Speaker 1: You and Taylor Smith will make a cute couple. Y'all.
Speaker 1: All right, y'all be killing, y'all be killing y'all.
Speaker 2: Man Dale, Oh the tailor one on me. I'm toxic,
Speaker 2: shall all my life, grinding all.
Speaker 3: My life, sacrifice, hustle, P pricing one slice. Got the
Speaker 3: brother geis swap all my life, Poppy, grinding all my life,
Speaker 3: all my life, grinding all my life, sacrifights, hustle, p
Speaker 3: pricing one slice, Doctor brother geiswap all my life, iop
Speaker 3: be grinding all my life.
Speaker 4: Hello, welcome to another edition of Club Shasha. I am
Speaker 4: your host, Shannon Sharp. I'm also the propriet of Club Shaha,
Speaker 4: and the guy that's stopping by for conversation and a
Speaker 4: drink today is a three time Grammy Award winning hit maker,
Speaker 4: a multi platinum selling singer, iconic songwriter, pop basalist, R
Speaker 4: and B powerhouse dancer, composer, producer, internationally acclaimed recognized.
Speaker 1: And a live, very very live and all the way
Speaker 1: live performer.
Speaker 4: Neil you doing, I'm good, but you'll stop eybody man
Speaker 4: to give me a coming bite of your time today.
Speaker 2: Thank you for having me.
Speaker 1: My research. If my research is correct, you're a vodka drinker.
Speaker 4: Yes, yes, I don't have vodka, but I have my
Speaker 4: very own Konjact. I would be honored if you would
Speaker 4: have a toast to your success and my success. You want, Hey,
Speaker 4: we're not gonna tell the club because you know the
Speaker 4: brown people, the brown make it tell the club up.
Speaker 1: We're not gonna tell the club up.
Speaker 2: Tonight I saw good. I happily do it.
Speaker 1: Absolutely, appreciate you, bro yesterday you know just the doctor.
Speaker 2: It is new.
Speaker 1: You had this while I had. We went since twenty
Speaker 1: twenty one. Cool all success, brod smooth, you know a
Speaker 1: little something acute ever we want.
Speaker 4: We beat twelve hundred knjacts at the Simple Wards the
Speaker 4: best tastes in Kangjact in twenty twenty two.
Speaker 1: So I appreciate you doing that. So how you doing.
Speaker 2: I'm good man, I'm in a good space, real a
Speaker 2: good space.
Speaker 4: I appreciate you stopping by. I know you had a
Speaker 4: big gig in Vegas. Actually we were on the plane
Speaker 4: flying back together yesterday.
Speaker 1: I was like, bad, I don't know if he just
Speaker 1: going have But.
Speaker 2: Now luckily I am virtually It's impossible for me to
Speaker 2: stay awake on the airplane. That's where I catch up
Speaker 2: on my sleep, even though that was like a thirteen
Speaker 2: second flight. Right still here, Oh yeah, I can't stay
Speaker 2: awake on the plane. The second butt touch seat, I'm gone.
Speaker 2: I don't want the water. I don't want to Peanut,
Speaker 2: don't you You're just gone gone whole time.
Speaker 1: Let's get right into it.
Speaker 4: The AI generated songs we see that Drake is complaining about.
Speaker 4: I think he had a song with the Weekend generated
Speaker 4: twenty million strings in forty eight hours. He complained about
Speaker 4: the song that he made with an ice Spice.
Speaker 1: Where is your what is your stance on this?
Speaker 2: I'm just okay. I feel like technology is very much
Speaker 2: like fire. It can destroy or it can warm a home,
Speaker 2: you know what I mean. Like, it's about it's about
Speaker 2: the way you use it. However, this specific technology, what
Speaker 2: is the good aspect of it?
Speaker 1: Like?
Speaker 2: What is the positive aspect of this technology? Like? What
Speaker 2: good thing are they going to do with it? Because
Speaker 2: I can totally see all the bad things that can
Speaker 2: be done. Right, It's like, you know, somebody said to
Speaker 2: me the other day, they have an AI now where
Speaker 2: you can tell the AI to write a song in
Speaker 2: the form of neo right, and then there's another AI
Speaker 2: you can go to and get Neo's voice to sing
Speaker 2: said song that was just written in the form of Neo.
Speaker 2: So basically, what does that mean? Neo no longer need it?
Speaker 2: So I'm like, what is it? What is the what
Speaker 2: is the endgame with this? Like, I don't, I don't.
Speaker 2: I don't understand what the positive aspect of this technology is.
Speaker 4: So you're telling me that there's an AI that can says, okay,
Speaker 4: basically be a ghost writer.
Speaker 2: Write a song like Neo, using words that Neo may use,
Speaker 2: tones that Neo may use, and then you can go
Speaker 2: to another AI and get Neo's voice to sing that song.
Speaker 1: Do you think record companies are going to head in
Speaker 1: this direction?
Speaker 2: I don't know, that's the thing, because I don't. I
Speaker 2: don't understand. Even with this Drake thing right now, right
Speaker 2: twenty million streams and however many streams of twenty four
Speaker 2: So that's that's money that's kind of just sitting there.
Speaker 2: Who gets paid? Who they get that money to? Like?
Speaker 2: Am I like, how how.
Speaker 4: If your soul you feel you should be getting monetizing.
Speaker 2: That If it's it's his voice, it's his voice used
Speaker 2: to us through AI, Like he I feel like he
Speaker 2: should get something for that, because they're using his voice.
Speaker 2: I'm more than certain he didn't give them permission.
Speaker 1: You feeling somebody get sued behind this article?
Speaker 2: I listen if saying my voice on it, I might
Speaker 2: be the first to sue. I'm trying to figure out.
Speaker 2: I just again, I don't get it. If somebody can
Speaker 2: tell me what the positive aspects of this technology is,
Speaker 2: all right, let's figure that out. Now, it's just a
Speaker 2: matter of how they use it. But if it ain't
Speaker 2: no positive aspects, and y'all, now, y'all, just y'all literally
Speaker 2: just taking money out of people's pocket, right, So.
Speaker 4: In other words, they're basically trying to cut the artists,
Speaker 4: the actual breathing, living artists, out.
Speaker 1: Of the equation.
Speaker 2: That's what it feels like.
Speaker 4: We see all these social media TikTok. Are you a
Speaker 4: fan of these like these shorts catchy jingles.
Speaker 2: To a degree? I mean, when it's when it's fun,
Speaker 2: it's fun, and that's all I find it good. But
Speaker 2: when all of a sudden, now the radio has to
Speaker 2: play this song because it's so popular on TikTok. Meanwhile,
Speaker 2: the best part of the song you heard on TikTok
Speaker 2: already and the rest of the song is gabbage, you
Speaker 2: know what I mean. It just takes down the quality
Speaker 2: of the music played on the radio. I mean it's again,
Speaker 2: it's about the way the technology is used.
Speaker 1: So you don't like this trend the word it's.
Speaker 2: Headed, not really, man, I mean so I feel like
Speaker 2: people are creating for the algorithm now as opposed to
Speaker 2: creating from from the heart, from the soul, like what
Speaker 2: music is supposed to. Music is supposed to be therapeutic.
Speaker 2: Music is supposed to be you as your realist. You
Speaker 2: know what I'm saying. There's things that I can't say
Speaker 2: out loud that I can write in a song and
Speaker 2: be totally all right with you know. So that's that's
Speaker 2: supposed to be the realist version of you. If you're
Speaker 2: writing a song and you're making the song a minute
Speaker 2: and twenty seconds long because of the fact that if
Speaker 2: the song is shorter it'll get streamed more, then you're
Speaker 2: not like you're not writing that. That's nothing. You're not
Speaker 2: saying anything worth being said in my personal opinion, So.
Speaker 1: I wanted to ask you this.
Speaker 4: You do you feel like artists make songs to be
Speaker 4: popular or do they make songs that they really feel
Speaker 4: It seems like me, I'm talking to you, you make
Speaker 4: songs that you feel passionate about and whether you know, yeah,
Speaker 4: obviously you want you wanted to be pop anyone, but
Speaker 4: you're not just specifically trying to make a song that's
Speaker 4: gonna be catchy.
Speaker 2: That's not my thing. No. Music has been therapy for
Speaker 2: me my entire you know what I mean. I credit
Speaker 2: my mother for giving me my first red notebook and
Speaker 2: telling me to write it down. And I was like,
Speaker 2: write what down? And she's like, I don't give it damn,
Speaker 2: just write it down because she saw that I needed
Speaker 2: an outlet, you know. So that's what music has always
Speaker 2: been for me. So if if I write something, what
Speaker 2: I've always found found for myself is that if I
Speaker 2: write from the heart, people tend to feel it more,
Speaker 2: thus attends to do better.
Speaker 1: You know.
Speaker 2: So I've never been I've never been to a place
Speaker 2: where it's like, Okay, let me write something that I
Speaker 2: feel like is gonna make money. That's never been my
Speaker 2: my That's never been my motivating factor, I should say
Speaker 2: for music, it's always been about being able to express myself,
Speaker 2: being able to being able to get that thing off
Speaker 2: me if I need, if I need that, That's what
Speaker 2: music has always been for me.
Speaker 1: So have you always had this gift?
Speaker 4: I mean because obviously you listen to music growing up
Speaker 4: and you know, like, man, I like this, did you
Speaker 4: go after you hear a song?
Speaker 1: And do you like? Okay, let me try to write
Speaker 1: something in the paper.
Speaker 2: To that degree something like that. I my mom used
Speaker 2: to watch TV with stereo on. Okay, Like music was
Speaker 2: always there every day, all day, more than just you know,
Speaker 2: cleaning the house on Sunday morning, Like every single day,
Speaker 2: it's music blaring out of our house. So it took
Speaker 2: me a minute to take the whole concept of the
Speaker 2: words that I was putting together and then putting these
Speaker 2: melodies with these words and then creating a song. Initially
Speaker 2: it was just kind of like, uh, journal entries, you
Speaker 2: know what I mean, or poems, you know, I find
Speaker 2: a little girl I like, and I write write a
Speaker 2: poem about her hair. Never get a poem to the girl,
Speaker 2: because I wasn't you know, I wasn't that dude. I
Speaker 2: had to grow into that dude anyway. But but yeah,
Speaker 2: that was it is what it is now. But well,
Speaker 2: yeah it took a minute to put the two together.
