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Speaker 1: Quest Love Supreme is a production of iHeartRadio. We've been waiting, ladies,

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Speaker 1: jump and welcome to another episode, a special episode of

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Speaker 1: Quests Love Supreme. We've been waiting for this. We've been

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Speaker 1: waiting for this. You know what, Steve, I'm actually more

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Speaker 1: excited for the twelve year old version of you right now.

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Speaker 2: Yes, I am super excited to talk to this man

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Speaker 2: and thank him. For everybody who's never had a bar

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Speaker 2: mitzvah before. This is going to be amazing.

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Speaker 1: This this is my Christmas gift to you, man. This

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Speaker 1: this is my Shaka Khan gift to you. I got

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Speaker 1: you the king of all bar mitzvahs exactly.

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Speaker 3: Never heard that title, but I'll accept that one. Oh

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Speaker 3: so talk about it.

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Speaker 1: That's great, all right. I just treat this like a movie.

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Speaker 1: Even before I introduce what this show is, I just

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Speaker 1: have to ask our guests, who I've not introduced yet,

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Speaker 1: do you know the true story of how the song

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Speaker 1: Celebration got written? Has Ronald Bill will tell you the

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Speaker 1: story of how it inspired him.

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Speaker 4: Not totally, but I have my own version of it

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Speaker 4: when I'm.

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Speaker 3: Through the experience. Okay, so maybe I need to hear this.

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Speaker 1: I'm under the impression based on Okay, so I used

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Speaker 1: to Oh, God, ladies and gentlemen, this quest. I love

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Speaker 1: a quest, Love Supreme. Of course, I'm here with Sugar,

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Speaker 1: Steven and our guest today. I don't even want to

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Speaker 1: waste long arduous introduction because you know my introduction is

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Speaker 1: will be nineteen minutes. I'm sitting here with the God,

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Speaker 1: the King of All bar Misvas, the God, the most

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Speaker 1: velvet voice, Yo, Supreme, Jesus Christ like mind, Nat King,

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Speaker 1: Cole the Voice James J. T. Taylor, formerly of Cool

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Speaker 1: in the Game.

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Speaker 3: Thank you all right.

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Speaker 1: So here's the deal. And I believe I might have

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Speaker 1: told this on on Robert's story as well, but at

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Speaker 1: the time when I invited Ronald Brother Beyon Colise Beyond.

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Speaker 1: Back when I was teaching at NYU with Harry Wider,

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Speaker 1: we once had brother Ronald Bell, saxophonist, primary songwriter of

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Speaker 1: Cool in a Gang, and he told us the story

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Speaker 1: of how he wrote Celebrations, so basically riding high off

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Speaker 1: the third wave of what the band is about the experience.

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Speaker 1: Of course, if you're fans of the band, you know

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Speaker 1: they came to it with a lot of jazz soul.

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Speaker 1: More on jazz, A lot of tribe called Quest Samples

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Speaker 1: came from that wave, and then in seventy four a

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Speaker 1: joke sort of mocking soul Makosa winds up being like

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Speaker 1: one of the most pivotal funk songs of the seventies.

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Speaker 1: So they had a seventies wave and then doing a

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Speaker 1: disco of course open Sesame on the Saturday Night Fever

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Speaker 1: soundtrack that was kind of their third wave. And now

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Speaker 1: they're about to start the hit making wave, and of course,

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Speaker 1: fresh off the success of their Ladies' Night single and

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Speaker 1: the subsequent album of that same name, they're on tour

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Speaker 1: and they happen to be in the Bay Area, and

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Speaker 1: I believe that they arrived in town the day before

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Speaker 1: on a Friday, to do some local record stores and signings,

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Speaker 1: because now you know, the heat is back on. The

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Speaker 1: Heat's back, yeah, And brother Ronald tells me that the

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Speaker 1: promoter who's bringing you guys to the particular venue, playhouse

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Speaker 1: in the Bay Area, has another show happening that night

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Speaker 1: and would he like to attend. Would you guys like

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Speaker 1: at ten? And that is when the Prince and Rick

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Speaker 1: James show come to this venue. And what winds up

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Speaker 1: happening is Prince goes on first, and at this moment,

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Speaker 1: Prince has the number one song in the country on

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Speaker 1: the Soul charts without Want to Be a Lover, right,

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Speaker 1: and Ronald says that he really wasn't all that familiar

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Speaker 1: with Prince, like he heard about him, but he really

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Speaker 1: didn't pay attention and he definitely wasn't familiar with the song. However,

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Speaker 1: he was highly impressed at how within two seconds everybody

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Speaker 1: just screamed and lost their minds. It wasn't just like,

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Speaker 1: you know, like everyone right, it could have been okay.

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Speaker 1: So he's more impressed with that. So that sort of

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Speaker 1: brings out the antennas in his brain is like, YO,

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Speaker 1: pay attention to the song for that. So he's just

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Speaker 1: pay attention to the song. And Prince finishes, is set

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Speaker 1: and it's like a twenty minut and it change over

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Speaker 1: for Rick James, and Ronald asked the promoter, YO, run

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Speaker 1: me backstays real quick to one of them dressing rooms

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Speaker 1: as a piano in it, and there was a spare

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Speaker 1: room and Ronald sits at the table and he starts

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Speaker 1: notating what he thought he just heard Prince do, which is,

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Speaker 1: I want to be a lover. He writes those chorus

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Speaker 1: down and he stares at this course and as most

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Speaker 1: songwriters do. Another way to get to sort of squeeze

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Speaker 1: juice from a used fruit is you figure out different

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Speaker 1: ways to flip a song, rewrite it again. People do

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Speaker 1: it all the.

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Speaker 3: Time, like all the time.

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Speaker 1: Fleetwood Mac famously on their Real It still says Spinner's

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Speaker 1: idea number two. Their favorite song was I'll Be Around,

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Speaker 1: and thus they made dreams on rumors I'll be around.

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Speaker 1: So anyway, he's looking at the notes and suddenly he's like, yo,

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Speaker 1: let me play this backwards now.

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Speaker 3: N then.

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Speaker 1: Backwards is then? So he notates, He notates the music

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Speaker 1: and he's like, all right, I got the idea. I'm

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Speaker 1: gonna go rock to watch Rick's James I believe when

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Speaker 1: you guys got finished the tour. It's like three weeks

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Speaker 1: later and he's gonna either demo or submit the ideas

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Speaker 1: to you guys. But he's like, wait, I gotta make

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Speaker 1: this complete song. Only got a groove. I want to

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Speaker 1: do a complete song. And at a bridge to it,

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Speaker 1: and he was running. He didn't have any nothing that

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Speaker 1: was coming to mind. He looks on the table on

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Speaker 1: top of the piano and there is a cash box

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Speaker 1: magazine and he opens up the charts. He goes right

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Speaker 1: to the pop charts and looks for the highest charting

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Speaker 1: Black song. So this particular issue, Rock with You by

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Speaker 1: Michael Jackson was number five. He knew Rock with You

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Speaker 1: well and when he wrote the bridge for it, due

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Speaker 1: It's Time to Come Together. It's the same chords as girl,

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Speaker 1: close your eyes, let this rhythm get into you. Every

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Speaker 1: one around, come on, come on that That to me

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Speaker 1: was one of the most genius stories I've ever heard

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Speaker 1: of a song being constructed.

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Speaker 3: Well, he was. He was always like that.

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Speaker 4: He was I called him to feel this leader, you know,

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Speaker 4: because he would do things like that, and sometimes we

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Speaker 4: would just hear it. We said, where did that come from?

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Speaker 4: And we just you know, to ourselves, and sometimes he would,

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Speaker 4: you know, regurgitate why he did it or why I came.

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Speaker 4: But my understanding was that when it was there, you know,

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Speaker 4: because when people bring all everybody would bring things in

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Speaker 4: all the time, ideas everything, you know, little lyrics here

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Speaker 4: are guitar player, a guitar part here, And it was

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Speaker 4: more of a celebration of the resurrection like Ladies' Night

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Speaker 4: came out big record, and nobody knew it was cool

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Speaker 4: in the gang because they heard.

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Speaker 3: Me, you know.

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Speaker 4: But we said, well, how we're going to follow that up?

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Speaker 4: So if you listen to Ladies Night, come on, let's

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Speaker 4: all celebrate. It was already preordained that we were going

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Speaker 4: to do celebration. Now, I don't know if that influenced him,

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Speaker 4: but I know when I knew it were going to

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Speaker 4: be celebration, I thought back, I said, you know that

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Speaker 4: spiritual thing starts hitting you and say like we were

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Speaker 4: like foreseeing this.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, we said, come on, celebrate, So now let's sell

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Speaker 3: all celebrate.

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Speaker 4: And then with the group going through that down period

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Speaker 4: from like seventy five I think to seven of eight

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Speaker 4: or something like that, Yes, thirty nine, there was a

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Speaker 4: drought and they told me the story that you know,

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Speaker 4: the record lay was going to drop them in all

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Speaker 4: that stuff, and I said, okay, well what we gonna do?

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Speaker 4: You know that came later, That question came later, but yeah,

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Speaker 4: so there was like a like I said, resurrection as well,

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Speaker 4: and we had gotten over that first Ladies to Night

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Speaker 4: album and that was big, and so how we're gonna

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Speaker 4: do it again? And people were actually doubting us. You know,

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Speaker 4: it was more like, you know, I want.

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Speaker 3: The old old cool to gang.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, I want I want to talk about it. I

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Speaker 1: want to I want to talk about that.

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Speaker 3: Wait.

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Speaker 1: Wait, I got to start to beget it. So I

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Speaker 1: just wanted to ask if you knew about that story.

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Speaker 1: But that was my that was my cold opening.

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Speaker 4: That was that was the first I've heard of it

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Speaker 4: that in depth anyway. But I think again, it doesn't

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Speaker 4: surprise me.

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Speaker 3: Because you know, he was like that man. He was

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Speaker 3: He was a.

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Speaker 4: Special kind of guy from a many different angles, many

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Speaker 4: different angles, but you know, a sweetheart, and I would

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Speaker 4: say he was more he was a collector. He was

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Speaker 4: a jazz guy. But you know, anything was possible, you know,

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Speaker 4: if it was there. And I think when he even

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Speaker 4: heard when he heard me sing, you know, he was.

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Speaker 5: Just like, uh, there goes that celebration.

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Speaker 1: That okay, wait, ladies, we just we had a technical difficulty.

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Speaker 3: We just rewinded.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, but Steve had punch line in the century. He

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Speaker 1: was like, well, there goes this celebration.

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Speaker 3: We got to write this stuff down. This is the song,

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Speaker 3: you know.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, it was either that or la oh no oh no.

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Speaker 1: All right, So wait, let me ask you, because we're

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Speaker 1: going to get to all these things, uh, but let

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Speaker 1: me ask you what was your very first musical memory.

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Speaker 4: My first musical memory was I had to be like six,

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Speaker 4: because I remember we had just gotten my first television.

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Speaker 4: I was maybe five or six, and I remember being

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Speaker 4: in the kitchen and looking through to the living room

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Speaker 4: and my grandfather brought the television and it turned it on.

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Speaker 3: There was a group there. I still don't I don't

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Speaker 3: know who they were, but I just knew that.

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Speaker 4: They were dressed like like a five man group, and

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Speaker 4: they were just looking beautiful. And I did I didn't

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Speaker 4: even go to the television. I just stood back and

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Speaker 4: watched them. It just kind of messed me, rather.

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Speaker 3: Like looking like, you know, the puppy, you know, with

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Speaker 3: the head, you know. And my sister.

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Speaker 4: I have eight sisters, by the way, so oh no,

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Speaker 4: that's why I understand women.

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Speaker 3: A house for of women, you know, so I know

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Speaker 3: how to move, you know.

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Speaker 4: But she entered into a contest on the Cousin Bruce Show,

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Speaker 4: and this has taken it back and she actually won,

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Speaker 4: and she won that big smiley face thing or Cussy

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Speaker 4: Cousin Brucie, and she sang a song by wasn't Linda Jones,

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Speaker 4: but it was called I Know.

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Speaker 3: I Know you don't love Me No More, No More.

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Speaker 4: Something like that, And there was a up at solo

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Speaker 4: and I would like and it was this is all

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Speaker 4: radio wasn't on television and I was and that radio

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Speaker 4: was always on top of the refrigerator and I would.

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Speaker 3: Stand there and mimic the trumpet solo.

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Speaker 4: That was like my part, and that was like the

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Speaker 4: first thing that drew me into music right there.

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Speaker 1: Wow, so you're one of nine?

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Speaker 3: Yeah, well, yes, ten?

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Speaker 1: Actually where do you fall in line?

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Speaker 3: I say?

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Speaker 4: I was always say that I was looked up to

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Speaker 4: and looked down on, right in the middle.

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Speaker 3: Because my you know, my sister, you know, we we

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Speaker 3: had we.

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Speaker 4: Had a lot of fund. You know, it's a house

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Speaker 4: full of women going on. And my brother he was younger,

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Speaker 4: and I had an older brother who was, you know,

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Speaker 4: my mother's child, but he'd be you know, we were

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Speaker 4: all one family, and when we got together, it was

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Speaker 4: a party.

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Speaker 1: So are any of your other siblings as gifted? Is

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Speaker 1: this a musical family?

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Speaker 3: I will say yeah, because everybody's staying in the church choir.

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Speaker 3: You know. It was almost like mandatory. You know.

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Speaker 4: My mom could sing, and we were born in the

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Speaker 4: rural south South Carolina.

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Speaker 3: What city in Lawrence, l a u are in US.

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Speaker 4: And for my mother, I think she realized that I

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Speaker 4: have to get my children out of here to get

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Speaker 4: some type of opportunity.

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Speaker 3: Going, you know. And this is just my thoughts. You know,

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Speaker 3: we really talked about that.

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Speaker 4: But when we came to Jersey, we actually went to

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Speaker 4: Brooklyn first when we maybe both found our way over

240
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Speaker 4: to uh In to Hackensack and at the church there,

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Speaker 4: at the New Hope Church, my sister, you know, we

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Speaker 4: were all in the choir, as I said, but my

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Speaker 4: sister Frieda, she actually did a solo once, just her piano,

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Speaker 4: and I remember that being such a had a great

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Speaker 4: effect that someone could be standing there with just a

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Speaker 4: piano singing. And she didn't dress in the robe. She

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Speaker 4: actually had a red dress on and with legs showing

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Speaker 4: in the church, you know. But it was it was classy,

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Speaker 4: you know what I mean. And I remember sitting on

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Speaker 4: the side just watching it and just saying, just letting

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Speaker 4: it all come in, you know.

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Speaker 3: And but everybody, you know, it's pretty much as far

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Speaker 3: as the professional side.

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Speaker 4: They didn't go into that, but but that that church

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Speaker 4: part was something that was a big influence on all

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Speaker 4: of us.

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Speaker 1: Where's your household's attitude to secular music at the time, Like,

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Speaker 1: were you allowed to listen to motown or music of

259
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Speaker 1: a day?

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Speaker 3: Oh?

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00:14:34,400 --> 00:14:37,560
Speaker 4: Yeah, absolutely? My mother, you know, I think you know,

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Speaker 4: being listen. My father passed away.

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Speaker 3: When I was nine. Okay, he was like only in

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Speaker 3: his forties.

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Speaker 4: Okay, So here's my mother with all these kids, you know,

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Speaker 4: and her rules were lawt you know, you came home

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Speaker 4: from school, you did this, you did that, You got

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Speaker 4: up in the morning, you did this, you did that.

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Speaker 4: And her thing was to make sure that we were

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Speaker 4: rounded up, that she knew where we were and what

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Speaker 4: we were pretty much doing. So she had a transistor

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Speaker 4: radio on the refrigerator, again which no one could touch,

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Speaker 4: and usually it was either some gospel going on on there,

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Speaker 4: and sometimes she would flip to.

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Speaker 3: Like some blues or something like that.

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Speaker 4: But my uncle, who yeah, he used to come by

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Speaker 4: and he would drop off jazz albums. He would first

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Speaker 4: he would bring jazz albums for me to listen to,

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Speaker 4: and he would leave him there, and I mean he

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Speaker 4: went from you know, still Austin and then also sometimes

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Speaker 4: in the mix he would have like a Mom's Maybley album.

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Speaker 4: So as long as you know we were in the

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Speaker 4: house doing our thing, she was pretty much happy.

284
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Speaker 3: So you know, it's like we're playing all the motown.

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Speaker 4: She's in the live in the kitchen doing her thing,

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Speaker 4: and we were in hip party of dancing. And back

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Speaker 4: then it was the long rc RCA. You know, stereo,

288
00:15:57,120 --> 00:15:59,480
Speaker 4: you know, the best sound in the world, right, Okay,

289
00:16:00,080 --> 00:16:01,920
Speaker 4: you know you're putting the records on and then the

290
00:16:02,000 --> 00:16:04,480
Speaker 4: quarter and all that stuff. But as long as we

291
00:16:04,480 --> 00:16:07,200
Speaker 4: were like happy and we were around her, she knew

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Speaker 4: we were.

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Speaker 3: We were having a good time. She let us stretch out.

294
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Speaker 4: Man, it was and I and that that also helped

295
00:16:13,560 --> 00:16:16,240
Speaker 4: speed up my love for music and and and going

296
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Speaker 4: into different genres as well.

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Speaker 1: I'll say that, uh, you're I'm not even gonna say

298
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Speaker 1: former employers. Your former group's story has been getting out

299
00:16:32,840 --> 00:16:37,160
Speaker 1: in the first three years, and they kind of taken

300
00:16:37,200 --> 00:16:41,920
Speaker 1: advantage of social media to tell these like two minute

301
00:16:42,280 --> 00:16:46,000
Speaker 1: Instagram animated vignettes of like what their life was like

302
00:16:46,760 --> 00:16:51,160
Speaker 1: as teenagers before they formed a band, and the kind

303
00:16:51,160 --> 00:16:56,120
Speaker 1: of war stories that Cool was talking about. And George,

304
00:16:56,280 --> 00:16:59,840
Speaker 1: you know that were you growing up in that part

305
00:16:59,840 --> 00:17:03,200
Speaker 1: of Jersey because like to hear cool tell it like,

306
00:17:03,280 --> 00:17:06,639
Speaker 1: I'm like, yo, I'm a shocked you still alive, Like

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00:17:06,680 --> 00:17:09,840
Speaker 1: the amount of the gang stories he told me, and

308
00:17:10,400 --> 00:17:14,080
Speaker 1: you know every day fighting for like a quarterbread, Like

309
00:17:14,160 --> 00:17:15,760
Speaker 1: literally did you get a quarter to get a loaf

310
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Speaker 1: of bread to eat that day?

311
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Speaker 4: Like?

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Speaker 5: Yeah?

313
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Speaker 1: Was was that?

314
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Speaker 4: Like?

315
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Speaker 1: What was Jersey?

316
00:17:20,800 --> 00:17:20,919
Speaker 3: Like?

317
00:17:21,200 --> 00:17:22,520
Speaker 1: What were your memories of Jersey?

318
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Speaker 4: My memories are faun I had fond members because we

319
00:17:25,880 --> 00:17:27,280
Speaker 4: didn't have that vibe.

320
00:17:27,440 --> 00:17:29,280
Speaker 3: You know, we had our boys.

321
00:17:29,040 --> 00:17:31,680
Speaker 4: With you know, park scraps, everybody you know, fighting and

322
00:17:31,680 --> 00:17:33,879
Speaker 4: stuff like that, but it was it was more like

323
00:17:35,320 --> 00:17:36,000
Speaker 4: very sparse.

324
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Speaker 3: You know in our area. Everybody knew everybody.

325
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Speaker 4: We didn't have a real racial problem, you know with

326
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Speaker 4: the white students that went to school with us. And

327
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Speaker 4: when we played we had it was within like about

328
00:17:49,600 --> 00:17:53,320
Speaker 4: two to four block area, so you knew everybody. And

329
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Speaker 4: when it was some fight, we never had like gangs

330
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Speaker 4: fighting to get territory and somebody stealing your money. If

331
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Speaker 4: somebody stole your money, you know there was a fight

332
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Speaker 4: going on, but it didn't happen too often.

333
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Speaker 3: Because we had this place called Second Street, Park, And

334
00:18:09,000 --> 00:18:10,159
Speaker 3: that's what it was like.

335
00:18:10,200 --> 00:18:14,800
Speaker 4: Our babysitter, our parents' babysitter. You know, they knew where

336
00:18:14,800 --> 00:18:17,840
Speaker 4: you were, and we weren't allowed to like just wander

337
00:18:17,920 --> 00:18:21,520
Speaker 4: off down downtown or go to this place. You know,

338
00:18:21,720 --> 00:18:24,000
Speaker 4: you had to ask and to go home to ask

339
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Speaker 4: to be somewhere. So again, we didn't have that type

340
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Speaker 4: of friction. No, not nothing close to Jersey City.

341
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Speaker 1: Do you remember the first time that you saw a

342
00:18:34,240 --> 00:18:38,120
Speaker 1: concert or performance like who were your north Stars? As

343
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Speaker 1: far as like, wow, that's what I want to do.

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Speaker 1: You're a rare breed of a singer that came out

345
00:18:47,720 --> 00:18:50,600
Speaker 1: during the time you came out, because you were kind

346
00:18:50,640 --> 00:18:53,560
Speaker 1: of like even to me, you were like an older

347
00:18:53,600 --> 00:18:59,280
Speaker 1: brother figure. You weren't my pops like that Teddy Pendergrass. Yeah,

348
00:18:59,400 --> 00:19:02,720
Speaker 1: you know, like that to me sounded like my pops

349
00:19:02,800 --> 00:19:07,119
Speaker 1: and my uncles, whereas like you were kind of like

350
00:19:07,200 --> 00:19:10,640
Speaker 1: my cooler older brother, like too old for us to

351
00:19:10,680 --> 00:19:14,560
Speaker 1: like live in a bunk bed, you know, but like

352
00:19:16,240 --> 00:19:19,960
Speaker 1: I like that varsity jacket level. So the thing is

353
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Speaker 1: is that I know, you know, by the time the

354
00:19:23,000 --> 00:19:28,160
Speaker 1: Jackson five come out, you're like eighteen, So I don't

355
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Speaker 1: know if it's hitting you the same way that it's

356
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Speaker 1: hitting like my seven year old sister, Like where the

357
00:19:34,480 --> 00:19:37,919
Speaker 1: Jackson five was everyone's north star? So for you, Like yeah,

358
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Speaker 1: because you have a Johnny Mathews voice. I asked like,

359
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Speaker 1: were you more akin to like the styles of Frankie

360
00:19:45,520 --> 00:19:46,800
Speaker 1: Lyman and the teenagers?

361
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Speaker 4: Like yeah, that's good that you brought that up. Well,

362
00:19:49,840 --> 00:19:52,280
Speaker 4: the thing is with my I remember, you know, like

363
00:19:52,320 --> 00:19:54,879
Speaker 4: I said, seeing in the church choir and everything, but

364
00:19:55,000 --> 00:19:59,040
Speaker 4: always had a band also, and I would like wherever

365
00:19:59,080 --> 00:20:02,320
Speaker 4: there was music happened in town, I found myself there,

366
00:20:02,920 --> 00:20:06,680
Speaker 4: whether it was older guys or you know, guys my age.

367
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Speaker 3: And when I had my.

368
00:20:08,880 --> 00:20:11,439
Speaker 4: First group of three and we were like we call

369
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Speaker 4: the Electoral five, you know, like the Jackson five, you

370
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Speaker 4: know before that, you know, when they were really like young,

371
00:20:17,720 --> 00:20:20,760
Speaker 4: you know, he had apple jack hats and the nice

372
00:20:20,800 --> 00:20:24,760
Speaker 4: shiny suits and everything, and we were called it Electro five,

373
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Speaker 4: you know, And so that that spread everything up. But

374
00:20:29,000 --> 00:20:31,680
Speaker 4: there was a band in town called the Phialaa Soul

375
00:20:32,359 --> 00:20:33,840
Speaker 4: and like the best of soul.

376
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Speaker 3: And I know it sounds a little fishy, but you

377
00:20:36,640 --> 00:20:40,480
Speaker 3: know I got to see.

378
00:20:40,520 --> 00:20:42,360
Speaker 4: I had to get back and see at least throw

379
00:20:42,440 --> 00:20:45,760
Speaker 4: one at him, you know. But but these guys were

380
00:20:45,800 --> 00:20:51,400
Speaker 4: so good. I'm telling you. They played sly It's close

381
00:20:51,440 --> 00:20:55,000
Speaker 4: as things to Sly as sly himself. And we used

382
00:20:55,000 --> 00:20:58,000
Speaker 4: to actually follow them around. And the thing that was

383
00:20:58,000 --> 00:21:02,040
Speaker 4: odd was that the Catholic Church is the diaces, would

384
00:21:02,080 --> 00:21:04,159
Speaker 4: allow us to have parties and they would have this

385
00:21:04,359 --> 00:21:08,800
Speaker 4: like little drop off. So they would go to Lodie,

386
00:21:08,880 --> 00:21:12,240
Speaker 4: to Hackensack, over to this town and they had a following,

387
00:21:12,560 --> 00:21:15,919
Speaker 4: and I used to follow them, and years later I

388
00:21:16,080 --> 00:21:18,200
Speaker 4: end up being the lead singer of that same group.

389
00:21:19,000 --> 00:21:23,760
Speaker 4: So Slyde became the one that I loved the most,

390
00:21:23,960 --> 00:21:27,600
Speaker 4: and not just because it was him, but it's the

391
00:21:27,680 --> 00:21:34,240
Speaker 4: eclectic part of their band, having clarinets, trumpets, women, you know,

392
00:21:34,320 --> 00:21:37,240
Speaker 4: a drummer, you know, all these different parts at a

393
00:21:37,280 --> 00:21:38,119
Speaker 4: B three organ.

394
00:21:38,520 --> 00:21:40,680
Speaker 3: So that was everything I pretty much grew up with.

