Speaker 1: What do you do when life doesn't go according to
Speaker 1: plan that moment you lose a job, or a loved one,
Speaker 1: or even a piece of yourself. I'm Brookshields and this
Speaker 1: is now What, a podcast about pivotal moments as told
Speaker 1: by people who lived them. Each week, I sit down
Speaker 1: with a guest to talk about the times they were
Speaker 1: knocked off course and what they did to move forward.
Speaker 1: Some stories are funny, others are cutwrenching, but all are
Speaker 1: unapologetically human and remind us that every success and every
Speaker 1: setback is accompanied by a choice, and that choice answers
Speaker 1: one question. Now, what we met? And it was as
Speaker 1: if I had never had my life without you, And
Speaker 1: I can't explain it, you know, And I remember it
Speaker 1: was like what the parking lot? I think it was,
Speaker 1: It's true, and I remember it was a parking lot.
Speaker 1: You remember that, Yes, of course I remember it. And
Speaker 1: I remember thinking like, oh, let me tell you, okay,
Speaker 1: because I remember it as if it happened yesterday. So
Speaker 1: you didn't. You didn't approach from the front. You snuck
Speaker 1: up from the back and you and you came up
Speaker 1: to me, and you I remember sitting there talking and
Speaker 1: you came up and hugged me from the back, and
Speaker 1: I said, who in the world is this? And I
Speaker 1: turned from my hand. That's exactly right, and I'm thinking
Speaker 1: to myself, what is going on? I turn around and
Speaker 1: broke your right. It was as if we had known
Speaker 1: each other for the last hundred years. You were so
Speaker 1: familiar and so down to earth that we were two
Speaker 1: kids just discovering each other again at the in the sandbox,
Speaker 1: you know what I'm saying. And it was gossip, gossip, gossip, gossip,
Speaker 1: gossip forever. We just picked up on everything. My guest
Speaker 1: today is an icon in the music world. Lionel Ritchie
Speaker 1: is an award winning musician and prolific songwriter. He first
Speaker 1: found success as a member of the Commodours and moved
Speaker 1: almost seamlessly from motown to solo superstardom with a string
Speaker 1: of massive hits, including one of my personal favorites, All
Speaker 1: Night Long. He's a Grammy, Golden Globe and Academy Award winner,
Speaker 1: a multi platinum artist many times over, and a member
Speaker 1: of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. But most importantly,
Speaker 1: this man has been a mentor, a friend, and a
Speaker 1: confidant since I was sixteen years old. He's always been
Speaker 1: there for me and so I was thrilled, although not surprised,
Speaker 1: that he agreed to do the show. So, without further ado,
Speaker 1: here is Lionel Richie. I'm so excited to actually see
Speaker 1: you in person. I've been hearing your sweet voice on
Speaker 1: my own and seeing you on FaceTime sometimes, but I
Speaker 1: miss you. Congratulations to you, and let me just tell
Speaker 1: you something. I love being on this show because we
Speaker 1: get to gossip anyway. So this is all about what
Speaker 1: we do off Mike anyway. So here we are used
Speaker 1: to Where are you right now? I'm in La California
Speaker 1: at my house, which is probably the novelty of life
Speaker 1: because I very seldom here. As you well know, it
Speaker 1: feels like you're always touring. I'm always sure. Yeah, so
Speaker 1: every time you know me, I mean in Europe or
Speaker 1: I'm over in some parts of the country. Now that
Speaker 1: the pandemic is over, I'm touring full time. Now I'm
Speaker 1: around the world. Really, Yeah, how do you two love it?
