Hear Baauer, M.I.A., G-Dragon Team for Booming ‘Temple’
Baauer has teamed with M.I.A. and Korean pop idol G-Dragon for the booming “Temple,” the latest track off the “Harlem Shake” beatmaker’s debut LP Aa (pronounced “double a”), due out Friday.
As Baauer told Rolling Stone, while the producer saw very little in terms of revenues following the viral success of “Harlem Shake,” the single put Baauer on the radar of artists like M.I.A., who reached out in an email shortly after “Harlem Shake” exploded.
“I sent her something via email, but nothing happened,” Baauer said of the initial M.I.A. communication. However, during a visit to London, the producer and the rapper found time to collaborate in the studio. “The energy is different being in the same room. I showed her a bunch of tracks, and we worked it out,” Baauer said, with “Temple” the result.
Aa also boasts Future and Pusha T on the previously released “Kung Fu” as well as guests like Rustie, Novelist, Leikeli47 and more. As Zane Lowe noted in his Beats 1 interview with Baauer following the premiere of “Temple,” the album is split down the middle with instrumentals and tracks with featured artists. “That wasn’t intentional, it just ended up happening,” Baauer said. “Just wanted to get an equal balance and get a nice feeling of just beats and songs with features.”
As for Aa itself, the producer said, “It all was a big process. All those things happened over the span of making the album – the title, the look of it, the order of the tracks – it took a long time, all those decisions were made individually.”