Speaker 1: My brother. Welcome to Eating Broke. Welcome to Eating wall Broke.
Speaker 1: I can't write songs, but with someone that can write
Speaker 1: some songs. Who, yes, who I am with? I flew
Speaker 1: all the way to Atlanta, got out of the podcast
Speaker 1: studio to be with what's going on everyone? My name
Speaker 1: is Barry No, but I write the songs and make
Speaker 1: the whole world sing. Can you just sing like one classic,
Speaker 1: just one line so the whole world can know who
Speaker 1: I'm sitting with. Alright, alright, alright, you're ready at the
Speaker 1: cobra Coka bana. Let's know what you know. I'm very
Speaker 1: mentally you asked me to no, I want, I want
Speaker 1: the real Okay, alright, the real and I'm so sick
Speaker 1: of love song so side up tease, so done, we
Speaker 1: wish And you still said I'm so sick love, so
Speaker 1: so sad and slow? So why can't I tune off
Speaker 1: through radio? Yeah? I smile and so oh my gosh,
Speaker 1: this was like probably the best moment of my life
Speaker 1: right now. That was amazing. I am with Neo, y'all.
Speaker 1: I am in your space. Yes, yes, this is Compound
Speaker 1: Studios here in Atlantuck. Yes, yeah, man, this is where
Speaker 1: the magic happens. This is where the magic happens, and
Speaker 1: this is where we get to watch and listen to
Speaker 1: what Neo used to eat when he was bro on
Speaker 1: the come up, on the come up, what are you
Speaker 1: gonna have us eating? First of all, well, so we
Speaker 1: did not come up with a lot of money. Um,
Speaker 1: dad checked out relatively early. So it was my my
Speaker 1: mom and my sister, uh moved to Las Vegas and
Speaker 1: we're living in the house, my mother, my sister, my grandmother,
Speaker 1: five aunts, and meat right until I was like sixteen,
Speaker 1: a lot of estrogen in the crib um. So me
Speaker 1: and my sister we were alone a lot because my
Speaker 1: mom had like five six jobs at all times, easily.
Speaker 1: So uh it was a lot of you know, syrup
Speaker 1: sandwiches and catch up sandwiches and basically any condiment that
Speaker 1: we could find in the refrigerator, put it between two
Speaker 1: pieces of bread and that was the sandwich. We see.
Speaker 1: There a lot of that is that because you guys
Speaker 1: couldn't cook, or well I couldn't cook, and then there
Speaker 1: was nothing to cook, you know, which makes it harder
Speaker 1: to uh. So, so it was a lot of that. Uh,
Speaker 1: it was a lot of noodles and cereal. Cereal was
Speaker 1: kind of the saving grace, you know, didn't always have milk,
Speaker 1: but we have some cereals. Throw that thing in the
Speaker 1: cup and take it outside with you, like, we used
Speaker 1: to do a lot of that. Yeah, and we didn't
Speaker 1: have the name brand cereals, and name brand cereals were luxury,
Speaker 1: like like the cinnamon toast crunch, for example, is my
Speaker 1: all time favorite cereal, and we didn't we didn't have
Speaker 1: cinnamon toast crunch. We had the cereal came into bags
Speaker 1: that was kind of like not fruit loops, is fruit rings,
Speaker 1: Centamon toast crunches is toast squares or something something, but
Speaker 1: you knew what it was, yeah, exactly. So, yeah, we
Speaker 1: did a lot of that. We did a lot of that.
Speaker 1: But every now and then moms were splurs and we
Speaker 1: can get the real. Every blue moon we get the real.
Speaker 1: So today we're eating the real day, we are eating
Speaker 1: our luxury struggle meal, actual cinnamon toast crunch, not the
Speaker 1: imitation that comes in the bag. That's honestly not even bad.
Speaker 1: It's hobnoutly just as good. It just don't say cinnam
Speaker 1: toast crum. Really you think it's just as good. Sometimes
Speaker 1: I used to feel like it used to leave like
Speaker 1: a little residue in my mouth on the like the fruit,
Speaker 1: the fake fruit fruit, the fruit rings. The fruit rings
Speaker 1: had a little funny Yeah, you had to be careful
Speaker 1: with those. The not Captain Crunch, but sergeant or whatever.
Speaker 1: It had a little bit of joints, his cutting roofi mouth.
Speaker 1: This is what it is. Regardless of get the name
Speaker 1: brand or the other one. They both chopping you up. Yeah.
Speaker 1: So when you were eating cereal, were you and we well,
Speaker 1: I guess we'll pour a glass a bowl. So when
Speaker 1: you were eating seah when I was growing up, we
Speaker 1: would pile up the bowls high, and then of course
Speaker 1: your parents would come in and be like, don't eat
Speaker 1: the ball to cereal? Where you like that or where
Speaker 1: you you know, just five or ten pieces in the
Speaker 1: trying to make a last it's activating math. Nope, I
Speaker 1: was definitely trying to make last. That was me. So
Speaker 1: I was I was the one kid my sister's hues. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that's right. But then I was very I was very
Speaker 1: much I understood, especially if we had the real, the
Speaker 1: real deal that week, It's like, all right, now, let
Speaker 1: me chill out because I need this to last a
Speaker 1: little while. Yeah, I mean my point for you. Oh yeah,
Speaker 1: go for it. I was gonna try and disrespect disrespect
Speaker 1: reasonable amount. Okay, this is a struggle meal, meaning we
Speaker 1: are not splurging. Okay, we can't splurt. I'm glad you're
Speaker 1: pouring it because because Okay, so now this is a
Speaker 1: real deal. Now how much milk are we talking? Are
Speaker 1: we going in the cup with the backyard or um? Well,
Speaker 1: today today we have milk. The cup in the backyard
Speaker 1: is but it ain't no milk. But what kind of
Speaker 1: milk were you? You You was drinking the We was drinking
Speaker 1: cow milk back then, at least we thought it was
Speaker 1: cow mill I don't know we were drinking Yeah. Yeah,
Speaker 1: this the whole almond milk thing didn't happen UNI until
Speaker 1: much later in life when I realized that I'm not
Speaker 1: a baby cow actually a baby cow. That's not even
Speaker 1: necessary to get it in. Look, how much milky? Poor,
Speaker 1: that's not a lot? What are you talking? Oh my gosh,
Speaker 1: I wish cameras becazoom in on. You eat cereal like
Speaker 1: white people. You have milk just in the bottom of
Speaker 1: the that's yes, you know what's so funny you say that,
Speaker 1: But I get made fun of in my house for
Speaker 1: not being black enough. So like, literally today, this is
Speaker 1: why you're so white. You eat cereal. Look you're eating
Speaker 1: it like it's soup. What are you talking about? What this?
Speaker 1: This is what it's supposed to be. That was way
Speaker 1: too much. I'm so glad. Wow, we should have a
Speaker 1: pole on whether it's black or white if you have
Speaker 1: too much milk, because that's black people use a lot
Speaker 1: of milk all of my Okay, well, so when I
Speaker 1: was coming up, all of my white friends got to
Speaker 1: stay at the house, and you know, see what money
Speaker 1: look like and stuff, but they would always eat be
Speaker 1: a full bowl of cereal and be a glass bowl.
Speaker 1: You don't both Like in the commercial, that's what I
Speaker 1: last bowl. You can see all the cereal and it's
Speaker 1: milk just in the bottom of the boat, and I'm like,
Speaker 1: how the hell do you eat it like that? That's
Speaker 1: so by the time you get to the stuff at
Speaker 1: the bottom, it's all salt, gross, Like yeah, but you
Speaker 1: know how at the end of the bowl you get
Speaker 1: to like drink the milk. Look how much milk you
Speaker 1: gotta drink? What are you talking about? This is this
Speaker 1: is full. I'm full all day from this because again
Speaker 1: we're talking about struggle meals, right, so this might have
Speaker 1: been breakfast, sand lunch. This might have been brunched right here.
Speaker 1: You were really struggling trying to tell you can we
Speaker 1: try and we know what this is. This is O
Speaker 1: G classic. I still eat this cereal every every crack,
Speaker 1: crack on the drugs, but cracks. When you pulled up today,
Speaker 1: you were driving a white I don't know if that
Speaker 1: was a Bentley. You know you're with these luxury style cars.
Speaker 1: I just knew it looked like a couple hundred grand
Speaker 1: on wheels, maybe more than get a specific just embarrassing.
Speaker 1: So what do you think eating cereal trying to make
Speaker 1: it last for a couple of meals to driving that car?
Speaker 1: Do you ever think back, like I can't believe all
Speaker 1: the time all the time. Yeah, man, I Um, I
Speaker 1: can vividly remember the things that we I mean, we didn't.
Speaker 1: After a while, me and my sister, we were kind
Speaker 1: of stopped being hung up on the things that we
Speaker 1: wanted because we knew we didn't. Just the money is
Speaker 1: just not there, right, So I recall vividly. Um just
Speaker 1: focusing on the things that we needed in those things,
Speaker 1: even not even being there sometimes because again so many
Speaker 1: people in this house. Everybody's doing what they can and
Speaker 1: make ends meet or whatever. But yeah, man, we just
Speaker 1: did not come from luxury at all. So to be
Speaker 1: where I am now, it's like it's it's almost surreal,
Speaker 1: you know what I mean. And now as now as
Speaker 1: a parent myself, I'm trying to I'm battling with my
Speaker 1: kids are not growing up the way I grew up.
Speaker 1: You know, I grew up appreciating money. Because when you
Speaker 1: have nine, my kids are coming up the rich already.
Speaker 1: They came out to womb rich. So I gotta make
Speaker 1: sure that I don't raise little heathens, you know, little
Speaker 1: helliens that's run around spoiled as hell, expecting the world
Speaker 1: to just, you know, catch how to them. How are
Speaker 1: you able to kind of see through all of the
Speaker 1: riff raff and eventually become neo? Like was there something
Speaker 1: going on that inspired you at that point? Um? Well,
Speaker 1: at this point, so from age seven, seven nine, somewhere
Speaker 1: in there, at this point, I'm I'm completely engulfed in
Speaker 1: music now, not not from a professional standpoint, I'm not
Speaker 1: doing it trying to get a deal or anything like that.
Speaker 1: It's it's my therapy at this point, like my mom
Speaker 1: gave me the read notebook. Um, at a point where
Speaker 1: I started becoming a knucklehead a little bit, just primarily
Speaker 1: because I'm becoming a young man and I got nobody
Speaker 1: to bounce these emotions and families off, right, So I
Speaker 1: started doing silly ship, just just kind of lashing out
Speaker 1: for no reason. Not for a reason, of course, but
Speaker 1: so my mom gave me this red notebook and she
Speaker 1: said write it down, and that was the beginnings of
Speaker 1: my My songwriting journey started with with journal entries initially,
Speaker 1: and I used to call it rant writing because whenever
Speaker 1: I was getting into that place where I was like,
Speaker 1: just grab my little my pin in my pad and write,
Speaker 1: and first it would be words and then scribbles and whatever.
