Speaker 1: Quest Love Supreme is a production of iHeartRadio Happy Black
Speaker 1: History Month from Quest Love Supreme. This week's classic is
Speaker 1: with the incredible Melbourne Moore, first air back in twenty
Speaker 1: twenty one, with the highly accomplished singer and actress. We
Speaker 1: appreciate you, Melba, hope you guys enjoyed this.
Speaker 2: Hello, gorgeous.
Speaker 3: Hi.
Speaker 4: How you say it? It is how you say it,
Speaker 4: you use it.
Speaker 1: You're the person to get her name right. And Lai
Speaker 1: has been everything I saw. Boy, she's been everything to
Speaker 1: every guest. Guest, Princess Leah.
Speaker 4: Yeah, everybody.
Speaker 1: What's going on, Miss Melbourne?
Speaker 4: Well, good to be here.
Speaker 5: Yeah, good, We're good to have you here.
Speaker 1: Great to have you here too, Ladies and gentlemen. This
Speaker 1: is Questlove, host of Quest Love Supreme. What can I say? Well,
Speaker 1: first of all Team Supreme, Solloy and Steve and unpaid
Speaker 1: Bill somewhere paying his bills. I got to say that
Speaker 1: this interview is a long time coming. Once again, I
Speaker 1: always say that we're honored to be in the presence
Speaker 1: of worldty, but this is definitely the case for that episode,
Speaker 1: For this episode, Melboln Moore, you know what can I say?
Speaker 1: Broadway actress she was in the original here, the original
Speaker 1: here with Ronnie Dice. So many questions. Uh, she is
Speaker 1: a Tony Award winner for Pearly. I even saw her
Speaker 1: in y'all might not remember this, but in seventy eight,
Speaker 1: Tim Buck two was a big deal. I saw Tim
Speaker 1: Buck two her an Earth Kit, I think so first
Speaker 1: week it came out, my mom took me to see
Speaker 1: Tim Buck two. Not to mention her music career, signed
Speaker 1: to a new Billguard's legendary Buddha Records in the early seventies,
Speaker 1: soon too Epic Records, and then of course in the
Speaker 1: eighties or legendary run on Capitol Records.
Speaker 4: Uh.
Speaker 1: Having discovered and been involved in so many greats, including
Speaker 1: one of our favorites, Freddy Jackson managing his career. Not
Speaker 1: to mention movies, just everything so legendary about this guest.
Speaker 1: Please welcome to our show. Finally, Queen Melbourne Moore, thank you, yes, yes,
Speaker 1: thank you so much everybody.
Speaker 4: I'm so excited to be here with you all. Well,
Speaker 4: how do you remember all that.
Speaker 1: Of yours?
Speaker 2: Id you was.
Speaker 4: One of them geniuses, That's what I heard about.
Speaker 1: I'm just the street, this is my my platform is
Speaker 1: nothing but just the having the best seat in the
Speaker 1: house and interviewing people that you know excite me. You
Speaker 1: know I didn't. I guess I became friends with you
Speaker 1: because you would always come to uh you know, are
Speaker 1: always on our DJ gigs. You're the nicest DJ gigs
Speaker 1: of mine as well, and got to know you. I'm
Speaker 1: still doing your jazz set one day. Actually, wait, I
Speaker 1: just did your dad. I forgot to tell you. I
Speaker 1: finally did your jazz yesterday. You asked the jazz set together,
Speaker 1: and wow, I finally I finally got one together, like
Speaker 1: last week when you know we shot this away later,
Speaker 1: but yes, I finally got one together. So how are you?
Speaker 1: Were you right? Are you still a New Yorker? Like,
Speaker 1: what part of the world?
Speaker 2: I'm just New York, New Jersey?
Speaker 1: Okay, that part of New York, yes, the Jersey part. Yes,
Speaker 1: I feel like everyone in Jersey. Yeah, true, true New
Speaker 1: Yorkers live in Jersey. I didn't get remember.
Speaker 4: Well now listen, I'm North New Jersey too.
Speaker 5: Oh wow?
Speaker 1: Okay, So what where were you? Were you always in
Speaker 1: New York or where were you born?
Speaker 4: I was born in New York. Yes, what.
Speaker 2: A Harlem hospital?
Speaker 4: Oh?
Speaker 1: Okay, your Harlem night.
Speaker 3: No.
Speaker 4: I lived on one hundred and eighth Street, so it's
Speaker 4: like two blocks below Harlem. I'm always on the cusp
Speaker 4: of everything.
Speaker 1: Okay, okay, almost there, but not quite there. I see that.
Speaker 1: I guess in your well, in your beginnings, what was
Speaker 1: your your your childhood into at least musically? Did you
Speaker 1: grow up in a musical family where you I know
Speaker 1: that your parents were also like singers as well, Like,
Speaker 1: what was your childhood?
Speaker 5: Like?
Speaker 4: I haven't in my jeans? You might know who Teddy
Speaker 4: Hill is?
Speaker 2: Do you?
Speaker 1: I know this name?
Speaker 2: For your time?
Speaker 4: I don't mean that. Yeah, you are walking encyclopedia, so
Speaker 4: you might not.
Speaker 1: I know the name Teddy Hill, but I'm not familiar
Speaker 1: with correct.
Speaker 4: It was a very famous big band leader. People like
Speaker 4: Physical Lesbie and those folks played in his band. Well,
Speaker 4: that's my natural father, but he didn't marry my mother.
Speaker 4: So my mother was a professional singer. Okay, okay, so
Speaker 4: I started out with music in my blood. But you know,
Speaker 4: a strange family. My grandmother had strokes, so she didn't speak,
Speaker 4: so I don't really know my my family history. My
Speaker 4: mother's from pipe shop, Alabama. Didn't nobody ever hear that?
Speaker 6: Right?
Speaker 4: You know about Birmingham, but you don't.
Speaker 1: Know about pipe pipe shop. Okay, really, don't sound.
Speaker 2: Like I want to go right.
Speaker 7: Everybody's from there, right, So as I started out my
Speaker 7: life really with a disjointed, broken.
Speaker 4: Family like many African American people. And then my mother
Speaker 4: married my stepfather who was a piano player and they
Speaker 4: worked together. So when I moved to Newark because he's
Speaker 4: he was from Newark, I then had a step sister
Speaker 4: and step brother later on two more blood you know
Speaker 4: have blood brothers, and uh Daddy made us all take
Speaker 4: piano lessons. So that's when I found out I could
Speaker 4: sing about well, I was already ten years old. I mean,
Speaker 4: when you were the instrument and you're born into it,
Speaker 4: you expect like you're going to start singing about three
Speaker 4: or four years old because the instrument is already there.
Speaker 4: So really started late, that's my point, I guess I'm ployment.
Speaker 1: So for you, starting at that age was late to
Speaker 1: you in your in your mind like, well.
Speaker 4: I mean usually when people have a voice, by the
Speaker 4: time at three or four years old, they can sing.
Speaker 3: Okay, is that what happened with your mom? Because y'all
Speaker 3: have similar voices and yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I guess you said question you want to know
Speaker 4: what you want to know? What is your question?
Speaker 8: Right?
Speaker 5: No?
Speaker 1: No, no, no, well I really want to know. I know
Speaker 1: that also in Newark, especially in that time period, the
Speaker 1: legacy that Newark had as far as its singers are concerned.
Speaker 1: I know that Cissy Houston was around there and at
Speaker 1: the time, and the work sisters and whatnot likes. As
Speaker 1: far as the musical richness of Newark, what was the
Speaker 1: environment like back then.
Speaker 4: Well, there were lots of music bars, clubs with bands
Speaker 4: and combos. Later on they were still continued to be
Speaker 4: and people like Rhodid Scott and these great organ players
Speaker 4: in these clubs all the time. Of course we also
Speaker 4: had concerts and it was just very very rich. I
Speaker 4: mean to the point too where by the time it
Speaker 4: was time for you to go to high school, a
Speaker 4: lot would you decided. I don't know if I could
Speaker 4: have any little talent, but I wanted to be involved.
Speaker 4: I want to be in music. So I went to
Speaker 4: music and art high school.
Speaker 1: What high school was that arts high Okay? So there
Speaker 1: there was like a performing arts high school, artigs school. Okay,
Speaker 1: I see.
Speaker 4: It's like a famous one, right, it's not famous like
Speaker 4: the one in New York, but I can tell you
Speaker 4: people like Wayne Shorter went there.
Speaker 1: Oh wow, yeah, I was going to say, who else
Speaker 1: went there that was of New Well, Wayne Shorter was
Speaker 1: one of them. Anyone else?
Speaker 4: Tons? I can't remember them all now, but tons and
Speaker 4: tons and tons of like because it's of talented people.
Speaker 1: Oh okay, Like who are your idols during that time period?
Speaker 1: Or like at least what was the who was the
Speaker 1: person that you looked up to the most, people.
Speaker 4: Like Bobby Tenants or Horror Silver. I thought I was
Speaker 4: gonna be a count of player.
Speaker 1: Oh well, okay, okay.
Speaker 5: That was.
Speaker 4: Yeah, well, because my stepfather was a counter player and
Speaker 4: he played really really well, and he loved and he
Speaker 4: made everybody around him just fall in love with it,
Speaker 4: So I thought I could do it too.
Speaker 1: So then, what was your first moment, as in an
Speaker 1: entry into your professional at least that moment where you
Speaker 1: knew that you were going to make this your life calling.
Speaker 4: Well, after I spent about two or three years teaching
Speaker 4: vocal music in public schools, I told my father, I said,
Speaker 4: this is your dream, daddy. I do it really well,
Speaker 4: but I don't want to do it. Please introduce me
Speaker 4: to some of your viewer peoplec can you get me
Speaker 4: into the industry as a performer. If it doesn't work,
Speaker 4: I'll come back and peach school. So, to make a
Speaker 4: long story a little bit shorter, one of the first people,
Speaker 4: and that was Valerie Simpson. Some music publishers offered trying
Speaker 4: to sell her songs already you know, at the beginning
Speaker 4: of her life and career, because this was like late
Speaker 4: sixties and we changed numbers, and she got me involved
Speaker 4: with studio background singing work and singing jingles. That was
Speaker 4: my into the industry. I started, you know, if you know,
Speaker 4: valuing sense if she's at the top of her change,
Speaker 4: she started out at the top. Yes, yes, because she's
Speaker 4: just a genius.
