Speaker 1: Quest Love Supreme is a production of iHeartRadio. This classic
Speaker 1: episode was produced by the team at Pandora.
Speaker 2: What up, y'all, it's unpaid bill Fromquest Love Supreme. As
Speaker 2: you may have seen throughout June, we are celebrating black
Speaker 2: music model by releasing an episode every day. So every
Speaker 2: day you added here especially picked QLs Classic, and on
Speaker 2: Wednesdays we are dropping new two part episodes with Wayne
Speaker 2: Brady and the legendary James Poyser, both of which were
Speaker 2: filmed in studio. Black music is deeply important to me
Speaker 2: and has been an influence throughout my entire career.
Speaker 3: It's also something to celebrated here at QLs.
Speaker 2: Back in twenty seventeen, we had Donnie Simpson on QLs,
Speaker 2: the Radio Hall of Fame inductee, spoke about his journey,
Speaker 2: his impact, and cultivating a personality that emphasized the power
Speaker 2: of broadcasting. We are so glad you're tuning in.
Speaker 3: Here we go.
Speaker 4: Supremo, Sun Supremo Row, Suprema Sun Supreme O, Row called
Speaker 4: Suprema something something, Supremo roll call some Prema.
Speaker 3: Some some Supreme roll.
Speaker 5: Cool Quest Yeah, Yeah, I Got soul, Yeah, Donnie Simpson
Speaker 5: Cool Yeah, Life Goals.
Speaker 4: Cora something Supremo, roll called Suprema something something Supremo roll.
Speaker 3: My name is Fante, Yeah, rocking your world.
Speaker 6: Yeah, when my hair gets dry, Yeah, I use Donny's
Speaker 6: Supercurl roll.
Speaker 7: Supremo roll Come, Supremath something Supremo roll call.
Speaker 3: My name is Sugar Yeah like Sugar Ray. Yeah, it's
Speaker 3: great to be here with a real DJ. Suprema Son
Speaker 3: something Supremo roll paid Bill. Yeah, I ain't got no problems. Yeah.
Speaker 2: Out out to North Korea and Dennis Rodmin.
Speaker 7: Pray Son Supprame A roll call Supreme Son Son Supreme.
Speaker 3: Roll is here. Yeah, not far from Mars. Yeah, shot
Speaker 3: for the Moon. Yeah, still among the stars.
Speaker 4: Roll call, Pray something Supreme A roll call suprameer some
Speaker 4: something Suprame roll.
Speaker 8: It's like and damn it, I'm hip. Yeah, Simpson in
Speaker 8: the place.
Speaker 9: Something something up. Roll call. My name is Donnie.
Speaker 10: Yeah.
Speaker 9: They called me green Eyes.
Speaker 11: Yeah.
Speaker 9: If I could finish this rap, yeah that would be
Speaker 9: a surprise.
Speaker 7: So Pray s Sun Up Brave A roll call, so
Speaker 7: Pray sup Prame A roll call Supramo, roll Suppramo Son
Speaker 7: so Supreme.
Speaker 5: People out, So you quite audible with telling you you're
Speaker 5: gonna say Donnie Simpsons year right.
Speaker 8: I'm not said written down?
Speaker 3: Okay, run anyway.
Speaker 5: Anyway, ladies and gentlemen, welcome to another episode of Quest Love.
Speaker 3: I'm your host, chuss Love.
Speaker 9: Uh.
Speaker 3: We have teams Supreme with us. Uh like you in
Speaker 3: the place sees love in the house.
Speaker 5: Yeah, Quest Love is always in the house. Sugar Steve
Speaker 5: is here. We got fun take alo uh unpaid Bill?
Speaker 9: Yeah, Hey, how you doing.
Speaker 3: I'm happy to be back.
Speaker 5: You've been so quiet that last few and I'm so
Speaker 5: glad that you're here.
Speaker 3: And bost Bill's here as well.
Speaker 11: Uh.
Speaker 3: I will say that every culture UH needs a pioneer,
Speaker 3: and our guest today is beyond pioneer. For thirty years his.
Speaker 5: Morning show and WPGC the Doninice Simpson Morning Shows trail
Speaker 5: Blazed and dumb wonders for the culture of soul and
Speaker 5: R and B. And I guess you could say that
Speaker 5: he's attained god status in the eyes of all of
Speaker 5: us in this room for seventeen years as the host
Speaker 5: of Ola La Video Soul norn BT, which practically gave
Speaker 5: the world its first view of artists like Whitney, Houston
Speaker 5: and Usher. You've done in depth conversations with greats like
Speaker 5: Aretha Franklin, anybody from the Purple Camp that I've not
Speaker 5: seen on any other networks.
Speaker 3: Jesse Johnson, Yes, Jesse.
Speaker 5: I mean the time, the list goes on and on,
Speaker 5: and he's just known for his his his grace, his
Speaker 5: his his knowledge of music. I mean, do you imagine
Speaker 5: that once upon a time there were hosts of radio
Speaker 5: shows and video shows.
Speaker 3: That actually had knowledge of the music. And yeah, that's
Speaker 3: who would have thought.
Speaker 5: That's that's a novel that's sadly missed right now. But
Speaker 5: more than anything, this this episode will probably be a
Speaker 5: masterclass on how to host.
Speaker 3: Such so you can use Yeah, it would sound like
Speaker 3: an amateur my favorite. Please welcome Dottie Simpson to ourself.
Speaker 9: Thank you, well, thank you, thank you, quest love appreciate
Speaker 9: you bro.
Speaker 3: Yo, he just said name.
Speaker 5: Of of all the episodes, this is probably the one
Speaker 5: that I will be the most nervous because I mean,
Speaker 5: I we all grew up with his voice and always
Speaker 5: a Managine the day that we have an opportunity. I
Speaker 5: never thought that my first time sitting with Donnie Simpson
Speaker 5: would be on your show, not this show.
Speaker 9: Well, I'm honored to be here man, I really am.
Speaker 9: This is awesome. Man. I'm a big fan of yours.
Speaker 3: Bro.
Speaker 5: I yeah, I know it sounds like false honesty whenever
Speaker 5: I say like, I can't believe you.
Speaker 3: Know I'm alive, But I mean that's really.
Speaker 9: Oh for really man, mad respect for you, Thank you,
Speaker 9: thank you, thank you, and a lot of people in
Speaker 9: this room, not all of them, but a lot of
Speaker 9: sorry that.
Speaker 3: He shut you down.
Speaker 5: So you're you're actually I know that we're lucky to
Speaker 5: have you today because you are going to induct uh
Speaker 5: your friends tonight.
Speaker 9: Well I'm not actually inducting them. I'm just there, sport, Yeah,
Speaker 9: just there in support.
Speaker 3: It's amazing.
Speaker 5: Yes, I know that no one is a bigger fan
Speaker 5: of Jimmy dam and Terry Lewis and the Time Family been.
Speaker 9: Oh no doubt you are.
Speaker 3: Even to this day. I still watch your interviews on
Speaker 3: YouTube with those guys.
Speaker 9: And yeah, man, and those are my toughest interviews too.
Speaker 9: It's funny because yeah, because they were we were boys.
Speaker 9: You know, we're so close. So my toughest interview you
Speaker 9: mentioned Sugar Ray Leonard, Sugar Ray Leonard, Jimmy jam and
Speaker 9: Terry Lewis and Smoky like those really boys always the
Speaker 9: toughest interviews because you know, you know them so well,
Speaker 9: and then all of a sudden you're in this formal setting.
Speaker 9: You know, you got to ask questions, and they're like,
Speaker 9: well you're asking me that. You know that, But it's
Speaker 9: just weird to me.
Speaker 5: It's like those are your especially when you when you
Speaker 5: did the I think the Pandemonium interview back in like
Speaker 5: nineteen ninety.
Speaker 3: One, yeah time.
Speaker 5: Yeah, like that was the first time where you know,
Speaker 5: normally there's there's a cool demeanor about you, but then
Speaker 5: like I saw you just as the Billy Press into
Speaker 5: their beatles, like the Times. Wow, it was just like, oh, well,
Speaker 5: Donnie Simpsons just like he's one of the one of
Speaker 5: the crew, and he was on the records.
Speaker 9: That's yeah, that's right, the Pandemonium malvel Wow, that's right. Well,
Speaker 9: you know, that's very flattering to say that. And I
Speaker 9: remember when they got their starring the Hollywood Walk of Fame,
Speaker 9: they said, man, all day long, all we kept saying
Speaker 9: was just one person missing man, you know, and that
Speaker 9: just you know what an honor. I mean, it wasn't me,
Speaker 9: it was Billy Preston, but no, but you know, we
Speaker 9: we are We're just friends like that. That that day
Speaker 9: that we recorded that show, before we recorded it, Uh,
Speaker 9: Jimmy and Terry set me down at the board in
Speaker 9: the studio and they're playing the album for me, the
Speaker 9: Pandemonia malvel So I'm sitting there and the intro comes on,
Speaker 9: and you know, I do the intro. I'm doing this
Speaker 9: intro and I'm sitting there like, how wait, what wait?
Speaker 9: That's my voice? How did I can figure it out?
Speaker 9: How they got me to do this introduction that I
Speaker 9: didn't record. And what happened was that they had lifted
Speaker 9: it from like five or six years prior to that.
Speaker 9: I went to present them, just to introduce them at
Speaker 9: the Minneapolis Black Musicians Awards shown and uh, and they
Speaker 9: lifted it from that and used it as the intro
Speaker 9: for the album. Man, I just it was just what
Speaker 9: an honor to open up, to open up for the time.
Speaker 5: That's right, because they briefly when Mars did fish Nets.
Speaker 5: I guess they briefly reunited as the time for that.
Speaker 5: Were you actually introducing them back in eighty seven as
Speaker 5: a full unit or were they just going on to
Speaker 5: get an a warld.
Speaker 9: Wow in eighty Yeah, that was a full unit. Then, yeah,
Speaker 9: that was the time that was everybody before Fishnet. As
Speaker 9: a matter of fact, fish Net was a part of
Speaker 9: that show that you're talking about. I think that I
Speaker 9: think we introduced that then.
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, yeah, man.
Speaker 6: There's a video on YouTube of you and the studio
Speaker 6: with them and they were playing the track for fish Net.
Speaker 3: Is that right? Yeah, yeah, they were, They were in
Speaker 3: the studio together. That that was a few years earlier though.
Speaker 9: The song was so hot. Man.
Speaker 5: So you know you're those that know you well know
Speaker 5: of your love affair with music. But yeah, where did
Speaker 5: it start? Where did your what was your childhood into you?
Speaker 5: As far as your relationship with music.
Speaker 9: I was always around music from the time I was twelve. Well, actually,
Speaker 9: I'll say even earlier than that. I remember when we
Speaker 9: got our first record player, and the first record we
Speaker 9: got was The Drifters Save the Last Dance for Me,
Speaker 9: and we would play that thing over. It is the
Speaker 9: only record we had, so we played it.
Speaker 12: Over and over.
Speaker 9: Forty five yep, forty five and big was the household?
Speaker 9: Oh it was six kids. I had a five boys,
Speaker 9: one girl, my mom and dad, and so it was
Speaker 9: eight in a little tiny house.
Speaker 8: Man.
Speaker 9: We had two bedroom house. Mom and dad had a bedroom,
Speaker 9: my sister had a bedroom. Boys were upstairs. It was
Speaker 9: like army bears up there lined up. Man, I'm telling you,
Speaker 9: but you know, but my mother decided to open a
Speaker 9: record shop when she when I was twelve, and so
Speaker 9: I worked in that record shop from the time I
Speaker 9: was twelve. So it was always around music, you know.
Speaker 9: I knew when music came out, the day it came out,
Speaker 9: you know, everything. And then we used to have a
Speaker 9: little contest between each other. We go, all right, so
Speaker 9: what do you think this is going to do? I said,
Speaker 9: you know, I think it'll go number one R and B,
Speaker 9: top ten pop, you know. And I would be right
Speaker 9: all the time. Man, I would always be able to
Speaker 9: predict them, you know. And I this other thing, And
Speaker 9: I don't know if it's like I don't maybe it's
Speaker 9: not psychic. Maybe it's just from experience of knowing people.
