Speaker 1: Quest Love Supreme is a production of iHeartRadio. Ladies and gentlemen,
Speaker 1: you know the show.
Speaker 2: You know the host, you know the co host, Fantakeolo Sugar,
Speaker 2: Steve Broke, ast Bill say hello, Hey, alright, all right,
Speaker 2: let's just get this out the way, because this.
Speaker 3: Is about this show was invented like this, like this
Speaker 3: Nephork is once in a blue boon.
Speaker 2: What can I say about our guest today, Ladies and gentlemen,
Speaker 2: I will simply state we do not deserve this guest
Speaker 2: at all. He possesses what I personally believe to be
Speaker 2: one of the most flawless tenor voices in modern music,
Speaker 2: as a songwriter, as an arranger, as a producer, as
Speaker 2: a performer, as an entertainer. Our guest, I don't believe
Speaker 2: that he has any singing peer whatsoever.
Speaker 1: And if he does, they have his last name. That's
Speaker 1: all I'm saying.
Speaker 2: Even as he approaches the bolden names of sixty this June,
Speaker 2: he has.
Speaker 1: Not lost a step.
Speaker 2: He's in fine form since when we first heard him
Speaker 2: over forty years ago front of his siblings. Please give
Speaker 2: us the honor of welcoming and giving flowers, Yes flowers, yes,
Speaker 2: only held your departs the quest love Supreme.
Speaker 1: Yes, I can't believe I Saiven, Yes, made it flowers? Hello, Elle,
Speaker 1: how are you?
Speaker 4: I'm great after that? That's that's wonderful. I didn't know.
Speaker 4: I didn't know I was approaching sixty. Emma, you don't look.
Speaker 1: At you don't look at at all, man, for real?
Speaker 4: You Yeah, you're not think about it, really, I ever think,
Speaker 4: but it doesn't feel like it.
Speaker 5: Oh good.
Speaker 2: I have to get out the habit of acknowledge numbers,
Speaker 2: like I feel like that is what slows slows us down.
Speaker 1: In terms of numbers.
Speaker 4: I mean, we've been doing f centuries. We pag people,
Speaker 4: we design people, we judge people by numbers. Everything.
Speaker 2: Yeah, but no, it's it's this is wonderful to speak
Speaker 2: with you.
Speaker 1: You know, I don't know if you know the history
Speaker 1: of this particular show, but we're really about celebrating your
Speaker 1: achievements and you know, going through the journey of your
Speaker 1: life as a creative and and and.
Speaker 2: All those things. So I will start at the beginning. No,
Speaker 2: I'm not asking where he was born because I know
Speaker 2: you were born in Detroit.
Speaker 4: Correct Detroit?
Speaker 2: Well, okay, can you because I know that your family
Speaker 2: moved to Grand Rapids. What is the difference between Grand
Speaker 2: Rapids and Detroit.
Speaker 4: Oh, well, today, not much because Grand Rapids has gotten very,
Speaker 4: very very seriously, that's just just lot more violence than
Speaker 4: it was when I was coming up. But in the seventies,
Speaker 4: my mother wanted us sustaining Grand Rapids Michigan because Detroit.
Speaker 4: You know, if you know about Detroit, it was kind
Speaker 4: of rough on us, being half breas, half black and
Speaker 4: half white. A lot of criticism from actually a lot
Speaker 4: of gotten a lot of fights from both sides, from
Speaker 4: whites and the blacks. So was a lot easier on us.
Speaker 4: And we went there to go to school. But every
Speaker 4: year during the summer we were back in Detroit anyway,
Speaker 4: because that's what most of our relatives was.
Speaker 1: What year did you move to Grand Rapids.
Speaker 4: Let me see, I was like eight years old, to see,
Speaker 4: I was born sixty one, let's do the mass around sixty.
Speaker 2: Yeah, So, do you have any memories of like at
Speaker 2: least Detroit, like post Riot, because you know, not many
Speaker 2: people understand or know that, I mean a big part
Speaker 2: of Motown migrating to the West and kind of what
Speaker 2: Detroit once represented. A lot of that sort of vanished
Speaker 2: after the Detroit riots that people aren't aware of, even
Speaker 2: though like a movie was made about it a couple
Speaker 2: of years ago. But do you have any memories of
Speaker 2: the time during that period in your life?
Speaker 4: Yeah, I was young myself. I think I was roughly
Speaker 4: around eight or nine years old when riots happened. I
Speaker 4: remember stepping outside. We used to go outside every chance
Speaker 4: we got as kids. I stepped outside one day and
Speaker 4: people were fighting the streets and cars were driving up
Speaker 4: on the sidewalk trying to run people over. I didn't
Speaker 4: know what was going on. My brother Bobby grabbed me
Speaker 4: and pulled me back in the house. He said, it's
Speaker 4: a riot. Mart Luther King got shot. I remember very well,
Speaker 4: very well I was. I don't remember being that scared
Speaker 4: of my life because it was crazy. I was looking
Speaker 4: for you. Imagine being eight years old seeing something like that.
Speaker 4: I got a lot of fond memories too, about about
Speaker 4: Detroit and my Grand Rappers Club. It's where I got
Speaker 4: my musical education, most of my influences. I have gospel
Speaker 4: influences too. I don't talk about them a lot, but Andre.
Speaker 1: Right now hear we can hear it in the intro
Speaker 1: to Love Me in a special way we heard.
Speaker 4: That's true. That's true. Yeah, I mean I was strongly
Speaker 4: influenced by Andrew Crouch and Walter Hawkins.
Speaker 1: Do you remember your first musical memory.
Speaker 4: My first musical memory? Actually you want to hear this?
Speaker 1: Yes, yes, yes.
Speaker 2: We love long drawn out stories on the show, like Okay,
Speaker 2: there's no such like fireside chat stuff.
Speaker 1: That's what we live for.
Speaker 4: Okay. Well, my mother every time we moved to a house,
Speaker 4: my mother had what you call a prayer closet, and
Speaker 4: she would put one closet in the house and it
Speaker 4: was hers. Nobody could go in there, and she would
Speaker 4: re decorated. She had an alter in there, and she
Speaker 4: would kneel down and pray. My mother prayed from twelve
Speaker 4: midnight to three in the morning every night, every night,
Speaker 4: so as long as I can't remember. So, but one
Speaker 4: particular night she got my brother Bobby out of bed
Speaker 4: in the morning. And I remember I was seven years old.
Speaker 4: I remember Bobby, his jaws was tight, he was mad.
Speaker 4: So and she said, well, the Lord told me that
Speaker 4: el is going to be a minister of music, so
Speaker 4: I want you to teach him a song. This is
Speaker 4: a true story. So here we are both sitting at
Speaker 4: the piano, and we had just got a We were
Speaker 4: real poor. We just got an upright piano donated to
Speaker 4: us from some neighbors. And because my brother Bobby was
Speaker 4: the only one to play piano at the time. So
Speaker 4: here we were sitting at the piano. He said, Mary
Speaker 4: had a little lamb. Then he looked at me and said,
Speaker 4: now play it. So my mother said, just it. She
Speaker 4: has some anointing oil and she anointed my fingers and
Speaker 4: my hands with it. She said, no, play it, and man,
Speaker 4: I started playing. I started playing in harmony. Was never taught.
Speaker 4: It's just I just saw it. I saw the notes
Speaker 4: in my in my head and I started playing it
Speaker 4: and harmy he played with one finger. I started playing
Speaker 4: it in the harmony. I've been playing piano every since.
Speaker 1: So you never had formal lessons. It was just.
Speaker 4: I tried to take lessons, but by the time I
Speaker 4: did it, I had my ear had developed so well.
Speaker 4: Playing by ear. They just sent me home and said, well,
Speaker 4: he's cheating, he's pretending like he's reading music.
Speaker 5: Did Bobby give you another lesson?
Speaker 4: Yeah, Bobby gave me many lessons. Bobby. Bobby was like
Speaker 4: a mentor for me musically, he sharpened, Well, he's shaving
Speaker 4: my musical taste. He got me into Marvin Gaye, sly Stone,
Speaker 4: I was George Clinton. It was like that, why right? Yeah?
Speaker 4: And then he would make me play songs and learn them.
Speaker 4: And I remember one time I played the song by
Speaker 4: Hearl from the Fire and I played it exactly perfect,
Speaker 4: just like it was, and he set me upside my head.
Speaker 4: I was like, what do you do that for? He said,
Speaker 4: I didn't tell you to copy it. I said, play
Speaker 4: it like you don't copy it. He was like, he
Speaker 4: was like really very meticulous in particular about what he wanted.
Speaker 4: I wish I'm glad about because that's helped to shape
Speaker 4: in me.
Speaker 2: You know, were you the first besides your brother Bobby?
Speaker 2: Were you the first of the family members to really
Speaker 2: catch onto music?
Speaker 4: No? No, no, no, My sister Bunny, Brandy, I'm number
Speaker 4: seven down the line, Randy, Marty, Tommy, Bunny, deezra Ellie, Shan, Teal, Bobby.
Speaker 4: Those are older than me. Okay, I see I got
Speaker 4: it eventually.
Speaker 1: Damn I'm so overwhelmed. I literally forgot you.
Speaker 2: Wait a minute, I had a good question too, Damn
Speaker 2: you the first album that you purchased.
Speaker 4: Yeah, first all my purchase was Earth Wind and Fire.
Speaker 4: It was.
Speaker 1: All in All album really.
Speaker 4: Yeah. The one was a you know, bye bye bye.
Speaker 1: Bye bye bye run Running Running, Yeah.
Speaker 4: That one. Yeah, that's first all my actually pert, but
Speaker 4: my brother Bobby kept him and Bunny. They're always I
Speaker 4: was listening to their albums. It was always buying them.
Speaker 2: But the first one that you purchased was definitely All
Speaker 2: in All that was yours. What is it about you
Speaker 2: always spoken about Maurice White being a musical hero of yours? Uh,
Speaker 2: and all of the interviews I've read, even before you
Speaker 2: worked with him in ninety two, What was it? What
Speaker 2: was it about his music that spoke to you feeling?
Speaker 4: It was just h It was the first time that
Speaker 4: I had heard any any band of musicians, uh, stretch
Speaker 4: out like that. They the horns and the and the strings.
Speaker 4: I mean, it was just pretty quest It was just
Speaker 4: so pretty good. You know, all the stuff they did
Speaker 4: in between Maya was picking up all of that, and
Speaker 4: then he had and then he just wouldn't stop. Each album.
Speaker 4: He just kept building and building and making everything larger,
Speaker 4: and it seemed like they were never gonna have a flop.
Speaker 4: They was just hit after hit after hit after hit,
Speaker 4: all this stuff, which it just moved me like that,
Speaker 4: you know really, and he was he was very He
Speaker 4: was a very smart producer. Sure, you know that, very
Speaker 4: very smart.
Speaker 2: Can you tell me of I mean, besides your your
Speaker 2: family group, did you in your high school experiences or
Speaker 2: in your neighborhood experiences, did you have other groups that
Speaker 2: you were part of or bands or were you guys
Speaker 2: just like contained as a family doing stuff together.
Speaker 4: Well, No, I've always had other other groups that I
Speaker 4: was in, other bands that I was in. See my brothers. Basically,
Speaker 4: to be honest with you, Okay, there's Randy, Marty, James, Chico,
Speaker 4: all of them. Music was like so natural for us.
Speaker 4: It was like you had to really make them sit
Speaker 4: down and practice because it came so easy for him.
Speaker 4: Like people who who need to develop something, you'll see
Speaker 4: them spending more time trying to develop it. But it
Speaker 4: was like with them, you give them a note, they
Speaker 4: got a family, it's easy, so now they're on. They
Speaker 4: get bored with it really easy, so they would be
Speaker 4: outside chasing the girls. Serious and I was always I
Speaker 4: was always very serious minded, even from a child. They
Speaker 4: used to call me professor because they said, you're too serious, man,
Speaker 4: be a child, Be a kid. But I've always been
Speaker 4: like that, so I was always somewhere practicing and studying, rehearsing.