Speaker 1: Is it different now at the stage in your career
Speaker 1: than it was in your twenties or your thirties. Well,
Speaker 1: I can answer that question for you very simply. No,
Speaker 1: it's not any different in terms of the enthusiasm. What's
Speaker 1: really different is now instead of doing three shows or
Speaker 1: four shows in a row, we do two shows in
Speaker 1: a road. Take a break, two shows in a row,
Speaker 1: take a break, Otherwise you'll burn yourself out completely. But
Speaker 1: as far as the crowds are concern Brooke, they are
Speaker 1: still showing up. Oh my god, Well, I mean, I
Speaker 1: want you question it. Why why not? You're brilliant and
Speaker 1: your heart is so beautiful, and I feel like you
Speaker 1: epitomize music and you've been an icon in the music
Speaker 1: industry for so long. But I honestly think it's because
Speaker 1: of the passion that you've had from music ever since
Speaker 1: you were a little bitty kid. And I would love
Speaker 1: to talk about just a little bit about some of
Speaker 1: those memories of little little baby Lionel. Oh my god,
Speaker 1: loving music. I would love that's It's very interesting. I
Speaker 1: grew up on a university campus. I grew up onto
Speaker 1: in Alabama, in Alabama, Tuskegee University. And when I say
Speaker 1: grew up on the campus, literally on the campus of
Speaker 1: the university. And so my mother was an elementary school teacher,
Speaker 1: and my grandmother was a music instructor and also one
Speaker 1: of the people up there on the campus. And my
Speaker 1: father was of course in the military at that time,
Speaker 1: because we had two divisions, the arm in the Air Force.
Speaker 1: Tuskegee Airmen were the Air Force, and the Army was
Speaker 1: of course the base on the campus. So I'm basically
Speaker 1: in a full time military base with a university campus.
Speaker 1: I'll put it. Got it, okay. And what made it
Speaker 1: so interesting was it was in the South, so gospel
Speaker 1: music guaranteed, the gospel choir on the campus guaranteed. Country
Speaker 1: music was all on the airways because that was pop
Speaker 1: music back then. And then the blues and R and
Speaker 1: B was all around us. And a little twist in
Speaker 1: my life was my grandmother was a classical pianist, and
Speaker 1: so right in the middle of all of this blues
Speaker 1: and R and B and gospel and country, I would
Speaker 1: wake up every morning hear my grandmother played back and Beethoven,
Speaker 1: and all of a sudden, it just became part of
Speaker 1: the flow of the sound of the house. So I
Speaker 1: was in this little melting pot surrounded so it was
Speaker 1: just it was very interesting. I didn't realize I was
Speaker 1: going to be a writer, and then as I started writing,
Speaker 1: I realized all of those, those influences started coming out. No,
Speaker 1: do you remember when you wrote your first song? Well,
Speaker 1: I do, I do it. I am a little kid.
Speaker 1: I was a little kid. It was called House of Clay.
Speaker 1: That's funny you would ask that question. And I never
Speaker 1: put it out. I never recorded it. But I just
Speaker 1: thought I had written. You would have thought I would
Speaker 1: have written the Star Spangled Banning. I'm walking around the
Speaker 1: house and my little house of Clay and they can't say,
Speaker 1: Lionel Junior, please stopped humming that song. But I was
Speaker 1: just somebody gave me a tape recorder and that was
Speaker 1: the big the reel to reel at that time. Was
Speaker 1: it a love story or was it just a love story?
Speaker 1: To the House of Clay. It was love story. It
Speaker 1: was the love story was in the House of Clay,
Speaker 1: in our little house of Clay. Oh my god. So
Speaker 1: you've been writing love songs to since day one is
Speaker 1: about maybe six or seven, not knowing it for anybody. No,
Speaker 1: it was basically for myself. I mean, you have to
Speaker 1: understand it was. It was no, there was nothing happening
Speaker 1: at that time. Where is there a line you remember
Speaker 1: from it or some words or yeah, in our little
Speaker 1: house of clay. It was in our little house of clay,
Speaker 1: things can be so beautiful in our little house of clay.
Speaker 1: That's good. Oh, I love it, Okay, So if I
Speaker 1: had to write an essay on it, I would talk
Speaker 1: about sort of molding your home to protect those in it.
Speaker 1: You're having it be safe but crafted and warm, and
Speaker 1: it was. It was. It was also very comforting. I
Speaker 1: think the thing was you could tell, probably at that
Speaker 1: stage of my life, that I was safe, you know,
Speaker 1: it felt safe. And so to write a song like
Speaker 1: house of Clay, in our little house of clay, it was.
Speaker 1: It was a very safe spot in my head, in
Speaker 1: my heart, and so I kind of look back on
Speaker 1: it now. You would bring that up. I just I'm
Speaker 1: just thinking about it now for the first time. But
Speaker 1: of course you would, really, But it was just one
Speaker 1: of those moments in my life where because sometimes childhood
Speaker 1: can be a little traumatizing as as you well know,
Speaker 1: as when you grow up. It's it's one of those
Speaker 1: things where things that you think are wonderful are not
Speaker 1: exactly the greatest things in the world. I think I
Speaker 1: used that song as my place to go, well, you know,
Speaker 1: when you when you grow When you grow up as
Speaker 1: a kid, you know, kids can be you know, if
Speaker 1: you don't play baseball, you know, they bully you, you know,
Speaker 1: so you retreat into this place where you feel safe.