395
00:21:41,320 --> 00:21:43,480
Speaker 4: And he was like, and still is to this day,

396
00:21:43,600 --> 00:21:48,200
Speaker 4: like my guy, you know, wow, Okay, yeah.

397
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Speaker 1: That's what's up. What was the first album you ever purchased?

398
00:21:53,000 --> 00:21:54,840
Speaker 3: And I knew you're gonna dig with that one. That's

399
00:21:54,880 --> 00:21:56,440
Speaker 3: a see.

400
00:21:56,440 --> 00:21:58,600
Speaker 4: The album were in the house that that never bought

401
00:21:58,680 --> 00:22:01,600
Speaker 4: because we didn't have money, so it was things usually

402
00:22:01,640 --> 00:22:08,879
Speaker 4: like a Surely Seizar album or something like that. But

403
00:22:08,960 --> 00:22:11,960
Speaker 4: I never bought gospel albums my mother. That was like

404
00:22:12,040 --> 00:22:15,200
Speaker 4: kind of her role. But if I think back to it,

405
00:22:15,200 --> 00:22:17,840
Speaker 4: it had to be something with motown or James Brown.

406
00:22:18,400 --> 00:22:20,119
Speaker 4: Probably a James Brown record.

407
00:22:20,520 --> 00:22:24,600
Speaker 5: Okay, okay, where are you living now? Just out of

408
00:22:24,640 --> 00:22:28,000
Speaker 5: curiosity in North Jersey? Okay?

409
00:22:28,640 --> 00:22:30,160
Speaker 3: Yeah, still home?

410
00:22:31,400 --> 00:22:33,919
Speaker 1: Besides church? Were there any other functions that you were

411
00:22:33,960 --> 00:22:35,080
Speaker 1: singing at high schools?

412
00:22:35,240 --> 00:22:39,760
Speaker 4: Or I would singing anywhere any style in the park

413
00:22:40,880 --> 00:22:46,080
Speaker 4: at it for nothing. You know, you wouldn't getting paid, But.

414
00:22:46,080 --> 00:22:48,560
Speaker 3: I never I don't have to see.

415
00:22:48,880 --> 00:22:52,480
Speaker 4: I didn't say to myself this is what I wanted

416
00:22:52,480 --> 00:22:56,440
Speaker 4: to do. I was in the midst of it from

417
00:22:56,480 --> 00:22:59,760
Speaker 4: the moment I heard music. If you if you understand

418
00:22:59,800 --> 00:23:02,000
Speaker 4: what I'm it's like I didn't have a time with Okay,

419
00:23:02,440 --> 00:23:04,600
Speaker 4: this is what I'm going to do for life. It

420
00:23:04,680 --> 00:23:07,200
Speaker 4: was just a part of me, you know. And it's

421
00:23:07,240 --> 00:23:08,840
Speaker 4: like a lot of things are like that for me.

422
00:23:09,480 --> 00:23:12,280
Speaker 4: You know, I don't have to really put on airs

423
00:23:12,800 --> 00:23:18,280
Speaker 4: to be something or to accept someone doing something. And

424
00:23:18,320 --> 00:23:20,680
Speaker 4: like it's like when I see you and your band,

425
00:23:21,040 --> 00:23:25,679
Speaker 4: it's like that's supposed to happen, and whatever you're doing,

426
00:23:26,200 --> 00:23:29,919
Speaker 4: I'm just gonna immerse myself in it and not be

427
00:23:30,080 --> 00:23:33,720
Speaker 4: so judgmental, even if I don't, you know, particularly like everything.

428
00:23:34,040 --> 00:23:37,520
Speaker 4: It's just I think that the life of music is

429
00:23:37,600 --> 00:23:40,159
Speaker 4: like my life blood. And that's why I don't have

430
00:23:40,200 --> 00:23:44,560
Speaker 4: a specific moment. But when when you say Jesus moment,

431
00:23:44,760 --> 00:23:49,040
Speaker 4: it's like, I remember, like my mother used to we

432
00:23:49,160 --> 00:23:51,359
Speaker 4: got too old to get that whip, and you know,

433
00:23:53,119 --> 00:23:55,320
Speaker 4: she would like make us sit on the steps or

434
00:23:55,359 --> 00:23:58,360
Speaker 4: something like that. And one day, you know, I don't

435
00:23:58,400 --> 00:24:01,000
Speaker 4: know what I did, but she she sat me on

436
00:24:01,040 --> 00:24:04,040
Speaker 4: the back steps in our back porch, and I was

437
00:24:04,080 --> 00:24:08,000
Speaker 4: just sitting there and I was always like a very

438
00:24:08,880 --> 00:24:12,200
Speaker 4: like outside the Bible thing, you know, like things didn't

439
00:24:12,200 --> 00:24:12,919
Speaker 4: make sense to me.

440
00:24:13,760 --> 00:24:14,760
Speaker 3: Is why does this happened?

441
00:24:14,800 --> 00:24:18,440
Speaker 1: I'm like, you know, but I meant that metaphorically.

442
00:24:18,560 --> 00:24:20,360
Speaker 3: I didn't mean, man, yeah, I know what you meant,

443
00:24:20,400 --> 00:24:21,800
Speaker 3: but I'm trying to get to something.

444
00:24:22,080 --> 00:24:27,160
Speaker 4: So one day I'm sitting there and I actually felt

445
00:24:27,240 --> 00:24:29,879
Speaker 4: like I saw the tree growing. And this is when

446
00:24:29,920 --> 00:24:33,360
Speaker 4: I was very very young, so I've always had that feeling.

447
00:24:33,760 --> 00:24:38,080
Speaker 4: So there wasn't a moment of that Jesus moment of music.

448
00:24:38,080 --> 00:24:40,320
Speaker 4: I'm going to do this in my life. It was

449
00:24:40,359 --> 00:24:43,160
Speaker 4: just a part of the maturation, was all of it.

450
00:24:43,640 --> 00:24:47,479
Speaker 4: So when it did happen, got it. I was already

451
00:24:47,520 --> 00:24:49,760
Speaker 4: in the midst of it, and it never overwhelmed me

452
00:24:50,080 --> 00:24:50,760
Speaker 4: at that time.

453
00:24:51,720 --> 00:24:54,800
Speaker 3: If you understand what I mean, Yeah, yeah, I got it.

454
00:24:55,400 --> 00:25:00,760
Speaker 1: So I'll ask you what was your knowledge of the

455
00:25:00,800 --> 00:25:03,320
Speaker 1: moment they became cool in the Gang? I know they

456
00:25:03,359 --> 00:25:08,800
Speaker 1: were various other groups, but were you wear them from

457
00:25:08,800 --> 00:25:13,399
Speaker 1: their first self titled record those Oh yeah, first, So

458
00:25:13,560 --> 00:25:15,680
Speaker 1: what was your opinion of Like what did you think?

459
00:25:15,840 --> 00:25:18,359
Speaker 1: Were they just like, oh they from Jersey or no?

460
00:25:18,600 --> 00:25:18,639
Speaker 3: No.

461
00:25:20,480 --> 00:25:23,080
Speaker 4: I thought they were awesome because we used to, you know,

462
00:25:23,200 --> 00:25:26,480
Speaker 4: carry the boomboxes. Have Ben and a friend of mine, Curtis,

463
00:25:26,480 --> 00:25:28,400
Speaker 4: he would always have his boombox and we would listening

464
00:25:28,400 --> 00:25:31,760
Speaker 4: to Cooling the Gang stuff walking to school. And sometime

465
00:25:31,800 --> 00:25:34,040
Speaker 4: I go to his house and I remember, I forget

466
00:25:34,080 --> 00:25:36,760
Speaker 4: what Albert was. I think was the ice block cool

467
00:25:36,760 --> 00:25:38,959
Speaker 4: in the Gang? It was like a block the message

468
00:25:39,000 --> 00:25:41,720
Speaker 4: yet the message yet Yeah, And so I got into

469
00:25:41,800 --> 00:25:44,159
Speaker 4: what they were talking about because we were growing up

470
00:25:44,160 --> 00:25:48,000
Speaker 4: in the civil rights so those things they were talking

471
00:25:48,040 --> 00:25:49,560
Speaker 4: about in a musical way.

472
00:25:49,440 --> 00:25:52,800
Speaker 3: So that's pretty clever how they got the message across.

473
00:25:53,359 --> 00:25:56,520
Speaker 4: You know, we're not even as blatant as like a

474
00:25:56,560 --> 00:25:59,600
Speaker 4: girl Scott did, you know. But it was something that

475
00:25:59,640 --> 00:26:04,159
Speaker 4: I could late to musically as well as instrumentally, and

476
00:26:04,240 --> 00:26:06,040
Speaker 4: something you could dance to at the same time.

477
00:26:06,560 --> 00:26:08,720
Speaker 3: So that was always a magnet.

478
00:26:08,760 --> 00:26:10,840
Speaker 4: And if you look at all the groups back then,

479
00:26:11,040 --> 00:26:13,600
Speaker 4: from James Brown, you know, I'm black and I'm proud

480
00:26:13,680 --> 00:26:17,680
Speaker 4: anything that anybody was doing Marvin, it was the social

481
00:26:17,720 --> 00:26:22,680
Speaker 4: consciousness while we were growing up that implemented music that

482
00:26:22,800 --> 00:26:27,080
Speaker 4: showed instrumentation and all these great guys playing this stuff.

483
00:26:27,359 --> 00:26:29,639
Speaker 4: And then, like I said, with my uncle dropping jazz

484
00:26:29,720 --> 00:26:32,240
Speaker 4: music off, I realized that they were telling the same

485
00:26:32,280 --> 00:26:35,679
Speaker 4: story growing up. So it was reaching and pulling me

486
00:26:35,800 --> 00:26:38,320
Speaker 4: in all of these different directions. But I thought that

487
00:26:38,440 --> 00:26:43,240
Speaker 4: Coolning were great, and ironically when I mentioned the Flair

488
00:26:43,240 --> 00:26:46,880
Speaker 4: of Soul, we actually opened up for them once at

489
00:26:47,520 --> 00:26:51,720
Speaker 4: Newark College I think it's Caine College in Newark, and

490
00:26:52,240 --> 00:26:55,240
Speaker 4: I tried to get backstage to meet them. This is

491
00:26:55,440 --> 00:26:58,399
Speaker 4: years before I even I became a member, and some

492
00:26:58,480 --> 00:27:00,160
Speaker 4: security guy wouldn't let me come.

493
00:27:00,080 --> 00:27:00,760
Speaker 3: Back to meet him.

494
00:27:00,880 --> 00:27:03,480
Speaker 4: But I wanted to talk to them about, you know,

495
00:27:03,520 --> 00:27:05,760
Speaker 4: what they were doing, because I liked it very much,

496
00:27:05,800 --> 00:27:06,840
Speaker 4: you know, Oh.

497
00:27:06,760 --> 00:27:08,760
Speaker 5: Okay, that's such a cool story.

498
00:27:09,080 --> 00:27:12,920
Speaker 4: Yeah, it's all one man, all it all.

499
00:27:12,960 --> 00:27:14,760
Speaker 3: It's all related in some way. You know.

500
00:27:15,240 --> 00:27:17,600
Speaker 2: That's really interesting that you were a fan and tried

501
00:27:17,640 --> 00:27:19,840
Speaker 2: to meet that ends up in the band, right.

502
00:27:19,840 --> 00:27:22,000
Speaker 3: Yeah, and end up. It's crazy.

503
00:27:22,200 --> 00:27:27,560
Speaker 1: How did you specifically get their attention? What's the story

504
00:27:27,600 --> 00:27:31,199
Speaker 1: process that leads to you, guys meeting to audition for

505
00:27:31,240 --> 00:27:31,600
Speaker 1: the band?

506
00:27:32,400 --> 00:27:34,280
Speaker 4: There was a there was a part on a house

507
00:27:34,320 --> 00:27:39,719
Speaker 4: of music and studios and the West Orange and I

508
00:27:39,760 --> 00:27:42,480
Speaker 4: did a session with Jeff Dixon.

509
00:27:43,920 --> 00:27:45,640
Speaker 3: Wait what Jeff Dixon?

510
00:27:45,840 --> 00:27:46,119
Speaker 5: Yes?

511
00:27:46,400 --> 00:27:46,760
Speaker 1: Really?

512
00:27:47,080 --> 00:27:48,720
Speaker 3: And I went I got.

513
00:27:48,520 --> 00:27:51,000
Speaker 4: A call that step and said, listen, man, this is

514
00:27:51,040 --> 00:27:53,399
Speaker 4: this guy doing a he's doing trying to put this

515
00:27:53,440 --> 00:27:56,400
Speaker 4: group together. And his name was Jeff Dixon. He wants

516
00:27:56,400 --> 00:27:59,200
Speaker 4: you to come down. I told him about you. And

517
00:27:59,440 --> 00:28:02,280
Speaker 4: but in the stadion and I did a There was

518
00:28:02,320 --> 00:28:05,840
Speaker 4: a section of the song that I did and when

519
00:28:05,880 --> 00:28:08,199
Speaker 4: I finished my part, I went out and when it

520
00:28:08,280 --> 00:28:10,960
Speaker 4: was done, he said, come back in, and he said,

521
00:28:11,000 --> 00:28:13,680
Speaker 4: he said, listen to what happens to the song when

522
00:28:13,680 --> 00:28:17,360
Speaker 4: your part comes, and he played it through and he said, you.

523
00:28:17,320 --> 00:28:19,119
Speaker 3: Hear that, that's it right there.

524
00:28:19,400 --> 00:28:21,879
Speaker 4: He said, I got to get you with somebody, you know,

525
00:28:21,960 --> 00:28:24,159
Speaker 4: And I was like, I was just doing what he

526
00:28:24,440 --> 00:28:28,040
Speaker 4: instructed me to do. So when I got the call

527
00:28:28,640 --> 00:28:32,320
Speaker 4: to come to audition, I don't know if it was Stephen,

528
00:28:33,280 --> 00:28:34,720
Speaker 4: whether it was Jeff Dixon.

529
00:28:34,440 --> 00:28:36,600
Speaker 3: That that told cool him about.

530
00:28:36,240 --> 00:28:40,800
Speaker 4: Me, but I know when when I got there, Irene

531
00:28:40,880 --> 00:28:44,160
Speaker 4: Conrad I mentioned, he said, yeah, well cooling them there

532
00:28:44,160 --> 00:28:47,000
Speaker 4: down here, and I went in and I met Chalice

533
00:28:47,120 --> 00:28:49,360
Speaker 4: and the thing for me, I really wanted to meet

534
00:28:49,440 --> 00:28:53,160
Speaker 4: DT and Spike for some reason, I don't know, because

535
00:28:53,240 --> 00:28:57,000
Speaker 4: these team was always like the cooler dress guy and

536
00:28:57,040 --> 00:29:00,640
Speaker 4: he had he played a great horn and Spike the trumpet,

537
00:29:00,680 --> 00:29:05,080
Speaker 4: and I just like he had this this jazzy thing

538
00:29:05,120 --> 00:29:08,200
Speaker 4: about him that was cool when he had a wittles

539
00:29:08,200 --> 00:29:10,920
Speaker 4: Peak kind of cut there. He was just like a

540
00:29:10,920 --> 00:29:14,120
Speaker 4: attractive kind of aura that they had.

541
00:29:14,200 --> 00:29:17,880
Speaker 3: You know, you really knew these cats, Yeah, I knew

542
00:29:17,880 --> 00:29:18,840
Speaker 3: them from just the music.

543
00:29:19,160 --> 00:29:23,200
Speaker 1: In my mind. I was like, especially now, I mean,

544
00:29:23,320 --> 00:29:27,640
Speaker 1: you know, I'm gen X and there's some gen Z's

545
00:29:27,680 --> 00:29:33,000
Speaker 1: and Jen alphas after these alphas that pretty much like

546
00:29:33,520 --> 00:29:36,200
Speaker 1: started with millennials, but also with gen Z and with

547
00:29:36,280 --> 00:29:39,360
Speaker 1: Jens Alpha where it's just like a kind of blatant

548
00:29:39,440 --> 00:29:46,400
Speaker 1: uh purposeful indifference, or it's where like I wouldn't think.

549
00:29:47,080 --> 00:29:48,600
Speaker 1: I thought, oh, he's probably a new guy in a

550
00:29:48,640 --> 00:29:54,240
Speaker 1: group and don't even know who Mickens is or who right, like, oh,

551
00:29:54,400 --> 00:29:56,240
Speaker 1: some old guys want me to sing in their group

552
00:29:56,280 --> 00:29:57,440
Speaker 1: and that.

553
00:29:58,640 --> 00:30:02,320
Speaker 4: No, I never thought that, if you know question back then,

554
00:30:02,400 --> 00:30:05,040
Speaker 4: like the albums they had the liner notes, they told

555
00:30:05,040 --> 00:30:05,480
Speaker 4: you who.

556
00:30:05,360 --> 00:30:06,880
Speaker 3: Guys were, so you would sit there.

557
00:30:07,120 --> 00:30:08,840
Speaker 4: You didn't have a cell phone or anything, so you

558
00:30:08,840 --> 00:30:11,400
Speaker 4: would go through the album and you're listening to it

559
00:30:11,640 --> 00:30:13,760
Speaker 4: and you were finding out, oh this guy played that.

560
00:30:13,920 --> 00:30:14,440
Speaker 3: Oh I didn't know.

561
00:30:14,680 --> 00:30:18,840
Speaker 4: And I didn't even know Dtu played played the flute okay,

562
00:30:18,840 --> 00:30:19,720
Speaker 4: And then I thought, oh, I.

563
00:30:19,640 --> 00:30:22,200
Speaker 3: Said that was him playing that, Oh okay. So when

564
00:30:22,200 --> 00:30:23,680
Speaker 3: I met him, I was like, yo, man, at that

565
00:30:23,720 --> 00:30:25,920
Speaker 3: part you played on this, you know, stuff like that.

566
00:30:26,040 --> 00:30:28,640
Speaker 4: So I was telling them little things that I appreciated

567
00:30:28,680 --> 00:30:32,120
Speaker 4: and and you know, funky George and listening to that

568
00:30:32,240 --> 00:30:35,440
Speaker 4: foot man, I said, wow, that's you know.

569
00:30:36,080 --> 00:30:38,880
Speaker 3: So it was I was like in heaven and so

570
00:30:38,960 --> 00:30:39,680
Speaker 3: to speak, you know.

571
00:30:40,320 --> 00:30:42,920
Speaker 1: All that I said about your your velvet voice, and

572
00:30:42,920 --> 00:30:47,200
Speaker 1: and you being a modern nat king Cole. I asked

573
00:30:47,240 --> 00:30:50,920
Speaker 1: them in my class, like what was that process like

574
00:30:51,000 --> 00:30:54,120
Speaker 1: of finally striking gold, because you know, he told a

575
00:30:54,160 --> 00:30:57,920
Speaker 1: story about everybody's disco dancing album like Flopped, And they

576
00:30:57,920 --> 00:31:01,800
Speaker 1: were in the store and doing an autograph session and

577
00:31:01,840 --> 00:31:04,480
Speaker 1: nobody was there, and one girl was like who they

578
00:31:04,600 --> 00:31:08,440
Speaker 1: supposed to be? Oh cool and gang ill like. She

579
00:31:08,640 --> 00:31:10,080
Speaker 1: was like, ah, man, we gotta get a singer. We

580
00:31:10,120 --> 00:31:13,000
Speaker 1: gotta get a singer. It's like desperation. But he says

581
00:31:13,800 --> 00:31:17,479
Speaker 1: that he knew within the first three seconds you were

582
00:31:17,520 --> 00:31:20,440
Speaker 1: the singer because you sounded like nacking Cole, And I thought,

583
00:31:20,520 --> 00:31:23,800
Speaker 1: like that might have struck me odd because I would

584
00:31:23,960 --> 00:31:27,440
Speaker 1: I would almost think like, okay, during that time period

585
00:31:27,520 --> 00:31:31,920
Speaker 1: seventy nine, you gotta compete with all these gruff, all

586
00:31:31,960 --> 00:31:36,080
Speaker 1: these I mean, either they're kind of over the top.

587
00:31:37,160 --> 00:31:40,360
Speaker 1: I'm not saying primitive exotic, but you know, unless you

588
00:31:40,400 --> 00:31:44,560
Speaker 1: come super animated, ah you like super Foot is animated,

589
00:31:44,800 --> 00:31:50,040
Speaker 1: Boots and Parliament they're animated, or you're coming like you know,

590
00:31:50,160 --> 00:31:55,120
Speaker 1: I mean the Mendingo, yeah, like or spiritual. You came

591
00:31:56,400 --> 00:32:01,040
Speaker 1: very classy, but you came see in a way that

592
00:32:01,280 --> 00:32:04,920
Speaker 1: wasn't like like, I don't know if Johnny Mathis would

593
00:32:04,960 --> 00:32:08,200
Speaker 1: be like just walking down the hood, you know.

594
00:32:08,200 --> 00:32:08,600
Speaker 3: What I mean.

595
00:32:09,400 --> 00:32:13,560
Speaker 1: But you almost had like a you had some street

596
00:32:13,560 --> 00:32:19,320
Speaker 1: confidence about you. But you also came off like you

597
00:32:19,800 --> 00:32:24,560
Speaker 1: might have done two years in ROTC Strain in or

598
00:32:24,600 --> 00:32:25,400
Speaker 1: in college.

599
00:32:25,800 --> 00:32:26,480
Speaker 3: I actually did.

600
00:32:27,560 --> 00:32:30,040
Speaker 1: As much as I love the Jackson's and they were

601
00:32:30,080 --> 00:32:33,160
Speaker 1: my heroes. I'd never looked at them once and thought

602
00:32:33,280 --> 00:32:37,000
Speaker 1: like you might be some college educated brothers. You know,

603
00:32:37,360 --> 00:32:41,200
Speaker 1: the commodoret talk all the time about going into Ski Institute,

604
00:32:41,800 --> 00:32:46,520
Speaker 1: but you know, but but they still wow. So for me,

605
00:32:46,680 --> 00:32:51,720
Speaker 1: you were like the first look into what we might

606
00:32:51,800 --> 00:32:52,560
Speaker 1: perceive day Lot.

607
00:32:52,560 --> 00:32:55,400
Speaker 3: Sould to be or like yeah yeah.

608
00:32:55,440 --> 00:32:59,000
Speaker 1: So for you, though, what was the audition process?

609
00:32:59,240 --> 00:32:59,360
Speaker 3: Like?

610
00:33:00,560 --> 00:33:04,240
Speaker 4: I didn't go in there like super nervous. And I

611
00:33:04,280 --> 00:33:07,840
Speaker 4: think again, as I said to you, the process was

612
00:33:07,880 --> 00:33:11,640
Speaker 4: the whole the whole thing included, meaning the music process

613
00:33:11,680 --> 00:33:14,600
Speaker 4: from being young all the way through. So this feeling

614
00:33:14,600 --> 00:33:17,920
Speaker 4: that I've had, the spiritual feeling i've had, was like, Okay,

615
00:33:18,000 --> 00:33:19,920
Speaker 4: I'm here, so this is what we're going to do.

616
00:33:20,120 --> 00:33:24,719
Speaker 4: And he said, let me hear you sing something. I said, well,

617
00:33:24,760 --> 00:33:27,000
Speaker 4: what do you want me to sing? He said, anything,

618
00:33:27,080 --> 00:33:30,480
Speaker 4: just make something up and he started playing these changes

619
00:33:31,400 --> 00:33:35,800
Speaker 4: and I sang, you know, in my baritone voice, you know,

620
00:33:36,400 --> 00:33:39,600
Speaker 4: and he said can you sing hi? And I said yeah,

621
00:33:40,000 --> 00:33:44,360
Speaker 4: and I did some falsettled stuff, you know, and that's

622
00:33:44,400 --> 00:33:47,400
Speaker 4: pretty much all I remember doing for him.

623
00:33:47,600 --> 00:33:49,880
Speaker 1: Did you know what you were walking into?

624
00:33:51,200 --> 00:33:51,280
Speaker 3: No?

625
00:33:52,400 --> 00:33:55,240
Speaker 1: So no one officially said cool in the gangs looking

626
00:33:55,240 --> 00:33:56,760
Speaker 1: for a lead singer said.

627
00:33:56,880 --> 00:33:59,200
Speaker 4: The only thing I knew was that they were looking

628
00:33:59,200 --> 00:34:02,040
Speaker 4: for some back round for me to sing background on

629
00:34:02,120 --> 00:34:06,240
Speaker 4: the record. Okay, and again you know that's what I do,

630
00:34:06,320 --> 00:34:10,000
Speaker 4: so okay is this where's the songs that you know?

631
00:34:10,040 --> 00:34:12,080
Speaker 3: And my thing, I'm like that, what's the song? What

632
00:34:12,080 --> 00:34:12,600
Speaker 3: are we going to do?

633
00:34:12,760 --> 00:34:15,120
Speaker 4: And thinking it's going to be more in the vain

634
00:34:15,200 --> 00:34:17,960
Speaker 4: of what they did before, you know, background, you know,

635
00:34:18,040 --> 00:34:20,560
Speaker 4: Hollywood's well, you know, jungle boogie, all that.

636
00:34:20,520 --> 00:34:21,040
Speaker 3: Stuff, you know.

637
00:34:21,600 --> 00:34:25,080
Speaker 4: And when I met with I think it was Gabe

638
00:34:25,120 --> 00:34:28,759
Speaker 4: Figarto the Light Records, he said, you know, Jay, that

639
00:34:28,840 --> 00:34:33,960
Speaker 4: era has passed. And when I met Diodado, I was

640
00:34:34,080 --> 00:34:36,200
Speaker 4: I don't think I was in the meeting, but he

641
00:34:36,280 --> 00:34:40,160
Speaker 4: asked Gabe, he said, he said, well, who's who's going

642
00:34:40,239 --> 00:34:45,000
Speaker 4: to sing this? And he said him this JT and

643
00:34:45,040 --> 00:34:47,240
Speaker 4: he said, I want you to put the music around

644
00:34:47,320 --> 00:34:54,480
Speaker 4: him his voice, and I'm said okay, okay, And you know,

645
00:34:55,200 --> 00:34:58,120
Speaker 4: so I'm green at this time. You gotta understand, as

646
00:34:58,120 --> 00:35:01,160
Speaker 4: far as studio work, I've never worked in the studio

647
00:35:01,960 --> 00:35:04,520
Speaker 4: in any capacity, Like what's going to come?