Speaker 4: I had to like make them do it, you know.
Speaker 4: And but once you get them in and you start
Speaker 4: teaching them nots, you get them into it, they're there.
Speaker 4: I mean, And honestly, I don't know anybody to harmonize
Speaker 4: this better than they do. I mean, you got to
Speaker 4: give it to them.
Speaker 1: I'll give it to you. I'll give it to you.
Speaker 1: I know, yes that. I mean when I say I
Speaker 1: give it to you, I give it to you. The
Speaker 1: de Barge clan.
Speaker 2: I was curious, however, if other like do you are
Speaker 2: you the type of creator or musician that like, it's
Speaker 2: hard for me to listen to some people without offering
Speaker 2: my notes inside my head or mine. I mean, it's
Speaker 2: one thing to listen to a song as a fan,
Speaker 2: but then it's another thing to listen to it and
Speaker 2: you start critiquing. So like your thoughts on at least
Speaker 2: at the time, like other groups that were closer to
Speaker 2: your age, like were you aware of like what the
Speaker 2: Five Stare Steps were doing or the Silvers early incarnation
Speaker 2: of the Silvers. I mean, the Jackson's are almost kind
Speaker 2: of because they were so you bick. What's It's almost like,
Speaker 2: I don't know, they're more of an institution than I
Speaker 2: considered them just a singing group. But what were your
Speaker 2: thoughts on like other people around, like younger acts at
Speaker 2: the time.
Speaker 4: I've always felt like different. I remember the Silvers we
Speaker 4: would come up. I remember, of course, the Jackson's. I've
Speaker 4: always felt like my style was different. I was going
Speaker 4: somewhere else. But but you know, I know how to
Speaker 4: pull from this person and that person different groups what
Speaker 4: I need. I was always thinking somewhere else. I mean, honestly,
Speaker 4: I just was. It was like I would listen to
Speaker 4: my peers, people that were my age who were and
Speaker 4: then the Tamberguinners. But I found myself more so steering
Speaker 4: towards older groups. It seemed like, I don't know, it
Speaker 4: was just I learned more, I mean, which was the
Speaker 4: reason why I had other groups that I was in
Speaker 4: even when I was coming up. I wasn't always just
Speaker 4: singing with my family. I was always there was a
Speaker 4: group I was in called Peacemakers, another group being called
Speaker 4: God's Children of harmony. Uh who called h TNT flashers?
Speaker 4: Don't ask me now.
Speaker 1: It's like, why why is that the name?
Speaker 4: Right? That something that one of the band members came
Speaker 4: up with. I don't know. I just went with it.
Speaker 4: But see, I remember I was very young. I started
Speaker 4: playing at seven years old, so I was by the
Speaker 4: time I was twelve years old. I was playing in
Speaker 4: the bars and clubs with my brother Bobby in his groups,
Speaker 4: but I was in the background. Nobody knew I was there.
Speaker 1: How old were you when you gave your first public performance?
Speaker 4: Uh? Twelve?
Speaker 1: Wow?
Speaker 4: Okay, so it was it was mostly just me playing
Speaker 4: the piano and singing backgrounds behind Bobby and and his groups.
Speaker 4: But for the most.
Speaker 2: Part, as a singer, would you say that as a singer,
Speaker 2: would you say that your brother Bobby is like your
Speaker 2: your north star, your at least, and because your vocal
Speaker 2: textures are the same.
Speaker 4: But you know what quests he One thing that Bobby
Speaker 4: instilled in me, he was to be myself, be me,
Speaker 4: never get lost, and and whatever influences you, make sure
Speaker 4: it becomes a part of who you already are and
Speaker 4: I consume you. So because of that, I mean, I
Speaker 4: could say Marvin gay and really be honest about it.
Speaker 4: And and Bobby and Maurice's White hundred Crouch Hawkins Slidestone,
Speaker 4: the Beg's allow. I made all of these my mentor
Speaker 4: because I got into every single one of them, just
Speaker 4: one just as much as the other.
Speaker 2: Well, eventually, I know, you guys have to migrate out west.
Speaker 2: How did the whole process start in getting at least
Speaker 2: with your your brother, getting Jermaine Jackson's attention, that stuff like,
Speaker 2: how did I guess the move to Motown? How did
Speaker 2: how did where was the first step that went out there?
Speaker 4: No, I'm sad because you said migrate so many of us.
Speaker 4: It's like I just see a whole tribe of us.
Speaker 6: I still don't have the official count. I was counting
Speaker 6: on my hands when he was doing it. Now, what
Speaker 6: is the official number of the Bard's children?
Speaker 4: Fifteen?
Speaker 1: Wow?
Speaker 5: Wait a minute, your mama, your mama, your.
Speaker 4: Ma, mama eleven or ten with my mama, We'll see.
Speaker 4: My daddy was roll right, but he yeah, he was.
Speaker 4: He was something else. He was having children while he
Speaker 4: was married to my mother. And check this out, he
Speaker 4: was bringing them home.
Speaker 5: I'm sorry, what now? What was he? What did you
Speaker 5: mean to bring.
Speaker 1: Oh, by the way, meet your new brother. Yeah, he
Speaker 1: pulled defenses second definitely.
Speaker 4: Yeah, Wow, I.
Speaker 1: Knew that experience.
Speaker 2: I had to meet one of my brothers that way,
Speaker 2: like when I was nine. Yes, I had two older brothers. Yeah,
Speaker 2: just one day. Casually meet your brother, different.
Speaker 5: Time, different times.
Speaker 4: That's a whole school, right. You get shot for doing
Speaker 4: that nowadays?
Speaker 1: Yes, exactly exactly. Now it's like make room for.
Speaker 4: Your brother, you make funeral plans right for you, for
Speaker 4: your father, your mother.
Speaker 6: We put them into the singing side of the de
Speaker 6: Barges too, like the other your father's kids or they
Speaker 6: just there.
Speaker 4: On the singing side that mostly came from my mother.
Speaker 1: Is there?
Speaker 2: I was just going to say, is there a DeBarge
Speaker 2: that does not know how to sing? And won't get
Speaker 2: angry if you agree with that question?
Speaker 4: They know it, they know it's.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 3: I think if al de Barges in your family, you
Speaker 3: know if you can sing or not. I think you
Speaker 3: have a pretty good benchmark of what's saying and what ain't.
Speaker 2: I mean, I was just curious whether or not like
Speaker 2: that sort of that kind of epigenetics works with talent
Speaker 2: as well, Like the entire family is blessed with the voice,
Speaker 2: but only maybe six or seven are blessed with it,
Speaker 2: and you know the rest are not that lucky.
Speaker 1: I always want to know.
Speaker 4: It works like that to genetics work the same way.
Speaker 4: Although I would have to say this, I don't know
Speaker 4: if you find this interesting or not, but my father,
Speaker 4: the timber in his voice, mixed with my mom is
Speaker 4: what helped, is what helped to shape in my tone. Really,
Speaker 4: because if you ever heard my father talk and sing
Speaker 4: he used to sing, you would know what I'm talking about.
Speaker 4: You could hear a mixture of his tone and my
Speaker 4: mother's to bless two equals what I have.
Speaker 1: Wow, I was gonna ask you, lle how do you
Speaker 1: preserve your voice?
Speaker 5: Man?
Speaker 3: I saw your the Instagram live concert that you did
Speaker 3: where you were playing.
Speaker 1: You sounded amazing. Man. That was so it was.
Speaker 3: It was fantastic and me and my wife we watched it.
Speaker 3: We put it on the big speakers like everything.
Speaker 1: It was great.
Speaker 3: And I just want to know how you preserve your voice, man,
Speaker 3: because you still singing all those songs, still in the
Speaker 3: same key, still with the same clarity.
Speaker 1: How do you preserve yourself?
Speaker 4: I will I will have to say water, Yeah, I drink,
Speaker 4: but I love water. So but ultimately, you know, having
Speaker 4: gone through what I've been through in life, we all
Speaker 4: know it was it was the grace of God. You know,
Speaker 4: God's got his hands on you, man, and he's got
Speaker 4: his hands on you, and he preserved me. I mean water,
Speaker 4: what I've been through water with long couldn't have it
Speaker 4: was It's God, man, you know. And uh, amen, you
Speaker 4: know what I'm saying. Amen, you could want to pass
Speaker 4: the off from plate now.
Speaker 5: We usually passed to him.
Speaker 2: All right, So back to my question, how did the
Speaker 2: transition to California happened?
Speaker 4: Yeah, okay, Well Bobby, he was missing and we didn't
Speaker 4: know where he was. Honestly, he just walked off one day.
Speaker 4: I think he was like eighteen years old. Yeah, and
Speaker 4: a month went by, no Bobby. Two months went by,
Speaker 4: no Bobby. Come to find out, this whole time he
Speaker 4: was in California and he was would switch him in a.
Speaker 2: Please don't say you saw him on television like, oh
Speaker 2: there he is, no, not that, but oh okay.
Speaker 4: We found this out like a year later. He was
Speaker 4: going for a year before we even knew where he was.
Speaker 4: And you know, my mother was hurt, so then, but
Speaker 4: we did hear it on the radio. Back then, there
Speaker 4: was no Internet, none of that stuff, so you know,
Speaker 4: it was kind of hard to figure out where he was.
Speaker 4: But he just left. I just took off and then
Speaker 4: next thing you know, Tommy was gone. But he had
Speaker 4: sent for Tommy, right all this was like his big secret.
Speaker 4: He wanted to surprise us, but it took him my year.
Speaker 4: But anyway, he got with Motown and I got to
Speaker 4: give Greg Williams credit because he put all that together.
Speaker 2: He was deep a relationship with Greg Williams. Because even
Speaker 2: now as we speak, you know, members of Switch have
Speaker 2: reunited to you know, still do trying to figure out
Speaker 2: how are they doing those songs without Bobby there?
Speaker 4: But what you mean?
Speaker 1: Yeah, I was like, how does that work? No? I mean,
Speaker 1: but nothing nothing against nothing, nothing against Philip.
Speaker 4: That was Paddy. That was that Caddy.
Speaker 5: I mean, but it wasn't a lot.
Speaker 1: It wasn't a lot.
Speaker 5: It's hard.
Speaker 2: I was going to ask, has there ever has there
Speaker 2: ever ever been a conversation about kind of.
Speaker 1: A quasi amalgamation of of de Barge and Switch?
Speaker 5: I mean, I mean, whatever you think.
Speaker 4: El break that down for me.
Speaker 2: Have you in your life ever saying uh, I call
Speaker 2: your name, it will never be or I call your name,
Speaker 2: or calling all girls, or I want to get closer
Speaker 2: and have you Do you have a relationship with Greg
Speaker 2: Williams where you two have talked about collaborating. I just
Speaker 2: always wanted to know was there a direct relationship with
Speaker 2: the Switch camp and the current DeBarge camp.
Speaker 4: I'm scared of this question, this question. No, no, I'm
Speaker 4: just take me serious. I'll try to be a comedian.
Speaker 4: At times it doesn't and I'll try it anyway, but
Speaker 4: anyway or to break.
Speaker 1: It's a real question. It's a real question. I didn't
Speaker 1: know that. I didn't know there was one under that
Speaker 1: bridge to go to the evening.
Speaker 4: It's cool, they look funny, but listen, uh Switch it's not.
Speaker 4: I don't feel some type of way about it or nothing,
Speaker 4: but I mean, I love I love Gregham just like
Speaker 4: a brother to me. They're out singing. Okay, put it
Speaker 4: this way. Sometimes when I'm out doing concerts, m hum.
Speaker 4: Unbeknownst to me, the promoters do this. So I look
Speaker 4: up and then they say, I know, Switches opening up
Speaker 4: for me.
Speaker 3: Oh they trying to force it, yeah, oh.
Speaker 1: Force the movement. So I did. I did hit up
Speaker 1: on something.