Speaker 2: What I'm going to tell you town Yes.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 1: So then would you say that acting, like did that
Speaker 1: come into play before you became a singer, and like
Speaker 1: was acting your first fours as far as like doing
Speaker 1: plays or whatnot?
Speaker 4: Heck no, no, I just mean I didn't have a
Speaker 4: clue that would be in my future. But one of
Speaker 4: the recording sessions was being performed by Galton and Bermott,
Speaker 4: who wrote the music for the show. Here and they
Speaker 4: were still casting for it, and they told us if
Speaker 4: we wanted to cut any of us, they had really
Speaker 4: basically been auditioning us without us knowing it, right, and
Speaker 4: if we wanted to, they would find a part for
Speaker 4: all of us in the show if we were coming
Speaker 4: down and sing for the director and to produce. I
Speaker 4: was the only one on the day get about getting
Speaker 4: into theater, so I got into my first world would
Speaker 4: show that.
Speaker 1: Way so okay for our listeners that don't know.
Speaker 5: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1: Yeah yeah. I was going to say, well, not only that,
Speaker 1: I know that hair was just something out of you know,
Speaker 1: out of nowhere and very uh, well, you know people
Speaker 1: think of hair. At least everyone that I know that
Speaker 1: that saw it in real time told me that basically
Speaker 1: that was the first time that you know, open front
Speaker 1: nudity was such a thing on Broadway. Like, how controversial
Speaker 1: was it? Then? To get involved? How did they talk
Speaker 1: you guys into it?
Speaker 4: We were in previews and I don't know, someone from
Speaker 4: the production team came up with the idea and told
Speaker 4: us what we had to do the new scene, and
Speaker 4: everybody's threatened quick because we didn't. I got in mind
Speaker 4: and was shocking to us. But then when they made
Speaker 4: it kind of well, if you want to do what
Speaker 4: you can, If you don't, you don't have to. I
Speaker 4: was curious, So I did it.
Speaker 2: M M every night every night. Well I don't, I don't.
Speaker 4: Remember if I did it every night?
Speaker 1: Right, do it?
Speaker 4: If you want to, You're gonna have to.
Speaker 2: Can you can you take us through their hair?
Speaker 3: Right? Because I read right that you also replaced Diane Keaton,
Speaker 3: which was like the first time the black woman had
Speaker 3: ever done that in theater. But can you what was
Speaker 3: the what was your your actual process and hair in
Speaker 3: that way?
Speaker 4: Okay, Well what happened was I've been in the show
Speaker 4: for about a year and they had a lot of
Speaker 4: different people coming into to do the lead role of Shield,
Speaker 4: and they weren't happy with them, so they kept leaving.
Speaker 4: And so one of the girls, one of the black girls,
Speaker 4: excuse me to come, he'all, don't never let got play
Speaker 4: out for would be great at it?
Speaker 2: Why don't you let Bill?
Speaker 3: But why.
Speaker 2: The same girl?
Speaker 4: She was very loud mouth, big mouth young matter of fact,
Speaker 4: one of the parodies that she played, she played Abraham
Speaker 4: Lincoln like the gettys Gettysburg Address, but like in rap
Speaker 4: I had the birthday, the babe, the birthday to you.
Speaker 2: It was something like that, very irreverent.
Speaker 9: Wow, yeah we did. We did for production of Hair
Speaker 9: when I was in high school. I played Hood.
Speaker 10: So yes, we weren't mad Man, we weren't doing but
Speaker 10: you know it was a very tone down version, but
Speaker 10: you know we did it.
Speaker 2: Yeah, so she pushed you in front of the bus
Speaker 2: and then well what happens?
Speaker 4: They I'd like the audition for so it rehearsed me
Speaker 4: in in the role and a couple of different Saturday matinees.
Speaker 4: Let me get up and try out for That's how
Speaker 4: I got the role.
Speaker 3: Mhm.
Speaker 1: Was that your first play or.
Speaker 4: Yeah I didn't. I had no theater background. Oh really, wow,
Speaker 4: you know black people, there's musical.
Speaker 2: I mean, yeah, but I'm talking about.
Speaker 4: Back in the day we were allowed to do anything.
Speaker 11: Now.
Speaker 1: Yeah, well, so many legends came from that production.
Speaker 4: Oh yeah, that's true.
Speaker 1: What was it like? Well, because I you know, you know,
Speaker 1: for a lot of my favorites that I grew up
Speaker 1: listening to when I was a kid in the seventies, like,
Speaker 1: you couldn't find out much about them. I mean, I've
Speaker 1: always heard about Ronnie Dyson and how incredible he was
Speaker 1: as a singer, but you know, he really didn't get
Speaker 1: that much press.
Speaker 4: No, there was no press for black people during that
Speaker 4: time except Jet magazine.
Speaker 5: Oh wow.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Besides Ronnie Dyson, was there anyone else notable that.
Speaker 4: Was in there was similar? I'm trying to think of you,
Speaker 4: Ben Vereen. Wait a minute, wow, Donna Summer?
Speaker 1: Wow? That right? I forgot Donosam. Okay, was it? How
Speaker 1: long was it until what Pearly was? Immediately after?
Speaker 4: Or immediately immediately because that same big Matt black girl, Yeah,
Speaker 4: I can say. Her name is Mary Davis. I always remember.
Speaker 4: Mary said, you've been in this player a long time.
Speaker 4: You just start going up the page. She said, you
Speaker 4: don't even know how to audition. Why don't you just
Speaker 4: see if you can learn how to audition. You don't
Speaker 4: even know how to audition. And she told me about
Speaker 4: auditions for Early and she told her out how to
Speaker 4: do what they called type passing. I said, well, Mary,
Speaker 4: horn is that? He said, Well, you learned something about
Speaker 4: the character, and you try to look like the character.
Speaker 4: And of course the character was a backwoods illiterate maid.
Speaker 2: But that's what that's who I was raised.
Speaker 4: By because I had what we called a governess or nanny,
Speaker 4: because my mother was a single parent. She was gone
Speaker 4: and she was she was a backwoods cotton chopper. So
Speaker 4: like most of Americans, we have two countries that we
Speaker 4: identify as and.
Speaker 2: So gun people's mine. Can you talk about those Pearly days?
Speaker 3: I'm sorry because I was just talking to my dad,
Speaker 3: who comes from New York around that time and used
Speaker 3: to party with y'all. You don't know him, that's fine,
Speaker 3: but he was saying that the parties around Pearly, and
Speaker 3: one of the lead dancers, who had two homes, one
Speaker 3: for the artists, I think, and one for himself, was like,
Speaker 3: just like you've never seen before early Pearly, the cast,
Speaker 3: cast parties and whatnot and the good Yeah.
Speaker 4: They were great.
Speaker 2: It is all you can say. Well, I could say more.
Speaker 4: But perhaps I shouldn't.
Speaker 3: Should if you don't tell us, would never know the
Speaker 3: history is all.
Speaker 4: Well, I'll tell you who was in the chorus. And he,
Speaker 4: you know, showed me like what the tony went about
Speaker 4: and told me that I had, you know, have a
Speaker 4: formal gown with George. Yes you know he's crazy, Yes, yes.
Speaker 2: Love him. Yes, the choreographer of The Wiz.
Speaker 4: Everybody, yes, right, and Sherman Hensley.
Speaker 5: Oh, that's all you have to say.
Speaker 1: We already we already heard about sermon because you.
Speaker 4: Know, he thought he was calming pray.
Speaker 8: Okay, wow, thought he was That's how it was.
Speaker 4: Oh my god, I love it.
Speaker 2: I love it.
Speaker 3: Y'all seem sometimes y'all just seem so much more freedom.
Speaker 3: Sometimes in here we're just a little bit more uptight.
Speaker 4: I didn't have a clue what I was doing, so
Speaker 4: I was free.
Speaker 2: Took about stage love stage.
Speaker 4: Right, I said, but what is that?
Speaker 2: I mean? I know it was your second a this
Speaker 2: ship your first audition, that's our first audition, my second.
Speaker 1: So how how shocked were you to get uh A
Speaker 1: Tony for Pearl.
Speaker 4: I seen it on tape, but I don't remember half
Speaker 4: of it because it was just too shocking. Wow, it's
Speaker 4: too shocked.
Speaker 2: Let me see what you wore, because I know it
Speaker 2: was fierce.
Speaker 4: I was in costume because we performed. I remember the
Speaker 4: lights were on because you know it was television, so
Speaker 4: I could see Pearl Bailey and Rex Harrison and these people.
Speaker 4: I don't know what I did say, I didn't know
Speaker 4: where are I supposed to be what the categories were,
Speaker 4: so I thought he had already called my category. And
Speaker 4: there was a gentleman. His name is an actor named
Speaker 4: Jack Jones, and he was doing a lot of the
Speaker 4: announcing and saying with categories. I was confused, but he
Speaker 4: was always drunk.
Speaker 9: You thought he had got it wrong. You thought he
Speaker 9: was drunk, and he did get it wrong.
Speaker 4: Wow, because he said somebody else's first name and my
Speaker 4: last name.
Speaker 7: The whole audience started knelling no, no, the more, no more.
Speaker 4: Oh my god, what's going on? You know, it was
Speaker 4: shocking to me.
Speaker 3: Wow, are your parents still with us at this point?
Speaker 4: When you ring your tony yes?
Speaker 2: What did they I mean, what did they think?
Speaker 4: Well, my dad was really glad that he didn't insist
Speaker 4: that I kept teaching school. I wasn't too happy about
Speaker 4: the new scene and hair oh in that part, but
Speaker 4: they were.