Speaker 1: But what I realized that once I was done doing that,
Speaker 1: whatever I was feeling, I didn't feel it no more,
Speaker 1: because it wasn't in me anymore. It's on the page now.
Speaker 1: So the music is is there, but it's not so
Speaker 1: much something that I'm doing to try to make money
Speaker 1: or be famous or anything like that. That didn't happen
Speaker 1: until like maybe eleventh grade of high school. Yeah, so
Speaker 1: this whole time you're writing, so every day all day
Speaker 1: and now we're these Was it like in a poetry
Speaker 1: format yet or no? Or was it just like almost
Speaker 1: like journaling? First it was journaling, then it became poetry
Speaker 1: once I learned how much I like girls but was
Speaker 1: not brave enough to talk to them. Wow, okay, all
Speaker 1: what Nope? Nope, nope, nope. Was not that dude. Um
Speaker 1: funny side story, So growing up in Las Vegas, there's
Speaker 1: not a lot for kids to do, At least initially
Speaker 1: there wasn't. All we really had with Circus Circus. Circus
Speaker 1: Cercus one of the first casinos that you hit on
Speaker 1: the strip. It's still there. It's like circus acts and
Speaker 1: all of that type of ship. So every weekend, me
Speaker 1: and my friends we would go to Circus Circus, walking
Speaker 1: round upstairs. And mind you, they were the ones that
Speaker 1: was brave enough to talk to girls. But I was like,
Speaker 1: they're they're like acing the whole because like they were
Speaker 1: going to try to talk to the girls, and if
Speaker 1: the girls wasn't interested, they'd be like, you know what,
Speaker 1: my boy can sing A boy that you want to
Speaker 1: see you a song quick, I'm like, and then I
Speaker 1: sing and then the night will go well, but that
Speaker 1: was smart. Yeah. My first manager was my best friend
Speaker 1: Kevin was up there. Yeah wow, so they was using
Speaker 1: Now No part of you was like, well I could
Speaker 1: do this, maybe just hum up to a girl, you know. No,
Speaker 1: not not on my own. I just I didn't have
Speaker 1: that confidence because, mind you, I'm broke. I looked broke, right,
Speaker 1: It's very obvious that I'm broke. So I was that
Speaker 1: broke dude who could sing a little bit, but definitely
Speaker 1: that broke through Did you get made fun up in school? Yeah?
Speaker 1: All that stuff that I was so so aside from
Speaker 1: me being broke, um uh. God chose to to make
Speaker 1: my hair situation a running joke in my life. Right.
Speaker 1: My hair started finding here when I was maybe ten, right,
Speaker 1: and it just kind of continued on through high school
Speaker 1: to the point where I was allowed to wear my
Speaker 1: hat because I used to get in fights all the
Speaker 1: time and hid people talking about wow, didn't you wasn't
Speaker 1: shaving it then? Or no no, no, no, no, no no,
Speaker 1: because that that felt I'm ten years old, like, I
Speaker 1: don't want to be bald. I didn't want that in
Speaker 1: mind you, I wasn't a I wasn't like really a
Speaker 1: sports kid, so I wasn't like looking up to Jordan
Speaker 1: and all of that. Like the high school I went
Speaker 1: to didn't even have a team. It was a performing
Speaker 1: arts high school. So I've been I've been an artie
Speaker 1: farci kid like my whole life. Okay, okay, now you're
Speaker 1: you're saying that you were shy with women. You start
Speaker 1: to your discovering writing, So is it like you would
Speaker 1: see a girl then, because I have to know where
Speaker 1: like the love songs come from, like the most amazing
Speaker 1: love songs, So it's like you see her and you're
Speaker 1: like pretty much yep. I had poems about girls, hair,
Speaker 1: poems about girls, eyes, poems about uh, it's just the
Speaker 1: things that I liked about these girls. But I would
Speaker 1: never be brave enough to give the poem to the
Speaker 1: girl or recite the poem to the girl. So it
Speaker 1: was just sit in the book. So one day and
Speaker 1: mind you, my mother, everybody in my family does something musical,
Speaker 1: bid writing, singing, rapping and producing instrument whatever something, so
Speaker 1: music has like kind of always been there. So before
Speaker 1: I started writing songs again, it was it was journal entries,
Speaker 1: then poetry, and then one day I realized that if
Speaker 1: I took these poems and put these melodies to him,
Speaker 1: that's that's flowing through my head all day anyway, that's
Speaker 1: a song, oh ship. And then from there just it
Speaker 1: was songs. It was every time I sat down to write,
Speaker 1: I was writing a song. I write a song, singing
Speaker 1: back to myself, a cool put the notebook back into
Speaker 1: my bed, and going by, Now, did you share these
Speaker 1: songs with your family? Oh? So you was keeping your
Speaker 1: stuff a secret. It was for me. It was for
Speaker 1: me because mind you, it was. It was again, it
Speaker 1: was my therapy. It was whenever I, you know, came
Speaker 1: home from school and and you know, people have been
Speaker 1: talking ship or whatever the case may be, or or
Speaker 1: you know, me and my sister got in an argument
Speaker 1: about something. Me and my sister really really close. So
Speaker 1: whenever we would fight a big deal, because like that's
Speaker 1: like like we're not twins for two years apart, but
Speaker 1: we might as well be twins. That's that's my twin, right.
Speaker 1: So it was it was. It was therapy. It wasn't
Speaker 1: it wasn't about being fly, It wasn't about making money.
Speaker 1: I didn't even realize I could make money doing it,
Speaker 1: yet at this point I'm just doing it because it
Speaker 1: feels good. So what happens in the eleventh grade where
Speaker 1: you're like, uh, pop concert? So I told you, I
Speaker 1: went to performing out of high school every year and
Speaker 1: thought this big talent show that they were called pop
Speaker 1: Concert and it was a major, major, major, major deal
Speaker 1: to everybody in the school except for me and the
Speaker 1: people that I was with. I was an art major, right,
Speaker 1: so we would they would they would have us like
Speaker 1: make banners and flyers and stuff. But that's the only
Speaker 1: thing that we would be that we would be obligated
Speaker 1: to do for the pop concert because we were artists.
Speaker 1: They don't the singers and the dancers and the tech
Speaker 1: guys like that it is for them. So every year
Speaker 1: the art majors just kind of like the grassy no kids,
Speaker 1: you know what I'm saying. So we're kind of sitting
Speaker 1: back laughing at how serious everybody is taking this pop concert.
Speaker 1: I think people in the cafteria crying can't get the stuff, like, relax,
Speaker 1: you're not getting signed by this, Okay, that's not happening.
Speaker 1: To calm down. So um, me and my me and
Speaker 1: my art friends. We decided this year that we was
Speaker 1: gonna just do something to kind of ease the tension
Speaker 1: for everybody, or at least that's what we thought, right,
Speaker 1: So we pulled straws. I pulled the short straw. The
Speaker 1: plan was, find a way to get on the concert.
Speaker 1: Right when you get on stage, stand up moon the
Speaker 1: crowd running Ohan. So I pulled the short straw. That
Speaker 1: was how you were going to ease the tension? Yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean because it was. It was It was just
Speaker 1: us making fun of how how serious everybody was taking
Speaker 1: It was like, y'all think, y'all let the Grammys right now.
Speaker 1: We're in high school. Seriously relaxed. But but anyway, So
Speaker 1: so I went to the choir room and I sang
Speaker 1: Boysmen into the Road, and the choir teacher was like,
Speaker 1: why are you not in my class? Because I'm not
Speaker 1: a singer? Sure I guess you are? Now? Am I am?
Speaker 1: I end? She said, yeah, all right back, because I again,
Speaker 1: I didn't have the confidence in myself to like take
Speaker 1: it seriously. But even though your friends kept making you
Speaker 1: sing in front of girls, yeah, but you didn't say
Speaker 1: I'm a singer. Wow, It didn't dawn on me. At
Speaker 1: that point. So night at the concert, I get up there.
Speaker 1: You know, everybody's like, you know what you gotta do?
Speaker 1: You got to playing? All right? Great? Cool, So get
Speaker 1: on the stage. The song starts, boys, well, no, no, no no,
Speaker 1: that's that's I make love to you into the road
Speaker 1: do yeah. Um. So funny thing happened because I knew
Speaker 1: what I was supposed to do. I knew what the
Speaker 1: plan was. As soon as the song starts, act like
Speaker 1: I'm gonna sing, I stopped turn around moon run right
Speaker 1: the plan. As soon as the song started, I kid
Speaker 1: you not. I kid you not. As soon as the
Speaker 1: song started, I looked up and the room was empty.
Speaker 1: The crowd was not there anymore, and I'm uh, and
Speaker 1: I just started singing, and I just sang the song.
Speaker 1: I sang the whole song that once I realized the
Speaker 1: crowd wasn't there anymore, I just closed my eyes and
Speaker 1: sang the whole damn song. And then by the time
Speaker 1: was up, mind you, the song ended to no applause
Speaker 1: because everybody was like, that's a little thing to be
Speaker 1: drawing the pictures. It was one of those ones, right.
Speaker 1: So the following day, and this is this is when
Speaker 1: I started really thinking, all right, maybe I could, maybe
Speaker 1: I could do this as a professional. Following day, all
Speaker 1: of a sudden, I'm getting all kind of attention that
Speaker 1: I never got before. Girls shape for shaper' is my
Speaker 1: real name then, and that doesn't want shaper So so
Speaker 1: roughly after that, a friend of mine that went to
Speaker 1: another school. Because mind you, at this point, people are talking.
Speaker 1: It's Vegas is a little people are talking like sing.
Speaker 1: So he comes to me it's like, um, me and
Speaker 1: my friends were putting together a singing group. I won't
Speaker 1: know if you want to be a part of group. Like, okay,
Speaker 1: in mind you. Even at this point, I'm not like, yeah,
Speaker 1: I'm gonna become a part of this group and we're
Speaker 1: gonna get a record deal and we're gonna make a
Speaker 1: million sell a million records. It wasn't that yet. It
Speaker 1: was just this is another opportunity for me to write
Speaker 1: and sing because this is what I love to do. Wow, now,
Speaker 1: your sister, everyone around you is not saying, oh, baby, bro, like,
Speaker 1: well you're you're younger, right, I'm older, big bro. I'll
Speaker 1: tell you why. Because so in my family, my sister,
Speaker 1: my sister sings as well. But my sister was born ready,
Speaker 1: like she didn't have to. I had to. I had
Speaker 1: to train and and and practice and become a good singer.
