The transformation of Terrace Martin

We've had the legend of Robert Johnson wrong this whole time. The deal he made at the crossroads wasn't with some mythical devil at all. The truth is he sold his songs — i.e. his soul — to a predatory music industry. A devil that would outlive him by four score and eight years. A hellhound that would generate billions off the blues he suffered and sold for decimals on the dollar.

None of that had truly occurred to me until my Zoom call ended with producer and multi-instrumentalist Terrace Martin, the cat who hatched a 21st-century jazz revival, spearheaded by he and his West Coast Get Down superfriends, before injecting it pure-and-uncut into rap's main artery. His co-conspirators cover every corner of Black music: Snoop, Lalah, Quik, Glasper, YG, SZA, Thundercat, Kendrick, Kamasi, Stevie (yes, Wonder), Herbie (yesss, Hancock). And those are just the household names.

Even with all that collaboration to his credit, the only deal Martin honors is the one he struck with the Creator. He mentions his "deal with God" so much over the course of our 68-minute convo that it starts to feel like a prayer. Something he repeats not only to ground himself, but to smudge the room and ward off temptation.

It even guided him through his own crossroads: At age 9, when he counted bankrobbing among his most promising career options. In seventh grade, when he prayed for "something that I could be passionate about." Even as a young adult, when his first day working a low-wage day job quickly became his last. "It was Central Data Telemarketing in Van Nuys. And the dude said, 'If you want to use the bathroom, you have to raise your hand.' So I raised my hand and kept walking, bro. I drove straight to Snoop's house and said, 'Man, I got to do beats. What the f***?'"

A decade after launching his own L.A.-based record label, Sounds of Crenshaw, Martin's celebrating with the release of a 4-LP instrumental suite titled Love Is Louder Than The Algorithms. A largely solo endeavor, each movement signals a different mood and messageboard: the 808-driven funk of Passion; the piano-forward contemplation of Peace; the immersive rhythms of featured drummer Marcus Gilmore on Purpose; the synthed-out, smooth vibe of Perspective. It's a near-perfect distillation of the muddy waters Martin makes of genre by fusing jazz, rap and R&B. Because, clearly, it's all from the same source.

This interview is edited for space and clarity.

Rodney Carmichael: This is the tenth anniversary of your record label, Sounds of Crenshaw, and a few days ago you posted on IG: "Sounds of Crenshaw is more than a record label it's a feeling. It's fearless honesty. Soul speaking without permission. Jazz freedom. Hip-hop truth. Blues memory. R&B love." Have you always seen this throughline connecting all of these different genres so clearly or did that take conscious effort and time for you?

Terrace Martin: I grew up in a household where that s*** was real life. All those genres in one — it was the Black experience. I don't know too many Blacks that have this household of one type of anything, though. Whether it's food, music, clothes — different everything. We're very vibrant, color-seeing, frequency-feeling, compassionate, loving people. My music today is a sonic snapshot of how I grew up. I think with Black music, one of the main throughlines that people may miss — because it ain't musical to me, it's spiritual — is the truth. Our truth is a harsh reality and we still haven't come out of our truth.

In my household, my father and mother weren't waking up saying today is gospel Saturday, hip-hop Monday, blues Tuesday. They played the music [that] made their spirits feel good. I grew up in the crack era, really thick in the '80s and the '90s, in South Central L.A. And like everybody else's family at that time, our family was hit with trauma, with bad fortune, with crack cocaine. And when Reagan brought the dope in, the FBI brought the guns in. I'm a child that's a product of that type of stuff. So my music was more life-driven. Whatever my mama played to stop crying or my daddy played to stop stressing [when] he had no money to pay the rent was what we were playing at that household. The only reason why I listed [the genres out] like that is because I know somebody else is out there that grew up the same way. When our parents go into the record store, they're not saying let me get the best R&B record out. Let me get Whitney. Let me get Luther. Let me just get the names of these artists that make my spirit feel right, you know? Genre started coming in — from what I studied in school — when muthaf***ers started trying to figure out the sauce. They thought it was an ingredient when the only ingredient is ancestral recall. That's the true ingredient in this. That's not to say different cultures can't be a part of this Black experience. I'm just talking about the ingredient and where it comes from. And I will not let it be denied or ever erased.

