Dilla Time: The Life and Afterlife of J Dilla, the Hip-Hop Producer Who Reinvented Rhythm by Dan Charnas

Dilla Time: The Life and Afterlife of J Dilla, the Hip-Hop Producer Who Reinvented Rhythm Reviews

• 
  chantel nouseforaname

  There's this feeling you get when you read something by someone who really cares, like realllllllllly cares about what they're sharing.
  
  You can feel the worlds that Dan Charnas had to move through to get the content for this book. You can feel the education that he's dropping on every page. The lessons in musicology and the realities about the scene, the industry, and the complicated man that is/was J Dilla.
  
  I love that Dan Charnas didn't shy away from the realities of J Dilla's life and personality, which could sometimes be so incredibly volatile that I'm surprised he had as many connections as he did! Charnas didn't shy away from the shambles Dilla left all his communities in with his disorganization and untimely passing. His music was incredible, and he'll forever be unforgettable for what he did with sound and how he changed various genres for the better.
  
  As a father/romantic-partner/brother/son/responsible human being, Dilla left much to be desired, and left a legion of pain in his passing. It's important to memorialize those elements of people as well because it's real. We live in the real world. It is what it is. However, the respect that Dan Charnas gave all these narratives was commendable. It never felt like a side was taken, and I respect that so much. He even eviscerated the toxic fan culture around J Dilla, the beat-loving culture vulture bros that ruin things with their "J Dilla Saved My Life" T-Shirts when "they don't know who Slum Village is". I'm not a purist, and I don't know it all. However, if I had a dollar for every time I've rolled my eyes as some dude tried to explain Dilla to me, I'd have a lot of money. I'm glad that he pointed out the toxic bro culture, BIG daps to Charnie for that! That was awesome.
  
  All in all, this book was an education on the evolution of Hip-Hop after J Dilla got his hands on it. It was a walk through Detroit and other spaces and places. It was an exploration of the international landscapes that he touched from the UK & Australia to Hip-Hop loving markets in Japan, etc. I loved Chapter 15: Descendants and Disciples, my fave chapter - it was sooo good! There were layers and layers of information about adjacent artists and musicians and Dilla's influence on their style and what-begat-what-begat-what... each layer was delicious, so interesting, mindbending, fun, and unique. I gotta go look for the playlist someone's made on this book on Spotify, it's bound to be dope.
  
  Lastly, the notes, selected discography, and index are enough to keep me busy from here until eternity. Dilla Time is a worthy read for anyone remotely interested in the evolution of Hip-Hop and the cultural significance of J Dilla.
• 
  Anthony

  Hey Siri, play "Dear Dilla" by Phife Dawg.
  
  I was 15-years-old when my love affair with hip-hop first began. What was once the de facto mask I donned to hide myself under a veneer of cool quickly became an education in beats, rhymes, and life. And few teachers taught as effectively as the then recently passed James Dewitt Yancey, aka Jay Dee, bka J Dilla. Musical acts like A Tribe Called Quest, Common, Slum Village, and The Pharcyde walled in the rabbit hole I was falling through, and the more I listened, the more I craved the lopsided, Dilla-made rhythms that united them; seemingly offbeat tracks like "The Light" or "Runnin" were the ideal fit to the soundtrack of my life.
  
  So yeah, I might be predisposed to love this shit.
  
  But even when trying and failing to cast aside my nostalgic biases, this is a pretty dope book. What Dan Charnas has penned here is at once a beautiful celebration of the music of J Dilla, approaching it with the scholarly vigor, technical analysis, and musical history it so sorely deserves. The book consistently stunned me with the extent of theory and musicology it delved into, thoroughly describing the methodology behind a traditionally crafted pop song compared against J Dilla's offkilter productions. There are charts inviting readers to beat their knees in time, and then again in 'Dilla time', making for a uniquely engaging reading experience. I found the alternating spotlight on traditional craft versus J Dilla's rule-breaking ways incredibly compelling, and I don't think it's any exaggeration to posit that J Dilla himself would have loved seeing his art presented in this way. Jeff Peretz's contributions deserve a great deal of recognition for imbuing the work with a structure worthy of Dilla's genius, especially because things get noticeably sloppy once that structure falls away.
  