Speaker 2: But once I did, like it became all I needed.
Speaker 2: Like I didn't need I didn't need any other type
Speaker 2: of therapy. I didn't need anybody to talk to because
Speaker 2: I had my music. I could, I could. You know,
Speaker 2: I wasn't judged by anybody, uh, when it was just
Speaker 2: me and my music. So like it became my best friend.
Speaker 1: Growing up. Who were some of the artists that you
Speaker 1: listened to? I don't know. I mean Teddy Pendergrass was
Speaker 1: when I growing up.
Speaker 4: Very white, so classics obviously, you know you had baby
Speaker 4: Face and you had Keith Sweat and you have so
Speaker 4: who did Neo Bari or like Okay, I kind of
Speaker 4: like this style.
Speaker 2: Like I don't think anybody listening to music in the
Speaker 2: nineties or was around for music in the nineties. I
Speaker 2: don't think any songwriter after that period can say that
Speaker 2: they didn't borrow something from Babyface. Yeah, Faces Faces Foundation, right.
Speaker 3: Uh.
Speaker 2: But then to go further back, you're Smokey Robinson. You
Speaker 2: know I have I have five Kings, and these are
Speaker 2: the five artists that I've always wanted to like, you know,
Speaker 2: if I could take these five person people on tournament
Speaker 2: in one person. This is who Neo was going to be,
Speaker 2: you know, this is what I was going to So
Speaker 2: it was Prince, Michael Jackson, Stevie Wonder, Samit Davis, Junior,
Speaker 2: Marvin Gaye.
Speaker 1: So like.
Speaker 2: So so my entire everything, my entire artistry came from
Speaker 2: me just pulling bits and pieces from these five specific artists.
Speaker 4: So you're more of a because most of these guys
Speaker 4: wrote a lot of these guys wrote for themselves. So
Speaker 4: you like the you like to write for yourself, but
Speaker 4: you like to write for other artists also.
Speaker 2: Indeed, indeed, I I started loving was all writing was
Speaker 2: always my first love. So I'm trying to say Kanye
Speaker 2: getting to me again, no no, no, no, but writing
Speaker 2: be even even so much before performing and all of that.
Speaker 2: Writing has always been my first love. So yeah, I
Speaker 2: learned that I could do it for other people as well.
Speaker 2: Actually started out doing it for other people before I,
Speaker 2: you know, got I guess confident enough to find my
Speaker 2: own voice and do the artists.
Speaker 4: Like radio streaming, it seems like streaming is kind of
Speaker 4: the way to go. Is like things, you still have
Speaker 4: the radio play, but it seems like streaming is the
Speaker 4: way to go.
Speaker 1: Now do you have a preference.
Speaker 2: You know what I put it like this, when they
Speaker 2: get the numbers right, when they finally you know, open
Speaker 2: up them books and realize that them laws is one
Speaker 2: hundred plus years old. All the music laws are one
Speaker 2: hundred plus years Okay, every aspect of music has evolved
Speaker 2: except the laws. And the laws are how artists make money,
Speaker 2: you know what I mean. Like streaming is cool, finding good,
Speaker 2: but it's to the point where if you are just
Speaker 2: a songwriter, just a songwriter, it's hard for you to
Speaker 2: live off of what you do.
Speaker 1: Right.
Speaker 2: So you know, once they get the numbers right with
Speaker 2: the streaming, I'm all for it. I'm all for you know,
Speaker 2: the evolution of the way people get their music, the
Speaker 2: way people consume the music. I'm all for that. But
Speaker 2: at some point somebody has to go, a wait a minute,
Speaker 2: these guys ain't getting what they work over you, right,
Speaker 2: you know what I mean? And that's that's what that's
Speaker 2: where it's at right now. You know, I don't even
Speaker 2: I don't even remember what a stream is right now.
Speaker 2: But at one point it was like like a fraction
Speaker 2: of opinion. I mean, streams you gotta get before you
Speaker 2: can see any real mind. You know, that's just that's
Speaker 2: mess up.
Speaker 4: Well, how do you change your system when the system
Speaker 4: is not instituting changes because they benefit the most from it.
Speaker 2: That's the problem. That's the problem. I I wish I
Speaker 2: could say that if the people rally together. But again,
Speaker 2: you know, the people that are pulling, the people that
Speaker 2: are pulling the strings are the people that are benefiting
Speaker 2: the most from the system staying what it is. So yeah,
Speaker 2: it's so uphill battle man. Why don't figure it out?
Speaker 1: Why don't love songs sold like they used to?
Speaker 4: Because you seem like you're back in the day he
Speaker 4: got song they I want to beat with you for
Speaker 4: the night. I want to like candles, I want to
Speaker 4: tell the pronographs. I want to turn off the lives
Speaker 4: and run the bath all. I would have a bubble
Speaker 4: baffa do all that now, it seemed like it want
Speaker 4: to be a smashing smashing Dash.
Speaker 2: Yeah, smashing Dash goes. I like smashing Dash. No, you
Speaker 2: got a songwriter spirit brother smashing Dash. Right.
Speaker 4: You know I'm saying that because I don't come to
Speaker 4: me that he gave it out here.
Speaker 2: Before we started sending some relatives. Brother Rick co written
Speaker 2: by what.
Speaker 4: Happened to the real soul love making song that you
Speaker 4: turn old you like, but this.
Speaker 1: Is my damn.
Speaker 2: I hate to I hate to say it this way,
Speaker 2: but there's there's there's really no way to beat around
Speaker 2: the bush. Every genre of music at one point got
Speaker 2: a hip hop makeover, okay, right, country music, country music
Speaker 2: got a hip hop makeover. Right? Hip hop has never
Speaker 2: been about love, so to speaker, at least not that farm.
Speaker 2: In the world of hip hop, that that love and
Speaker 2: that vulnerability was was looked at its soft right. So
Speaker 2: once hip hop became literally the biggest music in the world,
Speaker 2: now all the all the all you please, baby, baby
Speaker 2: please guys is looking at the fact that their audiences
Speaker 2: are shrinking and the hip hop audience is growing. So
Speaker 2: now it's like, all right, well, maybe she don't want
Speaker 2: me to beg no moment. Maybe that's that's what they want.
Speaker 2: All right, Well, now I gotta be tough now, now
Speaker 2: I gotta now, I gotta sing the word bitch, what what?
Speaker 2: And and and the women is gonna sing it with me? What?
Speaker 2: This is where we are now, This is where we
Speaker 2: are now, and it's it again, it is what it is.
Speaker 2: I cannot be a lover of music and not uh
Speaker 2: find the positive aspects of all genres of music and
Speaker 2: all evolutions of music, But at the same time, when
Speaker 2: an entire genre of music is no longer what it
Speaker 2: was at its best moments because of this other genre takeover. Yeah, man,
Speaker 2: that don't that don't feel good? That don't feel good.
Speaker 4: I heard all the time it's R and B dead.
Speaker 4: And if it's not, what, will R and B ever
Speaker 4: be what it once was?
Speaker 2: I do not think that R and B is dead.
Speaker 2: I think that R and B is going through a
Speaker 2: bit of an identity crisis right now. And will R
Speaker 2: and B ever be what it was? I don't think so.
Speaker 2: I think that the evolution of music is always going
Speaker 2: to be a forward motion as opposed to a backward
Speaker 2: most I just think that there's going to come a
Speaker 2: point where somebody of this new generation is going to
Speaker 2: realize the power of the way, what the way R
Speaker 2: and B was, and then grab elements of that and
Speaker 2: pull it into whatever the next thing is. That's what
Speaker 2: That's what I think it's going to happen.
Speaker 1: Did Auto Tunes ruined R and B?
Speaker 2: It didn't ruin it. It just made the club a
Speaker 2: little less elite. You know what I mean? Long long
Speaker 2: you had to that was what it was. You wouln't.
Speaker 2: You couldn't be part of the team if you didn't.
Speaker 2: I'll take it even back further than like before me,
Speaker 2: before your Joe de season, all that back when it
Speaker 2: was the whole band is in one room. We got
Speaker 2: to record this record. The drums got a microphone, the
Speaker 2: guitar got a microphone, the singer got a microphone, the
Speaker 2: backup singers got microphones. Ready action, you do the whole
Speaker 2: song all the way down. There is no flying taking
Speaker 2: up hook part and copy and pastes. We gotta do
Speaker 2: the whole song every hook sang out the whole every
Speaker 2: single time the person messing up your ass out of here,
Speaker 2: bro like na, we gotta start all the way over
Speaker 2: because you missed a note on the bass. Come on,
Speaker 2: But so you had to be like you had to
Speaker 2: be on it. You had to be on it. Now
Speaker 2: you can push a button and get it all, which
Speaker 2: means that the club is not as elite as it
Speaker 2: once was. Now anybody can come in.
Speaker 1: All right, Well, you mentioned boy bands.
Speaker 4: You started out as a boy bandes, what happened to
Speaker 4: the boy band.
Speaker 2: To a degree, the same thing that kind of happened
Speaker 2: to R and B is. You know what's worse than
Speaker 2: one dude sitting around big and four what it became.
Speaker 2: It's just to say that truth, that's what it became. Now,
Speaker 2: if if we ever get another boy band, it's gonna
Speaker 2: be more than likely a primarily hip hop based situation
Speaker 2: because we got to get back to that point where
Speaker 2: people realize the power of vulnerability. I don't think that.
Speaker 2: I don't think anybody understands how much power there is
Speaker 2: in being able to be vulnerable. You make vulnerable not
Speaker 2: look weak. There's no way it's vulnerable.
Speaker 4: Oh do you think they'll ever be? I mean, because
Speaker 4: you know, would there ever be another new kids and
Speaker 4: boys to me and in sync?
Speaker 1: And do you? I mean because I mean if.
Speaker 4: Splitting two hundred thousand, three hundred thousand and six ways
Speaker 4: as opposed to like six hundred thousand one way sounds
Speaker 4: better than.