648
00:35:05,200 --> 00:35:08,600
Speaker 2: Was Diodado part of your audition? Like was he one

649
00:35:08,600 --> 00:35:09,240
Speaker 2: of the people.

650
00:35:09,040 --> 00:35:12,359
Speaker 3: Who was No, No, he wasn't in there at all.

651
00:35:12,600 --> 00:35:14,480
Speaker 3: I met him a little later, but.

652
00:35:14,480 --> 00:35:17,239
Speaker 2: He was already involved with them at that point.

653
00:35:17,280 --> 00:35:21,239
Speaker 3: At that point, I was so everything was great, you know.

654
00:35:21,280 --> 00:35:23,359
Speaker 4: I was like I knew I was school a gang,

655
00:35:23,680 --> 00:35:26,360
Speaker 4: I'm in the studio, a house of music.

656
00:35:27,239 --> 00:35:29,840
Speaker 3: They liked me, and when.

657
00:35:29,719 --> 00:35:33,560
Speaker 4: We started working, we instantly I wouldn't say instantly, but

658
00:35:34,880 --> 00:35:37,880
Speaker 4: we started working on music and we would go to

659
00:35:38,239 --> 00:35:42,200
Speaker 4: I think on thirtieth West thirties Street at Daily Planet,

660
00:35:42,640 --> 00:35:43,839
Speaker 4: just playing songs there.

661
00:35:43,880 --> 00:35:48,640
Speaker 3: You know. So when dian Donald got involved, this.

662
00:35:48,640 --> 00:35:52,799
Speaker 4: Whole thing was trying to mesh what they brought in,

663
00:35:52,840 --> 00:35:54,959
Speaker 4: what everybody was writing. And at the time I wasn't

664
00:35:54,960 --> 00:35:59,040
Speaker 4: bringing anything in as far as like songwriting anything like that.

665
00:35:59,160 --> 00:36:02,480
Speaker 4: I was more like just feeding off of what's coming

666
00:36:02,520 --> 00:36:04,880
Speaker 4: at me. That me, let me be here, let me

667
00:36:04,960 --> 00:36:08,040
Speaker 4: listen to this guy, let me be over here, and

668
00:36:08,040 --> 00:36:10,600
Speaker 4: and it was all interesting, nothing was boring.

669
00:36:10,880 --> 00:36:12,920
Speaker 3: But the thing that was that was funny though.

670
00:36:12,920 --> 00:36:15,839
Speaker 4: Was that they had three girls, three women I would say,

671
00:36:16,160 --> 00:36:18,800
Speaker 4: singing background, and a couple of other.

672
00:36:20,239 --> 00:36:22,120
Speaker 3: Yeah, something sweet and got.

673
00:36:22,160 --> 00:36:24,120
Speaker 4: There was a couple other guys in there, and I

674
00:36:24,160 --> 00:36:27,719
Speaker 4: remember them looking at me sideways, you know, and I'm

675
00:36:27,800 --> 00:36:30,040
Speaker 4: up here saying, okay, I have to get my street

676
00:36:30,200 --> 00:36:32,759
Speaker 4: vibe on, you know, because what's going on? Like what

677
00:36:32,840 --> 00:36:34,680
Speaker 4: are these people looking at me like this for?

678
00:36:35,600 --> 00:36:37,080
Speaker 3: So I'm thinking, do I have to make a.

679
00:36:37,040 --> 00:36:39,279
Speaker 4: Phone call, you know, get some of my guys that

680
00:36:39,360 --> 00:36:43,200
Speaker 4: come because this is all me thinking this is not them,

681
00:36:43,440 --> 00:36:46,560
Speaker 4: and because I'm saying, why these daggers being thrown at

682
00:36:46,560 --> 00:36:49,200
Speaker 4: me when I'm here to help. You know, I didn't

683
00:36:49,400 --> 00:36:52,560
Speaker 4: ask to be here. I was encouraged and asked invited

684
00:36:52,600 --> 00:36:54,839
Speaker 4: to be here. And I thought that they were good,

685
00:36:55,160 --> 00:36:57,400
Speaker 4: and I said, well, we just keep them to myself.

686
00:36:57,480 --> 00:37:01,239
Speaker 4: This is all internal, you know, how music is going

687
00:37:01,280 --> 00:37:04,480
Speaker 4: on and people are walking around and I don't know

688
00:37:04,600 --> 00:37:05,440
Speaker 4: any of these people.

689
00:37:05,480 --> 00:37:06,839
Speaker 3: I don't even know cooling.

690
00:37:06,600 --> 00:37:10,000
Speaker 4: Them really, so I'm trying to vibe and make sure

691
00:37:10,040 --> 00:37:11,279
Speaker 4: I'm safe at the same time.

692
00:37:11,360 --> 00:37:12,680
Speaker 3: And you know, I.

693
00:37:12,640 --> 00:37:14,839
Speaker 4: Wasn't a person who hung out in the city, so

694
00:37:14,920 --> 00:37:17,759
Speaker 4: that whole thing, you know, was new too, So you know,

695
00:37:17,800 --> 00:37:18,960
Speaker 4: there's a lot coming at me.

696
00:37:24,360 --> 00:37:29,680
Speaker 1: What were you doing to survive before you joined the

697
00:37:29,760 --> 00:37:36,040
Speaker 1: band and how long was it until you felt secure

698
00:37:36,160 --> 00:37:41,240
Speaker 1: enough that you were making your living as a member

699
00:37:41,239 --> 00:37:41,960
Speaker 1: of Cooling the Game.

700
00:37:42,600 --> 00:37:46,680
Speaker 4: I went to HBCU as well in Norfolk State, Virginia.

701
00:37:46,880 --> 00:37:49,759
Speaker 4: I did two years there and it just wasn't my

702
00:37:49,920 --> 00:37:51,160
Speaker 4: time to be in college.

703
00:37:51,400 --> 00:37:51,640
Speaker 3: You know.

704
00:37:51,840 --> 00:37:54,879
Speaker 4: I was all about music and I didn't study music

705
00:37:55,000 --> 00:37:58,080
Speaker 4: there and I just had a difficult time, so I

706
00:37:58,239 --> 00:38:01,960
Speaker 4: dropped out because music was my passion, you know. But

707
00:38:02,040 --> 00:38:04,160
Speaker 4: when I came home, you know, I was pretty much

708
00:38:04,160 --> 00:38:06,720
Speaker 4: bumming around. I was playing a lot of different bands

709
00:38:07,480 --> 00:38:12,600
Speaker 4: and working odd jobs, got me an apartment and had

710
00:38:12,600 --> 00:38:15,680
Speaker 4: a raggedy car, that type of thing, and you know,

711
00:38:17,040 --> 00:38:18,719
Speaker 4: all of this happened, and then I get.

712
00:38:18,680 --> 00:38:20,120
Speaker 3: The phone call from Cooling Them.

713
00:38:20,400 --> 00:38:23,120
Speaker 4: But I think at seventy nine when we did the

714
00:38:23,200 --> 00:38:27,920
Speaker 4: Ladies and Night album and we started going to Paradise

715
00:38:27,960 --> 00:38:31,560
Speaker 4: Garage and all your different places for promotions and clubs

716
00:38:31,560 --> 00:38:34,320
Speaker 4: and garage yes, yes.

717
00:38:34,160 --> 00:38:35,759
Speaker 3: We did it. What was that?

718
00:38:36,360 --> 00:38:38,920
Speaker 4: I knew that was going to raise the eyebrows, but

719
00:38:39,120 --> 00:38:42,400
Speaker 4: we we actually had the record company did a promotion

720
00:38:42,520 --> 00:38:45,720
Speaker 4: there because you know, it was the greatest sound system

721
00:38:45,800 --> 00:38:47,000
Speaker 4: in the in the city.

722
00:38:47,400 --> 00:38:51,000
Speaker 3: Right, you know, with the with those the speakers, the.

723
00:38:50,960 --> 00:38:53,560
Speaker 4: Speakers right cranked up, you wouldn't even be able to

724
00:38:53,600 --> 00:38:54,480
Speaker 4: hear when you left there.

725
00:38:54,880 --> 00:38:57,480
Speaker 3: But we did a thing when they dropped Ladies'.

726
00:38:57,160 --> 00:39:00,440
Speaker 4: Night at Paradise Garage, you know, which was a appropriate

727
00:39:00,760 --> 00:39:03,719
Speaker 4: and I remember we went up and the DJ called us,

728
00:39:03,719 --> 00:39:06,080
Speaker 4: say cool in the gang the record you know, and

729
00:39:06,200 --> 00:39:06,520
Speaker 4: uh he.

730
00:39:06,600 --> 00:39:08,720
Speaker 3: Said, cool ist here, JT's.

731
00:39:08,320 --> 00:39:12,399
Speaker 4: Here and yeah you know that, you know, and they

732
00:39:12,520 --> 00:39:12,920
Speaker 4: dropped it.

733
00:39:13,000 --> 00:39:16,759
Speaker 1: Dude, I aspired to be his level of DJing like.

734
00:39:16,760 --> 00:39:19,760
Speaker 4: That he was here, awesome man, and he dropped it

735
00:39:21,960 --> 00:39:24,640
Speaker 4: and they hit the floor and everybody just looked at

736
00:39:24,680 --> 00:39:26,120
Speaker 4: each other was just like okay.

737
00:39:26,400 --> 00:39:30,040
Speaker 3: And the record company I think that they knew that

738
00:39:30,160 --> 00:39:31,719
Speaker 3: that they had it right there.

739
00:39:31,800 --> 00:39:37,000
Speaker 4: Because again, nobody expected it to sound like that. You know,

740
00:39:37,360 --> 00:39:39,600
Speaker 4: they looked they were looking for all these horns and everything,

741
00:39:39,680 --> 00:39:40,280
Speaker 4: and they were.

742
00:39:40,160 --> 00:39:43,680
Speaker 3: Like, well, who's who's the who's the voice? Where that

743
00:39:43,760 --> 00:39:44,640
Speaker 3: voice comes from?

744
00:39:45,080 --> 00:39:48,120
Speaker 4: And you know, some people were like, nah, man, that

745
00:39:48,160 --> 00:39:51,200
Speaker 4: can't be cooler then, you know, and some time I

746
00:39:51,239 --> 00:39:53,480
Speaker 4: got I got a little flak back to that, because well,

747
00:39:53,520 --> 00:39:55,279
Speaker 4: I want I want to hear the old stuff, the

748
00:39:55,320 --> 00:39:58,000
Speaker 4: winds down, and they were telling me said, listen, man,

749
00:39:58,719 --> 00:40:04,040
Speaker 4: we weren't eating on that up anymore, right, So yeah,

750
00:40:04,040 --> 00:40:04,960
Speaker 4: it was It was awesome.

751
00:40:05,920 --> 00:40:06,880
Speaker 3: Did I answer the question?

752
00:40:07,239 --> 00:40:07,439
Speaker 1: Yeah?

753
00:40:07,840 --> 00:40:09,880
Speaker 4: Yeah, because that that ladies night out, That's when I

754
00:40:09,920 --> 00:40:13,520
Speaker 4: realized I could I start making a living and you know,

755
00:40:14,000 --> 00:40:15,000
Speaker 4: bost some new clothes.

756
00:40:16,120 --> 00:40:18,359
Speaker 1: I figured as well, this is probably one of the

757
00:40:18,480 --> 00:40:21,520
Speaker 1: rarest chances I get to ask this question, So I'm

758
00:40:21,520 --> 00:40:26,160
Speaker 1: gonna try to ask very careful. Okay, Okay, So what

759
00:40:26,360 --> 00:40:30,520
Speaker 1: could a working class musician make in nineteen seventy nine?

760
00:40:31,120 --> 00:40:37,239
Speaker 1: I mean, I'm basically asking what is a living in

761
00:40:37,360 --> 00:40:40,239
Speaker 1: seventy nine? And I'm only asking this because, okay, like

762
00:40:40,360 --> 00:40:45,800
Speaker 1: hip hop has distorted the expectations of what one should

763
00:40:45,840 --> 00:40:48,680
Speaker 1: expect from this industry because you know, it's such a

764
00:40:48,719 --> 00:40:53,160
Speaker 1: hustling culture and you see everyone just like their money away.

765
00:40:53,840 --> 00:40:58,239
Speaker 1: And the thing is is that my manager kind of

766
00:40:58,280 --> 00:41:02,759
Speaker 1: told us from the G eight, look, I'm not doing this.

767
00:41:02,880 --> 00:41:05,600
Speaker 1: You guys aren't going to ball out of control, like

768
00:41:06,400 --> 00:41:10,719
Speaker 1: you're going to be able to slide your mom some

769
00:41:10,880 --> 00:41:15,279
Speaker 1: very significant petty cash monthly. You'll be able to have

770
00:41:15,560 --> 00:41:20,080
Speaker 1: a half decent crib. And if I do my job right,

771
00:41:21,000 --> 00:41:23,319
Speaker 1: you know, you guys will at least be able to

772
00:41:23,520 --> 00:41:28,200
Speaker 1: make at least what a surgeon would make. At the time,

773
00:41:29,000 --> 00:41:31,120
Speaker 1: I did agree with that, and I'll subscribe to it.

774
00:41:31,239 --> 00:41:33,680
Speaker 1: Now I'm in a mind state where I want to

775
00:41:33,680 --> 00:41:36,719
Speaker 1: be a daredevil and dream my highest dream like, but

776
00:41:37,760 --> 00:41:41,239
Speaker 1: back then I was really small minded with it. But

777
00:41:41,520 --> 00:41:45,960
Speaker 1: that said, you know, I think that's what at least

778
00:41:46,040 --> 00:41:49,719
Speaker 1: for the twenty years of doing the Roots, you know

779
00:41:49,760 --> 00:41:55,480
Speaker 1: before the Tonight show, that that enabled me to not

780
00:41:56,000 --> 00:42:00,480
Speaker 1: have distorted expectations and stay focused, you know, like a

781
00:42:00,480 --> 00:42:03,239
Speaker 1: lot of people after the third or fourth time, like

782
00:42:03,280 --> 00:42:05,920
Speaker 1: it took us four albums to really get to a

783
00:42:05,960 --> 00:42:09,120
Speaker 1: satisfactory place. But I think a lot of people would

784
00:42:09,160 --> 00:42:11,840
Speaker 1: start to give up or start sabotaging their cells for

785
00:42:12,760 --> 00:42:16,120
Speaker 1: And I'm asking this because there really wasn't the standard

786
00:42:16,239 --> 00:42:22,720
Speaker 1: of hip hop baller lifestyles expected for not at all

787
00:42:22,920 --> 00:42:28,279
Speaker 1: black singers. So what could you expect to make a

788
00:42:28,320 --> 00:42:33,080
Speaker 1: living on as elite singer of been established ben with

789
00:42:33,320 --> 00:42:35,359
Speaker 1: albeit with a new lease on life that they didn't

790
00:42:35,400 --> 00:42:37,600
Speaker 1: have before, like NB eighties.

791
00:42:38,840 --> 00:42:41,960
Speaker 4: Our situation, we didn't have that type of manager that

792
00:42:42,000 --> 00:42:45,319
Speaker 4: you had. We were not given any direction as far

793
00:42:45,400 --> 00:42:50,120
Speaker 4: as what you're going to make per se. My expectations

794
00:42:50,160 --> 00:42:54,680
Speaker 4: were simple, Matt, you know how many records did we sell?

795
00:42:55,920 --> 00:42:56,320
Speaker 3: Okay?

796
00:42:56,840 --> 00:43:03,360
Speaker 4: We got six of us record label gets. Okay, so

797
00:43:03,400 --> 00:43:10,400
Speaker 4: where's that was left over? And that wasn't happening now.

798
00:43:11,480 --> 00:43:15,560
Speaker 4: I couldn't rock the boat at that point because I

799
00:43:15,600 --> 00:43:21,840
Speaker 4: didn't really have the cachet, the the input, the in

800
00:43:22,040 --> 00:43:28,319
Speaker 4: seniority to do that. So they were rationing out weekly income.

801
00:43:28,680 --> 00:43:30,720
Speaker 1: So you were getting paid like a rookie.

802
00:43:30,719 --> 00:43:34,160
Speaker 4: Like a rookie, right, but enough to live better than

803
00:43:34,200 --> 00:43:38,400
Speaker 4: I was living just about a little bit more above that.

804
00:43:39,200 --> 00:43:43,120
Speaker 4: And we were we were actually working so much that

805
00:43:43,560 --> 00:43:46,520
Speaker 4: it should have been maybe five to ten times more

806
00:43:46,560 --> 00:43:49,640
Speaker 4: than that, you know, because we were killing it. We were,

807
00:43:49,719 --> 00:43:53,479
Speaker 4: and we were like working every day like like seem

808
00:43:53,560 --> 00:43:57,120
Speaker 4: like we've never never stopped. So the money really wasn't

809
00:43:57,160 --> 00:43:59,560
Speaker 4: adding up with the hits and how much we were touring.

810
00:44:00,160 --> 00:44:03,560
Speaker 4: And my family started asking that question. I go, okay,

811
00:44:03,680 --> 00:44:06,680
Speaker 4: well get your apartment. You got a decent car now,

812
00:44:07,239 --> 00:44:11,879
Speaker 4: and I could when I wanted to slide my mother

813
00:44:11,960 --> 00:44:14,960
Speaker 4: that money you were talking about, I didn't have as

814
00:44:15,080 --> 00:44:18,799
Speaker 4: much as I thought to do that, because at the time,

815
00:44:18,840 --> 00:44:20,960
Speaker 4: you don't really need a whole lot, you know, you

816
00:44:21,120 --> 00:44:25,839
Speaker 4: just kind of still in the midst of the musical part,

817
00:44:26,320 --> 00:44:29,080
Speaker 4: you know, and you just expect the money to be there.

818
00:44:29,120 --> 00:44:32,160
Speaker 4: You got around people around you. I'm with cooling them.

819
00:44:32,160 --> 00:44:34,920
Speaker 4: They've been around here since the sixties. You know, all

820
00:44:34,960 --> 00:44:36,120
Speaker 4: this is going to come around.

821
00:44:37,000 --> 00:44:38,640
Speaker 3: And it was fine, you know.

822
00:44:38,680 --> 00:44:44,479
Speaker 4: When I started asking questions, that's when I started finding out, you.

823
00:44:44,400 --> 00:44:47,080
Speaker 3: Know, all of the the side.

824
00:44:46,840 --> 00:44:51,359
Speaker 4: Deals, all the things that were not there, and you know,

825
00:44:51,400 --> 00:44:54,680
Speaker 4: you just kind of find your way through speak when

826
00:44:54,680 --> 00:44:57,640
Speaker 4: you can't speak. And some of the people that we

827
00:44:57,640 --> 00:45:00,239
Speaker 4: were working with, you know, I was told, you know, well,

828
00:45:00,239 --> 00:45:02,560
Speaker 4: you can't talk to these people like that. I said, well,

829
00:45:04,000 --> 00:45:07,239
Speaker 4: if I'm being a man, no one's gonna stop me

830
00:45:07,320 --> 00:45:10,960
Speaker 4: from talking and speaking up for myself. I'm not trying

831
00:45:11,000 --> 00:45:13,040
Speaker 4: to be a bad guy and sweet guy nothing. I'm

832
00:45:13,080 --> 00:45:16,080
Speaker 4: just gonna say that this fit ain't right, you know,

833
00:45:16,280 --> 00:45:18,880
Speaker 4: and this should be a little bit more balanced right here,

834
00:45:19,480 --> 00:45:19,719
Speaker 4: you know.

835
00:45:19,840 --> 00:45:21,720
Speaker 3: So that was always my position.

836
00:45:22,040 --> 00:45:26,520
Speaker 1: Were the people that were running Delight Records, the same

837
00:45:26,680 --> 00:45:31,600
Speaker 1: people by the time you got in the seventy nine position.

838
00:45:32,040 --> 00:45:36,920
Speaker 1: You're tenure in nineteen seventy nine. Because Ronald told me

839
00:45:37,000 --> 00:45:40,759
Speaker 1: that he was very careful with his words, but he's

840
00:45:40,800 --> 00:45:45,360
Speaker 1: basically insinuating to me that the whole Jungle Boogee story

841
00:45:46,080 --> 00:45:51,000
Speaker 1: was kind of at the insistence of some friends of ours.

842
00:45:51,600 --> 00:45:53,320
Speaker 3: I would say that, yes, I heard that.

843
00:45:53,560 --> 00:45:56,280
Speaker 1: Aah, that kind of hitman level.

844
00:45:56,320 --> 00:46:01,040
Speaker 3: Okay, well, the same same people. Wow, I see, and

845
00:46:01,320 --> 00:46:02,480
Speaker 3: you understand I was saying.

846
00:46:05,360 --> 00:46:08,440
Speaker 1: I totally understand what you're saying.

847
00:46:08,880 --> 00:46:11,080
Speaker 2: I'm so glad for once it's not my people who

848
00:46:11,080 --> 00:46:12,799
Speaker 2: are just screwing up.

849
00:46:13,320 --> 00:46:16,040
Speaker 3: It was you. It was you.

850
00:46:16,080 --> 00:46:18,120
Speaker 1: Have you read Mars Leavey's hit Man?

851
00:46:18,280 --> 00:46:20,400
Speaker 3: No not yet, No, No, I haven't.

852
00:46:20,960 --> 00:46:24,040
Speaker 1: Now that's that's the book that exposes the you know,

853
00:46:25,200 --> 00:46:29,040
Speaker 1: that's what built Jerry's, the whole game, Jersey, Sylvie Robbinson,

854
00:46:29,080 --> 00:46:29,640
Speaker 1: all them people.

855
00:46:30,040 --> 00:46:32,080
Speaker 2: So I'm sorry, let me let me interject here. So

856
00:46:32,200 --> 00:46:34,480
Speaker 2: what about the publishing side of things though? Was that

857
00:46:34,640 --> 00:46:38,600
Speaker 2: also sort of shady because you were you were writing

858
00:46:38,680 --> 00:46:39,880
Speaker 2: some of these big hits.

859
00:46:40,200 --> 00:46:42,880
Speaker 4: Yeah, because when I came into the group and I again,

860
00:46:42,920 --> 00:46:46,279
Speaker 4: when I started peeping some of the stuff, it was

861
00:46:46,320 --> 00:46:49,520
Speaker 4: more like they had told me they had a deal

862
00:46:50,280 --> 00:46:53,640
Speaker 4: that was already set when I came in, So I

863
00:46:53,760 --> 00:46:58,279
Speaker 4: kind of had to buy into what was already established.

864
00:46:59,120 --> 00:47:02,919
Speaker 4: Right I was within a separate entity. I was now

865
00:47:03,239 --> 00:47:06,920
Speaker 4: a part of the of the entity. And with that

866
00:47:06,920 --> 00:47:10,960
Speaker 4: that means that I was I had to adopt some

867
00:47:11,000 --> 00:47:13,279
Speaker 4: of the things that they had already had in order,

868
00:47:14,360 --> 00:47:16,520
Speaker 4: and that really wasn't anything I could do about it.

869
00:47:16,880 --> 00:47:21,040
Speaker 1: I do have a question about the repertoire when you

870
00:47:21,080 --> 00:47:23,319
Speaker 1: first get in the group. You know, as I said

871
00:47:23,320 --> 00:47:25,959
Speaker 1: at the top of the show, there's like almost five

872
00:47:26,040 --> 00:47:29,160
Speaker 1: to six levels of the band's history that one could

873
00:47:29,160 --> 00:47:32,920
Speaker 1: gravitate towards. If you're into a lot of early wrap samples,

874
00:47:33,600 --> 00:47:35,640
Speaker 1: then you know, the first three years are you bag

875
00:47:36,360 --> 00:47:40,319
Speaker 1: for kind of like the first real true steps into

876
00:47:40,480 --> 00:47:45,520
Speaker 1: funk territory, not soul funk. There's there's an era of

877
00:47:45,600 --> 00:47:49,000
Speaker 1: like you know, seventy four is seventy nine, and then

878
00:47:49,040 --> 00:47:52,719
Speaker 1: there's the disco period seventy seven whatever, and then here

879
00:47:52,800 --> 00:47:56,480
Speaker 1: comes the hits seventy nine and so on. When you

880
00:47:56,560 --> 00:48:01,000
Speaker 1: guys are putting your shows together, is there me attention

881
00:48:01,200 --> 00:48:06,120
Speaker 1: being paid to for the kind of pre wild and

882
00:48:06,160 --> 00:48:12,839
Speaker 1: peaceful catalog songs or songs like NT or ron Hamburger

883
00:48:14,080 --> 00:48:18,840
Speaker 1: or like a lot of these, or are they still

884
00:48:19,080 --> 00:48:21,479
Speaker 1: a part of the show, like the instrumental part of

885
00:48:21,320 --> 00:48:21,920
Speaker 1: the group.

886
00:48:23,160 --> 00:48:25,279
Speaker 3: Not really, that was once you came in.

887
00:48:25,360 --> 00:48:30,120
Speaker 4: Then it was just yeah, well sing not totally, but

888
00:48:30,120 --> 00:48:32,040
Speaker 4: but you know, Ronald, everybody was like, listen, man, they

889
00:48:32,080 --> 00:48:33,120
Speaker 4: want to hear the new songs.

890
00:48:33,400 --> 00:48:35,040
Speaker 3: And I said, yeah, but we got the we have

891
00:48:35,120 --> 00:48:38,399
Speaker 3: the best of both worlds here, guys. And I used

892
00:48:38,400 --> 00:48:39,760
Speaker 3: to preach.

