The career of producer, DJ, and label head Peanut Butter Wolf has been dominated by three auspicious partnerships. Two ended prematurely and tragically; the third continues to turn out remarkable work. Wolf first attracted attention as the producer for rapper Charizma. The duo signed to Hollywood Records and recorded a remarkable debut (Big Shots), but they parted ways with the Disney subsidiary over creative differences, and Charizma was killed in 1993. Wolf subsequently formed the Stones Throw label, partly to release the music he and Charizma recorded.
Stones Throw rose to prominence largely through Wolf's relationship with adventurous rapper, producer, and multi-instrumentalist Madlib. Stones Throw released such Madlib-produced and Wolf executive-produced standouts as Lootpack's Soundpieces: Da Antidote!, Quasimoto's The Unseen and The Further Adventures Of Lord Quas, Madvillain's Madvillainy, and Jaylib's Champion Sound. That last album brought Detroit cult hero Jay Dee into the Stones Throw family, a pairing that later resulted in his well-received instrumental opus Donuts. Like Charizma, Jay Dee died young, but Stones Throw will help keep his memory alive by re-releasing his acclaimed but little-heard solo EP Ruff Draft in March. The A.V. Club recently spoke to Wolf about Charizma, Madlib, Jay Dee, recording in a genuine bomb shelter, and Stones Throw's ongoing collaboration with Adult Swim.
The A.V. Club: How did you get the name Peanut Butter Wolf?
Peanut Butter Wolf: I've got to ask my spiritual advisor about that one. [Pause.] My spiritual advisor says I can't answer that question.
AVC: You can't answer that question?
PBW: No, there's a lawsuit pending on it.
AVC: What's the first hip-hop album that made a real impact on you?
PBW: There was never an album that I was really excited about. There was always just a few tracks. The early, early stuff. It was always about the single. Kurtis Blow, or Sugarhill Gang, or Grandmaster Flash, or any of those.
AVC: Did you gravitate more toward East Coast stuff as opposed to West Coast?
PBW: Well, when I started listening to it, that's all that was out.
AVC: How did you meet Charizma?
PBW: He was somebody I met when I was producing for all different people in my hometown of San Jose. Well, two things: I was the one that had the equipment, and I was the one who was making the beats. So everyone came to my house, and I would make tracks for them. And Charizma was someone who found out about me because I put out this record, this group called Lyrical Prophecy in 1990. Someone just brought him over to my house, a guy that I went to high school with. Charizma was like 16 at the time; I was like 20. We just became a group. At first, I was just producing for him and everybody else, and I'd have to schedule my time accordingly. He would get kind of frustrated, but he was like, "Aww, I know one day you're going to drop everybody else and just work with me." Which is what ended up happening.
AVC: Did you have instant chemistry with him?
PBW: No, I wouldn't say it was instant. He was really kind of reserved, and I was too. It took us both a little time to get out of our shells. It was kind of the same thing with Madlib. When I met Madlib, it reminded me of Charizma in a lot of ways. And our relationship is similar in a lot of ways, too. When Charizma passed away, I promised myself I would never be in a group again, and I really haven't. But I guess Madlib would be the closest thing to my relationship with Charizma.
AVC: You and Charizma were signed to the infamous Hollywood Records. Do you have any horror stories from your time on Hollywood?
PBW: Little stuff here and there. Our biggest horror story is that they wouldn't return our calls. We were just frustrated. They held up our studio time. They wanted us to go into a bigger studio that was a lot more expensive. We really liked the way our stuff sounded when it was in a $15-an-hour studio, and we didn't really see the point in doing that, especially when the recording budget gets recouped against the artist anyway, you know?
AVC: So you'd end up paying for it in the long and the short run.
PBW: And it wasn't so much that, it was just more that they never let us go in the studio. They just kept saying, "Oh, we've got to get approval from that person and this person." We got shelved. It was frustrating, because we couldn't even be creative anymore, because most of our stuff was done in the studio, and we spent all our time sitting around waiting. There was only so much we could do in preproduction. Now, everybody has home studios.
AVC: Is it true that you kind of gave up on music after Charizma died?
PBW: Yeah. For six months or something.
AVC: What did you do during that time?
PBW: I didn't do anything. I was just in shock. I just sat around and felt sorry for myself.
AVC: How did Stones Throw begin?
PBW: Stones Throw started because I was doing this stuff for all these other labels, and I was always frustrated with the end result. I felt like I had done enough stuff in the music industry—writing for magazines, DJing on the radio, working at record stores, working at a record distributor, being a recording artist. I felt like I knew a little bit about everything. One day I just said, "Well, I might as well just start putting records out."
AVC: Did you plan on releasing Big Shots as one of Stones Throw's first releases?
PBW: I kind of went back and forth with that, yeah. For one thing, I felt like my label wasn't set up yet. I didn't want to put it out until I was really up and running. I felt like it deserved the biggest push it could get. And then when I started feeling confident about the label, I felt like it was too dated-sounding, so I wanted to wait even longer and put it out as kind of a retro thing. Because I did realize that everything kind of goes in cycles with what people listen to. Just like fashion. It's just like 10 or 20 years later, people want to hear it again and dress that way again.
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