Speaker 1: So I think now that you kind of brought that up,
Speaker 1: I kind of probably use that little metaphor the House
Speaker 1: of Clay as a place I could go inside in
Speaker 1: my head, because member, now I'm on a you're on
Speaker 1: a university campus, and when you're growing up. I had
Speaker 1: a great childhood. It's just the part was where you
Speaker 1: go to hide some days. So this is the sixties
Speaker 1: in Alabama. Sixties in Alabama, which I mean already that
Speaker 1: brings up a lot, that brings up everything. And but
Speaker 1: the funny thing about it, we were on a university campus,
Speaker 1: all black university campus, so everything was safe. In other words,
Speaker 1: we didn't know as kids that what was happening outside
Speaker 1: fifteen miles away, twenty miles away from Tuskegee was the
Speaker 1: civil rights movement. And you know, you know, Martin Luther
Speaker 1: King is right down the street, and and the entire
Speaker 1: bus boycott, all this is happening right down the street.
Speaker 1: But yet our the little cocoon, if we called it,
Speaker 1: the bubble. You know, we felt safe in this environment
Speaker 1: on the on the campus as kids. And when did
Speaker 1: you start realizing that there was this other, more hostile
Speaker 1: world right outside your bubble that your parents created. I
Speaker 1: would say probably in my middle of my seventh eighth
Speaker 1: grade year. It's funny how life happens. You know, it
Speaker 1: was happening right in Montgomery, Alabama. It was happening right
Speaker 1: there in Selma, Alabama, exactly what twenty miles away, thirty
Speaker 1: miles away, and yet it had to go to Walter
Speaker 1: Cronkite in New York City and then I see it
Speaker 1: on the evening news, what's happening right down the street
Speaker 1: from where I lived. But as time went on, we
Speaker 1: became really aware. As beginning high school kids, we knew
Speaker 1: what was going on clearly because at that particular point
Speaker 1: we were starting to integrate the schools downtown in Tuskegee,
Speaker 1: and that was the whole beginning of the awareness. Did
Speaker 1: your parents talk to you about it? Did you Did
Speaker 1: they sit you down at all? And yeah, yeah, I
Speaker 1: mean they set us down, But we didn't have the
Speaker 1: problem that we have today, which is the day you
Speaker 1: have to have a dialogue with your your your sons
Speaker 1: and daughters black kids, to tell them how to navigate
Speaker 1: the police and how to navigate confrontation, because it's it's
Speaker 1: really every day in your face everywhere in the world.
Speaker 1: Here in Alabama, it was one of those at that
Speaker 1: particular time. It was just basically we didn't have to
Speaker 1: worry about leaving home because if we left home, our
Speaker 1: parents were with us up until up until, you know,
Speaker 1: high school, so we didn't really have that conversation of
Speaker 1: survival is just come home and home met just down
Speaker 1: the street and that's it and safe and safe. So
Speaker 1: when when do you you here your talking about that
Speaker 1: and then you grow up in a little bit more
Speaker 1: and it's nineteen sixty eight is when you join Commodore.
Speaker 1: We were freshmen on the university campus. How fabulous was
Speaker 1: this if we weren't the Commodore as yet? But it
Speaker 1: was a nice freshman group of guys who thought we
Speaker 1: were going to take over the world and kill the
Speaker 1: campus with our incredible music. Not realized the world. I mean, Brooke,
Speaker 1: if I had any idea that that little freshman talent
Speaker 1: show was going to morph into a career. What happened
Speaker 1: to me on that particular day when we had the
Speaker 1: freshman talent show on the campus changed my life forever,
Speaker 1: which was I was too slow to run track, I
Speaker 1: was too short to play basketball, I was too small
Speaker 1: to play football. The only sport I could play was tennis.
Speaker 1: And no girls hung around the tennis court while you're
Speaker 1: playing tennis. So all of a sudden, I walk out
Speaker 1: on the stage at the freshman talent show and the
Speaker 1: girls started screaming, and I said, Okay, I don't know
Speaker 1: what this business is, but I'm in it. That's all
Speaker 1: I want. And they've been screaming ever since. Hallelujah. Well
Speaker 1: that's why. That's why all you have to do. Would say,
Speaker 1: is it me? You're looking for it, and people that's it?
