Inside the Bomb Squad – Tales of Classic Hip-Hop Production with Keith Shocklee

Keith Matthew Boxley and his brother James Henry Boxley, better known as Keith and Hank Shocklee are founding members of The Bomb Squad. Originally stated as the DJ crew Spectrum City in the late 1970s, by the mid-1980s, The Bomb Squad would include Carl Ryder aka Chuck D, Eric “Vietnam” Sadler, Gary “G-Wiz” Rinaldo and Bill Stephney.

This team would become a production force for a number of hip-hop, pop and R’n’B artists, most notably Public Enemy. Albums such as It Takes a Nation of Millions to Hold Us Back and 1990’s Fear of a Black Planet (one of my favorite albums of all time in any genre) showcase the Bomb Squad’s distinct style of chaotic, hard-hitting, trancelike atonal soundscapes and rhythms. Built up of multiple layers of samples, album sources, drum machines and manipulated instruments, the sound all supported the unapologetic social commentary of Chuck D and Flavor Flav (William Drayton Jr.).

In today’s world, where it’s easy to layer loops, beats and sounds in a modern DAW, I was excited to sit and talk with Keith about crafting early hip-hop in the pre-DAW and pre-MIDI days of cassette decks, turntables, early samplers, tape punching and digital delay units.