Speaker 1: Their parents were more like fall back on something that's yes,
Speaker 1: secure and not. I was about to say about this point,
Speaker 1: do you at least have like a manager? Are you like, Okay,
Speaker 1: I'm going to go full throttle and no, so you
Speaker 1: just like I got lucky. I got one play and
Speaker 1: then oh I gotten another play and I won this Tony.
Speaker 4: So after that, I think I got an agent after that, okay,
Speaker 4: because because then, you know, our television show came along.
Speaker 4: I was working all the best supper clubs like the
Speaker 4: Palmer House in Chicago and Waldorf Astoria in New York,
Speaker 4: and you know these so they had to be negotiated, right.
Speaker 4: I got an Asian then.
Speaker 9: So explained that to us, like exactly when you say
Speaker 9: a supper club, what was that type of entertainment?
Speaker 4: Then you like, beautiful, fancy club. Let me see you
Speaker 4: know the City Wineries, yes, ma'am.
Speaker 1: Oh okay, yeah yeah, city Winery.
Speaker 5: Yeah, we played City Winery.
Speaker 2: Before something like that.
Speaker 4: Very class and very very you know. And you have dinner, you.
Speaker 5: Have supper, you have dinner, gotcha.
Speaker 4: Yeah. And you could have a big orchestra or small ensemble,
Speaker 4: but the top entertainment.
Speaker 5: Okay, got it?
Speaker 4: And you went down. Excuse me if you want to.
Speaker 4: I love this business. I gotta tell you.
Speaker 5: He loves you back.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: So your recording career, I knew that you got signed
Speaker 1: and I think in the seventies, but I made a mistake.
Speaker 1: Buddha wasn't your first label, right, No.
Speaker 4: Mercury was because I got that, I guess in the
Speaker 4: early early seventies while I was still in Pearly.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that was my first I look what you're doing
Speaker 1: to the man? I think that was what seventy one?
Speaker 4: Yeah, yeah, because I got that as a result of
Speaker 4: early I got and I got a recording offer as
Speaker 4: a lead singer. You know.
Speaker 1: Wait, so even then, it's not like, by the time
Speaker 1: you get a record deal, surely by this point your
Speaker 1: fully operational business, I should hope.
Speaker 4: So well, not if you don't know the business.
Speaker 1: Wait, how can one navigate without well, you know, at
Speaker 1: least in today's terms. You know, it's like everything has
Speaker 1: to be in place, like your manager, your tour managers,
Speaker 1: your social media manager, your business manager. But back then,
Speaker 1: it just none of that ever occurred.
Speaker 4: No, No, I think it was more structured then than
Speaker 4: it is now. You can almost be a one man
Speaker 4: man now, and you know, to your own media or
Speaker 4: you can because a lot of things that you can
Speaker 4: kind of outsource might call it there. It was very
Speaker 4: kind of a systematic, and especially being a black woman,
Speaker 4: somebody had had to go before you negotiate these things.
Speaker 4: I mean, the only reason I was even talked about
Speaker 4: being allowed into these venues was because it became it
Speaker 4: came through theater, which essentially it was white. Not essentially
Speaker 4: it was white. I mean I remember seeing Patty Lebelle
Speaker 4: on Tonightshell and then we're going to let her sit down,
Speaker 4: but the people wouldn't let him let her go because
Speaker 4: it's you know, systemic racism. So you have to have
Speaker 4: some kind of management team to carry out in the office.
Speaker 2: Cake.
Speaker 4: You had to go through somebody, you know, because.
Speaker 2: It wasn't it.
Speaker 3: Still it's funny because I was sitting here thinking like,
Speaker 3: but you came from a family full of musicians, but
Speaker 3: yet and still they're black musicians. So business was never right.
Speaker 3: So it's not like you could look to them and
Speaker 3: be like, well, what should I do when.
Speaker 5: There's still a level of information that's held from us, right.
Speaker 3: And then you're still you're evolving because you're in a
Speaker 3: place where they've never gone.
Speaker 4: And so it's like, precisely.
Speaker 2: Right, that's ill.
Speaker 1: The one the one album in your your arsenal that
Speaker 1: I'm fond of is Peach Melbourne, which came out in
Speaker 1: seventy five. First of all, before I ask you anything,
Speaker 1: I gotta know during the height of lean on me
Speaker 1: itis and not deal with this. Lean on me if
Speaker 1: you were, if you were alive and awhere at the
Speaker 1: time when the song was at its height in the seventies,
Speaker 1: most people will know that you hold a note for
Speaker 1: Lisa Good thirty seconds. I'll stay longer than longer than
Speaker 1: Bill Withers singing day on Lovely Day. Yeah, And I
Speaker 1: used to. I used to actually try to, and you
Speaker 1: would do this song often. I've seen you doing on
Speaker 1: the Tonight Show. I've seen you even when you did it,
Speaker 1: when you did it live, you held a note longer.
Speaker 1: And I just never knew a person that could hold
Speaker 1: one note for like almost fifty seconds. Did you? Did
Speaker 1: you regret having to do that every time? Like I
Speaker 1: almost felt like it was it was its own Olympic
Speaker 1: comp like competition, like the duration of holding that note,
Speaker 1: like it was fun and for.
Speaker 4: Me it was an athletic activity. It was something that
Speaker 4: was It wasn't always there everything that I'm able to do.
Speaker 4: It seems like I had to work twenty five times
Speaker 4: harder than other singers. I had to go jump, rope, boat,
Speaker 4: swim dog, you know, and do my vocal study, holler
Speaker 4: and scream and yell and everything, and then after a
Speaker 4: while the stamina due to the point where one day
Speaker 4: I remember I was singing this song tim every Mountain
Speaker 4: for some little group in a nursing home in some
Speaker 4: way I don't know right, and I took one of
Speaker 4: the big, big, big breath and I said, you know,
Speaker 4: let it out, and it kind of went over across
Speaker 4: the room. You know, it's through travel. And I was
Speaker 4: strong enough so that I was standing there holding it,
Speaker 4: but I wasn't so conscious that I was doing it,
Speaker 4: and I said, only wait, that's me. So I kept
Speaker 4: holding it. I said, well, I wonder if I could
Speaker 4: always do that when I started to develop stamina to
Speaker 4: do it. And it's just to become something that I'm
Speaker 4: so grateful for. I'm happy about it. Now I understand,
Speaker 4: like I can't.
Speaker 2: Eat everything and do this. That's why what I call.
Speaker 4: It, let it activity. Now. I can't go and handle Daniels.
Speaker 4: I can't handle no fried chicken.
Speaker 1: What? So what is what is? What is your h
Speaker 1: regiment as far as keeping your your your your muscle intact,
Speaker 1: because again, to hold it for that strong and that
Speaker 1: much vibrato over forty seconds is not normal. I thought
Speaker 1: it was cheating. Method where you know.
Speaker 4: Somebody, somebody says circular breathing. I said, I'm not an.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I thought you were circular breathing because you know,
Speaker 1: we know and what do you yell at the end
Speaker 1: of the song?
Speaker 2: Oh youse?
Speaker 1: That was tough, like what are you talking in tons?
Speaker 1: Like what?
Speaker 2: Of course?
Speaker 1: Okay, I never knew what you yell at the end.
Speaker 3: Of that was the whole topic. And I forget what
Speaker 3: show we were doing, but we talked about that.
Speaker 5: Yeah, I remember that. Yeah.
Speaker 4: I think the last times that I've been doing it's
Speaker 4: evolving to make it so, it's make it come.
Speaker 1: Okay when you're a five year old listening to that,
Speaker 1: I thought you were doing some sort of taekwon do
Speaker 1: I never heard of before.
Speaker 3: I do want to hear the answer to that question, though,
Speaker 3: because you never what is your prep when it comes
Speaker 3: to your voice?
Speaker 4: A lot of baked chicken, you know, or you lean protein.
Speaker 4: I know you think chicken is a gospel bird, but
Speaker 4: it is.
Speaker 12: Yes, what because I just thought you were gonna say
Speaker 12: no dairy or okay, well, no dairy, yeah, okay, yeah,
Speaker 12: no fried foods, no oil, you know, no what.
Speaker 2: A lot of fish?
Speaker 4: You know?
Speaker 2: Vegetables.
Speaker 4: But then I got to work out and I think
Speaker 4: the swimming hell mm hm hmm. I've always loved swimming,
Speaker 4: and I thought it was a scorpion water scign.
Speaker 2: It's not, is it. No? They walking on the on
Speaker 2: the desert, so well, I'll be walking to.
Speaker 4: I'm in mountains. Aerobic exercises thing, but make you breathe hard.
Speaker 4: It build up the lung capacity.
Speaker 9: I was curious to know the producer for Peach Melbourne
Speaker 9: was Eugene McDaniels and to hip hop to my generation,
Speaker 9: he means something totally different.
Speaker 5: But what was it like working with him?
Speaker 9: I've never really heard stories of you know, what he
Speaker 9: was like in the studio and his you know, creative process.
Speaker 5: What was what was that like?
Speaker 4: I wouldn't stay with him and his wife and his home,
Speaker 4: come to California Hills and so I'm very what do
Speaker 4: you call it, I'm affected by my environment? And he
Speaker 4: looked way up and was probably sitting, So I was affected.
Speaker 4: I sound to me on that pitched album, I sound
Speaker 4: different or like, I mean another zone. That's Jamie Jangles
Speaker 4: to me is like.
Speaker 1: That were you were you aware of his kind of
Speaker 1: his at least at the time in seventy five is
Speaker 1: controversial political zeros, Yeah, like stance with the government. I
Speaker 1: know that the story was that when his second album
Speaker 1: came out, Headless Heroes of the Apocalypse, Spiritual Agnew kind
Speaker 1: of placed a call to I'm at Ertigan and kind
Speaker 1: of had him blackballed, you know, had his musician's union
Speaker 1: card revoked.
