Good thread dude. That's cool your dad knew the sample lol.

Started playing bass guitar when I was 12, started playing drums, guitar, and keys a few years later, jamming with friends and shit. Been in a few bands playing death metal, funk, and blues covers. Did that for a while then when I was about 18 I got sick of all my stoner musician friends being unreliable and shit so I said fuck it and started recording my own music playing all the instruments myself, recorded a couple ep's as a solo black metal artist, got sick of promoting them and gave that up around age 21. Got a microkorg and a drum machine and started fooling around making techno and electronics stuff, that's when I adopted the name LAZER BEAR. Was kinda in a weird place musically for a while, I was still playing guitar and shit daily but didn't really feel at home with any particular genre or style. Then I was watching TV and saw some red bull beat battle with Dibiase on it, he was talking about the SP404 and I was intrigued, I knew I didn't like making music with a computer, and I knew nothing about samplers, and I was amazed to hear him say that he can make beats all with that little box, the SP404. So I did research for a while, started listening to flying lotus, samiyam, and dibiase and took the plunge and bought an SP404sx about a year ago or so. Never looked back. Now I feel like I have found myself musically. This is stuff that I can do alone, and its easier to get ideas recorded then it is to record guitar, drums, and bass. I have a lot of fun and get to be creative musically. And its all thanks to Dibiase and the Roland corporation.

Brother got me a sampletrak when I was like 10. Made some Congo drum loops on it, but never got any further than that. got reason later when I was 13 made more loops but never really understood how to make a whole song. Then one of my friends showed me how to use GarageBand and we started MySpace beat battling eachother. got into reason again finally able to make full songs then a couple years later the same friend showed me about spforums.

Damn you lucky your pops recognizes samples. I always asked my pop what sample is this and he'll never know. He say "I think its jazz, I don't know". Though he did recognized one sample from Monie Love's Its a Shame one time.

For me it started out when my parents would leave me and my brother home alone while they went to work or shopping at age 5 and 6. I remember being fasinated by the albums my father had in his collection and I was looking at all the artwork, then my brother (the eldest) walks in and says "those are for the record player". I didn't know what a record player was, but it was cool to know that the albums were more than pictures. He took a record out a sleeve and played it. Man did it blew my mind, because now its like the artwork has a voice to speak. I would spend hours and hours just looking for the craziest looking covers to see what sounds I'll get to hear. Then my brother began messing with the pitch which made me die laughing and making the record go backwards too. He say something like "See this lady on the cover? watch me turn her into frankenstein!" And he'll slow the pitch making the woman sound she was possessed by the devil. It was an experience that has stood with me to this day. This was before Hip Hop mind you.

On top of that my father always played the oldies station when we would go with him in his car and we would sing along or be silent for a dope tune. "Shimmy Shimmy Coco Pop!" - Little Anthony and The Imperials (check him!!)

As I got older, I had a bunch of cassette players that my father found at the junk-yard (a dope place, most of my toys came from there). I was always into having fun and manipulating sound. My first tape I made was when I was 9 years old. It wasn't Hip Hop, in fact I hated Hip Hop at the time, it was just a tape of me acting and doing random stuff and putting music in between, kinda like Ol Dirty Bastard's first album. I was singing the national anthem and then it turned into me banging on a garbage can singing All Night Long by Lionel Richie and then I broke into a freestyle, all types of shit going on. My whole family loved the tape, they said its good comedy. My pops played it at his job and they all had a laugh.

Thats what made fell in love with Hip Hop. When I found out that DJs were making beats off sampling records, I was like "Thats for me!!" I love manipulating a sound source.

Never looked back.

That's a great story Ill green.

i'll just leave this here: http://www.myspace.com/peopleoutofprioritypoop

Great stories fam. Well I've always liked music. My cousins used to let me hang out with them when i was 8 they were 21 and 22 and they would spin records. An I would love to play around with their mixer and records and what not. When I was 12 I picked up the bass and started playing in bands I also learned how to play the guitar. I got tired of all the band drama and let downs. Seemed like right when we got things rolling someone always had to be a let down so I took a break from bands and just got a effects bass pedal and experimented with that for fun. I was more into rock growing up bands like (Thursday, the mars volta, rage against the machine, smashing pumpkins., etc. the hip hop was always there though because I grew up in LA I didn't really start listening to hip hop until 2006 i started listening to pete rock and cl smooth and lords of the under ground. thanks to NBA street 2 on ps2 hahaha.
In 2007 I started listening to to Kanye a lot that's when his album Graduation had came out. I started looking at videos of kanye making beats and Pharell and it interested me because I would always like to play and make beats at school growing up with pencils taps(hi hats) and smacks(snare) and a fists hitting the desk for a kick. I though "i have rhythm to do this maybe i can make beats ?" at first I wanted to make mainstream style beats I bought an axiom 49 and used fruity loops. I really didnt like that program so i switched to reason and i liked it a lot better. from there I started listening to mos def then i found out about black star then I heard about doom from my friends. them madlib, flying lotus, daedelus etc (started a chain) I wont lie the producer that really got me into wanting to get an sp was Madlib, when i heard Madvillainy and Movie scenes vol1-2 that got me hooked. So i played around with my 303 for a bit then I bought an MPC 2000xl to go along with it but I didnt like all the time waiting to chop samples and i also didnt want to do auto chop. so I sold my mpc for an sp 555 and i sold my 303 for a microkorg. the reason i like the sps is because you can be very creative with them and experiment a lot and i love experimental music. Ive been making beats ever since. I wouldn't say music is my life because if it was you would be seeing me rocking shows with dibiase and flylo and all those cats. But I make music to express myself and it's also a fun hobby for me. If people like my music great if not too bad because im not trying to impress you. (sorry for the long post)