Speaker 1: I mean, honestly, well, it just you played right into it.
Speaker 1: I've been a sucker for it ever since. I tell you.
Speaker 1: I read somewhere that you told your daughter, I think
Speaker 1: it was Sophia, I wish you lots of failure young,
Speaker 1: and I found I found that very interesting because I
Speaker 1: think that's an important lesson. Were there any pivotal failures
Speaker 1: from your youth or your life that made a impact.
Speaker 1: That's a very good question, and the answer is I
Speaker 1: didn't realize what success was because I kept failing all
Speaker 1: the time. You know the words. I guess I just
Speaker 1: thought that failing that was there going to be the story,
Speaker 1: because I mean, first of all, think about it, I
Speaker 1: grew up on an academic campus. Was I very fond
Speaker 1: of academics? Absolutely not? How are my grades in math terrible?
Speaker 1: Do I remember texts to the point where I can
Speaker 1: regurgitate the text in five seconds? No? I didn't know
Speaker 1: what a d D was or ADHD. Didn't know what hyperactive? Well,
Speaker 1: we didn't know what it was then, yeah, well we'll
Speaker 1: see they knew what it was. It was called this
Speaker 1: guy has a problem. This kid has a problem. So
Speaker 1: back in my day, it was never comfanying to have it.
Speaker 1: It was always always we're trying to figure out line
Speaker 1: or slow him down. But I didn't realize that was
Speaker 1: a real positive if you know what it was and
Speaker 1: how to navigate it. As time went on, I realized
Speaker 1: that those moments of failure. When I say failure, I
Speaker 1: mean I wasn't at the top of the class. I'm
Speaker 1: getting to the music business with the commodorees, and I realized,
Speaker 1: how do you learn how to be on stage. You
Speaker 1: have to walk on stage. You know, there's only one way.
Speaker 1: You could take all the courses. You can take all
Speaker 1: the music you want to, but the bottom line is,
Speaker 1: if you want to be a performer, you have to
Speaker 1: go on stage. What happens on stage? Trial and error?
Speaker 1: Yes you can sing, but can't you sing while the
Speaker 1: fight's going on over in the in the bar? You know?
Speaker 1: One is there one sort of moment that performance that
Speaker 1: stood out for you where we really got that trial
Speaker 1: and it aired on error? Yeah, it was error on error.
Speaker 1: And the point was I do remember one night we
Speaker 1: were playing and right in the middle of the show,
Speaker 1: the lady walks on stage. Now remember that this is
Speaker 1: not Madison Square Gardens. This is a club. This is
Speaker 1: a club. Okay, So a lady walks on to lady
Speaker 1: walks on stage, and I have the microphone, and how
Speaker 1: do you deal with someone who wants to talk in
Speaker 1: the microphone with you when it's your show while you're
Speaker 1: trying to sing. And so that's a moment, that's a
Speaker 1: teachable moment. And I remember sitting there trying to sing
Speaker 1: the song and she's trying to talk, and what I
Speaker 1: should have done? Now, I should have dealt with it
Speaker 1: a different way. But at the time my frozen said, so,
Speaker 1: like an idiot, what did I do? I gave her
Speaker 1: the microphone? Oh gosh, And you know the answer to that,
Speaker 1: Oh no, I mean, you know it's like, now you'd
Speaker 1: probably I mean, if it was not a security breach,
Speaker 1: which to me that's already sounds like a nightmare in security.
Speaker 1: But I could see you then singing the song to her. Yeah,
Speaker 1: in a way, I'm like, I'm figuring that out and
Speaker 1: then everybody you know, so there's there's ways to do it.
Speaker 1: But I mean, that's just a moment. You cannot scare
Speaker 1: me now. In life, you cannot. I mean, every imaginable
Speaker 1: thing that's probably happened. But trial and arab were going
Speaker 1: back to your question, trial and error is the key
Speaker 1: to getting really good. People don't hear about that. They
Speaker 1: don't hear about the failures or the errors. Yeah, I mean,
Speaker 1: I'd love to tell you that every song I've written
Speaker 1: over the years was a hit. That's not true. You
Speaker 1: have to how many songs did I throw away or
Speaker 1: how many ideas that you throw away to kind of
Speaker 1: capture that one little jewel that's really stand out and
Speaker 1: so you know, you try it, you try it, you
Speaker 1: put it together, you try you take it apart. It
Speaker 1: took me longer to write All Night Long than any
Speaker 1: other song because it had so many different parts to it.