Speaker 4: Okay, yeahs. Matter of fact, it's happened quite a few times.
Speaker 4: And uh, I don't know whe you think they're trying
Speaker 4: to say, tell me something. I mean, do you.
Speaker 2: Feel do you feel like it would be sacrilegious for
Speaker 2: you to sing your brother songs?
Speaker 5: No?
Speaker 4: I do sing my brother's song. See that's that's the
Speaker 4: cool thing about it. I do it in my show,
Speaker 4: and it will switch opening up for me.
Speaker 7: Oh ship, that's a double oh conflict of.
Speaker 4: When I do it. You know I'm gonna bring it right?
Speaker 4: I don't know.
Speaker 5: I mean, so we got talked to grade because he no, no,
Speaker 5: there's no.
Speaker 4: I'm gonna be cool.
Speaker 1: You can leave it at that.
Speaker 4: Well what do you think? Have you heard him sing
Speaker 4: your show?
Speaker 2: Well, no, it's it's I just recently and shout out
Speaker 2: to a DJ Soul System for bringing back the the
Speaker 2: switch movement on Instagram.
Speaker 1: Yes, I will. I will say that I.
Speaker 2: I saw one clip, but I didn't watch it long
Speaker 2: enough or I guess I didn't want to watch it
Speaker 2: long enough to get disappointed.
Speaker 1: But this is what I do know.
Speaker 2: I do know that Philip Ingram, his voice is in
Speaker 2: mine for him and maybe eight.
Speaker 1: Year old de mirror.
Speaker 2: Is this dreaming of the day where that Ingram voice
Speaker 2: and met the Barge voice meets again at some.
Speaker 1: Point in this lifetime? So some way, yeah, that was
Speaker 1: That was my lofty way of asking. Has that ever
Speaker 1: come up in the last twenty years, like.
Speaker 4: Sometimes you have to be blunt with me as some
Speaker 4: things go over my head. Yeah, okay, I got you,
Speaker 4: But no, you know what, that would be great. I
Speaker 4: would love to sing with Philip. Philip is Phillips, I like,
Speaker 4: I love his voice.
Speaker 1: Yeah, he's a master. He's a master.
Speaker 2: So how was how was the door opened so that
Speaker 2: you guys could also sign the motown In the one.
Speaker 4: Bobby, he sort of tricked me into coming out here
Speaker 4: because I really didn't want to be in the group.
Speaker 4: I wanted to stay in Grand Rapids and don'tant to
Speaker 4: ask me why, but I did, you know, I was
Speaker 4: young man. So he said, well, ell, I need you
Speaker 4: to come out here and just play for my second
Speaker 4: album that I call Your Name album. So I was
Speaker 4: excited then, you know, because first he was saying we
Speaker 4: could starting this group the Barge. I can't be in
Speaker 4: the bars because I'm stuck in the contract we switch.
Speaker 4: I never really wanted to be in the group. Switch
Speaker 4: that loan, That's what I said. He said. My dream
Speaker 4: was to have a family group, he said, but they
Speaker 4: extended our contract, picked up the option. So I'm want
Speaker 4: to do it through you guys. He said, Hell, I
Speaker 4: want you to be the least singer. I want Bunny, Randy, Marty,
Speaker 4: so on and so forth. I didn't want to do it,
Speaker 4: So Bobby didn't want the group to get started without me,
Speaker 4: so he put it on the hold. But he got
Speaker 4: me to come to California when he said help me
Speaker 4: with my album. And I'm a Bobby the Barge fan,
Speaker 4: so when he said help me with my elbow, I
Speaker 4: was like, okay. He wanted me to play the piano.
Speaker 4: I was like, oh shoot, I'm gonna play piano if
Speaker 4: I want to switch the album. So he got me
Speaker 4: out here and he said, okay, I'm glad you're here.
Speaker 4: Now we're going to have a eating with our managers,
Speaker 4: Jermaine and Hazel Jackson. So I need y'all just sit
Speaker 4: and wait for me while I had his meeting. So
Speaker 4: we're in Jermaine's office. It's this big, beautiful white baby
Speaker 4: grand piano. Man, it was pretty so me or anybody
Speaker 4: Marty James was you know out here at the time.
Speaker 4: We looked at it. I started playing, We started singing.
Speaker 4: We sung about two or three songs, and then we
Speaker 4: heard hand claps and we look behind us Jermaine and
Speaker 4: Hazel standing there and mister Gordy mm hmmm. And that's
Speaker 4: how Bobby had tricked us into an audition.
Speaker 1: I got you.
Speaker 4: Have you ever seen an office? Have you ever seen
Speaker 4: an office where the walls open up like a door,
Speaker 4: like the all and then it just opens up.
Speaker 1: Now, I've seen that at will Smith South, Yes, So
Speaker 1: then the rest of us say.
Speaker 3: I've seen it in movies, yeah, which is.
Speaker 4: So that's where I was in Jermaine's office.
Speaker 1: Wow, okay, because.
Speaker 4: I didn't even know anybody was in there because all
Speaker 4: we saw was a wall the office behind the wall.
Speaker 4: So they were standing there the whole time with the
Speaker 4: all open. And that's how we auditioned. And so I'm like, okay,
Speaker 4: he got me, Bobby, and we was on the road,
Speaker 4: and then everybody made me feel like, hell, you got
Speaker 4: to do it, Come on, you got to do it.
Speaker 4: And I've always wanted to just stay in the background.
Speaker 4: For some reason, I never wanted to be lead singer.
Speaker 4: I never wanted to be out front.
Speaker 1: Why are you so shy about that? Clearly you're the leader.
Speaker 4: I'm brave, That's what it is. I'm brave a lot
Speaker 4: of things that I might be reluctant to do. I'm
Speaker 4: still brave enough to do it if I know it
Speaker 4: has to be done. I'm not a person. If it's
Speaker 4: got to be done, I'll bring it. So I saw
Speaker 4: the big picture. Then I was like, well, I got
Speaker 4: to do this for the family. But to be honest
Speaker 4: with you, I'm glad I did do it because my
Speaker 4: mind I changed my mind down the line somewhere, and
Speaker 4: I was happy that that Bobby saw fit to uh
Speaker 4: trick me into an audition.
Speaker 3: When you talk about working on that Switch album, did
Speaker 3: you do the vocal arrangement for the that.
Speaker 1: We are sending you this message to the intro is
Speaker 1: that you are you playing on it?
Speaker 4: No? No, not that one. No, that's Eddie Fluellen in
Speaker 4: the group. He ranged that. Ah, okay, okay, But I
Speaker 4: played piano on I Call Your Name and shit, yeah,
Speaker 4: just a little bit, Bobby. Then Bobby took over and
Speaker 4: played piano. I love you. Bobby Can really played the piano.
Speaker 4: It was really he was really good.
Speaker 2: It just hit me what I forgot to mention. I
Speaker 2: was talking to Jimmy Jam right before, about an hour
Speaker 2: before we did this. He told me that, without no doubt,
Speaker 2: you know, of course he's worked with literally everyone by now,
Speaker 2: but he said that, without no doubt, you are probably
Speaker 2: in his top five favorite clients that he's ever worked with.
Speaker 2: And he said that especially, he said that you would
Speaker 2: often just sit at the piano and just start doing chords,
Speaker 2: and he he himself was just like, you know, as
Speaker 2: a piano player that you have to admire someone who
Speaker 2: he was talking about your chord structure. He knew you
Speaker 2: had gospel training with a little bit of jazz chops,
Speaker 2: but really like made it your own.
Speaker 1: And he just said that one of his favorite.
Speaker 2: Things as a professional producers is sitting watching you and
Speaker 2: I guess speaking of like not knowing someone's behind you,
Speaker 2: watching like Jam would say that often. You know that
Speaker 2: that was his favorite thing in the world, like watching
Speaker 2: you do that.
Speaker 4: Yeah, that's a big statement from Yeah, that's a big
Speaker 4: statement coming from Jail.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Wow, did you ever play any other instruments like bass, guitar.
Speaker 1: Was you primarily just focused on.
Speaker 4: Piano, saxophone, violin, and uh yeah, that's about it.
Speaker 1: Saxophone violin, that's about it.
Speaker 4: Ship because everybody played the clarinet in grade school right.
Speaker 1: Quarter that I played the clarinet.
Speaker 5: Look at you?
Speaker 8: Yeah?
Speaker 4: Well, and you know what was what was an interesting
Speaker 4: song that I did? Honestly, I did it because my
Speaker 4: man Susany Pass and Tony Jones were my managers at
Speaker 4: the time. Man it thought it would be a good idea.
Speaker 4: That's the only reason why I did it. But speaking
Speaker 4: of not doing things, because you can't really see it
Speaker 4: sometimes I don't see all the way through. And I'm
Speaker 4: glad I've had direction and I was enough to take
Speaker 4: it from other people because it was a good move.
Speaker 4: Remember who's Johnny.
Speaker 3: Yes, yes, yes, circuit too, Yeah.
Speaker 5: And tried to look the other way.
Speaker 4: Yeah. I didn't want to do that song.
Speaker 5: I know that I could tell. I just know I
Speaker 5: can tell. No, you know what, let me explode, let
Speaker 5: me explore.
Speaker 6: I could tell because in my mind I knew el DeBarge.
Speaker 6: And although I loved that song and my mind, it
Speaker 6: didn't it just didn't go with.
Speaker 2: No but I have questions about that first solo record,
Speaker 2: but I don't want to skip it yet finished.
Speaker 1: Finishing story point.
Speaker 4: So for the first solo record, now you go ahead,
Speaker 4: and I want to hear it.
Speaker 3: Now before okay, before you real quick? Did you want
Speaker 3: to do the Facts of Life episode? Did you want
Speaker 3: to do that?
Speaker 1: Wait a minute first, yes?
Speaker 6: Yet to me, I'm here for All This Love conversation.
Speaker 2: Okay, we're not even on the first record yet. All right,
Speaker 2: let's go to the first album. How long did it
Speaker 2: take you, guys? Did you guys have those songs all
Speaker 2: ready for your very first record? People tend to think
Speaker 2: that All This Love is your first record, when actually
Speaker 2: that's your second album and the the Barges that came
Speaker 2: out in eighty one, which weird enough, Queen of My
Speaker 2: Heart and Share My World are originally on that record. Yeah,
Speaker 2: but what how much time did you guys have to prepare?
Speaker 1: Did you even have meetings on like who gets the helmet? Like?
Speaker 2: How are decisions made as far as what goes on
Speaker 2: the album, especially when it's between siblings.
Speaker 4: Well, what we did, we had We had a project manager,
Speaker 4: Iras Gordy Berry Gordy's knees every other day. She was
Speaker 4: the project manager. She what she would do is she
Speaker 4: would come in the studio and say, okay, who wrote what?
Speaker 4: Put your names out on this writer's split sheet? Who
Speaker 4: wrote this? Who wrote that? So we would all put
Speaker 4: our names out next to the songs we wrote, and
Speaker 4: then I would turn into credits whose song what? We
Speaker 4: had a deadline that we almost never made share my
Speaker 4: World and Queen of My Heart. As you said, that
Speaker 4: was on our first record, You're right, it was. It
Speaker 4: was record out before uh, the Author's Love album. So
Speaker 4: I put it on? Which album? I put it? I
Speaker 4: put it on.
Speaker 1: You put Queen of my Heart on in a Special Way.
Speaker 4: And Share my World too, and you put.
Speaker 1: Share My World on the Rhythm of the Night, Rhythm
Speaker 1: of Night.
Speaker 4: Okay, wise, because we had a deadline. Now we had
Speaker 4: another song that needs to be recorded for the Inn
Speaker 4: Special Way album. But Missus already said, nope, you got
Speaker 4: a deadline. It's not gonna make it on the album
Speaker 4: because you you gotta still do the vocals. It's not
Speaker 4: gonna make it. And he was real strict about it.