Speaker 9: But I could see you coming across the street to
Speaker 9: the record shop, and I'd go to the shelf and
Speaker 9: pull off, say three songs and guarantee that they would
Speaker 9: ask for those three, you know, and not two of
Speaker 9: the three, but all three, you know. I would do
Speaker 9: it all the time record with that. It was really good,
Speaker 9: really good. Really?
Speaker 3: So what city is this? Detroit from you were born?
Speaker 9: So I grew up under Motown? Said wow, so don't
Speaker 9: I'm not even can't even give Mama's Record Shop credit
Speaker 9: for that. That's going back to the Motown Review, you know,
Speaker 9: living there in Detroit under Motown with the temps. Man,
Speaker 9: you know, I remember as a kid man, I used
Speaker 9: to watch every Cadillac that went by, hoping you're gonna
Speaker 9: see David Ruffman one of the Tempts, are some smoky
Speaker 9: or one of their cousins would have just been just
Speaker 9: just cool anybody man related. Sitting at the Motown Review,
Speaker 9: my wife Pam is here with me, and she can
Speaker 9: she remembers that so well. We would go down there, man,
Speaker 9: I mean five shows a day with the Temptations, four
Speaker 9: top supremes, Bobby Taylor to Vancouver's junior Walker, Smokey Robinson.
Speaker 9: It was just endless, you know. So to grow up
Speaker 9: under that, how could you not have a love for music, man,
Speaker 9: you know? And so I was just always in that.
Speaker 9: When I was fifteen, this radio station there, WJLB, had
Speaker 9: a group that called the WJLB Sol Teen reporters. One
Speaker 9: student from each public school came in once a week
Speaker 9: recorded a little sixty second spiel about what was going
Speaker 9: on at their school. We'd beat Pershing High last week,
Speaker 9: fifty four to fifty two, cap and gown measurements of Friday,
Speaker 9: the Lovers of the Week ad and the number one
Speaker 9: song is you know that kind of thing.
Speaker 3: So I thought it was the upfront. I was like, wow.
Speaker 9: So they had asked me to do that for my school,
Speaker 9: and so I kind of wasn't interested at first, but
Speaker 9: finally my mother one day had a live broadcast with
Speaker 9: a local DJ who came out and did his show
Speaker 9: from there from the record store. And man, I went
Speaker 9: into that booth and saw him doing his thing, man
Speaker 9: and he's sitting here patting his foot to the music
Speaker 9: man and grooving, And I was like, man, I could
Speaker 9: do that, you know. And that was the very day
Speaker 9: I fell in love with radio that I said, I'm
Speaker 9: going to do that, And so I went and joined
Speaker 9: the reporters, and in the I got so popular from
Speaker 9: these little sixty second things that ran once maybe twice
Speaker 9: a day, that I was more popular than the DJs
Speaker 9: because I was his kid with a heavy voice.
Speaker 3: You know.
Speaker 9: And so they started putting me on on weekends for
Speaker 9: three hours on Saturday, and that lasted for about two months.
Speaker 9: They fired a guy who did eight to midnight weeknights
Speaker 9: and asked me to sit in for him for one
Speaker 9: week to give them time to find somebody else. I
Speaker 9: sat there for seven and a half.
Speaker 8: Years, a teenager with a radio job.
Speaker 9: Oh yeah, I mean I couldn't even do my whole
Speaker 9: show live because I couldn't work past ten thirty, you know.
Speaker 9: So I used to go in after school.
Speaker 3: Yeah, so you've had that golden voice since you were
Speaker 3: a teenager, since.
Speaker 9: My voice changed between the summer between seventh and eighth grade.
Speaker 9: And I remember well because I was in the choir. Man,
Speaker 9: I was the only male first soprano, which I love
Speaker 9: because I sat with the girls. Next time I come
Speaker 9: back and I'm this baritone, you know. But yeah, so,
Speaker 9: I mean, so you know, I was really blessed to
Speaker 9: have a start like that. Man, it was just it
Speaker 9: was just heaven sent.
Speaker 3: So for you, was it always radio aspirations? Did you
Speaker 3: have music? Like did you want to maybe be a
Speaker 3: singer or.
Speaker 9: I still want to be a singer, but I don't
Speaker 9: think I'm gonna make this. Will tell you, she tells
Speaker 9: you two things. He ain't no singer, and he ain't
Speaker 9: no rocket scientist.
Speaker 3: No no.
Speaker 9: But I mean, you know, I've always felt that anyone
Speaker 9: who doesn't sing wants to sing or wants to be
Speaker 9: a musician. As a matter of fact, I said, this
Speaker 9: is my part of my induction speech when I was
Speaker 9: inducted in the Rhythm and Blues Music Hall of Fame,
Speaker 9: which was I said, this is just such an honor
Speaker 9: for me because I've always felt that musicians always the
Speaker 9: cooler people in the room, respect, questlove.
Speaker 3: You know, you're definitely learned from you.
Speaker 9: I offered as advice, I mean, as as proof. Prince
Speaker 9: appearing at the Oscars, So you got the biggest stars
Speaker 9: in the movie stars forty fifty million dollars a movie
Speaker 9: Prince walked on that stage. They were like little girls,
Speaker 9: you know, musicians man. And I said, you know, for
Speaker 9: one night, y'all, let me in your group, you know,
Speaker 9: And I appreciate that, just for one night. I could
Speaker 9: never be I just always wanted to be cool enough
Speaker 9: to be a musician. I just I just ain't gonna
Speaker 9: make it.
Speaker 5: So did you have formal training when you finally started
Speaker 5: to do this radio because most people they'll go to
Speaker 5: artf programs in their colleges to learn how to you know,
Speaker 5: do upfront and be prepared.
Speaker 3: We're going to put you to the test on that back. Yeah,
Speaker 3: So you was it a learning curve where you just
Speaker 3: had to learn on the spot how to do these things?
Speaker 9: Or well, it's you know, I started so young. I
Speaker 9: mean I did go to school eventually. I mean I
Speaker 9: was in school or in high school, but I went
Speaker 9: to college and studied radio and TV also. But I
Speaker 9: was already doing it. I mean, you know, I mean
Speaker 9: I was one of the most popular DJs in Detroit
Speaker 9: and here I am going to college. It was like
Speaker 9: the experience. Nothing beats that, and you know that nothing
Speaker 9: beats doing it, and so you know, I think it
Speaker 9: was just kind of a natural, god given gift that
Speaker 9: I had, and you know, they certainly taught me how
Speaker 9: to develop it. Like in school, I learned how to
Speaker 9: use my diaphragm, you know, those exercises like singers, you know,
Speaker 9: because I remember, yeah, I remember my teacher coming up
Speaker 9: to me in college one day. He walked up behind
Speaker 9: me and he said, and I didn't know he was there.
Speaker 9: He says, So, Donnie, how come you always talk like
Speaker 9: this and hall? Because I'm a brother, That's how we
Speaker 9: talk in the hall. But he's you know, he taught
Speaker 9: me that you have to use your diaphragm, that you
Speaker 9: you know, it's like a backhand in tennis. You got
Speaker 9: to practice it so much that is second nature, that
Speaker 9: that is the way you talk, and that you can
Speaker 9: still be cool and talk from here. You don't have
Speaker 9: to talk from here to be cool.
Speaker 3: You know. Have you ever interviewed Barry White?
Speaker 9: Oh yeah, Oh my god, I love Barry.
Speaker 5: Anybody ever seen interview Barry White will suddenly find themselves
Speaker 5: trying to.
Speaker 9: No, man, I love my little boys too much. I'm
Speaker 9: trying to get down there with beer.
Speaker 3: Okay.
Speaker 5: So this is whenever, whenever we have anyone that has
Speaker 5: a notable radio experience on the show. Uh huh, we
Speaker 5: asked them to front celle or back sell of song.
Speaker 5: I'm pretty no, I.
Speaker 3: Don't even want to.
Speaker 9: He'll know he just ang hit it.
Speaker 3: Okay.
Speaker 5: Now see, now I got to pick this the perfect
Speaker 5: song with either a short into or long into or
Speaker 5: middle intro.
Speaker 3: What should I do? I think a long intro.
Speaker 8: But longs are easy, just so they're easier.
Speaker 3: But no, but what if it's.
Speaker 5: But if it's very wide extasy next, that's a one
Speaker 5: minute minute. That's a woman in six Temptations.
Speaker 9: Papa was rolling Stone's to sixteen, so Jock worked for
Speaker 9: me to actually hit that post once really to sixteen?
Speaker 3: Like, man, So wait a minute.
Speaker 5: If if there is long space in the front, are
Speaker 5: you expected to fill every last ounce in?
Speaker 9: I don't think so. Well. You know that's interesting because
Speaker 9: I think most radio people feel that you do.
Speaker 13: Uh.
Speaker 9: But to me, I love music so much that sometimes
Speaker 9: the music should you talk all over? Love's Theme by
Speaker 9: Barry White and the Love and the Orchestra. No, I mean,
Speaker 9: you know, some of the music is so beautiful. It's
Speaker 9: vocal in itself, you know what I mean. It's it's
Speaker 9: you know, it has a moment where it's the intro
Speaker 9: is over, song is started.
Speaker 3: Okay, yeah, are you ready for your I think so listen,
Speaker 3: here we go.
Speaker 9: Oh it's magic onetle two point three. You're listening to
Speaker 9: Dottie Simpson hanging out with Questlove. Weve got my boys
Speaker 9: on the stage now, man, these dudes do it right.
Speaker 9: Let's gonna get hot in here not hot enough norse
Speaker 9: to sweat. You know, he doesn't sweat, He just kind
Speaker 9: of SATs a kiss.
Speaker 3: So does this also mean that you have to study
Speaker 3: the song? Yeah, as in you.
Speaker 5: I mean when you went at the at the at
Speaker 5: the height of you being immersed inside of your your
Speaker 5: your radio days, would you pick a designated day to
Speaker 5: just study all the songs?
Speaker 3: Definitely?
Speaker 9: Not, definitely not. No, would never study. It's just knowing it.
Speaker 9: It's just appreciating it. I know it because I love it.
Speaker 3: I see. You know.
Speaker 9: No, I've never studied songs. You thought, Wow, sit there
Speaker 9: with a stop watch. This is eighteen seconds. You just
Speaker 9: feel it, you know, you just know, you know, you
Speaker 9: know where the song is.
Speaker 3: My songs usually have like a four bar eight bar
Speaker 3: or whatever intro.
Speaker 11: Okay, all right, I see if you write it too,
Speaker 11: it's a rhythm thing because that's what you were just doing.
Speaker 8: You were writing it, Yeah, like a musician. So again,
Speaker 8: like a musician.
Speaker 3: Oh man, you wanted to make sure. So I will
Speaker 3: say that Detroit is also.
Speaker 5: A very unusual town as far as music culture is concerned,
Speaker 5: because of their appreciation for other cultures as well. You know,
Speaker 5: at one point I knew that, Uh, I forget that
Speaker 5: the Jay gile Bands song that that was like number
Speaker 5: two on a particular station up there.
Speaker 9: I used to play, used to it was all kinds
Speaker 9: of stuff about jailes.
Speaker 3: So what was it that made such a black city
Speaker 3: so open to.
Speaker 5: Gary knew the talking heads or fail out or like
Speaker 5: just because I would look up old playlists from all
Speaker 5: their radio stations up there, and.
Speaker 3: It was endless. There were no boundaries on what was
Speaker 3: black music.
Speaker 9: Right. I don't. I can't. I wish I could tell
Speaker 9: you why we are that way, But I was always
Speaker 9: that way, man, love, you know, and I feel like this,
Speaker 9: you know for radio program directors or programmers that you know,
Speaker 9: radio people feel that people's ears are a lot narrower
Speaker 9: than they are. You know, people like different things, man,
Speaker 9: And you know, I mean growing up in Detroit, I
Speaker 9: mean I played I played all that stuff on the radio, man,
Speaker 9: Without doubt, the biggest moment in my radio career was
Speaker 9: breaking Benny and the Jets by Elton John. I've been
Speaker 9: sitting around with my boy, man, he's turning me on
Speaker 9: to Elton, right, And so I kept this went on
Speaker 9: for a week, man, I said, Man, I love this song,
Speaker 9: Benny and the Jets, man, And but I was scared
Speaker 9: to play it because you know, black folks didn't really
Speaker 9: know Elton, you know. And so finally I said, Man, Claude,
Speaker 9: I'm playing this song, and I played it.