Speaker 4: Cool.
Speaker 1: So thus he was kind of left to make a
Speaker 1: living as a singer songwriter. So this he worked on
Speaker 1: your record, roberta Flex Blue Lights in the Basement, Like.
Speaker 2: Oh the what did he lean on the side of
Speaker 2: Was he the big C word?
Speaker 1: Well, no, no, no, not even that. I think just
Speaker 1: I think it was rare for an artist to just
Speaker 1: you know the way that we call out the government
Speaker 1: now on Twitter, Instagram, Like his albums were Twitter. You
Speaker 1: just didn't hear of black people like just blatantly call
Speaker 1: the government's you know, liars or that stuff. And he
Speaker 1: had it in for Nixon to the point that you know,
Speaker 1: the Nixon administration just did all they could to silence him,
Speaker 1: and he couldn't. He lost his record deal, so you
Speaker 1: know him not if he didn't write that's the time
Speaker 1: I feel like making love to you then that would
Speaker 1: have been that would have been curtains for him. But
Speaker 1: I mean, he produced people in the meantime. They couldn't
Speaker 1: stop him from producing other people. So I just wanted
Speaker 1: to know, like just as a as a human being,
Speaker 1: like was he kind of bitter what the government was
Speaker 1: doing to him?
Speaker 2: Or he just I never heard.
Speaker 4: Him speak anything about his politics. That's what I thought.
Speaker 4: He was kind of, you know, kind of theory like
Speaker 4: me sweet and gentle and okay, you know, but he
Speaker 4: was No. I didn't know anything about his pologies for
Speaker 4: actually it.
Speaker 1: Oh okay, So were you aware that at the time
Speaker 1: when you made the record? Did you meet the kids
Speaker 1: that did Sunshine Superman with you? I didn't. I'm certain
Speaker 1: that people have reminded you that Wendy Melvoy of Wendy
Speaker 1: and Lisa Prince in the Revolution and her twin sister
Speaker 1: Susannah were the background singers on Sunshine Superman. So I
Speaker 1: probably knew it, but here at the time. Okay, I
Speaker 1: see you. Also, at least two albums later, you worked
Speaker 1: with Van McCoy. I know he produced the This Is
Speaker 1: Hit record? What was what was that?
Speaker 2: Like? He put me in disco?
Speaker 1: I was gonna say how can you describe what it's like. Two,
Speaker 1: every every artist I see that was recording in the seventies,
Speaker 1: disco was more like a kind of like that film
Speaker 1: and Louise Mountain Jump, like can we make it to
Speaker 1: the other side or are we going to fall underground?
Speaker 1: Like what were your thoughts on on conquering that? And
Speaker 1: you know, I know Neil Bouregart was your was your
Speaker 1: president at the time, Like what was he like? As
Speaker 1: not not much as said about Neil boorg Art's time
Speaker 1: at at Buddha and at Casablanca. I know that a
Speaker 1: lot of his artists were like, you know, colorful, and
Speaker 1: he really I guess you could say he was like
Speaker 1: the original Diddy, almost to the point where he was
Speaker 1: just as famous as his artist was.
Speaker 4: H I met him, I knew who he was, and
Speaker 4: he was very, very famous, But I really didn't have
Speaker 4: an awful lot to do with it because by that
Speaker 4: time I had good management. So they were the ones
Speaker 4: that actually went out and got Van and they and
Speaker 4: the label got Van McCoy for me m hm and
Speaker 4: put us together. Then then he and I, you know,
Speaker 4: worked on what we were going to do and try
Speaker 4: to establish and be as an recording artist and helped
Speaker 4: me develop a style and you know, an identity I
Speaker 4: didn't have. Yes, I had the note. Then what I
Speaker 4: was interested in Van McCoy for. I mean, he gave
Speaker 4: me this is Zip, which put me into the disco
Speaker 4: or the dance dan genre. But I knew he had
Speaker 4: written me in on me ah and the reason I'm
Speaker 4: so he wrote me Yeah, that's so weird.
Speaker 1: I can't imagine Van McCoy writing any non uptempo.
Speaker 4: He wrote lots of ballads, is very prolific songwriter.
Speaker 1: So that's how it reached you.
Speaker 4: Well, no, yes, but no. I had heard my favorite
Speaker 4: artist this a Rutha Franklin singing and I know I
Speaker 4: couldn't sing like her, but the lyrics and everything just
Speaker 4: moved me so much I started singing it. So I
Speaker 4: developed my own little arrangement of it with the long note.
Speaker 4: And I think the long note came in there because
Speaker 4: I was just so excited and so trying so hard
Speaker 4: to express something. And then once it had presented itself
Speaker 4: and I came in in contact and touch with so
Speaker 4: in the court, I made him do my arrangement me.
Speaker 1: Okay, you also worked with McFadden and Whitehead. I'm a Philadelphian,
Speaker 1: so like any of those guys that are in the
Speaker 1: arsenal of under the umbrella of Gamble and Huff and
Speaker 1: Mixter Wanzel and you know Tom Molton, like all all
Speaker 1: those guys under the Philly umbrella. What was it? What
Speaker 1: was it like working with McFadden and Whitehead? Let me see, well,
Speaker 1: they produced the Portrait of Melbourne album.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I told you what it was like working with
Speaker 4: Sherman Henson.
Speaker 2: Right, I guess you did.
Speaker 4: It was like that, Yes, good times, they were crazy.
Speaker 4: I've heard stories, especially Whitehead.
Speaker 5: Really wow Philly.
Speaker 2: I mean if he walked.
Speaker 4: Out on the streets, strange things happened.
Speaker 1: How strange? Did you record that in Philadelphia? Was it
Speaker 1: recorded in New York?
Speaker 4: Uh?
Speaker 2: In New York?
Speaker 4: Okay, we kind of stole them from a Philly International.
Speaker 4: Matter of fact, we were managing our company, Hush Production.
Speaker 4: We're managing Jean and John and so we were the
Speaker 4: ones that produced them or managed them to do you know,
Speaker 4: stopping us Now, it wasn't Philly an International.
Speaker 2: You better tell that story.
Speaker 1: Oh wait a minute, yeah you can't just casually like.
Speaker 2: You better tell it. It's more.
Speaker 4: Yeah, kind of borrowed them.
Speaker 1: So you see hush production started in nineteen seventy six.
Speaker 4: Well you remember the years it hadn't been around that
Speaker 4: time here.
Speaker 1: Well, I only knew of I only started hearing of
Speaker 1: the term hush productions closer to you, like your capital,
Speaker 1: but I never knew when it when it started. So
Speaker 1: you got you and your husband got into management.
Speaker 4: I could have a manager because I didn't have a
Speaker 4: manager still yet at a certain point, I had an asient.
Speaker 4: But by that time I had already lost my career
Speaker 4: for the first time.
Speaker 1: By this point, Uh yeah, yeah, that's that's unusual for
Speaker 1: an artist to start a manager at least you don't
Speaker 1: hear of that in the seventies, like it was like
Speaker 1: a separation of church and states. Like artists were artists
Speaker 1: and CEOs were CEOs, So what right?
Speaker 2: That was?
Speaker 4: What wasn't That was the case with me. But I've
Speaker 4: a husband was a gifted and was a gifted business person,
Speaker 4: and when we met, we started. We tried to find
Speaker 4: a manager for me, but everybody told me it was
Speaker 4: she's brought, but she can't do this, she can't do that.
Speaker 4: I started in the record industry as a backup, saying
Speaker 4: but so my point is that everything that they said
Speaker 4: I couldn't do had already done. So instead of having
Speaker 4: a stable of artists, we started a stable of managers.
Speaker 2: Mm hmm brilliant.
Speaker 4: Oh okay, So once we got me started, then we
Speaker 4: got Freddy and Kashif and you know, a whole bunch
Speaker 4: of people.
Speaker 3: I was wondering what your roster looked like? Can you
Speaker 3: can you brag some more with wils was on the roster?
Speaker 2: Let me see some.
Speaker 4: More Agan.
Speaker 1: All the capital Bo Higgins or Huggins, Huggins, I remember
Speaker 1: Bo Huggins, I remember?
Speaker 5: Or summer was that you guys?
Speaker 2: Yeah?
Speaker 4: It was a record company, lady.
Speaker 1: You mentioned Thomas.
Speaker 4: Paul Enforced, m DS Force and D's.
Speaker 2: And Paul Lawrence to Lawrence from the Ages. Now I
Speaker 2: see how the rain came together.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I had some music that you then.
Speaker 5: What was what was? Because she like he was always
Speaker 5: one of those guys that I just really.
Speaker 9: You know, admired, and you know we I had a
Speaker 9: music class in college and they made us read like
Speaker 9: his book, you know, everything you know about.
Speaker 5: The business, and she yeah, what was what was? What
Speaker 5: was he like?
Speaker 4: As a as a well we became well his daughter
Speaker 4: and his wife and I became real good friends because
Speaker 4: we for the recording studio in our little building at
Speaker 4: two thirty one west of the Ah Street, and when
Speaker 4: she would come, he would record the stuff in our studio. Well,
Speaker 4: you said, what was he like?
Speaker 5: Well, it was like a vocal coach mmkay.
Speaker 4: And the way he stacked the background voices almost like
Speaker 4: you take individual sounds and singers and you put them
Speaker 4: in different places, not like a background. But he structured everything.
Speaker 4: And he he was, I guess, uh, affectionist. And we'll
Speaker 4: go over one phrase all day. So you all got it.
Speaker 2: I said, good, I'm.
Speaker 4: Gonna get this. I'm gonna learn how to sing.
Speaker 5: Bet.
Speaker 2: I was fine with me. You know, I'm a student.
Speaker 4: I'm a teacher. They're gonna have patience with me to
Speaker 4: like get it.
Speaker 1: So you're not one of those singers that is like okay,
Speaker 1: three takes and I feel like it's enough, so let's
Speaker 1: move on.
Speaker 4: And no, the more I do it, the better I get.