  Charnas conducted nearly 200 interviews in service of this work, yet his ability to string together a consistently absorbing narrative from the same as he biographs Dilla's life often reads as muddled and spasmodic. There's a great deal of sweet tales about Dilla's childhood (I loved the part about his father tapping out beats on his belly, playing the music into him) and studio sessions with trailblazing artists like D'Angelo or ?uestlove, and as great as these tidbits are, they draw their strength from being influencee accounts as opposed to influencer expressions. The need to pull in big names to demonstrate Dilla's impact on the way popular music is made struck me as akin to needless namedropping. All of this seems designed to distract from the fact that Charnas seems to struggle with getting into Dilla's head; I never once felt like I was actually getting to know him. Our entire perspective on the legendary producer is held at an arm's length, seen through the eyes of others rather than from the man. Look, I enjoyed this book a great deal, and Charnas is obviously passionate, but his writing lacks empathy. I could read his passages on an LSAT exam and not find any of it out of place.
  
  This isn't entirely the author's fault, however. J Dilla's legacy after death is represented by a bitter disunity between the parties most interested in the same, and the stories often change drastically depending on who you ask. While Charnas does spend a significant amount of time (probably too much) exploring these issues and taking flawed parties to task for perceived selfishness, greed, and wrongfully expressed grief, he flies alarmingly close to unnecessarily throwing dirt on the names of family and friends like Ma Dukes or DJ House Shoes. While I strongly agree that J Dilla's daughters are being left with the short end of the stick from the activities of his estate, I hate that this is the note that the book ends on in substance because it concerns itself with drama that Dilla would have likely had no patience for.
  
  I love J Dilla's music like I love the broken part of myself that strives to be better each day. At times, I felt this book holding the music in the reverence it has always needed, but in others, I think it detracted from its own messaging by focusing on things auxiliary to the man himself. Charnas was wise to not shy away from the shortcomings of Dilla and his circle, but some of the more incessantly targeted chapters, along with the overwrought exhibitions of Dilla's musical followers, pervert what makes him worth writing about in the first place: the music.
  
  I love this man so much. Even with some issues in mind, we probably won't ever get a better book about him than this one.
• 
  Cat

  of course dan charnas wrote a killer book. like the Big Payback, Dilla Time will be read for years and years and years
• 
  Joe Lovinger

  Easiest five stars I’ve given! My mind is on the floor trying to imagine the research, dedication, and alchemy it took to put all this together. And then to make it so clearly and compellingly written? Impossible. Except it really happened and it’s this book. Proud to be an alum of the same school as Charnas.
• 
  Ryan

  Gushing review to come. Keep your mop and bucket to hand.
• 
  Jordan

  A stunning work of biography, journalism, and accessible musicology. A truly Robert Caro-level undertaking that entailed 190 interviews over four years. Also acts as a sort of corollary to Charnas’ The Big Payback, which detailed the history of the business of rap - i.e., mainstream hip-hop. This is the history of the other side of the coin. Absolutely essential.
  
  My only issue with the book is that it doesn’t give us much in the way of Dilla’s interiority. We see what he did but we don’t get much of who he was on the inside. I know that’s a difficult row to hoe, especially with a journalistic endeavor like this where getting inside someone’s head could be construed as editorializing or coloring outside the lines. Still, I hoped I’d come away with more of a concept of how Dilla felt and thought.
• 
  Ben Root

  “As with all shifts in music, heresy gradually becomes gospel.”
  
  Holy shit, what an unbelievable biography about truly one of the most important people in music. I’m incredibly impressed by the amount of research and effort to be faithful to the reality of this man’s life. Dan Charnas commands respect for his eloquent prose, the deep investigative work he did across all of his interviews, and his masterful understanding of music theory that allows him to unlock the mind-blowing truths about Dilla’s transcendent talent.
  