Speaker 11: Man.
Speaker 9: I played it twice that night, and I played it
Speaker 9: the second time because the phone was jumping off the
Speaker 9: hook from the first time. I'd never seen anything like
Speaker 9: it before or since. It was so instant. The next morning,
Speaker 9: the morning DJ calls me at home, wakes me up
Speaker 9: at seven thirty, Donnie, what is this song you played
Speaker 9: last night, Jitny and the Nets or something. Man, you
Speaker 9: got to bring that down here. We got to play
Speaker 9: it so fast that in two days Elton was on
Speaker 9: the phone really from London called wanted to know what's
Speaker 9: going on here. Benny and the Jets is breaking black
Speaker 9: in Detroit.
Speaker 3: You know.
Speaker 9: He comes to Detroit four or five months later to
Speaker 9: present me with a gold record for I mean, and
Speaker 9: this is at the height of his career. Man, this
Speaker 9: is you know, man, that just turned me out. Man.
Speaker 9: It was just it was amazing. Man, It was just
Speaker 9: an amazing moment. And always use it, especially now when
Speaker 9: I tell that story. It's important because it saddens me
Speaker 9: that there are young people in radio now with good
Speaker 9: ears that can't express themselves musically. You know, sad to me, man,
Speaker 9: you should be able to have a moment like that
Speaker 9: to come in. I mean, DJ, I'm supposed to be
Speaker 9: turning you on the music so it is understood.
Speaker 11: And then whatever radio station you go to that you
Speaker 11: have that some kind of freedom in that way where
Speaker 11: you can play what you you.
Speaker 3: Can take out in that way.
Speaker 8: Okay, you have freedom to play whatever.
Speaker 11: Absolutely, that's care because that's amazing because it's.
Speaker 5: The programming director that was ringing the emergency line. Like
Speaker 5: I'm certain every radio station has that, the red phone.
Speaker 3: Whatever they do.
Speaker 9: Man, bro, you can get me starting.
Speaker 3: Are you playing Princess Dirty? Like I'm just saying like.
Speaker 9: They don't they know not to bother me with that.
Speaker 9: I mean, I just you know, And I don't mean
Speaker 9: that to sound vain. I think that I just you know,
Speaker 9: they know that that's the only way I can work.
Speaker 9: I'm not going to do this if you're going to
Speaker 9: tell me how to do me, I can only do
Speaker 9: me and uh and if it works. I told in
Speaker 9: a negotiation for this return of mine. I said, Look,
Speaker 9: it got caught up in a while, and I just
Speaker 9: finally said, look, let's make it real simple. I do
Speaker 9: what I do. If it doesn't work, you tell me,
Speaker 9: I take my records and go home. You don't have
Speaker 9: to boun the rest of the contract. Nothing. I'm just gone,
Speaker 9: all right, Oh, I mean, you know, I just I
Speaker 9: have to have that kind of freedom.
Speaker 3: Man.
Speaker 9: You know, I'm a look out the window kind of guy. Man,
Speaker 9: how does the day feel? You know, because it's a
Speaker 9: spirit that connects us all man. A computer can't do that.
Speaker 9: You can't tell me that this song works today, this
Speaker 9: day feels a certain way. I used to get it
Speaker 9: when I did the Morning show Man once an hour,
Speaker 9: I would get out and walk around the building just
Speaker 9: to smell it. I need to smell the day, you know.
Speaker 9: And I know it may sound strange to people, you know,
Speaker 9: and you gotta have that to me, you know. And
Speaker 9: as far as like calling jocks, you know, I programmed
Speaker 9: WKYS in Washington for twelve years. I mean, and you
Speaker 9: talk about a meteoric rise, I mean, and I didn't
Speaker 9: even I kind of bumped into it. I wasn't trying
Speaker 9: to program. I never wanted to program. I just wanted
Speaker 9: to be a jock. But station was in sixteenth place.
Speaker 9: We were losing so badly, and they said, what's wrong
Speaker 9: with the station? I told him what I felt about it.
Speaker 9: I said, well will you do that?
Speaker 3: Wow?
Speaker 9: Yeah, okay, I mean I felt like I can at
Speaker 9: least do better than sixteenth. Man, we went from sixteenth
Speaker 9: to number one and nine months, you know, and it
Speaker 9: was just with feel, you know. I you know, I
Speaker 9: don't have anything against research. Research is cool as long
Speaker 9: as you use it. Don't let it use you. You know,
Speaker 9: It's just another tool if you want to use it.
Speaker 9: But I remember this programmer coming to me once had
Speaker 9: done this big research project, payed like sixty five gram
Speaker 9: to research all these songs, and he came to me
Speaker 9: and he said, man, can do you know what the
Speaker 9: number one song tested for us was? Said Marvin Gay,
Speaker 9: Let's get it on. How did you know that? I
Speaker 9: was like, I'm a brother, I live, this dog ain't
Speaker 9: on safari, you know. So, but you know, when I
Speaker 9: was programming, I wanted to just bring this up to
Speaker 9: because it's you know, and and I certainly don't mean
Speaker 9: to come off like I'm like chastising programmers. But you
Speaker 9: know when I programmed Man Hotline hot you would it
Speaker 9: would never ring. I never once called one of my
Speaker 9: jocks during the middle of his show to tell him
Speaker 9: something was that was bad. Hell, I know you know what,
Speaker 9: you know what you did it. You know it's bad
Speaker 9: more than I do. Why would I call you at
Speaker 9: that moment? Sacrifice the last two hours of your show
Speaker 9: for the first two that just and and then bigger
Speaker 9: than that is that. What happens is that then you
Speaker 9: start talking to me because you're afraid of me. You're
Speaker 9: to that phone ringing. I don't want you talking to me.
Speaker 9: I ain't got nothing to do with this. Talk to
Speaker 9: the audience. Man, This is about y'all. You know that's
Speaker 9: and I gave my jocks freedom, you know, I just
Speaker 9: I'm old school like that. Man, bring your records, man,
Speaker 9: do you think you know? Just express You'll be amazed
Speaker 9: at the performance you get from people when you entrust them,
Speaker 9: when you let them do what they do, when their
Speaker 9: name is on it instead of just them representing you.
Speaker 3: It's like you hired them for a reason.
Speaker 9: That's what you hired them for, right.
Speaker 11: Let them go, man, because this way of thought is
Speaker 11: not very prevalent right now, have you ever I mean,
Speaker 11: I know it's another burden, but have you ever considered ownership?
Speaker 9: Yeah? I used to think about it. We had looked
Speaker 9: at it a long time ago, and god, radio stations
Speaker 9: had gotten so expensive then it was just kind of crazy.
Speaker 9: But you know, I don't know that it's a business
Speaker 9: that I would be that interested in now.
Speaker 4: You know.
Speaker 9: It's uh, you know, the dollars have dried up to
Speaker 9: great degree, as you know, I mean with everything that
Speaker 9: is that advertising based model, radio, television, print, those dollars
Speaker 9: have gone to the internet, you know. So it's a
Speaker 9: different day, you know, and radio and TV are lucky
Speaker 9: most of them are just suffering pay cuts, print shutting
Speaker 9: their doors, you know. I mean it's a different day.
Speaker 9: So you know, No, I don't have that level of
Speaker 9: interest in it now.
Speaker 5: No, speaking of the uh you're breaking Elton John and
Speaker 5: bending the jets. What were some of the other notable
Speaker 5: artists that you had a first thing like, I feel
Speaker 5: like this person's the next one.
Speaker 9: Well, I had a I have a gold record at
Speaker 9: home that says thank you for being the first to
Speaker 9: play Whitney Houston. You give good lack.
Speaker 3: I literally only pulled that out there.
Speaker 9: Oh I thought you knew that.
Speaker 5: No, I was just I was like, oh, I know
Speaker 5: you gave Whitney Houston what I saw her very when
Speaker 5: she first came to Video Soul.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I remember that interview.
Speaker 9: But remember Shade first interview with Shade, her first interview
Speaker 9: I think I know in America, if not on television period,
Speaker 9: was with me. You know, So you know I you know,
Speaker 9: I certainly don't want to sound like I started all
Speaker 9: of these careers.
Speaker 3: This is why you're here. This is a masterclass.
Speaker 14: Seriously, there's a lot of artists that we probably wouldn't
Speaker 14: know about if we hadn't seen them on Video Souls.
Speaker 3: You know, you introducing them to us. So you are
Speaker 3: a very important part. Well, you know, it's thank you,
Speaker 3: and you're allowed to seat your own horn.
Speaker 9: No, and I wont, but it's it's it's so flat.
Speaker 9: I had Big Daddy Kane on my radio show yesterday
Speaker 9: and he was telling me. He says, man, I just
Speaker 9: want to thank you for the first time I was
Speaker 9: on Video Soul. Man, he said, I was so nervous. Man,
Speaker 9: I couldn't believe it. But he said, what blew me
Speaker 9: away was that I came in there, man, and you
Speaker 9: treated me like all the other artists. You treated me
Speaker 9: with respect, and I thought it would be just like,
Speaker 9: you know, all right, we got this rapper in here.
Speaker 9: Let's get the rap thing out.
Speaker 3: Of the way, he said.
Speaker 9: And it was just so different, you know, which blew
Speaker 9: me away that he thought I would treat him, you know,
Speaker 9: as I told him on the area yesterday. I said,
Speaker 9: kin man, if President Obama walked through this door right
Speaker 9: now or the janitor, they're gonna get the same level
Speaker 9: of love and respect for me. Believe that, you know so.
Speaker 9: But it's always fascinating to me that so many artists
Speaker 9: come up to you and tell you what you meant
Speaker 9: to their careers.
Speaker 11: You know.
Speaker 9: I remember going to see New Addition one night. This
Speaker 9: is twenty five years ago. No, not new Addition, I'm sorry,
Speaker 9: new kids, not that new kids on the block boys.
Speaker 3: Men.
Speaker 9: So I go backstage and they go, oh my god,
Speaker 9: Donnie's here, look at it. What's the date? April whatever?
Speaker 9: One of nineteen eighty seven. They all knew the date.
Speaker 9: They came on Video Soul. It was that significant to them,
Speaker 9: you know.
Speaker 3: Oh married, don't you week? Acapella? They were the team
Speaker 3: better than me.
Speaker 5: Wait only okay, because I was in the Motown Philly video.
Speaker 5: So even me and my parents were like sitting there
Speaker 5: with a VCR open, like like the video is going
Speaker 5: to come on because this is the first time that
Speaker 5: I'm seeing the video, Like, yeah, no, that was And
Speaker 5: we all went to high school together, so that that
Speaker 5: was like a moment like someone from my homeroom classes
Speaker 5: that still it was me two thousand and thirty five cents,
Speaker 5: thank you.
Speaker 3: Uh you know is legit like on on Video Soul?
Speaker 9: Yeah, it meant something to sit on that couch, you know,
Speaker 9: and uh, that's that's that's flattering. That's really an awesome thing.
Speaker 3: How so, well, I want to ease intwo video sol.
Speaker 5: How did how are you convinced uh to Well, you
Speaker 5: didn't totally abandon radio when you did video solo?
Speaker 3: Oh no, you did both. But did you figure that?
Speaker 5: Okay, it's time for the black version of MTV too,
Speaker 5: uh to come to fruition and I want to be
Speaker 5: a part of history.
Speaker 9: Now, Well, this has not happened. I mean, it wasn't
Speaker 9: my creation. I got a call from Bob Johnson asking
Speaker 9: me or actually was Jeff Lee his right hand man said,
Speaker 9: we're starting this show called Video Soul, and we liked
Speaker 9: for you to host it. At the time, I was
Speaker 9: still doing radio, of course, but I was also I
Speaker 9: just started doing TV locally in DC. For the last
Speaker 9: two years, I was a sports anchor George Michael, Yeah
Speaker 9: Michael backup for George Michael Sports much Machine. So you know, so, yeah,
Speaker 9: it was cool. I mean, I enjoyed that, but I
Speaker 9: like music, you know, sports is not what I do.
Speaker 3: So anyway, thank you, go ahead.
Speaker 15: So sports that you're thinking, that's actually how how I
Speaker 15: know you. I went to school down in College Park,
Speaker 15: Maryland in late eighties, early nineties, so I was watching
Speaker 15: the George Michael Sports Oh Wow.