Speaker 1: She was born with it, right. I heard her ship
Speaker 1: is effortless, like she'll come in here and blow the
Speaker 1: roof off this place. I think she don't have She
Speaker 1: don't have the drive that I have, which is why
Speaker 1: I'm here and she's not. But the skill. And I
Speaker 1: didn't know you could practice to get as good as you, yeah,
Speaker 1: because I thought it was amongst the way you. You
Speaker 1: just did a little, and I was like, remind you,
Speaker 1: I've been doing this since I was ninety two. Anything
Speaker 1: you do for that long, I should hope you get
Speaker 1: a little good at it. So you're saying like, if
Speaker 1: I practice really hard, if you are not horrible singing
Speaker 1: in the shower, if you are not toned there, I'm
Speaker 1: definitely you are. If I sang a tone to you
Speaker 1: couldn't repeat that tone, I guarantee you I will think
Speaker 1: I repeated it and you will be like, let's just
Speaker 1: the literal definition of tone death, right, got it? Got it?
Speaker 1: I've been like, oh I hit that, I killed him
Speaker 1: Marai and then not. Ye, that's what tone death is.
Speaker 1: When if I go h and you go uh and
Speaker 1: you think they were doing the same note, that's Tom Death. Okay,
Speaker 1: I loke. You want to practice this off quickly? Okay,
Speaker 1: no no, no, no no, no, no, no nice nice in
Speaker 1: middle of the road. Okay, ready, here we go. Uh
Speaker 1: do it again? Uh you're laughing? Okay one time when
Speaker 1: I promise you, okay, just repeat what I do. Uh damn.
Speaker 1: I'm tone death can never be a singer, well not necessarily,
Speaker 1: so there there's there have been cases where tone deaf
Speaker 1: people learned how to sing, but it is exceptionally harder
Speaker 1: because you're you literally can't hear the tones. Oh so,
Speaker 1: I'm like, you're good at so many other things accepted,
Speaker 1: You'll never I can't cook. Is that why weingrunch right now?
Speaker 1: Because I can't cook yet? But put me in the
Speaker 1: kitchen and you don't want your house clearly because it's
Speaker 1: going up. So I'm sorry, I got us all off
Speaker 1: off track. So you joined this boy group. Trying to
Speaker 1: get you back on. So you joined the boy group. Okay,
Speaker 1: my name was in the because you're from Nevada in
Speaker 1: the boats lage in the y. I don't thought that
Speaker 1: she was so cool and he about don't back. So
Speaker 1: you joined the guy group. And then you're like, at
Speaker 1: what point does it start to you start to realize
Speaker 1: that you're um so all right. So I meet the
Speaker 1: rest of the guys in the group, and two of
Speaker 1: them I knew already, just just from again in Vegas
Speaker 1: is small. Uh. So we were sitting putting harmonies together
Speaker 1: and and I'm kind of taking charge, not on purpose,
Speaker 1: but just because I know, like, all right, so you
Speaker 1: have the lowest voice, so clearly you would be the
Speaker 1: you be the base. You have the highest voice that
Speaker 1: you'd be, you know, and just putting everybody in their places,
Speaker 1: and we sound good, Like, we sound pretty damn good.
Speaker 1: So now I was like, all right, so now we
Speaker 1: just need original songs. And I'm like, oh we ship,
Speaker 1: hold on here, let's try this. And they're like, holy ship,
Speaker 1: you did that fast, and like what does it take
Speaker 1: a long time? I just did what I normally do,
Speaker 1: and and they were impressed. And so I meet the manager,
Speaker 1: the guy that's managing the group, and he's, you know,
Speaker 1: he got stars in his eyes. He's like, okay, all right,
Speaker 1: so yeah, here we're gonna do now this and this
Speaker 1: and this and that that that and put and as
Speaker 1: just at this point, I'm really sitting and like trying
Speaker 1: to like seeing things kind of come together, like this
Speaker 1: could really this could actually probably really be something like Okay,
Speaker 1: so now I'm taking it serious now Now now I'm
Speaker 1: writing specifically, I'm writing songs for my group, like this
Speaker 1: is who this is who I am at this point,
Speaker 1: I'm a member of this group. I'm writing songs for
Speaker 1: this group. Were rehearsing every day, putting harmonies together, doing
Speaker 1: talent shows around the city, like you know, good things,
Speaker 1: good things. Um, we actually did the showtime at the
Speaker 1: Apollo And how old were you senior in high school?
Speaker 1: This was right after high school. No no no, no, no, no, i'mline, i'mline.
Speaker 1: We were actually still who I've seen in high school,
Speaker 1: right because I remember having to go back to school
Speaker 1: and I was like, how did it go a little okay?
Speaker 1: Because it didn't go okay? Yeah, well okay, I put
Speaker 1: it to you this way. We didn't get booed off
Speaker 1: the stage. Sam Man didn't come out, but there were
Speaker 1: an exceptional amount of booze happening as we were doing
Speaker 1: what we were doing. That's crazy, yeah, man, we at
Speaker 1: this point we have been doing talent shows and stuff
Speaker 1: around the city. So like we we understood to a
Speaker 1: degree what the stage was, we didn't know what the
Speaker 1: Apollo stage was. Like. We got up there and nerves
Speaker 1: just took over it. We sounded terrible. It was bad.
Speaker 1: It was bad. You could actually find it on YouTube
Speaker 1: and stage. Okay, yeah, yes, Neo and a Well, my
Speaker 1: name wasn't Neo at that time. It was it was
Speaker 1: Go Go Go Go. Okay. Yes, childhood nickname based off
Speaker 1: of Go Go the Dodo Birds h w B character.
Speaker 1: My mom gave me the name because I was it
Speaker 1: was silly. Yeah, I was a really silly kid. So
Speaker 1: when you have that experience at Apollo, do you start
Speaker 1: to say, well, maybe I'm crazy for pursuing this. Do
Speaker 1: you start to doubt yourself? Um? I mean it was
Speaker 1: definitely uh you know what, I think, above anything else,
Speaker 1: our egos was really harmed with that because we just
Speaker 1: we walked mind you, We walked in there with all
Speaker 1: the confidence and chest out like we just knew we
Speaker 1: was that next thing. We walked in like that, and
Speaker 1: it was a very large and disgusting slice of humble pie.
Speaker 1: But but I feel like it kind of needed to happen.
Speaker 1: We needed to be brought down a couple of peggs,
Speaker 1: because you know, we were getting to that place where
Speaker 1: we were big headed. Every talent show we did except
Speaker 1: for like one, we we won everything talent show. So
Speaker 1: we're like a polo. We got this and we went
Speaker 1: in there and yeah, it was not it was not
Speaker 1: a good day. Not a good day. So then, now
Speaker 1: how do you get from that? I'm going to try
Speaker 1: to fast track you now to writing your first hit song. Okay, well, um,
Speaker 1: the group eventually disband not after the Apollo. We kept trying.
Speaker 1: After the Apollo. We actually moved to California, me and
Speaker 1: all the guys. Um, we didn't have jobs. So we
Speaker 1: we we graduated high school and then we sat in
Speaker 1: the Denny's and wrote out our plan on a napkin.
Speaker 1: Right moved to California. Right drive to California from Las
Speaker 1: Vegas and Corey's van. Corey was one of the guys
Speaker 1: in the group and the only one of us with
Speaker 1: a car. Right drive getting Corey's van. Drive to California.
Speaker 1: Find the Capitol Records Building. Park in front of the
Speaker 1: Capitol Records Building, stand up on top of the van,
Speaker 1: sing our songs until the president of Capital of Records
Speaker 1: runs out and demands that we signed to his record label.
Speaker 1: Wrote it on the Napkina plan, let's do it. Let's go,
Speaker 1: all right, So everybody packs, We're getting the van we
Speaker 1: had off. We get to Vegas, find a Capital Records
Speaker 1: Building California, sorry, California, California. Find a Capital Records Building,
Speaker 1: parking front of Capital Records Building, get on top of
Speaker 1: the van, singing our songs. People are kind of you know,
Speaker 1: stopping and watching and whatnot, but keeping they keep pushing.
Speaker 1: Um security kick this up to property, which we didn't anticipate. Okay, Um,
Speaker 1: all right, so it's not gonna happen today, got it,
Speaker 1: got it. We'll come back. Yeah, we'll just come back tomorrow. Yeah,
Speaker 1: we'll come back tomorrow. Okay cool? Oh ship, Um, where
Speaker 1: are we going to sleep tonight? Yeah? See what we
Speaker 1: what we didn't factor into that. That thing that we
Speaker 1: wrote down on the on the napkin was shelter food.
Speaker 1: You guys were like, we're gonna get signed, and that's it, right,
Speaker 1: We just we just knew that the second we got there,
Speaker 1: and from the first song we was getting a record deal.
Speaker 1: This is we just knew this and that did not happen.
Speaker 1: So Cory's van became home for about six months for
Speaker 1: all of you guys, all of us. Yes, shoot, so
Speaker 1: how did you survive money wise? Did you guys um
Speaker 1: our jobs here and there? Um? How long did was it?
Speaker 1: Six months? Six months? Six months? Shoot? Yeah? Man? Now
Speaker 1: were you comfortable with girls enough to like try to
Speaker 1: like sleep at a girl's crip every once in a while,
Speaker 1: every now and then at this point, Yeah, I've learned
Speaker 1: to use my powers at this point, Yeah, it was. Yeah,
Speaker 1: talking to women became a little easier, even as even
Speaker 1: as broked living in the van. Now I believe in
Speaker 1: you really well, let me sleep on your cap. You
Speaker 1: got twenty dollars for the dude you believe in. Yeah,
Speaker 1: a lot of dudes still do that. Yeah yeah, yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: I'm not proud of it. But the name of the
Speaker 1: game of survival, damn that do that to do? Yeah? So, um,
Speaker 1: the group eventually disbands. You know, everybody's tired of living
Speaker 1: in the band really, But within this six months, we're
Speaker 1: moving around the city, were bothering celebrities as they run
Speaker 1: coming out of restaurants. Hey, excuse, hey, we're seeing you
Speaker 1: might have we seen free all right? Cool? Well, thank
Speaker 1: you for like his music anyway, but hurt feelings hurt. Yeah.
Speaker 1: But but you guys was on it. And this was
Speaker 1: for social media because if you had social media, y'all
Speaker 1: would have been before all that. Now you literally had
Speaker 1: to harass people find him in run up on? Did
Speaker 1: he as he working out the restaurant? Did? He actually
Speaker 1: stopped for us and me saying he was like, that's dope,
Speaker 1: that's dope, keep doing it, and got in his car
Speaker 1: and bounced like, so is he gonna call it? He
Speaker 1: said it was good? Did you get it? I didn't
Speaker 1: get his numbers? Did you didn't get his number? Dawn?
Speaker 1: All right, guys back to the van? It get it? Yeah?
Speaker 1: But now we wound up meeting uh, this cat who
Speaker 1: had a boy band signed to Hollywood Records, which was
Speaker 1: Disney's record label at the time, and he basically said
Speaker 1: that he was like, if you guys write some songs
Speaker 1: for this group, I can then talk to Hollywood Records
Speaker 1: about maybe potentially signing y'all. Alright, cool, so wrote some
Speaker 1: songs for the group. Mind you, At this time, we
Speaker 1: don't know anything about publishing and rights and all that
Speaker 1: because they can write right. No, no, no, no, we
Speaker 1: all write. Everybody everybody writes. I was a little faster
Speaker 1: than everybody else, but we could all we could all right,
Speaker 1: So wrote these songs for this group named the group
Speaker 1: was Youngstown. Shout out to Youngstown. They were actually really
Speaker 1: cool guys, but um yeah, I didn't want up getting
Speaker 1: the money that we were supposed to get for that. Uh.