Speaker 4: He said, it's just not gonna make it on the album.
Speaker 4: But we needed another song, so I said, let me
Speaker 4: pull my song from from the first records. It's a done,
Speaker 4: put it on it and just remix it, right.
Speaker 1: Always wanted to do that, Okay, I see.
Speaker 4: The the credits and stuff will get mixed up sometimes,
Speaker 4: like like, for instance, stay with Me. You know it's
Speaker 4: my name's not on there as a writer, but I
Speaker 4: wrote it. Marty's name is.
Speaker 1: On there, and I hope that got fixed.
Speaker 6: It didn't, wow, okay, because Marty just forward everything.
Speaker 1: So at the time, you're thinking like, oh, stay with
Speaker 1: Me is like some really cool filler and this will
Speaker 1: be consequential to my life in the next twenty five years,
Speaker 1: will it?
Speaker 4: No, I never think much. I love to stay with
Speaker 4: Me from the beginning. See Marty, when he came to me,
Speaker 4: he said, well, I need you to help me write
Speaker 4: this song, and he had the hook stay with me,
Speaker 4: Stay with me, Stay with me, Stay with me. I said, okay, right,
Speaker 4: we gotta got to do more than that though, some variation, right,
Speaker 4: So he just laughing in my hands, and I started
Speaker 4: really feeling it. Core chain started. It just started coming
Speaker 4: to me. So I wrote the rest of the song
Speaker 4: and I went in and recorded it, and he loved
Speaker 4: it and but my name's not.
Speaker 1: Wow.
Speaker 2: I just hope that the publishing was fixed at least
Speaker 2: that much, because Nope, And at no point was that
Speaker 2: considered like, hey, this is good enough for a single.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I mean I thought so, but you have to
Speaker 4: remember the Barge was going through a transition with Motown
Speaker 4: at that time. I was becoming solo and right Garry
Speaker 4: Gordy was Motown was pushing him to the back. Right
Speaker 4: started a lot of controversy.
Speaker 1: Okay, no, no, you're not ready.
Speaker 4: To talk about that yet, not yet.
Speaker 2: I think, you know, I actually think it's it should
Speaker 2: be noted that, uh, there was once a time where
Speaker 2: a song like stay with Me was just like a
Speaker 2: regular song, like just yeah, it was like a B side, Yeah,
Speaker 2: just like a throwaway, which you know, considering the state
Speaker 2: of music now, you know that's that's amazing to be
Speaker 2: too much.
Speaker 4: Yeah, but you know what, it was treated like a
Speaker 4: single though it never was right.
Speaker 2: Right exactly now, that was my favorite even when I
Speaker 2: brought when I got that record that that was always
Speaker 2: my favorite to Bart's song. Side note, guys, side note,
Speaker 2: as I say this for Silent Treatment, one of those
Speaker 2: remixes we attempted kind of a stay with me asque
Speaker 2: attempt with the one and only L won't get this
Speaker 2: but lie about the mimic about to lose their minds
Speaker 2: with this with the one and only Richard Nicols singing
Speaker 2: the hook.
Speaker 4: She gets it.
Speaker 1: I got No, we were, I mean back in ninety
Speaker 1: three ninety four, where like you had to have like
Speaker 1: five remixes on the record, right, yeah, I have.
Speaker 3: I have them all.
Speaker 1: No, No, but way before before one More.
Speaker 2: Chance came out, we we actually stopped it once our
Speaker 2: boy told us that Big L had.
Speaker 1: Used because he used MVP.
Speaker 2: He used it right exactly when he told us that,
Speaker 2: then we like put it to bed. But we did.
Speaker 2: There is a silent treatment remix completed with Richard Nichols
Speaker 2: singing in a high false.
Speaker 1: And he couldn't sing it.
Speaker 2: But our whole, our whole logic was like, well, old
Speaker 2: thirty bastard can't sing.
Speaker 1: So this is hip hop. Like just do any this
Speaker 1: back where you can just do anything in the name
Speaker 1: of quote. This is hip hop. So yeah, I have
Speaker 1: to find yeah, bring it back.
Speaker 4: No, not really, not even a beat, not even a beat.
Speaker 2: We we we used it for something else, but nah
Speaker 2: we we we put it to bed. But you know,
Speaker 2: when Biggie blew up with it, I got salty like
Speaker 2: damn you know, but it was you know, uh But actually,
Speaker 2: you know what, I'm glad you mentioned her name because
Speaker 2: what was Iris's like Iris's role? I know, I know
Speaker 2: you said she was Barry's niece, but what was her
Speaker 2: role at Motown?
Speaker 1: Because anytime.
Speaker 2: Someone from Motown made an appearance on Soul Train, don
Speaker 2: always figured out a way to shout out Iris Iris
Speaker 2: Gordy in the audience or watching or whatever. But was
Speaker 2: she always the product manager?
Speaker 1: And and she was?
Speaker 4: She basically she was.
Speaker 5: She was.
Speaker 4: She's very musical. She loved being around music all the time.
Speaker 4: So I guess that's why Verry Gordy, uh Chapper as
Speaker 4: a project.
Speaker 5: Nepotism in the black people.
Speaker 1: Yes, it was.
Speaker 4: She did. She she knew what she was doing too.
Speaker 4: She she she knows she was doing she was.
Speaker 2: Was the appearance with Jermaine and anyone the first time
Speaker 2: you guys were in national television. You guys did Soul
Speaker 2: Train once before you did it on your own as
Speaker 2: de Barge.
Speaker 1: But kind of ass.
Speaker 4: Like, okay, did we do stop? Don't tease me?
Speaker 1: You did stop? Don't tease me and you did.
Speaker 2: I like it back when that was like maybe a
Speaker 2: throwaway song or something.
Speaker 1: I love it when you remind people of their past.
Speaker 1: That's my favorite thing. Just in case you forgot, Yeah,
Speaker 1: you were you were a tuxedo. You were a tuxedo
Speaker 1: with no jacket.
Speaker 2: Wait, okay, this is I hope I don't get trouble
Speaker 2: for this question.
Speaker 1: But I always wanted to know.
Speaker 2: So you guys are a family unit, your own motel. Obviously,
Speaker 2: of course, when you're thinking of the lineage of motown
Speaker 2: and being a family, of course, the J word is
Speaker 2: always going to pop up, and you know you're associated
Speaker 2: with one of those J words, which you're main. But
Speaker 2: I always wanted to know, like why, because the one
Speaker 2: thing that you guys rarely did was choreography.
Speaker 1: I'm so glad you're not mad at me for asking
Speaker 1: you this question. No, but like, no, no, no, no, no, no, no.
Speaker 2: I take it back when you when y'all did baby
Speaker 2: once you come Quick, y'all, y'all had some moves together
Speaker 2: or whatever.
Speaker 1: Yeah, but that's the one.
Speaker 2: The one thing that always puzzled me was that I
Speaker 2: knew that they were putting so much energy behind you guys.
Speaker 1: But it's like the one thing you were the first Motown.
Speaker 2: Act that I saw presented as a five person group
Speaker 2: as a family. But you guys never had a choreography
Speaker 2: like not since uh what's what's the boy band?
Speaker 1: Before? What's the boy band? Now?
Speaker 2: The one that Harry styles was in one direction? Wonderrec
Speaker 2: one direction? When I saw one direction on senl init
Speaker 2: a minute, this feels familiar, I said the barge.
Speaker 1: Why you're the first person to draw that comparison.
Speaker 2: Absolutely well, no, no, no, no, it's just that I used
Speaker 2: to seeing I'm used to seeing five people act out upon.
Speaker 1: Yeah, doing these intricate things, and you guys never did that.
Speaker 4: Wait where y'all y'all in Philadelphia? Booked me a flight
Speaker 4: to Philadelphia.
Speaker 1: In New York right now, about to pull up, about
Speaker 1: to pull up.
Speaker 2: But you know, I'm telling the truth, Like why wasn't
Speaker 2: why like why didn't you guys go.
Speaker 1: Through that that? Uh? I guess you could say Charlie
Speaker 1: Akins phase of like was that going by Motown by now?
Speaker 1: Like the whole yeah, all that stuff?
Speaker 4: Okay, Well, you know what I was wondering the same thing.
Speaker 4: I think it's because a lot of us couldn't dash.
Speaker 1: Probably I never thought of that.
Speaker 4: Left you can move, Yeah, but they brought choreographers in
Speaker 4: and it was like it was a joke.
Speaker 1: It was a joke. Choreographers started crying.
Speaker 2: I know, I fell down a rabbit hole where I
Speaker 2: just looked at every DeBarge clip from even.
Speaker 1: The McDonald's commercials. Everything.
Speaker 4: Oh yeah, it was so.
Speaker 1: I just notice that you guys were just two stepped
Speaker 1: on your own.
Speaker 5: You really think about.
Speaker 2: That video, Yeah, you just two stepped on your own.
Speaker 2: You just screwed, which I mean was cool enough. Your
Speaker 2: your voices were perfect. You guys made up like no
Speaker 2: one complained, like I was singing your asses off.
Speaker 4: Right, But have you ever have you ever seen any
Speaker 4: of our live shows? Okay, if you haven't. Back in
Speaker 4: the day, my brother Marty mm hmm was all over
Speaker 4: the stage all the time. And I know this had
Speaker 4: a lot to do with with the core everything because
Speaker 4: I remember Susany Pass and Berry Gordy saying like this
Speaker 4: just throwing as up what we did from how we rehearsed.
Speaker 4: No matter what kind of choreography we be there, Marty
Speaker 4: would stepped out of the choreography and come up to
Speaker 4: the edge of the stage all the time and start
Speaker 4: kicking his legs around doing karate and it's no secret.
Speaker 4: All you do is watch some old foot that you'll
Speaker 4: see it and uh, what was the thing in the
Speaker 4: eighties And it's like, it's okay, so much for the choreography.
Speaker 4: He would do it all the time, and James and
Speaker 4: Randy Buddy, We'll be looking at him. And then next
Speaker 4: thing I know, he's standing next to me and I'm
Speaker 4: I'm singing solo.
Speaker 1: I'm like, Marty, what yo, I'm so glad you said that,
Speaker 1: because what.
Speaker 4: Are you doing? Mary? You feels Marty good?
Speaker 2: Wait wait, well, okay, slight confession. I had part two
Speaker 2: to that question. I wasn't going to ask the second
Speaker 2: part unless you answer the first part. The second part
Speaker 2: was definitely your brother, Marty. Everybody known to do.
Speaker 4: Some crazy Well, one thing about what he does his homework.
Speaker 1: No, twice twice Marty.
Speaker 2: I have two clips of Marty where he will whereever, like, Okay.
Speaker 6: There's a Marty wearing the pink shirt and all this
Speaker 6: love cover on album cover.
Speaker 1: It could be Yeah, that's him, he's right in the middle.
Speaker 4: I knew that he was wearing.
Speaker 5: Yes, that's Marty Okay, got it. I just want to
Speaker 5: get everybody.
Speaker 4: No.
Speaker 1: But there's there's a there's a I forget what song
Speaker 1: it was.
Speaker 2: It wasn't you Were It was a song where it
Speaker 2: tas a guitar solo in it, and it wasn't you
Speaker 2: Wear It? Well, it might have been baby Once you
Speaker 2: Come Quick, But he took this like Hendrick's esque guitar
Speaker 2: solo without without a guitar strap at that So even
Speaker 2: then I was like, wow, he's doing that without a
Speaker 2: guitar strap. But he was like on his knees, on
Speaker 2: his back and everything. You guys were two stepping, like
Speaker 2: doing your regular two step thing whatever. But in my mind,
Speaker 2: I was like, wow, he's really going over the top
Speaker 2: with his guitar solo, like really means this ship.
Speaker 1: Yeah when it comes to right.