  This isn’t just a historical portrait, or a composite of an artist’s body of work. this is truly a detective case as to why and how James Yancey accomplished what he did. The man known as Jay Dee’s ability to perceive, dissect, and manipulate time (the medium that music decorates) is inhuman, and this book translates that alien skill in a way even the most naïve can understand. perhaps more importantly, this book chronicles the persistent echoing of Dilla’s alien consciousness, allowing the readers to truly digest the legacy of the man and the form he changed forever.
• 
  Mrs. Danvers

  This was a great read, educating me on the enduring importance of J Dilla and what it was that he did, exactly, that changed everything. I know almost nothing about music theory and this book taught me a lot without making me feel like I was studying for a class. I also really appreciate the candor with which this was written, that Charnas wasn't afraid to write honestly about each person in the book, and that where accounts differ, he clearly sets out each person's viewpoint. While I was aware as a distant bystander of many of the quarrels with the estate and others as they took place, I never felt like I had any real understanding of the issues. Charnas's descriptions shed enough light to let me know that I wasn't alone in this. This was both heartbreaking and, as well, a trip down memory lane in which loose ends were connected for me, as someone who was always too intimidated to frequent the Lesson boards (remaining firmly in GD).
• 
  Paul

  I generally really enjoyed this work, it's a rich and vibrant piece of biography and a near-scholarly look at musicology, though positioned for a more general audience. I particularly enjoyed the structure - probably 75% biographical chapters, and then 25% musicology or musical analysis. The building upon of the concepts around musical timing, complete with illustrations of the various timefeel concepts, was easy to follow and very interesting. The biography itself was vibrant and thorough, and generally stayed on the right side of hagiography, as Charnas said he would do. I was less a fan of the final hundred pages, though this is less a reflection on the book itself than it is my own perception of the strife and discord surrounding Dilla's estate after his passing, especially what I found to be the occasionally whiplash-inducing swings between criticism and deification of Dilla's mother. This wouldn't be a universal recommendation, but for anyone interested in music and culture, especially hip-hop, it's a great read.
• 
  ocelia

  a favorite of the year and it's NOT recency bias! i love music and i love learning!
• 
  Carlos Martinez

  Ultimate modern cliché to be a Dilla-nerd, but that's a cross I bear. This is a really lovely and detailed study of his life and impact. Made me cry more than once!
• 
  Daniel Polansky

  One afternoon some years ago I found myself at the Zimbabwe-South Africa border. I was driving south from Victoria Falls and wearing a J Dilla Changed My Life shirt. From what I can recall from that byzantine immigration procedure you needed a stamp certifying that your car was up to snuff, and a stamp agreeing that you personally should be allowed to exit the country. The line for the first was three people; the line for the second stretched out the door and looped the large building. I had settled in for a long wait when a security guard called me over. A lot of my time in Zimbabwe had been spent being touched for bribes so I was expecting the worst, but instead the guy asked me 'How Did J Dilla Change My Life?' Thinking he wanted me to to explain the shirt, I went on a quick shpiel about Dilla – your favorite producer's favorite producer, birth of Neo Soul, yadda yadda. Nodding approvingly, the security guard told me to give him my passport, then walked me to the front of the line and had the official stamp it.
  
  I also strongly suspect I am the only person to ever work Dilla into a major work of published fantasy—perhaps a dubious tribute, perhaps, but that's neither here nor there.
  
  Anyway, Charnas does a good job of explaining how Dilla earned such veneration during his brief career while also exposing many of the myths which sprung up around him before and after his premature demise. What emerges is a complex, contradictory figure, brilliant and mercurial. I found the book immense fun, and suspect even less vigorous devotees will enjoy it.
• 
  Rollie Pemberton

  One of the best music books ever made and an instant hip-hop classic. Dan Charnas demystifies the iconic producer (and underrated emcee) J Dilla who has sometimes been posthumously deified as a virtuous underground beatmaker when his reality was much more complicated and unstable.
  
