Few artists have left fingerprints on as many eras of Hip Hop as Erick Sermon. As one half of EPMD, he helped craft a blueprint for funky, unshakable Rap music that balanced street wisdom with innovation. As a producer, he supplied the foundation for Redman, Keith Murray, K-Solo, and countless others, developing a sound so distinct that fans could recognize it within the first two seconds: thick bass, swinging drums, and a groove that moved the floor.
Yet Sermon’s genius isn’t just historical, it’s ongoing. His peers revere him, new generations study him, and his influence continues to seep into contemporary production. Erick Sermon stands as a reminder that true innovators don’t fade; they evolve.
The Hip Hop Museum caught up with Erick Sermon to talk about his latest project, working with Shaquille O’Neal, his lost records with Dr. Dre and Kanye West, the power of EPMD, and more.
Adam Aziz: It’s been a while since we’ve seen a new project from you. How did the Dynamic Duos project come to be?
Erick Sermon: This has been an idea of mine for a minute, going back to 2018. Before Nas and Mass Appeal were getting iconic rappers to create new music, I had this idea. But then COVID came, and 300 Entertainment got bought out. Time went by, and now it’s finally coming. Like how you’re building the Museum and wanting to see Hip Hop preserved, that’s what I’m doing as well.
I wanted to know why my colleagues weren’t making any music, so I made music for them. That’s where the idea came from.
AA: When thinking of artists like you, LL Cool J, Redman, and others who have been around for almost all eras of Hip Hop, why do you think you and those other artists have been able to remain relevant while others haven’t?
ES: I know for me, I love Hip Hop. I don’t have to worry about going to get a beat or finding a studio. For me, it’s nothing to do this whenever I feel like it. Nobody said no when it came to getting involved with this project. I’ve never produced Cypress Hill, so I’m gonna do Cypress Hill. If I say I’m doing a Snoop and Nate Dogg record, I’m gonna do it. I’m going to do a Mobb Deep record my way. I’m going to do an M.O.P. record my way.
AA: Is it true there is an unreleased track with you and Biggie from the mid-’90s?
ES: No. I do know Biggie wanted to be on my No Pressure album. We did a video for the song “Hittin’ Switches,” and Puffy and Hype Williams did the video, and Biggie was there. Everywhere I went, he followed me. He told his girl, Tracey Waples, get me on the Erick Sermon album.
In one of his last articles in Rap Pages, they asked what artists he was checking for and he said me. I remember one time I was in the studio, working on Mary J. Blige, and Biggie was upstairs working on Life After Death. He saw me and said, “Yo, Erick, on my new album I’m doing a lot of singing like you’re doing.” He was definitely a fan. One of Puffy’s favorite groups was EPMD. They played us up in Bad Boy all the time.
AA: You worked on Shaquille O’Neal’s debut Rap album. What do you remember about first being approached to work on the project?
ES: I’m not gonna lie, I just saw dollar signs. I thought, okay, it’s Shaq, it’s Jive Records, I thought I was going to get some big dumb money because DJ Premier had turned it down. A lot of people said no. Nobody was taking that shot, but again, he was from Newark, New Jersey. He was a big fan of Redman’s. So I couldn’t say no. He let me write all the records I did for him.
Next thing you know, “I’m Outstanding” went platinum and then the album sold a million records.
AA: Were you surprised by Shaq’s MC abilities?
ES: When I heard “What’s Up Doc?” by the Fu-Schnickens, he killed that record! I knew he could rhyme on beat. That’s the main thing about an artist. Can they rhyme on beat in the pocket? Once I heard it, I said, “Okay, this is going to be something,” because he knew how to rhyme. You see how he is now, Shaq will pick anything up.
He was a big fan of Hip Hop, and he came to me because of Redman, who he was a big fan of.
AA: Is there a record that you’ve produced that you feel like deserves more shine?
ES: I’m always gonna be that underrated person when you talk about underrated producers.
When it comes to the work I’ve done, there aren’t that many of us. So if you know, you know — and if you don’t, you don’t. But again, when it comes down to making records, there are only a few like me. And I like pretty much everything I’ve done. To answer your question: I think everything did get its love. The ones that blew up? Yeah, they got the love they were supposed to. There wasn’t anything I made that people “slept on.” Everything I did did what it was supposed to do.