893
00:48:39,840 --> 00:48:41,920
Speaker 4: I said, man, we have to play open sesame tonight,

894
00:48:42,200 --> 00:48:43,640
Speaker 4: and it depends on where we were playing.

895
00:48:43,640 --> 00:48:44,759
Speaker 1: Wait a minute, they wouldn't do that.

896
00:48:45,120 --> 00:48:47,480
Speaker 3: No, we didn't that a hit.

897
00:48:47,600 --> 00:48:49,840
Speaker 1: I'm talking about like obscure and stuff.

898
00:48:50,600 --> 00:48:51,799
Speaker 3: Yeah, once in a while.

899
00:48:52,000 --> 00:48:54,239
Speaker 4: And I said that we would because you know, we

900
00:48:54,360 --> 00:48:56,720
Speaker 4: always had great segues into songs.

901
00:48:56,800 --> 00:48:58,560
Speaker 3: You know, I picked up a lot of that from

902
00:48:58,600 --> 00:49:01,640
Speaker 3: from working with with police, and I.

903
00:49:01,640 --> 00:49:04,239
Speaker 4: Said, we can just sneak that in right here. We

904
00:49:04,320 --> 00:49:08,040
Speaker 4: could sneak in tea right here, or you know, Googoo boxer,

905
00:49:08,360 --> 00:49:15,160
Speaker 4: something like that. Anyway, nasty, nasty, little funky track man.

906
00:49:15,760 --> 00:49:19,280
Speaker 4: And then of course opened sexity and some of the madness.

907
00:49:19,280 --> 00:49:21,120
Speaker 4: I'm sorry, yes, some of the madness. They didn't have

908
00:49:21,160 --> 00:49:24,320
Speaker 4: a problem with that. And Hollywood swinging. We would play that,

909
00:49:24,719 --> 00:49:28,239
Speaker 4: but as far as involving all the other stuff that

910
00:49:28,280 --> 00:49:31,560
Speaker 4: I was grew up on walking to school with, over

911
00:49:31,680 --> 00:49:35,120
Speaker 4: time it just was moved out. And each album that

912
00:49:35,200 --> 00:49:37,840
Speaker 4: we did, because we had like a almost a decade

913
00:49:37,920 --> 00:49:41,279
Speaker 4: run of just top ten or top five hits, that

914
00:49:42,520 --> 00:49:44,879
Speaker 4: those are the songs that they said people wanted to play,

915
00:49:44,920 --> 00:49:49,680
Speaker 4: and the audience became more global, and the global audience

916
00:49:49,719 --> 00:49:51,560
Speaker 4: didn't know all of those songs that we that you

917
00:49:51,640 --> 00:49:53,640
Speaker 4: and I like, you know, the nts and all that

918
00:49:54,120 --> 00:49:57,000
Speaker 4: they knew, celebration and all this.

919
00:49:57,200 --> 00:50:03,600
Speaker 3: And I remember when we did Joanna. You know this,

920
00:50:03,880 --> 00:50:06,000
Speaker 3: this is one of the most hurtful things that ever

921
00:50:06,120 --> 00:50:12,160
Speaker 3: happened to me. And no, no, I was good, but.

922
00:50:13,680 --> 00:50:14,439
Speaker 1: The way they're done.

923
00:50:17,040 --> 00:50:21,200
Speaker 4: And we were doing Joanna, and we we had this

924
00:50:21,400 --> 00:50:25,880
Speaker 4: black station and you know, we rolling everything and the

925
00:50:26,000 --> 00:50:28,120
Speaker 4: an R guy was trying to get the record played.

926
00:50:28,920 --> 00:50:31,120
Speaker 4: I don't think it was down with butter down there

927
00:50:31,440 --> 00:50:34,880
Speaker 4: in Philly. Uh, it was something like a big station

928
00:50:35,040 --> 00:50:38,320
Speaker 4: like that. But anyway, they said that it wasn't black

929
00:50:38,480 --> 00:50:41,400
Speaker 4: enough quest. I'm telling you, I remember going back to

930
00:50:41,560 --> 00:50:47,000
Speaker 4: my room and walking, just pacing in my room, back

931
00:50:47,040 --> 00:50:48,960
Speaker 4: and forth. I don't know how long I did it,

932
00:50:49,719 --> 00:50:51,960
Speaker 4: and almost like water coming out of my eyes right,

933
00:50:52,800 --> 00:50:55,960
Speaker 4: And I'm saying, I'm thinking about Frankie Lineman and all

934
00:50:56,040 --> 00:50:59,160
Speaker 4: these guys that paved the way to do all these things,

935
00:50:59,239 --> 00:51:03,120
Speaker 4: from from you know, jazz to Leontine Price and all

936
00:51:03,200 --> 00:51:07,279
Speaker 4: the I'm thinking about all of them that were you know,

937
00:51:07,440 --> 00:51:10,040
Speaker 4: couldn't even dress in the dressing room, had to come

938
00:51:10,120 --> 00:51:10,879
Speaker 4: in the back door.

939
00:51:11,000 --> 00:51:12,359
Speaker 3: That all this is in my head.

940
00:51:12,760 --> 00:51:15,040
Speaker 4: We were going through civil rights and you know, we're

941
00:51:15,080 --> 00:51:18,000
Speaker 4: trying to find our way through. And I'm doing this song,

942
00:51:18,120 --> 00:51:21,160
Speaker 4: this melodic song that is a part of me. And

943
00:51:21,280 --> 00:51:23,279
Speaker 4: if it's part of me and me and the group,

944
00:51:23,719 --> 00:51:26,160
Speaker 4: then it's a part of black America, you know. So

945
00:51:26,280 --> 00:51:30,080
Speaker 4: how could somebody black tell me that it's not black enough?

946
00:51:30,320 --> 00:51:33,160
Speaker 4: I said, what is black enough mean? So that was

947
00:51:33,200 --> 00:51:36,800
Speaker 4: the first time I was hit with that. And I

948
00:51:36,840 --> 00:51:40,160
Speaker 4: remember calling my mother and I said, Mom, I said,

949
00:51:41,000 --> 00:51:44,120
Speaker 4: I said, they said I wasn't my singing ain't black enough?

950
00:51:44,200 --> 00:51:44,320
Speaker 4: You know?

951
00:51:45,440 --> 00:51:48,080
Speaker 3: And she said something, she told me, she eased my mind.

952
00:51:48,200 --> 00:51:52,240
Speaker 3: She said, that's a good thing. That means that you're different.

953
00:51:53,760 --> 00:51:56,080
Speaker 4: They try to tell you that you're supposed to sound

954
00:51:56,360 --> 00:51:58,880
Speaker 4: like something they want you to sound like, but you

955
00:51:59,000 --> 00:52:02,080
Speaker 4: don't sound like that, so that makes you unique.

956
00:52:03,760 --> 00:52:04,480
Speaker 3: How you feeling?

957
00:52:06,280 --> 00:52:09,920
Speaker 4: And it sobered me up because it reminded me that

958
00:52:10,600 --> 00:52:16,880
Speaker 4: you've grown into this rainbow of styles from from the

959
00:52:17,080 --> 00:52:21,480
Speaker 4: little transistor radio to the Philea Soul and then hearing

960
00:52:21,600 --> 00:52:25,839
Speaker 4: all my heroes like the Motown and the Philly International

961
00:52:26,040 --> 00:52:29,160
Speaker 4: Sounds and all this and Stacks Records and all these

962
00:52:29,200 --> 00:52:34,800
Speaker 4: different great people and you're amongst those people now. So

963
00:52:34,960 --> 00:52:38,319
Speaker 4: you don't have to try to be anybody but who

964
00:52:38,400 --> 00:52:40,920
Speaker 4: you are, and that is a black man who can

965
00:52:41,000 --> 00:52:47,440
Speaker 4: do rock, funk, jazz, love, the love the classics, Leontine Price,

966
00:52:48,120 --> 00:52:49,080
Speaker 4: love Stravinski.

967
00:52:49,560 --> 00:52:51,600
Speaker 3: You know what I mean, You can, It doesn't matter.

968
00:52:52,040 --> 00:52:55,280
Speaker 3: It's not a colored thing with music. So she cooled

969
00:52:55,440 --> 00:52:58,520
Speaker 3: my little ass down real quick and said, you know

970
00:52:59,200 --> 00:53:02,640
Speaker 3: know who you are are, your tailor, and people have

971
00:53:02,800 --> 00:53:06,800
Speaker 3: already given you the christen you. You know that that

972
00:53:06,960 --> 00:53:08,160
Speaker 3: they accept what you are.

973
00:53:08,440 --> 00:53:10,759
Speaker 4: So don't you start thinking that you have to be

974
00:53:10,960 --> 00:53:14,600
Speaker 4: somebody else just because the radio station said this song

975
00:53:14,680 --> 00:53:17,680
Speaker 4: ain't black enough. Maybe not for what they want to play,

976
00:53:18,360 --> 00:53:22,600
Speaker 4: but globally the world has already said we love this.

977
00:53:23,360 --> 00:53:25,440
Speaker 1: You also got the last laugh, bro.

978
00:53:25,800 --> 00:53:28,320
Speaker 3: I mean, yeah, yeah, it was, it was, it was.

979
00:53:28,520 --> 00:53:31,520
Speaker 3: It was a traumatic time, bro, you know what I mean.

980
00:53:36,280 --> 00:53:38,160
Speaker 1: This is the dumbest question I'm ever going to ask

981
00:53:38,239 --> 00:53:41,759
Speaker 1: in my professional career, but this is the only chance

982
00:53:41,800 --> 00:53:45,680
Speaker 1: I get to ask it. When you shot that schlitch

983
00:53:45,719 --> 00:53:53,600
Speaker 1: maat liquor bull commercial, come on, come on, there was

984
00:53:53,719 --> 00:53:57,760
Speaker 1: never a real bull on the premises, right hell no, okay,

985
00:53:57,880 --> 00:53:59,080
Speaker 1: I would.

986
00:53:58,920 --> 00:54:03,960
Speaker 3: Have been gone before he broke through that. That was

987
00:54:04,000 --> 00:54:07,520
Speaker 3: a pretty good pre uh editing right pre.

988
00:54:07,560 --> 00:54:11,680
Speaker 1: Ai to this day when I go down a rabbit

989
00:54:11,719 --> 00:54:17,040
Speaker 1: hole on YouTube, I literally watched all forty five minutes

990
00:54:17,160 --> 00:54:23,360
Speaker 1: of every slitch won't like a Bull commercial, Very great running,

991
00:54:23,400 --> 00:54:25,640
Speaker 1: and I always wanted to know they used.

992
00:54:25,480 --> 00:54:25,880
Speaker 3: To edit it.

993
00:54:26,080 --> 00:54:28,520
Speaker 4: I mean, I hope I'll didn't ruin it for everybody,

994
00:54:28,600 --> 00:54:32,360
Speaker 4: but but yeah, we suggest you know, just looking running.

995
00:54:32,640 --> 00:54:34,320
Speaker 1: Yeah I got, but that was that was.

996
00:54:34,480 --> 00:54:36,440
Speaker 3: That was a hot commercial for a long time. It was.

997
00:54:37,280 --> 00:54:39,600
Speaker 1: It was man like, Yeah, it was a big deal

998
00:54:39,640 --> 00:54:43,279
Speaker 1: because you never saw like your favorites on that level.

999
00:54:43,360 --> 00:54:47,120
Speaker 1: My dad especially liked it because sometimes they would juxtapose,

1000
00:54:47,239 --> 00:54:49,840
Speaker 1: like you know, I think you guys did a version

1001
00:54:50,120 --> 00:54:51,760
Speaker 1: and there was the platters as well.

1002
00:54:52,120 --> 00:54:54,200
Speaker 3: That we did went with the four tops or the

1003
00:54:54,239 --> 00:54:54,759
Speaker 3: four tops.

1004
00:54:54,840 --> 00:54:58,040
Speaker 1: Yeah, like yeah, my dad, my dad comes from you know,

1005
00:54:58,120 --> 00:55:01,239
Speaker 1: the fifties Erasode and it was like important to see

1006
00:55:02,160 --> 00:55:04,560
Speaker 1: the group seems like represented absolutely.

1007
00:55:04,760 --> 00:55:04,960
Speaker 5: Yeah.

1008
00:55:05,120 --> 00:55:08,400
Speaker 1: So when I first got my record deal, like I

1009
00:55:08,480 --> 00:55:13,520
Speaker 1: would say that my first splurge, Like, okay, I made it.

1010
00:55:14,600 --> 00:55:17,000
Speaker 1: It's not much. There was too much of a build up,

1011
00:55:17,160 --> 00:55:22,880
Speaker 1: but you know for me, sneakers and my record collection,

1012
00:55:24,160 --> 00:55:26,880
Speaker 1: that was it. Yeah, it was all I wanted to

1013
00:55:26,960 --> 00:55:32,160
Speaker 1: do in like for you, what was your first like extravagant,

1014
00:55:33,280 --> 00:55:35,000
Speaker 1: I want cheese on my whopper like.

1015
00:55:36,000 --> 00:55:36,680
Speaker 3: That type of thing.

1016
00:55:37,040 --> 00:55:42,160
Speaker 4: Let me see, I think I got my first Mercedes, okay,

1017
00:55:42,400 --> 00:55:44,560
Speaker 4: because before, as I said, I had my own apartment,

1018
00:55:45,239 --> 00:55:47,520
Speaker 4: you know, barely paying the bill, you know, at a

1019
00:55:47,640 --> 00:55:50,879
Speaker 4: Ramity car, so you know, the being showed a little

1020
00:55:50,960 --> 00:55:54,200
Speaker 4: little prestige. Man, you know, let me get a decent

1021
00:55:54,320 --> 00:55:56,200
Speaker 4: car because they could call that I had. I'm gonna

1022
00:55:56,200 --> 00:56:00,320
Speaker 4: tell you this, the call I had, it had didn't

1023
00:56:00,400 --> 00:56:05,000
Speaker 4: hit from the side on the passenger side, right so

1024
00:56:05,080 --> 00:56:08,160
Speaker 4: whenever I went to pick somebody up, I would drive

1025
00:56:08,400 --> 00:56:10,359
Speaker 4: and pomp on the driver's side.

1026
00:56:15,440 --> 00:56:16,520
Speaker 1: Yeah, I'm gonna tell you something.

1027
00:56:17,400 --> 00:56:18,560
Speaker 3: We had some pride. You know.

1028
00:56:20,920 --> 00:56:23,320
Speaker 1: We had a group a group purchase. We got a

1029
00:56:23,480 --> 00:56:27,480
Speaker 1: land Cruiser that we all shared, whoever needed a land cruiser.

1030
00:56:27,560 --> 00:56:31,600
Speaker 1: I wasn't driving then, but Tarik would often dent that

1031
00:56:31,800 --> 00:56:35,160
Speaker 1: land Cruiser and get to the point where he would

1032
00:56:35,160 --> 00:56:39,600
Speaker 1: pick you know, his lady friends up only on the

1033
00:56:39,760 --> 00:56:41,640
Speaker 1: right side of the street, so that she could.

1034
00:56:41,520 --> 00:56:48,080
Speaker 3: Never see right exactly. That's exactly what I did.

1035
00:56:49,120 --> 00:56:53,560
Speaker 1: I see, I see. When you guys are on tour,

1036
00:56:54,560 --> 00:56:57,120
Speaker 1: do you have to do Don Boyce's at libs on

1037
00:56:57,239 --> 00:56:57,880
Speaker 1: Jungle Boogie?

1038
00:56:58,680 --> 00:57:00,600
Speaker 3: I did? Yeah, I tried.

1039
00:57:01,120 --> 00:57:05,239
Speaker 1: What was your first show like with the group first School?

1040
00:57:05,280 --> 00:57:05,879
Speaker 1: In the Gang show?

1041
00:57:06,520 --> 00:57:10,840
Speaker 4: This is I think this is before we actually started

1042
00:57:10,880 --> 00:57:13,640
Speaker 4: working on Ladies Night. I did a show with them.

1043
00:57:14,560 --> 00:57:16,160
Speaker 1: Oh you were singing with them even before?

1044
00:57:16,800 --> 00:57:19,800
Speaker 4: Yeah, right before we started. Yeah, I all needed one show.

1045
00:57:20,440 --> 00:57:23,920
Speaker 4: And then right after my audition, and I think I

1046
00:57:24,080 --> 00:57:26,600
Speaker 4: did an earth Wind and Fire song on their show.

1047
00:57:27,560 --> 00:57:30,000
Speaker 3: I sang a ballad. I'm trying to remember which one

1048
00:57:30,040 --> 00:57:30,280
Speaker 3: it was.

1049
00:57:30,880 --> 00:57:32,480
Speaker 1: Do you have a wonderful song?

1050
00:57:32,560 --> 00:57:36,080
Speaker 3: For you. Yeah, I don't know, maybe from the Head

1051
00:57:36,160 --> 00:57:37,400
Speaker 3: to the Sky album or something.

1052
00:57:38,040 --> 00:57:38,760
Speaker 1: Oh you went deep?

1053
00:57:38,920 --> 00:57:42,360
Speaker 4: Okay, yeah, something like that, you know, because he asked

1054
00:57:42,360 --> 00:57:44,920
Speaker 4: me because he just wanted to show the people that,

1055
00:57:45,160 --> 00:57:47,000
Speaker 4: you know, just I'll see how I you know.

1056
00:57:49,360 --> 00:57:52,280
Speaker 3: Or something. Yeah, you know, and it was very smart.

1057
00:57:52,320 --> 00:57:54,440
Speaker 1: But yeah, I mean, you're the lead singer. How do

1058
00:57:54,520 --> 00:57:59,200
Speaker 1: you know things like eye contact and communicating with the

1059
00:57:59,280 --> 00:58:02,600
Speaker 1: audience and you know, make the whole room feel like,

1060
00:58:04,160 --> 00:58:07,320
Speaker 1: you know, the things that you will probably have to

1061
00:58:07,480 --> 00:58:10,200
Speaker 1: lodge one hundred shows under your belt to truly know,

1062
00:58:10,520 --> 00:58:13,000
Speaker 1: like back in your hand? Are you just being thrown

1063
00:58:13,080 --> 00:58:14,600
Speaker 1: in the river? Like singer swim?

1064
00:58:14,960 --> 00:58:15,480
Speaker 3: She was up?

1065
00:58:16,120 --> 00:58:19,240
Speaker 4: But see again, as I said, I wasn't threatened by that,

1066
00:58:19,680 --> 00:58:21,760
Speaker 4: not not about being on the front of the stage,

1067
00:58:21,800 --> 00:58:24,960
Speaker 4: because I was always that guy. Like if I had

1068
00:58:25,000 --> 00:58:28,720
Speaker 4: a band and then the band was called street Dancer

1069
00:58:28,920 --> 00:58:31,959
Speaker 4: or or or play a Soul, I was always JT

1070
00:58:32,800 --> 00:58:33,840
Speaker 4: you know, and got it.

1071
00:58:33,920 --> 00:58:36,640
Speaker 1: And we were thre if that wasn't your first show ever.

1072
00:58:36,800 --> 00:58:39,040
Speaker 3: Like you no, No, When I was thirteen we did

1073
00:58:39,120 --> 00:58:40,920
Speaker 3: the Apollo What was that?

1074
00:58:41,240 --> 00:58:41,280
Speaker 6: Like?

1075
00:58:42,120 --> 00:58:42,880
Speaker 3: That was scary.

1076
00:58:43,680 --> 00:58:46,560
Speaker 4: I think we're like thirteen. We were trying to you know,

1077
00:58:47,080 --> 00:58:49,360
Speaker 4: make this something we were going to do, you know,

1078
00:58:49,440 --> 00:58:52,240
Speaker 4: with like our little band. And in fact, we did

1079
00:58:52,960 --> 00:58:56,640
Speaker 4: the Intruders, Cowboys, the girls, We did the rehearsal. And

1080
00:58:56,760 --> 00:59:00,000
Speaker 4: I never forget at the Apollo, I never I didn't

1081
00:59:00,080 --> 00:59:02,520
Speaker 4: think it was going to be this raggedy downstairs right

1082
00:59:02,800 --> 00:59:05,560
Speaker 4: where all the guests were. And there was the stairs

1083
00:59:05,600 --> 00:59:07,160
Speaker 4: that you had led us, you know, to go up

1084
00:59:07,200 --> 00:59:09,880
Speaker 4: to the stage, and there was this huge rat trap

1085
00:59:11,280 --> 00:59:14,440
Speaker 4: under the staircase. And I'm saying, what the hell and

1086
00:59:14,600 --> 00:59:17,360
Speaker 4: We're all sitting there and I'm saying, okay, so you

1087
00:59:17,560 --> 00:59:21,720
Speaker 4: just blanket out of your mind. So that night, our

1088
00:59:21,800 --> 00:59:25,320
Speaker 4: biggest thing was to make sure that Sandman didn't hook

1089
00:59:25,440 --> 00:59:26,560
Speaker 4: us off stage.

1090
00:59:27,080 --> 00:59:29,560
Speaker 3: That was our goal. If we could do that, we

1091
00:59:29,720 --> 00:59:32,000
Speaker 3: got it. And we actually came in third place.

1092
00:59:32,840 --> 00:59:36,200
Speaker 4: And this guy, uh, this older guy that's saying nat

1093
00:59:36,280 --> 00:59:39,280
Speaker 4: King Cole by the way and on the piano, he

1094
00:59:39,440 --> 00:59:40,200
Speaker 4: won that night.

1095
00:59:40,920 --> 00:59:43,240
Speaker 3: But but we we didn't get pulled off. We just

1096
00:59:43,400 --> 00:59:44,360
Speaker 3: we were in the line.

1097
00:59:44,440 --> 00:59:44,560
Speaker 4: You know.

1098
00:59:45,160 --> 00:59:46,000
Speaker 3: Well first he was.

1099
00:59:46,000 --> 00:59:49,400
Speaker 4: Thinking hand clapped, you know. Third you know, he said, okay,

1100
00:59:49,440 --> 00:59:51,600
Speaker 4: you guys come off, and then he won. So we

1101
00:59:51,680 --> 00:59:54,680
Speaker 4: were just relieved that we that we didn't get pulled

1102
00:59:54,680 --> 00:59:55,560
Speaker 4: off by sand Man.

1103
00:59:56,400 --> 00:59:59,919
Speaker 1: Which member of pulling the gang was the most diplomatic

1104
01:00:01,240 --> 01:00:04,200
Speaker 1: and welcoming you into the fold because you're also a

1105
01:00:04,400 --> 01:00:08,680
Speaker 1: rookie kind of coming to an established house where you know,

1106
01:00:09,000 --> 01:00:12,120
Speaker 1: like even there was a point where Alan Iverson had

1107
01:00:12,160 --> 01:00:14,920
Speaker 1: to carry the bags of six ers that he was

1108
01:00:15,000 --> 01:00:15,560
Speaker 1: better than.

1109
01:00:16,040 --> 01:00:18,800
Speaker 3: Yah, yeah, yeah, yeah, I didn't do any of that.

1110
01:00:19,400 --> 01:00:22,600
Speaker 1: Which member was the most diplomatic in welcoming you into

1111
01:00:22,640 --> 01:00:23,000
Speaker 1: the fold?

1112
01:00:24,480 --> 01:00:28,200
Speaker 4: I would say it was Calise and Cool because Cool

1113
01:00:28,320 --> 01:00:31,840
Speaker 4: at the time. In fact, when we first started going

1114
01:00:31,880 --> 01:00:35,760
Speaker 4: through the House of Music, he actually came up from

1115
01:00:35,880 --> 01:00:39,720
Speaker 4: Jersey City and picked me up from my home and

1116
01:00:40,160 --> 01:00:42,760
Speaker 4: he drove me down and back home. So Cool was

1117
01:00:42,840 --> 01:00:45,680
Speaker 4: more like like that guy. And you know we started

1118
01:00:45,720 --> 01:00:47,880
Speaker 4: hanging out as well. But he and I'll pay it

1119
01:00:48,120 --> 01:00:50,840
Speaker 4: to Calise, I went like to meet his mom, like

1120
01:00:51,000 --> 01:00:55,280
Speaker 4: Cools Calise's mom and stuff like that, you know, and I.

1121
01:00:55,400 --> 01:00:57,600
Speaker 3: Just think they realized I was, like, you know, I

1122
01:00:57,760 --> 01:00:58,960
Speaker 3: was a down guy, like you.

1123
01:00:58,960 --> 01:01:01,320
Speaker 4: Know, like you could you know, I wasn't like a

1124
01:01:01,440 --> 01:01:05,560
Speaker 4: rough rider, you know, but I wasn't wasn't no punk either,

1125
01:01:05,640 --> 01:01:08,160
Speaker 4: you know. I was just like and musically, you know,

1126
01:01:08,280 --> 01:01:10,720
Speaker 4: I could talk to them, and I actually learned so

1127
01:01:10,840 --> 01:01:14,560
Speaker 4: much from just sitting around listening, because my mother said,

1128
01:01:14,600 --> 01:01:15,560
Speaker 4: just keep your ears open.

1129
01:01:15,880 --> 01:01:17,320
Speaker 3: You don't have to talk all the time. You know.

1130
01:01:18,200 --> 01:01:20,160
Speaker 1: Are you significantly younger than them.

1131
01:01:20,160 --> 01:01:23,400
Speaker 3: Or just a few years like three? I think George

1132
01:01:23,520 --> 01:01:28,080
Speaker 3: was three years at least was two. I think Cool

1133
01:01:28,240 --> 01:01:30,800
Speaker 3: was three, so it wasn't too far. But a lot

1134
01:01:30,840 --> 01:01:33,000
Speaker 3: of people thought I was a lot younger than them.

1135
01:01:33,240 --> 01:01:34,439
Speaker 1: I thought you were the baby brother.

1136
01:01:35,120 --> 01:01:36,720
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, yeah, okay.

1137
01:01:37,600 --> 01:01:42,120
Speaker 1: Which remember would you have the most conflicts.