Speaker 1: We learned at that point that the record the music
Speaker 1: industry is full of people that will absolutely take advantage
Speaker 1: of whatever you don't know. Like they're not gonna they're
Speaker 1: not gonna sit you down and tell you. They're gonna
Speaker 1: take advantage of the fact that you don't know, right. So, uh,
Speaker 1: that was a learning experience, but it was also our
Speaker 1: only kind of end to the music industry. So when
Speaker 1: the band, when the group this, this band, I kind
Speaker 1: of stayed in contact with that dude, and um so,
Speaker 1: so I'm at this point, I'm living with one of
Speaker 1: their staff producers. Shout out to my man, Paully Paul,
Speaker 1: Uh living with him and his family. Minded they're they're
Speaker 1: they're filthy rich. So they had a big house and
Speaker 1: I'm in the I'm in the basement somewhere and we
Speaker 1: just wake up and we do music every day just
Speaker 1: just because, like not even so much knowing what we're
Speaker 1: gonna do with it. We're just doing it just because
Speaker 1: just to do it right. So, um that the guy
Speaker 1: that managed that group at the time, he's then taking
Speaker 1: these songs and shopping him, you know, trying to trying
Speaker 1: to trying to settle. Are you still under contract at
Speaker 1: this point when I'm just I'm literally just me and
Speaker 1: PAULI are good friends and he's letting me live here
Speaker 1: and we wake up every day and we do music.
Speaker 1: This is art. This is what we do. So uh,
Speaker 1: They're moving around New York and what nott trying to
Speaker 1: shop these records and people are asking questions about the
Speaker 1: voice on the records because I'm singing, I'm writing in
Speaker 1: singing these records to be shopped to other people, and
Speaker 1: they're like, well, who's the guy singing, Oh, that's the writer.
Speaker 1: His name that was just using my reading name at
Speaker 1: the time, Shaffer. So what what what do you want
Speaker 1: to do here? You're trying to So manager comes back
Speaker 1: to me, it's like, yo, they want to give you
Speaker 1: a deal. And initially I was like, nah, why Because
Speaker 1: I had never done anything as a solo before. I
Speaker 1: didn't know how to do that. And I'm like, wait,
Speaker 1: just me, what can I call my They're like, no,
Speaker 1: that's done this, they won't to see you. I'm by myself. Oh.
Speaker 1: So they eventually talked me into it, so I got
Speaker 1: a record, a regular son of Columbia Records. Um, it
Speaker 1: was more money than I than I had seen at
Speaker 1: that point, which was cool, and I mean my view,
Speaker 1: it wasn't a lot. It was it was artists advanced.
Speaker 1: But this moment that I had a time, so uh,
Speaker 1: going through the process of putting this album together for
Speaker 1: Columbia Records, I'm excited about the whole thing. Um, it's
Speaker 1: basically what we've been doing, me and PAULI, just making
Speaker 1: music every day, but now we're making music for my
Speaker 1: debut album. So it's like right, Um, But what I'm
Speaker 1: realizing is that the A and rs and the record label,
Speaker 1: you know, they have a very specific vision of who
Speaker 1: they want me to be, right to the point where
Speaker 1: they're like, yeah, yeah, yeah, that song is cool, but
Speaker 1: can you write something more like this? Yeah? And then
Speaker 1: I don't weary that where these yeah, I don't work
Speaker 1: with those producers. Work with these producers like like they're
Speaker 1: molding what it is they want and how old at
Speaker 1: this time? Um? Like early and mind you, I'm so
Speaker 1: green and just so excited for something to finally be happening.
Speaker 1: And I'm thinking that I can't tell these people know
Speaker 1: so anything that I'm like ya, yeah, alright, we're doing that.
Speaker 1: Who alight, who let's do that. That's how I am
Speaker 1: right now all the time? What the road right? So
Speaker 1: so um and mind you? And they was they was
Speaker 1: doing the most like I don't hold grudges or have
Speaker 1: any regrets, but say our cast was doing me there day.
Speaker 1: It was like every time we come to New York,
Speaker 1: these casts take us to mind you, I'm I'm I'm green.
Speaker 1: I've never been to New York, taking us to these
Speaker 1: really fancy restaurants Mr. The Childs and all of that,
Speaker 1: and every time the bill come, they just pop down
Speaker 1: the credit card. Everything is all good. What they didn't
Speaker 1: tell me is that the money on that credit card
Speaker 1: is my recording budget. Yeah. So we had missed Childs
Speaker 1: thousand dollars thousand dollar dinners on me and I had
Speaker 1: no idea. I had no clue to the point where
Speaker 1: I finally Okay. So, so album is done, artwork is done,
Speaker 1: everything is ready to go, and I'm looking at this
Speaker 1: picture of myself and I'm like, I have no idea
Speaker 1: who this person is. I don't know this person. I'm
Speaker 1: listening to the music like, yeah, it's cool, but this
Speaker 1: is not this is not me. This is this is
Speaker 1: their their version of me. Like and so I didn't.
Speaker 1: So I went to them like, would it be cool
Speaker 1: if I maybe went in and did a couple of
Speaker 1: songs that just made a little more sense with who
Speaker 1: I am? And they're like, well, I mean yeah you could,
Speaker 1: but your budget. Your budget is depleted. And I'm like,
Speaker 1: what do you mean, well, you're you're recording budget is gone.
Speaker 1: I'm like, how I know for a fact we didn't
Speaker 1: spend all the all the recording money on the recording
Speaker 1: and he's like, whoa, yeah, it's gone. And mind you,
Speaker 1: it took somebody in the office that worked for the
Speaker 1: A and Are to come to me like soul. So
Speaker 1: here's what happens. You know those Mr Child's visits, Yeah,
Speaker 1: that was that was that was on your budget. And
Speaker 1: I'm like, but but I was I didn't say they
Speaker 1: could do that. Well, I mean, you kind of don't
Speaker 1: have to. Like they the label gives them the card
Speaker 1: and their job is to make sure that you produce
Speaker 1: an album. And you know, so if they produce your
Speaker 1: album for cheap and this is left over, they pretty
Speaker 1: much get to do what everything to what. I'm like,
Speaker 1: what ass? That's crazy. Yeah. I don't know if that's
Speaker 1: still the case. I doubt it nowadays, just because you know,
Speaker 1: labels are slowly but surely getting the obsolete. But um,
Speaker 1: but yeah, so that's that's what the deal was back then.
Speaker 1: So I kind of rebelled. I was like, I don't
Speaker 1: I don't want to do this. This is not me,
Speaker 1: this isn't who I am. And they're like, so you're
Speaker 1: not going to cooperate. I'm like, well na, I mean
Speaker 1: I mean, if y'all let me go in and do
Speaker 1: a couple more songs, maybe alright. Cool. So they shelved me,
Speaker 1: and I sat on the shelf for two years. No.
Speaker 1: That was God. That had to have been scary. Um,
Speaker 1: not so much scary as it was depressing, because I'm
Speaker 1: like back to square one, Like I have a record deal,
Speaker 1: I have an album. Um, it's not coming out, and
Speaker 1: I'm but I'm in the contract, so I can't do
Speaker 1: anything else or going or anything. So what happens if
Speaker 1: you do? Um? What a statement sue when I got anohing?
Speaker 1: But but yeah, they could. So I'm I'm and I'm
Speaker 1: at this point, I'm like, all right, well, so how
Speaker 1: do you get out of a shelf deal? What do
Speaker 1: you have to do? Um? So my management eventually goes
Speaker 1: in them and goes listen to kids. Is still young
Speaker 1: If you're not gonna do not with him and just
Speaker 1: let him go. So lawyer's lawsuits, la la, la la la.
Speaker 1: They finally decided to let me go. They kept the album,
Speaker 1: kept the rest of the album that I did while
Speaker 1: I was over there, which I gave up freely. I'm like, fine,
Speaker 1: take it. I just want to be free, just want
Speaker 1: to be out of here. So they took it cool.
Speaker 1: So now I'm back to Score one. I'm living in California.
Speaker 1: I have my own place, but I'm sharing it with
Speaker 1: two other guys, two friends of mine, because I'm somewhat
Speaker 1: broken in right. So some time is passing. Management is
Speaker 1: you know, moving around, trying to find another situation. UM.
Speaker 1: In the process, of all of this. I'm driving down
Speaker 1: the street one day and I don't know whose car
Speaker 1: because I didn't have one. I don't know whose car was.
Speaker 1: I think it was Pauli's sister's car. Anyway, UM driving
Speaker 1: down the street and a song comes on the radio,
Speaker 1: a song called that Girl by Marcus Houston. If I
Speaker 1: wanted that gerl, then I would be with that gerl.
Speaker 1: But that one ain't for me. I remember, this is
Speaker 1: the best day of my life. But every time you
Speaker 1: sing it's the best day of my life. Every time,
Speaker 1: thank you, thank you, Let's see you. Sorry blessing, but
Speaker 1: so so I wrote that song. That song was actually
Speaker 1: supposed to be my first single when I was signed
Speaker 1: to Columbia Records. You wrote that I wrote that song.
Speaker 1: My voice is still all the backgrounds on that song
Speaker 1: is me. They kept my voice on the record. They
Speaker 1: just sold it to Marcus Houston. I had no idea
Speaker 1: that they sold it to Marcus Houston. I'm driving down
Speaker 1: the street and this song comes on the radio and
Speaker 1: I'm like, I know this record, that's my record with
Speaker 1: what the hell? So I called the management like yo,
Speaker 1: they so, when did they give the record to Marcus Houston?
Speaker 1: I don't know what, Well do I get a chicken?
Speaker 1: Why don't get ye? The rights? Right? I mean we
Speaker 1: eventually went back in you know, lawyer's walls. La la
Speaker 1: la got what I was old. But at the time,
Speaker 1: I'm like, this is just talk about kick when you down,
Speaker 1: Like damn, I'm already over. I'm already back in square one.
Speaker 1: Now at any point in this, are you crying like tears?
Speaker 1: Like tears, I can imagine you were. Um, I've never
Speaker 1: been afraid of emotion. Emotion. We have emotions to help us.
Speaker 1: We're supposed to use them. The thing that the thing
Speaker 1: that messes us up is that we we tend to
Speaker 1: let our emotions run us and you wind up using
Speaker 1: the wrong emotion for the wrong situation or you know,
Speaker 1: just going farther than you shoot on an emotion. But
Speaker 1: I but I've never been My mom raised me like,
Speaker 1: listen if it feels good, smile, laugh if it hurts, cry,
Speaker 1: and never be ashamed of either one because you've been
Speaker 1: giving these or a reason you're supposed to use them.
