Cropping Up: CARRTOONS

CROPPING UP is an interview series designed to introduce CABBAGES readers to talented hip-hop artists on the rise.

For this edition, I caught up with CARRTOONS. A Brooklyn-based producer, bassist, and songwriter, he's worked with everyone from Little Brother to Freddie Gibbs to Lexa Gates, earning co-signs along the way from both DJ Jazzy Jeff and Pete Rock. His latest album, Space Cadet, dropped in late September with features from Erick The Architect, Rae Khalil, and Wiki.

Are there any particular hip-hop albums/artists that really resonated with you, in your youth or otherwise, that you feel have had a particular impact on you as an artist? 

CARRTOONS: When I was in maybe fifth, sixth grade, I was lucky to have an older brother and sister. I was playing a lot of rock music at the time and I thought hip-hop might not be real music, the classic phase that a music snob would have. My brother made me a mix CD that I listened to on the way to school that had The Roots, from the live record [1999's The Roots Come Alive] they had put out. That was the first track on it, just a blatant, this is definitely people playing music. It had The Pharcyde, a lot of classic hip-hop that later became staples of my life. And my sister would always work out to A Tribe Called Quest on loop. She bought the D'Angelo record [2000's Voodoo] and I was like, what the hell is going on with this guy? He is naked. So it didn't all hit me right away, but it snuck into my life.

Then me and my friends were more underground hip-hop. Madlib was really our thing, [and] MF DOOM. Those were really the two heroes for me, one West Coast guy and one East Coast guy. It turned out those were the two guys that I really just connected to. I found a bunch of other more "normal" music, so to speak, through that later on in life. As I got into college, Dilla became the staple. Then we decided to try to actually play it a little bit. I didn't really have a plan on producing that type of music or playing it. And then, just because I was studying jazz, these two worlds merged really easily. It just became kind of a natural fit and I started doing a lot of that stuff that even realizing, to be honest.

With A Tribe Called Quest, those records took the upright bass as literally the low end theory. It took me a while to realize that that the conceptual part of the record and what they were doing at that time. Anybody that knows that knows Q-Tip loves bass and plays. Josh David, who had played on some of his records, and Derrick Hodge, are two of the greatest bass players around, definitely two of the most underrated. So as time goes on, you figure out as you get closer to the source. I was lucky to have met both of those guys and watch them play. I try to take a small piece of that and try to put it into whatever I'm doing. 

In 2022, you put out Homegrown, which put you on listeners' radars, so to speak. What do you feel you learned from that album's experience and how it connects with Space Cadet?

Well, I certainly didn't expect the record to do as well as it did. I've been blown away that it's really lived on and carried on. People seem to still be discovering it; it seems to still be getting discovered at a lot of dinner tables across America, which is a beautiful thing. I had made "Groceries", and when my wife came home, I said, I think I just made a wedding song.

To me, it's still like a beat tape, kind of rough around the edges. I think that's what people kind of like about it. I've been trying to not be too precious about little mixing things and stuff like that sometimes because the ideas are king. The ideas from that really spoke for themselves–kind of weird, a little bit left-of-center. With the new record, I've been trying to get back to that a little bit more and also lean into the things that we're working then.

A big difference [with Space Cadet] is that I could get together with people again and we could do a combination of some of the stuff that I learned during COVID and also the best part of collaboration, being in the room with you.

When it comes specifically to features on the new album, you've got some CABBAGES faves in here, namely Erick The Architect ("Walls Up") and Wiki ("Cascade"). Could tell me a bit about how those two artists in particular were recruited for Space Cadet and how that communication went? Did you give them direction or suggestions?

I met Erick first just through the internet; he had reached out on Instagram, just sent a nice message, planted a seed. We've sent stuff back and forth for years now. None of it amounted to anything, but I definitely sent him a message more like, I have a track for you this time. I actually have a real thing for you. Sent him two or three ideas, said lemme know which one you're feeling. He was really responsive. I believe I had already posted this on some of my socials, a list of themes written in my door, being a space cadet and love and jealousy being the main ones. There was a couple of others: New York music is back, just fun things I was thinking about. It's not even necessarily things he'd have to write about, just prompts that tell you what headspace I'm coming from and what the record means to me.