Speaker 1: Okay, I see under that under that production unit. So
Speaker 1: you guys managed to conceived. Did you guys also manage
Speaker 1: like uh, well no, there was uh, there was Ronnie
Speaker 1: Harris as well.
Speaker 4: Yeah, with your nat Ronnie.
Speaker 1: Yeah, Ronnie Harris like a bunch of like Tri State
Speaker 1: guys that I know that were kind of under the
Speaker 1: were they under like Cashief's tutelage or because he had
Speaker 1: a very Vronnie.
Speaker 4: Was his own and the team was parallel.
Speaker 2: Another okay, another.
Speaker 1: I see yeah, like for me, especially the the about
Speaker 1: to say somewhere with it, the other side of the
Speaker 1: Rainbow album, that's probably yeah, one of my favorite records.
Speaker 5: That was the one. My aunt used to play that
Speaker 5: record all the time. I was. I think that was
Speaker 5: like three when that came out, But I remember the
Speaker 5: one with.
Speaker 1: The art is uh you think of Melbourne?
Speaker 2: Did you?
Speaker 1: I think did you specifically work with I just have
Speaker 1: one question about the seventy eight record because I know
Speaker 1: I knew you did a cover of you Stepped into
Speaker 1: My Life? The b specifically write that for you?
Speaker 2: Or instead.
Speaker 1: The begs wrote that for you?
Speaker 4: No, No, that was I forgot that the album? Was
Speaker 4: it done well? All those songs up from Saturn it Saturday?
Speaker 1: She might Eman might have done it. Someone else did it,
Speaker 1: but I didn't know who did it first. First Okay,
Speaker 1: I see.
Speaker 4: Do you get anything?
Speaker 3: Every time d Nice plays that record because he plays
Speaker 3: that record and I hear it in my dreams.
Speaker 2: Thank you that us. It's like a new record. I
Speaker 2: love it.
Speaker 4: D nice and all your deep days, you're gonna make
Speaker 4: us relevant.
Speaker 2: Yeah good, I'm hoping that you was okay good? So
Speaker 2: it does matter. It does matter, okay.
Speaker 4: Absolutely, because you know, God keeps me. Don't get too religious, bodes.
Speaker 4: God keeps doing, you know, new things, at least every
Speaker 4: decade or so, and he changes it. And so you've
Speaker 4: got to change the context. You gotta change the neighborhood.
Speaker 4: I can't do that. I'm not even a songwater mm
Speaker 4: hm oh.
Speaker 2: DJs.
Speaker 4: First of all, you used to just spend records. Now
Speaker 4: that's grown into their songwriters, producers, You promote shows. You
Speaker 4: created a genre, so you have some autonomy, you have
Speaker 4: some authority, and you you have created a well, yeah,
Speaker 4: a community, a beat days and I'm not saying it's
Speaker 4: all black but sweet, So we have some place to
Speaker 4: be like in the early days, especially since somebody like me,
Speaker 4: my opportunities came through theater soul racist. But what they
Speaker 4: try to get you to do and you wanted to
Speaker 4: do was a crossover. But if you do that, you
Speaker 4: leave your community and they try to convince you don't
Speaker 4: belong here, you don't belong there. Well it was too late,
Speaker 4: thank god for that to being convinced that. So then
Speaker 4: you know, we try to get a manager. And when
Speaker 4: we couldn't do it, then we said, okay, well won't
Speaker 4: we tried it. You've done theory, you've done TV, you've
Speaker 4: done this. So we got somebody from each of those
Speaker 4: areas and then said, okay, what kind of music we're
Speaker 4: going to do. So and like I said, my then
Speaker 4: husband is gifted a business, so nobody taught him business.
Speaker 4: If you learned it, just like many of us have
Speaker 4: centered people, you didn't get a chance to go get it,
Speaker 4: get taught it. Then you learn it some kind of way.
Speaker 4: You learn it. You know, you have to learn how
Speaker 4: things go and create a space for yourself. And you know,
Speaker 4: they call it r and you put it in the
Speaker 4: back on the corner, and that turns out to be
Speaker 4: the foundation of American music. Anyway, that's my humble opinion
Speaker 4: right now.
Speaker 5: Don't be humbled about it. It's true.
Speaker 1: There's one question I missed before we skipped to uh Becashi.
Speaker 1: I always wanted to know this, so you worked with
Speaker 1: another legendary producer, Peter Pete Bai. Yeah, I guess, uh, well,
Speaker 1: I'd like to know at least what was the decision
Speaker 1: in getting him? People a lot they did, uh, like
Speaker 1: a lot of his music, like between him and Georgio
Speaker 1: or Moro, Like those guys were like into like teat
Speaker 1: your electronic past that I mean, what what we now
Speaker 1: know is like electronic music, Like those guys were pushing
Speaker 1: Well they were German producers, so sort in line of
Speaker 1: what crap work was doing and all that stuff. What
Speaker 1: was it like working with him? That was the decision
Speaker 1: to sort of go into sort of like a futuristic
Speaker 1: dance mode or like what was it like working with him?
Speaker 4: Well? Yes, because we were trying to stay current and
Speaker 4: once again, like I said, my husband went out and
Speaker 4: found the songwriters and producers who irrelevant for the time
Speaker 4: and seeing where things were going and could we fit
Speaker 4: into it, they decided they would work with me, and
Speaker 4: so I co wrote a lot of the songs that
Speaker 4: we did together because by then we told me I
Speaker 4: should learn how to write.
Speaker 2: Yes, yes, you get your money out, yeah the money.
Speaker 4: Guess he was trying to teach me that here so
Speaker 4: did you.
Speaker 1: I felt like you made the transition to the eighties.
Speaker 1: It was for a lot of artists, it was hard
Speaker 1: transitioning to the eighties. But of course with you know,
Speaker 1: you work with with Paul Lawrence and Kashif and and
Speaker 1: all those cats, those New York Cats or Jersey New
Speaker 1: York Cats. Just what was the what was the environment
Speaker 1: like at the time, because also like uh, you know,
Speaker 1: there's there's Lala, There's like so many, so many of
Speaker 1: these greats that are in the what R and B
Speaker 1: was at the time. What I what I say is
Speaker 1: with with at least the style of Kashif was him
Speaker 1: being kind of instrumental on the sound of boogie, which
Speaker 1: is you know, post disco kind of the sound that
Speaker 1: uh Leon Silver's ushered in, like that boogie sound. Could
Speaker 1: you explain what the environment in the early eighties was
Speaker 1: like in New York as far as like that whole
Speaker 1: cruise concerned Freddy Jackson, La La like all those people.
Speaker 4: Oh, of course I may be, you know, particularly actually
Speaker 4: describing it was so much fun. It was on the musical.
Speaker 4: It was like you were exploring a place where everything
Speaker 4: functioned and worked, probably because we were in charge and
Speaker 4: you could negotiate with the record company. I didn't. I
Speaker 4: didn't mine then husband did. It was good at it.
Speaker 4: So we were touring. We were sending up and mean artists.
Speaker 4: It's always fresh downs. And I mean, I'm a musician,
Speaker 4: so I mean that that was like being in heaven.
Speaker 4: We have fun. We liked each other. You know, we
Speaker 4: have no problems. It was great. And then you know,
Speaker 4: there was no lack of money or or or work.
Speaker 4: It was wonderful. I was happy, but my baby was
Speaker 4: was you know. I just I was a new mother.
Speaker 9: Do you is there is your former husband? He's still alive.
Speaker 9: Him and his brother, they're still alive. Okay, are y'all
Speaker 9: on good terms or how is it that relationship?
Speaker 4: Now?
Speaker 5: Y'all good?
Speaker 4: That we're family? Hey, you get religious, but God creates us.
Speaker 4: So I want to, you know, suck up to the balls.
Speaker 4: I see and our daughter is happy and you know,
Speaker 4: coming into her own So yeah.
Speaker 2: He's got an eighties baby.
Speaker 1: It sounds like, okay, what was the story in developing?
Speaker 6: Uh?
Speaker 1: Freddy Jackson? Like I feel like of your stadium. He
Speaker 1: was definitely your your breakout artist. How did you discovery?
Speaker 4: I told you by Sherman Henslady too as a party.
Speaker 4: That's how it was. I remember one time we were
Speaker 4: in the studio and he was going to come around
Speaker 4: to my house, you know, for a break, just you
Speaker 4: know a little bit.
Speaker 2: So I got dressed up.
Speaker 4: I forgot what I had on, but I had to
Speaker 4: get him, you know.
Speaker 2: Mm hmmm.
Speaker 11: So so I opened the door and it was so
Speaker 11: he was so shocked he fell down on the uh
Speaker 11: the hallway floor laughing.
Speaker 2: I said, now, what was the outfit? Do you remember?
Speaker 4: I forgot? It was some crazy I don't know. Nobody
Speaker 4: else would see this but know him and me?
Speaker 3: Where is Freddie Jackson from from of course, oh that's
Speaker 3: that's too much, okay, all right.
Speaker 4: But but he likes to keep it and Doug's he's
Speaker 4: a darker. He could probably do stand up if you
Speaker 4: wanted to. That's his real personality, was laughing. And of
Speaker 4: course you know he could sing anything you can hear, right, So.
Speaker 3: Wait, I'm gonna ask you can I just asked the
Speaker 3: question that some of the eighties babies might want to know.
Speaker 2: I'm sorry, I don't know this is touchy, but.
Speaker 3: Were he and Luther as question that beef? Because we
Speaker 3: grew up thinking it was beef.
Speaker 1: I was going to say, like, in my mind, I
Speaker 1: felt like there's some pot biggie.
Speaker 11: Going on.
Speaker 1: He was going to be the king of the hill, don't.
Speaker 4: I don't think they were friends, but I think it
Speaker 4: was just like a lively uh friendly competition, especially on
Speaker 4: Freddie's part, m because Luther was the man. Luther is
Speaker 4: the man.
Speaker 2: Yeah, Mini has his own spot.