Speaker 1: That whole macho thing. Men don't cry, it's the hell
Speaker 1: we do. Yeah, we do. If you know what's good
Speaker 1: for you, because otherwise you hold that ship in and
Speaker 1: then you blow up at some dude at the store,
Speaker 1: and now you're in jail. Somebody took your gas pumpers.
Speaker 1: So you hear your song on the radio, and you know,
Speaker 1: crying my thug tears, and I called my manager and
Speaker 1: and he told me that there was pretty much nothing
Speaker 1: we could do at the time. So I cried a
Speaker 1: few more thug tears and then I kind of just
Speaker 1: kept pushing after that. It's like, at that point, um,
Speaker 1: my relationship with said manager is doing the ling because
Speaker 1: you know, um, I don't know, I don't know if
Speaker 1: they're going as hard to try to find another situation
Speaker 1: as they did with that, because they were. They were
Speaker 1: kind of mad at me, honestly, because I'm part I'm
Speaker 1: pretty much the reason that we got shelf because there
Speaker 1: saying all right, so we got this set up and
Speaker 1: this set up and this set up and it set up,
Speaker 1: and I'm like, I'm not doing none of that ship
Speaker 1: because I don't This album is not me. And they're like, oh, okay,
Speaker 1: well the next thing, and my management is like, yeah right,
Speaker 1: So we eventually, you know, dad it, So now I'm
Speaker 1: really back at square one. I don't even have management anymore. Man,
Speaker 1: PAULI still cool, but you know, PAULI is moving on
Speaker 1: doing other things. Um. So that's when I'm I remember,
Speaker 1: I'm walking down the street. Uh, like a block away
Speaker 1: from the crib. I was going to the corner store
Speaker 1: or whatever. And if I'm by myself, I'm by myself then,
Speaker 1: which means I'm a sing like I'm by myself. So
Speaker 1: I'm walking down the streets singing at the top of
Speaker 1: my lines. The people walking past them from ards. I
Speaker 1: don't care. I'm just I'm just I'm here. I got
Speaker 1: the blinders on the right, but I did notice a
Speaker 1: STUV driving in the opposite directions. Hit thing and come back,
Speaker 1: turn around to come back, pull up next to me.
Speaker 1: Hey are you seeing or something? Yeah? Oh well the
Speaker 1: money I noticed, right. Yes. So Tango, my current manager,
Speaker 1: we met, shout out to a man, Tango, this is
Speaker 1: how we met. So mind you. He's like, yo, I
Speaker 1: got the studio on these producers. We literally right around
Speaker 1: the corner. Uh, come let me show you pull up.
Speaker 1: So I just found him, Like, okay, they do it
Speaker 1: could be a murderer, Um, but let's go all right.
Speaker 1: So I hop in the truck pull off. We pull
Speaker 1: about ten minutes down to down the way to where
Speaker 1: the studio is at. I made the producers. We sit
Speaker 1: up and talk. You know. It's a cool vibe. Start
Speaker 1: making music that same night. Um, but mind you, nobody's
Speaker 1: talking deal, nobody's talking anything like that yet. We just
Speaker 1: I'm literally just writing me songs, you know, sitting laugh
Speaker 1: and joking with him. And then gone, right, So one
Speaker 1: day time they don't know your back story or anything.
Speaker 1: You guys, just nobody knows anything. So Tango goes. After
Speaker 1: about two three weeks of this, Tango goes, all right,
Speaker 1: I'm gonna get your record deal. And then I don't
Speaker 1: know about all that, And he was like, why I
Speaker 1: had a record deal before, and that that if if
Speaker 1: that's what happen, a record deal is owned. He was like,
Speaker 1: He's like, no, you just went in there with the
Speaker 1: wrong people. He's like, listen, give me four months. If
Speaker 1: I don't give you a record deal in four months,
Speaker 1: walk away, hands washing, no contract on nothing. I'm like,
Speaker 1: cool too much later at a record months later, I
Speaker 1: had a record deal. Uh. And it was kind of
Speaker 1: it was kind of on purpose by accident, because we
Speaker 1: started out kind of the same way we started with
Speaker 1: the other management, just doing records and moving them around,
Speaker 1: shopping them whatnot. Um. We were in New York on
Speaker 1: on on a mission like that, just moving around playing
Speaker 1: records for different record labels. We stopped at the Death
Speaker 1: Jam building because the person I was with, my man Sauce.
Speaker 1: He's a producer, uh from the groups offing of people
Speaker 1: are early nineties I remember, but anyway, he's my my
Speaker 1: vocal producer all that. So I'm with him and he says, yo,
Speaker 1: before we go back to the hotel, let's stop in
Speaker 1: the Death Cham building, not to shopping on records, but
Speaker 1: a friend of his works in the Death End building
Speaker 1: that he hasn't seen since high school. And he's like,
Speaker 1: I'm in New York. I at least want to go
Speaker 1: say what's up? All right, cool? We head upstairs. He
Speaker 1: didn't tell me that this friend was Tina Davis, who
Speaker 1: at the time was head of A and R for Right.
Speaker 1: So we're walked in her office. I've never seen him before,
Speaker 1: I don't know who she is. I'm like, all right, cool.
Speaker 1: So I'm sitting the corner on some thumb Twitter like
Speaker 1: waiting on them to hit the whole reunited and it
Speaker 1: feels so good. Oh yeah, you look nice seeing you, said, girl,
Speaker 1: did you cut your hair out of all of this?
Speaker 1: And I'm like, all right, I'm hunger. Now go give
Speaker 1: me a slice of pizza that we leave here. Huh
Speaker 1: oh nice to meet you. Yeah. So she goes to him, So,
Speaker 1: what you mean up to I'm doing this, doing that?
Speaker 1: You know what, I'm working with this writers, Neil, he's
Speaker 1: a writer. La la la la. Oh you're right, yeah,
Speaker 1: Well she played me something, starts playing with some of
Speaker 1: the music. She's listening to the music, but she's but
Speaker 1: she's locked on me to the point where I'm like,
Speaker 1: hell's wrong with right? So so she she goes, you
Speaker 1: wrote these yeah, and that she's singing too. Yeah you
Speaker 1: can dance? Yeah a little bit? What right? Right now? Yeah?
Speaker 1: I got up. I'm sorry performing to the record. I'm
Speaker 1: like performing to her because I looked at that as
Speaker 1: a challenge, like, you're not gonna challenge me. This is
Speaker 1: my music, it's my ship. You're not gonna challenge me.
Speaker 1: So I got up. I'm performing, stood up on her
Speaker 1: desk the whole night. I went for it, mind you,
Speaker 1: stone faced the whole time no emotions. Jeez, I would
Speaker 1: have been hold on to say, hey mr ready busy, Yeah,
Speaker 1: I have somebody you might want me, Okay, come with me. Up.
Speaker 1: You heard and you knew who that was. I know
Speaker 1: exactly who that was. So at this at this point,
Speaker 1: I'm like, I look over itself, was like, what was
Speaker 1: happening right now? Right right? So we go up, We
Speaker 1: shiit sit outside his office for a few minutes. I'm
Speaker 1: sitting there with Sauce. I'm like, bro, He's like, I
Speaker 1: don't know unless we're here. We're here, all right, cool.
Speaker 1: So I walked in the room. I remember at the
Speaker 1: time he had this long office, or at least I
Speaker 1: might be making this up, and this is what it
Speaker 1: felt like in my mind. I walked in the door,
Speaker 1: just long office because he was all the way over there,
Speaker 1: big chair and uh and it's like couches on either side.
Speaker 1: He has his his tastemaker is sitting in the room
Speaker 1: with him, his taste people that that, you know, the
Speaker 1: people who people whose opinions he trust. So I walked
Speaker 1: in and he's like, so you're the next big thing
Speaker 1: hunt and I'm like, all right, well, let me hear something.
Speaker 1: So I started playing the same song that I that
Speaker 1: I performed for for a Teina earlier. So senior record,
Speaker 1: same thing. Hop up on the desk, the whole nine
Speaker 1: right stone faces from the whole room. No one is
Speaker 1: giving me anything. I'm like, okay, we were just wasting
Speaker 1: everyone's time here. Clearly they're not interested. So I finished,
Speaker 1: no applause, no nothing, and l A goes all right,
Speaker 1: thank you, can you step out? Let me how let
Speaker 1: my folks right quick. I'm like yeah, sure. So we
Speaker 1: go back outside, sitting out there for like an hour,
Speaker 1: like you know, the lady that she was so nice.
Speaker 1: She gave with chips and water and everything, and she
Speaker 1: was like she was like normally if it takes as long,
Speaker 1: it's a good thing. And I'm like, okay, alright. So
Speaker 1: hour goes by. I'm like, you saw they faces. They
Speaker 1: let's let it all right. So we get up and
Speaker 1: as we're walking out, like folks, their head out the
Speaker 1: door says Neil, what's your lawyer's information? LA wants to
Speaker 1: give you? Uh, I don't have a limople. Okay, we'll
Speaker 1: work that out. We'll work that out. Congratulations and thank
Speaker 1: thank you, thank you. We'll call you Tom. All right,
Speaker 1: all right, I'll tell you. So we walked out of
Speaker 1: building number what does that? What? What did I just
Speaker 1: accidentally get a deal just now? So? Yeah, it was,
Speaker 1: it was, it was. It was a moment. Now when
Speaker 1: you talk to Sauce, did you ever ask him like
Speaker 1: did he know kind of what he was walking you into? No?
Speaker 1: We literally went in there so that he could see
Speaker 1: Tina here though. Yeah, am Id we had already we
Speaker 1: had already been to Death Jam shopping music that week,
Speaker 1: so we didn't that was what we was going in
Speaker 1: there for. Like, we went in there like two days
Speaker 1: before that, talking to somebody else trying to shop some records,
Speaker 1: and I was like, oh, yeah, these are nice, We'll
Speaker 1: call you like all right whatever, and we left went
Speaker 1: back literally just for that, and and walked out with
Speaker 1: a record deal. What a story? Yeah, and then you
Speaker 1: at what point do you have your first major hit
Speaker 1: breakout record. I'm not talking under because you had hits
Speaker 1: before your format before the deal. Yeah. Um, so before
Speaker 1: the whole record deal situation. Um Tango knew some people
Speaker 1: that worked with Dr Dre Right, so that's where he
Speaker 1: took me initially, trying to get me signs. I'm gonna
Speaker 1: see if Dr Dre wanted to sign me. So I
Speaker 1: went in there and you know, met with Dr Drames,
Speaker 1: starts struck moment like wow, man, right, So he's playing
Speaker 1: me tracks like think you right to this? Yeah? Hell yeah?
