Apparently, Travis Barker doesn’t sleep. At all. Which is how he’s able to keep cranking out remixes while simultaneously working on a new Blink-182 record, his own solo album, and rehearsing for an upcoming show with none other than Slash (a November 22 benefit for the Los Angeles Youth Network). And that’s not even getting into his business ventures, or his role as a rock-and-roll dad.

“Yeah, I wake up at 6,” he laughed. “I’m a busy man, I guess.”


Seriously, the guy never rests. And as if you need further proof of this, check out his brand-new remix of Drake’s “Forever” (with video of Travis drumming), which Barker emailed to MTV News Wednesday (November 11) morning. It’s just the latest in a long line of hip hop tracks he’s remixed (earlier this year, he took a stab at Eminem’s gory “3 A.M.” and his take on Soulja Boy’s “Crank That” has already established itself as a YouTube staple), and it just proves that he can’t leave a good beat alone.

“This song gets played so much — whether it be on TV or on the radio or XM — and I think songs like this that you can’t escape, you start to get ideas in your head about how you’d want to flip it,” Barker said. “And this song is awesome; every verse is crazy. Who could ask for a better lineup as far as rappers? And everyone’s going in on their verse. So I was excited about it, I didn’t have to think twice about getting on it.”

Working strictly off an a cappella track, Barker crafted his “Forever” mix from the ground up, spending a week tinkering in the studio with his production partner, Sweatshop. The main goal, he said, was to build a drum line that matched the constantly shifting mood and tempo of the song, which famously features verses from Kanye West, Lil Wayne and Eminem, even if that meant showing a bit of restraint on the remix — something he’s not used to doing.

“Remixes are hard, because some of my critics will be like, ‘Trav, you shoulda gone bananas on it,’ but going bananas on it will sometimes take away from how cool a song is — it’s a happy medium,” he laughed. “With this one, I see a gradual crescendo — it just gets bigger and bigger and bigger, all the way up until the last chorus, where I crash out and there’s a big Phil Collins moment, with a drum-fill solo underneath Drake’s chorus. It was a tough one, man.”

So is Drake happy with the end result? Barker has no idea — seems Drizzy hasn’t even heard the remix yet. No one has. Until now, that is.

“No one’s heard this!” Barker said. “Actually, Marshall [Mathers, a.k.a. Eminem] heard it, and he loved it — but no one else has.”