I've heard you mention "ancestral recall" before. On the R&B Money podcast, you talked about transcribing Kendrick [Lamar]'s music and laying it down next to John Coltrane's music. You described the similarities you saw as ancestral recall.

You can't explain a human with that much music and art, depth and ability, but don't come from a lineage and a household of music. You can't explain that. I don't give a f*** what science tells us. I know a lot of folks believe certain things are taught traits, but it's no mystery why you get a Kendrick that didn't grow up hearing jazz. When he's spitting these lyrics and these rhythms, I'm looking at how Trane is playing in 1956 with Miles. And then Trane played different on Giant Steps in 1959. And then Trane played different in the mid-'60s on A Love Supreme. I see this growth in Trane and I see the same growth in Kendrick. But my father was playing Trane everyday. You can kind of explain me a lot more, 'cause you can touch the lineage. I'm not even the baddest one in my family, I'm just the OK one that shows up on time. You feel me? So, my thing is really easy to break down.

With Kendrick and a few other artists that I work with, I'm like where does this come from? And the only thing I could think about — by studying history and different things with this art — is ancestral recall. Basically, it's when you have somebody years back, one of your ancestors, put in that spiritual work with the Creator. So when that flesh perished, that gift was still in the air. And it just transferred over to the next spirit that the Creator felt was deserving of it. That's what I feel happens.

I think there are a lot of us — whether we subscribe to deep genre delineations and the way the industry tells us to consume music or not — who might still be some heavy hip-hop cats and be kind of so-so on jazz. Or we might be heavy into R&B but might not necessarily have dived all the way into the blues enough to see the connection. You've always synthesized them all together and we see that not only in your work but in the different genres and generations of cats you work with and pull together — from Snoop to Herbie Hancock. But on this project, It almost feels like you're breaking down each component for us and separating them into the different languages you speak. Was that the vision you started with?

Love Is Louder Than Algorithms is something I tell my son: 'Put that d*** phone down, boy!' Even my mother: 'Oh, did you see what happened to Snoop?' 'That's fake news, mom. He's not in Aruba swimming. It's fake news.' Instead of breaking down music, I want to break down elements of what I feel that can help my personal family out with life. And hopefully it can help somebody else out. I just want to give statements with my music as a backdrop to be the soundtrack for these words. I feel words are powerful. If I could get off Peace and somebody say, "What did you mean by Peace?" Well cool, now we're talking about peace. "Break down your album Perspective." I like that because we're not talking about the album, now we're talking about perspectives.

I'm not really preaching to the musicians and the other artists. I do music for the person that's nine months late on their rent [and] ain't got no job but got two kids. I love where all my music goes but I'm not preaching to the choir. I wanted to use my music as vehicles to say certain words and slogans that I believe could help people.

Love Is Louder Than Algorithms means love is a real element. The algorithm is not, because we fuel the algorithm. If we all cut our electricity off at one time tonight, the algorithm's gonna suffocate. Even us talking on Zoom is a deep thing to me, low key. I just feel like it's a dark power that's trying to eliminate the human experience. And it's easy to look at AI but that's surface. Because once they kill the human experience, joy disappears. When joy goes, love is gone. Once joy and love are gone … chaos. A confused world is an evil power's Playstation.

So this is a battle for you? This really is spirit work for you — this album.

I don't know life without spirit work. Some people say, "You could be bigger than you are." But I made a deal with God, bro. People don't like saying God because they've got all these other names. But, personally, I made a deal with God. Cause I was going down the wrong path in seventh grade. I wasn't sure if I was going to start robbing banks and killing muthaf***ers out of fear. I just needed a gift, 'cause I didn't have any ability. I didn't feel I was that smart. I didn't love myself. I had friends but I didn't really like the friends I had. And I said, God, if you can give me something that I can be passionate about and just help pay my rent — I was in seventh grade saying "pay my rent" because I grew up with people who couldn't — I ain't gonna lie to you God I probably won't walk all the way in your footsteps, [like the words] you wrote in that Book, but I'm gonna hang onto a lot of them. I ain't gonna kill nobody. I ain't gonna be evil to nobody. I'm not gonna take conscious advantage…. 

