved work, including the E-produced “Whateva Man.”

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