Hip-Hop History Month #4

Chris Taylor, also known by his moniker "The Glove", is a DJ and producer on the West Coast hip hop scene starting from the 1980s. The Glove is known for his appearance in the film Breakin' alongside Ice-T, and he is credited on "Phone Tap", by Nas, as producer. Other early production credits include "Reckless" (Ice T & Dave Storrs) "Tibetan Jam" (Chris "The Glove" Taylor) "Go off" (Ice T & Dave Storrs) "Itchiban Scratch" (Chris "The Glove" Taylor). He produced, but wasn't credited for "Stranded on Death Row" and "Doggy Dogg World" on the genre-defining albums The Chronic and Doggystyle, but, we later found out that exclusion was the case for most people on Dr. Dre projects. He also written/produced the tracks for Xxplosive (Dr. Dre) and Hello (NWA) also uncredited. But let's take it back further.

It all started with a club called Radio (popularly known as "Radiotron", made famous in the movie Breaking). The spot was a phenomenon because there used to have lines going around the block and it was open to any age over 13. Kids today will NEVER know the fun teenagers had back then. The L.A. Times put them on the cover of their Calendar section and the producers of the movie came to check it out. Back then, people like Sting from The Police and Malcolm Mclaren would come out to the club.

So they began shooting the movie at the club and one day, The Glove overheard the producers talking about how they needed music to capture the feel of a certain scene. He walked over to them and told them that he could do it. He was just a DJ at the time and had never produced anything up until then. They agreed to it and originally it was supposed to be just a music score for the scene. They had already hired Ice-T as the rapper for the movie, so The Glove approached him about rapping over the beat. They recorded “Reckless” in the middle of the night and finished at 2 am.

He got his hands on a drum machine after the producers agreed to let him do his thing. He learned how to program the beats on it with help from another westcoast icon, Egyptian Lover.

After doing “Reckless”, which sold 4 MILLION copies by being on the Breakin’ soundtrack, he decided that he didn’t want to do rap after that and that’s why there is a huge gap between that song and his work with Dre. He felt like R&B music paid more at the time. He had an organ and piano background from church and high school, so he was writing songs.Enter the group "Po, Broke and Lonely". They were making hot songs and a mutual friend told Dre about the group. Dre had already heard of him through the DJ scene. They met out at a party in Palm Springs and Eazy E signed them as a group because he was looking for something that was self-contained to where he didn’t have to produce everything – and that was because of The Glove. He was also an engineer, which a lot of producers aren’t. They’ll just lay a beat down and leave it at that.

The first thing they worked on was the Po, Broke and Lonely album. They had a joint called “Funky Vibe” and he did the remix. They were at a studio in Carson and The Glove was the first person to introduce Dre to an SSL studio mixer. The way he had been recording was by having all of these different hands pushing the faders up and down on the board. He told him he was working too hard and said, “let me show you this thing called Automation.” It was the reason why he got to mix The Chronic album with him. The credits say, “mixed by Chris Taylor” but Dre mixed more of that album than he did. He sat in front of those boards.

The Glove was the second producer signed to Death Row Records, counting Dr. Dre when they first started. Suge used to tell The Glove all of the time that he was going to be the next "Dr. Dre". But how can he be the next "Dr. Dre" when he's leaving his name off of everything? Rightfully, he took issue with all of that and those were times that he took breaks from working with Dre. He would just go focus on something else. As a matter of fact, he didn’t get back with Dre until he left and started Aftermath.

He actually had to be convinced, actually, but honestly he figured all of that happened because of Suge. It was just Dre running his own company now so everything seemed to be all good. He worked on The Firm’s album, and he co-produced the song, “Phone Tap.” He got credit for the song and got paid. He came up with the concept of having a “phone voice” for the song and did the beat but Dr. Dre really did take that song to the next level – and that’s what he does.

I could probably write a book on the accomplishments of this man, but this post is a lil extensive. Let's just say, to this day, accomplishments are still growing, and growing, and growing. From the Aftermath compilation, to Xzibit, to The Chronic 2001 (where he got burned again), but that's all another story.

Chris The Glove Taylor is not near as celebrated as he should be. He is an icon, a pioneer....a living legend. The contribution he made to my personal love for hip-hop is undeniable. That's why I had to give this man his flowers. Love you, brutha.