What was the advantage to working primarily with Mike Lowe on “Smoke and Mirrors?
” With this record, most of these songs were done. I did maybe three or four records after signing this album with Heiro. I was doing these records at my leisure. If you listen to my album, everything is “tomato and tomotoe.” The songs don’t really coincide with each other. If you listen to an album like “The Great Adventures of Slick Rick,” from beginning to end, that record made sense. This album to me, it’s a declaration of independence in my mind and doing music. I did these records at my leisure. I didn’t do these records according to a deadline. That’s how I always used to put albums out, with deadlines. I didn’t do it this time. I was recording out of my own pocket. I met up with Domino, the situation sounded good, it was a financially sound deal to do with them. I just came off the road on a tour of 43 cities with the Hieroglyphics. In my whole career, I never did a tour in the states like that. If I would have done these states years ago, I might have sold a lot more records.
