MORE STEVE HOPKINS
DANGER!
A visit to hiphopkins.com may cause you to think.It also may cause you to laugh.
Thinking & laughing in tandem have been known to cause befuddlement and generalized disorientation in those who lack a sense of humor.
Also in those who lack sense.
Proceed with caution - at least that's what the attorneys advise me to tell you.
Consistently I get emails asking me: "How do you do it? How do you write, create, compose?"
And how do you bust off those ill-azzed joints?
WhO aRe YoU sTe VE?????
So here's what's what. My name is Steve Hopkins - aka hiphopkins - not that I am claiming to be funky soul brother number two - I'm not - but really it's like this: I am down with hiphop music, I was born with 7/10ths of the name, it's a danged catchy one so I'm rolling with it. If Arnold Schwarzenegger can be the "Governator", then I feel pretty well justified in calling myself hiphopkins.
In case you hadn't noticed, I like to make music. And beats. And whatever.
I wrote, produced, and recorded every last little groove, melody, harmony, mix, & remix you hear on this site - it all originated somewhere within the feverish confines of my being. For better or worse. The artists represented on these pages are people I have produced and collaborated with. Some of them are even still on speaking terms with me. Some of them actually ARE me. I have a particular specialty with Japan as you can see with my artist Meyou - the first & most successful female hardcore rapper in Japanese history. You can follow the upward trajectory of her career as I continue to write all the songs and produce her recordings here at studio hh in Los Angeles, Cali Caliente USA. Our first CD, Infinity, was released in 2002 on my very own Saikotunes label and licensed as an import to R & C in Japan. Our current CD is in wide release in Japan on King Records as of September 2004. 150,000 downloads of the ringtone for our song, "Hana" is a pretty good indication of both her popularity and the Japanese tech sensibility.
I also write & produce a lot of commercial music - jingles, underscore, tv/radio adverts for the corporate and Hollywood entertainment world. Yeah that's right - call me a sellout, a "shill for the man", "enemy of the proletariat", "pawn in the game", a "lackey for the running dogs of capitalism". Karl Marx would no doubt be appalled. Although Karl was never much known for his love of funky beats. Well, do you really expect us to make a living as musicians in the record business when all of you lot would rather steal - oh - excuse me, "download" the fruits of our labors as opposed to paying for them? You may not BUY a Lexus but you can't really fault me for hooking them up with an insanely catchy advertising jingle that helps them to both sell more cars and helps me to subsidize the leisure time activities of all you "downloaders" who can't be bothered to pay me for my work. I'm not upset - just real.
A vital part of my continued synergistic association with the Hollywood and advertising media world consists of my licensing music from my music library to these aforementioned running dogs of global capitalism. And I am happy to do so since they pay me a decent living wage for my efforts. Oddly enough I have yet to license a single note of music to any of the communist countries, although my "web statistics' tell me that I have a lot of "download activity" in those area codes. Funny how that works.
Yeah - I do all of my productions out of my own decked-out recording
studio but you know it ain't all it's cracked up to be. Nowadays with
the advent of the "laptop studio" you can get a lot of the same results
while lounging at Starbucks checking out the hotties and munching on that
fat-free bran muffin while simultaneously eavesdropping on your neighbors
wifi communications. And you'll save a bundle on that studio liability
insurance.
Having your own studio real estate is useful however for hosting wild,
out-of-control recording sessions populated by large numbers of the type
of people whose association with you will get you permanently thrown out
of Starbucks and temporarily thrown into prison.
Try THAT on a laptop! Being a musician myself I do like having my own
spot where I can spread out and engage the talents of my fellow "musos"
day or night - dangerously anti-social attitudes aside - to come in and
play real instruments on my recording sessions. But ultimately, having
your own studio is the only way to "control the means of production" -
i.e.: get_things_done. And since producing music is what I do,
then studio hh is the place where it all goes down.
I guess you could say I also like to philosophize - a harmless enough hobby that helps me to articulate some of the more renegade, bizarre, and unfounded notions that lurk within the non-registered parameters of my cranium. Saves on the therapy bills - which as those of you who reside within the city limits of Los Angeles California USA will well know, tend to be exorbitant. Of course nobody pays me for this activity so please refer back to www.hiphopkins.com/mediamusic/show_me_the_money to understand the macroeconomics of my operation. No, I don't have a blog because I have a full time job doing this music stuff and I can't believe that anybody really cares to know what I think on a daily basis about astrobiology and global cooling trends on Mars anyway.