1138
01:01:41,680 --> 01:01:45,720
Speaker 4: With well in the beginning, you know, none, I was.

1139
01:01:45,960 --> 01:01:48,720
Speaker 4: I was hanging out with everybody. But I don't even

1140
01:01:48,800 --> 01:01:52,920
Speaker 4: know where it turned. But uh, for some reason, d

1141
01:01:53,120 --> 01:01:57,440
Speaker 4: ted started. We started rubbing a little bit, you know,

1142
01:01:57,560 --> 01:02:00,560
Speaker 4: and I didn't understand what happened because I was I

1143
01:02:00,680 --> 01:02:01,440
Speaker 4: remember him.

1144
01:02:01,760 --> 01:02:05,640
Speaker 3: In Penwa bringing their daughter Michelle to my room to

1145
01:02:05,720 --> 01:02:10,600
Speaker 3: meet me. Actress Michelle actors yes, the late yeah and.

1146
01:02:12,720 --> 01:02:16,480
Speaker 4: Oracle if that matters, and so you know, it was

1147
01:02:16,600 --> 01:02:20,120
Speaker 4: all all good man were hanging out, party together, and

1148
01:02:20,400 --> 01:02:24,479
Speaker 4: somewhere along the line, you know, we just started friction.

1149
01:02:24,640 --> 01:02:27,920
Speaker 4: And I just didn't understand it because we were constantly,

1150
01:02:28,680 --> 01:02:30,240
Speaker 4: you know, banging out songs.

1151
01:02:30,280 --> 01:02:32,600
Speaker 3: You know, we were in the studio all the time,

1152
01:02:33,040 --> 01:02:34,440
Speaker 3: and if we were in the studio, we were on

1153
01:02:34,520 --> 01:02:38,280
Speaker 3: the road. And most of those albums we were actually

1154
01:02:38,400 --> 01:02:41,160
Speaker 3: touring and would come home off the road and go

1155
01:02:41,320 --> 01:02:44,360
Speaker 3: right to the studio, and we I think for almost

1156
01:02:44,400 --> 01:02:45,440
Speaker 3: a decade, we never.

1157
01:02:45,360 --> 01:02:48,920
Speaker 4: Had a vacation, you know. So I didn't understand with

1158
01:02:49,080 --> 01:02:53,680
Speaker 4: the success what happened. I tend to believe that more

1159
01:02:53,680 --> 01:02:58,320
Speaker 4: of the focus became on me than the group. And

1160
01:02:58,880 --> 01:03:00,720
Speaker 4: and I used to tell them, I said, listen, man,

1161
01:03:01,840 --> 01:03:04,280
Speaker 4: who's in the studio with you, who's.

1162
01:03:04,080 --> 01:03:06,640
Speaker 3: On the stage with you? These people are gonna say

1163
01:03:06,680 --> 01:03:09,920
Speaker 3: whatever they you know, they want and in any band, they.

1164
01:03:10,000 --> 01:03:13,440
Speaker 4: Usually gravitate to the lead singer no matter, you know,

1165
01:03:13,520 --> 01:03:17,120
Speaker 4: if you had the Stone, people know Mick Jacket or Genesis,

1166
01:03:17,200 --> 01:03:18,400
Speaker 4: they know you know Phil, you know.

1167
01:03:18,560 --> 01:03:22,080
Speaker 3: So it's not put you down or anything like that.

1168
01:03:22,240 --> 01:03:23,440
Speaker 3: It's just the way things are.

1169
01:03:23,920 --> 01:03:27,280
Speaker 4: Because I was never into that mindset or you just here,

1170
01:03:27,280 --> 01:03:30,200
Speaker 4: I said, man, listen, if it wasn't for this guy

1171
01:03:30,400 --> 01:03:32,080
Speaker 4: being in the room, this wouldn't have happened.

1172
01:03:32,600 --> 01:03:35,640
Speaker 2: And I never forget that were you singing lead vocals

1173
01:03:36,000 --> 01:03:38,560
Speaker 2: on every song on every album as soon as you

1174
01:03:38,640 --> 01:03:39,440
Speaker 2: started on.

1175
01:03:39,560 --> 01:03:43,200
Speaker 4: Ladies, Yeah, but then on it was all yeah, and

1176
01:03:43,400 --> 01:03:47,160
Speaker 4: in the shows and the shows yes, well, and we

1177
01:03:47,240 --> 01:03:50,320
Speaker 4: didn't have like background singers either, so we had like

1178
01:03:50,480 --> 01:03:55,320
Speaker 4: horn players singing background and that was sometimes you know

1179
01:03:55,400 --> 01:03:57,720
Speaker 4: a bit more stressful for me because I would have

1180
01:03:57,840 --> 01:04:02,040
Speaker 4: to you know, I'm m seeing singing highs and lows

1181
01:04:02,640 --> 01:04:08,680
Speaker 4: singing background dancing and entertaining, and it started wearing me

1182
01:04:08,720 --> 01:04:10,360
Speaker 4: out a little bit, you know, later on.

1183
01:04:11,600 --> 01:04:14,960
Speaker 1: For me, this is a rare chance to find out,

1184
01:04:15,120 --> 01:04:18,720
Speaker 1: like what my life would have been like, you know,

1185
01:04:18,840 --> 01:04:21,360
Speaker 1: had I been born maybe twenty years earlier. Like if

1186
01:04:21,400 --> 01:04:24,280
Speaker 1: me and my best friend in high school still say

1187
01:04:24,360 --> 01:04:26,920
Speaker 1: we started a group in seventy nine instead of ninety three,

1188
01:04:27,080 --> 01:04:29,280
Speaker 1: then this is about as close as I'm going to

1189
01:04:29,320 --> 01:04:32,320
Speaker 1: get to. Hmm. I wonder what it happened if the

1190
01:04:32,440 --> 01:04:36,640
Speaker 1: roots came out like fifteen years earlier. So yeah, was

1191
01:04:36,720 --> 01:04:39,560
Speaker 1: it a strict environment when you entered the group? Like

1192
01:04:39,960 --> 01:04:42,040
Speaker 1: was there rules? Sit here too?

1193
01:04:42,640 --> 01:04:43,520
Speaker 3: Nothing was said.

1194
01:04:44,360 --> 01:04:46,960
Speaker 4: The only thing when we were my first first show

1195
01:04:46,960 --> 01:04:48,880
Speaker 4: I did was till we stopped to get something to eat,

1196
01:04:49,320 --> 01:04:50,960
Speaker 4: and they were trying to convince me not to eat

1197
01:04:51,040 --> 01:04:56,360
Speaker 4: pork because they were only cool and police from most

1198
01:04:56,360 --> 01:04:58,520
Speaker 4: of the people thought the whole band was, but it

1199
01:04:58,680 --> 01:05:01,840
Speaker 4: was only the two of them, and that as you know,

1200
01:05:02,360 --> 01:05:05,840
Speaker 4: I didn't mind that give up bacon then okay food,

1201
01:05:05,920 --> 01:05:10,400
Speaker 4: so but as far as like musically, their vibe like

1202
01:05:10,520 --> 01:05:15,200
Speaker 4: through osmosis so to speak, it premeated you, you know,

1203
01:05:15,760 --> 01:05:20,000
Speaker 4: and my respect for what they did musically, I respected

1204
01:05:20,080 --> 01:05:23,600
Speaker 4: that greatly, So I didn't really want to, you know,

1205
01:05:23,760 --> 01:05:25,640
Speaker 4: upset the cart, you know what I mean. I was

1206
01:05:25,800 --> 01:05:28,920
Speaker 4: kind of like fit in, and I think maybe Calice

1207
01:05:29,000 --> 01:05:31,760
Speaker 4: felt that I had that type of spirit too, like them,

1208
01:05:31,840 --> 01:05:35,760
Speaker 4: because after a while, it was almost like we had.

1209
01:05:35,640 --> 01:05:36,680
Speaker 3: So much to common.

1210
01:05:36,760 --> 01:05:41,280
Speaker 4: Like they moved their parents moved them from Youngstown for Hi,

1211
01:05:42,160 --> 01:05:45,520
Speaker 4: you know, for a better life in Jersey, and my

1212
01:05:45,640 --> 01:05:48,120
Speaker 4: mother moved us from South Carolina for a better life

1213
01:05:48,160 --> 01:05:50,400
Speaker 4: in Jersey. So there was things that we didn't even

1214
01:05:50,440 --> 01:05:54,000
Speaker 4: have to discuss that was just part of our DNA,

1215
01:05:54,920 --> 01:05:58,120
Speaker 4: you know. That made it easy when.

1216
01:05:57,960 --> 01:06:01,840
Speaker 1: You're tracking your vocals, what's the particular environment that you're

1217
01:06:01,960 --> 01:06:04,720
Speaker 1: used to, Like, is it like a whole crowd of

1218
01:06:04,800 --> 01:06:07,600
Speaker 1: them there watching or is it just like do you

1219
01:06:07,680 --> 01:06:12,040
Speaker 1: prefer to be alone and just with police or just

1220
01:06:12,120 --> 01:06:14,320
Speaker 1: someone one person or a mirror.

1221
01:06:15,160 --> 01:06:17,120
Speaker 4: And in the beginning, I was so green that I

1222
01:06:17,200 --> 01:06:22,320
Speaker 4: had to I wasn't accustomed to singing with headphones. Somebody

1223
01:06:22,360 --> 01:06:24,439
Speaker 4: would just say, listen, just put one behind your ear,

1224
01:06:25,320 --> 01:06:27,480
Speaker 4: and that was kind of weird too, you know, because

1225
01:06:27,520 --> 01:06:29,880
Speaker 4: I'm listening to the room and everything. So I had

1226
01:06:30,000 --> 01:06:33,720
Speaker 4: I had had to really make adjustments, and it caused

1227
01:06:33,760 --> 01:06:38,120
Speaker 4: me to sing fragments like like like part of phrase,

1228
01:06:38,320 --> 01:06:41,800
Speaker 4: things like that, you know, you know you sing ladies tonight,

1229
01:06:41,880 --> 01:06:44,000
Speaker 4: you know, girl, y'all got one, you know, then we

1230
01:06:44,080 --> 01:06:46,000
Speaker 4: have to go back, go yah, you know, do it

1231
01:06:46,080 --> 01:06:49,800
Speaker 4: over again instead of singing through. And but I found

1232
01:06:49,840 --> 01:06:52,760
Speaker 4: out that the more that I studied the song and

1233
01:06:52,840 --> 01:06:56,760
Speaker 4: I knew it lyrically, then I could ingest the point

1234
01:06:57,080 --> 01:06:59,880
Speaker 4: of the song and that made it a lot freer

1235
01:07:00,120 --> 01:07:04,040
Speaker 4: for me. But I didn't really care if who was

1236
01:07:04,080 --> 01:07:06,240
Speaker 4: in the studio because I didn't really see him anyway.

1237
01:07:06,600 --> 01:07:09,920
Speaker 4: I would mostly see d O and like Jim Bonafon

1238
01:07:10,520 --> 01:07:13,680
Speaker 4: and maybe somebody who was in the corner. But the

1239
01:07:13,800 --> 01:07:17,800
Speaker 4: concentration was just trying to do the best performance. I

1240
01:07:17,880 --> 01:07:20,360
Speaker 4: really wasn't worried about the people got it.

1241
01:07:20,840 --> 01:07:25,080
Speaker 1: I'm one of those music kids that never gravitates towards

1242
01:07:25,120 --> 01:07:28,040
Speaker 1: the single. And that's because you know, in Philly before

1243
01:07:29,200 --> 01:07:33,080
Speaker 1: kind of in nineteen ninety seven, Bill was signing which

1244
01:07:33,280 --> 01:07:37,400
Speaker 1: like radio conglomerates could pre program all their music, you know,

1245
01:07:37,520 --> 01:07:42,800
Speaker 1: black radio pretty much let their DJs be the tastemaker.

1246
01:07:42,920 --> 01:07:47,080
Speaker 3: And you know, yeah, but DJ's had names, you know, right.

1247
01:07:47,120 --> 01:07:51,600
Speaker 1: So that said cats like Doug Henderson, doctor Perry Johnson,

1248
01:07:51,680 --> 01:07:54,560
Speaker 1: like all the Philly cats spinning the days. You know,

1249
01:07:54,640 --> 01:07:57,680
Speaker 1: it's weird. They played Jones versus Jones.

1250
01:07:58,840 --> 01:08:01,680
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, I know more than.

1251
01:08:01,760 --> 01:08:04,080
Speaker 1: Like Jones versus Jones? Was that even a single?

1252
01:08:04,600 --> 01:08:04,760
Speaker 3: Oh?

1253
01:08:05,480 --> 01:08:09,520
Speaker 1: I recently found out, maybe like four or five years

1254
01:08:09,560 --> 01:08:15,680
Speaker 1: ago that Stevie's Isn't She Lovely? Was never a single?

1255
01:08:16,960 --> 01:08:17,000
Speaker 3: What?

1256
01:08:18,160 --> 01:08:18,960
Speaker 4: That wasn't a single?

1257
01:08:20,080 --> 01:08:20,759
Speaker 1: Never a single?

1258
01:08:21,880 --> 01:08:21,920
Speaker 3: What?

1259
01:08:22,240 --> 01:08:27,160
Speaker 1: But Barry had a genius plan. He basically wanted to

1260
01:08:27,200 --> 01:08:31,840
Speaker 1: guarantee a number one debut. So it was sort of

1261
01:08:31,960 --> 01:08:34,320
Speaker 1: like she use what you want to play off the

1262
01:08:34,400 --> 01:08:38,599
Speaker 1: album and just play it. Most people gravitated towards Isn't

1263
01:08:38,640 --> 01:08:42,800
Speaker 1: She Lovely? But then weird enough, like almost nine months

1264
01:08:42,920 --> 01:08:48,360
Speaker 1: later they'll officially release I Wish Yeah, yeah, like a single.

1265
01:08:48,439 --> 01:08:50,920
Speaker 1: But it's like July of seventy seven.

1266
01:08:51,080 --> 01:08:53,880
Speaker 4: Like that was a great thing about DJs though, because

1267
01:08:54,200 --> 01:08:57,240
Speaker 4: you know before even though what was that the late

1268
01:08:57,400 --> 01:09:01,040
Speaker 4: night Von Hopper and all of them, Frankie Crocker and

1269
01:09:01,120 --> 01:09:03,720
Speaker 4: then they would they would play singles off albums, and

1270
01:09:03,880 --> 01:09:05,519
Speaker 4: that also helped us spread out.

1271
01:09:05,560 --> 01:09:08,240
Speaker 3: So like you, I would find songs and say, oh man,

1272
01:09:08,280 --> 01:09:10,559
Speaker 3: they did this need to be a single, you know, right?

1273
01:09:10,680 --> 01:09:14,040
Speaker 3: And so that was that was the power man.

1274
01:09:14,880 --> 01:09:17,800
Speaker 1: That was a beautiful thing when when something special first

1275
01:09:17,880 --> 01:09:21,320
Speaker 1: came out, they weren't playing take my Heart, even though

1276
01:09:21,320 --> 01:09:24,240
Speaker 1: I know there was the first single, right they was

1277
01:09:24,840 --> 01:09:31,200
Speaker 1: Philly owned Stepping Out. Stepping Out should have been the

1278
01:09:31,320 --> 01:09:33,600
Speaker 1: first single. We weren't mad at to get down on it.

1279
01:09:33,920 --> 01:09:37,760
Speaker 1: That that sufficed. But you know, back when DJs would

1280
01:09:37,760 --> 01:09:40,000
Speaker 1: get promos of the albums three months ahead of.

1281
01:09:40,000 --> 01:09:43,400
Speaker 3: Time, Yeah, why do you think that's so? Watch? Stepping Out?

1282
01:09:43,439 --> 01:09:46,200
Speaker 3: Was that because of the party that the stepping parties

1283
01:09:46,240 --> 01:09:46,719
Speaker 3: they had.

1284
01:09:46,760 --> 01:09:48,400
Speaker 1: I'm in, you know, I'm in added all the keys

1285
01:09:48,439 --> 01:09:53,719
Speaker 1: to it. You're singing in a smooth falsetto. As a DJ,

1286
01:09:55,080 --> 01:09:57,720
Speaker 1: I was like, well, you know, okay, so the group

1287
01:09:57,800 --> 01:10:00,240
Speaker 1: that did this all the time was and I kind

1288
01:10:00,240 --> 01:10:03,240
Speaker 1: of ridicule them for this, but this is also how

1289
01:10:03,280 --> 01:10:06,960
Speaker 1: I live. At the Tonight show. You play any bark

1290
01:10:07,200 --> 01:10:10,240
Speaker 1: song for me now, and I'll tell you the forty

1291
01:10:10,320 --> 01:10:12,240
Speaker 1: five of what they were originally playing.

1292
01:10:12,880 --> 01:10:15,400
Speaker 3: It was like, all right, color over it, right right, yeah.

1293
01:10:15,320 --> 01:10:18,840
Speaker 1: Listen rubek' scube and mix this up and yeah, like

1294
01:10:19,080 --> 01:10:22,720
Speaker 1: shine is earth winding fires on your face or right

1295
01:10:22,920 --> 01:10:25,439
Speaker 1: right right, shaking rumps to the funks, you know what

1296
01:10:25,479 --> 01:10:28,360
Speaker 1: I mean? Like very diprivatve. But in my mind I

1297
01:10:28,560 --> 01:10:32,160
Speaker 1: was like, I was like, I bet you stepping out

1298
01:10:32,520 --> 01:10:35,479
Speaker 1: started as a quasi. Don't stop till you get enough groove.

1299
01:10:35,840 --> 01:10:38,280
Speaker 3: I don't know, but it's possible.

1300
01:10:38,800 --> 01:10:41,040
Speaker 1: Answer this for me. What is the division of labor

1301
01:10:42,360 --> 01:10:45,920
Speaker 1: when you guys are recording in the studio, Like are

1302
01:10:46,000 --> 01:10:49,960
Speaker 1: you all together trying to jam something out? Or is

1303
01:10:50,040 --> 01:10:52,760
Speaker 1: it like here's your part, here's your part, here's your part,

1304
01:10:53,760 --> 01:10:54,960
Speaker 1: and then you write the song later.

1305
01:10:56,040 --> 01:10:56,680
Speaker 3: It was all of that.

1306
01:10:56,880 --> 01:10:59,320
Speaker 4: Sometime we would be playing together, but most of the

1307
01:10:59,439 --> 01:11:03,320
Speaker 4: time after Ladies night, people were bringing bits and pieces

1308
01:11:04,120 --> 01:11:07,160
Speaker 4: like like when when when Charles we did Joanna. Charles

1309
01:11:07,479 --> 01:11:09,920
Speaker 4: came in, it was just an alp a stroke guitar

1310
01:11:11,880 --> 01:11:15,160
Speaker 4: k and he wanted to dedicate it to his mother

1311
01:11:16,240 --> 01:11:18,880
Speaker 4: and we were sitting there and said, okay, dear mom,

1312
01:11:19,040 --> 01:11:22,680
Speaker 4: that's what he called it. We say, well, well what else? Man?

1313
01:11:23,479 --> 01:11:25,040
Speaker 3: And it wasn't really much going on.

1314
01:11:25,560 --> 01:11:27,599
Speaker 4: And I think George was the one that said let's

1315
01:11:27,720 --> 01:11:30,960
Speaker 4: let's let's just take a name Joanna Nobody. It wasn't

1316
01:11:30,960 --> 01:11:31,439
Speaker 4: a Joanna.

1317
01:11:31,479 --> 01:11:33,759
Speaker 3: We knew. He just grabbed a name and it sang

1318
01:11:34,040 --> 01:11:37,920
Speaker 3: really well and we never changed it. For example, who

1319
01:11:38,040 --> 01:11:41,120
Speaker 3: directed that video. I don't know who was that.

1320
01:11:41,800 --> 01:11:46,160
Speaker 4: We shot that acting up in North Bergen on the

1321
01:11:46,240 --> 01:11:50,040
Speaker 4: first part and then over in Lynnhurst, New Jersey at

1322
01:11:50,080 --> 01:11:53,840
Speaker 4: the diner. I forget who who actually shot that though

1323
01:11:54,960 --> 01:11:57,600
Speaker 4: that's a lot of fun in retrospect.

1324
01:11:58,400 --> 01:12:04,080
Speaker 1: How burdis them? What celebration? Because this was it like

1325
01:12:04,240 --> 01:12:07,519
Speaker 1: at the rate where you released this song, do you

1326
01:12:07,680 --> 01:12:12,880
Speaker 1: realize that this song is not just a hit song

1327
01:12:14,160 --> 01:12:16,479
Speaker 1: like that, This song is never ever going to die

1328
01:12:17,200 --> 01:12:19,080
Speaker 1: ever ever ever ever going to die.

1329
01:12:19,640 --> 01:12:21,760
Speaker 4: It's funny you say that because I don't know if

1330
01:12:21,840 --> 01:12:23,560
Speaker 4: you had you had a long talk with police, but

1331
01:12:24,439 --> 01:12:30,640
Speaker 4: I don't think police liked the guitar riff really. There

1332
01:12:30,720 --> 01:12:32,719
Speaker 4: was a part that he didn't like too much because

1333
01:12:32,760 --> 01:12:35,479
Speaker 4: we came off the road and it was it was

1334
01:12:35,520 --> 01:12:36,960
Speaker 4: a part that was done. I think it was a

1335
01:12:37,000 --> 01:12:40,519
Speaker 4: guitar riff, and he was really pissed off about that.

1336
01:12:41,400 --> 01:12:43,920
Speaker 4: We used to take the cassettes home to study.

1337
01:12:44,600 --> 01:12:47,720
Speaker 3: And this is the truth. I played it for my mother.

1338
01:12:48,360 --> 01:12:50,360
Speaker 3: That's what you think about that. She said, you're going

1339
01:12:50,439 --> 01:12:52,800
Speaker 3: to sing that for the rest of your life. Really,

1340
01:12:53,640 --> 01:12:57,840
Speaker 3: i Q I'm telling you, bro. She was always like that.

1341
01:12:58,040 --> 01:12:59,960
Speaker 3: She was intuitive with certain things. You know.

1342
01:13:00,680 --> 01:13:02,040
Speaker 4: She said, you're going to sing that for the rest

1343
01:13:02,040 --> 01:13:04,680
Speaker 4: of your life, and here we are. That's why that

1344
01:13:04,800 --> 01:13:06,880
Speaker 4: was enough for me, but we didn't know as a

1345
01:13:06,920 --> 01:13:07,360
Speaker 4: group though.

1346
01:13:07,840 --> 01:13:12,479
Speaker 1: That song is still in my DJ playlist, but now

1347
01:13:12,800 --> 01:13:18,320
Speaker 1: it has a new meaning because I played the Spanish version. Yeah,

1348
01:13:19,439 --> 01:13:22,800
Speaker 1: and when people like, you know, when people were playing

1349
01:13:22,800 --> 01:13:25,200
Speaker 1: the hook like I'll eq it iss such that they

1350
01:13:25,280 --> 01:13:28,479
Speaker 1: think they're in the regular version, and then when I

1351
01:13:28,560 --> 01:13:31,760
Speaker 1: put the Spanish version on, it's always the moments where

1352
01:13:31,760 --> 01:13:35,280
Speaker 1: they stop and they look at me and it's like

1353
01:13:35,360 --> 01:13:36,640
Speaker 1: they got processed for.

1354
01:13:37,120 --> 01:13:40,120
Speaker 3: Four seconds right right right, and then like they're.

1355
01:13:40,000 --> 01:13:42,760
Speaker 1: Really like it almost energizes the more that you guys

1356
01:13:42,800 --> 01:13:45,439
Speaker 1: would have been so considerate. I mean, Motown used to

1357
01:13:45,479 --> 01:13:47,360
Speaker 1: do that all the time, but whatever.

1358
01:13:47,400 --> 01:13:50,280
Speaker 4: It burdens some to Yeah, that was a big thing

1359
01:13:50,320 --> 01:13:53,040
Speaker 4: to do, but we were really huge a South America.

1360
01:13:54,360 --> 01:13:57,160
Speaker 4: They and that was the labels idea. They said, listen, man,

1361
01:13:57,560 --> 01:14:00,720
Speaker 4: you got a huge following to South America. Let's try

1362
01:14:00,760 --> 01:14:03,759
Speaker 4: the Spanish version. And Diodado actually wrote out the lyrics

1363
01:14:03,800 --> 01:14:04,040
Speaker 4: for me.

1364
01:14:04,560 --> 01:14:06,200
Speaker 1: How did you guys hook up with dia Data?

1365
01:14:06,920 --> 01:14:09,600
Speaker 3: I don't know how he came into play, except that

1366
01:14:09,960 --> 01:14:12,720
Speaker 3: I think he was working at House of Music was a.

1367
01:14:12,760 --> 01:14:17,439
Speaker 4: John Trope if I'm not mistaken, and gave in them

1368
01:14:17,680 --> 01:14:20,679
Speaker 4: talk to him about, you know, producing cool in the gang.

1369
01:14:20,880 --> 01:14:23,280
Speaker 3: That was before I came, So I don't really know

1370
01:14:23,360 --> 01:14:24,559
Speaker 3: that entire story.

1371
01:14:25,120 --> 01:14:29,120
Speaker 2: What was Deodata from your perspective, bringing to the production,

1372
01:14:29,479 --> 01:14:32,640
Speaker 2: to the making of the music or the arrangements or

1373
01:14:32,640 --> 01:14:33,160
Speaker 2: anything like that.

1374
01:14:33,479 --> 01:14:35,360
Speaker 4: Well, the most I had heard, you know, he was

1375
01:14:35,439 --> 01:14:40,360
Speaker 4: this unbelievable arranger. I didn't know much about him, and

1376
01:14:40,479 --> 01:14:42,280
Speaker 4: so I just started looking them up, you know, and

1377
01:14:42,320 --> 01:14:44,080
Speaker 4: I think he had Did he have.

