Not the kind of reckless, punk rock, doesn't care about the future sort of bravado, but the courage to consider the risks inherent in his decisions and still make them. After 10 years of making mind re-arranging music, criss-crossing the globe and rising from obscurity to be one of the most sought after independent producers in the world, Philadelphia's RJD2 is ready to take control of every aspect of his career.

But how'd he get to this point? It began in Ohio, where he produced for local rap favorites MHz and Copywrite, before getting signed to Definitive Jux Records. In 2002, he released Deadringer, the now classic album that defied description, pushing the boundaries of sample-based music. He was a hip-hop producer who had foregone making beats to instead create incredibly dense instrumentals that have as much rhythm and feeling as a live band. Emotional and memorable samples were not used to loop endlessly, but rather to build on each other in ways we could never expect. The world took notice, advertisers contacted him and tracks from Deadringer were featured in commercials, movies and extreme sports videos all over the world, while the album itself got rave reviews and eventually sold more the 75,000 copies.

The next five years were filled with constant touring, the release of several solo projects (The Horror EP, Since We Last Spoke), numerous collaborations and constantly doing remixes for other artists. During this time he was slowly building a collection of classic instruments and synthesizers, the kinds that appeared on the records he sampled, and learning how to play them. After several years of work in his home studio, RJ released The Third Hand in 2007. Here, he pushed himself in new creative directions, leaving Def Jux for a one-off deal with XL Recordings and doing everything on the album himself. Instruments, singing and sampling, nobody else touched this record. Some fans felt betrayed because of the apparent shift in direction, but he saw it differently. "I decided at a point that I'd rather look back on a varied catalog that was interesting and challenging," he says from his home in Philadelphia, "than one of multiple attempts at the same vibe, with varying degrees of success." He realizes that changing the way he works and sounds will upset people, and indeed at every show there's at least one guy who comes just to be mad he hasn't been remaking Deadringer for the past eight years. "It's the way people are," he says. "You move on and just don't think about it anymore."

RJ is still thinking, though. This January he released The Colossus, the collaborative yang to the solo yin of The Third Hand. A mixture of his sampling and instrumental prowess blended with a guest list longer than most night clubs, it's a stunning achievement. One of RJ's signatures is the ability to make an album full of huge songs, songs that are each their own event, yet still fit nicely into the framework of the album. When asked how giant-sounding songs like "Gypsy Caravan" and "A Spaceship for Now" flow so nicely with eerier, groovier songs like "The Stranger," he admits that it's not completely on purpose. "It comes down to inherent tendencies we have as musicians," RJ says. "I always try to do something that doesn't sound like me, but I never succeed because you naturally gravitate towards the tempos, chord progressions and sounds that you like."

The construction of RJ's studio lends itself to his sonic coherence as well. The instruments he's collected are spread throughout the house like children who don't get along. Each one has a dedicated mic that lives with it and the cables are all routed through the walls into two, old RCA tube pre-amps that feed into Pro Tools. The stagnant state of his recording setup means he can't experiment with strange mic'ing techniques, but what he has works wonderfully, saves him time and means that each instrument has a signature sound. "The beauty of it is that I DJ'd before recording," he says. "I spent seven years focused on records, sound sources. I look at instruments the same way: sound sources to make the sounds I want for my writing."

The Colossus makes use of all the sounds RJ's discovered over the last 10 years. In fact, he looks at this record as a kind of overview of all the ways he's made music. Some songs are him playing the instruments, some are strictly sample-based, some are instrumentals and some have vocals. As he has with all his records, the track list jumps around in styles and feel while maintaining the unmistakable RJD2 sound. A bevy of MCs and instrumental guests are featured like Kenna, Aaron Livingston and Phonte Coleman. Ironic that it is on this album, his most collaborative yet, where he is leaving behind all the labels and going truly solo. RJ's Electrical Connections is his own homegrown label and in addition to releasing The Colossus, RJ is re-releasing all his old material (which he recently acquired the rights to).

We've watched as this DJ built his fan base and career from the ground up, slowly amassing the instruments and gear he needed to design and build a studio in his Philadelphia home, and now he has started his own record label. RJ stays relevant by throwing himself into the fray other artists try to keep their hands out of. This begs the question, is all the extra work worth it? As far as the label is concerned, he's not sure yet. "We won't know 'til later in the year," he says. The big advantage is owning the masters. It's not as lucrative in the immediate sense, but in the long run I'll make more money." He mentions that signing other artists is always a possibility, but he won't consider it until he's stable with his new company.

A lot of publicists could learn something from the way RJ's Electrical Connections is connecting with fans. Announcing the new label, he started a blog with weekly giveaways and a countdown to the album's release. He tweeted, held contests to get fans to tweet about his new album and got the word out that a tour was on the way so the Internet faithful could help spread the news. He thinks that, especially for smaller artists, the Internet has completely changed the art of promotion. "The old way of getting a street team out there doesn't fit with artists like me, especially in a short time scale and a small budget," he says. "It's just not worth it."

All in all, RJ is in a pretty good place right now. He's touring with the same band that accompanied him on the Third Hand tour, he's working on an instrumental version of The Colossus, he has several side-projects coming out, and he feels refreshed. Mixing his writing styles for The Colossus felt like a reawakening of his creative core and he's excited for the next step, whatever it may be. All that, and he has some advice for aspiring musicians out there. "Don't spend too much money getting into the system," he says. Instead, learn to do it yourself. "Budgets are shrinking and everything is downscaling, going more independent." Of course, he doesn't really need to say all that. We could just follow his example.

http://www.myspace.com/rjd2

Photographer: Ben Mistak and Dan McMahon