April 28, 2026
Latin Energy, Locked In for Cinco de Mayo
Whether you’re opening, headlining, or bouncing between genres, these Latin playlists give you room to move. DJcity has you ready for Cinco de Mayo with pl...
Sunday, November 25, 2018
Watch: Timbaland on Getting His Start as a DJ and Collaborating With Superstars
Legendary producer Timbaland recently stopped by the Drink Champs podcast for an interview.
The Grammy award-winner has worked with superstars like Beyonce, Jay Z, and Justin Timberlake, among others. During the interview, Timbaland talked about getting his start as a DJ, the collaborations that defined his career, and more.
On how he got his start in music:
“I was beatboxing… [but] my main passion back then was DJing. And how I got into making beats is… let me try to make a beat so I can blend my records too… so I just took what I had, and I was passionate about sounds. I love noises.”
On first finding success in the industry:
“We weren’t thinking like, you know, ‘this is a hit,’ we’re thinking ‘we’re getting recognized… our passion is getting looked at, it’s not taken for granted…’ because we put in a lot of work, and our work was accepted.”
On working with Dr. Dre, and his influence on hip-hop’s sound:
“Dr. Dre. was the God of rap… he made rap sound clean, he made it sound so clean… I wanted to know like ‘yo how do you mix that drum, how do you get them drums to sound like [that]?’”
Watch the interview above.
Related: Watch: Marley Marl Talks Producing Electronic Music, Current State of Hip-Hop