Speaker 4: Yeah true that you sure everybody would want to aspire
Speaker 4: to that. But that's just my humble opinion because I
Speaker 4: don't really know.
Speaker 9: What was the relationship, like with with you with like
Speaker 9: Hush and Capital.
Speaker 5: I remember I was watching two years back.
Speaker 9: I think I was watching Freddy's Unsung and he was
Speaker 9: talking about how his records were like going crazy, and
Speaker 9: the people at Capital didn't They had no idea, Like
Speaker 9: they didn't even They were just so unaware of what
Speaker 9: was going on in black music at that time that
Speaker 9: when his record kind of took off, it, you know,
Speaker 9: they weren't prepared for it.
Speaker 5: They weren't prepared.
Speaker 4: It wasn't only what was going on in black music.
Speaker 4: Our company became really uh and I jumped to the
Speaker 4: record company. We were the ones that started.
Speaker 5: Street promotions with the gotcha.
Speaker 4: And actually working your own record in your your own areas,
Speaker 4: and your own marketing people and your own salespeople.
Speaker 5: Got you.
Speaker 4: You know when we're going to say, when we give.
Speaker 1: You a hit, do you find that that it's harder,
Speaker 1: harder to be both artist and artist manager. Yes, it
Speaker 1: involves a lot of babysitting and Jedi mind tricks and yeah,
Speaker 1: but you.
Speaker 4: Know what, I think, I'm naturally a mentor, so I
Speaker 4: can't manage. That's his whole skill that I don't really have,
Speaker 4: and I don't think I have a real great interest
Speaker 4: in it. But I'm always interested in showing you and
Speaker 4: opening the way. Like for instance, we took Freddy on
Speaker 4: the road with me and he was my opening act.
Speaker 4: I didn't let him open for me. I put him
Speaker 4: in the middle of my show and introduce people Tom
Speaker 4: and set him as soon as he starts saying, you're
Speaker 4: gonna start screaming, so I'm gonna tell you who he
Speaker 4: is now famous Freddy. Put him in the middle of
Speaker 4: my show instead of trying to make him they're all
Speaker 4: black share when you're first trying to get out there. Yeah,
Speaker 4: So naturally, I think a mentor I'm not a manager.
Speaker 9: Now, and that is a different there's a distinction. I
Speaker 9: understand exactly what you mean. That makes sense.
Speaker 3: I have a lot of other thingers been coming to
Speaker 3: you for, like mentorships throughout the years. I was curious
Speaker 3: about that, especially with all the with the voice stuff
Speaker 3: were I.
Speaker 4: Think they don't come to me because you know, I
Speaker 4: have a team of people and they deal with everything,
Speaker 4: and so they don't come to me. But whenever I
Speaker 4: have an opportunity, thank god, people are interested interviews. People
Speaker 4: want to know, well, how do you do this? And
Speaker 4: how what would you tell somebody else? And so in
Speaker 4: that that way I can I can offer you know,
Speaker 4: information with suggestions even better.
Speaker 1: You mentioned, uh, Melissa Morgan was also part of that stable, correct, Yeah,
Speaker 1: again these are I'm just asking because again, like there's
Speaker 1: just a period between eighty two to probably ninety two
Speaker 1: of a bunch of artists that you know, there wasn't
Speaker 1: social media out back then. There wasn't anything unless they
Speaker 1: were in Jet Soul train or ride on magazine you
Speaker 1: really didn't know or ebony, you really didn't know about them.
Speaker 1: What was Melissa like in working? How did she become
Speaker 1: part of the stable.
Speaker 4: Once again, Hush signed her as an artist, and so
Speaker 4: their relationship with her was with her. But Melissa and
Speaker 4: I have become friends and well, what can I say?
Speaker 4: She likes me, so, I mean when I had difficult times,
Speaker 4: she's what.
Speaker 2: Now do you need a ride?
Speaker 5: Wow?
Speaker 4: I help you? You know, where do you go? And
Speaker 4: you called the find out and see how I am?
Speaker 4: And whatever? We just spent you know, and we've we've
Speaker 4: done some shows together now that I have no manager,
Speaker 4: and you know, we can do shows ourselves and say
Speaker 4: who we want to be with. We often work together.
Speaker 4: We've been in okay, a lot.
Speaker 1: You know, I do in you know what, when when
Speaker 1: the when the when the iron was hot in that
Speaker 1: period in the eighties, did you think about making uh
Speaker 1: a return to your other to the other arenas that
Speaker 1: you were in as far as like you're acting and
Speaker 1: plays and whatnot.
Speaker 4: Well, yes, I I made my then husband put Pearly
Speaker 4: on videotape. Okay, well the only thing I've seen on video.
Speaker 4: I'm sure the others it's Hamilton since then, because it's
Speaker 4: still not a common thing for people to do.
Speaker 1: Oh okay, so there was unusual back then. Wait, would
Speaker 1: you involved with the what was your involvement in all right,
Speaker 1: this is a deep one. Are you guys familiar with
Speaker 1: Death by Temptation?
Speaker 2: Yes?
Speaker 9: Wait, yes, wait wait all Over You by Freddy Jackson.
Speaker 5: That was the joint. But it was the joint with
Speaker 5: kadem Hardistan and Building, yes.
Speaker 1: And James the third on the He created that. Ye
Speaker 1: oh wait, he created Death by Tentation Okay, yes, he wrote.
Speaker 4: And produce that, well, we produced it was to.
Speaker 1: Say, were you the producer of the film as well?
Speaker 1: Or yes? Okay?
Speaker 9: You know what was that like stepping into film and
Speaker 9: like producing your own film?
Speaker 5: I mean, that's a lot we were because we started.
Speaker 4: To learn how to try to promote it and get
Speaker 4: it into theaters, and so I started to get into that.
Speaker 4: But my whole relationship with my husband and and hush
Speaker 4: production broke down shortly after that.
Speaker 5: Oh man, what what led to the breakdown? In your opinion?
Speaker 4: I don't think I should say not with not.
Speaker 2: That, not with the daughters sitting there. She's like, Mama, Mama.
Speaker 4: I love you.
Speaker 2: I can already hear it. Field, let me ask because
Speaker 2: we're in the nineties now, But.
Speaker 4: But literally that, you know, trying to be uh men,
Speaker 4: are ways and be better.
Speaker 8: Yeah.
Speaker 4: Yeah, and it's such a different place now. And I
Speaker 4: think because of the COVID and everything around the world stopping,
Speaker 4: we do have a chance to start over. And maybe
Speaker 4: the playing field will never be even, but we've all
Speaker 4: grown so much we have a chance to try to
Speaker 4: start over.
Speaker 5: So trying to really do that, that's real, that's fact.
Speaker 3: But that period is when you credit like things went
Speaker 3: bad and then because I think you said something early
Speaker 3: on where you were like, my my career fell, it
Speaker 3: fell down, or something like that, and then you that
Speaker 3: was you said that was the first time, so you
Speaker 3: can reckon.
Speaker 4: Right, that was that was before this time? We now, okay, okay, Well,
Speaker 4: one thing I've gotten very good at is falling and
Speaker 4: getting back up.
Speaker 2: That's it is, it is.
Speaker 4: But you got to work out. See you got to be.
Speaker 5: Now you look amazing, like you've really I wasn't.
Speaker 3: Gonna be in your business, but I was about to
Speaker 3: ask about your moisturizing.
Speaker 5: I was.
Speaker 3: Because you said, you know, you know, I was like,
Speaker 3: is that not for the fried foods? If I didn't
Speaker 3: eat fried foods, is that what I would end uble?
Speaker 4: Looking like that?
Speaker 2: Okay? Can you can she answer that? Daughter? Yes, okay,
Speaker 2: I'm waiting.
Speaker 4: You know, massages and heat and my screams and stuff,
Speaker 4: you know, and masks and and exercise the face and
Speaker 4: exorcise you know, like exorcism.
Speaker 3: Yes, because my mother always said you supposed to do
Speaker 3: I oh and all.
Speaker 4: Like you have to exercise it.
Speaker 2: Yes, people don't know that. Okay, so that's real. Yeah. Yeah,
Speaker 2: like a mere you got to so you know, black
Speaker 2: don't crack. But it could rust, you know what I'm saying.
Speaker 4: Yeah, you had to take the little forms of rust sometime,
Speaker 4: you know.
Speaker 3: But can we can we talk about nineteen eighty seven
Speaker 3: because is that when lay miss?
Speaker 2: When did they miss?
Speaker 4: Yes, yes, that's no, the miss was I thought it
Speaker 4: was later?
Speaker 2: Was it later?
Speaker 3: I think it was.
Speaker 4: I think it was little because.
Speaker 2: Or ninety nineteen ninety, Well it was.
Speaker 4: Around that time because that's the times. And then I
Speaker 4: lost my family and hush and all of that, and
Speaker 4: I really was homeless.
Speaker 5: Oh wow, But I never.
Speaker 4: Heard of Michael Matthews.
Speaker 5: Michael Michael Matthews.
Speaker 2: Oh no, we want to know.
Speaker 4: Well, he created the gospel musical that Tyler Perry has
Speaker 4: taken to the Lanks that he has Okay, the first
Speaker 4: one to Tyler, do No, Michael Matthews did the first one.
Speaker 2: Okay, that's what.
Speaker 1: I'm the very first gospel. Okay, gospel pioneered the gospel part.
Speaker 4: Yes, he pioneered it. And what he did was he
Speaker 4: went to the churches around the major cities that have
Speaker 4: black populations and he sold to them. So that's that's
Speaker 4: why we have gospel plates because they're from there. The
Speaker 4: audiences were the church. And so by the time I
Speaker 4: met Michael, I was just about to be evicted. Uh
Speaker 4: my daughter had run away and didn't know where she
Speaker 4: was because of all the trouble was going on. I
Speaker 4: uh found out that that I was divorced and I
Speaker 4: had to go figure out all that stuff. But uh,
Speaker 4: Michael had called me and invited me to come out
Speaker 4: to Saint Louis. It was he was doing one of
Speaker 4: its plates and it's this.