started playin guitar when i was 9 years old, got obsessed with synths,samplers, bad quality/gritty sounds and i would circuit bend everything i could find that made noises around 16. learned the drums and piano... yea basic shit

-

When I was younger I always fucked around with a keyboard from my dad and later on with another little keyboard my dad had that was smaller so I could always play with it for example on my room. And while listening to music, mainly the instrumental/beat behind the lyrics was something that made or broke the song for me. Kinda logical since I could only understand dutch back then..

And that was before I even knew Hip-Hop.

Later on after having played soccer and done karate, at the age of 13 after watching Run DMC - It's Like That, I wanted to bboy (at the time I called it breakdance of course). So after following classes I met these 2 people who also bboyed but already knew ALOT about Hip-Hop and they actually changed my life.

So with Hip-Hop, comes Hip-Hop music. But it didn't really sound like it was made with a band or something.. It sounded different. And after wondering how it was made I stumpled upon the videos of Memorecks, where he would show his chops/sample first and just play live with it along his drums. After that I found out the samples came from records. And after that, since I couldn't take classes for an instrument in the first place, I bought my first MPD24 (Before I was already messing with FL Studio). Since then I saved up for a mixer and turntable that I still have and use and got to work.
Later on switched to a MPC1000 which was alright, then to a SP404SX which I really liked but didn't put to much time in and made me join these forums. Then I got a MPC2000XL, which is somewhat better than the 1000 when it comes to my needs, and later on the SP303 which I really LOVE. Though I have to admit, the gear I bought was mainly because the people I was heavily inspired by used them. Not really because THEY used them, but it gave me an idea of what you can do with them.

This is almost the story of my life so far lol.

Oh yeah, great stories everyone. Especially yours in haze hahaha, being mad at your moms for buying censored cd's!

When I was 10 I copped a FL Studio demo after hearing Little Brother and liking the beats. Back then I worshipped 9th Wonder lol, I stayed on Youtube for hours watching FL tutorials and sampling videos. When I was I kid and first started to discover underground hip hop, all I listened to was Little Brother, Murs, and all around more lighthearted stuff cuz I didn't really understand lyrics.This past summer before I started 8th grade, I listened to so much music and now I'm into Madlib, Dilla, dead prez, DOOM, etc. guys of that nature. I got a 303 in December, and my style really changed. I can't even really listen to my old beats to be honest. At first I didn't really know about sampling so I started out sampling hip hop songs lol. One of my first beat attempts has a loop of a 90's Shaq song .

panda bear made me buy a 303, then i tought sampler were cool, then I bought almost every SP and wierd other things.

sticked with 404sx and some other machines.

never listened to jdilla or any legit beatmaker really. i like ODB.

the only beats I listen are people from here and soundcloud.

i still listen to animal collective.

wasnt it VK that inspired you to make beats? LELELEL

These stories are really cool.

I guess I'll tell mine but I'll keep it pretty short.

When I was like 3 or 4 my dad bought a piano. He was always listening to music and he also played the cello and he picked that up because of ELO. So between him listening to the latest crazy records and playing his cello and piano along with them, and of course "I WANNA BE LIKE MY DAD!" I would try to play the piano with music I heard. When my parents noticed I had a knack for figuring out melodies by ear, they enrolled me in piano classes. I took piano for 8 years before getting fed up with it (videogames come AFTER PRACTICE? NO! lol). At any rate, I'd make music on my dad's keyboards and stuff, we'd duet stuff and the like. Somewhere in there I took violin lessons but didn't dig it all that much (especially while also having to take piano lessons and practice that too). Later in jr. high, I took up the trombone in band. After that I said I was done with this musical instrument stuff (1993-ish) and about that time my dad got an Ensoniq TS-12. All bets were off at that point. I was 13 by then. Been making tracks ever since, whether on hardware or on computer with tracker software. The 404 is just another part of the evolution of what I do. I've never been great at it, but it's just something I have to do and I think all you dudes know what I mean.

VK inspired me to sing