What Had Happened Was, the podcast from polymath Open Mike Eagle, will return for its fourth season featuring Questlove. Hosted on Mike’s own podcast network Stony Island Audio, new episodes drop weekly starting October 11th.
Each season Mike sits down with a single legendary creator in hip-hop to discuss their life, impact and legacy with untold anecdotes that range from bizarre, to humorous, to enlightening. In its inaugural season, Mike hosted the legendary rapper Prince Paul who recalled stories about working with everyone from RZA to MF DOOM to Chris Rock and of course his own projects De La Soul and Handsome Boy Modeling School. The podcast’s second season saw El-P and Mike delving into the rapper and producer’s storied career, examining topics ranging from his work with the hip-hop trio Company Flow, to the founding of Definitive Jux, to the seminal rap group Run the Jewels and more. Moving into the podcast’s third season, Mike hosts A&R executive and producer Dante Ross who unpacks his journey from working with Queen Latifah, MF DOOM, and his time as head of Elektra Records’ A&R division.
This is not Mike’s first foray into creative pursuits beyond the realm of music. As recently as this past month, Mike revealed that he wrote an episode of Apple TV+’s acclaimed adult animated show Strange Planet as well as voicing a character in the show. In 2019, he created and starred in the Comedy Central show The New Negroes along with Baron Vaughn, where the two blurred the lines between comedy and music with performances from comics like Sasheer Zamata, Chris Redd, and Hannibal Burress as well as music performances from Lizzo, Method Man, and Danny Brown amongst others.
This past August, Mike released his latest album, Another Triumph of Ghetto Engineering and took it on the road with a 15-date tour across North America. Paralleling themes Mike explores out of his work in music, Another Triumph of Ghetto Engineering is a sobering reflection on black creativity, specifically in the rap and hip-hop space, mixed with OME’s own personal experiences. Speaking on the album, he shares,
“In the ghetto we never stop toiling! These songs are all fancy ways of saying ‘fuck you’ to people that ignore us and ‘thank you’ to people that care if we live or die! Pay close attention to the song titles! This is another triumph of ghetto engineering!“
In 2022, the rapper released his critically-acclaimed album Component System with the Auto Reverse, which was praised by Pitchfork, “as the geographical and spiritual nexus of Chicago, New York, and Los Angeles, tracing a map of people and places that have shaped Eagle’s experience with hip-hop.”
Stay tuned for season four of What Had Happened Was and more from Open Mike Eagle coming soon.