Speaker 1: I couldn't figure out where's the ending of this song.
Speaker 1: It just kept shifts in the middle. It goes on
Speaker 1: and there's three hoods, another shift, and then Tom Beliethy
Speaker 1: said no more yards over here, and then All Night
Speaker 1: longs over here. Then Jambo Jambo's back over here. Karamu
Speaker 1: fiesta for whatever. I've got so many parts. What do
Speaker 1: I do with all these parts? It could either be
Speaker 1: a grand disaster or it could be a great thing.
Speaker 1: You know, you have to really embrace failure, if you
Speaker 1: if you approach something from fear, then you're halfway doing it.
Speaker 1: You know, just kind of lean into it. If you're
Speaker 1: gonna do it, do it well, and then you just
Speaker 1: if it doesn't work out, I mean, you know, then
Speaker 1: you just move on and you try something else. You know,
Speaker 1: if this doesn't work out, then you try another one.
Speaker 1: You know, but you always talk. You always sort of
Speaker 1: bring it back to the people who are in your
Speaker 1: personal life who sort of grounded you through all whether
Speaker 1: I mean you started talking up about that with the tour,
Speaker 1: and through I imagine successes and failures, you still have
Speaker 1: that base to go back to. And what I find
Speaker 1: especially interesting is that you got married early. Your first
Speaker 1: marriage was to college sweetheart. College sweetheart. Yes, I was
Speaker 1: basically a senior and she at that point was basically
Speaker 1: a sophomore. And we met each other there. But at
Speaker 1: that point we went on after she graduated. I'm now
Speaker 1: in the commodorees full time, so it was maybe four
Speaker 1: to five years after we met you got married and
Speaker 1: we got married. Yeah, And was she living with you
Speaker 1: in Hollywood? Oh yeah, Oh no, definitely, we moved out
Speaker 1: right after well, let me put out this for the Commodore's, No,
Speaker 1: for the commadoors. We were in Alabama full time. And
Speaker 1: then after Kenny Rogers, this is well into my commodore
Speaker 1: commodore career. Where now Kenny Rogers is when I moved
Speaker 1: into Hollywood, California. And that was the AHA moment in
Speaker 1: my life when I realized, this is not Kansas anymore.
Speaker 1: We are not in Kansas, you know what I'm saying.
Speaker 1: It was one of those woe yeah, and the forces
Speaker 1: against you, you know, it's just stacked against you at
Speaker 1: that point, because it's like it's like no other place
Speaker 1: I've ever been to before, because I couldn't get one
Speaker 1: person degree on the same philosophy three blocks away. And
Speaker 1: did that affect your relationship? Well? Always, I mean you
Speaker 1: don't know that, you know because you figure, you figure
Speaker 1: it's remember that you're born and raised in a small town.
Speaker 1: The funny thing about it, in my small town of Tuskegee,
Speaker 1: I'll give you a statistic, no one in my entire
Speaker 1: community ever got a divorce. Oh you understand, all right.
Speaker 1: So now here we are in Hollywood, California, and you think,
Speaker 1: you know Hollywood is like Alabama, you know it's nobody. No,
Speaker 1: it's not. It's not a nurturing place. Let me put
Speaker 1: it that way, married or not married, married or not married,
Speaker 1: it's not a nurturing place. It's not a place where
Speaker 1: you feel safe to say. You know. What I loved
Speaker 1: about Tuskegee was the whole town had the same philosophy.
Speaker 1: That's number one. Number two. I didn't have to hide
Speaker 1: from my mom and dad. I had to hide from
Speaker 1: the whole town. If I was sneaking, you follow me.
Speaker 1: So the whole town raised me. Here in Hollywood, California.
Speaker 1: All you have to do is cross the street. You
Speaker 1: don't have to go out of your neighborhood. And it's
Speaker 1: a different philosophy every day. Meanwhile, what was happening the
Speaker 1: most was you still trying to discover the new you
Speaker 1: or me in this case, you know, I mean I
Speaker 1: was a commodore. I didn't know anything about solo life,
Speaker 1: solo career, and so all of this is happening just
Speaker 1: about the time I'm meeting you. So you had been
Speaker 1: married about fifteen years and you had the one that
Speaker 1: col that was that was that was a bright light.