With Wiki, my producer Josh Pleeter had a relationship with Tony Seltzer. We've worked with Tony a good amount, great guy. So Wiki just felt like the right person for this song. I really love his stuff with Alchemist. He was the first person that came to mind. It took a little bit of persistence and patience, but we got in the room and, as soon as we did, we hit it off and honestly just talked about a lot of the themes. He wrote that on the spot. We just smoked a ton of weed, recorded it right there. I did some background vocals and then Rae [Khalil] ended up hearing that and insisting that she add a little at the end. She was the last piece of the puzzle on this project. She was super busy finishing up own record, which I was also helping out with. I sent her a message being like, Rae, listen, it's not a record of mine without you on it. I desperately need you to come in here in the last minute and tie this thing together for me if you have any time. And like the MVP that she is, she came in. I feel like she completed the project in a really nice way.

Beyond your own projects, I suspect a lot of people have heard you from your work on Lexa Gates' Elite Vessel. You produced two standout tracks on that, "Lately, Nothing" and "What You Wish For." What do you get out of contributing to or participating in other artists' releases?

I love producing for other people. To me, that's what a producer does; they serve the artists that they're working with. I only made up the name CARRTOONS so I could produce other people. I had no intention of ever releasing music as CARRTOONS, for sure. My focus is still going to be for producing other artists, especially right now. I'm feeling the itch to work with some people that I feel like I'm more prepared to work with than I was a few years ago. I'm kind of glad that I've had this time to soak in a lot of the stuff that I was learning, particularly during COVID when I was working really hard and working every day, treating it a little more like school.

Working with Alexa was a real happy accident, to be honest. My friend Joshua, who I've mentioned, kind of discovered her in a way, with a bunch of other people around at that time on the internet. We were sending this stuff and, honestly, that first one got sent back to me as a pretty completed project. I was like, wow, that sounds incredible. We went in person for the second session and the first line she sang was about taking a shit. I thought that was pretty funny. So I was like, this girl was pretty wild. We had a lot of fun with it. I was just thrilled to see the world fall in love with her the way that we had when we found the music. So you never really know what's going to work. 

Zelooperz, Dali Aint Dead

(buy it / stream it)

Given all the excitement surrounding Tyler, The Creator's DON'T TAP THE GLASS, with its inherent reclamation of dance music as a Black art form, the arrival of Zelooperz's second album of 2025 should be celebrated accordingly. As if his trippy Real Bad Man collab Dear Psilocybin wasn't already a must-hear, the Detroiter's truly thrilling Dali Aint Dead seizes not only on his hometown's technoid legacy but that of the wider American hip-hop scene's contributions to club culture. From the hardscrabble retro boogie of "Bebe Kids" and the soulful bounce of "Broke Ass Hoes" to the psychotropic Lugerian trap of "Shrooms" and the rave-addled crunk of "Lebanon James," the Bruiser Brigade combatant's latest team-up with go-to producer Dilip compels the body forward and back, side to side, and so forth. The smirking surrealist influence of the project's historic namesake melts over the rapper's lyricism, with winks and witticism baked into practically every other bar. Album highlight "Mona Lisa Left Eye" kicks off with a nod to Ron Browz's "Arab Money" beat before referencing Allen Iverson, Baywatch, G-Unit, and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. Later, on the disorienting "Hypnagogia," he drops rapid-fire doozies like walk in this bitch like Handsome Boy and pockets on Carl Winslow one after the other.

The Expert, Vivid Visions

(buy it / stream it)

It can be tough for European hip-hop producers to draw attention and earn respect in a scene dominated by beatmakers in the United States and Canada. Nonetheless, over the past few years, Dublin's The Expert has been making noteworthy moves stateside with indie rappers NAHreally and Stik Figa on full-length collabs. (Even more impressive is that he's done so via the Amsterdam-based Rucksack Records.) With the release of the showcase-styled Vivid Visions, he reveals how far his intercontinental reach extends, bringing several of the contemporary North American underground's most esteemed emcees into his retro/modern interpretation of psychedelia. With a sensibility informed by both The Avalanches and The Monkees, he crafts a whimsical, majestic, often magical series of rhythmic soundscapes, resulting in rather groovy moments for the likes of AJ Suede, Milc, and ShrapKnel. Duncecap doles out quirky confessions on the circus acid of "Mind Of A Maniac," while elusive Canuck Buck 65 resurfaces for the far-out n' funky "What It Looks Like." Though the aforementioned NAH and Stik both reprise their collaborative roles, on "40 Winks" and the Blu-infused "Dreams," Chicago's own Defcee actually boasts the most features here, with the penultimate "In The Style Of Bigg Jus" standing out in particular.

Three new tracks to snack on...

Jim Legxacy, "i just banged a snus in canada water"

Billy Dean Thomas, "Give Me My Applause"

MESSIAH!, "fasho!"