Speaker 1: And he's like hold on, and then you'll play the
Speaker 1: same track with a song on it already from this
Speaker 1: other artist. And I guess apparently I didn't notice at
Speaker 1: the time, but apparently he was trying to decide between
Speaker 1: me and this other artist. I don't remember to do
Speaker 1: his name, but but he had a weird style anyway,
Speaker 1: it was he was he was. He was a little
Speaker 1: bit more funned than me. So he eventually wound up
Speaker 1: going with old Boy. But every time he would play
Speaker 1: me a record, I'm like, he's like, you like, can
Speaker 1: you beat this? Yeah? I think so. Right, So I'm
Speaker 1: writing records, writing records, writing records. I wrote. I wrote
Speaker 1: like four records in an hour, right, Damn, you're good,
Speaker 1: he was. So he was like, he was like, this
Speaker 1: is good. He was good. Let me let me think
Speaker 1: about it, right, So come back the next day He's like, yeah,
Speaker 1: I think I'm ana go with my man, you know,
Speaker 1: just for what we're trying to do. He just got
Speaker 1: a little bit more wrong, and I'm like, okay, that's fine,
Speaker 1: So back to the drawing board. But as we're leaving,
Speaker 1: Scott Storch, Scott Storch stops was like, Yo, I don't
Speaker 1: know the hell dre talking about, but if you ever
Speaker 1: in Miami looked me up? Okay, I left. I guess
Speaker 1: him and Tango had a conversation after I left, if
Speaker 1: you wanted up in Miami to follow on a week
Speaker 1: he just happened to be working for Mario. Wow. Okay.
Speaker 1: The first song that we did together was you should
Speaker 1: Let Me Love You first on Me and Scott did together. Yeah. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and I remember, um, I mean when we finished with
Speaker 1: the record, like we we knew it was special, like
Speaker 1: we we both said that, like yeah, and we got
Speaker 1: some addition. Yeah. That's when I was like, I was like,
Speaker 1: is Mario is that dude gonna be able to pull
Speaker 1: this off? Because my I didn't know Mario all I
Speaker 1: knew at the time he was like still young. I
Speaker 1: remember to break my hair record and I'm like, this
Speaker 1: was like a it's like a love record like this,
Speaker 1: this this record got an old soul. Only is he
Speaker 1: gonna be able to deliver this man that that dude
Speaker 1: made me eat my words when he showed up. Mind
Speaker 1: he I think he had just turned eighteen, So I'm
Speaker 1: really like, he ain't gonna know what this song. He
Speaker 1: don't be able to pull it dad and got it
Speaker 1: in and cut that song in an hour, one hour,
Speaker 1: whole song finished, start to finish, ad libs everything I
Speaker 1: had apologized to that dude that I literally going to
Speaker 1: brom I'm gonna keep funking with you. I counter Drea
Speaker 1: before you got here. I didn't think he was gonna
Speaker 1: be able. I didn't know you was baby Sam cooking
Speaker 1: this thing. Da congratulations. So we became cool after that.
Speaker 1: So the song comes out and uh yeah, it blows up.
Speaker 1: It becomes the number one twelve weeks, the second most
Speaker 1: play song and radio hits something something nuts like that.
Speaker 1: So so I went in to that death gam situation
Speaker 1: with that one in the tuck like I had already
Speaker 1: did it, and it just came out. So it wasn't
Speaker 1: like a big, big, big, big wow. So you had
Speaker 1: the heat you had had, but but it wasn't. It
Speaker 1: hadn't blown yet. It was out and like people was
Speaker 1: talking about it, but it hadn't like really gone yet.
Speaker 1: So by the time I got to meet jay Z,
Speaker 1: because you know, remember l Ay was CEO, jay Z
Speaker 1: was president. So by the time I got to meet
Speaker 1: jay Z walking the room and I'm like, hey, how
Speaker 1: you doing. My name is Neil, And he was like, Nick,
Speaker 1: why do you get that song away? Nice to meet
Speaker 1: you too, Mr G sir, All right, cool? Uh can
Speaker 1: we start over? Because that was that was that was
Speaker 1: the thing, So he really did. Those are his first
Speaker 1: words to me, why do you get a damn song away?
Speaker 1: Because I wrote it for family? Like, nah, but you
Speaker 1: should have kept that that was yours. I got more
Speaker 1: I can write, but um, but yeah, yeah yeah. So
Speaker 1: for a long time I was just a little neigta
Speaker 1: rot the Mario song. That was my name for like
Speaker 1: a like a long anywhere I went, especially to James,
Speaker 1: like a little Neiga with the Mario h um, the
Speaker 1: little neiggat pleasure. Yes, it's a long name, is it?
Speaker 1: Is it foreign? Yeah? It is. At any of these points,
Speaker 1: are you like I have officially arrived. No, even when
Speaker 1: jay Z is referring to you as the little No,
Speaker 1: I'm still not. It's still not registering to me that
Speaker 1: I've that I've made it at this point because it's
Speaker 1: just I'm really just working and working and working and
Speaker 1: just going with the flow, not paying attention to what's
Speaker 1: kind of happening around me. So like it it's I
Speaker 1: never I didn't want. I didn't care to be famous.
Speaker 1: I didn't get into this for that. I mean, I
Speaker 1: didn't get into this to make money. I thank God
Speaker 1: that I've learned that I can make money from this,
Speaker 1: But it wasn't my motivating factor for doing this. I
Speaker 1: love music. If nobody ever paid me ever again to
Speaker 1: do music, you still pull up and find me right here,
Speaker 1: like this is my leisure time, right, So I'm not
Speaker 1: I'm not paying attention to you know, the Mario song
Speaker 1: is blown up and everybody's I'm like, okay, cool, what's
Speaker 1: time in the studio? You know, I'm not. I'm not.
Speaker 1: It literally took ten years for me to finally sit
Speaker 1: still long enough to go oh Ship. We did win
Speaker 1: three Grammars, didn't we oh Ship? We did sell it
Speaker 1: to me and recursent we oh Ship? I did work
Speaker 1: with Michael Jackson, didn't not oh Ship. We didn't like
Speaker 1: like literally, it kind of just all hit me at once,
Speaker 1: but but it was because we had finally stopped, Like
Speaker 1: we toured for two years off of um uh, you're
Speaker 1: too gentlemen, you're a gyman. I'm literally on the road
Speaker 1: for two years. Show. You didn't get to really take
Speaker 1: it in because you were just work working, just moving, moving,
Speaker 1: moving moving. All right. Now we're doing this world show.
Speaker 1: All right now, we're doing that a war show, all
Speaker 1: right now, we're shooting this video al right now, we're
Speaker 1: working with dis artist and now Bimimi Mimimi. Right until
Speaker 1: we finally set still, like all right, tours over. We
Speaker 1: can go home for about a month everybody you know, recalibrate,
Speaker 1: and then we get back out there. And within that month,
Speaker 1: I just sat and blew my own damn mind, Like,
Speaker 1: oh we've done a lot of ship. We've done a
Speaker 1: lot of really really really cool ship. This has been
Speaker 1: a career and it ain't over. We still let you. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and you're a tough career because it's constantly transitioning and
Speaker 1: oh man, yeah, getting in is one impossible journey. Right
Speaker 1: once you get in, getting the success because it's countless
Speaker 1: people they get signed and put songs out and nothing happens.
Speaker 1: You never hear from them again. Right, So there's all
Speaker 1: of these doors that that you have to get through.
Speaker 1: You get through one and you think, oh yeah, I'm
Speaker 1: secure now because I gotta get through this from now.
Speaker 1: You gotta get a hit record, get a hit record,
Speaker 1: and I gotta get another one. Keep delivering every time.
Speaker 1: In mind you as this is happening, you're aging. The
Speaker 1: game is changing now, We've got social media and we
Speaker 1: got all of these all of these new the way
Speaker 1: that people are are are getting them music, they're doing
Speaker 1: that different Now. Everything is changing and you just have
Speaker 1: to keep up with the times, but not become the times,
Speaker 1: if that makes sense. It was like I've been around,
Speaker 1: I've watched countless trends come and go, right, And I say,
Speaker 1: watched them come and go because that's what trends are
Speaker 1: supposed to do. They come, they do what they're gonna do,
Speaker 1: and then they move. If you base your artistry off
Speaker 1: of that trend, when that trend leaves, you leave with it.
Speaker 1: Right when you signed to def Jam officially and started
Speaker 1: releasing records under them, you were able to control your
Speaker 1: own narrative, right because the neo that I like love
Speaker 1: and love is you know you and the sound that
Speaker 1: you put your stamp on versus the first one, right, yes,
Speaker 1: know that was that was one of the things that
Speaker 1: that let me know that I was in a much
Speaker 1: different situation than I was with the Columbia Columbia situation,
Speaker 1: because I actually went to l A Read and said,
Speaker 1: all right, look, I've kind of done this dance before
Speaker 1: one other time, and it was a really really negative situation.
Speaker 1: So here's what I'm not doing. Okay, y'all are not
Speaker 1: gonna tell me what I can and can't wear. Y'all
Speaker 1: are not gonna tell me what producers I can and
Speaker 1: can't work with. Y'all are not gonna tell me what
Speaker 1: kind of songs. Right, I'm not doing it this way?
Speaker 1: And ll A Rey looked me in my eyes and said,
Speaker 1: I signed you because I like what you do already.
Speaker 1: Why would I didn't turn around and change that? Amen?
Speaker 1: And I was like, thank you, We're good. That's rocks.
Speaker 1: What advice would you what advice would you give to
Speaker 1: someone that is broke, like literally broke, is passionate about music,
Speaker 1: wants to pursue it to also get out of being broke,
Speaker 1: which is different from you your situation, but definitely so
Speaker 1: um okay. So one of the beautiful things about the
Speaker 1: music industry today is that you don't really have to
Speaker 1: have a lot of money to do it. You can
Speaker 1: get in broke, you can't in now. Um, how far
Speaker 1: you go, that's gonna depend on your work ethic and
Speaker 1: then at some point how much money you can invest
Speaker 1: into yourself. I tell people all the time, don't don't
Speaker 1: chase your dreams to the point where you chase him
Speaker 1: right off a damn cliff, Like, make sure you can
Speaker 1: find forself, like you can work at McDonald's. All right,
Speaker 1: that's that's this many hours in a day. You still
Speaker 1: have got all these hours to focus on your music,
Speaker 1: to put towards your music. But this these hours is
Speaker 1: making sure that you can eat these hours, making sure
Speaker 1: that the lights stay on. You know what I'm saying,
Speaker 1: do that go get you a little nine of five.
Speaker 1: It ain't nothing wrong with that, And it ain't nothing
Speaker 1: wrong with that. That's literally nine to five. After five,
Speaker 1: get back into your craft. But make sure that you
Speaker 1: can take care of yourself at least to a degree. Uh.
Speaker 1: Like the whole starving artist thing, it doesn't have to
Speaker 1: be that. It literally doesn't. Um, but did you work
Speaker 1: their jobs when you were because it seemed like you
Speaker 1: were busy alot. I've worked every fast food chain you
Speaker 1: can think of, really, yes, McDonald's, McDonald's first. Yes, none
Speaker 1: of these jobs lasting longer than three weeks. That's not
Speaker 1: a good thing. I'm just saying that that. And I
Speaker 1: learned early on that I might have a slight problem
Speaker 1: with authority, just like I just look at it like this.