Speaker 1: I mean, you have to understand that that was one
Speaker 1: of those things that little angel comes along at the
Speaker 1: right time and kind of solidifies your life. That was
Speaker 1: one of those things that happened. I wasn't you know
Speaker 1: in life there's surprises that makes the difference. That was
Speaker 1: a wonderful surprise that came along. And I love her
Speaker 1: to death, oh, I mean I know, and she loves
Speaker 1: you so much, and she just came into your life
Speaker 1: and it changed well, I tell you what it did.
Speaker 1: It kind of get It gave me an anchor when
Speaker 1: I say an anchor in a good way. You know
Speaker 1: when we use the word grounding, you know, every once
Speaker 1: in a while, and you know, this business, it's so
Speaker 1: much about me, me, me, I, I my mind that
Speaker 1: when you find a little face that comes along and
Speaker 1: you realize, okay, now there's a person right here that
Speaker 1: needs my assistance, it's called my kid. And from that
Speaker 1: point on, you know, I kind of enjoyed watching her
Speaker 1: stumble and grow, and because she came in with a
Speaker 1: lot of stuff at the time, but it was one
Speaker 1: of those things where I really felt connected to her
Speaker 1: to kind of no matter what was craziness was happening
Speaker 1: in my life and in my ex wife's life. You know,
Speaker 1: we wanted to make a commitment to make sure that
Speaker 1: her life was solid. And what was your experience like
Speaker 1: co parenting that was? Wow? Well, um, I'll put it
Speaker 1: like this. The PTA meetings that we had in Alabama
Speaker 1: were not the same PTA piece we had Hollywood, California.
Speaker 1: Those were some different kind of parents altogether. But again,
Speaker 1: co parenting was one of the agreements that we had.
Speaker 1: It was it was difficult, but but the co parenting
Speaker 1: part was easy because we both agreed that we loved
Speaker 1: her she is. That's that's the story. I mean, I
Speaker 1: could you have to know Brook, It's it's this business
Speaker 1: is like strange, but at the same time, you can
Speaker 1: survive it. But it's going to take an effort. It's
Speaker 1: not going to be an easy ride. And that that's
Speaker 1: not only for the artist, but it's also for the kids,
Speaker 1: the kids, the parents, the grandparents. Everyone's going to go
Speaker 1: through the Canada, you know, shout through the Canadas. It's tough.
Speaker 1: I'd love to switch a little to your solo career
Speaker 1: because that's I mean, we met around the time that
Speaker 1: you decided to to go solo, and um, you recorded
Speaker 1: Endless Love. I remember I told you that story, right.
Speaker 1: The producers wanted me to sing it as this little girl,
Speaker 1: and so I was going to sing it with you
Speaker 1: and was all ready and then this Diana, somebody some
Speaker 1: come up and coming right now, some lady come up
Speaker 1: and coming in. Yes, and the business. Yes, my mother comes.
Speaker 1: My mother said, honey, Um, you know that song you
Speaker 1: were supposed to sing for the for the studio. You're
Speaker 1: not gonna sing it anymore. I was like, you're kidding.
Speaker 1: It was I couldn't believe it. Um, but you had
Speaker 1: been with the Commodorees by that point for about fourteen years.
Speaker 1: What made you finally decide that you could or would
Speaker 1: or wanted to go out on your own? You know what?
Speaker 1: Didn't want to go on my own, had no I wouldn't.
Speaker 1: I know that sounds like a shot. Wasn't going that route.
Speaker 1: It just I was writing my behind off. And when
Speaker 1: I say that, I mean in a good way. I
Speaker 1: loved writing. And so here's Kenny Rodgers and so and so,
Speaker 1: and I've got around in this love. And of course
Speaker 1: they kind of backed me into in this love because
Speaker 1: how it came to me was we need an instrumental.
Speaker 1: And I said, oh, okay, okay, that's fine, And so
Speaker 1: I hummed this little bab ba song bah blah blah
Speaker 1: blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah
Speaker 1: blah blah. It just came to you, and you and
Speaker 1: I Bob bought it, and they said okay. And they
Speaker 1: came back to me and said, okay, can we do
Speaker 1: the bah bah? Next thing? I know that came to me.