You gotta have accountability. I walk with that, so my deal is different than everybody else's. Even business people don't understand. I'm doing this rebrand thing where, in this game, you've got to work with certain people to keep the brand up. You can't work with certain people because they keep the brand down. I have to follow [that] because I'm in the music business and my children eat off of it. But my artistic, spiritual life is not the f***ing deal I made. And I can't be on earth living 100% off of earthly deals, because I made a spiritual deal. And I can't explain that because there is no paperwork.

What happens when the business doesn't like or, more importantly, doesn't support where the music is going? When you see proof of hip-hop and R&B's popularity dipping — or Black music being deprioritized by major labels — is that concerning to you or is that liberating for you?

It's both. Because I can't sit here and lie to you. I'm of the music business now. I'm in it. I'm swimming in it. It's deep, man. I've got to answer that question with this kind of answer, though: To be in this business as long as I have, and still smile and work with people and just love everything, is because I fell in love with the light and the cool s*** and I fell in love with the fumbles and the dark s***, too. What I mean by that is I've been through so much trauma and good s*** to where it started getting hard to separate what is what in the music business.

So how do you navigate it then?

I don't navigate it. I had to fall in love with both because I come from an environment where they were trying to shoot you. For years, I would justify the f***ery in the music business [by] saying at least nobody's trying to kill me. Because I'm cool. I play the horn. It's all peace. The music business is not set up for an artist to really be successful. It's set up for the building to be successful. The music business is set up to borrow and lease the talent and the time of artists — till the artist gets frustrated and leaves. And then the lease turns into ownership. So I treat the music business like truck driving. I'm driving this truck. I got to make a stop in Mississippi and drop off this load. The music business has nothing to do with my praying — with my love for the art — though. At all.

I just make a living doing music. Every note I play helps pay my child's tuition. I'm not getting caught on TMZ falling on my face for my artistry. I'm not doing clown, coon type s*** [or] tearing down Black people to be popping. I'm one of the last Mohicans that just does music. I'm not a content creator. I like content. I want to make that bread. But I can't think about how to make content all day because, remember, I got a deal with the Creator. But I am on such a mission, the wrong trend could be a setup for me to fall. I believe in music. I believe in every note I play. It's gonna help something. Even if it really activates when I'm gone, it's gonna help something because that's the deal on my spiritual contract. I could go left right now and breach my whole deal, but I may perish. And I'm not prepared to do that. One of my deals is stay true and only connect with true people. That's why you see me with outstanding relationships with Kendrick and certain people, because they're just real humans and they're on the same mission.

A few years ago you addressed a tweet to your "rap friends," saying that because the love you've shown them in the business over the years hadn't always been reciprocated, you were done working with them. How did your rap friends end up taking that?

They all called me. If you called me, a hit dog gon' holler. All my friends know what's up with me. I don't got to be your friend in my deal to be blessed. I felt the same way I felt about gang-banging. 'Cause gang-banging is so full of self-hate. All of my bad deals and being taken advantage of [were by] people that look just like us. I hadn't worked with white artists. I hadn't seen white execs. So it was more pointed to my friends, 'cause I've made money with all my friends, it wasn't for all of them because a lot of them show love. But it was a blanket statement that everybody needs to feel. Because unless you are a mega producer and you [sold] all your catalog and all your publishing and everybody eats off of you forever, you don't make a lot of money being a record producer.

I'm only gonna f*** with an art form that f**** with me, and I was feeling at the time all of my rap friends — because they was probably having f***ed up situations — I wasn't giving a f*** about them, respectfully. Now when you get to the Kendricks and them, those are my brothers. YG, we've been in the paint. So everybody who asked, Who you talking about? I'm like, You, if you say so! Straight up.

But Terrace you really are the nucleus for everything that's happened in L.A. in terms of synthesizing these different scenes — rap, jazz and R&B — into something accessible and digestible. I know you probably don't want to take all the credit, but how did you do it and how does it feel to see it get exported around the world?