  I basically devoured this book and thoroughly enjoyed the stories about Dilla’s work with Common, Slum Village and others. It was fascinating to learn about some of the deeper meaning around the sample choices on Donuts and I came away with greater context around why and how Dilla made the beats that he made.
  
  Could’ve done without the stuff about his estate but I understand why it’s in there and won’t fault the author for including it. This book is an impressively complete picture of an elusive artist who defied categorization during his life but has gone on to become one of the most influential artists in recent history. A must read for any music lover.
• 
  Andrew Horton

  This book is a masterpiece. It might be the first music biography I've ever read that doesn't mess up the technology and production concepts - very few writers understand them enough to not only write credibly about them but communicate them to a layperson audience of non-musicians/non-producers , and Charnas does both in style. James Yancey legitimately changed the sound of hip hop, but to communicate this without resorting to "drunk monkey style" comparisons is a feat. He also busts a lot of persistent myths and mythology that surround Dilla - he didn't make "Donuts" on his deathbed (or even an MPC or SP-404!), he didn't just turn off quantize and play in his beats by feel, and he didn't just die of lupus, plus some more. I appreciate that this isn't a hagiography - James was no saint, and neither is Ma Dukes, especially in her financial dealings with his estate - but the warts-and-all approach makes this a complex and complete portrait of a complicated dude and some complicated situations.
• 
  Alexis

  I listened to the audio book, narrated by author Dan Chanas in a way that flowed well with the book's content. When I learned that the written book includes diagrams I got a copy of that also, but I found that Chanas has done such a good job talking about "time" in music that the diagrams were unnecessary for my understanding! This is one of the book's biggest strengths - explaining in a clear and persuasive way what was unique about J Dilla's beat - and how it relates to musical styles that came before, how it influenced hip hop and a lot of popular music, how Dilla created it, how it evolved, etc. Musical TIME is a main character of this book just as much as Dilla is (as the title, Dilla Time, suggests). This is a huge strength of the book, and it's why it works as a fairly long biography of someone with a short life.
  
  I do wish that I'd realized sooner that there is a
  website linking to all the music Chanas mentions ... it's organized in order of mention and it's the easiest way to hear the many examples cited. These popular music examples are fun and can be helpful - Chanas says so many times, "listen to" and "notice", and his explanations about why he's using the examples are clear and help bring his points to life conceptually.
  
  The book begins and ends with a lot of discussion about musical theory / time, and the middle of the book is more about Dilla's life, family, music career, and death. At times I thought some of this biographical detail could have been presented more simply. In the end I think it's worth it to have this full exploration and documentation of J Dilla's life, and it's worth it to stick with the book even when feeling mired in sad family infighting after Dilla's death. Chanas brings it around in the final chapters to an eclectic exploration of contemporary experiments with time in music. This book was published in 2022 so it feels very current.
  
  I wasn't very familiar with J Dilla before reading this book; afterwards, I feel glad to know his work and I feel the book has changed me in some way, as many people feel they were changed by Dilla's beats. It was a recommendation from my library, and a good one!
• 
  Jake Kasten

  Must read for anyone who loves music. The sections breaking down the rhythmic nuances that make “dilla time” are able to convey some fairly complicated ideas in easily digestible ways. Dilla’s life is a fascinating journey of someone who knew what they wanted to do and wasn’t going to back down from that plan.
  
  Before this book I knew and loved Jay Dee, but I didn’t realize quite how deep his influence reached in the music I love. Dilla Time has existed across genres since I first began getting serious about music in high school, so while I’ve always thought of him as one of the best - I didn’t realize he was also the original.
  