Speaker 3: Cool dream Machine Sports sports Machine sports legend Donnie Simpson. Yeah.
Speaker 9: So so anyway, they said, wanted me to do this show,
Speaker 9: and I'll be very honest with you, my first answer
Speaker 9: was no. You know, no, I didn't want to do it.
Speaker 9: I've always been very careful about what I get involved
Speaker 9: in because all I have to sell is image, you know,
Speaker 9: so I'm very protective of that. You know, it's got
Speaker 9: to be right. And b e T in its infancy
Speaker 9: wasn't a pretty baby. Yeah, right, exactly, exactly right. So
Speaker 9: I didn't want to do that, but I thought about
Speaker 9: it for two days and then finally the bottom line
Speaker 9: became this, that this is our first black television network.
Speaker 9: If you have something to offer it, you have to
Speaker 9: do that.
Speaker 3: Period.
Speaker 9: Let's go. And so I'm glad I did.
Speaker 11: Man.
Speaker 9: I mean it was, uh, you know, it was amazing.
Speaker 9: When we first started, we were in one and a
Speaker 9: half million homes. When I left, that number was like
Speaker 9: forty five million. You know, now it's like one hundred
Speaker 9: or something. I mean, it's just crazy, you know. And uh,
Speaker 9: you know, it put me in black houses all across
Speaker 9: this country, you know, just.
Speaker 3: Like you know about your radio career.
Speaker 9: I just yeah, most people around the don't get shocked
Speaker 9: when they find out how do radio? Yeah, but uh yeah,
Speaker 9: but you know it was really something special. Man, it
Speaker 9: was uh you know. Uh, Terry Lewis we were talking
Speaker 9: about it recently and he was saying how that I
Speaker 9: was just telling him about the love and respect that
Speaker 9: I get and how it just blows me away, you
Speaker 9: know every time, and uh, he says, it's because you
Speaker 9: mean something to people. You know, that you represented a
Speaker 9: time when music was fun. You know, the videos were
Speaker 9: fun and all of that. You know, it was clean, fun,
Speaker 9: you know, and you represent that time. It's like, well,
Speaker 9: I've never thought about it like that, but you know.
Speaker 3: It's uh.
Speaker 9: I remember one night the VH one did a series
Speaker 9: called Black in the eighties, and then he had interviewed
Speaker 9: me for it, and so they told me there's coming on.
Speaker 9: So I watched it that night. It was an hour
Speaker 9: long and the first fifteen minutes they did Brian Gumbele,
Speaker 9: the first black to host the early morning national television show.
Speaker 9: Then they did or Senil Hall, first black to host
Speaker 9: a late night talk show. Then they did Cosby The
Speaker 9: Cosby Show, and first black TV show where the mother
Speaker 9: and dad were doctor and a lawyer, not a plumber
Speaker 9: and a janitor or something, you know. And then they
Speaker 9: did Donnie Simpson and Video Soul, and man, I'll never
Speaker 9: forget it. When the show ended, all I could think was, well,
Speaker 9: how the hell am I supposed to sleep tonight? Seriously?
Speaker 9: Because I never had it put in perspective like that,
Speaker 9: you know what I mean.
Speaker 3: It's like.
Speaker 9: A line from that I've always loved from Elton John
Speaker 9: rocket Love not rocket Love, that's Stevie wonder rocket ma
Speaker 9: man right when he says in all the science, I
Speaker 9: don't understand. It's just my job five days a week,
Speaker 9: you know, I mean, you think this is a rocket
Speaker 9: man an astronauts. It's like it's so glorious. You know,
Speaker 9: your DJ is a glorious You know, Man, I don't
Speaker 9: care who you are or what you do. It's just
Speaker 9: what you do.
Speaker 5: So at the time, you weren't thinking that you're doing
Speaker 5: a historical service for mankind. That there's a bunch of
Speaker 5: eleven year olds watching you and recording this because we
Speaker 5: will record the show and watch it over and over again.
Speaker 9: Crazy to me, No, I never thought. I mean I've
Speaker 9: had three or four the ESPN anchors come up to
Speaker 9: me and tell me you're the reason I do TV
Speaker 9: because I used to watch you.
Speaker 3: It's like.
Speaker 9: That, Man, that's mind blowing to me. Of course, I'm
Speaker 9: telling you.
Speaker 11: Man.
Speaker 5: Between you and probably probably the only person that could
Speaker 5: challenge or even match your cool might be Don Cornelius.
Speaker 3: Like you two are parents. Yea cool one the next.
Speaker 3: And that's the thing.
Speaker 5: You always pervade this, this level of intelligence and cool
Speaker 5: and knowledge, no matter who the artist was. Like if
Speaker 5: I were interviewing like Wild Animal era Vanity, I would
Speaker 5: have been sweating profusely. But you gave her the same
Speaker 5: level of respect that you would have done for Sergio
Speaker 5: Mendez or or Side Garrett or Quincy Jones or I'll
Speaker 5: be short, like you know what I mean.
Speaker 3: Like that to me was was even more amazing.
Speaker 5: Like it's one thing to interview someone that you love
Speaker 5: and that you're you know that you have history of,
Speaker 5: Like I'm sure that you know if a Motown luminary
Speaker 5: comes on the show, then you know you're just giddy
Speaker 5: about it.
Speaker 3: But how do you prepare yourself.
Speaker 5: For an artist that you might not know of, Like
Speaker 5: say about first year Karen White comes on the show,
Speaker 5: and you might not know that much about her, but.
Speaker 9: I ask her, ah, like you did. Seriously, that's how
Speaker 9: I prepare. There's no herd for like ten years, but
Speaker 9: there there's no preparation. I mean, every artist I've ever
Speaker 9: had on Video Soul, they would give me a bio
Speaker 9: and a list of questions and I would take a
Speaker 9: car right sit down on the side. Seriously, I would
Speaker 9: never look at it because I felt that there's nothing
Speaker 9: wrong with me not knowing you grew up in Tuscaloosa,
Speaker 9: that I can ask you that. I mean, this is
Speaker 9: an interview, this is getting to know you. What's wrong
Speaker 9: with that being the first of where you grow up at?
Speaker 9: You know, Oh, I grew up in Philip oh Man.
Speaker 9: What happened to the Sixers the other night? That's conversation.
Speaker 3: Okay, you know it, that's just you know.
Speaker 9: I mean, if it's somebody I knew, I'm telling you
Speaker 9: this may be the depth of the preparation. I'd go,
Speaker 9: all right, Luther's on this show today. I'm riding in
Speaker 9: and I go, what is it you want to know
Speaker 9: about Luther Man? Why you why does your weight keep
Speaker 9: going up and down?
Speaker 3: I said, all right, that's what I'm going to ask him.
Speaker 6: And you know it's but you could ask him that
Speaker 6: though I don't think nobody else could get away with.
Speaker 9: But you know, and and that is a blessing for
Speaker 9: you to say that you get it. That it's just
Speaker 9: like h on with all due respect, I'm going back
Speaker 9: to Johnny Carson the Tonight Show that when the conversation
Speaker 9: with Johnny was always different from any other host I
Speaker 9: ever saw, because they had so much respect for him.
Speaker 9: He could ask things that others might not because they
Speaker 9: just lose. But Jimmy's like that too, because he's so cool.
Speaker 9: You know when when you're cool with people like that man,
Speaker 9: and they feel you and it's real, it's not stage questions.
Speaker 9: And you know, when you've read the bio, the chances
Speaker 9: are I'm gonna ask you a question based on that bio.
Speaker 9: It's something that you've been asked a thousand times already before.
Speaker 3: What was your first interview on Do you remember your
Speaker 3: very first interview on the show?
Speaker 9: Who was your first My very first interview is with
Speaker 9: the Fat Boys? Eighty three or eighty four? God, so
Speaker 9: like that, yeah, man, the Fat Boys. Second one was
Speaker 9: with Rick James.
Speaker 3: Bitch, Okay, what was that?
Speaker 9: Like?
Speaker 3: Okay, we have yet to have a potential Off the
Speaker 3: Chains guests.
Speaker 5: We're kind of entertaining that, like all of our guests
Speaker 5: are either like super legend or we've worshiped them. Yeah,
Speaker 5: but okay, Rick James a perfect example. If someone has
Speaker 5: the potential disorder be off the Chains.
Speaker 3: Oh, how do you reel them? And how do you
Speaker 3: how do you maintain how do you drive the car
Speaker 3: and not have them drive the car?
Speaker 9: Wow? That's wow, what a great question because.
Speaker 3: You still have to steer and navigate.
Speaker 9: Yeah, you still gotta steer and.
Speaker 11: Right.
Speaker 3: And it was the eighties, so we know that Rick
Speaker 3: might have been on that, you know, so you don't
Speaker 3: know where the conversation was going to go.
Speaker 9: But I've never had that problem. I never had anybody,
Speaker 9: had anybody go rogue on me, just you know, go crazy,
Speaker 9: go just it just never happened.
Speaker 8: But a little left, you've had some people maybe go
Speaker 8: a little because even.
Speaker 9: That every everybody left, you know, shoot.
Speaker 3: Has an interview going a little weird, and you guys
Speaker 3: had to do a lot of editing.
Speaker 9: Magic well back in the day for like what we're
Speaker 9: gonna do is like most of the years on Video Soul,
Speaker 9: we were live. It was live until the last three
Speaker 9: or four years.
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, I never do that.
Speaker 9: Yeah yeah, we used to do it live.
Speaker 3: Man's risky.
Speaker 9: Well yeah, but today that's the way I liked it
Speaker 9: because that made it like radio for me. I hate tape.
Speaker 9: I hate recording. It's just it's a different pressure that
Speaker 9: you perform better when it's live. For me, you know,
Speaker 9: when it's live and I know you don't get to
Speaker 9: back it up and then it's real because for me,
Speaker 9: when you're backing it up and editing, then you're trying
Speaker 9: to make it perfect. And like I never ever ever
Speaker 9: watched video soul. I don't listen to tapes of my
Speaker 9: radio show because I feel like then I'm trying to
Speaker 9: make myself perfect and I'll never be that. All I
Speaker 9: need to be is me. That's it, That's all I
Speaker 9: need to be, Donnie Simpson.
Speaker 8: Does that mean a programmer has never pulled you in
Speaker 8: aircheck meeting and.
Speaker 9: It said, oh lord, no, since you were a teenager.
Speaker 11: There's never been a boss, because I mean most I
Speaker 11: know people know this, but like in radio, usually your
Speaker 11: boss will at some point at the end of the week,
Speaker 11: pool you in a room and say, let's listen.
Speaker 9: To what you did here. You know what, for one period,
Speaker 9: when I first moved to DC in seventy seven, we
Speaker 9: did have a program director and oh my goodness, it
Speaker 9: was crazy for me. For a year and a half
Speaker 9: I did live under that. I've forgotten that because it
Speaker 9: was such you know, that's out of how many years
Speaker 9: got I started in sixty nine, so you know, one
Speaker 9: and a half years of slavery. But you know where
Speaker 9: he would walk in with a stopwatch and go. That
Speaker 9: was seventeen seconds. You had to come in under fifteen
Speaker 9: seconds on anything you said, you know, I mean, it
Speaker 9: was just so finally I was gone.
Speaker 3: I was gone.
Speaker 9: I said I can't do this. I'm leaving. And I
Speaker 9: had a job offer in LA and so they offered
Speaker 9: me the music directorship to keep me. So I stayed
Speaker 9: and then I worked under this music director. My music
Speaker 9: director was he's a brother, but he had so much
Speaker 9: or it was let me be careful.
Speaker 14: Yeah.
Speaker 3: We know, wink, we get it.
Speaker 9: Yeah, we need Muller to investigate this one. But he
Speaker 9: we would have our record meetings or every week, you know,
Speaker 9: the music meetings, and he'd go around the room. I
Speaker 9: was the music director under him. He was the program director.
Speaker 9: And I had two assistants, and both of them were
Speaker 9: political appointees. This is DC. One was David Brinkley's son,
Speaker 9: the other was his senator's son. He go around the room.
Speaker 9: He play, uh, I'll never forget this. When he played
Speaker 9: Beast of Burden, rolling Stones, you know, so he goes, so, John,
Speaker 9: what do you think of that? Oh?
Speaker 3: I love it.