Speaker 1: Next thing, I knew at that point we're gonna have
Speaker 1: her sing the first verse to the person in the room.
Speaker 1: Could you write us a first verse? Okay, my love,
Speaker 1: this is only you in my life, the only thing
Speaker 1: that's right. But first you have a breath that I take.
Speaker 1: You have a step I make good, Lila. We've decided
Speaker 1: to make that extended now and make it a full song.
Speaker 1: Could you write the lyrics? And we're gonna make it
Speaker 1: a duet? Wow? Okay, who would you like to have
Speaker 1: to do it? And I'm thinking to myself, I'm doing
Speaker 1: Kenny Rogers, I'm doing the Commodorees at night, Kenny Ross
Speaker 1: in the day. I don't have any time in between
Speaker 1: to do this. All it was supposed to be was
Speaker 1: a simple instrumental and now here I am with Diana Ross.
Speaker 1: And but I tell you this took a life of
Speaker 1: its own. I mean, it came on and the rest
Speaker 1: is magical history. I must tell you, because us Diana,
Speaker 1: just the combination about voices came together. Forget about it.
Speaker 1: It was I mean, it was, it was happening. I
Speaker 1: mean I just remember, you know, being so mesmerized by
Speaker 1: it and being feeling so lucky that I was on
Speaker 1: I got to be on the cover of the album
Speaker 1: for the song, and I sort of thought, oh god.
Speaker 1: You know, I remember thinking, oh my god, I can't
Speaker 1: believe that I'm on the cover of the album. It's
Speaker 1: so funny, Brooke, because I mean, you've been a part
Speaker 1: of my life, even though because you were so young,
Speaker 1: you you, your face, your image, your being has been
Speaker 1: so much a part of my life that of course
Speaker 1: I thought it was just so natural for you to
Speaker 1: be on the cover. It was like one of those things.
Speaker 1: And I'm thinking to myself, great way to sell a record,
Speaker 1: put Brooke on the front cover. And we haven't hit record,
Speaker 1: you know what I'm saying. But I mean, it's it's
Speaker 1: funny how we just paralleled all the way down through
Speaker 1: our careers and just start our emotion and our lives.
Speaker 1: And I always have really phoned you out of the
Speaker 1: blue for just the most emotional moments in my life.
Speaker 1: And and that's a relationship I will always cherish. If
Speaker 1: you look back on your life, is there a certain
Speaker 1: decade that that really stands out to you where you
Speaker 1: experienced just the most growth? Yes, yes, well, well that's interesting. Um,
Speaker 1: believe it or not. People think it was the eighties,
Speaker 1: but it was it was. It was the seventies. I
Speaker 1: have to tell you something for me, getting me to
Speaker 1: not be frozen on stage and to go out on
Speaker 1: stage with confidence and say give me the microphone, give
Speaker 1: me that mike, give me that mike. You know, I
Speaker 1: mean with because I was this shy kid. So my
Speaker 1: most growth was to go from a kid who was
Speaker 1: just in the wings of a stage let alone out
Speaker 1: on stage, to now to be a front man for
Speaker 1: a band. Oh my god, this is like night and day.
Speaker 1: Did you have stage fighter? I was terrified, you know,
Speaker 1: because it was I had no ego, so you know
Speaker 1: it was I wanted to be in this bay. I
Speaker 1: don't have it. You're exactly right. I didn't have that
Speaker 1: jock mentality like you know, give me the ball coach.
Speaker 1: You know. I wasn't that guy. I would always come
Speaker 1: off stage and they even to this day, they'll say
Speaker 1: to me, great show, Lionel, and little voice inside of
Speaker 1: my head will go, really, you know, it's still it's
Speaker 1: still there. It's it saved me. I think Brooke for
Speaker 1: the longest part, I think that lack of real I mean,
Speaker 1: don't get me wrong, ego was there when I'm stepping
Speaker 1: in the studio, but when it came to actually having
Speaker 1: something to work. It was really almost a surprise to
Speaker 1: me as everybody else. Holy cow, that that records to
Speaker 1: hit record, you know, and was there did you find
Speaker 1: freedom though? When you finally got that sort of that
Speaker 1: different kinds of confidence to sort of in that solo career?