Speaker 1: I'm not going to let you yell at me over
Speaker 1: a French fries. I'm not letting that happen. I just that,
Speaker 1: just that doesn't make any sense to me as a
Speaker 1: man and as a person for me to just sit
Speaker 1: here and allow you to be yelling in my face
Speaker 1: because I put too much salt on you know what,
Speaker 1: take this little thing, take a look mountain, dudes. I'm gone.
Speaker 1: And and pretty much every one of those jobs kind
Speaker 1: of ended that way. It's like I did something. I
Speaker 1: burned a pizza, but in mind, that was my faut
Speaker 1: because I was talking to my friend it was bullshit,
Speaker 1: and the manager comes into what the wrong with you?
Speaker 1: I got fired from McDonald's, and I realized early on
Speaker 1: that McDonald's and waitressing was very hard For me, I
Speaker 1: felt like there's a lot of pressure in lunch all right,
Speaker 1: very stressful, and you're supposed to be nice as people
Speaker 1: are jerks. Yeah yeah nice yeah, and those jobs you
Speaker 1: would think that they look easy, but yeah, I can't.
Speaker 1: I can't do either. I respect the people that do
Speaker 1: it too. Oh yeah yeah. But all I have to say,
Speaker 1: don't feel like, don't feel like you're above it as
Speaker 1: an artist trying to trying to get it going, like
Speaker 1: you're not. You're not above any job. It doesn't mean
Speaker 1: you have to stay there, doesn't mean you have to
Speaker 1: thrive and try to become a manager of McDonald's one
Speaker 1: day and the ship, but you definitely need to do
Speaker 1: something to make sure that you can provide for yourself
Speaker 1: at least in the slightest degree of you know, if
Speaker 1: it's cinema, told crunch, every day, whatever, as long as
Speaker 1: you can provide for yourself a little bit, and from
Speaker 1: there focus on your music. Now you have your Spotify,
Speaker 1: you have your YouTube, you have all of these different
Speaker 1: ways that you can get your music, that you can
Speaker 1: get your art out there that did not exist before.
Speaker 1: I didn't there was no Spotify when I was hassling
Speaker 1: Diddy coming at the restaurant like there was no other
Speaker 1: way to do it, but that now you have all
Speaker 1: of these other outlets, and really the spoils go to
Speaker 1: the person that works the hardest where everybody's sleep. You
Speaker 1: need to be working. You need to be posting regularly
Speaker 1: about your music, about your artistry, so that people know
Speaker 1: where to go to get it, people know that it exists.
Speaker 1: And I'm not saying post on Monday and don't post
Speaker 1: again until Wednesday. No, that doesn't work. It doesn't work.
Speaker 1: It's a job, just like anything else that you would do.
Speaker 1: It's a job. And the more time and and time
Speaker 1: and energy that you apply to it, the better if
Speaker 1: you're gonna be Now, I I've heard about publishing, and
Speaker 1: there's there's the artist. You're the artist, and then there's publishing.
Speaker 1: Can you for the people that don't know how that
Speaker 1: structure works? Because I was my head, I think that
Speaker 1: if you're a songwriter, we're gonna talk a money. You
Speaker 1: make more right from publishing, but from publishing. But then
Speaker 1: the artists like, how does that whole music? So the artist,
Speaker 1: the artist doesn't get publishing unless they wrote on the song.
Speaker 1: Publishing is for writers for writers and producers. Um. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and that's primarily the bread and butter of a songwriter.
Speaker 1: You know, you write a song, it becomes a hit,
Speaker 1: it lasts for a little while. Anytime that song is
Speaker 1: played longer than thirty thirty seconds. Anywhere you're getting paid,
Speaker 1: you get like a check in the mail. You got
Speaker 1: to check the mail or you know, how are you
Speaker 1: how do you work it out the mind? They send
Speaker 1: it straight to my accountants. But but yeah, that's that's
Speaker 1: your that's your that's your livelihood as a as a songwriter,
Speaker 1: you're publishing. And then as an artist, if you're not
Speaker 1: doing that, you just get the album sales and the
Speaker 1: you get a portion of the album sales. But I
Speaker 1: mean most most record deals are set up in designed
Speaker 1: for you to stay in debt, so you don't get
Speaker 1: a large portion of the record sales. You get pennies
Speaker 1: on the dollar. Um. But as an artist, as the
Speaker 1: person in the forefront, you have so many opportunities to
Speaker 1: make money in so many different ways. It's sponsorships and
Speaker 1: all of that ship. Like you know, songwriters don't really
Speaker 1: get sponsorships, but publishing pager forever as long again, as
Speaker 1: long as the song is being played longer than thirty
Speaker 1: seconds anywhere on the face of the planet. You're making money.
Speaker 1: I heard a clip on social media, didn't dive into it,
Speaker 1: so I can't tell you who it was where. This
Speaker 1: songwriter said that when she writes songs, she always doesn't
Speaker 1: she tries not to outsing the singer, and she also
Speaker 1: tries to dress less. So I guess a sexy or
Speaker 1: attractive or pretty or whatever, Well, I mean, yeah, hands down,
Speaker 1: this business is harder for for women than it is
Speaker 1: for men, just from a standpoint of you know, if
Speaker 1: you are an attractive woman, you're always an attractive woman.
Speaker 1: And every time you walk into the room, even if
Speaker 1: you're walking into the room as a multi platinum selling
Speaker 1: artists or or Grammy Award winning songwriter, you're an attractive
Speaker 1: woman first when you walk in that room, and that's
Speaker 1: the first thing that people are gonna notice. And then
Speaker 1: it's up to you and your your your accolades, and
Speaker 1: your your mental abilities to get people to pay attention
Speaker 1: to the other things about you as well. And you know,
Speaker 1: if you walk into the room, walk into the studio,
Speaker 1: and you know the things are sitting up and things
Speaker 1: sitting out, that's probably where the majority of the attention
Speaker 1: is gonna go, you know, and that you want to
Speaker 1: sit and talk business, you want to talk about songs.
Speaker 1: But I'm looking at the citties right now, like the cities,
Speaker 1: just talking about something else, trying to figure out which
Speaker 1: conversation I'm supposed to pay attention to you because Tittis
Speaker 1: is talking to me. So so yeah, it's it's it's
Speaker 1: definitely in a songwriter's best interest walking into the studio
Speaker 1: to walk in, just walk in like you're not there
Speaker 1: for that sort of attention, you know what I mean.
Speaker 1: And then as far as out singing the singer, yeah,
Speaker 1: that's that's something that I that I I pride myself
Speaker 1: on and had to learn as well, because as a
Speaker 1: songwriter that can sing, you get in there and you
Speaker 1: just go for it and you don't realize maybe not
Speaker 1: everybody can do what you can do. Maybe not everybody
Speaker 1: can sing as hid you. Maybe not everybody can do
Speaker 1: that ad lib is intricate as you, And that will
Speaker 1: be the instance where an artist will not want the
Speaker 1: song because they're like, I'm not gonna sing it better
Speaker 1: than you just did, So what's the point of what's
Speaker 1: the point in me trying to do this record. So
Speaker 1: if you keep it kind of the middle of the road,
Speaker 1: you know, just good enough, that gives the artist's space
Speaker 1: to add their thing to it. You know what I mean.
Speaker 1: If you listen to my demo of Beyonce as they're
Speaker 1: replaceable and then Beyonce's version to be replaceable, you'll notice
Speaker 1: the slight differences because I left room for her to
Speaker 1: create them. Give what I will give to your versus.
Speaker 1: It's on It's on YouTube. Oh for real, your merchant.
Speaker 1: I didn't. I just put it there, but I looked
Speaker 1: the other day to day, okay, okay, and then I
Speaker 1: just spaced on. But I had a question that I
Speaker 1: was like saving in my brain. Not totally. I'm so
Speaker 1: mad at myself. It was, oh, last question. I'm not
Speaker 1: gonna try to keep you because I want to invade
Speaker 1: your space. Um. You write a lot of hit records.
Speaker 1: How do you determine what you keep for yourself and
Speaker 1: what you give away? UM? A lot of times it
Speaker 1: depends on the way the song came to be. Like,
Speaker 1: for example, if I went into a studio that was
Speaker 1: paid for by said artists or said artists management, said
Speaker 1: artists label, whatever the case may be whatever comes out
Speaker 1: of that session, it's supposed to go to said artists. Right,
Speaker 1: Your people pay for the time, pay for me to
Speaker 1: be here. So whatever I produce in this in this
Speaker 1: block of time, it's supposed to go to UM. But
Speaker 1: if I go to the studio, as I told you earlier,
Speaker 1: I go here just on my leisure, just being here,
Speaker 1: just creating. Right. So if I go on and do
Speaker 1: that with nobody's specific in mind and it comes out amazing,
Speaker 1: of course I'm thinking, all right, I'm gonna hold onto
Speaker 1: this one. But there's times where I go in like
Speaker 1: that and do something and be like, oh, such and
Speaker 1: such a sound amazing one. I got something you should
Speaker 1: check out, you know what I mean. So it kind
Speaker 1: of there's no specific way it happens like it could be.
Speaker 1: It could be either of those of those instances. Okay,
Speaker 1: now I love you, but your latest singles says don't
Speaker 1: love don't love me? Yeah? Did you like the way
Speaker 1: I did that I love you, but don't love you?
Speaker 1: You know, every girl could relate to this. Okay, every
Speaker 1: girl has heard this at one point in their life.
Speaker 1: I'm not saying that out of frustration because you're banging them,
Speaker 1: I could totally relate to the right. I can relate
Speaker 1: to all your records. That's why I've played them so
Speaker 1: many times, his love. So tell me about your latest project. Yes,
Speaker 1: self explanatory? Um, okay calling calling the album self explanatory
Speaker 1: for a couple of different reasons. First reason being I'm
Speaker 1: almost twenty years in at this point. I really don't
Speaker 1: feel like at this point a neo album needs that
Speaker 1: much explanation. You kind of know what's coming to a degree, right,
Speaker 1: It's gonna be There's gonna be stories because I love
Speaker 1: to tell us stories, thank you very much. It's gonna
Speaker 1: be melodic. You know, it's not gonna be this this
Speaker 1: this rap, same thing that everybody's doing right now, at
Speaker 1: least not all of it. You know, I gotta acknowledge
Speaker 1: what's happening right now, but not become right. It's going
Speaker 1: to be the kind of music that you live life
Speaker 1: to the kind of music that you cleaned the house
Speaker 1: on Sunday, to the kind of music that you sit
Speaker 1: up and think about that dude, who if he had
Speaker 1: just did this, it would have been perfect. Whatever the case,
Speaker 1: this is the music that you're gonna get from a
Speaker 1: neo album pretty self explanatory. Um, second Lee, the self
Speaker 1: explanatory concept comes from just what music is and what
Speaker 1: music does. Like it's it's almost I mean you can
Speaker 1: try to sit in and put it in words, but
Speaker 1: it's it's it's easy to just feel it. It's easy
Speaker 1: to just put it on and let the music take
Speaker 1: you where it's gonna take you. Let the music explain
Speaker 1: it to you, you know. Yeah, yeah, so that's what
Speaker 1: this album is about. Um, there are songs on this
Speaker 1: album that the die hard Neo fan will definitely latch
Speaker 1: onto because it's familiar. And then there are songs on
Speaker 1: this album that, you know, people who maybe just heard
Speaker 1: Neo's name or just got familiar you know, some of
Speaker 1: this new generation some stuff that they can latch on
Speaker 1: too as well. Um. The song Don't Love Me kind
Speaker 1: of a heavy record, uh it is. It started out
Speaker 1: as an open letter to my wife at a really
Speaker 1: really dark point in our relationship, you know, Um, right
Speaker 1: before the pandemic, we were definitely talking divorce. And I've
Speaker 1: actually credited the pandem me for saving my marriage because
Speaker 1: you know that that that whole quarantine thing made us
Speaker 1: sit down in each other's faces and talk about the
Speaker 1: things that we wasn't talking about, you know, those uncomfortable
Speaker 1: conversations made us have those and by the grace of God,
Speaker 1: we figured out how to get back to where we
Speaker 1: just love each other. And that's that's what that is.
