It’s Tuesday night, Sept. 20, and out front of Eugene’s WOW Hall, the bass is felt before it is heard. The opening act started playing 20 minutes ago and still the line to get in reaches down the stairs and along the sidewalk.
Inside the venue, the mob of fans stays tightly packed in front of the stage for fear of losing their spots. Most in the crowd are in their late teens or early twenties, but the membrane of the stage mob is composed of many late 20- and 30-something couples.
The energy changes as the second opener, Bambu, a Los Angeles-based rapper and self-proclaimed community activist, wraps up his set.
The critically acclaimed, Seattle-based hip-hop group Blue Scholars is the next and headlining act of the night. Before Blue Scholars comes on stage, the crowd grows larger and surges with electricity like a wave approaching the beach.
Blue Scholars DJ and producer Sabzi takes the stage as sounds of a grainy movie projector plays across the speakers. “Y’all ready to see a movie?” he says. “My name is Saba. I’ll be your projectionist this evening.”
With hands waving above their heads through the smoke of hip-hop show, the audience dances hard during the Blue Scholars’ performance.
After the show, the Emerald sat down with DJ/producer Sabzi (Saba Mohajerjasbi) and MC Geologic (George Quibuyen) for an interview about the music creation process and their recent release, “Cinemetropolis.”

“Cinemetropolis,” your latest album, dropped June of this year. How long was this album in the works?
Sabzi: It depends. The oldest beat on there is from ’07, technically, but the way the process works, I’d say it maybe took about a year, six months to a year. There are so many different places where you can say, “Oh, it started here, or it started here.”
Geo: We talk about it, for a lot, when we travel, when we’re doing shows, when we’re kicking it. Before we even get to the process of starting to make beats and writing and then after that, it’s recording. In a way, it’s been in the process since shortly after the last full-length album. But like Saba said, probably intensively with a deadline and with songs already in mind, then for the last year or so.
You’re calling the album a visual soundtrack. What do you mean by this?
Sabzi: Well, it’s kind of like it’s a movie. But it’s on a record. It’s like watching a film. Beyond that, we have developed two sort of minifilms @@ap style@@from it and we’re going to do some more.
What served as the creative inspiration for the album?
Sabzi: You can say that a lot of it has to do with the current state of culture in general and identity. And how we have a tendency to live most of our lives through moving pictures and recorded audio. “Cinemetropolis” is sort of a discussion of that, so to speak. The fact that we spend more time on the Internet watching videos, or listening to music, or reading things, looking at pictures, than we do actually out here. The difference in reality that you see on the Internet — you could see pictures from an event that you went to, you’re like, “Wow, those photos make it look like it was a completely different show than the one I was at.” This record, the inspiration behind it, the whole purpose behind it, “Cinemetropolis” is that world. So this is just sort of like an exploration of it.
How did you meet NBA legend Slick Watts, and what’s your relation to him?
Sabzi: Well, hey, we’re both townies. All three of us are townies. He was a Seattle icon back during his day. And he also got paid so little for being someone in the professional NBA.
Geo: Oh yeah, way before the million-dollar contracts in the NBA.

How did the video that you and Slick did together come about?
Sabzi: The (Seattle Super)Sonics gig guys@@what are ‘gig guys’?@@ who spearheaded the documentary about how the Sonics were robbed from Seattle by Howard Schultz, they developed a relationship with Slick through that process. As Scholars fans, they were like, “Yo, we should do something together. We can actually get Slick Watts in it.” So we put together almost like a sketch of what it would be like to hang out with Slick Watts and sort of reminisce in a Sonics way.
Geo: See this is what we’re talking about. Media transforms as it goes into the media world and back to the people and then back into the media and then back again. Maybe in two years people will think we were actually on the Sonics. That’d be tight. (Laughs)
Going back to the production process, Geo, how involved are you in the creation of Sabzi’s beats and sounds?
Geo: In and out. Sometimes I’m like, “Do what you do,” and sometimes I’m like, “Hey, can you make it sound like …” and then I’ll insert inarticulate music jargon here. Or sometimes I’ll come up with a concept and he’ll make a beat, like his interpretation of what the sonic concept should be. Or he’ll already have something and then he’ll be like, “You should write this to this beat.” There’s not any one way we work. That’s even on this one record. And if you compare this record to the last and that one to the one before that, it’s all been completely different experiences.

And Sabzi, how much of a role do you play in Geo’s prose?
Sabzi: In his prose? I’m like, “Yo, don’t do that.” I came up with the line, “Then I did this, and I did that, and this is how I felt, so fuck that.”
Geo: You came up with a few lines.
Sabzi: I used to be on the mic all the time and in the front. I think it’s ’cause secretly I want to rap, but I can’t do it.
Geo: Remember when you’d send me songs? I’d record at your crib and then I’d leave, and then you’d email your song, and somehow you had a couple bars rapping in it?
Sabzi: (Laughing) Yeah, I know.
What did you guys listen to on the way down to Eugene?
Sabzi: Actually, I was roading with our sound guy here, and we just chopped it up about home improvement and trying to raise kids.
Do you have a family? Are you a family man?
Sabzi: I don’t. Not yet. One day.
Anything in the pipeline with Common Market or any other side projects?
Sabzi: Yeah, “Made in Heights.” We just put out a new EP. There’s more songs, and it’s even tighter.
Where can we find it?
Sabzi: www.madeinheights.bandcamp.com. That’s the bomb. And I’m about to put out a beat tape too sometime during this tour. I was going through my files a while back, and I found over a hundred unreleased beats. So we’re probably going to put out a bunch of them.