Speaker 2: But in concert were you guys doing, Like was it
Speaker 2: like that as well? I totally forgot that. When we
Speaker 2: did the baby Face episode, he told us that you
Speaker 2: guys opening for Luther and when the deal was on
Speaker 2: the road with you guys, that that was your your
Speaker 2: your shows were incredible and his in his words that
Speaker 2: they were incredible. But I was basically asked about Marty
Speaker 2: like did he always do those over the top solos
Speaker 2: in concert as well?
Speaker 4: Every show? Every each and every concert. Wow, if it was,
Speaker 4: it was amazing because he always say that he wasn't
Speaker 4: gonna do it no more, and then we'll do it.
Speaker 4: We had to have meetings about it. Group mes serious
Speaker 4: means all right, listen, Matt, you we made a bruise.
Speaker 4: We start, You're gonna get it doc all this stuff.
Speaker 4: He right back out.
Speaker 2: Yeah, Oh my god, I've been dying and know this. Okay,
Speaker 2: this this is what makes the show worth having. I've
Speaker 2: been dying to know this answer for decades and it
Speaker 2: happened just like I thought in my head.
Speaker 4: Yep, you're right right.
Speaker 2: What were those early tours like once all this left
Speaker 2: came out?
Speaker 4: It was our first time out there Motown. They they well,
Speaker 4: Barry Gordon, he cheated tricked us too. We didn't know you.
Speaker 1: Guys got tricked a lot in your career, but.
Speaker 4: This was kind of this was kind of a cool
Speaker 4: one though. Here we didn't we didn't really know that
Speaker 4: we were that popular because all we did was we
Speaker 4: got up in the morning at six and the limbo
Speaker 4: was outside are waiting for us, and we drive up
Speaker 4: to Barry Gordye's house. We stayed there all day and
Speaker 4: then the nighttime. Then will take us to the studio
Speaker 4: and from the studio to home next day, repeat same
Speaker 4: thing for months and months. So we didn't see anything.
Speaker 4: We didn't we didn't know what was happening on in
Speaker 4: the outside world. Were just studio rats man and mister
Speaker 4: Gordye's house, studio sleep. So when we went on on
Speaker 4: that first tour, man, they were telling us, well, you
Speaker 4: gonna have to work really hard. The album's not doing
Speaker 4: that great. Uh you know. I said, well, it looks
Speaker 4: like on the charts it looks pretty good. Like it's
Speaker 4: doing pretty good to me. They said, well, you're a
Speaker 4: airplay hit. You know. Back back then that was thing
Speaker 4: called being an airplay hit. You weren't really selling that
Speaker 4: many records, but you was just playing a lot, you
Speaker 4: know what I mean. Yeah, So I said, okay, They said,
Speaker 4: so you have to work really hard to get these
Speaker 4: fans to come out. Uh, you know, do the best
Speaker 4: you can. So we get out there. Man. We got
Speaker 4: off the planning and we getting ready to go to
Speaker 4: our first show. No, before we go to the show,
Speaker 4: we had to go to an in store, Remember the
Speaker 4: in stores, Yes, we think. We didn't think nobody was
Speaker 4: gonna be there. They told us it'll be a few
Speaker 4: people here. To just be nice to them, you know,
Speaker 4: because they came out in the snow, so be nice
Speaker 4: to him.
Speaker 1: Is this Detroit?
Speaker 4: This wash? Yeah?
Speaker 2: Yeah, I knew the story.
Speaker 1: I read about this and ride on magazine.
Speaker 7: But go ahead, go ahead, memory, But is this the one?
Speaker 4: Uh?
Speaker 2: Simple want to drop something about like fans going crazy
Speaker 2: almost tearing up.
Speaker 1: The place or whatever.
Speaker 4: But no, no, not that, not that I know.
Speaker 1: Something happened in Detroit.
Speaker 4: Not that.
Speaker 1: Let you know that you guys were celebrities.
Speaker 4: Well what happened was actually it was New York. It
Speaker 4: was in Detroit. It was New York.
Speaker 1: Okay, the snow was.
Speaker 4: Real deep, and uh, the limo got stuck in the snow.
Speaker 4: So we got out of walking because they said, well
Speaker 4: the in stores only two blocks away. We walked into
Speaker 4: snow in store and uh, finally the limo pulls up
Speaker 4: after we get there. He got understuck. So we see
Speaker 4: all these people and I'm thinking they're for somebody else.
Speaker 4: We all did. We were like, okay, you just walked up,
Speaker 4: like who else is here? What other sleepers because they
Speaker 4: ain't here for us. We ain't that popular.
Speaker 5: I tried to walk in the front door.
Speaker 4: Yeah okay, and then they we had to get back
Speaker 4: in the limo real quick.
Speaker 1: Oh wow.
Speaker 4: And then they start rocking the limo like this, pushit
Speaker 4: limo going up. This was in the snow, man, now
Speaker 4: for us not to be popular, so they tried to
Speaker 4: tell us that, and then we went from not being
Speaker 4: popular in our minds to having some really really haven't
Speaker 4: energetic motivated fans because they was rocking that limo. I'm
Speaker 4: telling you, man, there.
Speaker 6: Was was y'all prepared for that, Like had Bobby or
Speaker 6: anybody prepared Like, no.
Speaker 4: We wasn't prepared for that because they told us, you know,
Speaker 4: you're not doing too good.
Speaker 6: But I mean when you finally when you finally realize
Speaker 6: you're doing good, you got all these fans where y'all
Speaker 6: prepared for what came about.
Speaker 4: We was in the snow. One of them was pulling
Speaker 4: my hair asking me for an autograph, and I'm looking
Speaker 4: up at it like it was I literally I was
Speaker 4: on the ground, I was on the pavement, and then
Speaker 4: I'm looking for Bunnie. I'm trying to protect her and
Speaker 4: she's up against the car and then Marty's back there
Speaker 4: loving it. He's oh, girls, he's hey.
Speaker 1: And this is pre security.
Speaker 4: Pre scurity was busy. Guess what security was busy doing.
Speaker 4: He was trying to save there on. You know what,
Speaker 4: you honestly, you had a whole bunch of New York fans.
Speaker 4: You know, it is New York, New York, and they tough,
Speaker 4: and security was trying to keep them back from very
Speaker 4: gates man. They ate the security for breakfast.
Speaker 6: Hell, can I ask you a question because you mentioned
Speaker 6: this earlier on We were talking about growing up and
Speaker 6: you were kind of like in Grand Rapids you were
Speaker 6: fighting like the black folks the white folks, you know,
Speaker 6: because you were mixed.
Speaker 5: I love that you say half read such an error anyway, Uh, but.
Speaker 6: My question is like, what does it feel like now
Speaker 6: that people are looking at you and think, y'all the
Speaker 6: most beautiful, talented people in the world. These are black people,
Speaker 6: white people, Like, how do y'all mentally do you just
Speaker 6: leave at what happened in Grand Rapids?
Speaker 4: And you know what, we always wanted to be accepted,
Speaker 4: especially by black people. We have we have my mother's
Speaker 4: side of the family it's all black. So we for
Speaker 4: that reason, we like cleave to them because we just
Speaker 4: wanted to be accepted by black people, like because we
Speaker 4: were told you ain't black and uh, and then white
Speaker 4: people you ain't white either, right, you know, that's how
Speaker 4: it was in the sixties and the real controversy. But
Speaker 4: so when we got accepted by our cousins, you know,
Speaker 4: our black cousins, and that's when we first discovered we mean,
Speaker 4: I'm not black, I'm black. Black comes in different shades.
Speaker 4: For for a while, we didn't know what we were
Speaker 4: because my mother didn't talk about it. We didn't talk
Speaker 4: to her about it. We didn't like to worry about
Speaker 4: about this stuff on the way home from school, fighting
Speaker 4: and stuff. She would never know it until one of
Speaker 4: us was bleeding or something. Uh. But other than that,
Speaker 4: we kept it from her. Well, my dad knew. But shoot,
Speaker 4: we had to protect him.
Speaker 6: Really because I was in the black neighborhood.
Speaker 4: Yeah, yeah, we had to protect him. But so when
Speaker 4: we especially when we got with Motown because it was
Speaker 4: it was predominantly a black label, it was just probably
Speaker 4: be black man being around among our people, and uh.
Speaker 4: And then and then to see so many people of
Speaker 4: color at our concerts and stuff. We we always had
Speaker 4: a pop up pill. It just came natural for us.
Speaker 4: So you know, uh, we were crossover anyway.
Speaker 6: But a lot they had to do with color too
Speaker 6: in that way, which is yeah.
Speaker 4: Yeah, yeah, like white. What they said, like Brandon almost worried,
Speaker 4: you know, Oh, don't be hating now.
Speaker 6: I'm just laughing because you can't say that in twenty
Speaker 6: twenty one.
Speaker 5: I was like never yeah.
Speaker 4: And my brother Chico, he was real adamant about it.
Speaker 4: He was he was like he's young than me, but
Speaker 4: he taught me about the word Hugh. You know, Hugh
Speaker 4: h u e. He's like Q man, different shades of
Speaker 4: one color, that's what we are. And uh but that
Speaker 4: was a real man. I seemed like a big thing
Speaker 4: to some people, but it was a really big thing
Speaker 4: to us. And so you know, like to be around
Speaker 4: dark skinned people, man our people, it was like and
Speaker 4: they accepted us. It was like it wasn't no things.
Speaker 4: Yeah you black and said yeah, but you just don't
Speaker 4: know where we came from, what we went through. To
Speaker 4: hear you say that, man, it's like I almost want
Speaker 4: to pay you.
Speaker 1: Wow.
Speaker 3: Well, I want to ask a question about physically about
Speaker 3: the song all this Love. Was that written specifically for
Speaker 3: Marvin or was it just influenced by Marvin?
Speaker 4: It was written for Marvin. I wrote it, my brother
Speaker 4: read it. You know the way we write, We write
Speaker 4: off of each other vibes. Randy was just sitting next
Speaker 4: to me, and I love Randy so much. Man, that's
Speaker 4: my that's my cat. His personality, his spirit is so beautiful. Man,
Speaker 4: if you ever be around it, you know what I'm
Speaker 4: talking about. So just because of that, I just felt
Speaker 4: I had some problem. No one could sing the South
Speaker 4: Anty me just like that question out of nowhere, the
Speaker 4: word and the feeling, and I remember it felt so good.
Speaker 4: I felt like crying. It was just felt so good.
Speaker 4: And and Randy said, man, that's an like something you
Speaker 4: should you should write for Marvin. Man, you know, you
Speaker 4: should write there for Marvin. So I finished the song
Speaker 4: and I took it to mister Gordy and I said,
Speaker 4: I wrote this for Marvin and he was like, no, no, what.
Speaker 1: So Marvin never heard it. Jeordan Barry he shot it down.
Speaker 1: Martyn left by this time.
Speaker 4: Also, although I found out that Marvin did hear when
Speaker 4: I met Marvin. Oh, I found out he did here
Speaker 4: what Marve's what he saying, Well, he only heard it
Speaker 4: because somebody at Motown had got it to him. Uh okay,
Speaker 4: I'm not going to be mission no names. I know
Speaker 4: who it was. When I'm gonna tell no no, somebody somebody.
Speaker 5: Got off to her in.
Speaker 1: It's forty years after the fact.
Speaker 4: Right right, Well anyway, but by that time it was
Speaker 4: on our album. And uh so when Marvin, when we
Speaker 4: did the Motown twenty five, that's when I first Marvin
Speaker 4: and he picked me up like this. I don't know
Speaker 4: if you ever seen the pictures of that. He picked
Speaker 4: me up in air like he.
Speaker 1: Was like wow, really, oh wow?
Speaker 4: Yeah? And I was shy, man, you should show me that.
Speaker 4: I was like like a little a little groopie. I
Speaker 4: have my head. Marv Gaates is ELDI bars. I was like,
Speaker 4: you know, so he picked me up like this, he said,
Speaker 4: So this is young man that everybody says, sound like me.
Speaker 4: You're gonna get me trouble boy.
Speaker 1: Wow.