1378
01:14:44,200 --> 01:14:46,519
Speaker 3: Two thousand and one Space Odyssey?

1379
01:14:46,920 --> 01:14:47,080
Speaker 1: Yeah?

1380
01:14:48,040 --> 01:14:51,240
Speaker 4: Yeah, yeah at that time, but beyond But more so

1381
01:14:51,439 --> 01:14:54,360
Speaker 4: than that, I just heard that his collection of and

1382
01:14:54,520 --> 01:14:59,599
Speaker 4: respect that he had as an arranger was pretty pretty

1383
01:14:59,640 --> 01:15:03,200
Speaker 4: watch bread. Everybody that that spoke of him spoke very

1384
01:15:03,240 --> 01:15:06,000
Speaker 4: highly of him. So when he would talk to us

1385
01:15:06,040 --> 01:15:10,080
Speaker 4: about music, it wasn't so much telling us this is

1386
01:15:10,280 --> 01:15:12,800
Speaker 4: that I'm going to put this major chord here and

1387
01:15:12,880 --> 01:15:15,519
Speaker 4: this minor. It wasn't that, it was just he would

1388
01:15:15,560 --> 01:15:17,519
Speaker 4: do it. And he would always do it with a smile,

1389
01:15:17,600 --> 01:15:20,559
Speaker 4: with his little cigarette in his mouth, you know, his piece,

1390
01:15:20,600 --> 01:15:24,720
Speaker 4: and you know, an unassuming guy. But when he brought

1391
01:15:24,800 --> 01:15:28,960
Speaker 4: the orchestra in to do the streaming work, that's when

1392
01:15:29,160 --> 01:15:32,920
Speaker 4: I opened my mind again and saw him. They you know,

1393
01:15:33,080 --> 01:15:36,080
Speaker 4: they greeted him as doctor, and I said yes. And

1394
01:15:37,000 --> 01:15:39,200
Speaker 4: it actually flipped me back to when I was in

1395
01:15:39,800 --> 01:15:43,040
Speaker 4: high school or what was it, maybe grade school, when

1396
01:15:43,120 --> 01:15:46,120
Speaker 4: my my music teacher took us to see how the

1397
01:15:46,240 --> 01:15:49,880
Speaker 4: West was Won in New York the movie but it

1398
01:15:50,040 --> 01:15:52,200
Speaker 4: was a screenplay, and I mean screen was on a

1399
01:15:52,400 --> 01:15:54,960
Speaker 4: movie was on screen, but there was a real orchestra.

1400
01:15:55,160 --> 01:15:57,880
Speaker 4: And that was my first time seeing an orchestra. So

1401
01:15:57,960 --> 01:15:59,960
Speaker 4: when I saw dal do that, you know, I had

1402
01:16:00,200 --> 01:16:05,240
Speaker 4: become accustomed to first be quiet and listen and understand

1403
01:16:05,320 --> 01:16:06,519
Speaker 4: how parts work together.

1404
01:16:07,479 --> 01:16:09,519
Speaker 5: I'm I was always curious what he was bringing to

1405
01:16:09,760 --> 01:16:10,960
Speaker 5: that the recipe.

1406
01:16:11,800 --> 01:16:15,600
Speaker 4: Yeah, it was I again, I'm all ears man and

1407
01:16:16,080 --> 01:16:18,200
Speaker 4: just bringing it all in and I think that his

1408
01:16:18,520 --> 01:16:20,320
Speaker 4: the key thing was just his arrangements.

1409
01:16:21,240 --> 01:16:23,160
Speaker 5: Yeah. Was he playing any of the keyboards?

1410
01:16:24,080 --> 01:16:25,599
Speaker 3: Uh yeah, sometimes he did.

1411
01:16:25,720 --> 01:16:27,800
Speaker 4: Yeah, But he also brought in a couple of people,

1412
01:16:28,160 --> 01:16:31,519
Speaker 4: this guy named Adam on Too Hot. If you listen

1413
01:16:31,600 --> 01:16:34,360
Speaker 4: to Too Hot real close, there's a Fender Roads in

1414
01:16:34,439 --> 01:16:37,800
Speaker 4: the back besides the whole courts that are playing, and

1415
01:16:37,920 --> 01:16:41,439
Speaker 4: it's making these certain movements that each time I I

1416
01:16:42,360 --> 01:16:45,679
Speaker 4: have a band keyboards try to play it, they usually

1417
01:16:45,840 --> 01:16:50,360
Speaker 4: uh miss that because the movements have all these overtones going,

1418
01:16:50,520 --> 01:16:53,960
Speaker 4: you know, for those Roads had that beautiful reverb bottom

1419
01:16:54,000 --> 01:16:54,160
Speaker 4: you know.

1420
01:16:54,520 --> 01:16:58,040
Speaker 3: So, but yeah, he was, he's he's a master man.

1421
01:16:58,120 --> 01:17:00,439
Speaker 3: He's he's a tre as You're no.

1422
01:17:00,640 --> 01:17:03,920
Speaker 4: I think if he had met him, oh the group

1423
01:17:03,960 --> 01:17:05,599
Speaker 4: had met him, we would have all these hits.

1424
01:17:11,240 --> 01:17:15,519
Speaker 1: I would probably say that something special is that's sentimental

1425
01:17:15,600 --> 01:17:17,439
Speaker 1: to me? Because you know I got that for Christmas.

1426
01:17:17,520 --> 01:17:22,519
Speaker 1: It was Christmas. Christmas of eighty one was a special

1427
01:17:22,600 --> 01:17:23,280
Speaker 1: Christmas one.

1428
01:17:23,320 --> 01:17:24,000
Speaker 3: Yeah yeah. Yeah.

1429
01:17:24,120 --> 01:17:27,760
Speaker 1: Of your canon, which album do you feel is your

1430
01:17:29,000 --> 01:17:32,640
Speaker 1: best performance and of your song catalog?

1431
01:17:33,439 --> 01:17:35,320
Speaker 2: How are you going to steal my question, like this

1432
01:17:35,800 --> 01:17:38,719
Speaker 2: mister quest left take it away? Well, no, no, because

1433
01:17:38,760 --> 01:17:40,920
Speaker 2: actually they are coming from you, because it's kind of like,

1434
01:17:41,360 --> 01:17:43,519
Speaker 2: you know, it's kind of you're not supposed to ask

1435
01:17:43,560 --> 01:17:45,920
Speaker 2: this question really, you know, like because they're all in

1436
01:17:46,080 --> 01:17:46,800
Speaker 2: your baby.

1437
01:17:46,840 --> 01:17:47,840
Speaker 1: Yeah, what's your favorite kid?

1438
01:17:47,960 --> 01:17:48,280
Speaker 6: You like?

1439
01:17:48,840 --> 01:17:52,080
Speaker 3: Yeah, right, exactly. But I'll say the album wise, it

1440
01:17:52,120 --> 01:17:55,719
Speaker 3: would be Emergency. Okay, wow, Emergency album.

1441
01:17:56,280 --> 01:17:58,920
Speaker 1: But I think that was also the biggest selling correct.

1442
01:17:59,160 --> 01:18:02,680
Speaker 4: Yeah, double yeah, biggest so but I still say, you know,

1443
01:18:02,880 --> 01:18:07,640
Speaker 4: too Hot has something that's romantic that because when I

1444
01:18:07,720 --> 01:18:10,120
Speaker 4: listened to it, you know, I could listen I remember

1445
01:18:11,080 --> 01:18:15,360
Speaker 4: how again, I was still learning things, and I could

1446
01:18:15,400 --> 01:18:19,680
Speaker 4: hear vocal things that I said, we'll do that now,

1447
01:18:20,000 --> 01:18:23,800
Speaker 4: you know, or things that, being more mature and able

1448
01:18:23,920 --> 01:18:28,519
Speaker 4: to do more with my voice now, things I would

1449
01:18:28,560 --> 01:18:31,040
Speaker 4: have tried something a little different. But I think Too

1450
01:18:31,120 --> 01:18:36,439
Speaker 4: Hot as a song, but Emergency as the album.

1451
01:18:37,400 --> 01:18:39,840
Speaker 1: Wait, I don't know if I got the answer. Did

1452
01:18:40,040 --> 01:18:42,120
Speaker 1: Celebration become burdensome at all?

1453
01:18:42,920 --> 01:18:42,960
Speaker 3: Like?

1454
01:18:43,040 --> 01:18:45,040
Speaker 1: Did it get too big for you? Do you feel

1455
01:18:45,120 --> 01:18:48,160
Speaker 1: like it was ridiculed too much? Was it too successful?

1456
01:18:48,960 --> 01:18:49,760
Speaker 3: No? Not for me?

1457
01:18:50,840 --> 01:18:53,720
Speaker 1: Like this song took you places that I don't think

1458
01:18:53,800 --> 01:18:57,200
Speaker 1: your other contemporaries like they weren't your contemporaries. It wasn't

1459
01:18:57,320 --> 01:19:01,320
Speaker 1: like BT Express or Mass Production or hell, even Earth

1460
01:19:01,360 --> 01:19:04,560
Speaker 1: Wind and Fire kind of stalled at the gate of

1461
01:19:04,600 --> 01:19:06,600
Speaker 1: the early eighties, and you guys were able to go

1462
01:19:06,720 --> 01:19:09,240
Speaker 1: places that they weren't able to go.

1463
01:19:09,880 --> 01:19:13,960
Speaker 4: It was electric man, because again, you know, you know,

1464
01:19:14,080 --> 01:19:17,200
Speaker 4: you write songs and when you finish, you just feel

1465
01:19:17,240 --> 01:19:19,559
Speaker 4: good about it. You don't know what's going to happen

1466
01:19:19,640 --> 01:19:21,439
Speaker 4: with it, you know, you just put your heart and

1467
01:19:21,479 --> 01:19:24,479
Speaker 4: soul into it. And that's basically what we did.

1468
01:19:24,600 --> 01:19:27,360
Speaker 3: And there was the pieces. We had a mechanic over here.

1469
01:19:27,479 --> 01:19:29,800
Speaker 4: One got twisted and knob there, this guy turned that

1470
01:19:29,880 --> 01:19:33,120
Speaker 4: one just did that, and we put it together and

1471
01:19:33,240 --> 01:19:34,160
Speaker 4: the label said, I.

1472
01:19:34,200 --> 01:19:35,160
Speaker 3: Think we got something.

1473
01:19:35,800 --> 01:19:38,639
Speaker 4: But you know, if the machine isn't there a lot

1474
01:19:38,720 --> 01:19:41,880
Speaker 4: of songs that may have been a celebration level, you.

1475
01:19:41,920 --> 01:19:45,200
Speaker 3: Know, don't make it. We had everything, everything was.

1476
01:19:45,240 --> 01:19:48,599
Speaker 4: Lined up for us, you know, and with me becoming

1477
01:19:48,720 --> 01:19:52,520
Speaker 4: more of a face and a sound that was becoming familiar,

1478
01:19:53,439 --> 01:19:53,920
Speaker 4: they kind of.

1479
01:19:53,960 --> 01:19:57,600
Speaker 3: Went with that, you know, and even the yahoos and

1480
01:19:57,640 --> 01:19:58,320
Speaker 3: all that stuff.

1481
01:19:58,360 --> 01:19:59,920
Speaker 4: And you know, I always tell that joke, you know,

1482
01:20:00,280 --> 01:20:03,479
Speaker 4: you're very rarely hear like a black group say Yahoo.

1483
01:20:03,760 --> 01:20:06,759
Speaker 3: You know that that's usually out for the country groups.

1484
01:20:06,760 --> 01:20:09,360
Speaker 3: You know what I mean? Right, But it was again,

1485
01:20:09,560 --> 01:20:12,519
Speaker 3: you know, you got the low voice. It's a solo graces, you.

1486
01:20:12,560 --> 01:20:14,639
Speaker 1: Know, so something for everybody to sing.

1487
01:20:15,000 --> 01:20:16,719
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, and you just sing along.

1488
01:20:16,840 --> 01:20:19,719
Speaker 4: And we talked about the bob mitsfih you're talking about.

1489
01:20:20,120 --> 01:20:21,760
Speaker 4: You know, the worst thing is when you hear them

1490
01:20:21,800 --> 01:20:22,879
Speaker 4: playing the wrong inversion.

1491
01:20:23,680 --> 01:20:26,360
Speaker 1: I'm sure you've been pretty to every version of celebration,

1492
01:20:26,560 --> 01:20:27,040
Speaker 1: knowing the man.

1493
01:20:27,760 --> 01:20:28,639
Speaker 3: I'm telling you, man.

1494
01:20:28,760 --> 01:20:30,720
Speaker 4: And the worst when they tried to get me to

1495
01:20:30,760 --> 01:20:33,640
Speaker 4: come up and sing no, I had too many drinks already, so.

1496
01:20:36,880 --> 01:20:40,240
Speaker 1: Oh, cooler game, saying at our host, Yah, yeah.

1497
01:20:40,120 --> 01:20:42,679
Speaker 3: Exactly, Jay to come down, tell me about.

1498
01:20:42,439 --> 01:20:44,920
Speaker 1: Okay, So if you don't want to answer, you don't

1499
01:20:44,960 --> 01:20:46,920
Speaker 1: have to answer, go go to it.

1500
01:20:47,000 --> 01:20:47,160
Speaker 3: Man.

1501
01:20:47,680 --> 01:20:49,360
Speaker 1: What were the hedonistic eighties?

1502
01:20:49,600 --> 01:20:54,600
Speaker 4: Like girls, girls, girls, some drugs? All right, But we

1503
01:20:54,720 --> 01:20:57,640
Speaker 4: didn't we didn't really really get into that. It was

1504
01:20:57,800 --> 01:21:05,760
Speaker 4: just again, the success became big within a year to

1505
01:21:05,920 --> 01:21:10,120
Speaker 4: two year period that it consumed us in a way

1506
01:21:10,840 --> 01:21:13,719
Speaker 4: that we did. I don't think that the group knew

1507
01:21:13,840 --> 01:21:17,439
Speaker 4: how to be, how to receive it in that way,

1508
01:21:17,560 --> 01:21:17,720
Speaker 4: you know.

1509
01:21:18,600 --> 01:21:21,600
Speaker 1: So for you to come in at seventy nine and

1510
01:21:21,680 --> 01:21:27,280
Speaker 1: you're pretty much coming into a situation one you know

1511
01:21:27,600 --> 01:21:31,120
Speaker 1: that bring success and you're kind of the reason for

1512
01:21:31,240 --> 01:21:36,280
Speaker 1: that success. Yeah, But I always wanted to know for

1513
01:21:36,439 --> 01:21:40,960
Speaker 1: the band members that were there before nineteen sixty nine,

1514
01:21:41,040 --> 01:21:45,559
Speaker 1: before the label deals and all that stuff, or Spike

1515
01:21:45,840 --> 01:21:53,439
Speaker 1: for DT, for Cool, for Calice, for George, what is

1516
01:21:53,520 --> 01:21:54,599
Speaker 1: success for them?

1517
01:21:54,840 --> 01:21:54,880
Speaker 3: Like?

1518
01:21:56,000 --> 01:22:00,120
Speaker 1: I mean, you guys are the only Americans besides as

1519
01:22:00,200 --> 01:22:03,360
Speaker 1: Judie Wattley at do they know it's Christmas?

1520
01:22:04,160 --> 01:22:04,320
Speaker 3: Right?

1521
01:22:04,880 --> 01:22:10,320
Speaker 1: But you guys are at a crazy level of notoriety.

1522
01:22:11,600 --> 01:22:14,960
Speaker 1: So how are they adjusting to this? If you can

1523
01:22:15,040 --> 01:22:15,719
Speaker 1: speak for them.

1524
01:22:16,040 --> 01:22:19,240
Speaker 3: I really can't. But all I know is that we

1525
01:22:19,360 --> 01:22:21,080
Speaker 3: all shared and everything equally.

1526
01:22:22,000 --> 01:22:25,000
Speaker 4: It wasn't like at a certain point, you know, when

1527
01:22:25,000 --> 01:22:27,840
Speaker 4: we were at one time flying coach, you know what

1528
01:22:27,920 --> 01:22:31,320
Speaker 4: I mean, you're flying first class full you know, when

1529
01:22:31,400 --> 01:22:35,200
Speaker 4: at tension started happening, I started having my own car.

1530
01:22:35,520 --> 01:22:38,960
Speaker 4: Stuff like that happened. But when we hit the stage,

1531
01:22:39,120 --> 01:22:41,840
Speaker 4: it was about let's go take this, Let's put the

1532
01:22:41,920 --> 01:22:45,080
Speaker 4: flag down, you know, And and all of this stuff

1533
01:22:45,160 --> 01:22:49,439
Speaker 4: really helped me segue into my solo career, right, it was.

1534
01:22:49,520 --> 01:22:52,080
Speaker 4: It was a really proven ground, but I can't really

1535
01:22:52,160 --> 01:22:57,520
Speaker 4: speak to how they received it, whether they were overjoyed,

1536
01:22:57,840 --> 01:23:01,479
Speaker 4: because they never said to me me, you know, don't

1537
01:23:01,479 --> 01:23:04,080
Speaker 4: forget this is the group, you know, or don't think

1538
01:23:04,120 --> 01:23:07,680
Speaker 4: you're too big, and stuff like that that came from outside,

1539
01:23:08,560 --> 01:23:08,720
Speaker 4: you know.

1540
01:23:09,120 --> 01:23:11,559
Speaker 3: And it was time for me to make my exit.

1541
01:23:11,840 --> 01:23:14,519
Speaker 4: It had reached a height where that type of tension

1542
01:23:14,920 --> 01:23:19,000
Speaker 4: had gotten to too much and I didn't think that

1543
01:23:19,080 --> 01:23:20,559
Speaker 4: they had my back anymore.

1544
01:23:20,840 --> 01:23:23,519
Speaker 3: And we did a show it and I forget it.

1545
01:23:23,600 --> 01:23:28,600
Speaker 4: New Year's done, Atlantic City, and I had flu and

1546
01:23:28,720 --> 01:23:31,080
Speaker 4: I was really, really sick, and of course back then

1547
01:23:31,360 --> 01:23:34,280
Speaker 4: I was about one p fifty, you know what I mean,

1548
01:23:34,680 --> 01:23:38,479
Speaker 4: soaking wet, and we had been touring and it was

1549
01:23:38,520 --> 01:23:40,519
Speaker 4: the end of the year, and you know, New Year's

1550
01:23:40,600 --> 01:23:41,720
Speaker 4: was always big money night.

1551
01:23:42,280 --> 01:23:45,599
Speaker 3: And I was sick, but I refused not to perform.

1552
01:23:46,080 --> 01:23:51,639
Speaker 4: And I went out there and sound voices half gone,

1553
01:23:52,439 --> 01:23:55,720
Speaker 4: and I doing cherish and I closed. I closed my

1554
01:23:55,800 --> 01:23:59,120
Speaker 4: eyes and when I tried to open them, all I

1555
01:23:59,240 --> 01:24:03,800
Speaker 4: saw was no not an object, just a wall of red,

1556
01:24:04,040 --> 01:24:07,920
Speaker 4: like just red. And I froze and I opened my

1557
01:24:08,000 --> 01:24:11,920
Speaker 4: eyes again, and it came open, but then it went

1558
01:24:12,040 --> 01:24:15,760
Speaker 4: red again, and I got scared to death man, and

1559
01:24:15,920 --> 01:24:19,840
Speaker 4: I was able to walk backstage and poll I think poor.

1560
01:24:19,880 --> 01:24:23,160
Speaker 4: I pulled cool off of somebody. I said, listen play

1561
01:24:23,240 --> 01:24:25,200
Speaker 4: jungle Boy Holly was swinging something. Let me go back

1562
01:24:25,240 --> 01:24:28,720
Speaker 4: here and get myself together. And when I couldn't, I

1563
01:24:28,880 --> 01:24:31,439
Speaker 4: had to come back out and I left the stage

1564
01:24:32,320 --> 01:24:36,080
Speaker 4: that particular night. I'm back there and all my family

1565
01:24:36,200 --> 01:24:38,639
Speaker 4: was at the audience. You know, they ran backstage. People

1566
01:24:38,680 --> 01:24:40,800
Speaker 4: even fans were coming back saying, you know, what's wrong

1567
01:24:40,840 --> 01:24:43,400
Speaker 4: with what happened. They knew something was wrong because I've

1568
01:24:43,479 --> 01:24:46,400
Speaker 4: never been like this, and I'm sitting in my room

1569
01:24:46,960 --> 01:24:48,920
Speaker 4: and none of the guys came over to see how

1570
01:24:48,960 --> 01:24:50,559
Speaker 4: I was doing, except one.

1571
01:24:50,439 --> 01:24:53,439
Speaker 3: Guy, Curtis, and he told them, he said, God, didn't

1572
01:24:53,439 --> 01:24:55,760
Speaker 3: you see this guy sick? You know, he can't do it.

1573
01:24:56,160 --> 01:25:01,120
Speaker 4: And that part hurt me more because I felt that

1574
01:25:01,280 --> 01:25:05,120
Speaker 4: their interest was more worrying about making the money the

1575
01:25:05,280 --> 01:25:08,800
Speaker 4: brand than a guy who who've been here since the

1576
01:25:08,920 --> 01:25:11,160
Speaker 4: really label was gonna was going to drop you guys

1577
01:25:11,479 --> 01:25:14,160
Speaker 4: in the seventies, and we got together and it was

1578
01:25:14,240 --> 01:25:16,280
Speaker 4: never I never claimed it was just me, you know,

1579
01:25:16,479 --> 01:25:19,840
Speaker 4: never had that attitude. But to get to this point

1580
01:25:20,479 --> 01:25:22,599
Speaker 4: and you don't even come back to check on the guy,

1581
01:25:23,400 --> 01:25:24,160
Speaker 4: I said, that's it.

1582
01:25:24,520 --> 01:25:25,519
Speaker 3: And I and I left.

1583
01:25:26,120 --> 01:25:27,240
Speaker 1: That's how you left the group.

1584
01:25:27,720 --> 01:25:31,599
Speaker 4: Yeah, that night, I called my family and I said,

1585
01:25:31,680 --> 01:25:35,320
Speaker 4: I got it. I can't do this anymore. So it

1586
01:25:35,479 --> 01:25:38,559
Speaker 4: was it was obviously back to your question that they

1587
01:25:38,640 --> 01:25:42,800
Speaker 4: must have felt something along the way, more than what

1588
01:25:43,000 --> 01:25:46,120
Speaker 4: I felt of them, because I never looked at them

1589
01:25:46,160 --> 01:25:49,720
Speaker 4: any other way except what we did. And uh, but

1590
01:25:50,320 --> 01:25:52,360
Speaker 4: that was that was that was a rough time because

1591
01:25:52,400 --> 01:25:55,360
Speaker 4: I was really really sick, but I never let on.

1592
01:25:56,280 --> 01:25:58,559
Speaker 4: And you know I've had that many times over the years.

1593
01:25:58,600 --> 01:26:01,640
Speaker 4: I was not well and I still did shows, you know,

1594
01:26:01,640 --> 01:26:05,120
Speaker 4: because I knew I had more responsibility just myself. You know,

1595
01:26:05,280 --> 01:26:08,720
Speaker 4: they had families, you know, themselves. We had records to

1596
01:26:08,800 --> 01:26:11,760
Speaker 4: break and you know, sacrifice, man, you know you can

1597
01:26:11,840 --> 01:26:14,280
Speaker 4: do this. And many times I'd just go back to

1598
01:26:14,360 --> 01:26:17,880
Speaker 4: my room and you know, taking mirror and gin sing

1599
01:26:18,080 --> 01:26:21,360
Speaker 4: and you know, all these different things. And I mean

1600
01:26:21,400 --> 01:26:23,519
Speaker 4: a clip for Adams, you know, he would he was

1601
01:26:23,600 --> 01:26:26,360
Speaker 4: into all of that and he would be me Golden Seal,

1602
01:26:26,520 --> 01:26:27,080
Speaker 4: and I'm.

1603
01:26:26,960 --> 01:26:30,840
Speaker 3: Like, you know, trying to get right. So but I

1604
01:26:30,960 --> 01:26:32,800
Speaker 3: never let on, hey man, I can't sing the night.

1605
01:26:33,000 --> 01:26:34,880
Speaker 3: You know. Sometime like when we.

1606
01:26:35,080 --> 01:26:38,880
Speaker 4: Started to sing a stepping out, it was difficult because

1607
01:26:38,880 --> 01:26:42,120
Speaker 4: it was a falsetto right, and you know, sometimes that

1608
01:26:42,280 --> 01:26:44,920
Speaker 4: click wouldn't happen and it would take like a few

1609
01:26:45,000 --> 01:26:46,920
Speaker 4: songs to get there, so we'd have to like take

1610
01:26:46,960 --> 01:26:47,679
Speaker 4: that out of the set.

1611
01:26:47,800 --> 01:26:50,920
Speaker 3: But most of the time, you know, you can walk

1612
01:26:50,960 --> 01:26:53,280
Speaker 3: your way through it, you know. But but that was it, man.

1613
01:26:53,400 --> 01:26:57,200
Speaker 4: But again, and what I got into, you know, my

1614
01:26:57,360 --> 01:27:02,120
Speaker 4: solo solo dealing. You know, my first I met with

1615
01:27:02,240 --> 01:27:07,040
Speaker 4: Gerald Busby and Jerrold said, listen, man, I don't think

1616
01:27:07,080 --> 01:27:09,880
Speaker 4: you need to be at motow. You need to go

1617
01:27:10,040 --> 01:27:14,840
Speaker 4: talk to Clive and and I remember sitting with Clive

1618
01:27:15,439 --> 01:27:18,040
Speaker 4: and Clive played for me. You don't believe us. That's

1619
01:27:18,080 --> 01:27:21,439
Speaker 4: what friends are for. In his office, you know, with

1620
01:27:21,960 --> 01:27:26,680
Speaker 4: Luther and Stevie and and and at that time I

1621
01:27:26,720 --> 01:27:28,960
Speaker 4: thought maybe he felt that maybe I should be one

1622
01:27:29,000 --> 01:27:32,360
Speaker 4: that was singing that could do that and make a

1623
01:27:32,439 --> 01:27:33,200
Speaker 4: long story short.

