Photo by Zac Schuss
Mike WiLL Made-It released his latest studio album R3SET in March, nine years after his last record, Ransom 2. Today, the super-producer shares the music video for the project’s blingy, fan-favorite track “Russian Roulett3” featuring Young Thug. In the Sin Spirits-directed video, Thug and Mike transform some everyday Atlanta sights into surreal set pieces: a giant diamond ring (that Thug hangs off of), club girls on an editorial photo set, and massive sneakers that move like cars.
“Russian Roulett3” is the latest in a long line of collaborations between Thug and the producer, and its immediate hookiness highlights their effortless chemistry by now. Per Young Thug via email to The FADER, “Mike is the architect. He knows what makes a good record. It’s always easy working with other artists who get it, especially from Atlanta. We've been making hits for years, that's my brother.”
Over his decades long career, Mike WiLL Made-It most devoted creative relationship has been to Atlanta, having fostered the careers of dozens of rappers across generations, many of whom return the favor on R3SET — 21 Savage, Sahbabii, Swae Lee, and more. Watch the music video for “Russian Roulett3” below. Read our check-in with the producer as he reflects on how Atlanta reshaped rap and whether the art of hip-hop is dead.
The FADER: Tell me about working with Young Thug on "Russian Roulette." How did this song come together in the studio?
MIKE WILL MADE-IT: Organically to be honest. It was a song I produced with my Ear Drummer brother Pluss. It just felt fun and bright groovy, Pluss is the cheat code for that. I knew Thug was the man for that track. It was dope watching him work on it because it was so effortless but still yet complex. He went three 16s and a catchy hook, felt real hip-hopish… Feels new and nostalgic at the same time. It’s not a song you feel like, "Man he rapping too much,” because he’s story telling and flipping his flows every four bars which I found dope.
What made you decide to release R3SET, nearly a decade after your last full-length album?
Timing was really everything, I couldn’t have planned this. I just know what right feels and sounds right. I never understood why artists would take certain time off from releasing music, until now… I feel like I finally created the project I wanted to come out with next after RANSOM II.
The album feels like a showcase of how important Atlanta has been in shaping the sound of hip-hop for the last decade. How would you describe Atlanta's importance in our understanding of hip-hop and rap today?
It’s literally “the sound.” And the new mecca. I like to call it the soil. This is where you plant a new seed, water it, give it light and watch it grow.
It’s humbling to watch. ATL is at the forefront when it comes to Hip-Hop production and sound I’d say. To see the type of production company we have built at Ear Drummers alongside our peers we grew up with on the ATL music scene who are out here also killing, it is a great thing to see. I told the producers around my age and younger who I was coming up around, like Sonny Digital, 808 mafia, all Ear Drummers when we were teenagers like, “One day the world is going to want our sound and we won’t have to try and find how we gonna get heard, they going want to hear us we will be the popular sound.” And thinking about us entering into this industry and seeing the reactions from people who were not used to our sound not knowing whether to love it, hate it, like it, or be unsure all the way to now the world actually is loving our sound and emulating it and actually evolving it to new things is dope to watch.
So many careers have been built off of it and so much more to come. I think we have become essential, and it’s also cool to watch people like the ones I collaborated with on R3SET evolve like Thug, 21, Luda, T.I., Killa Mike, Sah Babii, and more, showing that ATL has bars, plus style and lingo.
Last year, Billboard reported that it was the first time in 35 years that no rap songs were on the Hot 100. What's your take on hip-hop's chart decline?
Changing of the guards right now. I think hip-hop thrives during a time where people are working together and not against each other, that’s what creates moments and momentum for growth. When the ego, the gossip, the division, the overthinking gets in the mix it slows the motion. I also feel like it’s time for all hip-hop artists to lock in with an open mind and work with real producers and base the album or project they are working on to be an experience, a feeling and the best of its kind.
I think there’s a lot of artists that are trying to keep up with the internet, whether it’s comments or other artists or views or likes, or even numbers. People used to want to be the shit locally first, now people think they are supposed to be the biggest in the world out the gate, they act according to that which takes the air out of tire… we gotta stay on making the cool and doing the cool and letting that spread all while staying hungry and humble while doing the work.
How have your listening habits evolved over the years? What sounds, scenes, or artists are exciting you as a producer?
I just like a TRUE ARTIST. One that likes to be challenged, that’s making cool and challenging songs. I like to learn about other artists in different parts of the world and see how we can create a new unexpected sound by bringing their style to the production I’m bringing. If it’s rap, and it’s here from home I like to be able to feel something, I want to hear new bars, new lingo, new ways of saying shit, new flows, motivational or money making type music.
I don’t really get into all that downplaying the next person type shit if that makes sense. Other than that I keep an open ear and mind like when I did the records with BTS, I just really was looking at that as something fresh, or the eight songs with Jennie on her last album. I am currently working on a project with Sid Sriram that is sounding next level and I'm very excited about that along with many more. I’m constantly trying to find ways to evolve the sound but stay rooted as well where I’m not chasing any sound, I’m creating something new with what I have been bringing mixed with another world / scene. I find that always being the recipe to something cool.