Speaker 9: I think it's great. David, what do you I think
Speaker 9: it's great? I think Donnie what do you think. I
Speaker 9: think it's great. We can't play that ship you, right,
Speaker 9: you know, I mean I love it, but it's got
Speaker 9: the fit brothers.
Speaker 3: Can I assume that that was the single after Miss You?
Speaker 3: Were you guys playing Miss You?
Speaker 9: No? That was that was before Miss You? Because I
Speaker 9: Miss You came after, as I recall it, because I
Speaker 9: played Miss You as a program director, so I wasn't
Speaker 9: programming then. Yeah, we I'm pretty sure we could. We
Speaker 9: could check the records. Yeah, I think that's the way
Speaker 9: it went because I played Miss You. That works. Beast
Speaker 9: Burden does not. Little Riverband reminiscing. We can't play that, man,
Speaker 9: you know. Yeah, it's it's.
Speaker 8: Because you also got to consider the area, right, Like,
Speaker 8: it's not just the.
Speaker 9: People in the area in d C and go go baby.
Speaker 3: You know it was hard. Yeah, that's my next question.
Speaker 5: Okay, Now, as the the top taste maker of DC
Speaker 5: that had the world's ears, how is such a beautiful
Speaker 5: subculture like go go, how's it met?
Speaker 3: So men?
Speaker 5: Me obstacles and I feel like the ripple never gets
Speaker 5: to expand west west more west than West Virginia or Ohio,
Speaker 5: West Virginia or Okay, It's like let's let's just go
Speaker 5: back to Virginia.
Speaker 3: Yeah, but it's you've lived in DC for decades. I
Speaker 3: assume you still do.
Speaker 9: Oh yeah.
Speaker 5: How is black people's jam bam music not resonated to
Speaker 5: the rest of.
Speaker 3: The United States of America at least?
Speaker 9: I have no idea why that is. It's like, I mean,
Speaker 9: we thought it was going to break out when we've
Speaker 9: had Yeah well.
Speaker 3: And good to that movie came out.
Speaker 9: Chuck was the first bust and Loose was the first
Speaker 9: number one go go song in the country. I mean,
Speaker 9: it was number one song in the country. That was
Speaker 9: Go Go and uh. And then the second was the
Speaker 9: Butt by EU with the help of the movie School Days.
Speaker 3: You know.
Speaker 9: So we're thinking, man, this great breakout now, and it
Speaker 9: never did. Those are the only two to this day
Speaker 9: that ever went number one in the country. You know,
Speaker 9: you had people like Grace Jones, some people used it elements, yeah,
Speaker 9: used elements. Yeah, but it just never broke out for
Speaker 9: some reason. And I don't know, you know, I don't
Speaker 9: know why Western world never caught on to drop the
Speaker 9: bomb on the White boy.
Speaker 10: You know, I just don't get I.
Speaker 9: Don't know.
Speaker 2: We see no idea how that didn't work out, shocker.
Speaker 5: So on the other side of that coin, though worrying
Speaker 5: about someone going rogue, there could be the other side
Speaker 5: of that coin of having artists that are signed reclusive. Now,
Speaker 5: as as I as obsessed as I am with all
Speaker 5: of David Rich's work as a as a writer and
Speaker 5: read both of those Aretha books, I know that she
Speaker 5: was a frequent guest of yours on the show, and
Speaker 5: you go into her house and her plan for you
Speaker 5: and she you know, she was rather loquacious. She talked
Speaker 5: a lot, which if she didn't know you, you could
Speaker 5: tell that. You know, there's a distance there. So how
Speaker 5: did you what was a hard interview for you, like
Speaker 5: for an artist that wasn't that talkative? Or did you
Speaker 5: ever interview Prince ever.
Speaker 3: In your career?
Speaker 9: Yeah? On radio okay with Soul? This was about seven
Speaker 9: what years ago?
Speaker 3: Oh you seventy?
Speaker 9: I was like, oh no, no, no, no, no, no no,
Speaker 9: because you remember Prinsident He had done that one interview
Speaker 9: I think it ran on MTV and he interviewed himself.
Speaker 14: Actually, I was watching a click on on YouTube today
Speaker 14: of you introducing that on video Soul.
Speaker 9: Yeah yeah, yeah, so no, and it was Prince and
Speaker 9: Michael were the only two artists that I always wanted
Speaker 9: to interview, you know, but never got to have them
Speaker 9: on Video Soul, you.
Speaker 3: Know, even though we ever get them.
Speaker 9: Yeah, oh yeah, being Prince were friends. And you know,
Speaker 9: as a matter of fact, the night you referenced earlier
Speaker 9: when we went to UH flight Time for the Pandemonium
Speaker 9: album for the time, Uh, we partied at UH at
Speaker 9: Paisley Park that night. You love this story. This is
Speaker 9: so funny.
Speaker 3: Yes, we bring the story.
Speaker 9: Uh that Wednesday, we're recording Video Soul. I had David
Speaker 9: Bowie on the show, and who was so cool and
Speaker 9: uh so after the show we were talking and I
Speaker 9: was telling him I was going to Minneapolis that Friday
Speaker 9: to do this time thing, and he says, I'm playing
Speaker 9: Minneapolis Friday. You got to come to the show. I
Speaker 9: was all right, cool, I'm there, So get my buddy
Speaker 9: to go with me, Sugar, Ray Letter. So we rode
Speaker 9: to Minneapolis and we do the thing.
Speaker 11: I don't.
Speaker 9: We that's me and Ray hung every day man, my
Speaker 9: boy still to this day. But so anyway, we get
Speaker 9: to the show that Friday night and they set like
Speaker 9: eight seats at the sound board right so we go
Speaker 9: to sit in our seats, and so I'm going by
Speaker 9: and I bump this lady in front of me and
Speaker 9: I excuse me, ma'am. And Prince turns around. So what
Speaker 9: he says, Hey, Donnie, Prince Man, so sorry about that.
Speaker 9: And so then he turns back around a minute or
Speaker 9: two later, he says, I'm having a party at Paisley
Speaker 9: Park tonight, you and Ray are to come. I said,
Speaker 9: all right, cool. So we go to the party. Man,
Speaker 9: you know, it's like twelve people there.
Speaker 3: Man, he always parties were just yeah, six people.
Speaker 12: I know.
Speaker 9: It's me, Prince, Ray, David Boy and his band members Cat.
Speaker 9: He was dancing with him and my boy Jeff Newman,
Speaker 9: who produced my show video Soul. And I mean that
Speaker 9: was like that was it, you know. But we had
Speaker 9: the greatest time. Man. It was just the coolest night.
Speaker 9: And he played the Black Album that night. Okay. And
Speaker 9: now now this is so years later he tells me,
Speaker 9: because you know that album was notorious because it wasn't released.
Speaker 9: And so years later Prince told me, he said, you
Speaker 9: know you're the reason I didn't release the Black Album.
Speaker 9: What And I said, why? What do you mean? He says,
Speaker 9: you remember what you said that night at Paisley Park.
Speaker 9: I said what he said, you said, this is such
Speaker 9: a groove, and I was about so much more. Wow,
Speaker 9: And I thought, wow, is he serious or is.
Speaker 11: He just.
Speaker 9: Seriously? That was really deep to me that because that
Speaker 9: is what I said. It's like, man, this is such
Speaker 9: a groove, you know. But but what Prince needed to
Speaker 9: know is that you could be about that much more.
Speaker 9: But I can't hear it. I don't hear lyrics. I
Speaker 9: hear groove, I hear vibe, I hear feel you know,
Speaker 9: I know where it is. But man, it could be
Speaker 9: thirty years later and I'd be like, damn, that's what
Speaker 9: they were talking about, you know, too close.
Speaker 10: He was, See the thing is, It's like, the thing is,
Speaker 10: I know I know that you know a lot of
Speaker 10: a lot of his.
Speaker 5: Earlier Nelson George reviews of his post Rise post nineteen
Speaker 5: ninety nine, Rise kind of got under his skin and
Speaker 5: that he didn't want to be that philosophical and he
Speaker 5: just wanted to let y'all know that he was still down.
Speaker 5: And I've you know, that was his statement of letting
Speaker 5: y'all know, like, yo, I'm still down, and this is
Speaker 5: me but and you validated you're still down because that's
Speaker 5: such a groove. But maybe there's that itch in his
Speaker 5: soul that's just like say the deep statement, and you're.
Speaker 3: Right right, and we're stuck with love sexy.
Speaker 9: I got to tell you this is going back to
Speaker 9: something you said earlier. But it's so cool that because
Speaker 9: Jimmy and Terry, my boys and my mom introduced me
Speaker 9: to the time. That's who told me about the time,
Speaker 9: how well I was in DC. Mom still at a
Speaker 9: record shop in Detroit. You talked about that diversity. Simpson's
Speaker 9: Record out still there years fifty years, man, fifty years. Yes,
Speaker 9: I've never been there.
Speaker 5: No, I always shop. I always shop in uh gross
Speaker 5: point blank. What's gross point in Michigan? Yeah, points a
Speaker 5: place called Melodies and Memories out there that I do
Speaker 5: all my digging.
Speaker 3: But Simpson's Record Shop is still there. Yeah.
Speaker 9: Yeah, a mom and pop YEP, mom and pop record store.
Speaker 9: When I told you that's where I started my career.
Speaker 9: Still there.
Speaker 3: Right now, Stephen doing a week tour of America record stores.
Speaker 9: We have more hot dogs and candy than she does records.
Speaker 15: Now, can I interject the question, Donnie, So, what's your
Speaker 15: what's your record collection looking like these days?
Speaker 3: Oh?
Speaker 5: We said, oh wait, there's a frown over there. Are
Speaker 5: you in a situation where you had to get rid
Speaker 5: of stuff and put it in storage?
Speaker 9: Marriage my records?
Speaker 3: Yeah?
Speaker 9: Are you asking? What am I into?
Speaker 3: Or what? Do you still have your physical like that?
Speaker 9: I still have everything everything, man, I would assume it's
Speaker 9: worth some money. Man.
Speaker 3: Okay, fire in the house hypothetical, that's a Knockwood situation. Yeah,
Speaker 3: fire in the house. You're saving five records?
Speaker 9: Okay, top five? What albums?
Speaker 3: What's your forty five is into? Okay? Yes? What out?
Speaker 3: What five albums are you saving?
Speaker 9: What's going on? Hot Buttered Soul?
Speaker 3: Yes?
Speaker 9: Who off the wall?
Speaker 5: Wait now before you name the last two, I also
Speaker 5: mean that I'm certain that you have rare items of
Speaker 5: your your action as well.
Speaker 3: Can just save his whole collection? We'll all we'll all
Speaker 3: show up at the fire and help him get out.
Speaker 9: Goodbye, Yellow Brick Road. I got one more. That's hard. Well,
Speaker 9: look at they all fighting, they trying to get out
Speaker 9: the fire. Oh wow, one left? Oh god, I got Marvin.
Speaker 3: Let's see fires.
Speaker 13: Okay, Stevie's anthology. I'm cheating that off here STEVIEE right,
Speaker 13: wow one Stevie.
Speaker 9: Oh my goodness, man, you get Sophie's choice, you'll stream,
Speaker 9: you can stream the rest on Pandora. I'm just saying that,
Speaker 9: ah fulfilling, this first Finaley, that's the Stevie one, Jod,
Speaker 9: I don't know.
Speaker 3: That was a great cruschetto. I mean, what would you say?
Speaker 5: That's what we're talking about, because out of the Genius period,
Speaker 5: that's my least favorite Stevie record of the Genius period.
Speaker 3: Really, that's the one I know the least songs on.
Speaker 3: I know it, but I mean besides my mind.
Speaker 5: For me, I don't know why I like Music of
Speaker 5: my Mind out of the five of them, because it
Speaker 5: was the first of the five. But even then I
Speaker 5: was like one, So I mean it was the first
Speaker 5: of the five. He was just more raw and that
Speaker 5: it was the first of the five, or do you first?
Speaker 3: It was the first five? Yes, my first.
Speaker 9: The first record I ever bought was by Stevie. It's tight. Really,
Speaker 9: that's the first purchase I ever made.
Speaker 3: Of music, the first your your very first record.
Speaker 9: Yeah, because that's before my mother. I didn't buy records
Speaker 9: for law because you open the record shop and then
Speaker 9: I got into radio. But yeah, I paid sixty nine
Speaker 9: cents for Babe Bit Everything is all right?
