Sid Roams Break Down Prodigy’s Product Of The ’80s

Sid Roams = Joey Chavez (left) and Tavish “Bravo” Graham.

We got so used to hearing Prodigy over Alchemist beats in recent years that we were a little surprised to see Sid Roams get more work than Al on P’s last album. Sid who? We hadn’t even heard of the name when we wrote our H.N.I.C. Pt. 2 review. But after hearing non-stop Sid Roams heatrocks on P’s new album, Product of the 80’s, we knew we had to get familiar.

Sid Roams is actually two people: veteran L.A. producers Joey Chavez and Tavish “Bravo” Graham. The duo found instant chemistry with Prodigy, which led to their collaborative album with P, Un Pacino and Twin Gambino. “We had seen what Alchemist and P had done with Return of The Mac’s blaxploitation theme and appreciated the way the album was sonically cohesive,” says Chavez. “We pushed for the 80's theme and did our best to execute that aesthetic'heavy-laden with synthesizers and drum machines'throughout the process.” The result is an end-to-end banger, which Sid Roams was eager to dissect with us.

Read on for Sid Roams’ track-by-track analysis of Product of the 80’s…

Story and interview by Jaeki Cho

WADDUP G'Z

JOEY: P recorded the hook first and immediately Bravo and I were hyped because it felt like a real anthem. Not too deep…real catchy…just smackin 'em in the head…like “Waddup Gz!” P is good for keeping up on those slang phrases. Then, once he started to lay down the verses, we bugged cuz of how he was playing with his schemes. “It ain't nothing…ain't nothing but this murder rap.”
BRAVO: Yeah, the beat was hard to begin with, but P really brought it to life with the old school studda-step. He grabbed a phrase that had been floating around in the click (”Waddup Gz”) and made the anthem for greeting the posse on the block.

SHED THEY BLOOD feat. Un Pacino (prod. by Jake One)

JOEY: Jake One is the homie. Since we started this label thing a few years ago, he's been sending us beats. And dude is prolific. He has probably sent 120 beats over time, which was always exciting to sit and listen to, cuz you know you gonna hear some well thought-out music. Bravo and I would go through the beats together to decide which ones felt right for the aesthetic we wanted to achieve with the record. We always play the A&R role of narrowing down the list before playing beats for the artists. It's no disrespect to producers out there; it's just that we're responsible for creating the sound of the record and we had a very specific criteria.
BRAVO: We picked that beat together with P when we first started going through outside-producer beats. But each time he came through, something else would get done instead. It took Un recording a verse and chorus to it for P to come through and complete the track. We switched P's verse to the top cuz he came in so aggressive on it.

BOXCUTTERS feat. Big Twins

JOEY: We're always inspired by unearthly, spooky melodies, and this beat came about after watching a zombie flick. It feels like you can hear them screaming in there. At first, the beat felt kinda stiff. We had to work real hard to give it more movement. Twin put it down first and then the song laid around for a few weeks….for some reason we had to push this one on P a little bit. But it turned out to be my favorite verse on the record.
BRAVO: Yea, we did the first verse with Twin and finally P added his part. Me and Joey came up with the chorus idea after the verses were down. P's bridge at the end was the chorus at first but we felt like we could flip something different and it turned out pretty dope. I like that joint too.