Speaker 6: Huge, like two thousand seater, three thousand theater theater. There
Speaker 6: was jan pat None of the black people knew whose churches,
Speaker 6: so he know he learned he out how to market.
Speaker 4: The churches and fill him up every day of the week.
Speaker 4: And so what he did then he said these incredible
Speaker 4: actors and singers that he had put into the shows
Speaker 4: and musicians. That's where Mary and Mary came from.
Speaker 6: Oh wow, you know they're mad, right, you're ridiculous.
Speaker 4: Well, and the one of them that's married to the
Speaker 4: piano player. He was a piano player from Mark, not
Speaker 4: Warren Campbell Canty. But to give you the and I
Speaker 4: give the quality of the music and what we were
Speaker 4: doing with what was raw, and I came out to start.
Speaker 4: He was bringing stars into those incredible companies.
Speaker 2: Which they do.
Speaker 4: Okay, yeah, So actually that's how it really began. To
Speaker 4: learn how to sing gospel because I'm like but opera though,
Speaker 4: well no, I s opera. I was born doing that.
Speaker 4: I had to learn how to sing the hospital.
Speaker 2: Wow, okay wow verse reverse?
Speaker 4: What was what was the question?
Speaker 2: I was asking about le mis?
Speaker 4: But oh okay, So so I was telling you about that.
Speaker 2: But then I didn't have anything.
Speaker 4: So I was trying to write a play where I
Speaker 4: could be the star so I could get up and
Speaker 4: get some work. But Richard J. Alexander, who casts the
Speaker 4: miss A Rob was in this little town called Hollywood, Florida.
Speaker 4: He came to see my play and he didn't know
Speaker 4: I could see classical music because you don't sing classical
Speaker 4: in parly right, it would be great for them. That's
Speaker 4: how I got it.
Speaker 1: You know you mentioned you mentioned something earlier that I
Speaker 1: wanted to ask. So, you know, in twenty twenty, a
Speaker 1: lot of people in our profession and entertainment, especially in March,
Speaker 1: I'm one of them, was definitely panicking because you know,
Speaker 1: a lot of artists didn't know if they were coming
Speaker 1: or going. You know, this is how I make my
Speaker 1: living and you know that. So I personally went through
Speaker 1: about a good six to seven weeks of just straight
Speaker 1: up like panicking, I'm about to lose everything. But you know,
Speaker 1: so I will say that it takes a steady mind
Speaker 1: to navigate yourself out of that situation. How were you
Speaker 1: able to the first the first time around when you
Speaker 1: were about to lose everything and sort of not knowing
Speaker 1: where your career was going to go? Like what how
Speaker 1: is your mind state in that keeping slowan state daddy
Speaker 1: to get to agree in or pastor if you will,
Speaker 1: or a safer space that you could still be And
Speaker 1: like how how were you able to to mentally overcome that.
Speaker 4: I don't think I overpayment.
Speaker 2: I don't know.
Speaker 4: I don't think I was calm and settled. I was depressed.
Speaker 4: I was oppressed, repressed, it was desperate.
Speaker 1: Yeah, but I believe you overcame it because you're here
Speaker 1: speaking with us, yeah, right now, and you were you know,
Speaker 1: yeah so. But just at the time, what I was
Speaker 1: saying was that after two months of just oh man,
Speaker 1: I'm gonna, I gonna, I'm gonna time I lose everything
Speaker 1: and we'll lose everything, then I just had to stop,
Speaker 1: sit silent and restart all over again.
Speaker 6: You have to.
Speaker 4: You have to. There's really nothing else you can do.
Speaker 4: But I'll tell you the part of I've always had
Speaker 4: help when people who came to my aid, even going
Speaker 4: through the Grand Sister's station, people me a hand money.
Speaker 4: I mean, I was embarrassing and a shameful because they
Speaker 4: knew my story. But people came to my aid. And
Speaker 4: one of the things I guess is out standing for
Speaker 4: me about going on the road with Michael Matthews and
Speaker 4: the the the Gospel shows is they really were saved people.
Speaker 4: Well they did, as I found out. I would say,
Speaker 4: he invited me to come out on the road. But
Speaker 4: I remember the first rehearsal what's Steek's last name? John
Speaker 4: Jackson just good morning, says pays the Lord. Everybody that said,
Speaker 4: oh my God on the back because I met around me,
Speaker 4: so I was cussing, you know. Oh, and you know
Speaker 4: and Michael, they would pray beforehand, and sometimes I would
Speaker 4: be just so.
Speaker 2: Broken.
Speaker 4: I'm sure I didn't inquire anything I was because I
Speaker 4: was too No, I didn't.
Speaker 2: I would just sit there.
Speaker 4: But there was somebody would come and sit by me,
Speaker 4: maybe coming to my room and just be with me.
Speaker 4: You don't know how to talk, and I know I
Speaker 4: was spiritually oriented. To be dropped into that. Then you
Speaker 4: kind of discover what's going on and what is saving you.
Speaker 4: And you know, Charlie Wilson, right, his brother Rodney Wilson
Speaker 4: was was on on the road and we used to
Speaker 4: call him Elebition. Well he's hilarious, but saved people. This
Speaker 4: is what they do, this is how they live. And
Speaker 4: of course all the shows were about family in different situations,
Speaker 4: some of them kind of raw, but the whole point
Speaker 4: was you need Jesus. But that's really what I am
Speaker 4: and who I am. What happens is I can go
Speaker 4: back and tell you some of these incidents is that
Speaker 4: it never occurred me to do anything harmful to myself.
Speaker 4: But I wasn't numb. I couldn't think or figuring anything.
Speaker 4: But someone always came and said, what about this, well,
Speaker 4: how about this? Well you need this, you know, or
Speaker 4: like like I could didn't know what was going on
Speaker 4: with me, as it turned out. That's why I know
Speaker 4: there's you know, no coincidences or accidents. He put me
Speaker 4: on the road with him just when I was going
Speaker 4: to get invicted and I had filed bankruptcy, so I
Speaker 4: didn't even have a bank account, but he paid me
Speaker 4: seven thousand dollars cash every week. My only problem was
Speaker 4: I was going married and the favor back, especially with
Speaker 4: all them singles.
Speaker 2: Wow, but that's the truth.
Speaker 4: You know, when you and you. It was my first
Speaker 4: time going on a tour, any kind of a tour.
Speaker 4: You're riding along the highway and you know, travel tour
Speaker 4: buses and the bus driver he praised before we go there,
Speaker 4: serious about it, and just just an amazing presence. I
Speaker 4: can only say it's the presence of God. You know.
Speaker 4: However you can describe it or I'm not so good
Speaker 4: at describing it all the time, but I know you
Speaker 4: just are and you're not by yourself. You might think
Speaker 4: you are.
Speaker 1: I feel it you're not actually speaking of which I
Speaker 1: totally forgot to mention. We should note that you were
Speaker 1: part of the ensemble cast of The Fighting Temptations.
Speaker 4: Yes, that's the gospel show.
Speaker 1: I totally forgot about that. What was it like doing
Speaker 1: that production?
Speaker 2: Fonce and Cuba good and Jr? Right?
Speaker 4: Several wonderful all of the wonderful experiences. But I wasn't
Speaker 4: going to the movies or watching movies on TV. So
Speaker 4: I didn't know that Couba Gooding Junior was acrobat. He
Speaker 4: was he stiver.
Speaker 2: I wouldn't. I wouldn't. Nobody knew that.
Speaker 5: No, we didn't know.
Speaker 2: Cuba he's a real acro. You mean slips?
Speaker 1: Yeah, he was. He was training to be in the Olympics,
Speaker 1: like he No, if you look at the if you
Speaker 1: if you look, God, I'm really dating myself here, uh.
Speaker 1: Line of Richie closed line Richie closed the nineteen eighty
Speaker 1: four Olympics in Los Angeles, and Cuba Gooding Junior was
Speaker 1: He's sort of like the Alphonso Robero of line Richie's
Speaker 1: Michael Jackson. Uh at the at the closing ceremonies for
Speaker 1: uh the like to and break dancing and all that stuff.
Speaker 1: I did not know that we I'm telling you we
Speaker 1: have to get Cuba on the.
Speaker 4: Show because he's amazing, the nicest.
Speaker 1: Craziest story I've ever heard. Like, he's one of the
Speaker 1: most interesting people.
Speaker 4: I know. It's like saying you too that you know
Speaker 4: there were nice people? And I would say about Beyonce,
Speaker 4: she made everybody look short and ugly.
Speaker 2: Well, what you're gonna do? But I remember the.
Speaker 4: Last song of when the credits are coming down, she
Speaker 4: and Angie so On and I are strutting down the runway,
Speaker 4: you know, doing I saw I could dance if I
Speaker 4: wanted to know.
Speaker 2: But.
Speaker 4: Replicate that? Do you remember the opening song that old
Speaker 4: Anne Nesby and Shirley Caesar are singing to me You're
Speaker 4: about to master?
Speaker 2: I don't not remember.
Speaker 5: We watched that on the two of US.
Speaker 3: I got so because we fast forward. Can I get
Speaker 3: the whole story to Let Freedom Ring? From the song
Speaker 3: to the video? Can I just can I get some
Speaker 3: left Freedom Ring story?
Speaker 4: Can I well? Let me see it? Okay? I was
Speaker 4: on sabbatical. I think I've gotten sick, and then I
Speaker 4: was no just taking time off, and I was watching
Speaker 4: TV and I saw the na A CP Awards and
Speaker 4: they were honoring doctor Dorothy Height. Oh my goodness, who
Speaker 4: is that lady? I want to meet her. So I
Speaker 4: found out how to get in touch. And when I
Speaker 4: called her and she said, why don't you come out
Speaker 4: with us and the Black family reunions that we do.
Speaker 3: My dad has a picture of you and Dorothy Hype.
