Mark Batson is credited on hundreds of the most successful music tracks of the last 20 years. He keeps thousands of them unreleased in his archive and today is a rare opportunity to hear about his experience of working with Eminem, 50 Cent and Dr. Dre.
Mark’s latest encounter with Marshall was earlier this year when they worked on Eminem’s most recent album “Music To Be Murdered By” – a long way since 2004 when Mark Batson co-wrote iconic “Ass Like That” for “Encore” that he produced side by side with Dr. Dre. Mark worked with the brightest stars during the golden era of Aftermath. What can he share about that time?
It was amazing, and one of the best musical experiences of my life. Working with the top people had a lot of benefits, and they were all really fun to work with. 50 Cent is absolutely hilarious. He used to come to the studio and have the whole room on the floor laughing until our stomachs were hurting. There would literally be tears pouring down my face listening to his stories… and Dre is the best band and team leader I’ve ever worked with. His work ethic is ridiculous and we made a lot of incredible music. He rarely releases songs and I probably have a thousand to 1500 tracks that are in his vault. He plays the music loud with the best sound system in the country, and a lot of people couldn’t take the intensity of the volume beating in your chest, but I grew up with Hip-Hop and going to jams, block parties and clubs so I loved it. Creating with him was like going to the best club in the city, making the music, and then having drinks and rocking out to it.
Mark has a wide musical range and a classic training that helps him work with the most modern of music trends, explains he in the interview with HipHop-N-More
I knew that different styles could be appreciated if presented in the right context. I bring that sensibility and respect to every art form, and consider Eminem in some ways to be parallel to Yo-Yo Ma in talent. I have collaborated with both of them and both are supremely dedicated to the highest level of performance and emotion. If you study your craft, you become flexible and confident. It makes fulfilling a variety of roles that much easier.
Of course, there is a question that intrigues an interviewer as much as millions of hip hop heads. What about “Detox”, that famous album that Dr. Dre allegedly scrapped. There are rumours that it was almost ready when the project was buried. Mark, who worked on “Detox” alongside Dr. Dre can confirm that there were plenty of songs ready. But with Dr. Dre it does not mean much. He has his own, sky-high standards:
At the end of the day, I recorded over 200 tracks at least for Detox. I pitched him a variety of tracks and he even selected a few to create songs to. At some point, he realized he didn’t like the direction he was going in, and decided not to release it. When we were in a session on Game’s album (The Documentary), he was reinvigorated to make Detox when we made the song ‘Higher‘. He even says “look out for Detox” at the end of the song. […] Dre would cut what I would think were whole albums for Detox, listen to them for six months and then describe it with that word: “Ehhh.”
People on the team would want him to put the music out, because they thought it was not fresh for him but would still be brand new to everybody else, but his level of all-time perfection would kick in, and then the spirit of creativity, and then he would be on to something else. Dre loves the process of creating. He can be satisfied sometimes with making the art, revelling in it on a personal level, and then moving on to something else.
Read the interview in full on HipHop-N-More.