Speaker 5: So forty five were sixty nine cents back in Well
Speaker 5: that came out sixty sixty.
Speaker 9: Yeah, sixty six or sixty seven.
Speaker 5: Well, I also know that you your you as a
Speaker 5: concert spectator, that you've probably seen some of the best
Speaker 5: shows of all time.
Speaker 3: Now in your radio career. You told us about your
Speaker 3: your childhood career.
Speaker 5: But what what were the experiences like, because I'm certain
Speaker 5: that you know you saw the very first Mothership Connection
Speaker 5: shows like stuff we take rant it now, like the
Speaker 5: ideas of the Jackson's levitating or earth Wind and fire
Speaker 5: levit taking all that stuff, like, man, what concert will
Speaker 5: stay with you forever?
Speaker 3: As far as like.
Speaker 9: All the Michael concerts really, I mean he's just the
Speaker 9: greatest ever to me, Yeah, without doubt, Michael the fire
Speaker 9: you know, see earth Wind and fire Man in their prime,
Speaker 9: you know with Maurice, you know, was amazing. The very
Speaker 9: first concert ever saw in my life, James, you know
Speaker 9: where Cobo Arena in Detroit. This had to be sixty seven,
Speaker 9: Jesus something like that, maybe sixty eight? Did he do
Speaker 9: say it loud? So? No, it was before said Loud,
Speaker 9: SOI say it loud. I'm black and I'm proud with
Speaker 9: sixty eight, you know. And James was my king, right,
Speaker 9: you know. And I used to tell them that all
Speaker 9: the time. Man, you're my king, I'm your soldier. There
Speaker 9: ain't nothing I wouldn't do for you. And I meant that, man,
Speaker 9: because he taught me to be proud of who I was.
Speaker 9: You know, my skin color man said loud was the
Speaker 9: most significant song ever for me. There would never be
Speaker 9: a song more important than that for me, you know.
Speaker 9: And so James gave me all that that sense of prime.
Speaker 3: You know.
Speaker 9: Me had assists from Curtis Mayfield and you know, but
Speaker 9: but it was James. So to see James and concert
Speaker 9: was just amazing early on because I remember as a
Speaker 9: kid sitting there at twelve years old. So wow, I
Speaker 9: was twelve. So that was that was sixty six and
Speaker 9: all I can think of. I'm not a musician, so
Speaker 9: I don't know why, but I'm like, damn, this dude's
Speaker 9: got two drummers. He's gonna wear one out.
Speaker 3: He knows that ain't gonna make it.
Speaker 9: So wow, I saw Sammy Davis Junior. That was amazing
Speaker 9: to see Sammy. You know, wow, wow, you'll appreciate this,
Speaker 9: and I know shifting gears a little bit, but say
Speaker 9: it people that I've had the opportunity to spend time
Speaker 9: in the studio with Tell Okay, now, of course you
Speaker 9: know there are a bunch of them. But before the
Speaker 9: just when I think back on my life in my career,
Speaker 9: to just blow me away, Marvin Sly Prince, Prince invited
Speaker 9: me in the studio one night, and that's rare. He didn't,
Speaker 9: you know, yeh, didn't have people in the studio. Uh
Speaker 9: and Stevie, you know, to spend time in the studio
Speaker 9: with Stevie, man, it was just oh my goodness.
Speaker 5: You speak of watching Marvin in the studio. Can you
Speaker 5: speak of watching Marvin in the studio?
Speaker 9: Actually it's kind of cheating because he wasn't He wasn't
Speaker 9: doing his album. He was recording the Originals. He was
Speaker 9: producing the Originals. Yeah did you know that, you know?
Speaker 3: Yes?
Speaker 9: Yeah, they yeah, yeah, But uh, Pam was with me.
Speaker 9: She was just my girlfriend. Then she's my wife of
Speaker 9: forty three years now. But I'm crazy, said she only
Speaker 9: forty four. But I remember Pam saying to me like
Speaker 9: because Marven was trying to show him how to sing
Speaker 9: the song, and she goes, why didn't he just sing
Speaker 9: you can't nobody do that? Yeah, but you know Marvin,
Speaker 9: when he invited me to the studio, how cool is this.
Speaker 9: I'm hanging out with ron Banks of the dramatics.
Speaker 3: Wow.
Speaker 9: Yeah, me and Ronnie. Ronnie was my best friend and
Speaker 9: that side of the music, of the business of music.
Speaker 9: Ronnie was my best friend, all the dramatics, but Ronnie
Speaker 9: in particular. And uh so we're riding down the street
Speaker 9: and we see Marvin going in his house, going up
Speaker 9: the driveway, and uh so, Ronnie says, it's Marvin. Man,
Speaker 9: let's stop and say hello to him. I'm sorry. Cool.
Speaker 9: So we stopped and uh he introduces He said, yeah, man,
Speaker 9: I listen to you every night. Man. I was like,
Speaker 9: all right, cool, And he says, you ought to come
Speaker 9: in and check me out in the studio. I said,
Speaker 9: all right, I'd love to do that. He says, well,
Speaker 9: I'm going in tomorrow all night. He says, but here,
Speaker 9: let me give you this phone number. Call me tomorrow morning, man,
Speaker 9: because I'll get up in the morning and decide to
Speaker 9: climb Mount Everest and I'll be gone, you know. And
Speaker 9: he said it in such a way as like I'm
Speaker 9: not trying to act like I'm eccentric or something like that.
Speaker 9: I'm just telling you, dog, you need to check because
Speaker 9: I do that. Right.
Speaker 3: He's known for that, right, he is known for that.
Speaker 5: Yeah, man, So how many cats know that Marvin lived
Speaker 5: in a bread truck for seven months in Hawaii?
Speaker 3: Oh? Yeah?
Speaker 9: Is that right?
Speaker 3: Right after Dream Lifetime came on, he took his remaining money.
Speaker 3: That was right before. I thought it was before a
Speaker 3: minute love.
Speaker 5: I thought, well, yeah, after dream before he did that,
Speaker 5: before he moved to Belgium and lived in the monastery.
Speaker 3: And what you call this is round eighty. Yeah.
Speaker 5: Yeah, he purchased a bread truck because I add a
Speaker 5: good room into it.
Speaker 3: Oh you mean our lifetime? Yeah, in our lifetime, I'm sorry,
Speaker 3: in our lifetime.
Speaker 9: If I had to pick one voice, I mean one artist,
Speaker 9: I mean, Marvin's my favorite vocalist ever. I just love Marvin.
Speaker 9: But the most intimate is that the right word. Most
Speaker 9: emotional moment I ever had with music was with Marvin.
Speaker 9: One night, I was sitting there listening to Flying High
Speaker 9: in a Friendly Sky, and I'd heard the song for
Speaker 9: forty years. I told you I don't hear lyrics, right,
Speaker 9: so not really. I mean flying I in the Friendly Sky,
Speaker 9: all right.
Speaker 3: I guess it's.
Speaker 9: Commercial for uniting it. I don't know, you know, but
Speaker 9: that night I'm sitting there and I'm listening to it, man,
Speaker 9: and I heard every word after It had to be
Speaker 9: thirty years at that point, and man, you know, I'm
Speaker 9: telling you, bruh, I sat there and cried for forty minutes,
Speaker 9: and I mean bawling, man, because I saw Marvin's life
Speaker 9: and his drug addiction. It spells it out so well.
Speaker 9: You know, my second oldest brother was classic Vietnam case,
Speaker 9: you know, came back from the non decorated war hero
Speaker 9: addicted to heroin, you know, and watched that struggle that
Speaker 9: he went through and sent my family through. You know,
Speaker 9: we you know, we all got touched by that thing.
Speaker 9: And you know, I just sat there, man, It just
Speaker 9: it just took me to a place where nothing but
Speaker 9: music could take me to where I went that night,
Speaker 9: you know, But you know, I go to the place
Speaker 9: where the danger waits me self destructions in my hands.
Speaker 9: You know, in the morning, I'll be all right, but
Speaker 9: then the pain soon the night comes and the pain.
Speaker 9: Oh man, it's just I was out running yesterday morning,
Speaker 9: and that's I always have my iPod on random, yeah,
Speaker 9: on shuffle, and that song came on. I'm running crying.
Speaker 9: You saw me, you thought I was sweating.
Speaker 3: So can I ask? I mean, it's no secret that.
Speaker 5: Where we are now in twenty seventeen is a long
Speaker 5: way from where we were in nineteen sixty seven or
Speaker 5: sixty nine when you first started. So I know that
Speaker 5: it has to be bothersome to not necessarily watch the
Speaker 5: evolution of where black music and black cultures go, the
Speaker 5: evolution or yeah, just the the evolution of it.
Speaker 3: Does it worry you that very few.
Speaker 5: Members of the next generation aren't necessarily grabbing onto the
Speaker 5: baton that the forefathers had and sort of not even
Speaker 5: dropping it, but just having a disregard or a sheep
Speaker 5: oft shrug like eh okay, yeah, like is it?
Speaker 3: Well?
Speaker 5: I'm just saying that you seem to be an open
Speaker 5: book culturally to everything, like you know in sixty nine, you.
Speaker 3: Know, say loud, I'm black. I'm proud changed your life.
Speaker 3: I'm certain that.
Speaker 5: Prince's arrival with or the the onslaught of dirty Mind
Speaker 5: and what he would later unleash was new and shocking,
Speaker 5: but you seem to be.
Speaker 3: A board of it and what came after.
Speaker 5: Yeah, at what point and you don't have to specifically
Speaker 5: mention names or whatever, but at what point or at
Speaker 5: least the year did you were the seeds of indifference
Speaker 5: there for you? Or it's sort of like, man, like,
Speaker 5: I guess, I guess this is what this is what
Speaker 5: passes for talent, or this is what passes for music
Speaker 5: or m I guess I'm just getting older.
Speaker 9: Yeah, well, you know, well, first of all, I have
Speaker 9: to tell you this that I was, I was always
Speaker 9: has to. I never wanted to make the statement that
Speaker 9: they don't make music like they used to, okay, because
Speaker 9: I felt like every generation makes that statement, and they're right,
Speaker 9: they don't make it like.
Speaker 3: They used to.
Speaker 9: They never have, they never will. It's always changing. So
Speaker 9: and then I remember when we did the interview with
Speaker 9: Quincy Jones from his house to back on the Block album.
Speaker 5: I was gonna say you committed him on being open minded,
Speaker 5: and that always stuck with me, like I never want
Speaker 5: to be the old guy that's like exactly, you know,
Speaker 5: I hate this music, right, And you said that and
Speaker 5: I was like, oh, okay, that's what I need to be.
Speaker 9: Yeah, like Quincy, you know you look, I mean that album.
Speaker 9: I go to do this interview with Quincy. I mean
Speaker 9: there's Ray Charles and Ella Fitzgerald, Sarah Vaughan, Big Daddy Kane,
Speaker 9: iced Tea. You know, let me kick my credentials, young
Speaker 9: player bread in South Central LA, Home of the body
Speaker 9: Bag You Want to Die had colored rag. I used
Speaker 9: to walk in stores in the LA down you finish
Speaker 9: a inch a ca Spray.
Speaker 3: Who Man I just wrapped with He said, you deserve that.
Speaker 9: But the first time I heard that, Me and l A.
Speaker 9: Reid had this conversation because I was telling him, said, man,
Speaker 9: when I first got that album, I was listening to it.
Speaker 9: I said, it took me forty minutes to get through
Speaker 9: the first song. And he said me too, because you know,
Speaker 9: I mean, I know, Gula Matari, Quincy Jones. You know
Speaker 9: I'm right. And then I opened up. The first thing
Speaker 9: I hear is this gangster rap. But then all through
Speaker 9: the album was like a lesson to me that you know,
Speaker 9: you can embrace it all all right. So now they're
Speaker 9: doing the human beat.
Speaker 3: Box all right?
Speaker 9: So all right, little Let's get Ella Sarah Sarah, Bobby
Speaker 9: McFerrin and take six no instruments. All right, well, let's
Speaker 9: do that. You know, it was just he could make
Speaker 9: it all work, all right, Now get past that, and
Speaker 9: I'll have to tell you that in the last five, six,
Speaker 9: seven years, you know, it's not like there was any
Speaker 9: particular moment where I felt like, well, where are we?