Speaker 1: Did you find the freedom minute in the commodore career
Speaker 1: and in the solo career it was it was probably
Speaker 1: at that particular point in life when you find that
Speaker 1: you know how to do what you know how to do,
Speaker 1: it's yours. In other words, you know, no one does
Speaker 1: that like you do that, and that's a hard thing.
Speaker 1: I mean, that's like to get there, to really be
Speaker 1: able to do that and not compare yourself to other people.
Speaker 1: Best time ever in my life, I must tell you,
Speaker 1: because at that particular stage, I didn't have to study Keats.
Speaker 1: I didn't have to study you know, you know, you
Speaker 1: don't have to go back. Just all you have to
Speaker 1: do is just go it. Go Lionel, what are you
Speaker 1: thinking about? And you go, I'll be right back, you know.
Speaker 1: Probably you know, I didn't have to pass an exam,
Speaker 1: you know, And it was that wonderful moment when I
Speaker 1: just said, Okay, I think I've got this, you know,
Speaker 1: because that was really the beautiful part of my life.
Speaker 1: That's wonderful, and I'm sure you'll have more of those.
Speaker 1: I call the show now What because it's I'm always
Speaker 1: interested in in when the unexpected happens, and you know,
Speaker 1: you ask yourself, now, what do I do? And what
Speaker 1: would you say? Or now what moment has been? I
Speaker 1: think that I'd like to look at my career. I'd
Speaker 1: like to look at my life as a calling card.
Speaker 1: It's a it's a what do I What do I
Speaker 1: do with all of this recognition? What do I do
Speaker 1: with all these songs? What do I do now for
Speaker 1: the rest of my life? You know? I love walking
Speaker 1: out on stage and the entire world sings with me,
Speaker 1: they laugh with me, they cry in front of me.
Speaker 1: They've lived a life with me. I've gotten now with
Speaker 1: American Idol, this new group of nine to seven year
Speaker 1: olds going, that's Lionel, you know, So what do I
Speaker 1: do now with all of this? And I think at
Speaker 1: this point it's a teachable moment now for me because
Speaker 1: I love helping people to understand life is hard. When
Speaker 1: these kids come on that show, they gave me the
Speaker 1: kind of essence of what the world is. So my
Speaker 1: job now is motivating. How can you motivate? I travel
Speaker 1: around the world. I've got fans, they've been divorced, they've
Speaker 1: been broken, they've been you know, every possible thing, and
Speaker 1: here they are on watching me. And so now I'm
Speaker 1: taking the opportunity now to form different organizations around the world.
Speaker 1: I'm involved with King Charles, the Prince's Trust. I'm chairman
Speaker 1: of the board of Trust. We're both the same age,
Speaker 1: and we both have the same mission of how do
Speaker 1: we touch as many people as we can around the world,
Speaker 1: and so that became something really endearing to both of us.
Speaker 1: So we're working with that together. So we're in every
Speaker 1: country in the world now. So give me, give me
Speaker 1: an forty years broken, I'll have it all worked out. Okay, Well,
Speaker 1: I hope you keep having those now what moments? And
Speaker 1: I think that this is another one, and it's it's
Speaker 1: stemming from a really beautiful place and with an even
Speaker 1: more open heart, which I didn't think was possible. But
Speaker 1: you keep doing it feels like it just keeps getting
Speaker 1: bigger and bigger. And thank you so much for spending
Speaker 1: this time with me. I love I love this format
Speaker 1: of now we can. We can just meet on your
Speaker 1: podcast every two weeks or whatever you want to. I
Speaker 1: am here and I'm ready for you. Anytime you want,
Speaker 1: you need something from me, or you want me to
Speaker 1: talk about something. We got it. I will, I would
Speaker 1: gladly do it. Well. You will hear from me off
Speaker 1: and on for the rest of your life, so don't
Speaker 1: worry about it. Perfect. That was the incredible Lionel Richie.
Speaker 1: If you want to hear more from him, head over
Speaker 1: to Lionel Richie dot com to get tickets for his
Speaker 1: latest tour. That is it for us today, Talk to
Speaker 1: you next week now. What with Brookshields is a production
Speaker 1: of iHeartRadio. Our lead producer and wonderful showrunner is Julia Weaver.
Speaker 1: Additional research and editing by Darby Masters and Abou Zafar.
Speaker 1: Our executive producer is Christina Everett. The show is mixed
Speaker 1: by Bahed Fraser.