Speaker 2: Me right, definitely, so definitely. So I mean, and mind you,
Speaker 2: let us keep in mind that the boy band is
Speaker 2: not dead. It's not it's not dead. It's just Korean.
Speaker 1: Oh okay, okay.
Speaker 2: Shout out to BTS, Shout out to the whole K
Speaker 2: pop movement, like they still they still going strong with
Speaker 2: the boy band movement. It's just it's I don't know,
Speaker 2: you know what, I got to give a lot of
Speaker 2: credit to K pop and just I've been over there
Speaker 2: and saw just the machine that it is over there.
Speaker 2: Like they're literally going from like from a kid from
Speaker 2: a child and training these kids in music, guitar with piano,
Speaker 2: real live music, teaching them how to really sing, really dance,
Speaker 2: and then deciding if they're gonna get in a group
Speaker 2: or if you're gonna be a solo artist. And it's
Speaker 2: like and it's producing. It's producing a pretty quality product
Speaker 2: of producing on myself. So shout out to K pop
Speaker 2: and just everything that's happening in that movement. Man, it's dope.
Speaker 1: What happened to your group? Why stay together?
Speaker 2: We we disbanded because we was broke, and you know,
Speaker 2: you can only be broke for so long before you know,
Speaker 2: being broke with people just gets annoying.
Speaker 1: It's like one person be broke where you got five.
Speaker 2: I can be broke by myself and b aight for
Speaker 2: a little while, but I'm broke with you, and I
Speaker 2: got to listen to you plan by being broke to
Speaker 2: bro I don't. But now we we eventually broke up
Speaker 2: because you know, things just wasn't moving away we expected
Speaker 2: in the movie. And mind you we it's not like
Speaker 2: we really sat down and devised like the best plane, right,
Speaker 2: you know what I mean? We after after graduation, we
Speaker 2: all sat in the Dennys in Las Vegas and rode
Speaker 2: out on a napkin what our plan was. And the
Speaker 2: plan was hopping Corey's van because Corey was the only person,
Speaker 2: only one of us with a car. Hopping Corey's van
Speaker 2: driver California, find a Capitol Records building, Park in front
Speaker 2: of the Capitol Records Building, jump up on top of
Speaker 2: the van and sing our songs until the president of
Speaker 2: the Capitol Records comes down and gives us a record deal.
Speaker 2: This was the plan. Notice I didn't mention food, I
Speaker 2: didn't mention shelter. Yeah, all of these things that that
Speaker 2: was so easy. Shelter Corey's van provided shelter for six months,
Speaker 2: foecasts in the in a v W van for six months. Yeah. Yeah,
Speaker 2: that's that's that's that's that's the epitome of.
Speaker 1: What you were dedicated.
Speaker 4: You like, Okay, this is what is gonna take for
Speaker 4: the time being. So we got to make the best
Speaker 4: of the situation.
Speaker 2: We did what we had to do until we just
Speaker 2: couldn't do it no more. It just it just got
Speaker 2: to the point where it's like, all right, you know what,
Speaker 2: maybe this ain't what it's supposed to be.
Speaker 1: So did the guy come down from Capitol Records?
Speaker 2: And the only people that came out of Capitol Records
Speaker 2: for us was security the law. Yes, we got to
Speaker 2: a first name basis with the security guard at Capitol
Speaker 2: Records because we would show up around the same time
Speaker 2: every day, get up sing our songs, you know what
Speaker 2: I'm saying. We started doing it when we knew everybody
Speaker 2: was at lunch, so people would come out, you know,
Speaker 2: sometimes they throw us a little change or whatever the
Speaker 2: case may be. But then after a while, dude like,
Speaker 2: all right, y'all gotta make a movie. All right, ted,
Speaker 2: we'll be back tomorrow. Yep.
Speaker 1: So who would you compare your group? Took? What was
Speaker 1: your group? What would we?
Speaker 2: We idolized Boyston men?
Speaker 1: Okay, so we was we.
Speaker 2: Was about you know, finding them four and five part harmony,
Speaker 2: right right, y'all love songs. That was our thing.
Speaker 1: No instruments, any instrument.
Speaker 2: Not not well enough to get on stage with them.
Speaker 2: Now sit in the room and tap out on the
Speaker 2: piano thing thinking think yeah, this one thing thing, think
Speaker 2: that one. That's that's about as good as we got with.
Speaker 4: So when you performed the MTV you did Apollo Show Apollo,
Speaker 4: you was like, Okay, I made it, or did you
Speaker 4: like I'm still not here.
Speaker 2: Yet with the group or just as myself you feel
Speaker 2: as myself? It was definitely good to be able to
Speaker 2: go back to some of those places where you know,
Speaker 2: I kind of fell on my face with the with
Speaker 2: the group and and and do it over. Uh that
Speaker 2: that definitely felt good. But now I didn't realize I
Speaker 2: made it until I We used to throw a Grammy
Speaker 2: party every year, whether we want or not, we just
Speaker 2: throw the party. And I remember Prince and Steven Wander
Speaker 2: crash my party. Now crash my party is not the
Speaker 2: way that I want to say that, because but who's
Speaker 2: not letting Steven Win and Prince Lee bud so y'all,
Speaker 2: y'all had crashed nothing. They just they showed up. They
Speaker 2: showed up uninvited. I didn't invite them because I'm like,
Speaker 2: I figured they wouldn't come, but yeah, they they crashed
Speaker 2: my party. So I remember they. I remember sitting in
Speaker 2: the section. Prince is right here and Stevie Wonder is
Speaker 2: right here, and I'm just sweating bullets, like what do
Speaker 2: I say?
Speaker 1: Like?
Speaker 2: These are two of the reasons that I even do this, right,
Speaker 2: So I took a sip of my drink. Prince Lean's
Speaker 2: over and goes, what are you drinking? Vodka cranberry? He goes,
Speaker 2: mind you, I'm already sitting this closer, man, So now
Speaker 2: you want me to get even close? Okay, all right,
Speaker 2: it's just fucker's.
Speaker 1: Bad for you.
Speaker 2: And didn't say nothing else the rest of the time
Speaker 2: he was at That was the That was the entirety
Speaker 2: of our conversation. I didn't touch the drink until it
Speaker 2: left again.
Speaker 1: I couldn't well clearly listen to it because.
Speaker 2: No, no, But in the moment, in the moment, you know,
Speaker 2: it was that, you know, Deebo say shut up, I
Speaker 2: shut up.
Speaker 1: Your first deal? What was that moment?
Speaker 2: Like my first deal, my first deal with was with
Speaker 2: Columbia Records, and it was I'll say this, it was
Speaker 2: a learning experience, you know, a as an artist signed
Speaker 2: to a label, you don't got a whole lot of freedom,
Speaker 2: but there are some elements of it that you can control,
Speaker 2: you know. I went in under the impression that I
Speaker 2: had no control of anything. So I was kind of like,
Speaker 2: it's kind of like a robot a little bit, you
Speaker 2: know what I'm saying. Pretty much, whatever they told me
Speaker 2: to do, I did whatever they told me to wear,
Speaker 2: whatever producers they told me to work with, you know,
Speaker 2: just because I'm thinking, I worked so hard to get here,
Speaker 2: let me not rock the boat, right. So it finally
Speaker 2: came down to the album is done, the artwork is done,
Speaker 2: We've picked the first single, were ready to go, and
Speaker 2: I'm looking at like a flyer of the artwork, and
Speaker 2: I'm like, this is not me, this is not me,
Speaker 2: This is like, this is baby tyres Is. Somebody like,
Speaker 2: no disrespect to Tyrene, but I feel like that's kind
Speaker 2: of the direction they were trying to go with me.
Speaker 2: If you see the pictures, it's like, yeah, there's a
Speaker 2: little Tyresis anyway, much a lot of Tyreses anyway. So
Speaker 2: I go to the label on some listen. I know
Speaker 2: the album is finished, but do y'all think I could
Speaker 2: go in and maybe do one or two more songs
Speaker 2: that just kind of fit. Who the hell I am right,
Speaker 2: And they were like, well, no album is done, and
Speaker 2: also your budget is depleted. I'm like, how much my
Speaker 2: budget depleted? I know exactly what we spent. And this
Speaker 2: is when I learned that, Okay, I don't know if
Speaker 2: this still goes on. It's been a while since I've
Speaker 2: had this happen to meet. But you get a record
Speaker 2: deal and they take you out to eat and they
Speaker 2: throw that credit card down at the end of the night,
Speaker 2: and what they don't tell you is that that's your
Speaker 2: budget on that credit card. What yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah yeah.
Speaker 2: We went with Tomtterr Child's a bunch of different times.
Speaker 2: I'm like, they just you love me in here, mister
Speaker 2: Childs every time we visited. All right, my label loved me. No.
Speaker 2: I was paying for all that and had no idea,
Speaker 2: had no clue what it was.
Speaker 4: Clearly you said your first deal, so things didn't go
Speaker 4: as expect you when you were dropped, what are you thinking?
Speaker 2: To be completely honest with you, I went into a
Speaker 2: slight depression just behind really feeling like, you know, my
Speaker 2: foot was in the door. Maybe I should have just
Speaker 2: maybe I should just went with what they wanted me
Speaker 2: to do. Maybe I should have, you know, to hell
Speaker 2: with artistic integrity and just go for it. But then
Speaker 2: I know, I know in the back of my head,
Speaker 2: I would have never been able. I wouldn't been able
Speaker 2: to look myself in the maryor so I'm back to
Speaker 2: square one, just kind of trying to figure it out
Speaker 2: at this point. You know, Yeah, it was, it was.
Speaker 2: It was a rough little moment just because I didn't
Speaker 2: know that that was like the most uncertain moment that
Speaker 2: I that I had experienced up to then. You know,
Speaker 2: because even even when we was living in the van,
Speaker 2: you know, I'm talking to my mom every day, and
Speaker 2: I knew that if push come to shove and it
Speaker 2: hit the fan, I could go on home. But then
Speaker 2: in this situation, I'm out here. I'm rough Lee twenty
Speaker 2: twenty one years old. I just got dropped from my
Speaker 2: record label. My managers is not picking up the phone
Speaker 2: no more because we got dropped from a record Like
Speaker 2: it's like, all right, well, clearly they don't want you.