1624
01:27:33,600 --> 01:27:36,360
Speaker 3: M c A offered me more money, so I ended

1625
01:27:36,439 --> 01:27:37,000
Speaker 3: up signing with.

1626
01:27:37,120 --> 01:27:39,640
Speaker 1: M c A over there or The Master of the

1627
01:27:39,680 --> 01:27:40,480
Speaker 1: Game album.

1628
01:27:40,600 --> 01:27:41,120
Speaker 3: Master the Game.

1629
01:27:41,160 --> 01:27:44,040
Speaker 4: I was the first yeah, master of the game, and uh,

1630
01:27:44,280 --> 01:27:47,840
Speaker 4: you know, working with little Silas over there, A and R.

1631
01:27:48,320 --> 01:27:51,880
Speaker 1: I hear a lot about him, but his name always

1632
01:27:51,920 --> 01:27:54,439
Speaker 1: comes up when it's like new edition related stories or whatever.

1633
01:27:54,600 --> 01:27:58,560
Speaker 1: But what was it like being on your own and

1634
01:27:59,479 --> 01:28:01,080
Speaker 1: only yourself to answer to?

1635
01:28:02,120 --> 01:28:04,400
Speaker 4: It was a little frightening, I was must say, got

1636
01:28:04,520 --> 01:28:06,960
Speaker 4: frightening because you know, I was so used to from

1637
01:28:07,160 --> 01:28:09,719
Speaker 4: you know, being a young teenager, always with the band.

1638
01:28:10,320 --> 01:28:12,560
Speaker 4: You know, like I said, it was electro five, you know,

1639
01:28:12,720 --> 01:28:15,600
Speaker 4: the street dance of these bands, file at soul, you know,

1640
01:28:15,760 --> 01:28:16,320
Speaker 4: moved the gang.

1641
01:28:16,360 --> 01:28:18,439
Speaker 3: It was always like a group of collection, you know.

1642
01:28:19,160 --> 01:28:23,360
Speaker 4: And when I got out there, I realized that I

1643
01:28:23,520 --> 01:28:27,599
Speaker 4: didn't know as much as I needed to know about

1644
01:28:28,680 --> 01:28:31,760
Speaker 4: how to really structure songs.

1645
01:28:31,439 --> 01:28:32,760
Speaker 3: Like complete you know what I mean.

1646
01:28:32,800 --> 01:28:35,799
Speaker 4: I could do parts and things like that, but and lyrics,

1647
01:28:35,840 --> 01:28:38,800
Speaker 4: but I didn't claim to be a pianist, like a

1648
01:28:38,920 --> 01:28:40,400
Speaker 4: skill musician and nothing like this.

1649
01:28:40,600 --> 01:28:44,680
Speaker 3: But I could anything I hear, I can write. I've

1650
01:28:44,720 --> 01:28:48,519
Speaker 3: always had that, you know. And when when I got

1651
01:28:48,560 --> 01:28:50,200
Speaker 3: with MCA, I.

1652
01:28:50,360 --> 01:28:53,280
Speaker 4: Realized that they wanted me to do something like I

1653
01:28:53,360 --> 01:28:56,280
Speaker 4: had done before with cooling them, and I was already

1654
01:28:56,560 --> 01:28:59,680
Speaker 4: beyond that. You know, I wanted to be more of

1655
01:28:59,720 --> 01:29:04,080
Speaker 4: a eclectic artists and bringing the styles that I loved,

1656
01:29:04,360 --> 01:29:06,960
Speaker 4: you know, from rock and all these different things, and

1657
01:29:07,880 --> 01:29:11,360
Speaker 4: so I hoped it was this guy named Dennis mccowski. Okay,

1658
01:29:12,200 --> 01:29:16,879
Speaker 4: he introduced me to James ingram Ta, Vega, Rose Stone,

1659
01:29:17,880 --> 01:29:22,280
Speaker 4: Phil Perry, James you know, Jeff Pericaro, Paulino Da Costa,

1660
01:29:22,760 --> 01:29:26,920
Speaker 4: and I was like, okay, this is this. I love this,

1661
01:29:27,200 --> 01:29:30,040
Speaker 4: this this collection right here. And that's when I started

1662
01:29:30,080 --> 01:29:32,920
Speaker 4: working on Massive Game and plus publishers were sending me

1663
01:29:33,040 --> 01:29:37,320
Speaker 4: songs uh to uh to choose from, you know, and

1664
01:29:37,439 --> 01:29:39,800
Speaker 4: that kind of helped me a lot. But Louell, he

1665
01:29:40,000 --> 01:29:43,000
Speaker 4: was there the whole time trying to help me get

1666
01:29:43,040 --> 01:29:46,320
Speaker 4: a hit record, you know, because again I got paid

1667
01:29:46,360 --> 01:29:49,840
Speaker 4: well and the record company was just kind of letting

1668
01:29:49,880 --> 01:29:52,920
Speaker 4: me do what I wanted to do. And uh, you know,

1669
01:29:53,360 --> 01:29:57,160
Speaker 4: the first single, I still think they picked the wrong song.

1670
01:29:58,200 --> 01:30:00,200
Speaker 4: They picked the other song Sister Rosa, and I did

1671
01:30:00,240 --> 01:30:04,320
Speaker 4: a video with Michael Peters, you know who did Thriller,

1672
01:30:04,600 --> 01:30:07,880
Speaker 4: you know, Michael and all that stuff, and uh, we

1673
01:30:08,000 --> 01:30:10,320
Speaker 4: went did the whole video and everything like this, but

1674
01:30:10,400 --> 01:30:13,559
Speaker 4: they didn't jump on the record because I still think

1675
01:30:13,600 --> 01:30:17,639
Speaker 4: they should have chosen Romancia or some other Yeah, yeah,

1676
01:30:17,760 --> 01:30:21,040
Speaker 4: you know, and uh so that kind of a little

1677
01:30:21,120 --> 01:30:23,800
Speaker 4: bit of taste there. And you know, people were expecting

1678
01:30:24,280 --> 01:30:26,639
Speaker 4: j T the song. You know, it ain't no ladies night,

1679
01:30:26,720 --> 01:30:29,640
Speaker 4: you know, when are you gonna do that? And I

1680
01:30:29,840 --> 01:30:32,040
Speaker 4: was doing my interviews, I'd tell everybody I said, well

1681
01:30:32,080 --> 01:30:37,200
Speaker 4: I did that, and my mind isn't there now. And

1682
01:30:37,320 --> 01:30:40,639
Speaker 4: that's when I think Bobby Brown hit a new edition

1683
01:30:41,680 --> 01:30:44,560
Speaker 4: right and by Bobby was blowing the doors out, you know,

1684
01:30:44,680 --> 01:30:45,519
Speaker 4: right there, and.

1685
01:30:47,080 --> 01:30:48,760
Speaker 3: They said, well, won't you give me something like that?

1686
01:30:49,320 --> 01:30:51,280
Speaker 3: And I was like, I said, then you talked to

1687
01:30:51,360 --> 01:30:53,200
Speaker 3: Bobby and he's like, well man, we tried to be

1688
01:30:53,320 --> 01:30:54,599
Speaker 3: like what you what you did?

1689
01:30:55,120 --> 01:30:57,200
Speaker 4: You know? So how you guys telling me to do

1690
01:30:57,360 --> 01:30:59,720
Speaker 4: something like that? So it started. That's when the mill

1691
01:30:59,760 --> 01:31:04,040
Speaker 4: start to turning, and we knew we had to, you know,

1692
01:31:04,240 --> 01:31:06,680
Speaker 4: kind of go back at it, you know. And and

1693
01:31:07,280 --> 01:31:09,760
Speaker 4: even with James Ingram, all these guys on, they still

1694
01:31:09,840 --> 01:31:12,639
Speaker 4: didn't you know, promoted the right way.

1695
01:31:13,400 --> 01:31:20,280
Speaker 1: Was it hard adjusting in an environment more conducive to

1696
01:31:20,479 --> 01:31:26,840
Speaker 1: like New Jack Swing than say, the kind of musicianship

1697
01:31:26,960 --> 01:31:29,800
Speaker 1: that you were used to like? Was it what does

1698
01:31:29,840 --> 01:31:34,800
Speaker 1: it mean to be faced with a pivot, you know,

1699
01:31:34,880 --> 01:31:36,599
Speaker 1: instead of a band, you might have to have two

1700
01:31:36,720 --> 01:31:37,400
Speaker 1: dancers with you.

1701
01:31:38,760 --> 01:31:40,000
Speaker 3: That was fun. I did that.

1702
01:31:40,840 --> 01:31:45,240
Speaker 4: I did in fact, actually that Teddy, Yeah, Teddy Teddy

1703
01:31:45,280 --> 01:31:47,960
Speaker 4: actually did a song you know, eight days for me.

1704
01:31:48,120 --> 01:31:51,280
Speaker 3: So I had those dancers. But it was again, it

1705
01:31:51,439 --> 01:31:54,160
Speaker 3: wasn't it was music, man, it wasn't. This is not

1706
01:31:54,320 --> 01:31:56,840
Speaker 3: rocket science here, you know, it's like, what do you feel?

1707
01:31:57,520 --> 01:32:01,760
Speaker 4: You know, I'm still same way today, you know, like

1708
01:32:01,880 --> 01:32:06,760
Speaker 4: I write every day and it's always something that you know,

1709
01:32:06,800 --> 01:32:09,800
Speaker 4: I'm sure when I finished with you, you know, I'm

1710
01:32:09,840 --> 01:32:11,760
Speaker 4: going to write something about this experience.

1711
01:32:11,880 --> 01:32:14,519
Speaker 3: So wow, I said, let's go at it.

1712
01:32:14,920 --> 01:32:20,080
Speaker 1: Okay, Hey, in the history of you being a professional singer,

1713
01:32:20,680 --> 01:32:26,160
Speaker 1: as anyone ever yelled fire and rein to you from

1714
01:32:26,200 --> 01:32:27,080
Speaker 1: the audience, you.

1715
01:32:27,200 --> 01:32:31,320
Speaker 5: Did steal my question, I was.

1716
01:32:31,439 --> 01:32:35,040
Speaker 2: I was honestly wondering about that today about look at

1717
01:32:35,080 --> 01:32:35,880
Speaker 2: his victory pose.

1718
01:32:35,960 --> 01:32:36,400
Speaker 5: That's great.

1719
01:32:38,080 --> 01:32:38,120
Speaker 3: No.

1720
01:32:38,240 --> 01:32:41,400
Speaker 2: I used to sort of study the the publishing stuff

1721
01:32:41,479 --> 01:32:44,680
Speaker 2: in credits and in like sort of books, and I

1722
01:32:44,800 --> 01:32:47,799
Speaker 2: was always wondering if if the publishing ever got crossed

1723
01:32:48,240 --> 01:32:51,439
Speaker 2: between you guys, you know, and anything not.

1724
01:32:51,560 --> 01:32:53,840
Speaker 3: The money at that time, he was making big money

1725
01:32:53,960 --> 01:32:56,160
Speaker 3: and we weren't, but but I used to.

1726
01:32:56,479 --> 01:33:00,760
Speaker 4: When I first went solo, the public just got things

1727
01:33:00,840 --> 01:33:03,640
Speaker 4: mixed up. In fact, at the at the Rock and

1728
01:33:03,760 --> 01:33:06,559
Speaker 4: Roll Hall of Fame, he came over to my room

1729
01:33:07,200 --> 01:33:09,519
Speaker 4: and I'm in the dressing room and he came over

1730
01:33:09,600 --> 01:33:10,000
Speaker 4: to meet me.

1731
01:33:10,080 --> 01:33:11,960
Speaker 3: He said, I always wanted to beat you. I said, really,

1732
01:33:12,479 --> 01:33:15,320
Speaker 3: and no, that was the first time y'all met. That's

1733
01:33:15,360 --> 01:33:17,479
Speaker 3: the first time we met, right.

1734
01:33:17,560 --> 01:33:18,840
Speaker 1: I wish I could have been there for that.

1735
01:33:19,400 --> 01:33:21,920
Speaker 4: Yeah, man, And he came over and we hugged each

1736
01:33:21,920 --> 01:33:25,840
Speaker 4: other and we share share some you know, conversation, and.

1737
01:33:25,920 --> 01:33:26,960
Speaker 3: I told him that story.

1738
01:33:27,000 --> 01:33:29,920
Speaker 4: I said, I was getting the like kind of country songs, man,

1739
01:33:30,000 --> 01:33:32,960
Speaker 4: And you know, my my manager said, wait a minute,

1740
01:33:32,960 --> 01:33:34,920
Speaker 4: I think this supposed to be for the other James Taylor.

1741
01:33:35,040 --> 01:33:37,160
Speaker 3: So we had a laugh and I said, I want

1742
01:33:37,160 --> 01:33:38,640
Speaker 3: to do something with you. He said, let's do that.

1743
01:33:38,880 --> 01:33:41,920
Speaker 3: You know, so that may happen in the near future.

1744
01:33:43,160 --> 01:33:46,800
Speaker 1: Voices I approve with that. Do you know Marvin ever

1745
01:33:46,920 --> 01:33:51,680
Speaker 1: heard you're not to him on? Take my heart if

1746
01:33:51,680 --> 01:33:52,040
Speaker 1: you want it.

1747
01:33:53,160 --> 01:33:55,519
Speaker 4: I don't know, man, but I've been tell you because

1748
01:33:55,520 --> 01:33:57,680
Speaker 4: you know, I'm a big Marvin fan. As well, but

1749
01:33:57,840 --> 01:34:00,320
Speaker 4: we were doing the that's when I was still with Cool.

1750
01:34:00,800 --> 01:34:04,240
Speaker 4: We did the rain I think the Rainbow Room or

1751
01:34:04,280 --> 01:34:09,400
Speaker 4: the Rainbow Theater in London. And we're on stage because

1752
01:34:09,479 --> 01:34:11,240
Speaker 4: I don't know what song we were singing, and I

1753
01:34:11,360 --> 01:34:14,839
Speaker 4: looked to my left over in the corner and Marvin

1754
01:34:14,960 --> 01:34:17,839
Speaker 4: is standing in the way man.

1755
01:34:17,880 --> 01:34:18,360
Speaker 3: Almost like.

1756
01:34:19,840 --> 01:34:22,000
Speaker 4: Yeah, he was living there, right, So of course I

1757
01:34:22,080 --> 01:34:25,320
Speaker 4: had to bring him on and just walking on stage

1758
01:34:25,479 --> 01:34:29,439
Speaker 4: place with berserk and you know, he walked off and

1759
01:34:29,880 --> 01:34:32,120
Speaker 4: we were taking a picture to the other. Look, he's

1760
01:34:32,160 --> 01:34:34,519
Speaker 4: looking over at me like this, you know, looking down

1761
01:34:34,640 --> 01:34:34,840
Speaker 4: on me.

1762
01:34:35,200 --> 01:34:37,320
Speaker 3: He said, j T. You know I can slam dunk you.

1763
01:34:37,439 --> 01:34:38,360
Speaker 5: You know that, right?

1764
01:34:39,200 --> 01:34:41,559
Speaker 3: I said, bro, I can play ball too, but let's

1765
01:34:41,600 --> 01:34:44,479
Speaker 3: do this. We never got to play, but he was

1766
01:34:45,640 --> 01:34:46,360
Speaker 3: he was amazing.

1767
01:34:46,520 --> 01:34:46,680
Speaker 1: Man.

1768
01:34:46,760 --> 01:34:49,479
Speaker 3: I would have loved to just take the ball to

1769
01:34:49,600 --> 01:34:50,880
Speaker 3: him a little bit because he was a tall He

1770
01:34:50,960 --> 01:34:54,160
Speaker 3: was kind of a tall guy. It would have been tough.

1771
01:34:54,600 --> 01:34:56,720
Speaker 3: But yeah, but no, I don't know if he ever did.

1772
01:34:57,640 --> 01:34:59,320
Speaker 1: It's one of my favorite Ada libs of Jews.

1773
01:35:00,800 --> 01:35:03,960
Speaker 3: So I was actually talking to George because George wrote

1774
01:35:04,000 --> 01:35:04,519
Speaker 3: the song.

1775
01:35:05,280 --> 01:35:11,960
Speaker 1: And I was like, I said, like Marvin marveling huh right, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah,

1776
01:35:12,400 --> 01:35:15,280
Speaker 1: exactly exactly. You know, there was a time period in

1777
01:35:15,320 --> 01:35:19,559
Speaker 1: which videos were not necessary but could be an option

1778
01:35:19,720 --> 01:35:22,160
Speaker 1: to help you sell a little more if you were

1779
01:35:22,200 --> 01:35:23,960
Speaker 1: trying to get your stuff played on like Top of

1780
01:35:24,000 --> 01:35:26,360
Speaker 1: the Pops or you know, if you couldn't get to

1781
01:35:26,520 --> 01:35:29,679
Speaker 1: Europe in time. What was the video process like? Because

1782
01:35:30,280 --> 01:35:36,840
Speaker 1: even that video for Misled, which I'll never understand, like

1783
01:35:36,960 --> 01:35:38,880
Speaker 1: are you just showing up and like, okay, it's a

1784
01:35:39,040 --> 01:35:42,760
Speaker 1: chase scene with an Indiana Jones and a bunch of

1785
01:35:42,840 --> 01:35:44,600
Speaker 1: white popes dancing around me, Like.

1786
01:35:44,760 --> 01:35:47,960
Speaker 4: Yeah, right, well, you know, you know, of course I've

1787
01:35:48,040 --> 01:35:51,840
Speaker 4: always been into film, you know, and like even right now,

1788
01:35:52,040 --> 01:35:55,120
Speaker 4: you know the my future project that I'm working on

1789
01:35:55,320 --> 01:35:56,200
Speaker 4: now I'll tell you.

1790
01:35:56,200 --> 01:35:57,200
Speaker 6: About that in a minute.

1791
01:35:57,240 --> 01:35:59,280
Speaker 4: But okay, because I was in the film earlier in

1792
01:35:59,360 --> 01:36:02,559
Speaker 4: my life, I was able to when videos came along,

1793
01:36:02,800 --> 01:36:05,720
Speaker 4: I could process everything that's happened because most of our

1794
01:36:05,840 --> 01:36:09,000
Speaker 4: songs was like a storyboard, you know, And you mentioned Misled.

1795
01:36:09,400 --> 01:36:12,200
Speaker 6: It was about you know, it was basically Coalice's.

1796
01:36:11,720 --> 01:36:14,759
Speaker 4: Life story, part of his life story, and my my input,

1797
01:36:15,320 --> 01:36:19,120
Speaker 4: and it was the metaphor of the white Dancer was

1798
01:36:19,240 --> 01:36:24,360
Speaker 4: like she was like the cocaine that people were taking,

1799
01:36:25,439 --> 01:36:29,240
Speaker 4: you know, misleading, looking beautiful and everything and taking you

1800
01:36:29,400 --> 01:36:31,479
Speaker 4: down that rabbit hole, you know.

1801
01:36:32,080 --> 01:36:36,639
Speaker 6: And my nephew who played the as a young kid. Yeah,

1802
01:36:36,680 --> 01:36:39,800
Speaker 6: that was my nephew, yeah, you know. And so to

1803
01:36:40,160 --> 01:36:41,360
Speaker 6: bring that part in, that was.

1804
01:36:41,400 --> 01:36:45,800
Speaker 4: Theatrical and the special effects. So and then the one

1805
01:36:45,840 --> 01:36:48,360
Speaker 4: thing that happened on that video was that we said

1806
01:36:48,400 --> 01:36:49,880
Speaker 4: how are we going to get the band in? And

1807
01:36:49,960 --> 01:36:52,920
Speaker 4: I wrote most of that concept. I said, well, you

1808
01:36:53,040 --> 01:36:55,880
Speaker 4: guys are going to be you know, incognito as well,

1809
01:36:56,160 --> 01:36:59,720
Speaker 4: and it's a dream state. So that's why you know,

1810
01:36:59,800 --> 01:37:02,080
Speaker 4: that happened. And when we came at the end and

1811
01:37:02,120 --> 01:37:04,320
Speaker 4: they were like JT, we got to go, man, we

1812
01:37:04,360 --> 01:37:06,800
Speaker 4: got a gig to do, they were in the dream

1813
01:37:06,840 --> 01:37:11,520
Speaker 4: and that's when they turned around. So Michael definitely influenced

1814
01:37:11,600 --> 01:37:14,320
Speaker 4: that as far as the video because remember MTV wasn't

1815
01:37:14,360 --> 01:37:19,080
Speaker 4: playing us, and Michael turned that around. So that's when

1816
01:37:19,160 --> 01:37:22,040
Speaker 4: the whole video thing for black artists started kicking in.

1817
01:37:22,360 --> 01:37:24,960
Speaker 4: And we knew that Michael had raised the bar, so

1818
01:37:25,120 --> 01:37:27,960
Speaker 4: we had to raise the bar because if you remember,

1819
01:37:28,200 --> 01:37:31,679
Speaker 4: on most of the charts, if we knew Michael was coming,

1820
01:37:32,160 --> 01:37:35,280
Speaker 4: we had to get our position first, you know, because

1821
01:37:36,800 --> 01:37:38,559
Speaker 4: you know we're going to knock you out a number one,

1822
01:37:38,920 --> 01:37:42,080
Speaker 4: but being there in the top five or top ten,

1823
01:37:42,600 --> 01:37:45,280
Speaker 4: that means in the stores your music was right there

1824
01:37:45,280 --> 01:37:48,000
Speaker 4: along inside his and it would help your sales.

1825
01:37:48,520 --> 01:37:49,320
Speaker 3: You know. All of that.

1826
01:37:49,880 --> 01:37:54,240
Speaker 6: The video world actually helped me with the project I'm

1827
01:37:54,280 --> 01:37:56,000
Speaker 6: doing now and what my future.

1828
01:37:55,800 --> 01:37:56,200
Speaker 3: Is going to be.

1829
01:37:56,920 --> 01:37:59,800
Speaker 1: Got it At the time you guys get invited to

1830
01:38:00,080 --> 01:38:04,560
Speaker 1: you band aid, like, do you have any ankling of

1831
01:38:04,640 --> 01:38:06,400
Speaker 1: a clue what you guys walked into?

1832
01:38:07,280 --> 01:38:09,000
Speaker 6: No, because we were on tour again.

1833
01:38:09,120 --> 01:38:10,479
Speaker 1: I just had a night off in London.

1834
01:38:12,720 --> 01:38:15,360
Speaker 6: We were actually just I don't know if we I

1835
01:38:15,400 --> 01:38:16,439
Speaker 6: think we did having night off.

1836
01:38:16,520 --> 01:38:19,320
Speaker 4: But the thing that that bothered me was that they

1837
01:38:19,360 --> 01:38:22,600
Speaker 4: had mentioned i think on the news or something that

1838
01:38:23,160 --> 01:38:25,040
Speaker 4: you know, it was all of these big stars there

1839
01:38:26,000 --> 01:38:30,040
Speaker 4: and when we got there, there was no cameras and

1840
01:38:30,160 --> 01:38:32,439
Speaker 4: I remember telling DT, I said, you know, with the

1841
01:38:32,520 --> 01:38:35,680
Speaker 4: press man and all people telling about the press and

1842
01:38:35,800 --> 01:38:39,879
Speaker 4: we walked in. No one said, you know, okay, JT,

1843
01:38:40,000 --> 01:38:41,600
Speaker 4: you're going to be doing this and it's going to

1844
01:38:41,640 --> 01:38:43,240
Speaker 4: be doing that. We kind of just walked in the

1845
01:38:43,240 --> 01:38:45,760
Speaker 4: studio and there was everybody was just sitting around the

1846
01:38:45,880 --> 01:38:50,120
Speaker 4: room and and pill Collins and and Geldolfs and they

1847
01:38:50,160 --> 01:38:52,679
Speaker 4: were behind the board and they just kind of waved

1848
01:38:52,920 --> 01:38:58,280
Speaker 4: and you know, and later on I thought somebody mentioned

1849
01:38:58,320 --> 01:39:02,479
Speaker 4: that they wanted me to do the part that what

1850
01:39:02,680 --> 01:39:04,719
Speaker 4: tonight thank God, and I didn't.

1851
01:39:04,880 --> 01:39:06,960
Speaker 6: I'm glad they didn't ask me because I would have

1852
01:39:07,040 --> 01:39:07,479
Speaker 6: never done that.

1853
01:39:07,560 --> 01:39:13,240
Speaker 2: Beuchne Bono's line, thank God it's you, it's them instead

1854
01:39:13,280 --> 01:39:13,439
Speaker 2: of you.

1855
01:39:13,600 --> 01:39:17,160
Speaker 4: I said, well, I would have never sang that anyway,

1856
01:39:18,479 --> 01:39:20,439
Speaker 4: because that's just a little too much for me. You know,

1857
01:39:20,640 --> 01:39:23,360
Speaker 4: I wouldn't thank God it's you. You know that that's

1858
01:39:23,400 --> 01:39:24,760
Speaker 4: not my vibe, you know what I mean.

1859
01:39:25,280 --> 01:39:26,519
Speaker 3: But yeah, it was.

1860
01:39:26,600 --> 01:39:29,120
Speaker 4: It was awesome, man, but we still didn't know how

1861
01:39:29,160 --> 01:39:32,400
Speaker 4: it was going to come out. I just enjoyed, you know,

1862
01:39:32,560 --> 01:39:35,760
Speaker 4: meet and you know, sting and fill. But it was

1863
01:39:35,880 --> 01:39:38,240
Speaker 4: it was intense. It was like no time to really

1864
01:39:38,640 --> 01:39:41,120
Speaker 4: hang out and talk about it. And when they put

1865
01:39:41,200 --> 01:39:42,840
Speaker 4: us all on the stands together, it.