Hey, I am gonna take credit. But let me tell you what kind of credit I'm gonna take. I always knew when to leave the party and I knew what parties I should always go to. I'm not the best musician. I don't do the best music. But one thing I pride myself on: I know how to put a crew together to get to the top of a mission. I've always been good at putting together, or what I call secretly putting together — because sometimes you can't tell muthaf****ers you're putting them together. Sometimes you gotta say, "Hey, I'm showing up over here." And you gotta [have] a little bit of something that everybody likes. That dude likes that kind of weed. He likes that kind of Kool-Aid. That dude like tequila. That dude likes you to feed his ego. But all of them together make Voltron. So if that muthaf***er don't like this muthaf***er, you go tell that muthaf***er, You know he really likes you, he just doesn't talk that much. You get to the f***ing mission. Because when I was younger, I used to really study robbing banks. So I knew I had to put together a real crew and I knew I probably wouldn't like everybody I put together. Everybody you like and love ain't the strongest around you. Sometimes you gotta outsource a real one, you feel me? I just always knew, if I ain't the best let me surround myself with the best and be the weakest link.

Did you have a mission in mind? And did you imagine it becoming what it became and influencing the direction of music in the way that it has?

We knew we were gonna be steppers in L.A. and South Central, because that was the goal originally. F*** the world, we here. And then when I started traveling the world at 19 [or] 20 with Snoopy and different people like that, I started seeing how the world reacts. I started learning how everybody suffers the same, everybody cries the same, so I started putting those lessons into my music and the mission started changing.

But I always had a vision. I always knew that all my friends were the best in the world. I just believed in them. I just knew spiritually, Kamasi Washington is the best. I knew spiritually, Thundercat, nobody's like him. I knew spiritually, Kendrick Lamar is the John Coltrane of hip-hop.

One place you consistently credit for your musical development — and the development of this L.A. scene — is Leimert Park. What were the ingredients that made it such a magical breeding ground?

Leimert Park, that's my third community right there. My first is from birth to seven years old: That's mom and dad, family — all your cousins, uncles. My second community is when I left the house: That's the Crips, the Rollin' 60s, the homies. That's what it is. They outside. Looking intriguing. Cars. Music playing. Blue rags everywhere. Everybody having fun. Cause CRIP means Community Research In Progress. It just felt like family. I didn't know the darts that it came with till much later in my life.

Now Leimert, let me tell you how deep Leimert is. Because I fell in love with Crippin' so hard. Which leads into why the Creator sent me to Snoop, too. 'Cause it was gonna take a huge Crip to turn my life around. It wasn't gonna take no freedom fighter with an Afro and all black. We used to beat them up, respectfully. So anyway, I started playing the saxophone. But for a month, I was still driven by my second community. And my auntie Betty said, "Hey, it's a jazz club in Leimert called the World Stage." I had been hearing about it because my dad used to go down there. But I was a kid when he was going — like in '91. So I said, "Yeah, I'm down to go." My auntie took me down there for my 14th birthday and I'm like, Oh, it's cool. 'Cause where we from in L.A., Leimert is a whole other gang area.. And as I'm over here, I'm falling in love with music simultaneously. But it's still a Crip neighborhood with the Bloods up the street. And I go to school with everybody. All the L.A. hood s*** is simultaneously growing with me as my art is growing. Nothing is separate. I'm still saying "cuz." I'm still pulling up. I'm still carrying a gun inside my horn case at 15, 16, 17 — until I went to jail for the gun case [and] Snoop had to bail me out. So I was still battling in that early Leimert community. But when I say Community Research In Progress — [that's] Leimert Park.

This community was a community [where] everybody knew everybody, protected everybody and violence was not accepted. I mean, somebody would get slapped every now and then for saying something stupid. But no murder. That's the community that really raised me because they knew how to deal with a kid that was from literally half a mile away — which is a whole other world — but has this God-given talent and this love for jazz out the blue. Leimert was the community that knew how to cater to the kid that was rough around the edges but had a gift. They knew how to protect that and keep that. And they also knew how to restore my innocence. Because my innocence was taken at like four or five years old when I saw a couple of homies get killed in my face as a kid. When I started seeing murders in my face, that took my innocence. Leimert really made me really fall into who I am as Terrace Martin. Leimert let me know I ain't got to give up how I feel, because I don't want to hurt nobody, but I'm from this thing. I'm from the streets. And I'm on earth to inspire — not just the streets but everybody else.

Copyright 2026 NPR