Speaker 2: I have no I have no options, no anything, right,
Speaker 2: So it's it's literally a back to square one moment,
Speaker 2: and I just leaned on what was always there, which
Speaker 2: was the music. You know what I'm saying. I literally
Speaker 2: met the man that is my manager today as I
Speaker 2: was walking down the street, just literally singing at the
Speaker 2: top of my lungs with my eyes closed because I
Speaker 2: was that's the only place that I could find solace.
Speaker 2: And I'm just walking and singing, and he's in an
Speaker 2: suv driving in the opposite direction. Scared turned around in
Speaker 2: the middle of the street and came back, Ay you
Speaker 2: singing something? Yeah, clearly, yeah, I choke. You said, I
Speaker 2: know this person, this person, that person I got this
Speaker 2: studio that is I to mind you. I'm hearing this.
Speaker 2: I'm seeing his lips moving, but I ain't listening nothing whatever.
Speaker 2: Brook All right, well, right round the corner, all right,
Speaker 2: come on, let's go. I hopped in the van again.
Speaker 2: I don't know who this person is. You could have
Speaker 2: you could have killed me. I ain't know. He brought
Speaker 2: me around the corner to uh, these two these two
Speaker 2: producers that he was working with. And I worked with
Speaker 2: him for roughly three to four months before we got
Speaker 2: the death Jam deal and mind you, no contract. He
Speaker 2: said to me, He said, to me, listen, I'm gonna
Speaker 2: shake your hand right now. If I don't get you
Speaker 2: a deal in four months, you walk away with that handshaking.
Speaker 2: We go out, we go away. So I don't need
Speaker 2: no paper, I don't need no nothing. Four months to
Speaker 2: the day, I had a record deal. I had a
Speaker 2: record deal. Death Jam. Yeah, so much load of tango,
Speaker 2: much letter, my team, much a lot of compound.
Speaker 1: That's you go to death Jam. Yes, that goals. That's
Speaker 1: your second record, that's your second record contract. Things going well.
Speaker 2: Things are going well. Things are going well because I
Speaker 2: went in there with a little bit of knowledge. It's
Speaker 2: like noa, noa, we don't need to go to Miss Challo.
Speaker 1: Yeah we're good. I'm good. Yeah, I cooked before I left.
Speaker 2: I'm straight left overs.
Speaker 1: We're good, right good Okay.
Speaker 2: So and then also I got the opportunity to talk
Speaker 2: to la Read and really talk to him like from
Speaker 2: an artist, from an artist soul to an artist soul.
Speaker 2: I went to him and said, listen, the music that
Speaker 2: you're that you've heard and that you've liked, is the
Speaker 2: music that I really do. If this is a situation
Speaker 2: where you're gonna try to turn me into somebody else,
Speaker 2: we don't have to do this. I'll go somewhere else.
Speaker 2: And he said to me, he was like, I'm signing
Speaker 2: you because I like what you do. Why would I
Speaker 2: try to change that? And that was just a quiet
Speaker 2: cool you know, I can actually express myself for real
Speaker 2: and really be who I am and and get this
Speaker 2: music out here the right way. And sure enough, that's
Speaker 2: what happened.
Speaker 1: So when did when did jay Z take over Death
Speaker 1: Jail for La?
Speaker 2: Jay Z came in kind of right at the top
Speaker 2: of when I got signed, Like you know, l A
Speaker 2: l A was always you know, always top dog, but
Speaker 2: he took up. He's CEO president, you know. So yeah, Jay,
Speaker 2: I mean, my first time going to one of six part,
Speaker 2: jay Z took me on. Their first time going to
Speaker 2: tr L, jay Z took me on. He really kind
Speaker 2: of just took me under the wing, like you know,
Speaker 2: this is this is our new R and B artist
Speaker 2: and I appreciate him to this day for it.
Speaker 1: He got upset with you because you wrote a song
Speaker 1: gave it away.
Speaker 2: Yeah yeah, so, uh, shortly before before the deaf Jam
Speaker 2: situation happened, I leaned on songwriting. You know, I was
Speaker 2: just I was just a songwriter. So I wrote a
Speaker 2: song for Mario you should let me love you?
Speaker 1: Right.
Speaker 2: So this song goes on and uh stays at number
Speaker 2: one for like twelve thirteen weeks. Something like that becomes
Speaker 2: one of the most played songs in radio history. So
Speaker 2: when I the first time I got to meet jay Z,
Speaker 2: by this time, I've been signed for, you know, a
Speaker 2: couple of months at this point, I walked into the
Speaker 2: room and he's in there in La ref I walk in, like, Hey,
Speaker 2: how you doing. It's nice to meet you. You're like, man,
Speaker 2: why you get a damn song away?
Speaker 1: That first eight?
Speaker 2: Nice to meet you too, But I'm neil. Yeah, while
Speaker 2: you get a damn songway? Yeah, to this day, yeah,
Speaker 2: you get on me about giving a damn song away,
Speaker 2: But I was just a songwriter when I wrote it.
Speaker 2: I didn't write it for myself. I mean, had I known,
Speaker 2: do you think you could have done it justice like
Speaker 2: Mario did. I'll be the first to tell you that
Speaker 2: Mario got chops that I don't. You know that. I
Speaker 2: ain't got no shame in that, but I know that
Speaker 2: I got chops too, So yeah, I feel like I
Speaker 2: feel like it would have worked either way.
Speaker 1: Do you have you ever given a song away that
Speaker 1: you felt you should have kept.
Speaker 2: Once or twice, once or twice. There was a point
Speaker 2: in time where I would have a little bit of
Speaker 2: separation anxiety with certain songs, right you know what I mean?
Speaker 2: Like I feel like especially if I hear the end
Speaker 2: result and be like and am not totally pleased with
Speaker 2: some of the decisions made, right, you know, then it
Speaker 2: becomes that feeling of Man, if you was gonna do that,
Speaker 2: I could have just kept my damn song. But but
Speaker 2: at the same time, you have to you have to
Speaker 2: let an artist be an artist, right. I can't allow
Speaker 2: a person. I can't expect a person to think the
Speaker 2: way that I'm gonna think, make the choices that I'm
Speaker 2: gonna make, especially when I've given them the song. Like uh, Beyonce,
Speaker 2: for example, if you hear my version of Irreplaceable, you
Speaker 2: hear the basis, you hear the foundation, but then you
Speaker 2: hear her version and you hear all the Beyonce isms
Speaker 2: that she put on top of it. Like, you want
Speaker 2: an artist to do that for the record? You want that?
Speaker 1: When did you know your paying game was stroll?
Speaker 2: When I got my name, Honestly, I got my name
Speaker 2: from a producer friend of mine, Dion Evans Uh. He
Speaker 2: used to work a lot with with Digital on the
Speaker 2: ground back in the day park and all of them.
Speaker 2: He was a person that dubbed me Neo. It was
Speaker 2: it was shortly after the Matrix movie came out.
Speaker 1: So which came first, that Neo Matrix.
Speaker 2: Matrix Neo came first. Yeah, that Neo definitely came first.
Speaker 2: But the reference was the way Neil could do things
Speaker 2: in the Matrix that other people couldn't do.
Speaker 1: Correct.
Speaker 2: I could do things in music that other people couldn't do, Like,
Speaker 2: for example, I used to prove myself on how fast
Speaker 2: I could write a song, like give me an hour,
Speaker 2: I give you twelve records, quick, quick, quick. Now, not
Speaker 2: that's I said twelve records. I ain't say twelve good records, right.
Speaker 2: I learned later on quality versus quantity, But at that moment,
Speaker 2: I was I was the cat that was gonna get
Speaker 2: in there and just crank him out. And Dion says
Speaker 2: to me, He's like, it's like like he had never
Speaker 2: seen that before. Like you let the Neo the music industry,
Speaker 2: and that's where the name came from.
Speaker 1: You wrote to the.
Speaker 4: Left, to the left, Yes, indeed, I think now, correct
Speaker 4: me if I'm wrong, La read because did you want
Speaker 4: to do the song?
Speaker 1: And he said give it to Beyonce because he's like
Speaker 1: it fits more Beyonce.
Speaker 2: La was definitely part of that decision, but it was okay.
Speaker 2: So it was this, I wrote the song to do
Speaker 2: it myself myself and Stargate shout out to Stargate, let
Speaker 2: him got your death. But when we got finished with
Speaker 2: the song and we're listening to it, it and it's
Speaker 2: like it's it's just we knew it was a hit,
Speaker 2: but it feel right, you know what I'm saying. They
Speaker 2: didn't like I love this song, but it's something about
Speaker 2: this ship.
Speaker 1: I do not like.
Speaker 2: It became that. So that's that's when we finally started going,
Speaker 2: you know what, maybe if we okay, maybe if we
Speaker 2: flip this and flip that and and and let them
Speaker 2: want let a female do it. And like we was
Speaker 2: on the fence a little bit, and l a Ree
Speaker 2: was kind of the tipping factor, like, you know what, Yeah,
Speaker 2: I definitely feel like this song will get more more,
Speaker 2: more power punch with a woman singing it.
Speaker 1: How did you decide to give it to Beyonce?
Speaker 2: I didn't. We Actually we actually had shopped into a
Speaker 2: few different female artists who shall remain nameless because we
Speaker 2: want it, but want it, they adn't want it. They
Speaker 2: didn't understand man him. I'll say this, it's it's female artists.
Speaker 2: You know, it's female ARTI as you know, a whole
Speaker 2: bunch of them. Yep, and you know the one up
Speaker 2: you know the ones I'm talking don't know her.
Speaker 1: This is the first mission.
Speaker 2: No, no, not anger that, but yeah, Beyonce's name was
Speaker 2: not the first name that popped up when we were
Speaker 2: shopping the song. But once Beyonce got ahold of it,
Speaker 2: it became I mean, the rest is history, right, No,
Speaker 2: it became what people know in love today.
Speaker 4: So let's just say, for the sake of argument, I sing,
Speaker 4: I don't I say, Neil, I need you to write
Speaker 4: me something?
Speaker 1: How much you charge it?