  Loved getting to see Vijay Iyer pop up in one of the music theory sections.
• 
  Elizabeth

  An incredible amount of history is covered in this book - of J Dilla, of hip hop, of Detroit’s music and just music itself. It was such an interesting lesson in the technical aspects of making music too and it built my ability to understand the singularity of his gift and of Dilla time. It’s a great one for audiobook, and the playlist and all the accompanying exercises give you so much to explore.
• 
  Mayu

  Carnatic music’s soul is in the taalam. Musical beats have been drilled into me simply by being South Indian and I found a lot of similarities between the way Dilla was brought up and the way South Indians are. Music is our bread and butter and beats are the backbone.
  
  This book made me love Dilla and everyone he influenced even more than I already do. I was concerned that there would be too many technical details about drumming and production but in fact (just like Dilla’s production process) the technical aspects took a backseat to artistry. If you like hip hop, soul, jazz… if you like music in general you need to read this book.
  
  
• 
  Joey Valdez

  To chronicle the life and work of an artist as heavily mythologized as J Dilla is a daring aspiration. Dilla Time, however, impresses beyond the standards of the monumental task by illustrating James Yancey's humanity, following the ripples of his influence into the work of artists like D'Angelo, Janet Jackson, and Kendrick Lamar, and explaining the genius of Dilla's production in a way that simultaneously captures the full depth of his production techniques in the context of American music and presents it in an accessible way that even casual hip hop fans can appreciate. It is a love letter to Detroit, African (and African American) music history, and the underappreciated field of music technology, portraying Yancey as a conduit through which all of these contextual factors could synergize into a revolutionary style of hip hop music. Much music writing falls into the trap of overly effusive words of praise for its subject in a tone that feels more like the superfluous words of a fan rather than a unique perspective that contributes more to the reader's understanding of an artist beyond what one could find clicking through Wikipedia and a few interviews. avoids this by telling the story of Dilla's rise to stardom through the eyes of his friends, family, and revered contemporaries like Q-Tip, Pete Rock, DJ Jazzy Jeff, and ?uestlove. There are so many fly-on-the-wall stories from the making of albums like Fantastic, Vol 2., Voodoo, Like Water for Chocolate, and Labcabincalifornia that hip hop nerds will adore, as well as heartbreaking recollections of the moments surrounding Dilla's tragic passing by those closest to him. Dilla Time pairs this with chapters outlining the evolution of African American music, digital music technology, and scholarly analyses of Dilla's programming technique. Put together, Dilla Time's hybrid biography/musicology leaves readers with a true understanding of the depth of J Dilla's talent and innovation -- so much that it makes you wonder why all music biographies are not written and structured like this.
  
  Note: This review was written based on an uncorrected proof received in advance by MCD/Macmillan Publishers.
• 
  Jak Krumholtz

  If you’re a musician/drummer you have to read Dilla Time. I’ve never played an instrument. (I’m worried music will lose its magic.) I glossed over excellent technical explanations because of that.
  
  I appreciate the book not shying away from his negative traits. The book covers more estate drama than I cared for. (Sadly that’s legacy too.) It covers Okayplayer a bit which I’m sure is how I learned about Dilla. (Charter Member!)
  
  Also Charnas’s prior book, The Big Payback, was just fantastic.
  
  {sidenote: It kinda blew my mind that one of the first tracks Dilla produced was on Poe’s first album. In ’96 she crowd surfed over me in a Dayton parking lot and her brother wrote a favorite book, House of Leaves.}
• 
  MÉYO

  This fantastic audiobook did an amazing job paying tribute to the best and most influential Hip-Hop producer of all time! Just like 9/11, listening to J Dilla’s Slum Village debut for the first time was an overwhelming experience for me and many other aspiring Hip-Hop producers who instantly realized there was a literal god amongst us, and to continue tapping away on the AKAI MPC was pointless!
  
  I was just enamored with J Dilla’s production skills and I was not at all familiar with this personal life/drama and so I was blown away at the depth and research the author utilized to paint a vivid portrait of J Dilla’s upbringing, influences and industry maneuvers before he achieved worldwide fame. While inside an HMV looking for another J Dilla joint, it was only when I saw RIP written on J Dilla’s label card that I learned he had died! Again, this audiobook does a great job describing the horrible disease J Dilla hid from the public as he banged out hits while bed ridden.
  