Speaker 4: Matter of fact, you see your pictures, they're they're on
Speaker 4: they're on the internet, right.
Speaker 1: I got a search that like him.
Speaker 4: He got me like this way up in the air,
Speaker 4: off my feet.
Speaker 1: Wow.
Speaker 2: I have a question about the the All This Love record?
Speaker 1: You know again this of course in eighty two.
Speaker 2: This this could just be like an everyday thing, but
Speaker 2: I mean, these are monsters that you have on your record,
Speaker 2: on your record, like, first of all, Benjamin, what was
Speaker 2: it like working with Benjamin?
Speaker 1: Well, even before I.
Speaker 2: Get to Benjamin right almost, how did you wind up
Speaker 2: producing or at the helm of producing this record? I
Speaker 2: would assume that your brother had a lot to do
Speaker 2: with the first record. What was the meeting that changed
Speaker 2: the personnel and the process on All This Love?
Speaker 1: That was different from the first record?
Speaker 4: You did because I knew what I wanted and it
Speaker 4: seemed that nobody else did. I tried to work with
Speaker 4: other producers, but the songs was going in the wrong direction,
Speaker 4: and and it was it wasn't a problem with them
Speaker 4: for them, they knew it too. In fact, a couple
Speaker 4: of producers said, hell, you should do this yourself, as
Speaker 4: that's the only way the song is going to stay
Speaker 4: the way it was born and you have your own ideas.
Speaker 4: And so I wanted to produce it myself then, but
Speaker 4: most time wasn't gonna let me do it. They said, no,
Speaker 4: you don't have an experience as producer, you on what
Speaker 4: you're doing. So it was because of Stevie wondering to
Speaker 4: this day, I thank him for that. He he he
Speaker 4: told mister Gordy because Stevie heard he came to the
Speaker 4: studio a lot and he would hear what he was doing.
Speaker 4: And so I said, STEVEE, they won't let me produce
Speaker 4: it though, so he went to mister Gordon. He said,
Speaker 4: if you don't let these guys produce it, be making
Speaker 4: the grave error. He said, because it's very special what
Speaker 4: he has and you should take a chance on him.
Speaker 4: Let him do it. That's what he told me. And
Speaker 4: they did so because and it was really because Stevie
Speaker 4: had said that, you know. And I thank him for
Speaker 4: that to this day, because from that point on I
Speaker 4: was I didn't really know a lot, but but I
Speaker 4: learned it as I was going along, and my brother
Speaker 4: Bobby taught me some things. But there's something you have
Speaker 4: to get from yourself, you know what I'm saying, question
Speaker 4: get it from within you, within you. And I had
Speaker 4: to find what that was through trial and there. Whether
Speaker 4: it was going to be a mistake or not, it's
Speaker 4: just just would have happened be a mistake because it
Speaker 4: was something I had to.
Speaker 2: Do at the time, did you know. Okay, So first
Speaker 2: of all, like Benjamin Wright is doing horn arrangements and stuff.
Speaker 2: He did like the string arrangements on Michael Jackson's Off the.
Speaker 1: Wall justin timber Lake. Yeah, yeah, and yeah and justin
Speaker 1: timber Lakes.
Speaker 4: Right, swag together the others.
Speaker 2: But I mean also with like, I mean, it's not
Speaker 2: often that you see like a.
Speaker 1: Like Russell Ferrante's name from.
Speaker 2: The Old Jackets or Freddie Washington. Yeah, the you know,
Speaker 2: the the ready for ready for forgive.
Speaker 1: Me, not to forget me?
Speaker 2: Not right, even Rick Scott, Daniel Lamel, how did you
Speaker 2: get all these months? Say, yeah, Ricky Lawson and Ali
Speaker 2: Brown Richard, you had all the monsters on this record,
Speaker 2: which I know in eighty two that was like that's
Speaker 2: whatever everybody was was at the top of their craft.
Speaker 2: It's yes, we're in a we're in a place now
Speaker 2: in twenty twenty one where there's such a drought of
Speaker 2: talent that it's just mind baffling to me that all
Speaker 2: these great talents are on one record when to them
Speaker 2: it could have just been a Wednesday Thursday morning check.
Speaker 2: But how did you even did you have relationships with
Speaker 2: these musicians in the beginning.
Speaker 4: Yeah, my brother Bobby was responsible for that. He knew
Speaker 4: all of them. He knew all He got his Ricky Lawson,
Speaker 4: Oli Brown, Leon and Google Chancellor, right, Harvey Mason, theyd
Speaker 4: all some stuff.
Speaker 1: Lasiana's doing guitar solo and all this love right.
Speaker 4: Yeah. Him and Charles Fairing, Yeah, yeah, him and Charles Fairing.
Speaker 4: To be honest with your childs. Fairing played the solo first.
Speaker 1: Okay.
Speaker 4: It was Iris's idea to bring Holy Jose Felic on it.
Speaker 1: He was on Motown at the time, right, Yeah, he
Speaker 1: was on Motile Yeah, signing eighty two. Yeah.
Speaker 4: She said, let's just try him. Let's try I know
Speaker 4: we got Charals doing the soulo already, but let's just
Speaker 4: try and see what Jose could come up with. So
Speaker 4: we blended the two. A lot of people don't notice
Speaker 4: we blended them both together. Wow, Charles and Jose planning
Speaker 4: at the same time at the same time. A lot
Speaker 4: of good time players find out figure that out when
Speaker 4: they try to play the solo. Wowkle's easy, but it's
Speaker 4: not one.
Speaker 1: One more question.
Speaker 2: So I know the name, I know that either she
Speaker 2: did well, she's listed under vocal arrangements.
Speaker 1: I'm assuming that maybe background or whatever. I don't know.
Speaker 1: But the Linda Howard that's mentioned here, that was Linda
Speaker 1: Howard formerly of High Energy. Correct.
Speaker 4: Yeah, yeah, what song was it? Thought?
Speaker 2: I don't well, just says, uh, vocal arrangements Linda Howard.
Speaker 2: That's just so random to me. Only asked that Linda
Speaker 2: Howard is the first person I ever wrote a fan
Speaker 2: letter to when I that's interesting, U.
Speaker 1: No, it's just listed on the album, not not.
Speaker 4: Oh okay, I got what. I get what you saying? Yeah, okay,
Speaker 4: So did you have a did you have a fan
Speaker 4: crush on her?
Speaker 1: I did? Yeah, I mean I was.
Speaker 2: I was a high Energy fan actually, speaking of Motown
Speaker 2: twenty five, even even though some some person sort of
Speaker 2: ate the energy up in the room for that particular night,
Speaker 2: I will say that, uh, you know, for a lot
Speaker 2: of us. Also, our our favorite moment on that show
Speaker 2: was the kind of de barge high energy mix up
Speaker 2: of uh, he's a pretender and I forget what song
Speaker 2: you guys did?
Speaker 4: Uh we did can't stop together?
Speaker 1: Right? Exactly? What was it like doing Motown twenty five?
Speaker 4: Oh? Wow?
Speaker 1: Well, besides Marvin No.
Speaker 4: No, I know. Can you imagine all of the talent
Speaker 4: that was there. It was tense too. It was it
Speaker 4: was tense because we were kind of like almost working
Speaker 4: on CPE time because.
Speaker 1: Because it took five hours almost just.
Speaker 4: To get everybody together. Susany Pass is so great, man.
Speaker 4: I mean, she the relationships, the way she deals with people.
Speaker 4: People didn't want certain artists didn't even want to come
Speaker 4: back and do it and be a part of it.
Speaker 4: But Susanne, with her grace herself, she was able to
Speaker 4: talk to them into doing it. So because of that,
Speaker 4: time was getting away from from us, and a lot
Speaker 4: of them decided to agreed to do it at the
Speaker 4: last minute. Michael didn't even agree to do it until
Speaker 4: until the last minute, right, yeah. So you know imagine
Speaker 4: you're going to schedule time. It's television, you know how
Speaker 4: that is. So it was a lot of tense, a
Speaker 4: lot of tension going on a matter. It was everybody was.
Speaker 4: It was crazy, man. But I didn't even know how
Speaker 4: it was going to turn out. The day we actually
Speaker 4: did it, I was like, is.
Speaker 2: This going Were things shot separately or was it shot
Speaker 2: currently in a row?
Speaker 4: Was it straight com currently okay, yep, straight too, man, Yeah.
Speaker 5: I got that dance step. And at that time, no ya,
Speaker 5: I was.
Speaker 1: Gonna say that's phiography.
Speaker 4: Can I redeem myself with the dance biography? I redeem
Speaker 4: myself geography?
Speaker 1: Yes, you yourself.
Speaker 4: Have you seen a real love video, a real love video?
Speaker 1: Yes, I've seen it? Yes, No, you you know you
Speaker 1: got it together? You gotta.
Speaker 4: I don't say something, say something.
Speaker 2: You got bro. I couldn't dance. I just say, y'all
Speaker 2: didn't work with the choreographer. That's all A big difference,
Speaker 2: big difference. We should have mentioned.
Speaker 1: I like it.
Speaker 2: I mean yes, I don't want any classics.
Speaker 1: I like it. And the process of writing that song.
Speaker 4: Brandy was playing the bass over and over again, boom
Speaker 4: boom boom, doom boom boom boom boom, just over and
Speaker 4: over again, and he kept singing, My brothers they do
Speaker 4: this to me all the time. They have one part
Speaker 4: and they sing it over and over again and then
Speaker 4: tell me too, so Randy, But and I don't mind
Speaker 4: doing it.
Speaker 5: But the lucky number seven.
Speaker 4: That's where he lucky number seven. Let's go to Vegas.
Speaker 4: So anyway, that's what he had. And then you know,
Speaker 4: I wasn't gonna leave it like that. We had to
Speaker 4: come up with a verse, and that we did so
Speaker 4: I didn't thinking about you, you know, it just felt right, man.
Speaker 4: I love writing with Randy. He's his spirit just makes
Speaker 4: you want to write. So that's how we came up
Speaker 4: with it.
Speaker 2: Okay, I was going to say that the process, I like,
Speaker 2: it's one of those songs in which I think there's
Speaker 2: two totally different verses.
Speaker 1: It's almost like the Saturday Love Thing.
Speaker 4: Yeah, totally different hooks too.
Speaker 2: Right, but it's it's still but it's somehow in my mind,
Speaker 2: I feel like it's two different hooks, two different verses,
Speaker 2: but it's just reinterpreted different.
Speaker 1: And I actually I actually admire that process, Like.
Speaker 4: Oh, I hear what you're saying when we brought back
Speaker 4: to the first verse to.
Speaker 2: Second exactly exactly. I admire that trick, and I wish
Speaker 2: I could master that.
Speaker 4: You know, Chico told me that he was the first
Speaker 4: one that told me, you said, ell you the only
Speaker 4: one to know that can do that and pull it
Speaker 4: off because I did it in All Is Love too.
Speaker 1: Wait a minute, yeah, god, you're right. Wow, problem if
Speaker 1: you just sing it different? Ah? Man, Okay, I didn't
Speaker 1: notice that tool. Right now, I want.
Speaker 3: To ask you about just your writing of creating of
Speaker 3: Loved Me in a Special Way, because I just I
Speaker 3: love that song. That was just I had like a
Speaker 3: lot of memories to that as a kid, like what
Speaker 3: was that?
Speaker 1: What was that like when you made that?
Speaker 4: I got good memories of that song. I was driving
Speaker 4: on Freeway headed west one oh one. I was on
Speaker 4: my way to Billy Preston's house.
Speaker 1: Oh why, it was.
Speaker 4: A traffic jam, and that song just hit me. You
Speaker 4: would you know traffic jams in LA. A song like
Speaker 4: that's not supposed to hit you. It's something mean is
Speaker 4: supposed to right, But that song just hit me, man,
Speaker 4: And the chorus was in my head and I couldn't
Speaker 4: wait to get to Billy's. I said, I gotta get
Speaker 4: to a piano. So I remember getting off the freeway
Speaker 4: and trying to take the streets because he lived way
Speaker 4: Hull and drive way up in the canyons. And when
Speaker 4: I got there, I said, Billy, where's the piano? Man?