Speaker 2: Hmm?
Speaker 1: Okay? You how does that work?
Speaker 4: Does somebody call you and say, hey, Neil, can you
Speaker 4: write me a song? Or do they send you like,
Speaker 4: what do you think of changes? Additions?
Speaker 2: Normally they ask and then okay. So it's if you're
Speaker 2: an independent artist. You know, I got the independent artist
Speaker 2: price because I know what it is to be independent,
Speaker 2: you doing everything yourself. I'm not gonna charge you what
Speaker 2: I would charge your record label, for example, because I
Speaker 2: know I'm not Yeah, I'm not you, I'm not hitting you.
Speaker 2: I'm getting your record label. So you know how how
Speaker 2: it happens, be it I run into the artists or
Speaker 2: artists management, reach out to my management or whatever the
Speaker 2: case may be. They say, we love for Neo to
Speaker 2: go in the studio for such and such artists.
Speaker 1: All right.
Speaker 2: They would then set up studio time you know that
Speaker 2: they pay for it. However, many days or whatever they
Speaker 2: want me to go in, I go in, and whatever
Speaker 2: I write within those days, I submit to them what
Speaker 2: they like, they keep, but they don't.
Speaker 1: I get back.
Speaker 2: And that's how it works.
Speaker 1: Have you ever told anybody no.
Speaker 2: M Yes, yes I have, just because I genuinely didn't
Speaker 2: see it was it was a cat that wanted me
Speaker 2: to do a feature on his record, you know, up
Speaker 2: and coming dude, and it was it was just some
Speaker 2: real It just it wouldn't have made no sense in
Speaker 2: my personal opinion, wouldn't made no sense, like I'm never
Speaker 2: gonna do anything that's gonna intentionally jeopardize my brand or
Speaker 2: or you know, confused people in the realm of my brand,
Speaker 2: and it just wouldn't made no sense.
Speaker 4: I mean, I'm looking at some of the people you've
Speaker 4: written for, Beyonce, Rihanna, Whitney and Mary J Jennifer Hudson, Monica,
Speaker 4: b K Music, So.
Speaker 1: I mean, I mean you got a who's who? How
Speaker 1: do I mean?
Speaker 4: I mean all these people, I mean, everybody's coming out
Speaker 4: in the woodwork, said Neo Neo neo. And they expected
Speaker 4: you to write irreplaceable. They expected you to write to
Speaker 4: the left.
Speaker 1: Damn.
Speaker 4: I mean, Michael Jordan's going fifty every game. There was
Speaker 4: a couple of there's a couple of thirteen fourteen points
Speaker 4: in there too.
Speaker 2: It's been a it's been more than a couple of
Speaker 2: times where you know, an artist asked me for something
Speaker 2: and I'll write them what I feel like is what
Speaker 2: they asked for, and they'll they'll say, no, I mean
Speaker 2: that happens.
Speaker 1: It happened.
Speaker 2: But I don't. I don't so much because well not,
Speaker 2: because what didn't work for you might work for her
Speaker 2: or him or whoever you know, and once you give
Speaker 2: it back to me, his mind. Like their songs that
Speaker 2: made it to Beyonce's album made it to Rihanna's album
Speaker 2: that were not written for Beyonce Arihanna. These are the
Speaker 2: songs that other artists turned down, and these artists didn't.
Speaker 1: Not even looking hot. So let mess your question.
Speaker 4: How do you think an artist feel I turned this
Speaker 4: song down? I turned that song down? Beyonce did Rihanna?
Speaker 4: That could have been?
Speaker 2: I can imagine that. That's a hard pill to swallow.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I can, but hold on.
Speaker 4: Sometimes it's maybe it's just Beyonce and Rihanna and you
Speaker 4: wouldn't have had the same success with said song.
Speaker 2: That's possible, that's possible, but the reality is you ain't
Speaker 2: even try. So who's to say, right, who's to say
Speaker 2: at least at least they had the guts to give
Speaker 2: it a try and it turned out to work for them.
Speaker 1: Have you ever written? Have you ever written? Have you
Speaker 1: written for someone?
Speaker 4: Because if they say, write me a song, if you're
Speaker 4: gonna pay you for it, do they ever say, nah,
Speaker 4: I'm not good, just keep it, or you just have
Speaker 4: to do you have to.
Speaker 1: Turn it over to them.
Speaker 2: No, I turn it over to them, you know, and
Speaker 2: then they decide whether they want to keep, which ones
Speaker 2: they want to keep. Whatever they don't keep, they just give.
Speaker 1: Back, okay, And then you shop it to somebody else.
Speaker 2: Yeah, shop it to somebody else. So I'll take a
Speaker 2: piece of it, turn it into a hook for this rapper. Everything,
Speaker 2: give me use for something, you know what I mean?
Speaker 2: It never, it's never anything that just has to in
Speaker 2: the archive.
Speaker 1: You ever had anything leaked? Yeah?
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, man, But how would you have to know
Speaker 2: who's doing it?
Speaker 1: Neo? Nah?
Speaker 2: So this this particular situation, this was back when Sony
Speaker 2: Studios existed in New York. You know, may it rested,
Speaker 2: It ain't there no more Sony Recording Studios, Stargate. They
Speaker 2: had a room at a room of their of their
Speaker 2: own in Sony Studio. Somebody broken Stony Studios and stole
Speaker 2: their hard drives. Me and Brandy had did like four records,
Speaker 2: and the following week them Joints was in the world.
Speaker 2: It's because somebody broke in and stole the hard drives. Wow, yeah,
Speaker 2: it happens. But since then, I mean, it's it's it's
Speaker 2: I don't know, it's a slippery slope. It's hard to
Speaker 2: keep anything absolutely private anymore, you know. So Yeah, I've
Speaker 2: definitely had had things leaked, but I've always looked at
Speaker 2: it as all right, Well, if the music leaked and
Speaker 2: people like it, that just adds to my fan.
Speaker 4: Base, right right, So when you when you say the writers,
Speaker 4: you say the writers into streaming. It's not the same
Speaker 4: writing for an album or things of that nature. Correct,
Speaker 4: What do you mean as far as you say, like
Speaker 4: the streaming SERTs like the right, you said writers when
Speaker 4: they streaming a record, the writers don't get the compensation
Speaker 4: that they deserved.
Speaker 2: Well, yeah, no, the streaming the numbers that writers are
Speaker 2: getting for streams is not what it needs to be,
Speaker 2: not at all.
Speaker 1: So you got to have like need to stream like
Speaker 1: a billion times to make.
Speaker 2: Anything, billions millions and billions of streams before you start
Speaker 2: to see an your real money. Yes, definitely.
Speaker 4: So why do you why do you stay writing? I
Speaker 4: mean because it seems like everything is kind of like
Speaker 4: going towards the streaming industry, and that means it gets
Speaker 4: less and less in your pocket.
Speaker 2: Well, I mean there are there are exceptions to every
Speaker 2: situation and to every rule, right you know, I again, Uh,
Speaker 2: my motivating factor has never been financed in regard to
Speaker 2: this business. I do this because I love it. If
Speaker 2: there was no money to be made in it anymore,
Speaker 2: you still find a neo song somewhere really, Yes, yes,
Speaker 2: because I don't do this just for money. I thank
Speaker 2: God and the Creator that I can provide for my
Speaker 2: family doing what I love. But to be honest, if
Speaker 2: I could not provide for my family doing what I love,
Speaker 2: I would just find a way to provide for my
Speaker 2: family while doing what I love. You know what I mean?
Speaker 2: Because this is this is music is woven into my DNA.
Speaker 2: I couldn't stop if I wanted to.
Speaker 1: That's just what it is.
Speaker 4: So how's the interview process if somebody wants to write it?
Speaker 4: When you want someone wants you to write a song
Speaker 4: from them, do you sit, do you're talking the phone?
Speaker 1: Do y'all go out to dinner? Do you like get
Speaker 1: a sense?
Speaker 4: I mean, because if you know the artist, you kind
Speaker 4: of get a sense of kind of like the direction
Speaker 4: they want to go in.
Speaker 2: I mean, it's it's always, uh, it's always a sign
Speaker 2: of respect to ask an artist like, Okay, what's the
Speaker 2: what's the concept?
Speaker 1: Like?
Speaker 2: Is there a concept to your project as opposed to
Speaker 2: just trying to shove a song down their throat? Right?
Speaker 2: You know, because it's like, well, I don't even talk
Speaker 2: like that, all right, right, So so I'll definitely give
Speaker 2: the artists the respect of asking, you know, is there
Speaker 2: something specific you want to say? Is there a specific
Speaker 2: genre that you that you're hunting for? You know, we'll sit,
Speaker 2: we'll have a conversation. We'll have a kind of an
Speaker 2: off the cuff conversation like how's your love life, like,
Speaker 2: what's you know, what's going on in your world, what's
Speaker 2: what's keeping you awake at night if anything at all?
Speaker 2: And that's where we figure out what we want to
Speaker 2: write about and that and you know, I feel like
Speaker 2: doing that makes the artists know and understand that this
Speaker 2: is literally being custom made for you. This is not
Speaker 2: a song that I had in my back pocket and
Speaker 2: a right maybe I could sell it to this one.
Speaker 2: Not you, alright, maybe you No. It's like I'm literally
Speaker 2: asking you where you at and if you say something
Speaker 2: that that sparked something that I already got, yeah, I'll
Speaker 2: let you hear it. But ultimately and that you're paying
Speaker 2: me to be here. We're gonna sit and we're gonna talk,
Speaker 2: and I'm gonna create something for you from scratch.
Speaker 4: Were you in the studio when when Beyonce is doing Irreplaceable,
Speaker 4: did you know irreplaceable was going to be that I
Speaker 4: did not know. So at the studio and as you
Speaker 4: as you're writing this song and you hearing her singing.
Speaker 2: Well, here's the thing with Beyonce. Beyonce is one of
Speaker 2: those few artists that don't really need nobody, right. So
Speaker 2: I was there for about fifteen minutes, and I remember
Speaker 2: there was one instance where I tried to feed her
Speaker 2: no and she was like, it's cool, I got it.
Speaker 1: Like that, go get some coffee.
