808 Blake a.k.a Blake German

808 Blake: Producer

BIO
SMKA Productions is fueled by the creative mastermind of producer, Blake “808 Blake” German. 808 Blake grew up during the birth of southern rap, but spent a lot of time listening to his father’s Mo-Town record collection and quickly began admiring the likes of – Quincy Jones and Donald Bird. “Whenever I would listen to music growing up I would only pay attention to the songs composition,” he says. In high school he began playing around with the Fruity Loops music program, but it wasn’t until his freshman year in college when he decided to fully dedicating himself to creating music. He spent most of his freshman year locked in his room working on beats, sampling and trying to teach himself everything he could about music composition.

After graduating from The University of Georgia, 808 Blake co-founded SMKA and became a full-time producer. Since the birth of SMKA, 808 Blake has produced music for tons of artists, The Atlanta Symphony Orchestra and feature length films. He has been the main producer behind SMKA’s (Dope Artists) meets SMKA and The 808 Experiment series. And although he enjoys working with such a variety of talented artists, he says, “I like the ability to work with an individual artist so that I can find their comfort zone – or artistic direction – and we can connect and grow together.”

It is hard to define 808 Blake’s production style when he produces what he feels on any given day and is influenced by everything he experiences. However, if forced to put into words 808 Blake says his production is a cross between “alternative, funk, soulful & southern.”

One of 808 Blake’s other passions is theater. He performed on stage, as the lead role, throughout high school and hopes to one day produce a musical. However, 808 Blake has modest goals for music, “I just enjoy being a student of music. There are always new things to learn and room for growth,” he says. “The most important thing is to have fun. I love working with a variety of artists – when you work with talented people you can always create something special. It is all a learning process and the more I work with different people the more I can learn and give back to music.”

808 Blake has produced for over 100 artists, here are a few:
Aleon Craft
Bone Crusher
El Da Sensei
Fashawn
Fat Tony
FKi
Freddie Gibbs
Fresh Daily
Grip Plyaz
Jarren Benton
Joe Scudda
Juicy J (of 36 Mafia)
Jus Nice
Kyle Lucas
Nappy Roots
Outasight
Playboy Tre
Pill
REi
Sean Falyon
Stanza
STS
Tanya Morgan
Tony Williams
Tom P
Yelawolf
Ying Yang Twins
Young Scolla