Speaker 4: I got to play this really quick before it gets
Speaker 4: out of my head. And I was playing the chords
Speaker 4: love Me in a Special Way and seeing just the
Speaker 4: melody that I had at the time. I said, now
Speaker 4: this is it sounds too Gospelly. I ain't gonna do
Speaker 4: nothing with this. And I looked at Billy and Billy
Speaker 4: was crying. Man, I'm not crying, but he had a
Speaker 4: tear rolling on his nose like this.
Speaker 1: Wow.
Speaker 4: I just looked like this. I remember looking like this,
Speaker 4: like what happened is like why is he crying? And
Speaker 4: he said, man, that's beautiful. Man record the man, please
Speaker 4: record it. But I couldn't.
Speaker 6: So as we hear it, well, as we heard it,
Speaker 6: you played it for Billy the song that we hear it, right.
Speaker 4: Yeah. I did the same thing with Time and Reveal.
Speaker 4: I didn't think it was I thought Time Reveal was
Speaker 4: too corny. Remember I told you at the beginning of
Speaker 4: our talk sometimes you can't see all the way through.
Speaker 4: And because you know, he said, I like it, but
Speaker 4: ain't nobody don't like it. So Chico said, man, are
Speaker 4: you serious? Time Reveal? That's the business. I said, it's
Speaker 4: too corny, man, nobody want to hear. What can I
Speaker 4: do to make.
Speaker 5: It because at the time, yeah.
Speaker 4: You know Rick James, you know, give it to me
Speaker 4: baby and all that stuff. Yeah, So I like, nobody
Speaker 4: want to hear this? He said, Man, just do me
Speaker 4: a favor, just recorded for me. I said, okay, let
Speaker 4: you know.
Speaker 5: That you're the a.
Speaker 2: I'm sorry, Who's whose decision was it to give James
Speaker 2: his looks for uh in a special way? Because he
Speaker 2: got more lead on sid I'm sold on side one.
Speaker 2: Uh you know what would be my lady and need somebody?
Speaker 4: Well, yeah, James h James is always danced to his
Speaker 4: own beat, march to his own beat. He wasn't in
Speaker 4: the group at first, you know, on the first al right,
Speaker 4: on the very first, and I fought for my little
Speaker 4: brother to get in the group. I worried mister Gordy
Speaker 4: to death about it. I pestered him every day. I
Speaker 4: started putting James on songs, let them sing so Mster
Speaker 4: Goady could hear it, And finally they signed him up.
Speaker 4: He was buying all the slove he was in the group.
Speaker 4: He was just I don't know, uh, he just Marshy
Speaker 4: was on. But he's just different. I like it. Well,
Speaker 4: James has a really nice tone in his mid range,
Speaker 4: but he doesn't like to sing there. He likes to
Speaker 4: go up high. And yeah, he's kind of piercing.
Speaker 3: Yeah, James, he did a record and I know we'll
Speaker 3: get to it. James did a record, I mean years
Speaker 3: ago with DJ Quick called the Divorced Song. Yeah, and
Speaker 3: I heard the song. I thought it was you because
Speaker 3: I just heard it. I didn't have the credits in
Speaker 3: front of me. I was like, Yo, this is I
Speaker 3: was like, hell killing this. And then when I saw
Speaker 3: the credits, I was like, oh shit, this is James.
Speaker 1: James right right.
Speaker 4: So many times I had Baby, I ain't got nothing
Speaker 4: to fool to you. No, I want not to ease.
Speaker 4: Sure's nothing home with my keys, so we can get
Speaker 4: it on.
Speaker 2: For the in the Special Way album, especially with touring
Speaker 2: behind it. I know you guys toured with Luther Vandros.
Speaker 1: What was that like?
Speaker 4: Amazing? Luther Vandros was like the uncle and the papah
Speaker 4: he was. He was the coach, he was the principal
Speaker 4: at school. We was like his little brother said he
Speaker 4: was like the whole time we were out with Luther,
Speaker 4: he was disciplining us and teaching us the ropes. I
Speaker 4: mean we got on stage a minute late one time
Speaker 4: and he fined us fifteen thousand dollars.
Speaker 9: Damn.
Speaker 4: Wait what fifteen thousand dollars.
Speaker 6: He comes collecting like he looks for that, like after
Speaker 6: he said he'd come back and be like with my money.
Speaker 4: Well yeah, yep. But see the thing is we were
Speaker 4: in union halls, you know. Oh they was doc him
Speaker 4: and he said, no, y'all got to pay me. You can't.
Speaker 4: You can't be on too late, you can't get off
Speaker 4: too late. And the Union hallsman, and then Radio City
Speaker 4: Music Hall that's when we got. That was the biggest fine, real.
Speaker 1: Time a lot, yeah, metty.
Speaker 4: Radio City Music Hall was thirty thousand dollars Jesus because
Speaker 4: we got on late and went off late and they
Speaker 4: pulled the plug on us. And then yeah, so we
Speaker 4: learned our lessons the highway. But Luther was like, he
Speaker 4: was so cool with us, man. He I'm telling he
Speaker 4: was like his little brothers. He was cool. He'd take
Speaker 4: us out to eat every night, make sure we knew
Speaker 4: the ropes. He taught us everything. Man. He used to
Speaker 4: give us pointers about our show, and he would tell Marty, now, Marty,
Speaker 4: you need to come down. You need to come down.
Speaker 4: And of course when one hear and.
Speaker 2: Okay, so a dream uh probably you know, I mean
Speaker 2: of of your arsenal. I mean, everyone has their favorites,
Speaker 2: but I know that A dream is is somehow like
Speaker 2: in most of barges feel like that's always in like
Speaker 2: their their top three songs. I know that was written
Speaker 2: by your sister, but what what was the process of
Speaker 2: putting that together?
Speaker 4: Well, Bunny would always again come to me and ask
Speaker 4: me to do the music to her songs. She always
Speaker 4: had all of her melodies and and she would even
Speaker 4: have instrument parts. Sometimes Bunny was amazing. If she could
Speaker 4: play the panel, she would she would be amazing. But
Speaker 4: she had this part. But I hear that, I hear that.
Speaker 1: Everyone likes everybody translator.
Speaker 4: So then she but she had the whole song, the
Speaker 4: melodies and everything, you know. And then so she said,
Speaker 4: now this was this part, you know, last night I
Speaker 4: dream you. And when she got to this part, now
Speaker 4: here it is right here and a flash, you know.
Speaker 4: So we figured it out. So I had to write
Speaker 4: all the music around that. You know. I didn't know
Speaker 4: back then that music had writing. The music had anything
Speaker 4: to do with with writers songwriting. I thought, if you
Speaker 4: wrote the music, you just wrote the music. But it
Speaker 4: had nothing to do with the songwriting. Wasn't I ignorant.
Speaker 1: You're gonna learn. You're gonna learn one way or another.
Speaker 4: So I learned. I learned. Well, yeah, man, she's still
Speaker 4: this day one of my favorite songwriters.
Speaker 2: So how shocked or how pleasantly surprised were you when
Speaker 2: in the next ten years or fifteen years that these
Speaker 2: songs would find new life to them where it's like,
Speaker 2: you know, and even though we're talking about just a
Speaker 2: choice for you with with a Dream, stay with me,
Speaker 2: I like it and all this love. But I mean,
Speaker 2: it's been those four songs alone have been utilized at
Speaker 2: least like by three to five different hip hop.
Speaker 6: Classics, like I would love to know what Bunny thinks
Speaker 6: about I A'm mad at you?
Speaker 5: What does Bunny think about that?
Speaker 4: Yeah, a lot, I should hope.
Speaker 1: So so I like you.
Speaker 4: I know, well, I can kick myself anyway and then
Speaker 4: just give it.
Speaker 5: I don't understand.
Speaker 4: And they knew you wrote, we wrote others, you know,
Speaker 4: yeah that's on the next Oprah. Okay, that's not. But
Speaker 4: I like you. You're very focused, man, question.
Speaker 2: I like you well, I mean, at the very least,
Speaker 2: at the very even at the very least, even if
Speaker 2: you didn't get to reap.
Speaker 1: The the you know, the the monetary highs of what
Speaker 1: those songs could reap in.
Speaker 2: Yeah, then at least it's brought timeless. You can perform
Speaker 2: those songs, those songs would never die.
Speaker 4: You to remember me? You asked me, what did I
Speaker 4: think people go this fire? Remember me the one who
Speaker 4: didn't even want to record time and reveal Because I didn't. Right,
Speaker 4: So you know, I'm shocked of all people because I
Speaker 4: didn't even think time of reveal was or love me
Speaker 4: in a special way was with great songs.
Speaker 1: I just thought, Man, love me in a special way,
Speaker 1: that's my one. I mean.
Speaker 4: They're like to me, they're like my babies. You feel
Speaker 4: about your kids, all of them all.
Speaker 3: Yeah, Now your vocal arrangement at the end of love
Speaker 3: Me in a Special way, man, like that ship is.
Speaker 1: So that's just a great song.
Speaker 4: That was hawkins influence.
Speaker 1: Absolutely, you know.
Speaker 4: The choir. Yeah.
Speaker 2: Actually, okay, So when you're when you're giving these like
Speaker 2: these mammoth vocal performances in the studio, like how much
Speaker 2: pressure is it to because it's just hitting me, like
Speaker 2: from until the day you die, everyone's going to expect
Speaker 2: you to sing, you know.
Speaker 5: So.
Speaker 2: Like like at the end of the time, we'll reveal
Speaker 2: you'll have to hold that note forever, like yeah, how
Speaker 2: even now it's expect Thank god, your voice is been
Speaker 2: fine form. But I mean, are there times where it's
Speaker 2: like a collective eye roll? Like, God, can I do
Speaker 2: I have to.
Speaker 1: Hit this note? Or do you just now? Are you
Speaker 1: at the place where you just let the audience sing
Speaker 1: those parts?
Speaker 4: Oh? No, I'm never at that place.
Speaker 1: Yeah, talk that ship, you know I'm from.
Speaker 4: Okay. My voice is cool, it's good. I don't have
Speaker 4: no problems with at all. So, you know, all glory
Speaker 4: to God, but beautiful, and I'm glad I don't because
Speaker 4: I love singing. I love singing every note that I've
Speaker 4: ever sung on the records. I love singing. My brother Bobby,
Speaker 4: just to blame for that, he taught me to end
Speaker 4: the song in a way, go out with a bang,
Speaker 4: don't end it. Don't act like the song is ending
Speaker 4: just because he said, keep it going. He said, build
Speaker 4: a song from beginning to the end. He said. The
Speaker 4: moment it becomes uninterested, uninteresting, you're losing it. You know.
Speaker 4: Don't think because the first was great, that that's gonna
Speaker 4: carry you. To make every part its own signature, you know,
Speaker 4: beginning to the end, and that's that's why I do
Speaker 4: it like that.
Speaker 1: Okay.
Speaker 2: So for Rhythm of the Night, was there a basic strategy, like,
Speaker 2: was there a strategy meaning beforehand that okay, we must
Speaker 2: take them to the next level now, like let's get
Speaker 2: to that next Yeah, and what was the results of that?
Speaker 4: It was with Diana Dyane Warner and I we were
Speaker 4: good friends. We still are, I mean like that well,
Speaker 4: and so we were hanging out a lot, and she
Speaker 4: was always writing songs, speaking of that first first solo
Speaker 4: album that we never hit talk but so Rhythm of
Speaker 4: the Night came about, she was just well, Susany Pass
Speaker 4: and Tony Jones, our manager at the time, they said,
Speaker 4: we need to take them to another level, just like
Speaker 4: you said, we need uh, we're trying to build them
Speaker 4: and do this and that. So Diane, I need you
Speaker 4: to write this kind of song. U RO. I didn't
Speaker 4: even know what they were talking about, but she did.
