In part two of our conversation with Little Brother to commemorate the 20th Anniversary of their debut album The Listening, we talk about the lyrical innovations and homages threaded throughout the songs, the lasting impression they have left on groups that followed, who their “little brothers” are and losing one of their biggest influences.

Phonte: Yeah, that definitely was the plan. I remember when I sat down and started writing it, it was heavily inspired by Slum Village. Fantastic, Vol. 2 was just an album that I played into the ground. I played the MP3 tags off that album. I can’t stress it enough, you know what I mean?

And so, one of the things that was really inspiring for me was just the way that they, as MCs, incorporated space and rhythm. It wasn’t so much what they were saying, but it was the cadences and the way they kind of became … The way that T3 and Baatin, they became like instruments. You know what I mean? And Dilla as well, of course. And so, that was kind of the thought of going into that verse. I was like, “All right, I kind of want to just play with what 9th has done with the beat. I kind of want to play around that.”

And I kind of started writing it and it wasn’t rhyming, and I was like, “All right, I think I can do this for a whole verse.” And so I just did it. It felt right for the playful vibe of the song, because If you’re going to do the “girl joint,” if you’re going to do the girl record, you still want it to be playful and fun, you know what I mean? You don’t want to make “Wildflower” by Ghostface, you know what I mean?

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