  BOY do I feel like a moron having just learned the truth about J Dilla’s posthumous cameo in the “One Won’t Do” music video! 😂
  
  The craziest part about J Dilla’s production genius is that his style influenced musical theorist to write research papers that analyzed his “multi-swing” style and to quantify why it has such a positive appeal. The audiobook does a great job giving audio examples of music theory, drumming and timing patterns that can’t conveyed through text. The book was a solid five stars, but after J Dilla died, the book starts to drag on and on describing all the family infighting, money drama, the near implosion of his legacy and plus, I didn’t care for the Hiatus Kaiyote promotional plug.
• 
  Andrew Patterson

  Came back to edit this intro - turns out it wasn't as hard as I thought it would be to summarize how much I enjoyed this book and the impact it had on me.
  
  Dan Charnas has taken the time to painstakingly lay out the impact and influence that J Dilla had on the world - before, during, and after his life. In doing so, he wove connecting threads through my own relationship with not just Dilla's music, but the music of countless others, the history of how that music came to be, and perhaps most surprisingly my own art and perspectives on culture. This book threads together artists and movements I hadn't realized were connected in myriad ways, and made my record shelves make sense in an obvious way I hadn't deeply (or technically) understood. Tracing the steps through a discography of known Dilla works, works he contributed to, and works that are built from his foundation was a joy. I felt little fireworks of a strange sort of validation or sense of community every time I turned a page and a new beloved track or artist made their appearance and fell into place.
  
  It was then equally as difficult to read about the darker side of Dilla's life, the strife and battle over his legacy, and of course his illness and death. However, I didn't find any of this diminished his contributions or how I feel about them or his art - if anything it ignited in me a sense of urgency to create, reminded me to give out flowers while people can smell them, and to value the time we have with each other and the beautiful things we make.
  
  The pages are now well-marked, and I imagine this book will be one I return to frequently. I can't recommend it enough!
• 
  Stephen

  Prior to reading this, I had only a vague knowledge of J Dilla’s work (I don’t usually pay much attention to production), so I was delighted to realize how much of Dilla’s work I was already familiar with and enjoyed hearing stories about how it came to be, through his perspective. Hearing about his process, how he manipulated sounds and samples to achieve his signature sounds, was very engaging. The book does a great job of breaking down the technical steps and music theory happening in a way that’s easy to follow along.
  
  It is fairly magnanimous, not whitewashing his flaws or elevating any one person’s recollections and perspectives as ultimate truth. I also really appreciated that multiple chapters are devoted, on the front end, to explaining the musical and cultural context of Detroit music leading up to Dilla’s life and, on the back end, to exploring how his legacy has carried on after his passing.
• 
  Dee

  An engaging enough read with lots of previously unknown detail about Dilla’s persona, habits and the drama surrounding his relationships with friends, women, family and the music business. This is where I gleaned the most value.
  
  The book has a good amount of what I deem to be filler. Surely listening to Dilla’s work is all you need as demonstration of his methods. Attempting to analyse and theorise the time-signatures and swing percentages of beats he made in like 10 minutes is a little pretentious and quite unnecessary. It’s simply not that deep.
  
  The man himself would tell you it was just a ‘feel’. Even his brother (illa J) explained the programming merely mimicked a swag or disjointedness in the way they physically moved. Rza also explained the same thing to me regarding his own production.
• 
  Danielle Kim

  super interesting and very dense. kind of difficult for me because i really have so little knowledge of hip hop / soul / jazz genres. will never hear a beat the same way again, probably. also explained a lot of things that i had intuited or experienced, while listening or dancing to music. kind of wild!
  
  plus: made me think a lot about what it means to be an artist, and the tension between self recognition, private/community recognition, and public/mass recognition. often i’ve thought of art as conversation; this book really emphasizes art as lineage… those who came before j dilla all the way through to those who came after. lol v biblical…?