Speaker 2: Just gone by my bit. And mind you, by the
Speaker 2: time I came back in the rooms home with them
Speaker 2: like she's like was doing, took him out of maybe
Speaker 2: an hour to do that. To do what she needed
Speaker 2: to do in that moment, took him maybe an hour.
Speaker 2: So that wasn't I've dealt with artists where you kind
Speaker 2: of got a hold of hand through the whole process.
Speaker 2: And I ain't mad at that either, you know what
Speaker 2: I'm saying. But but you know, a person like like
Speaker 2: a Beyonce, like Beyonce is, she's an anomaly, Like she
Speaker 2: don't she she got every note, she know exactly what
Speaker 2: she wanted to do, ad lib wise and all of that.
Speaker 2: Like she'll she'll listen to your idea. But to be honest,
Speaker 2: she don't need you that right, you know what I mean?
Speaker 2: So that's that's what that was.
Speaker 1: Give me a mount Rushmore, a female artist you've written for?
Speaker 2: Oh Man, mount Rushmore. How many heads are mount Rushmore?
Speaker 1: I wasn't good. Okay, we ain't gonna let you add
Speaker 1: none either.
Speaker 2: Damn yeahs my mount rush for ye.
Speaker 1: I know you want to build a bob about Rushmore?
Speaker 2: All right, fa fa Top four, Beyonce, Rihanna, Mary J. Blige,
Speaker 2: Celine Dion.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 4: So Celeine Dion calls you, Neil? Does anybody have anybody
Speaker 4: since you've gone started giving going by the name Neo?
Speaker 4: Has anybody called you your government name, not.
Speaker 1: Lord?
Speaker 2: Maybe an attorney call you, yeah, mister Smith.
Speaker 4: Yeah, but does anybody have anybody say, in the last
Speaker 4: twenty years called you by your government name?
Speaker 2: Not any artists? Like you? Got to you got to
Speaker 2: know me. You got to get to that place where
Speaker 2: you really know who I am before you call me
Speaker 2: anything other than Neil.
Speaker 4: Okay, Yeah, So Celeine Dion calls Neo up. Sim So
Speaker 4: how did that conversation go?
Speaker 2: Surprisingly? Uh, she was a fan of my music. She's
Speaker 2: a fan of We actually met through her husband, you know,
Speaker 2: may Rest, and he was telling me that she was
Speaker 2: a fan of the music, and I was like, yo,
Speaker 2: I'm a huge Celendian fan. I love to write with her.
Speaker 2: One day, mind you this this conversation happens. And then
Speaker 2: a month later, you know, I get a call out
Speaker 2: of nowhere and it's heard right, and she tells me
Speaker 2: she's a fan of the music and tells me that
Speaker 2: she wants to work together. We get in this wrote
Speaker 2: we did the song, but actually she wanted me to
Speaker 2: write her a song. Initially, okay, because I've written her
Speaker 2: songs in it week. There's one that we did together,
Speaker 2: which was the whole other mind blowing situation. So she said,
Speaker 2: I love what you do. I'd love for you to
Speaker 2: write me some songs. I did two songs for her
Speaker 2: on the Oh Man, I gotta find a name. I
Speaker 2: gotta find a name of that album, not the last
Speaker 2: one she put out. It's like like two albums back
Speaker 2: in the two songs for on that album. And we
Speaker 2: just kind of kept in contact. Like she's really really
Speaker 2: cool people right, like like she's she's silly, like she
Speaker 2: was doing ever especially impersonations, like she's she's really really cool.
Speaker 2: So I remember the following album cycle, she was like,
Speaker 2: we have to do a song together. And I'm like why, Like,
Speaker 2: if you have Seline Dion's voice, what the hell do
Speaker 2: you need neo voice for it? Right? And she's like, no, no, no, no, no,
Speaker 2: we're doing the song together. You write it, you let
Speaker 2: me know what it's done. I'll fly you guys out
Speaker 2: and we make it happen. And sure enough, so I
Speaker 2: wrote the song. We recorded it at the recording studio
Speaker 2: that is at the Poems in Las Vegas, right, you know,
Speaker 2: because she was doing her residence here, and yeah, man,
Speaker 2: the rest is history. One of one of the most
Speaker 2: genuine people that I've ever met. Like, you know, you
Speaker 2: meet artists, and you know, some people give you who
Speaker 2: they really are. Some people give you their representatives. Some
Speaker 2: people give you who they think that you expect to see.
Speaker 2: She walked in as her and you know, unapologetically her,
Speaker 2: like you know, hair and a messy bun, like we
Speaker 2: hear the work. Hey, it's nice to meet you. I'm Selene.
Speaker 2: Let's let's rock like and I respect that.
Speaker 4: You wrote when you wrote Unfaithful for Rihanna. Every time
Speaker 4: I walk out the door. I see him die a
Speaker 4: little more inside. I don't want to hurt him anymore.
Speaker 4: I don't want to take away his life. I don't
Speaker 4: want to be a murderer. How do you come up
Speaker 4: with that hook?
Speaker 2: That is a story. A lot of a lot of
Speaker 2: my a lot of my songs come from actual experiences.
Speaker 2: And you know, if it's not an you will make
Speaker 2: a cute couple.
Speaker 1: Y'all all right about y'all be killing y'all, be killing y'all.
Speaker 2: Tailor one on me. I'm toxic. I mess, I mess
Speaker 2: all that. A few tailors all love no, But I write.
Speaker 2: I write from experience. Man, It's it's not always my
Speaker 2: personal experience. Like, for example, Irreplaceable was the story about
Speaker 2: one of my aunts. I grew up in the house
Speaker 2: with five aunts, and that one particular aunt that just
Speaker 2: always had a new boyfriend. So that's that story came from.
Speaker 2: That song came from that story. Unfaithful came from a
Speaker 2: story that my sister was telling me about a dude
Speaker 2: that she was dating back in the day. You know,
Speaker 2: she she might get mad at me for telling this story,
Speaker 2: but it is I mean, she she was. It was
Speaker 2: one of those situations won't know which one you're talking about.
Speaker 2: I do, but she'll know. And I'm gonna get home
Speaker 2: and catch some catch a couple of these, A couple body.
Speaker 1: Nah.
Speaker 2: But she was she was dealing. She was dealing with
Speaker 2: this dude and it was that whole situation. And he's
Speaker 2: just he's just too nice. He's so nice, Like I
Speaker 2: literally just walk over his back, he's so nice. So
Speaker 2: because he was so nice, she started dealing with somebody
Speaker 2: else and it got to the point where like everybody knew.
Speaker 2: Everybody knew, and it's like, okay, okay, she's she's she's
Speaker 2: doing what she's doing. The whole family knows, her friends know,
Speaker 2: his friends know. The only person that's acting like they
Speaker 2: don't know it's him, and it's like, what do you do?
Speaker 2: So so that's so, that's what the old thing came
Speaker 2: back because she felt terrible about it, but at the
Speaker 2: same time, it's like.
Speaker 1: Not enough to stop doing it though.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's what it was.
Speaker 1: That's what it was.
Speaker 2: Thank you who almost said her name. She was mad,
Speaker 2: you'd be all right, you're.
Speaker 1: Right, said that breakups are great for writing songs. Is
Speaker 1: that how you feel?
Speaker 2: Absolutely? Yes, definitely, So I don't know what it is
Speaker 2: about heartbreak or turmoil or drama or animosity or sadness.
Speaker 2: But for whatever reason, when you when you put yourself
Speaker 2: there and you write anything, it's gonna be deep, it's
Speaker 2: gonna be meaningful, it's gonna have depth, it's gonna have emotion.
Speaker 2: And those are the those are some of the key
Speaker 2: ingredients to a song that you just can't stop singing.
Speaker 4: So in other word, just because you know, because everybody
Speaker 4: automatically thinks, but when you write a song, you're talking
Speaker 4: about a personal experience, like us your confession.
Speaker 1: Everybody said he talking about chili.
Speaker 4: Yeah, but you're saying that, hey, you know, it might
Speaker 4: be on It might be a sister, it might be
Speaker 4: a homeboy that was.
Speaker 2: Going through Always me, no, not always, because my my
Speaker 2: story and what's going on with me. You know, I'm
Speaker 2: a I'm gonna I'm gonna dabble into it a little bit,
Speaker 2: but for the most part, I'm a I'm I've learned
Speaker 2: that it's certain aspects of me that I would like
Speaker 2: to keep for me, right, you know, because the world, uh,
Speaker 2: it ain't a person walking face of the planet that
Speaker 2: has the right to judge anybody, right they don't stop them,
Speaker 2: you know. And and you know, I got kids. I
Speaker 2: don't want my kids to to to get into all
Speaker 2: that and see all of that, you know. But other
Speaker 2: than that, yeah, I write from I write from just
Speaker 2: things that I've always found that if I write from
Speaker 2: something that really happened, the song just comes out better.
Speaker 2: I can make it up all day, but those songs
Speaker 2: just don't have the same you know what I mean,
Speaker 2: Like it's it's that thing, right, it's that thing like, no,
Speaker 2: this really happened. I really had to you know, I
Speaker 2: really couldn't turn the radio off. I really had the
Speaker 2: answer machine with hey, we can't come to the phone
Speaker 2: right now. You know, we use kids. The hell we
Speaker 2: was doing right, But like the fine details that that
Speaker 2: you are, that you can put into it when it's
Speaker 2: something that you really experience, like that's the like that's
Speaker 2: the weapon X that turns it into that hit song.
Speaker 4: Because you're in this place, it's on your mind. You
Speaker 4: can't seem to escape it. Uh, the mind can't relate,
Speaker 4: can't race what the heart can't delete, and so you're writing.
Speaker 4: So that puts you in a space that man, I
Speaker 4: might as well, you know, turn this heartbreak into something. Yeah,
Speaker 4: something good can come out of every bad situation.
Speaker 2: Definitely.
Speaker 1: We don't see it at the time, but you says, okay,
Speaker 1: this happened then any way I wanted to I'm putting
Speaker 1: pen to paper. Yep.
