Peak Below the Line: Big Rula

By Molombo Thillia Thillot III

(This series “A Peak Below the Line” was made to highlight the often forgotten important parts of a music team. From producers to engineers and from instrumentalists to songwriters, La Tonique has created a platform to push these key players to the forefront. The grandiosity of some of our favorite artists could only be explained by the sheer amount of players that are effortlessly consolidated under that brand and/or persona. We stand on the shoulder of giants and music arguably is the arbiter of this metaphor.  If you don’t want to read the interview, you can also listen to it on Soundcloud.)

Who you are and what your friends call you? 

Big Rula. My name is Ruslan and I’m 6’7 so I removed two letters from my name “s” and “n” which is difficult to pronounce by my music experience, it made sense.

Where are you from? What brought you to Los Angeles?

I was living in Uzbekistan, people always think it’s the country where Borat is from.

It’s not?

No (laughs) but it is a neighboring country, that’s where Imanbek is from but...I love my country. And I was like, feeling really good. It's an absolutely safe country. You can not even hold the guns, not just guns, bullets. You can go to prison as a terrorist for seven, 11 years. 

You're saying that like those are real concerns. (sarcastically) How could people have fun without guns?

Knives? 

(laughter)

But why Los Angeles? 

Well, I've been traveling a lot across the world, like maybe I visit thirty-four countries

OK, that's a whole different story. Why are you traveling across the world? Was it the music?  

I was working at the soccer federation. A football soccer manager. I was managing the trips for their kids, the hotels, training, food, everything. 

You didn't come from a music family, you came from a soccer family?

Yes, it created the window to travel. My father was an owner so of course, his son who knows English was going to be part of it. It was good practice

From soccer to being a budding juggernaut in the music industry in Los Angeles, where is this bridge? 

You can mix sport and music sometimes. Music was my passion. When I was young, my mom put me into piano classes. After four years, when I was 11, I told  Mom, “No more piano put me in fighting classes!”. I didn't know that my life will be so tightly connected to music later in life. 

What brought it back? 

It was my English teacher.  I was 14. I just came back to school after the summer holidays. Everybody was talking about a new person from America, a  volunteer.  Those finishing university, the government of the United States, gave the chance for students to go to Third World countries.

Uzbekistan is a third world country?  Americans can be high and mighty. How did you two get close?

It’s not (laughs)  but we became close because a couple of times he was sleeping outside the area, he was struggling, he was really struggling with the host family. Because of the past couple of days he was sleeping outside the house. He didn't always have a place to stay.  After the 10 p.m., they would just lock the door and went to sleep without don't give a fuck what's going on with him. It was 2002 and he introduced me to American culture but more importantly hiphop. I never heard anything like it before: NWA, Eazy-E, Grandmaster Flash and Afrika Bambaataa. Before that, all I heard was Russian market music and maybe the occasional international pop hit like Backstreet Boys or Britney Spears. I would scratch CDs and listen to them all day. I remember getting in trouble for deleting a wedding video in the process. (laughs) 

When was your first song?

So, yeah, I was in Crimea, the name of the city, Yalta, I was there in 2002, 16 years old and I recall my first track. I didn't have much money, only $50 so I had one hour to record. It was all I needed because I was hooked.

So we understand the origin of the music...so why Los Angeles?

I needed to be in an environment to run myself with a huge market. And I always wanted to do music, but I couldn't because the music didn't bring me enough money to live for it.  That's why I had to work. God always gave me opportunities to work in different places. But I also wanted my own work for the world to follow, not just the work a father gave to his son.

Plus the music industry is a central industry here. You can live your dream, you can do what you like and have money and success over this economy you can become strong. I didn’t choose other countries, for example, Russia, because the dollar is killing all currencies all over the world. So you just don't know. 

So this was both a financial choice and an environmental one? 

And my own. I moved to L.A. four years ago. Anything I did before, people would think it's part of my father. And I would say his effort to build himself inspired me to have my own challenge. If I go back to my country, it would be lost. I bet everything to stay here, to put my roots here and prove myself. And this is my test. 

Has he visited?

He has, and he’s very proud.

What has your journey, here in Los Angeles been like for you?

Being in L.A., I feel an energy that your destiny deserves to be known. Crazy musicians, talkers, promoters, videographers, actors all around me. And I felt that I needed to, right now, prove that I also caused something different in music. I started in multiple roles, songwriter for female singers because women’s projects have money.

 (laughter)

So you already had a portfolio that broke you into the culture here? What was the learning experience like? 

It really helped me to understand the conception of the music, how to control the mood of the listener, where you put more energy, where less I know my own song producer like a producer-engineer. That's why I learned how to be an engineer myself, for myself. 

Completely self-taught.

And then I realized that I'm not just an engineer. I put my producer’s effort into engineering. I combined the knowledge which I got here and then what I'm doing right now. This helped me to build to be a beatmaker, producer, vocal producer, engineer at the same time because I don't know, you can find people who can be engineer or producer, but not together here.

What's the difference between an engineer and a producer? 

I feel like pushing buttons. Not just make your sound on the balance and levels already produced. The guy who creates melodies could create the beat, create an arrangement and create the vibe of the track itself. But the person who is fixing the vibe, the vocal production. I'm not just engineering. I'm teaching my artist how to build the track, how to sing about how to be the best representation of themselves on the track.

Who was the biggest artist you started working with when first landing here? 

Rarri. It took a while too. He's a very picky artist. Everything needs to be perfect from the balance, from the reverb to the key compression and the mic. To allow his voice to sound in the way he exactly was because he was experimenting with.  He went to a lot of other studios so I didn't let him down. I put myself on the level of a big artist. It was a big step. And finally, it got to the point where he started working with Trippie Redd. And of course, me, I was part of this whole work because he was my friend. He's my friend. He was my roommate at the time too. He would record music all day and night. And I had a big life experience to be part of it.  

How many tracks have you worked on since being here? 

September was my birthday. I started counting the track I did past the past year, it was almost 113 tracks. 

Have you always worked in logic? 

I’ve tried others, like Pro Tools, but Logic is home. 

Do you think you get enough credit for the work you've done? I know it's a heavy question, it's a big elephant, a room for a lot of producers.

If you put the seed to the ground, put the water and sunlight then one day it will become a tree. I don’t hunt for the credit. I just do my work well. I  know it will bring me much more success than worry. You can feel it in the beginning, since you prove to people that you can do good work. The success fulfills me,  I'm not hungry for money. The money will find itself. You just need to think about how to update, how to perfect yourself, how to get yourself to a different level. Not because you need money, BUT because you want to be better, better than others. When you feel that you can do your thing better than others, you will be established.  

This is doing it for the music. How do people usually find you?

You know, music can speak for itself. People are always trying to see who did this and how to contact this person. 

You're a great teacher. But has there been a time you had to say no, like somebody not up to your par? 

It’s too easy to say no. There's a thin board between yes and no. You see, you try to make the best out of the artist. If there’s effort then I will work with that, you always give the chance to artists to be better.

What projects are you working on now?

I’m working on two personal projects; one in English and the other in Russian. I’ve been working with Azuma Mazi for the new Fast and Furious soundtrack and with him, I’ve been introduced to Flash Gotti, a very talented man. 

What's your goal in music? 

It’s not just for the plaque. Music is art and art has been defining things in history. I compare the life of humans to falling stars. After they hit the atmosphere you can still see signs of them. And after we die there could still be histories of ourselves.

I understand the metaphor because we are light-years away.

When we enter history we can become forever. Through music, you can become immortal. I want to make good music that can become eternal.

Molombo is a culture writer for La Tonique.