Speaker 9: Where is R and B? But you know, I look
Speaker 9: at the charts. It's like me and Jimmy and Terry
Speaker 9: have had this conversation like it's just like it's just
Speaker 9: hip hop and pop, you know, like we're not there.
Speaker 3: You know.
Speaker 9: I miss those days. Man, when the top ten pop songs,
Speaker 9: you know, half of them are black, you know, and
Speaker 9: I mean black black, you know, right, so the soul charge, right,
Speaker 9: you know, I miss that. It seems like it's just
Speaker 9: it's changed. And that's very frustrating for me, you know.
Speaker 9: And and uh, you're asking me the question, but I
Speaker 9: ask you the question. Is it Is it that the
Speaker 9: musicians have bailed on it they're just so nonchalant about it,
Speaker 9: or is it that the music companies don't I have
Speaker 9: thought that ever giving it voice.
Speaker 3: I have a theory. No because they're there.
Speaker 5: I could name about six or seven people on the
Speaker 5: Internet that are like killing that might not get a
Speaker 5: shot because they're not easily digestible. But I also feel
Speaker 5: as though I don't know where black people are spiritually. Yeah,
Speaker 5: I don't know where we are spiritually now, as opposed
Speaker 5: to fifty years ago where we relied on the church.
Speaker 3: As a training ground for singers.
Speaker 9: Yeah, now that's true, you know, and musicians. I never
Speaker 9: thought about that.
Speaker 5: I'm going to be This is probably the most explicitly
Speaker 5: honest I've ever been concerning my spirituality on this show.
Speaker 3: But just lately, just as far as the the political turmoil.
Speaker 16: That we're living in right now, House of Cars season six, Yeah,
Speaker 16: pretty much, and what's been going on in the past
Speaker 16: three years as far as.
Speaker 5: Justice is concerned, as far as the unarmed killings of
Speaker 5: black boys and black women. You know, I used to
Speaker 5: question on Twitter, like, well, you know, where's the spiritual
Speaker 5: center that says that this is wrong? Like if this
Speaker 5: were if the injustice that was happening in twenty sixteen,
Speaker 5: all those unarmed shootings were happening in sixty six, sixty seven,
Speaker 5: I would have heard from the church from now and
Speaker 5: I'm not saying that, Okay, well, I'm maybe question you know,
Speaker 5: because it's so blasphemous for black folks that have been
Speaker 5: raising the church to even have thoughts.
Speaker 3: Of atheism or whatever.
Speaker 5: But you know, just where the idea of Christianity in
Speaker 5: twenty sixteen, it seems very tainted to me then it
Speaker 5: was when I was a kid growing up in church.
Speaker 5: And you know, your grandmam took to U church, you
Speaker 5: had to be there for eight hours. So I know
Speaker 5: that if I'm sort of questioning that, then I know
Speaker 5: there's a lot of people that are just like me
Speaker 5: that are moving away from that spirituality. I'm not saying that, oh, well,
Speaker 5: God doesn't exist if all this injustice is happening, but
Speaker 5: I know that, you know, our answer was always primarily
Speaker 5: always hang on to the Lord.
Speaker 3: The Lord will make it all right.
Speaker 5: And just you know, and I don't know if black
Speaker 5: people are there now, like even in our singers, like
Speaker 5: the hero now is Rihanna, who is about is not
Speaker 5: in the church anti She's more the mall or the
Speaker 5: you know, like I don't know where, like her home
Speaker 5: base is where you think of a reef, it's like,
Speaker 5: oh that's the church. Do you know, but the generation
Speaker 5: that Rihanna's raising isn't spiritual based.
Speaker 3: Like Lauren Hill in a way that yeah, that's that's and.
Speaker 9: It's not just blank. I mean you look at what
Speaker 9: the Christian right just allowed to happen in our last election,
Speaker 9: you know, I mean, if you can give him a
Speaker 9: pass for talking about grabbing women how he wants to
Speaker 9: grab and that's okay, Yeah, we've.
Speaker 3: Just lost spirituality, not even religion, but just spirituality. So
Speaker 3: I just feel like.
Speaker 5: That that reflects in the music and if that's not there,
Speaker 5: then we've pretty much lost soul music unless the spirit
Speaker 5: of it has just gone to the UK where.
Speaker 3: There's still people there, and.
Speaker 11: We're also becoming more inclusive as a people as wells
Speaker 11: and I think that has a lot to do with
Speaker 11: it too. We weren't, you know, we can know, I
Speaker 11: mean not watered down for lack of a better term,
Speaker 11: but you're talking about the sixties and when music was
Speaker 11: made then it definitely was not as inclusive as it
Speaker 11: is in twenty seventeen. And then you have to do
Speaker 11: with the cultural appropriation and who's making the money off
Speaker 11: of this sole means, I just.
Speaker 14: Point out a labels not wanting to do more work
Speaker 14: than you know, if they can just market one artist
Speaker 14: one certain way instead of having to do it a
Speaker 14: whole bunch of different ways to target you know, all
Speaker 14: these different.
Speaker 11: Audisms, and if they can sing soul and not be
Speaker 11: black and capture two different audiences.
Speaker 5: Who So do you find it ironically weird that some
Speaker 5: of the more popular soul artists are not looking like
Speaker 5: the person in the mirror when you're listening to it.
Speaker 3: Like or is that to you?
Speaker 5: Just I'm sorry you no, no, no, I'm saying that
Speaker 5: now if you think of soul music, nine times out
Speaker 5: of ten, it's sam right right, right.
Speaker 9: Right right right? Oh? I know, yeah, it's strange. Yeah,
Speaker 9: it's it's strange.
Speaker 3: You know.
Speaker 9: And I mean I don't fault you for that, you know,
Speaker 9: I mean you got sold. I mean the artists that
Speaker 9: you just named very soulful and I love their music,
Speaker 9: you know, but you know, it reminds me of watching
Speaker 9: and gosh, should I call this out in American idol
Speaker 9: or you know these shows? And you know, my wife
Speaker 9: and my daughter gets so mad at me.
Speaker 3: Was it?
Speaker 9: They finally just stopped watching it with me because I'm
Speaker 9: sitting oh god, he's so crazy. It's like what you know,
Speaker 9: So you you like, I take you to church this
Speaker 9: Sunday and find and just on this Sunday and find
Speaker 9: you three four voices better than anything you've heard on
Speaker 9: this whole season.
Speaker 11: You know.
Speaker 9: That's that's how I always.
Speaker 8: Felt about Fantasian.
Speaker 9: Jennifer Hudson, Well, yeah, there were moments, right right.
Speaker 5: The thing that I find problematic about reality shows and
Speaker 5: the contest is that, you know, I feel like since
Speaker 5: ninety seven we've negated the idea of subculture or an
Speaker 5: underground you know, Aretha Franklin wasn't.
Speaker 3: Made in thirteen weeks.
Speaker 5: Yeah, it was made in seventeen years, started at eight,
Speaker 5: you know, and it took slow development in her father's church,
Speaker 5: in a subculture, and you know, because of the rush,
Speaker 5: because music is more as a means of escape for
Speaker 5: poverty for a lot of black folk. You know, it's
Speaker 5: it's more or less probably used now as a means
Speaker 5: to survive as opposed to express your spirituality. So yeah,
Speaker 5: I'd find those shows rather dangerous. But that's a whole
Speaker 5: another episode, of course.
Speaker 6: And those shows aren't really about music, They're about TV,
Speaker 6: you know, I mean it's not about that, you know
Speaker 6: what I'm saying about who's the greatest. It's about That's
Speaker 6: why you get William Hunks out there.
Speaker 9: Right right, like try to get you to watch.
Speaker 3: So what would you?
Speaker 9: By the way, I found a CD at my mother's
Speaker 9: record shop of Aretha singing in her church, in her
Speaker 9: father's church when she was twelve. How good is that
Speaker 9: my ma had that in the record shop. Oh my god,
Speaker 9: I haven't she doesn't have anymore.
Speaker 5: I was just gonna say, did you guys sell a
Speaker 5: Reverend cl Franklin's ceremony?
Speaker 9: Yeah?
Speaker 5: Yeah, oh yeah, man, we're making a pilgrimage because I
Speaker 5: know somewhere in the storage unit.
Speaker 3: There's a gym in there.
Speaker 9: Yeah yeah, oh yeah, we are going up there. She
Speaker 9: more or less specializes in gospel music now anyway. As
Speaker 9: a matter of fact, Wow, going back, I remember I
Speaker 9: used to send Elton gospel music to London because he
Speaker 9: couldn't get it right right. I'd send the stuff, send
Speaker 9: him stuff from my mom's record shop. Man.
Speaker 3: Yeah, all right, we are coming to Joy.
Speaker 8: Is that where? Okay? So it's right because the record
Speaker 8: store is still in existence, right.
Speaker 9: Yeah, it's still for right now, it's struggling though.
Speaker 8: It's tight because it sounded like he might have half
Speaker 8: of the records in DC too.
Speaker 9: No, yeah, well I got a few.
Speaker 3: We'll come and save the store. Don't do no worry.
Speaker 3: We wait.
Speaker 5: I want to ask one this kind of backwards, to
Speaker 5: go back then. But since uh, there's a movie about
Speaker 5: Detroit coming out in August about the sixty seven riots,
Speaker 5: I want to ask, how was your mom's story, How
Speaker 5: was that unscathed from because sixty percent of the city
Speaker 5: went up in flames during those riots up there? Like,
Speaker 5: how are you guys able to protect the store and
Speaker 5: not have it affected?
Speaker 9: Well, we also had Simpsons patrol service got started first.
Speaker 9: Actually my dad had a rent a cops service, so
Speaker 9: he actually he protected the store. Plus you know, she
Speaker 9: was protected anyway, everybody in the neighborhood knew. They knew. Okay,
Speaker 9: oh yeah, she was protected. They weren't, you know, Mama
Speaker 9: was They.
Speaker 3: Weren't going to burn the jams.
Speaker 9: No, they weren't going to burn no, none of that. No,
Speaker 9: but uh, you know, and mom has always been cool. Man,
Speaker 9: like you go over there. My mother has always say
Speaker 9: it has the best security force there is, the Winos.
Speaker 9: They don't miss no days.
Speaker 3: Don't.
Speaker 9: Yeah, you know, And they were always so cool with mom.
Speaker 9: You know, if they need a cigarette, whatever, man, you know,
Speaker 9: Mom's got them. Man, just whatever. MISSI they called Mississippi,
Speaker 9: but uh, you know she come to open up. Man,
Speaker 9: they'd be standing in front of her store. They stand there,
Speaker 9: make sure she's in. Okay, Once she's in, they gone
Speaker 9: across the street because they know it's bad for business,
Speaker 9: you know, but let somebody come in there looking threatening
Speaker 9: the enforced Baby.
Speaker 3: I'm telling you what side of Detroit? Was it on
Speaker 3: east side?
Speaker 9: Yeah? Not far east? Yeah? Yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah
Speaker 9: right yeah. You start thinking about your pilgrimage.
Speaker 6: I was like, I want to ask you, do you
Speaker 6: still keep in touch with any of the old crew,
Speaker 6: like Sherry Carter.
Speaker 9: Madeline, like all those everybody you just named? Yes?
Speaker 8: Is it a Facebook group somewhere that y'all have?
Speaker 9: Yeah, you'll be going in yeah yeah yeah yeah, no
Speaker 9: we still talk?
Speaker 3: Yeah? Yeah?
Speaker 9: Man?
Speaker 8: Did they ever talk on it? I was just a
Speaker 8: strength of what you just said.
Speaker 11: Is there ever talk of like a full out reunion
Speaker 11: on B E T with you everybody?
Speaker 3: Okay?
Speaker 9: That that was a very quick are you no? You
Speaker 9: know for me, you know, when it was done, it
Speaker 9: was done, and that's the way I am when i'm you.
Speaker 3: Know the end. When When was when the video so
Speaker 3: officially in that's a cool question. No, it was hold
Speaker 3: on the Planet Grooves.
