Cainon Lamb (Countdown)

YKIGS: You were mentioning earlier that you don’t really listen to the radio. Are you ever concerned your sound might not work on the radio because a lot of the stuff out right now is dance driven?

CL: Yeah well, I never concern myself with dance or whatever the case may be. I did a song for Beyonce called “Countdown”. That song pretty much came about by me just doing what I do every day in the studio. I wasn’t trying to get on Beyonce’s album or work on a song for her. I just did a song. The song or idea got to her. In detail of how it got to her, my publisher Big Jon Platt over at EMI pretty much heard the music and was like “Whoa, what is this?” He played it for Beyonce that same day. I was flying out to L.A. for the ASCAP awards at the time and he called me when I got off the plane. I saw a whole bunch of missed calls from him. He was like “Hey man, that track that you sent me…” I don’t always send my publisher music like I used to. I just sent that randomly. That was one track I sent that whole year to him. He was like “What is this? This is the most unique thing I’ve ever heard’”. Then He told me what Beyonce did once she heard it. He told me Beyonce started bouncing up and down, dancing when the countdown came on. She started dancing, bouncing, moving all kind of ways. He said “Man that song might be a smash” and I was like “Wow are you serious?” He was like “You don’t know what you just did!” Beyonce wanted to the cut song in three days. I was like “What do I need to do?” So I just sent the rest of the files to them, so she could do it. I didn’t actually go in the studio with her, but the song got done. It had a couple of other people help finish the song like The-Dream help write on the song, Ester Dean helped write on the song and Beyonce helped write on the song. Her production partner Shea Taylor helped finish the song off. It came out beautiful and it went number one on the dance chart last month.

 

http://youknowigotsoul.com/interview-with-grammy-nominations-and-number-one-records-with-missy-elliott-under-his-belt-already-lamb-sets-out-goal-to-produce-entire-projects

 

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How did you get involved with Beyoncé?

I did a song one night, right before the BET Awards last year. I was in the studio and I was listening to Boyz II Men. The song, “Uhh Ahh” starts with a countdown of “10, 9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1.” So I thought, “Wow, that could be something. Just the countdown itself.” Once the countdown was in the computer I sped it up a little bit. I put the snare drum taps to it and I started a beat. I sent the song to my publisher, E.M.I., and my publisher called me the next day. He said, “I haven’t heard nothing like this in a while. I had a meeting this morning with Beyoncé and I played a couple other songs I had and she wasn’t really feeling them. When I played the beat that you sent me, you should have seen how she went crazy! She started dancing and bouncing up and down and just doing all kind of stuff. She loved that beat! I’m glad you sent the instrumental because she’s going to go in the studio and record it two days from now. You may need to try to make a female version of the countdown part.” So I agreed to do that. I never actually met Beyoncé. Then The Dream, the artist, wrote the verses and that’s how it got created.

That was an experience where I thought, “Wow, it had to be God.”

Beyoncé is our Michael Jackson of today. Hundreds of songs get submitted and she only picked 12 to put on her album. For people to say, “Your song could be one the best songs on the album,” that’s just an incredible opportunity and I’m proud to be on the project

 

http://archive.today/gN0ut

 

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