Speaker 2: Absolutely. It is the ultimate gift from God because you know,
Speaker 2: everybody goes through hurt and heartache and pain. Not everybody
Speaker 2: gets the outlet that music is right, you know, I
Speaker 2: don't have to. I don't have to pack it down
Speaker 2: and eventually blow up for something stupid. Now, as soon
Speaker 2: as I feel it, as soon as my chest get heavy,
Speaker 2: I can sit and write it. After I'm done writing,
Speaker 2: I'm good because it ain't in me no more. It's
Speaker 2: here now, you know, And I'm gonna get that to
Speaker 2: the world and like minded people are gonna listen to
Speaker 2: it and be like, yeah, I understand that I've been
Speaker 2: there before. I felt that before, and that's how we
Speaker 2: get to where I am.
Speaker 1: Now. Do you think any of the women like songs
Speaker 1: that you wrote like that, you know what? Wrote this
Speaker 1: about me? I know what.
Speaker 2: Yes, I've been that. Some of them have reached out
Speaker 2: and asked, is.
Speaker 1: That about me?
Speaker 2: No?
Speaker 1: No, I ain't talking about you.
Speaker 2: It's about you. That don't mean you don't mean you
Speaker 2: get no money for Dan Will. It's about you. Come on,
Speaker 2: I said, I put the date in the song. You
Speaker 2: know it's about you. However, enjoyed from from Johanna Civic.
Speaker 2: We did.
Speaker 4: We see a lot of you got an extensive catalog.
Speaker 4: We see a lot of people selling off their catalog.
Speaker 4: Is that something that you're interested in?
Speaker 2: If for the right price, yeah, yeah, for the right price,
Speaker 2: I definitely do that, just because I know that I'm
Speaker 2: not done, Like I haven't written my greatest song.
Speaker 4: Right, So if you sell your catalog, that means you
Speaker 4: start the process of another or then every does everything
Speaker 4: that you right go into that catalog.
Speaker 2: Oh no, no, no, you start the process. You start
Speaker 2: another one, Okay, start over, which I have again I
Speaker 2: have no problem with because I I have yet to
Speaker 2: write my most amazing record. And as things happen in
Speaker 2: my life, you know, as time progresses, different things happen.
Speaker 2: I just got more and more ammo for for this gun.
Speaker 1: So yeah, do you like writing more or do you
Speaker 1: like performing more?
Speaker 2: As of late, writing more? I love to perform. I
Speaker 2: love to get out there and you know, do that
Speaker 2: home you perform I am absolutely.
Speaker 4: So that because you have singers, you have performers. You
Speaker 4: have and you can do both, but you really like performing.
Speaker 2: Performing is my thing. I can stand still and sing
Speaker 2: a song, but I ain't gonna have no fun. If
Speaker 2: I don't have no fun, you probably gonna have no
Speaker 2: fun either. So now we're gonna jump around, We're gonna
Speaker 2: work the whole stage. This is this is who I am.
Speaker 1: Yes, where are you on social media? Uh?
Speaker 2: What are my social media handles?
Speaker 1: Hold on?
Speaker 2: The IG is at neo h the Twitter is at
Speaker 2: Neo Compound.
Speaker 1: Respond Do you respond to comments?
Speaker 2: Yeah? Yeah, so, I mean I don't. I don't read
Speaker 2: comments as much anymore because, for whatever reason, you read
Speaker 2: them comments and all of a sudden you start to like,
Speaker 2: let those opinions mean something, when the reality is opinions
Speaker 2: are not special because literally everybody got one, right, So
Speaker 2: I don't. I don't readcomments as much as I used to.
Speaker 2: But should you receive a DM from from me and
Speaker 2: you see the yellow yellow, you see the blue dot,
Speaker 2: you know that that's really me.
Speaker 1: It's really me.
Speaker 2: I'm really responding.
Speaker 1: Oh okay, yeah, yeah, let's get it.
Speaker 4: I want to get through your upbring before I get
Speaker 4: you out of here. Born in Arkansas. Yes, how old
Speaker 4: were you when you left Arkansas and went to Vegas?
Speaker 2: Roughly eight nine years old somewhere in there. And we
Speaker 2: got to Vegas and stayed in Vegas and went to
Speaker 2: high school in Las Vegas, the whole nine, right, that
Speaker 2: was weird, definitely, just it wasn't weird as it was happening.
Speaker 2: It's weird as I look back and like know how
Speaker 2: other people's high school situation went. You know, you go
Speaker 2: through high school with that click of friends all the
Speaker 2: way up and you'll graduate together and all that I
Speaker 2: don't happen in Vegas because everybody's coming in to do
Speaker 2: what they're gonna do for about a year. It's tours sound,
Speaker 2: it's military base, you know what I'm saying. They in
Speaker 2: and out. So every school year you start with brand
Speaker 2: new people teaching you how to be a people person.
Speaker 2: Not to mention, there's a strip every day and where
Speaker 2: you meet Susan and her nine friends from Minnesota and
Speaker 2: they and and yeah, so.
Speaker 1: That so that so that's the best. That's one of
Speaker 1: the best parts about Vegas hunts.
Speaker 2: You meet a lot of people. You meet a lot
Speaker 2: of different people from all walks of life. Everybody find
Speaker 2: a way to Vegas at some point. Yeah, to a.
Speaker 1: Degree, to a degree, fifty degree, seventy five degree.
Speaker 2: I mean, I'm I'll say this, as as my age progresses,
Speaker 2: my patience gets shorter, you know what I mean, Like
Speaker 2: energy becomes real, real important as you as as time progresses.
Speaker 2: And now I'm real picky and choosy about what I
Speaker 2: choose to give energy to and who.
Speaker 4: So, yeah, did grow up with growing up in Vegas
Speaker 4: make you want to do show? Make you want to
Speaker 4: get on stage?
Speaker 2: Or absolutely?
Speaker 4: Yeah?
Speaker 2: Man, that was that was you know you you hit
Speaker 2: the strip as as a teenager and you see the
Speaker 2: limos pull up and you see the celebrity get out,
Speaker 2: and you know, if you get a chance to get
Speaker 2: into any of these Vegas shows, and you just it's
Speaker 2: an experience, bro, Especially as a kid, you're looking at
Speaker 2: that like, oh man.
Speaker 1: That would be me.
Speaker 2: That's that's what I want to do right there.
Speaker 4: Yeah, so your parents they weren't together, but so so
Speaker 4: did it have an impact that your dad wasn't around?
Speaker 4: And you said, you talked about your mom, you talked
Speaker 4: about the women in your life, your aunts, and you
Speaker 4: wrote songs, and you had seemed like in your sisters
Speaker 4: and your mom and your aunts, so you had very
Speaker 4: strong women around you.
Speaker 2: Definitely, so definitely so had uncles that that you know
Speaker 2: that were there, but you know they show up eating leave.
Speaker 2: But no, it was primarily my mother, my grandmother, five aunts,
Speaker 2: my sister, and me. And I never really, I never
Speaker 2: really felt like I was missing anything from not having
Speaker 2: a dad until you know, I got of a certain
Speaker 2: age and I'm in school and my friends are talking
Speaker 2: about their dads and they're doing with their dads, and
Speaker 2: I'm like, wait a minute, I ain't. I ain't never
Speaker 2: did that. But then it becomes a thing.
Speaker 1: Did you play sports?
Speaker 2: Uh? Not really a little bit, but I never really
Speaker 2: took a seat I would. I was more of an
Speaker 2: artistic kid than an athletic kid. I could do it,
Speaker 2: but if I had to chew, if I had the option,
Speaker 2: I was somewhere writing a song.
Speaker 1: How did being raised by women impact your songwriting?
Speaker 2: It helped me escape the potential of the whole toxic
Speaker 2: masculinity thing that that everybody so up in a uproar
Speaker 2: about today. I feel like toxic masculinity is the opposite
Speaker 2: of a person that is in touch with and not
Speaker 2: afraid of emotion. Like I've heard people say, how do
Speaker 2: you write from the mind of a woman so well,
Speaker 2: and it's like, I'm not writing from the mind of
Speaker 2: a woman. I'm writing from the mind of a person
Speaker 2: that's not afraid of emotion. You're giving these emotions for
Speaker 2: a reason, okay, that they're supposed to help you throughout life.
Speaker 2: You're not supposed to ignore them. You know the whole
Speaker 2: boys don't cry. That's not a thing. It's not a
Speaker 2: thing at all. Like, that's that's how you That's how
Speaker 2: you breed that toxic male. You know, I gotta address
Speaker 2: every situation with aggress and that's how.
Speaker 1: You breed that.
Speaker 2: My mom didn't raise me like that. She said, if
Speaker 2: it's smile, if it feels good, smile and if for
Speaker 2: hers cry, and never be ashamed of either one because
Speaker 2: you're giving them for a reason the tools.
Speaker 4: Do You feel like man suppressed a lot of their
Speaker 4: true feelings of motion and they can't properly be who
Speaker 4: they truly are.
Speaker 2: Absolutely, absolutely, I feel like especially nowadays, where you know,
Speaker 2: all vulnerability is viewed as weakness, and any man showing
Speaker 2: any is ridiculed or whatever or something like that. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 2: you get caught, and it's like I've just never I've
Speaker 2: just never bought into that. You know what I'm saying.
Speaker 2: I've been bullied before. I understand what that is. You know,
Speaker 2: nine times out of ten, the cat bullying you is
Speaker 2: getting bullied, as Daddy would' his ass. Something's happening to him.
Speaker 2: It's not just he ain't just wake up and decide
Speaker 2: to mess with you. He messed with you cause somebody
Speaker 2: messing with him. I get that, I understand what that is.
Speaker 2: I just really feel like the way that the way
Speaker 2: that my mom brought me up, don't even she didn't
Speaker 2: bring me up, is chump you know what I'm saying.
Speaker 2: She definitely taught me how to try to fend for
Speaker 2: self and defend myself. But at the same time, she
Speaker 2: taught me that every situation is not called for aggression,
Speaker 2: right you know, you set up and argue with a fool.
Speaker 2: To the people watching, they don't know who the fool is,
Speaker 2: right y'all both y'all both look like fools right now,
Speaker 2: And that and that was that was me growing up.
