Grammy Award-winning Queens producer Rockwilder has crafted hits for Redman, Method Man, Jay-Z, Janet Jackson, Erykah Badu, Busta Rhymes and Destiny's Child. In this week's 24 Hour Grind he gives his advice for aspiring producers while giving us a look at some of his favorite career moments.

Be As Original As You Can, Put Your Style & Your Heart Into Your Work
Try not to emulate anyone’s style, because that’s one of the things bringing the production world down, people imitating people’s sound to the point you don’t even know who is who anymore. So I would say be original. There is only one Pharrell, only one Timbaland, only one me, thank God, only one Kanye. Everybody has their certain lane but now it’s become a world of producers who all sound the same. As original as you make yourself to be, it gives you your own lane and provides a certain style for yourself. When you work with your style it makes it all good. I call some folks software producers and I hate them. They don’t have a soul, they are just emulating. A lot of times music doesn’t move the way it used to is because it doesn’t have the same soul behind it. The soul drives it, that’s why music from back in the day will be played forever, because there was passion and soul behind it. When a person played a horn he put his heart behind it, so forth and so on with every instrument. It’s just not the same when you are using software. All the Stevie Wonder songs will be played forever, these songs that are coming out now are not going to be played forever, they'll be played three months and then be gone. Everything is a 99 cent iTunes song now. People used to buy albums, they don’t do that anymore.

Greatest Moments in Rockwilder History:

Becoming Rockwilder/When I Got My Name
My girlfriend who pissed me off gave me the name. I wasn’t a producer at first, I was a rapper – I was supposed to be signed as an artist, so we were working on a demo. The night I was working on the demo, my girlfriend was told not to go to a party. At the time, the people I was signed to was trying to figure out a name, they were going between Goldie and something else. I was in the studio making this song, and back in the days you could do a good girl song and get away with it. So I was doing a song for my girl, after I finished the second verse I called her and her sister answered and said, “Kisha went to the party.” So when it came time to do my third verse it was real aggressive and hateful. So my partner stopped the track and was like 'What's wrong with you dog, you are attacking the track like some kind of rottweiler!' His girlfriend was in the studio and she kept calling me Rockwilder all night, saying, "Are you alright Rockwilder???" So I got the name Rockwilder because of the anger I felt for Kisha. She was like “You were really that upset that I went to that party?” and I was like “Yep, it’s how I got my name.”

So thanks to Kisha for giving me the name!