In another related posthumous big-up, this week on of my co-workers brought in a hip-hop producer picturebook book called “Behind the Beat”. Now this isn't just any old run-of-the-mill hip-hop picture book. Flipping through it, you get a great feel for the essences of the studios as subjects and the producers who work in them without that cheesy, gear-whore exhibitionist vibe.

At the end of the book, one of the last producers featured is J Dilla who sadly passed away several months ago after a long battle with lupus disease. Hauntingly, like the music video by Johnny Cash, shot just months before his death, these images of him in his studio were published in Behind the Beat (according to Amazon.com) last November, just months before his passing in early February 2006.