Speaker 1: But this particular song, yeah, it was a letter. It
Speaker 1: was a letter that I had written to her, um,
Speaker 1: basically telling her that I did not think that I
Speaker 1: was capable of being the man that she deserved, that
Speaker 1: she should leave. And of course she didn't want to
Speaker 1: leave you. We love you, We can't leave. Thank god
Speaker 1: she didn't leave. But um, but yeah, yeah, that's that's
Speaker 1: how the song came to be. And we were initially
Speaker 1: going to do the video, but we decided not to
Speaker 1: because we didn't want to even acting wise, we didn't
Speaker 1: want to go back to that place. I was surprised
Speaker 1: she wasn't in the video. What does this mean? Let
Speaker 1: me go on Instagram. Let's see what's his personal life
Speaker 1: is like. That's when we do just so you know, oh,
Speaker 1: she's not in the video. Let's go to Instagram. Let's
Speaker 1: fact check. How is his marriage? What's going on? Now?
Speaker 1: We're good man, We're in a We're in a really,
Speaker 1: really good place right now. I love how you kept
Speaker 1: that real right there. You know. I when you when
Speaker 1: you love somebody, when you genuinely love somebody, you don't
Speaker 1: want to hurt them. And if you know that you're
Speaker 1: not gonna be what it is that they need you
Speaker 1: to be to stick with that person, to stay with
Speaker 1: that person knowing that you're not gonna do right, it's
Speaker 1: just selfish now as a man, Just for all the
Speaker 1: women that have heard this line before, is it heartbreaking
Speaker 1: for the man to say that to the woman? Like
Speaker 1: are you sad to say that? Because it's like almost
Speaker 1: like you're quitting. I was. I don't know quitting is
Speaker 1: the right word. No, no, no, no, no, that's that's
Speaker 1: that's actually accurate because what I realized is you can
Speaker 1: do anything, like there is no I can't be this person.
Speaker 1: There is no I can't be faithful. I can't there
Speaker 1: that doesn't exist. We what we want to do, and
Speaker 1: that is the bottom lines of everything we do. What
Speaker 1: we want to do. If you want to be faithful
Speaker 1: to that woman, you'll be faithful to that woman. Like,
Speaker 1: don't tell me that you can't. I'm not capable of
Speaker 1: it that because that's just you basically saying that you
Speaker 1: don't want to, you'd rather not because there's nothing stopping you.
Speaker 1: What's what's stopping you? But she had a fat as,
Speaker 1: She gonna always have a fat ass. That's never gonna change.
Speaker 1: What what's what's your point? So the sadness to me was, Um,
Speaker 1: I was sad because I didn't want her to leave.
Speaker 1: But I also didn't feel like I was gonna I
Speaker 1: was gonna do right by her. That I can honestly
Speaker 1: say now at this at this time, I didn't want
Speaker 1: to do right by her. I was I was allowing uh,
Speaker 1: the lustful spirit to to to control me, you know
Speaker 1: what I mean. Um, But again, through those really uncomfortable
Speaker 1: conversations and and you know, just blatant, painful honesty, we
Speaker 1: we got to we got to where we need to be.
Speaker 1: I realized that I was copping out. And now she
Speaker 1: didn't deserve that either. So and she was she was
Speaker 1: gangs as. She was like, yeah, she's like, no, I'm
Speaker 1: not going anywhere. She's she's actually the one that said
Speaker 1: it to me first. She was like, no, it's not
Speaker 1: that you can't. It's not that you can't do it,
Speaker 1: it's that you won't do it. Wow, that's what it is.
Speaker 1: So until you can stop being a coward and figure
Speaker 1: out where it is you want to be, you know,
Speaker 1: don't don't don't feed me this wow. Like yeah, So
Speaker 1: I kind of had this step back and get my
Speaker 1: thing together, right. But we are in a great place now,
Speaker 1: you know. The pandemic was the best part of mine.
Speaker 1: I would say it was the scariest thing because I
Speaker 1: had a business and went to zero. It crashed and
Speaker 1: burned in a micro second. And then of course I
Speaker 1: was thinking about eating moll broke. I was like, I
Speaker 1: want to do eaty more broke. I want to do
Speaker 1: eaty more broke. Well, I had an events company, went
Speaker 1: to ship you ain't got nothing but time. I did
Speaker 1: a mural of my garage. I was doing people. I
Speaker 1: haven't passed my house, Like what are you doing today?
Speaker 1: I'm like, bro, I have too much time. But one
Speaker 1: of the things I didn't have time for was like dating,
Speaker 1: and I was in all these serious relationships my husband
Speaker 1: now husband. I was like, I lined up like three
Speaker 1: guys that I thought looked good on paper, and I like,
Speaker 1: straight up was like interviewing for this pandemic, Like yo.
Speaker 1: Then the world's about to happen. It's time to settle down.
Speaker 1: And every guy that looked good on paper was like, uh,
Speaker 1: just we're not fun to hang out with. In the pandemic,
Speaker 1: I was like, oh, Ship, I don't even have an
Speaker 1: excuse to get out of hanging out with you. I
Speaker 1: can't say I'm going to work, you know, yeah, I
Speaker 1: have nothing. So my husband, who I was looking at
Speaker 1: as like my fun because he, like on paper, looked
Speaker 1: like shit, like he was like the worst on paper,
Speaker 1: but he was the most fun. So I was like,
Speaker 1: you know what, I'm stuck. The guy that looks like
Speaker 1: Ship on paper is who I am having fun with,
Speaker 1: trapped in the house with, and the guys that looked
Speaker 1: great on paper, I couldn't stand being in a room
Speaker 1: with him for more than three seconds. So I decided, bucket,
Speaker 1: I'm gonna have fun. I'm going to live my best
Speaker 1: porn star life. And you know, uh, within a year
Speaker 1: and a half, I ended up pregnant and married. I said, well,
Speaker 1: the guy who didn't look good on paper for all
Speaker 1: the ladies who always assumed like the guy has to
Speaker 1: have all these things, and it was the best relationship
Speaker 1: I've ever been in and thankfully it was the pandemic.
Speaker 1: And before we got into the pandemic, you know, he
Speaker 1: kept tell me, if he just will give me a chance,
Speaker 1: I could tell you gonna love me, You're gonna like me.
Speaker 1: Stop looking at me like a bag of meat. So yes, pandemic,
Speaker 1: right than pandemic. Well, thank you so much for eating
Speaker 1: uh cinnamon toast crunched with me. It was very nostalgic
Speaker 1: and giving me best. I don't know, I don't know
Speaker 1: what can top it, but this has been amazing. I
Speaker 1: get to tour your whole space. Yes, yes, you know,
Speaker 1: we get to go up up close and personal with you. Oh.
Speaker 1: I did want to share one last thing. So years
Speaker 1: and years ago, when early twenties I had a high
Speaker 1: school magazine, Neo came out. He had the PD record,
Speaker 1: you know he had. He came out right around the
Speaker 1: same time as Chris Brown. I saw Neo. My twin
Speaker 1: called me up. She said, hey, there's these two guys.
Speaker 1: You gotta check them out. They're dope, They're gonna be
Speaker 1: theyre could be huge. And I came off to her
Speaker 1: house and she, you know, she showed me Chris Brown
Speaker 1: and Neo, and I was like, oh, my god, this
Speaker 1: guy Neo and I love Chris Brown to not not gonn,
Speaker 1: but I ain't gonna lie. I was leading towards new
Speaker 1: so I called over to death Jam and you know,
Speaker 1: made arrangements. I got ahold of to Sean and Tango
Speaker 1: and anyways, we ended up setting up an interview and
Speaker 1: I wanted to tell you guys the story because Neo
Speaker 1: doesn't know what I'm about to say about Neo. So
Speaker 1: we were we were behind the scenes. Our company was
Speaker 1: really struggling. We were broke, We were barring cameras just
Speaker 1: to shoot his interview. We were we were dire you
Speaker 1: and we would have high school students do the interview
Speaker 1: with you. It was anyway, one of the guys on
Speaker 1: our team was like, Neo, I love your sneakers. You
Speaker 1: don't remember this. He was like, Neio, I love your sneakers.
Speaker 1: And you were like, well, what size are you? And well,
Speaker 1: you didn't say it corny like that, you like, and
Speaker 1: I think he had the same size sneaker. And we
Speaker 1: were at the hotel right there in Hollywood. I don't
Speaker 1: know the name of it, it's and you literally took
Speaker 1: off your sneakers, handed it to him and walked away
Speaker 1: in your socks and one and made his freaking day.
Speaker 1: And two. I will never ever for get you walking
Speaker 1: away in your socks. And that was my story. That
Speaker 1: was That's who Neo is for. I do not remember that,
Speaker 1: but it does sound like something that I would do,
Speaker 1: especially if I have more shoes. Yeah, yeah, you were like,
Speaker 1: it's okay, it's okay. He's like, you sure you know
Speaker 1: he's walking away the songs you sure you can give you?
Speaker 1: He was like, it's okay, it's okay, I have more.
Speaker 1: I have more. But that's who Neo is for. People
Speaker 1: that don't know and listen to your records and even
Speaker 1: when you're dealing with to Seawan and Tango like I call,
Speaker 1: they answer. I don't know why they listen, and they
Speaker 1: you know, they always helped me out. So shout out
Speaker 1: to your whole team. I hung out here the last
Speaker 1: couple of hours and I enjoyed every minute of it.
Speaker 1: Thank you, Thank you so much for coming on. Eating
Speaker 1: Wild Broke, Eating Wild Broke all right, and exactly Peppe
Speaker 1: for more Eating while Broke from I Heart Radio and
Speaker 1: The Black Effect. Visit the I Heart Radio app, Apple podcast,
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