Speaker 2: I wasn't a cat that was so eager to jump
Speaker 2: into a fight. You know what I'm saying. Nine times
Speaker 2: out of ten, I'm talking so fast. You don't want
Speaker 2: to fight no more. That's why that's who I was.
Speaker 1: I read your favorite sport is boxing.
Speaker 2: You're still absolutely absolutely congrats Tank did that?
Speaker 4: Yeah, man, so growing up in Vegas, the Mike Capitol World,
Speaker 4: I don't know how many fights Tyson that you saw,
Speaker 4: may Weather that you saw.
Speaker 1: What is it about the fight game that makes you
Speaker 1: such a fan?
Speaker 2: I love the strategy, there's some there's some fighters that
Speaker 2: I that I'm more of a fan of than others.
Speaker 2: You know, you got you, you got your slugg as
Speaker 2: you catch gonna go out there and swing as hard
Speaker 2: as they can till somebody fall down. That's what Floyd
Speaker 2: has always been a favorite of mine because he's strategic.
Speaker 2: Floyd's game is not hitting you. Floyd's game is making
Speaker 2: you miss, which is just even more embarrassing. Like that's
Speaker 2: that's the mind games that Floyd's plays. I'm gonna let you.
Speaker 2: I'm gonna let you swing for the fences and you're
Speaker 2: gonna hit me none, You're not gonna touch me. Love.
Speaker 2: I've always loved just the cleverness of something that's supposed
Speaker 2: to be so brutal, but you literally got to use
Speaker 2: your mind if you're gonna be good at it, if
Speaker 2: you're gonna be successful at it. This brutal blood sport
Speaker 2: where you feel like it's just two men going in
Speaker 2: there beating the hell out of each other for the
Speaker 2: hell of it. Now, this is a strategic game, you
Speaker 2: know what I mean. And it's just I've always been
Speaker 2: a fan of that, that contrast. It's like, this is
Speaker 2: what you expect, but in actuality, it's really this, you know,
Speaker 2: I've always been a fan of that.
Speaker 1: I'm gonna get you out to hear your last two questions.
Speaker 4: Do you feel as an entertainer that you need more
Speaker 4: than one revenue stream because you entertain you sing?
Speaker 1: You right?
Speaker 2: Absolutely so. We already discussed the fact that songwriters just
Speaker 2: a songwriters. If you're not making billions and billions and
Speaker 2: billions of streams, you can't even live off your livelihood,
Speaker 2: you know what I mean. You'll have a hit song
Speaker 2: on the radio and be broke. This is a real thing,
Speaker 2: Like that'll make no sense. There's no other medium that
Speaker 2: that happens in. You can't have the number one blockbuster
Speaker 2: movie in America and live in an apartment. That's not happening. Now,
Speaker 2: they don't page you well for that music, not so much.
Speaker 2: That's just what happens. So yes, as an artist, as
Speaker 2: a as a songwriter, it is an your best interest
Speaker 2: to have multiple streams of revenue. You know, if you
Speaker 2: are a person with a personality, use that, you know,
Speaker 2: don't rely on just one aspect of entertainment. If you
Speaker 2: are a person that understands what entertainment is and your
Speaker 2: entertainment value, I.
Speaker 1: See you throw it in your hat and the acting ring.
Speaker 1: So fifty cent bl yes, yes, a few episodes.
Speaker 2: I met I met fifty a while ago. You know
Speaker 2: what I'm saying. We did did the joint together, you know,
Speaker 2: so we always kind of kept in contact. He he
Speaker 2: basically told me that he was he was gonna figure
Speaker 2: out a way for us to work because he saw
Speaker 2: that I was, you know that I was interested in
Speaker 2: doing the acting thing. So he's like, we're gonnaigure out,
Speaker 2: We're gonna find a way to find a way to
Speaker 2: make it work. He threw me a couple auditions, and
Speaker 2: mind you, that's that's one thing that I really loved
Speaker 2: about him is that he wasn't just gonna give me something, right,
Speaker 2: you know? He's like, yo, you know this is this
Speaker 2: is an opportunity. You get in there, you do the audition.
Speaker 2: If you get it, you get it. If you don't,
Speaker 2: you don't, And like, I respect that, you know. So
Speaker 2: same thing with this BMF situation that that's going on now.
Speaker 2: He said, I think I found something that that's gonna
Speaker 2: make sense, you know, or at least I would like
Speaker 2: to see you in his row. So he pressed me
Speaker 2: with the BMF thing. I'm I think, I don't you
Speaker 2: know what. Let me not even give it away. Yeah,
Speaker 2: I'm on BMF for a few episodes. Yeah yeah, i'mnna
Speaker 2: leave it.
Speaker 4: At that, but I gotta get some player to him this.
Speaker 4: You once found one of your artists asleep. Now I'm
Speaker 4: assuming you got a nice five house, probably be more
Speaker 4: than one bedroom, I'm assuming.
Speaker 1: I mean that's Barry. I mean it's very consumption.
Speaker 2: With no man.
Speaker 1: Thinking that Neil's got a nice house. He has more
Speaker 1: than been So why what made him think it would
Speaker 1: be okay? Was he explain it? Explain it?
Speaker 2: Okay? Shout out to my man, Lucky Day, I love
Speaker 2: love you today, Unlucky that day. I didn't bring you
Speaker 2: back up him. I didn't bring it up. But we're here,
Speaker 2: all right. Lucky Day is an R and B artist, extraordinary,
Speaker 2: one of Grammy last year. Like, dude is doing this thing.
Speaker 2: I love that he's doing his thing. Before Lucky Day
Speaker 2: got his shot, h there was a time, a point
Speaker 2: in time where I was going to sign him. Okay, right,
Speaker 2: so you know we're writing songs together, your artist.
Speaker 1: At the time you were thinking about signing.
Speaker 2: Were we were going to sign Yeah, okay, but we
Speaker 2: writing songs together. For example, Jamie Fox's verse on Uh yeah,
Speaker 2: he wrote that, Okay, he wrote that. So so basically
Speaker 2: I'm about to go on the road. I gave him
Speaker 2: access to my house. I'm like, listen, you can post
Speaker 2: up here. You know what I'm saying.
Speaker 1: Do what you do.
Speaker 2: One room, one rule, don't go in my room.
Speaker 4: So you so crystal clear, you made it a bundantly clear.
Speaker 4: You have access to the hot house tomorrow my room.
Speaker 2: Okay, right, so I got it, go on the road.
Speaker 2: You know what I'm saying. Chat went the cat back
Speaker 2: and forth. I am I ain't can destroying the house,
Speaker 2: all right?
Speaker 1: Cool? Cool?
Speaker 2: So I get home that morning I go into my
Speaker 2: room and old boys asleep in my bed with a
Speaker 2: young lady. I'm like, alrighty, so yeah, I took it
Speaker 2: up on myself to wake him up and like, come on, break,
Speaker 2: you gotta go. Hold you ain't working up with the
Speaker 2: right left no no, no, no walking as on two pieces.
Speaker 2: I'm in bro, I'm saying, I just I pull like
Speaker 2: it was like, hey, I gave breakf bed, you gotta go.
Speaker 1: Ain't you're gonna be sleeping?
Speaker 4: I don't told you have access to eat all the
Speaker 4: food and the kitchen, the refrigerator.
Speaker 1: You go to. I got five bedroo crib and you
Speaker 1: can break your answer.
Speaker 4: I know your mom fail every situation that the call
Speaker 4: war aggression, get really aggressive with him.
Speaker 2: You know what is is. I can't even fop him,
Speaker 2: and it is what it is. But we've spoken since then.
Speaker 2: You know what I'm saying, It's it's all love. You know,
Speaker 2: it ain't no beef, rantomosity whatsoever. You know, I'm more
Speaker 2: than happy for old boy and what and what is
Speaker 2: what he's doing in his crazy you know what.
Speaker 1: I kind of empathized with it because I don't know
Speaker 1: I'm bout there to hit it. You you are fair.
Speaker 1: I'm like, let me show you.
Speaker 2: Know that exactly how it went. I don't mind. Nice,
Speaker 2: I don't mind. I don't mind. I let my friends
Speaker 2: use the nil. They can use it as cool.
Speaker 4: Last question, World d Ash your coach star, Yes, how
Speaker 4: how did that impact you hearing that news?
Speaker 1: But did you know he was going through something?
Speaker 2: That that I had no idea that he was going
Speaker 2: through anything. And and and you know, just from the
Speaker 2: circle of friends that I knew that knew him, they
Speaker 2: had no idea that he was going through anything. I've
Speaker 2: always looked at that with a side eye. I ain't
Speaker 2: making no accusations or nothing like that, but just the
Speaker 2: twitch that I knew he would, that man was in
Speaker 2: love with his children, that man was in love with
Speaker 2: his wife, that man was in love with life. But
Speaker 2: I can't I can't say I knew what he was
Speaker 2: going through. And you never know what somebody's going through
Speaker 2: in the dark. You have no idea. But the twitch
Speaker 2: that I knew, the twitch that was represented to me
Speaker 2: was not somebody that would have that would have did that.
Speaker 2: So I've always I've always felt a way about that.
Speaker 2: You know what I'm saying, he was he was brother
Speaker 2: was was a light, you know what I mean, Like
Speaker 2: you like you meet people and it's like it's just
Speaker 2: a bright dude, it's just just good energy. I'm going
Speaker 2: off of this dude. And that's what he was. That's
Speaker 2: we all every time I saw him, that's what he was.
Speaker 2: So I don't know that that story just had never
Speaker 2: added up to me personally, but it is what it is.
Speaker 1: Appreciate you. Thanks for your time all stopping by the club.
Speaker 1: Indeed all the best moving forward.
Speaker 2: Thank you, sir. Thank you for having me sweating in
Speaker 2: and drinking.
Speaker 3: All my life, grinding all my life, sacrifice, hustle, pair
Speaker 3: the price, wanta slice, got to brow the dice, swap
Speaker 3: all my life.
Speaker 2: I've been grinding all my life, all my life, grinding all.
Speaker 3: My life, sacrifice, hustle, pay the price, and want to slice.
Speaker 2: Got to brow the dice, the swap all my life.
Speaker 2: I've been grinding all my life.