1866
01:39:42,960 --> 01:39:45,000
Speaker 6: Was just like, Okay, this is what we're going to sing.

1867
01:39:45,080 --> 01:39:48,480
Speaker 6: We learned the song and we went through the process.

1868
01:39:49,800 --> 01:39:52,519
Speaker 1: For you, what was the best like when you think

1869
01:39:52,600 --> 01:39:55,600
Speaker 1: of like the good times or whatever, like places you

1870
01:39:55,680 --> 01:39:59,560
Speaker 1: played or even people you met or people that you

1871
01:39:59,760 --> 01:40:03,080
Speaker 1: never I thought you meet. What's a career highlight for

1872
01:40:03,200 --> 01:40:06,160
Speaker 1: you of something like like, wow, I can't believe this happened.

1873
01:40:07,280 --> 01:40:13,080
Speaker 4: There's many, okay, But I think going to Africa for

1874
01:40:13,200 --> 01:40:19,840
Speaker 4: the first time was monumental because I remember when we

1875
01:40:19,920 --> 01:40:23,960
Speaker 4: were at House of Music once and this is doing

1876
01:40:24,000 --> 01:40:30,000
Speaker 4: a part time and this agent came to the studio

1877
01:40:30,520 --> 01:40:34,200
Speaker 4: and asked us to play, and that's when everybody was

1878
01:40:34,280 --> 01:40:35,639
Speaker 4: refusing to place some city.

1879
01:40:35,680 --> 01:40:39,799
Speaker 6: It was part of our protests, and I remember looking

1880
01:40:39,840 --> 01:40:44,960
Speaker 6: at this guy almost tearing up that how could he

1881
01:40:45,080 --> 01:40:48,240
Speaker 6: have the nerve to come here and ask us to

1882
01:40:48,439 --> 01:40:53,240
Speaker 6: perform there, knowing the atrocities that were going on, right

1883
01:40:53,680 --> 01:40:58,120
Speaker 6: And I remember we got a silver record I think

1884
01:40:58,240 --> 01:41:01,160
Speaker 6: from South Africa, and.

1885
01:41:01,520 --> 01:41:03,639
Speaker 4: When we got it, I said, I refuse to hang

1886
01:41:03,720 --> 01:41:09,479
Speaker 4: this up in my house until Mandela is freed, and

1887
01:41:09,600 --> 01:41:13,880
Speaker 4: I put it in the closet, and when he was freed,

1888
01:41:14,320 --> 01:41:17,200
Speaker 4: I took it out and celebrated that. But I think

1889
01:41:17,800 --> 01:41:22,519
Speaker 4: going to Liberia and then learning about the slave quarters

1890
01:41:22,600 --> 01:41:27,200
Speaker 4: and where our people were brought from the shores and

1891
01:41:27,320 --> 01:41:30,080
Speaker 4: things like that, the Ivory Coast up and down, you know,

1892
01:41:30,880 --> 01:41:34,240
Speaker 4: And I always felt like I didn't want to take

1893
01:41:34,360 --> 01:41:37,960
Speaker 4: money out of there like like I because it wasn't

1894
01:41:38,000 --> 01:41:39,080
Speaker 4: really built up as.

1895
01:41:39,040 --> 01:41:41,800
Speaker 3: Much like Ghana right like it is now, you know.

1896
01:41:41,960 --> 01:41:43,560
Speaker 3: And I just didn't.

1897
01:41:43,400 --> 01:41:45,080
Speaker 6: Understand what I understood.

1898
01:41:45,200 --> 01:41:49,519
Speaker 4: But I didn't feel good about doing a concert and

1899
01:41:49,680 --> 01:41:52,760
Speaker 4: taking money from a place that we should have just

1900
01:41:53,840 --> 01:41:55,320
Speaker 4: left it there, you know.

1901
01:41:56,320 --> 01:41:59,840
Speaker 6: But I think Africa was. It's still to this day

1902
01:42:00,280 --> 01:42:02,799
Speaker 6: the feeling I get that touches my heart most.

1903
01:42:07,680 --> 01:42:07,880
Speaker 3: One.

1904
01:42:08,000 --> 01:42:11,519
Speaker 1: Congratulations on getting in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, Yes,

1905
01:42:11,600 --> 01:42:15,280
Speaker 1: thank you. Were you surprised or were you actively hoping

1906
01:42:15,360 --> 01:42:15,600
Speaker 1: for this?

1907
01:42:16,760 --> 01:42:16,920
Speaker 3: Well?

1908
01:42:17,000 --> 01:42:19,599
Speaker 4: You know, I tell the story I said, it's when

1909
01:42:19,640 --> 01:42:22,559
Speaker 4: I think back to being at thirteen, you never think

1910
01:42:22,640 --> 01:42:26,000
Speaker 4: about it. You never think about any accolades, at least

1911
01:42:26,040 --> 01:42:29,160
Speaker 4: I did. My whole thing was just a love for music.

1912
01:42:29,280 --> 01:42:29,439
Speaker 3: Man.

1913
01:42:29,960 --> 01:42:33,080
Speaker 6: And you know when they told us about the rock

1914
01:42:33,240 --> 01:42:35,320
Speaker 6: of course, I call all my family and.

1915
01:42:35,360 --> 01:42:39,040
Speaker 4: I think they announced it on the American Idol or

1916
01:42:39,080 --> 01:42:42,000
Speaker 4: something like that, and we were all sitting around watching

1917
01:42:42,120 --> 01:42:42,960
Speaker 4: waiting for it to come on.

1918
01:42:43,040 --> 01:42:45,719
Speaker 6: When they said bam, cool the gang. My phone jumping

1919
01:42:45,800 --> 01:42:48,599
Speaker 6: off the hook, people talking about how can I get there?

1920
01:42:48,600 --> 01:42:49,200
Speaker 3: I want to come.

1921
01:42:49,720 --> 01:42:51,920
Speaker 6: We had a lot of family there. But it was

1922
01:42:52,040 --> 01:42:55,800
Speaker 6: just a culmination of all of the years of.

1923
01:42:57,439 --> 01:42:59,479
Speaker 3: The sweat being.

1924
01:42:59,280 --> 01:43:02,599
Speaker 4: Away from my family, having my family there and enjoining

1925
01:43:02,640 --> 01:43:06,240
Speaker 4: some of it, coming into cooling the gang and then.

1926
01:43:06,200 --> 01:43:07,120
Speaker 6: Leaving the group.

1927
01:43:08,000 --> 01:43:12,479
Speaker 4: And also, you know, I brought everything from Hackensack High

1928
01:43:12,479 --> 01:43:15,880
Speaker 4: School to you know, the bands I was in too,

1929
01:43:16,479 --> 01:43:19,519
Speaker 4: you know, Jersey City. Anybody that I met along the

1930
01:43:19,600 --> 01:43:22,880
Speaker 4: way were a part of it. And that's including you,

1931
01:43:23,280 --> 01:43:27,719
Speaker 4: your group, the Philly sound Motown, so you know anything,

1932
01:43:28,120 --> 01:43:30,519
Speaker 4: it was like I was. It was like I was

1933
01:43:30,600 --> 01:43:33,240
Speaker 4: bringing all of you with me, you know. And then

1934
01:43:33,320 --> 01:43:35,439
Speaker 4: of course, you know, to find out that you were

1935
01:43:35,479 --> 01:43:37,560
Speaker 4: going to be with me, I'm like, oh, man, this

1936
01:43:37,720 --> 01:43:40,200
Speaker 4: is too good to be true, you know. So you

1937
01:43:40,240 --> 01:43:42,160
Speaker 4: know when I walked up and met you, you know,

1938
01:43:42,240 --> 01:43:45,200
Speaker 4: I was like yo, right in the middle of playing Yo, man,

1939
01:43:45,240 --> 01:43:45,599
Speaker 4: what's up?

1940
01:43:45,760 --> 01:43:47,360
Speaker 6: And I got a good picture. I want to say

1941
01:43:47,439 --> 01:43:48,840
Speaker 6: to you about that too, But.

1942
01:43:48,880 --> 01:43:51,280
Speaker 1: I was nervous, man, and like, you know, well you

1943
01:43:51,400 --> 01:43:51,960
Speaker 1: were nervous.

1944
01:43:52,040 --> 01:43:53,240
Speaker 6: Come on, man, you were smacking.

1945
01:43:53,880 --> 01:43:57,320
Speaker 1: No, I mean, but just you the only legendary illuminary

1946
01:43:57,400 --> 01:44:01,080
Speaker 1: of like my life sound check track that I haven't

1947
01:44:01,520 --> 01:44:02,599
Speaker 1: met yet, you know what I mean.

1948
01:44:02,720 --> 01:44:06,400
Speaker 4: So yeah, it was awesome and you guys play man

1949
01:44:06,840 --> 01:44:08,360
Speaker 4: and it was And the thing about it, it was

1950
01:44:08,439 --> 01:44:10,000
Speaker 4: that you wouldn't believe this that night.

1951
01:44:11,080 --> 01:44:11,679
Speaker 3: That was a week.

1952
01:44:11,760 --> 01:44:15,400
Speaker 4: That week I had some dental work done right, and

1953
01:44:15,520 --> 01:44:17,559
Speaker 4: I had this I don't know if you ever heard

1954
01:44:17,600 --> 01:44:21,280
Speaker 4: of TMJ, but it's winter your jaw locks.

1955
01:44:23,080 --> 01:44:27,280
Speaker 6: So that whole night and the performance, I couldn't open

1956
01:44:27,400 --> 01:44:30,799
Speaker 6: my mouth with this much what so I'm.

1957
01:44:30,720 --> 01:44:34,600
Speaker 4: Singing and in rehearsal I was actually when I was

1958
01:44:34,640 --> 01:44:37,759
Speaker 4: walking around the stage, was trying to find the vowel

1959
01:44:37,880 --> 01:44:40,679
Speaker 4: sounds of how I was going to say certain things.

1960
01:44:41,160 --> 01:44:44,160
Speaker 6: And I couldn't hit like the high notes. Yahoo, if

1961
01:44:44,200 --> 01:44:47,759
Speaker 6: you listen back to I couldn't. I couldn't do it. Oh, wow,

1962
01:44:48,240 --> 01:44:50,280
Speaker 6: old night. So I was in a little bit of

1963
01:44:50,360 --> 01:44:54,320
Speaker 6: an agony while I was enjoying myself. That's a story

1964
01:44:54,400 --> 01:44:58,760
Speaker 6: nobody could tell, right. I didn't know, man, nobody knew it.

1965
01:44:58,840 --> 01:45:00,679
Speaker 1: You know, we wouldn't been the wiser.

1966
01:45:01,200 --> 01:45:01,439
Speaker 3: Wow.

1967
01:45:01,800 --> 01:45:04,679
Speaker 4: But the night was awesome, bro, And it's like it's

1968
01:45:04,720 --> 01:45:06,880
Speaker 4: something that I will you know, treasure forever.

1969
01:45:07,600 --> 01:45:12,960
Speaker 1: Before that night, had you had any contact with cool Like,

1970
01:45:13,160 --> 01:45:15,880
Speaker 1: was that the first time you guys spoke since the

1971
01:45:15,960 --> 01:45:16,880
Speaker 1: reunion or.

1972
01:45:18,000 --> 01:45:18,600
Speaker 3: Oh no, no.

1973
01:45:18,840 --> 01:45:21,080
Speaker 4: The first time was a few years ago when we

1974
01:45:21,479 --> 01:45:24,920
Speaker 4: were inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame, got it.

1975
01:45:25,400 --> 01:45:28,160
Speaker 4: And that was the first time I had seen them

1976
01:45:29,240 --> 01:45:35,680
Speaker 4: and since the early nineties. I still went in there like,

1977
01:45:36,160 --> 01:45:38,599
Speaker 4: you know, just proud of what we had accomplished over

1978
01:45:38,640 --> 01:45:41,200
Speaker 4: the years. And you know, so they all came to

1979
01:45:41,320 --> 01:45:44,640
Speaker 4: me and we spoke and they were cordial and and

1980
01:45:44,760 --> 01:45:47,479
Speaker 4: in fact, Plice came to me and pulled me to

1981
01:45:47,560 --> 01:45:50,120
Speaker 4: the side and said, man, whyn't we get back together

1982
01:45:50,160 --> 01:45:53,320
Speaker 4: and do this again. And I was taken back because

1983
01:45:54,560 --> 01:45:59,120
Speaker 4: we did celebration that night, got our award, and you

1984
01:45:59,200 --> 01:46:02,400
Speaker 4: know it, we went our separate wates and again going

1985
01:46:02,439 --> 01:46:03,960
Speaker 4: back to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. That

1986
01:46:04,040 --> 01:46:06,439
Speaker 4: was the other thing that was kind of bittersweet that,

1987
01:46:07,040 --> 01:46:11,680
Speaker 4: you know, George and Charles d T. Clifford and they

1988
01:46:11,720 --> 01:46:14,160
Speaker 4: were there and it was like I'm sitting with their

1989
01:46:14,200 --> 01:46:18,800
Speaker 4: wives and their children, you know, there we're talking and

1990
01:46:18,920 --> 01:46:21,040
Speaker 4: things like this, and you know, I was just a

1991
01:46:21,120 --> 01:46:21,920
Speaker 4: little empty.

1992
01:46:22,160 --> 01:46:23,960
Speaker 6: There was a space there that was empty, you know.

1993
01:46:24,120 --> 01:46:28,640
Speaker 4: But I hope that if they're looking down, they appreciated

1994
01:46:28,680 --> 01:46:31,400
Speaker 4: what Cool and I did along with you know, you and.

1995
01:46:31,439 --> 01:46:32,200
Speaker 6: The roots as well.

1996
01:46:32,640 --> 01:46:34,000
Speaker 5: What are you working on now?

1997
01:46:34,400 --> 01:46:36,920
Speaker 4: Well, you know the thing right now is I just

1998
01:46:37,160 --> 01:46:40,960
Speaker 4: kind of you know, I was right before COVID hit,

1999
01:46:41,280 --> 01:46:43,479
Speaker 4: you know, I realized I was doing out.

2000
01:46:43,479 --> 01:46:45,280
Speaker 6: Going out doing all these one nighters.

2001
01:46:45,320 --> 01:46:48,559
Speaker 4: You know, money was great and everything, but every day

2002
01:46:48,600 --> 01:46:50,920
Speaker 4: you leave, you know, you come back home, you lose

2003
01:46:51,000 --> 01:46:52,280
Speaker 4: three days, three or four days.

2004
01:46:52,920 --> 01:46:55,040
Speaker 6: And when I was working on I started working on.

2005
01:46:55,120 --> 01:46:58,960
Speaker 4: This project with my son, who was a filmmaker and

2006
01:46:59,040 --> 01:47:04,160
Speaker 4: a director, and we weren't getting anywhere, and so I said, listen,

2007
01:47:04,200 --> 01:47:07,320
Speaker 4: I got to stop touring. And actually COVID helped me

2008
01:47:07,320 --> 01:47:12,280
Speaker 4: because nobody was really working that much anyway. So like

2009
01:47:12,360 --> 01:47:14,360
Speaker 4: I've always done, I said, well, I want to do

2010
01:47:14,479 --> 01:47:18,640
Speaker 4: something that hasn't been done before, or something different and

2011
01:47:18,800 --> 01:47:24,040
Speaker 4: include different genres social media, film, music, and make a

2012
01:47:24,120 --> 01:47:28,879
Speaker 4: combination of all of those things and involve people like yourself,

2013
01:47:29,680 --> 01:47:34,160
Speaker 4: you know, your group, and different artists from different genres

2014
01:47:34,200 --> 01:47:37,920
Speaker 4: around and include like like the visual effects of things,

2015
01:47:38,040 --> 01:47:40,880
Speaker 4: and you know, to vote all the time to new

2016
01:47:41,000 --> 01:47:44,479
Speaker 4: kind of music and development, you know, and you know

2017
01:47:44,560 --> 01:47:47,479
Speaker 4: it's enhanced my knowledge, you know, or directing and writing

2018
01:47:47,560 --> 01:47:50,240
Speaker 4: in that genre without letting everything.

2019
01:47:49,920 --> 01:47:50,479
Speaker 3: Out of the bag.

2020
01:47:51,240 --> 01:47:53,479
Speaker 4: It's like, you know, when you're trying to do something

2021
01:47:54,840 --> 01:47:58,439
Speaker 4: that hasn't been done, it takes a lot of attention.

2022
01:47:59,320 --> 01:48:01,439
Speaker 4: You know, you have to go through every little piece.

2023
01:48:01,560 --> 01:48:05,960
Speaker 4: Is not just one creative idea. The idea grew and

2024
01:48:06,120 --> 01:48:09,840
Speaker 4: now we're at a point where we're at I would

2025
01:48:09,880 --> 01:48:15,439
Speaker 4: say the script for example, you know, and all I

2026
01:48:15,520 --> 01:48:18,160
Speaker 4: can say to you is, I will promise to lead

2027
01:48:18,240 --> 01:48:21,439
Speaker 4: you on as we've developed this because it's something that

2028
01:48:22,320 --> 01:48:23,960
Speaker 4: hopefully will you will be a part of.

2029
01:48:24,640 --> 01:48:27,680
Speaker 6: I'll just actually straight out, you know. Uh, And I

2030
01:48:27,800 --> 01:48:32,000
Speaker 6: think that it's something that is needed today because when

2031
01:48:32,040 --> 01:48:34,240
Speaker 6: I listened to some of.

2032
01:48:34,280 --> 01:48:38,160
Speaker 4: The music that's out here, it seems like things are

2033
01:48:38,240 --> 01:48:41,880
Speaker 4: either plateaued or just have staged.

2034
01:48:41,560 --> 01:48:45,680
Speaker 1: A little stagnant, little vibrational yeah, you know, so we

2035
01:48:45,840 --> 01:48:46,760
Speaker 1: need we need.

2036
01:48:46,720 --> 01:48:47,599
Speaker 6: A little something.

2037
01:48:47,840 --> 01:48:49,960
Speaker 4: And you know, and usually over the years, you know,

2038
01:48:50,040 --> 01:48:52,759
Speaker 4: we've had a collective of people doing so many different

2039
01:48:52,800 --> 01:48:55,880
Speaker 4: styles that we could pull from anywhere. You know, Now

2040
01:48:56,000 --> 01:48:58,800
Speaker 4: it just seems like there's some some things that are

2041
01:48:58,920 --> 01:49:01,400
Speaker 4: just not you know, when I listen to it, I'm

2042
01:49:01,439 --> 01:49:05,559
Speaker 4: not being fed as much. So right, you know, six

2043
01:49:05,760 --> 01:49:10,040
Speaker 4: years of like revising this this project, you know, I'm

2044
01:49:10,120 --> 01:49:11,800
Speaker 4: kind of looking at some things that I wrote down,

2045
01:49:12,880 --> 01:49:16,240
Speaker 4: combining like the mediums of music and filming. But it's

2046
01:49:16,360 --> 01:49:20,280
Speaker 4: it's like, I can I explain this. It will be

2047
01:49:20,439 --> 01:49:25,200
Speaker 4: something that will be future, but something with grassroots of

2048
01:49:25,320 --> 01:49:29,160
Speaker 4: the arts, Okay, something I think that everyone will be

2049
01:49:29,240 --> 01:49:30,080
Speaker 4: able to relate to.

2050
01:49:30,840 --> 01:49:33,720
Speaker 1: All I got to say is, uh, man, you are

2051
01:49:34,600 --> 01:49:36,559
Speaker 1: in the highest sense of the term of class act.

2052
01:49:36,640 --> 01:49:36,800
Speaker 3: Man.

2053
01:49:37,000 --> 01:49:40,000
Speaker 1: You just you know, I'm so glad you got your flowers.

2054
01:49:40,040 --> 01:49:43,880
Speaker 1: I'm so glad you got recognition. And that's often hard,

2055
01:49:44,000 --> 01:49:49,760
Speaker 1: especially for a lot of our brothers and sisters who

2056
01:49:50,640 --> 01:49:55,519
Speaker 1: are pioneers, our leaders, and oftentimes their artwork is taken

2057
01:49:55,560 --> 01:49:59,400
Speaker 1: for granted and they're not given the proper respect to you.

2058
01:49:59,520 --> 01:50:01,160
Speaker 1: And you are that person, man.

2059
01:50:01,240 --> 01:50:05,840
Speaker 4: I appreciate that, you know, and those artists that you mentioned,

2060
01:50:06,280 --> 01:50:10,000
Speaker 4: you know, deserve to be heard, they deserve to h

2061
01:50:11,520 --> 01:50:14,760
Speaker 4: to have that like that, that renaissance, you know. Uh

2062
01:50:14,920 --> 01:50:17,240
Speaker 4: And and I really think that this project, you know,

2063
01:50:17,960 --> 01:50:20,360
Speaker 4: I'm going to do that and listen before we be

2064
01:50:20,520 --> 01:50:22,280
Speaker 4: in this. Man, there's so much more to talk about,

2065
01:50:22,360 --> 01:50:24,960
Speaker 4: but I just first want to, you know, congratulate you

2066
01:50:25,040 --> 01:50:25,920
Speaker 4: on the Summer Soul.

2067
01:50:26,479 --> 01:50:30,360
Speaker 6: Thank you, Hey, bro, where's that oscar? Man, I'm looking

2068
01:50:30,439 --> 01:50:32,880
Speaker 6: for that goal. Look behind you over there and put

2069
01:50:32,920 --> 01:50:34,120
Speaker 6: that statue up behind me.

2070
01:50:35,160 --> 01:50:37,519
Speaker 1: This is my office, man, I keep my oscar at home.

2071
01:50:37,640 --> 01:50:39,880
Speaker 6: But yeah, well this is going to be another one, bro.

2072
01:50:41,040 --> 01:50:41,519
Speaker 3: I mean it was.

2073
01:50:41,600 --> 01:50:44,519
Speaker 4: It was really so well put together, man. And like

2074
01:50:44,600 --> 01:50:46,920
Speaker 4: the way you when you brought in the people from

2075
01:50:46,960 --> 01:50:49,720
Speaker 4: hallm you know, telling their stories. The way you interplayed

2076
01:50:49,800 --> 01:50:52,040
Speaker 4: that with the music, it was like it was like

2077
01:50:52,120 --> 01:50:52,840
Speaker 4: a story book.

2078
01:50:53,080 --> 01:50:53,960
Speaker 6: It was magical.

2079
01:50:54,080 --> 01:50:54,240
Speaker 5: Man.

2080
01:50:54,280 --> 01:50:58,320
Speaker 4: You you have a special gift with that. And as

2081
01:50:58,360 --> 01:51:00,280
Speaker 4: I said, you know, with the special that you doing,

2082
01:51:00,400 --> 01:51:02,960
Speaker 4: I think it's great to hear because it kind of

2083
01:51:03,080 --> 01:51:05,080
Speaker 4: leads into what we're what we're doing now.

2084
01:51:05,960 --> 01:51:08,240
Speaker 5: I want to say some sort of an announcement of

2085
01:51:08,360 --> 01:51:10,880
Speaker 5: my own. I've done the math JT.

2086
01:51:11,160 --> 01:51:14,439
Speaker 2: And since you've technically technically technically appeared at the most

2087
01:51:14,560 --> 01:51:18,000
Speaker 2: bar mitzvahs in the history of bar mitzvah, I am

2088
01:51:18,520 --> 01:51:21,920
Speaker 2: announcing that you have been declared an honorary Jew and

2089
01:51:23,040 --> 01:51:24,879
Speaker 2: you can consider yourself bar Mitzvah.

2090
01:51:25,400 --> 01:51:27,160
Speaker 6: All right, do I have to have to learn my

2091
01:51:27,680 --> 01:51:28,479
Speaker 6: speech and everything?

2092
01:51:29,280 --> 01:51:31,520
Speaker 5: You're part of the Hebrew persuasion.

2093
01:51:32,720 --> 01:51:33,040
Speaker 3: There you go.

2094
01:51:33,600 --> 01:51:35,920
Speaker 1: Thank you very much, brother, for doing this podcast and

2095
01:51:36,560 --> 01:51:39,719
Speaker 1: you know on behalf of the family and Suger Steve

2096
01:51:40,320 --> 01:51:44,000
Speaker 1: this Quest Love Brother James, J T. Taylor, the one

2097
01:51:44,040 --> 01:51:44,400
Speaker 1: and only.

2098
01:51:44,760 --> 01:51:47,479
Speaker 6: Thank you so much, love you, Thank you guys, appreciate it.

2099
01:51:48,000 --> 01:51:49,040
Speaker 5: Thank you so much.

2100
01:51:49,160 --> 01:51:49,360
Speaker 3: J T.

2101
01:51:49,560 --> 01:51:49,760
Speaker 5: That was.

2102
01:51:51,720 --> 01:51:53,920
Speaker 7: This is Sugar Steve. Thank you for listening to Quest

2103
01:51:53,960 --> 01:51:57,759
Speaker 7: Love Supreme. This podcast is hosted by mere Quest Love Thompson,

2104
01:51:57,920 --> 01:52:01,400
Speaker 7: Lijah Saint Clair, Sugar Steve Mandel, and unpaid Bill Sherman.

2105
01:52:02,360 --> 01:52:05,080
Speaker 7: The executive producers are a mere Quest of Thompson, Sean

2106
01:52:05,160 --> 01:52:09,479
Speaker 7: g and Brian Calhoun. Produced by Brittany Benjamin, Jake Payne

2107
01:52:09,520 --> 01:52:14,720
Speaker 7: and Liiah Saint Clair. Edited by Alex Conroy. Produced for

2108
01:52:14,800 --> 01:52:20,759
Speaker 7: iHeart by Noel Brown. West Love Supreme is a production

2109
01:52:21,000 --> 01:52:27,920
Speaker 7: of iHeartRadio. For more podcasts from iHeart Radio, visit the

2110
01:52:27,960 --> 01:52:31,599
Speaker 7: iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your

2111
01:52:31,640 --> 01:52:32,280
Speaker 7: favorite shows.