Speaker 9: Wh It was like nineteen ninety seven, I think. I
Speaker 9: know because they brought me back to do a special
Speaker 9: Millennium show or the Top Videos of the Century, and
Speaker 9: so I came back for that. But for the last
Speaker 9: two years that I did the show, I'm telling you, man,
Speaker 9: it was on New York Avenue, and every night I
Speaker 9: would drive up New York Avenue and all I could
Speaker 9: think was that, God, forty minutes more and you could
Speaker 9: be at the Bay having dinner with Pam. That's all
Speaker 9: I thought about every night. And that told me that
Speaker 9: it was time. Yeah, that it was time. I didn't
Speaker 9: want to do it anymore, you know, And it just
Speaker 9: changed for me, I think because I started. They started before.
Speaker 9: We used to do it in the afternoon at one o'clock,
Speaker 9: and sometimes for a number of years we did at three,
Speaker 9: but always live. And then we started recording it at
Speaker 9: seven o'clock at night, and you know, with me doing
Speaker 9: my morning radio show, it's just too much. I just
Speaker 9: it didn't feel same to me. I didn't. I just
Speaker 9: I don't know. And it was fourteen years, you know,
Speaker 9: and so no, I you know, my it was done.
Speaker 9: It was people always go mad. God, don't you miss it?
Speaker 3: You know?
Speaker 9: I don't. I mean, well, I missed the people. The
Speaker 9: show was fun, But I always think about those last
Speaker 9: two years, man, where it's just like, no, it was time.
Speaker 9: Everything has its time, you know. That's the way I feel, man.
Speaker 9: And we had our run and it was cool, it
Speaker 9: was great. It served his purpose for that moment, and
Speaker 9: we're done with it.
Speaker 8: But you did miss TV because you came back with
Speaker 8: Donnie have the Dark a little bit?
Speaker 9: Yeah, yeah, I decided I wanted to. That was Pam's fault. Really,
Speaker 9: she wants you out of the house.
Speaker 3: Quest.
Speaker 9: Let me tell you how she put it though. She said, Donnie,
Speaker 9: everywhere we go, all you hear is how much they
Speaker 9: love you and want you to do something else. You know,
Speaker 9: God has given you a talent that you should be
Speaker 9: sharing with people. That's the way she put it. What
Speaker 9: I heard was get out. It's been five and a
Speaker 9: half years.
Speaker 3: I brought you out of the house records.
Speaker 9: Because I didn't do anything for five and a half years. Man,
Speaker 9: What was that like?
Speaker 3: We're going from just going going going, having years to chill.
Speaker 9: It was cool, man, it was great. I tell everybody
Speaker 9: I started. I started a shuttle service. Yeah, I would
Speaker 9: shuttle grand babies back and forth.
Speaker 3: And I was good at it.
Speaker 9: And in the summer I became a pool boy, you know,
Speaker 9: for my grandkids. Man. So so I loved it, man,
Speaker 9: But but I'm happy to be back in the game.
Speaker 11: You know.
Speaker 9: It's you know, I love music in particular, and I
Speaker 9: felt like it was five and a half years of
Speaker 9: me not knowing what was going on, you know, and
Speaker 9: I don't and I never experienced that before. I've never
Speaker 9: been out of loops as the time I was twelve,
Speaker 9: you know, I always knew what was happening, you know.
Speaker 9: So you know, so it's been cool, man. And then
Speaker 9: and then the love of the people give you two man.
Speaker 3: You know, It's just.
Speaker 9: You know, it was almost like me and Ray Leonard
Speaker 9: had this conversation because we were talking. He took off
Speaker 9: for five years before he came back and fought Hagler,
Speaker 9: and he was talking about how it was so much
Speaker 9: more intense when you came back because you know people,
Speaker 9: you know, they're used to you, and then you're gone
Speaker 9: for this and you figured that's it, there's no more,
Speaker 9: and then all of a sudden you come back and
Speaker 9: it's a different level of appreciation, you know, and uh,
Speaker 9: you know people just people treat me swell.
Speaker 11: But when did you realize that you probably could never
Speaker 11: do radio anywhere else but the DMV, Like the DMV
Speaker 11: might not let you.
Speaker 8: Was there a moment where you realized that you came.
Speaker 9: Or that you just wouldn't a dog you got you
Speaker 9: painting them straight up gangs now.
Speaker 8: Him right like you on Ben's chili bowl wall now
Speaker 8: like you can't leave?
Speaker 9: You are like, no, I never felt like that, like
Speaker 9: they wouldn't let you leave. I mean, you know, I
Speaker 9: mean because I was always so you love DC across
Speaker 9: the country anyway. I absolutely love d C without doubt.
Speaker 3: Because I'm certain that at one point you could write
Speaker 3: your own ticket and let me see what it's up
Speaker 3: in Chicago.
Speaker 9: Or go to l A or But for what I mean,
Speaker 9: you know, I mean d Yeah, and I love Detroit.
Speaker 9: I mean Detroit, that's you know, that's home. Baby. But
Speaker 9: you know, I mean, I'm already. I've been in Chicago.
Speaker 9: Be Et video Soul put me in every city in
Speaker 9: this country. I don't need radio to do that. I've
Speaker 9: never felt the need to to leave to go.
Speaker 3: You know.
Speaker 9: That's another reason why I've never felt pressure to do syndication.
Speaker 9: You know, I'm ask you know.
Speaker 3: B E.
Speaker 9: T put me in more homes, and syndication could ever
Speaker 9: put me in from radio, you know it could that
Speaker 9: could never be matched with radio what B E.
Speaker 3: T did for me.
Speaker 9: So that's not that big a deal to me, you know.
Speaker 9: And when I've had those conversations and I go, well,
Speaker 9: I play some of everything, you know, So what happens
Speaker 9: on this station in Detroit kim all the time? What
Speaker 9: happens when I play uh Drake or Tupac or whatever,
Speaker 9: you know, whatever it is. I'm like, well, you can
Speaker 9: play them, but you know, and you can talk about them.
Speaker 9: But we'll cover the Tupac song with Luthor. Oh no, no,
Speaker 9: you won't, you know, because you know, for me, it's
Speaker 9: not like I'm not a bit driven show, you know.
Speaker 9: I just I play music, we talk about it, and
Speaker 9: you know that's what I do. So music is such
Speaker 9: a big part of what I do. I can't. You
Speaker 9: can't take them, you can't cover It's got to be
Speaker 9: like a listen line. I mean, you know, you got
Speaker 9: to listen to the same thing in Chicago and San
Speaker 9: Francisco that they're listening to in DC. You can't cover
Speaker 9: my music with something else, right, you know, that's part
Speaker 9: of that's the biggest part of the experience to me.
Speaker 5: And sometimes it's good to be local, you know. Sometimes
Speaker 5: I'm telling you, man, this is one of those cases.
Speaker 3: Where be local is to be better.
Speaker 9: And you know, I'm old school in that way. I
Speaker 9: like that. But again, I'm very blessed in that TV
Speaker 9: gave me that thing that most people in radio are
Speaker 9: seeking through syndication. I had it in TV already.
Speaker 6: One question I ad to you was in regards to
Speaker 6: the culture of BT when you talk about the early years,
Speaker 6: and you were saying that it wasn't pretty, you know
Speaker 6: what I'm saying. I remember those early years, and I
Speaker 6: remember it was kind of rough, but it was also
Speaker 6: really real. And I mean just from watching your show,
Speaker 6: and I remember there was this other show I think
Speaker 6: you just come on after the video, so the it
Speaker 6: was a movie show, and it was this lady had
Speaker 6: a segment called Popcorn and pig Feet what. Yes, But
Speaker 6: in this this particular episode was notable because they dissed
Speaker 6: Graffiti Bridge, like I mean straight up smashed Graffiti Bridge.
Speaker 3: And I was like whole, Like, I mean, there was
Speaker 3: that segment.
Speaker 6: There was another segment where like Dwayne Martin was going
Speaker 6: through the record store like holding up records like on
Speaker 6: some like Kiss of the disc kind of shit like Yo,
Speaker 6: this new Tony Tony Tony album is crazy, Yo, this
Speaker 6: is the new t Shir Campel album.
Speaker 3: This shit is whack.
Speaker 6: Like, I mean, they were just it was ruthless, you
Speaker 6: know what I mean, and so and even like on
Speaker 6: your show, I mean you would give like I mean,
Speaker 6: god man, was.
Speaker 3: It like vertical hole. I think that was the first
Speaker 3: place seems too much too visually. I remember that interview.
Speaker 6: She had had a cold, ye, so like you don't
Speaker 6: remember so much so real and it was no PC,
Speaker 6: no cut card. It just seemed to be I mean,
Speaker 6: as as much as you described those early years as
Speaker 6: they were kind of rough and kind of ugly, to me,
Speaker 6: that was the charm because I knew I was getting
Speaker 6: just uncut.
Speaker 3: When did that change?
Speaker 6: Do you or do you remember when it kind of
Speaker 6: shifted and they were like, all right, maybe we gotta
Speaker 6: polish it up, like we can't just you.
Speaker 9: Know, be this, and people like I can't play commercial,
Speaker 9: you know, No, I don't.
Speaker 14: I don't know, I can't play what the rough Side
Speaker 14: of the Mountain commercial I found.
Speaker 3: Coming up Jesus.
Speaker 9: But no, I don't know when that when that changed. Man,
Speaker 9: I don't know. You know, I've I've always felt like
Speaker 9: you got to keep it real. Like there are times
Speaker 9: when I play a song to this day and I'll go,
Speaker 9: you know, wow, my boys will kill me, but almost
Speaker 9: say it anyway, Cooling the Gang celebration I played that
Speaker 9: you are talking about that song on the air, is like, God,
Speaker 9: I can't take that song anymore, I said, I you know,
Speaker 9: I mean, I'm happy for Cooling the Gang that this
Speaker 9: every bar, it's for wedding, any celebration you got over
Speaker 9: the last thirty five years they played that song, I said,
Speaker 9: But when I go down to Jamaica and I hear
Speaker 9: it's a celebration, it's like.
Speaker 3: You can't escape it.
Speaker 9: Escaping it, you know, give me some of the other
Speaker 9: cooler stuff. That's but you know, I think that people
Speaker 9: appreciate that because it's real, and that's just my opinion.
Speaker 9: You know that if everything is great, then you can
Speaker 9: no longer be believable because everything's not great. You know, Yeah,
Speaker 9: you should sometimes say yeah, you know that song is
Speaker 9: not for me, but I play it. It's popular. People
Speaker 9: are crazy, you know.
Speaker 5: Well, Donnie uh, we thank you for coming on the
Speaker 5: show and this has definitely been a master class in man.
Speaker 9: Man, thanks for having me. I wanted to have one
Speaker 9: final question.
Speaker 6: This is from my mother, who like absolutely loves you.
Speaker 6: She wants to know I guess I want to know,
Speaker 6: did you have a smoke before you went on the air.
Speaker 12: No, Man, definitely not always waited to laughter the show.
Speaker 12: How people used to ask me that all the time.
Speaker 9: And one show I actually came out I addressed that.
Speaker 9: I said, people always ask me that, and but no,
Speaker 9: I am not high, I said, but when I smile,
Speaker 9: I squeimped my eyes closed. They would try out kind
Speaker 9: of make up and stuff trying to get my eyes
Speaker 9: to look more open, and it's just that's just.
Speaker 3: Who I am.
Speaker 9: It just so I explained all that on the air,
Speaker 9: and I said, so anyway, so no, I do not
Speaker 9: get high, but let's get our show started. We're gonna
Speaker 9: play this video and I'm gonna go in the back
Speaker 9: smoke a joint. We'll be back in a minute.
Speaker 10: Oh god.
Speaker 5: I thank you Donnie Simpson for all that you've done
Speaker 5: for us. And you know raising, I don't want to
Speaker 5: put it like no, he.
Speaker 6: Pretty much raised like any any left of center like
Speaker 6: black stuff you got put on like it came through video.
Speaker 3: So thank you, hey man, thank you very much. We
Speaker 3: appreciate you. One more time.
Speaker 9: Thank y'all.
Speaker 3: I won't be happy to be here.
Speaker 5: I won't be happy here, Sugar Steve, Boss, Bill On Bifield,
Speaker 5: bron Tickelo.
Speaker 3: This is Quest Love. You've been listening to Quest Love
Speaker 3: Supreme only on Pandora. We see you on the next program.
Speaker 3: Thank you.
Speaker 1: Quest Love Supreme is a production of iHeartRadio. This classic
Speaker 1: episode was produced by the team at Pandora. For more
Speaker 1: podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or
Speaker 1: wherever you listen to your favorite shows.