AA: You feel like you’re an underrated producer?
ES: Yes. I think that because, you know what’s surprising? If you go on Instagram and look at every producer list, I’m in it. It’s very rare that I’m not on those lists when they’re released. But sometimes you look at some of them and you’re like, “Oh, for real?” And I gotta mention one name: Jermaine Dupri. Jermaine has the same thing I have, where people call him underrated, too. Meanwhile, you’re like, “How can you say that?” So people feel that way about me, too. But my colleagues — like Pharrell and them — they all bow down. And I’m like, “Yo, don’t do that.” And they’re like, “Nah, man. You are who you are. Trust me. We’re doing this because we have to.”
And people will say to me, Erick, when it comes to production, we look to Dr. Dre, but Dre played your shit live. If I sampled it, he played it, and it was bigger. But there are a lot of people who have told me Dre is one of my biggest fans.
When I worked with Dre in 2022, we made six records together. Nothing’s ever coming out. When I was there, Dre told my boy, “make sure Erick doesn’t leave.” That was one of the best sessions. I’ve never been produced by anybody before. And the way Dre produced me, I’ve never experienced anything like that. Me and him made the dopest record with me and him rhyming.
And then in May 2023, I was with Kanye West for eight months. It wasn’t Vultures when I was there. Kanye and I were doing something else. He was rhyming. We were making other types of beats. And I had to bury my mother because my mother had passed on May 30th, and Kanye helped me with that because he told me about his mom dying and what he did.
When I went back into the studio with him, I flew to Italy, where they were, and when I got there, it was him and Ty Dolla Sign. Then Vultures came. What him and I were working on was classic Kanye. He had some beats that he was playing, oh my God. He would take what I had and revamp it, and I would be like Oh shit, I didn’t think of doing it that way.
AA: Who are some newer MCs that Erick Sermon is digging today?
ES: I just heard something new with G Herbo that was fantastic. My son had put me on to Juice World, XXXTENTACION. I had no idea those dudes were MCs. They was real rappers. Tee Grizzley. Those with the ability to tell a story. I like Russ. There are a bunch of people out there doing their thing. Larry June. Freddie Gibbs. Benny The Butcher. Conway.
The Clipse came out, shifted the whole game, and opened ears for everybody to hear the new Raekwons. The new Ghostface. The new Big L. The new Mobb Deep. If it weren’t for The Clipse, people wouldn’t be seeing things like this.
AA: Shifting things around a bit, I love the Back in Business album. How difficult was it to find your sound for that album when Hip Hop had changed since EPMD released their previous album, Business Never Personal, in 1992?
ES: It was a five-year spread, but I didn’t look at the shift. My mentality wasn’t around what other people were doing. I know DMX was doing his thing, and you had the coming of Master P and them from that side, but Def Jam is Def Jam, and EPMD is EPMD. I was just looking at us coming back, and when you got something like “Da Joint” and other records like “KIM”, “Richter Scale”, the comeback was a dope comeback with records that were able to compete with whatever was new in ’97.
AA: What’s the oddest place you’ve ever found a sample?
ES: “KIM” came from the public domain, where it came from a record from the ’40s or whatever. The same thing with “Symphony 2000.” That song is huge overseas because I sampled a random record from Italy, and whenever it comes on, people go crazy.
AA: How do you feel about Hip Hop today?
Right now, I’m looking at it like, why are so many people repeating each other? You know what our era was like. It was fantastic. You’d have 25 groups, and none of them sounded like each other, and they all won. But now, everything sounds the same. But there is a shift happening where the veterans and the icons are making so much noise that the young rappers are losing ground. Look at Spotify. Things aren’t selling. Of course, the shows are packed because people want to see them, but where are the classic records?
AA: Why do you think it’s important that Hip Hop has its own physical Museum space?
ES: Everybody else has their own space. But also, people have questions, especially young people. You can tell them about things, but their attention span is short. Records now have two verses because they can’t handle three. But when The Museum opens, they can look at something and get more information that way.
The Museum is important for that reason. It’s an educational space.
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