Born in Jamaica, Kino Beats rose to popularity for producing a number of hits for the likes of Juelz Santana, Wiz Khalifa, and Lil Gnar to name a few. The Norfolk-native offers up a unique sound in hip-hop and quite frankly, it's taken him a long way. Kino is also known for doing a series of joint projects, including 2019 effort Work As Usual. The project boasts features from OG Maco, YFN Kay, and Tracy T amongst others. Kino has been building out a formidable catalog for some time now and things are finally coming full circle for the music vet.
In our recent chat, I spoke with Kino Beats about some of his most popular records over the years, including A$AP Rocky's "Hear Me" and Larry June's "The Dealer, Pt. 2" to name a few. Check it out below.
A$AP Rocky - "Hear Me"
"Hear Me" is such a special beat to me because it is really the 5th version of the same beat and served as my first collaboration with my favorite producer Pharrell Williams. The beat started with chops of the sample I did but I just never liked the groove I had with the drums. After a few versions, I sent the chops to Miles Sloan. He put his twist on it I liked his bounce tweaked it up and RIP Asap Yams he placed the beat with Rocky for me. Literally an hour before the song leaked on AWGE SoundCloud page Rocky engineer called me and asked if I did the record with Pharrell I said not that I know of and that was my way of finding out that Pharrell did the chorus on the final record. One of my favorites even though this record is a gift and a curse because it was a single leak and never released on a project.
Larry June - "The Dealer, Pt. 2"
My good man Larry June has all the vibes in the world. We did a lot of work together with OG Maco and I always like to catch him when he is on his "Trap Larry" vibe. This record was one we did during heavy touring time. I sent the beat to his phone and he hit me back with this banger.
Lil Quill - "Back @ It"
This record was just organic ATL trap energy! Me, TraumaTone, Mal & Quil just went on like a 3-4 day span of just knocking out records back to back and one morning at 6 AM I left the studio went home and just wasn't tired. I decided to just bang out one more beat home and texted Quil like "bro yall still in the studio?" He hit me back like "yeah" so I sent this beat and his response was "we outta here twin" they recorded the song in 20 minutes flew to Miami two days later and shot the video.
OG Maco - "Check On Me"
This record is another very special record for me. After touring the world together over ten times, me and Maco built a very strong friendship so when he started having complications with his health it concerned me. I flew out to L.A. to spend some time and check up on him *no pun intended*. He was in the hospital at the time they told him they wanted him to stay one extra day he rips the iv out and tells me he has studio booked at 9 PM. I try to convince him to stay in hospital but we end up leaving and this was the first track we recorded. It actually became the intro to our album "Legends Live Forever" and we actually are about 80% complete with Legends Live Forever 2.
Lil Gnar & Germ - "Perc 300"
This record right here was just raw energy! Me and TraumaTone produced a record for Money Man entitled " Area 51." We developed a new sound of jus alien future trap sounds. Gnar hit me saying let's work so I had him meet me over at Sonny Digital studio in Atlanta and loaded this beat up and he and Germ just went crazy! We ended up doing 3 records that night that all made his album with Germ Big Bad Gnar Shit 2.