Speaker 3: My dad's a photographer in DC. He has a picture
Speaker 3: of y'all two at that Black Family reunion.
Speaker 4: You know I'm not lying, You're not lying.
Speaker 2: I was there to him.
Speaker 4: I'm sorry, go ahead, I was at the time.
Speaker 3: Oh, I mean I was, you know, like one.
Speaker 1: Don't worry.
Speaker 4: She was younger than me. So I started to travel
Speaker 4: with doctor Hight and uh go to the breakfast and
Speaker 4: you know we had people like Maxine Waters and you know,
Speaker 4: alexis Hermon.
Speaker 2: And alexis Herman.
Speaker 13: Wow.
Speaker 4: I mean I met Cored Scott King.
Speaker 2: I that was at the Black Man of reunion.
Speaker 4: The Jackson's came, hey, this is crazy.
Speaker 2: I remember.
Speaker 4: Yes, that's where I first met Sewers. Uh the Clark's sisters. Wow.
Speaker 1: Okay, who were one?
Speaker 2: Left? Rightom ring right? Okay's telling the story right.
Speaker 4: Right right there on that, but there was performing at
Speaker 4: one of the reunions. I said, oh my god, what
Speaker 4: was that? That's how it was. It was so exciting.
Speaker 4: She says, well, no, you should sing something. And at
Speaker 4: our breakfast meetings or some of our meetings, why don't
Speaker 4: you sing the new natural anthem? But I didn't know
Speaker 4: we had one.
Speaker 6: Out?
Speaker 2: Okay, I'm sorry, go ahead. More.
Speaker 4: I found undoubt about it. And I was with Capital
Speaker 4: Records at the time, so I went to our a
Speaker 4: R person and who's with the label at the same time?
Speaker 4: Was B B and C C One Yes, that a
Speaker 4: gospel artist was on a regular label, and he went
Speaker 4: and got BB one.
Speaker 1: Is for me, mhmm.
Speaker 4: And Bby got everybody else.
Speaker 3: BB got everybody else from Dion to I'm trying to remember, takes.
Speaker 13: It Wonder the Wonder, Howard hewittt Bobby Brown, Bobby Brown
Speaker 13: like that was Bobby Yes, And he was the green
Speaker 13: screen because.
Speaker 3: Obviously Bobby didn't make it to the day of shooting.
Speaker 3: He was one of the only ones with a green screen. Right,
Speaker 3: I'm guessing, right, Melville, I don't know.
Speaker 2: I wasn't there.
Speaker 4: What they did? You know?
Speaker 2: A lot of it now I'm talking about the video.
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, yeah, Bobby was on the green screen.
Speaker 2: I remember PAG.
Speaker 4: Six and The New Virgin. She just got a Grammy
Speaker 4: nomination for the recent recording of I think so.
Speaker 3: And who was the decision because I know that Jasmine
Speaker 3: Guy is dope in her al Eli history, But who
Speaker 3: made the decision to have to have her dancing in
Speaker 3: the video?
Speaker 7: And probably Debbie Allen right, because she directed, She directed,
Speaker 7: video directed.
Speaker 4: It was her concept and she directed it. And kind
Speaker 4: of think, well, I think I think w was my
Speaker 4: understudy in Pearly. She was one of the lead dancers.
Speaker 4: You know, she was dancing with George Fazon.
Speaker 2: Right, because she did the of.
Speaker 4: Course, you know, she went did all those other wonderful
Speaker 4: things later on Wow.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 4: It was her concept and we had Loucassin to the narration,
Speaker 4: but on the audio version it was Jesse Jackson and
Speaker 4: we got permission from nub A c PECE. We didn't
Speaker 4: want it to be money thing. We wanted to donate
Speaker 4: all the all the funds of NUBA CP and it
Speaker 4: was my idea to have all of the different celebrities
Speaker 4: because I figured if I didn't know that we had
Speaker 4: a Negro national anthem, other people would know, they would
Speaker 4: think it was my hip record. So it was my
Speaker 4: idea to have and I.
Speaker 3: Did, and I may have done that that was hit record.
Speaker 2: I thought it was left free to ring. I was like,
Speaker 2: that's not the way to yeah.
Speaker 1: Right right, So okay, before before I wrap, I gotta
Speaker 1: do I mean, because I have a lot, a lot
Speaker 1: of them. I mean, I could say fall in or
Speaker 1: just a little bit more love coming at you, but
Speaker 1: of your of your songs, of your arsenal, what songs
Speaker 1: are your personal favorites.
Speaker 4: Well, I don't have personal favorites. I have favorites of
Speaker 4: people liking it, and their two favorites seem to be
Speaker 4: Love's coming at you and lean on me.
Speaker 1: Even to this. So when you performed that to this day,
Speaker 1: are you still as intense when you're performing it?
Speaker 4: Yeah, because for some maybe it's because I'm still not
Speaker 4: really trained in a certain way. If I really focus
Speaker 4: and get everything out, I still get so scared.
Speaker 1: H to this day, Yeah.
Speaker 4: It never goes away. It's like, I guess.
Speaker 1: That's a good thing. That means you still care.
Speaker 4: I think so because you stop and you focus when
Speaker 4: am I doing it, that it's not the same show
Speaker 4: you did before, and I thought, okay, because this is
Speaker 4: not something that's just naturally uh okay, I have to
Speaker 4: take care of it. So I have to make sure
Speaker 4: everything is. Like I said, I could give you a
Speaker 4: run for your money for whoever is the fattest person
Speaker 4: you've ever seen if I didn't watch it. So I
Speaker 4: got to make sure I can still get.
Speaker 2: On my clothes.
Speaker 4: I think you know.
Speaker 1: Wait, I was gonna ask, like, have you ever been
Speaker 1: in a situation where you were a horse one night
Speaker 1: or able to kind of had to slide under the
Speaker 1: slide under the bar like y'all see you just Bobby
Speaker 1: brown them y'all. Okay, there's so.
Speaker 4: Many, so many times I haven't had background cigarettures and
Speaker 4: nobody you know.
Speaker 2: So what do you do? You make sure you're ready.
Speaker 4: That's why you now. I know I'm going to get scared,
Speaker 4: so I try to prepare.
Speaker 1: I assure you that her audience were just sing the
Speaker 1: the ad libs verbatim.
Speaker 2: Before we go.
Speaker 3: Can I ask boss, because it's it's funny. We were
Speaker 3: talking about COVID and stuff, and I'm just curious as
Speaker 3: for fans and stuff, we see you on the nicest
Speaker 3: show we see you all around? How can people continue
Speaker 3: to like support you? I see you got a little
Speaker 3: poster back there that your daughter might want you to
Speaker 3: shout out. But I mean for folks who just want
Speaker 3: to support since you can't come see you.
Speaker 4: So she told me where I am on Instagram?
Speaker 5: He told me right.
Speaker 4: On Instagram at nulber one more.
Speaker 2: M hmm.
Speaker 5: I'm going to it right now, okay.
Speaker 4: And the website is Melbournmore dot com. Am I anywhere else? Honey?
Speaker 2: And what's your daughter's name? Charlie C h A R
Speaker 2: L I Charlie. Shout out to Charlie.
Speaker 1: Thank you, Charley, baby girl shout out, shout out. Yeah.
Speaker 1: I gotta say that this this is definitely one of
Speaker 1: the silver linings of of the COVID era because when
Speaker 1: I first saw you on on the scroll, I was like,
Speaker 1: there's no way that that's actually Melbourne Moore possible.
Speaker 2: What's the scroll?
Speaker 11: Oh?
Speaker 1: I'm sorry? The scroll when when when I'm DJing and
Speaker 1: I can see who's in the room in the comments
Speaker 1: and you get the comments and I'm like, oh my goodness,
Speaker 1: thank you. Yeah, I'm just you know this, this is
Speaker 1: this is one of the few bright spots of twenty twenty,
Speaker 1: which you know, I can have a conversation and link
Speaker 1: up with with my childhood heroes. And you're definitely a hero.
Speaker 1: And I thank you for sharing your story with us
Speaker 1: on the show.
Speaker 5: Thank you for everything that you've contributed, like yes, seriously.
Speaker 2: Absolutely flowers Flowers, Yes, I'll take a look.
Speaker 4: I'll say. You know, I've heard about your quest and
Speaker 4: I was very very much intimidated because you are walking
Speaker 4: encyclopedia just a thing, you know. But fortunately you decided
Speaker 4: to come mindly, you know, let me be comfortable. I
Speaker 4: really thank you for that, because you could really take
Speaker 4: it somewhere else. I've seen and I've seen. I've seen
Speaker 4: you played the druones.
Speaker 1: I play Yes you did, No No, all things to
Speaker 1: you and I appreciate it. Yeah, this is this is
Speaker 1: one for the books, Ladies and gentlemen. Al but more
Speaker 1: on Quest, Love Supreme, on behalf of Fun, Tigelow, Sugar
Speaker 1: Steve and Uhigo Bye Sugar Steve.
Speaker 5: Thank you, I have done. I have your nineteen twenty
Speaker 5: one album.
Speaker 2: Look at God.
Speaker 1: He doesn't say much, but you know it always counts
Speaker 1: uh Liyah and unplayabill uh you know it's the team
Speaker 1: Supreme and we will see you on the next go
Speaker 1: round of course, Love Supreme. Thank you, Thank you for
Speaker 1: listening to Quest Love Supreme. Hosted by Amir Quest, Love Thompson,
Speaker 1: Why You, Saint Clair, Sugar, Steve Mandel an unpaid Sure
Speaker 1: Executive producers are Amir Quest, Love Thompson, Jean g and
Speaker 1: Brian Calvin. Produced by Brittany Benjamin Cousin, Jake Payne and
Speaker 1: Liah Saint Clair. Edited by Alex Convoy. Produced by iHeart
Speaker 1: by Noel Brown. What's Love Supreme is a production of iHeartRadio.
Speaker 1: For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts,
Speaker 1: or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.