Speaker 4: She got down and she just wrote that song and
Speaker 4: said here you go. Wow, she's that bad. Yeah.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 3: Why was that the only video that y'all shot? Because
Speaker 3: that's I think that's the only the barge video there
Speaker 3: there was no wear it. Well, there's no video for
Speaker 3: you where well, he's the facts of life.
Speaker 4: Mold Town was ready to go out. At that time,
Speaker 4: Moldtown was declining at well, not declinent.
Speaker 1: Well they were there, You're about to sell, yeah, exactly.
Speaker 4: So all the budgets was being pulled. And see he
Speaker 4: saw he knew before he announced that, he already knew
Speaker 4: during the rhythm of night what he was going to do.
Speaker 4: But uh, the artist always pays the price.
Speaker 2: All right, Well I wanted to know. Okay, So this
Speaker 2: also starts the period of your career, which now these
Speaker 2: particular ballots and you know, I can say the same
Speaker 2: with love always and also with uh like someone where
Speaker 2: you know, these are more pop ballots, which I ducked them.
Speaker 2: But it kind of starts with who's holding down?
Speaker 1: And now, right, did you did you?
Speaker 2: Did you like that? Because you didn't write it? Is
Speaker 2: it different when you don't write a song and it's
Speaker 2: just given to you?
Speaker 4: Yeah, it is, it's different.
Speaker 1: Uh, how did you feel about it then? As opposed
Speaker 1: to now.
Speaker 4: I was paying attention to to the people that I
Speaker 4: felt knew what they were doing. You know, I was
Speaker 4: new to this business and I had management and for reasons.
Speaker 4: So I was listening to him. They said, try this,
Speaker 4: keep your mind open now, trust me, I know what
Speaker 4: I'm talking about it. So I did, and I could
Speaker 4: feel it the whole time that it wasn't where I
Speaker 4: was at.
Speaker 1: You know, But despite it being a hit, despite it
Speaker 1: being a hit, yeah, and a massive hit at that.
Speaker 4: Yeah, despite it being a hit, it wasn't where I
Speaker 4: was at.
Speaker 5: I was just saying, where were you Where the song
Speaker 5: wasn't like, where were you.
Speaker 4: Where I was at. It was a hit, okay, so
Speaker 4: that's where I was that.
Speaker 1: I was with you.
Speaker 4: I was with the hitt. No, I was with that,
Speaker 4: you know. That's where That's where my mentality was. That's
Speaker 4: where my drive was. But there are there are other
Speaker 4: there are other kinds of hits. I wanted to write
Speaker 4: my own hit, and I could have still did. Who's
Speaker 4: Holding Down and Now? But I was completely ruved from
Speaker 4: writing period anything on that album. It was like I
Speaker 4: was discouraged. Two. I wasn't encouraged to write. It was like,
Speaker 4: just let somebody else write.
Speaker 2: Even despite the fact that you you had a great
Speaker 2: but in their minds it was like those are black hits,
Speaker 2: those don't count.
Speaker 1: Like you're going for pop right now? Yeah, it's crazy.
Speaker 1: I know that it's crazy.
Speaker 4: And if I knew what I know, if I know
Speaker 4: who what I know now, but I can't say because
Speaker 4: I yeah, I felt it, but I said, well, maybe
Speaker 4: they know something I don't know.
Speaker 2: And is that song still a part of your repertoire now?
Speaker 2: Do you still do that song in your.
Speaker 4: It's like I feel mixed emotions about it because when
Speaker 4: I when I, whenever I do it, I'm wondering, is
Speaker 4: anybody feeling this audience right? And uh, but I know
Speaker 4: what I do the other songs. You don't have to
Speaker 4: say anything. I know you feeling it right, But I
Speaker 4: haven't had the proof because pop to me back then
Speaker 4: was like a facade. It was like it wasn't real.
Speaker 4: It was like it was like something that was made up,
Speaker 4: like pop was I did? Yeah, And it's like and
Speaker 4: they played a lot of games with the paola and everything.
Speaker 4: It was like how was a word they used to
Speaker 4: hide all that behind, like you could get any real
Speaker 4: any real figures or real chart and real real ratings,
Speaker 4: say you know what I mean, not on paper. So
Speaker 4: I don't even know what was it? Just there was
Speaker 4: a pop chart and had numbers.
Speaker 5: Speaking truth, that was an error where people was thinking
Speaker 5: the same thing.
Speaker 4: You weren't alone, I mean, because you know black people,
Speaker 4: it's a lot of us, man, so it can't be
Speaker 4: the pop means popular, right right.
Speaker 1: Well it was. It was just eighty five was definitely
Speaker 1: a sincre swim moment, and you know it sure was
Speaker 1: well and a lot of acts were just well, a.
Speaker 2: Lot of acts were going on under So it was
Speaker 2: like the type of black music was sort of like
Speaker 2: in a titanic position, which.
Speaker 1: Either got down with the program or you got.
Speaker 4: Ran over exactly exactly.
Speaker 2: And so did you feel that way about Rhythm Mother Night?
Speaker 2: Even though I loved the.
Speaker 4: Mother Night Rhythm mother Knight was business. I loved it.
Speaker 1: Oh I'm glad you said that. I'm like wow, because.
Speaker 4: Memories of Who's hold Down and Now? Who's hold Down
Speaker 4: and Now is a great song.
Speaker 5: I love who was Johnny?
Speaker 4: I love Who's Johnny? I just didn't want to do
Speaker 4: it at that time.
Speaker 5: No, I don't know, I do love, but I did.
Speaker 5: And also I was a little younger too, so it
Speaker 5: was like a fun song.
Speaker 4: And I and.
Speaker 1: You got your own weird.
Speaker 2: Actually, Peter Wolf, how did Peter Wolf get into the
Speaker 2: because I know he wrote that.
Speaker 4: Yeah, he did. Peter Wolf was Actually it's very instrumental
Speaker 4: in me doing the song. He talked me into it.
Speaker 4: Come on, you got I mean he was fake, I
Speaker 4: know it. I was in mic. Yeah.
Speaker 6: When I was singing, I was singing with like a
Speaker 6: proper tone like Johnny he said, look the other way.
Speaker 4: But when you hear it, it's got a lot of energy.
Speaker 4: That songs got good energy to it. I love listening
Speaker 4: to it.
Speaker 2: You know, you know that weird solo in the middle, Yes,
Speaker 2: exactly what the solo was that the little scatty I
Speaker 2: don't know what that.
Speaker 1: I don't know.
Speaker 2: Was it vote coder or that was you or something? No,
Speaker 2: I yes, I was. I was a boor for that,
Speaker 2: even though you know it was.
Speaker 5: Love the movie with your boy in Indian Face.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I forgot that was associated with short circuit damn. Yeah, okay, okay.
Speaker 2: So Fante asked you earlier about the facts of life.
Speaker 2: So that's my sentimental favorite because when I first got
Speaker 2: a VCR, that's probably the very first thing I recorded
Speaker 2: was your.
Speaker 1: I will never on the facts of what No, it's.
Speaker 4: I will never, ever ever have anything bad to say
Speaker 4: about the facts of Life because I love the girls
Speaker 4: they were. They were so cool, They're so cute. We
Speaker 4: were like family. We stay cool even after that for
Speaker 4: a long time. And plus that was my first time
Speaker 4: acting with George Kemp.
Speaker 1: Was right. Yeah, I was on.
Speaker 4: I did I was on. I did something with George Coloney.
Speaker 4: I acted with George.
Speaker 1: That's right.
Speaker 4: A lot of people don't know that's colony on there.
Speaker 4: Oh yeah, I put that in.
Speaker 2: So question, Were you guys supposed to have a bigger
Speaker 2: role in the Last Dragon or did I read that wrong?
Speaker 2: Were you guys actually supposed to be in it as
Speaker 2: opposed to just Vanity playing the video? But I could
Speaker 2: have sworn like I first saw, like uh when they
Speaker 2: were talking of the movie being made, that you guys
Speaker 2: were actually in it.
Speaker 1: I don't know if that was character or incorrect.
Speaker 4: I don't know, it's possible, Okay, okay.
Speaker 1: I didn't know.
Speaker 6: It wasn't never awkward as Susan the past was management
Speaker 6: and she was so connected to Motown.
Speaker 1: I'm sorry, I just yeah, yeah, it was that a
Speaker 1: conflict interest at all?
Speaker 4: Yeah, it was. It was. I didn't know it at
Speaker 4: the time, but that's what I was experiencing. I was
Speaker 4: experiencing a conflict adventures the whole time. Yeah, but I
Speaker 4: didn't know. I didn't know that's what it was. But
Speaker 4: that's what I have, huge experiences of conflicts adventures.
Speaker 1: In general. Are you in a good place with her
Speaker 1: now or yeah?
Speaker 4: I was then too, Okay, Yeah.
Speaker 1: And she's a guess that we would like to get
Speaker 1: on the show yees. Yeah? So in general, like, what
Speaker 1: was it like working with her?
Speaker 4: An education, a constant reminder of uh, the worth and
Speaker 4: the value that you have. We never left her presence,
Speaker 4: and same with her cousin, Tony Jones. They were management together.
Speaker 4: Both of them never left their presence feeling low. You
Speaker 4: always felt extremely great about yourself. H You always had
Speaker 4: a better sense of who you were. I mean this
Speaker 4: was every time I was with them.
Speaker 1: Okay, man, So what was the process that finally ended,
Speaker 1: at least at the time the lineup that we knew
Speaker 1: of DeBarge in eighty five that led to your solo
Speaker 1: career the next year? Like, how did that? Was there
Speaker 1: a conversation had or was it just.
Speaker 4: Like, well, the work ethics were majorly different between me
Speaker 4: and my siblings, right, I was always in the studio
Speaker 4: and they were rarely showing up. Okay, so Motown saw
Speaker 4: that brought up mister Gorge's attention in the eat. You know,
Speaker 4: I saw more Motown people showing up at a studio
Speaker 4: that should have been a signed to be there, and
Speaker 4: they were just always there because they were reporting back
Speaker 4: every time that the family wasn't there and how many
Speaker 4: hours I was there. So missr Goury basically made it
Speaker 4: up in his mind before I knew it. We did
Speaker 4: photo session together as a group. The album Ready to
Speaker 4: Come Out album came out, and my picture was this
Speaker 4: big on the album cover.
Speaker 1: Oh see, and the design.
Speaker 4: No small I did. Moton had done that. They had
Speaker 4: already begun their Eldibars solo process. As you hear. They
Speaker 4: didn't talk to me about it, They didn't talk to
Speaker 4: anybody about it. They just started doing it. Man, that
Speaker 4: that cased some pros.
Speaker 1: At the time.
Speaker 2: It couldn't have been a thing where it's like, Okay,
Speaker 2: I'm gonna do this one solo record and then we'll
Speaker 2: come back in eighty seven and make something else together.
Speaker 4: And see the thing is when you do a solo album,
Speaker 4: you know, like groups today, they do a solo album.
Speaker 4: One of them might do a solo album, but they're
Speaker 4: still in the group. Right. But it's different when you
Speaker 4: when you put al DeBarge with the Barge uh and uh,
Speaker 4: and then my pictures the Vegas and then the rest
Speaker 4: of theirs are small and it wasn't like that before.
Speaker 4: It's gonna be some problems.
Speaker 1: Who did that? Who did that? Cause the biggest problems
Speaker 1: with with you and your family? He's funny, put you
Speaker 1: on the spot.
Speaker 4: Who do you take a guess? Was it?
Speaker 3: It wasn't Bobby, Bobby, wasn't it was James or.
Speaker 5: Remember Blanks?
Speaker 4: I mean he righty basically spoke what the rest of
Speaker 4: them right didn't want to say. But they don't have
Speaker 4: no problem with speaking in his mind. But we would
Speaker 4: be doing interviews and he was in the middle of
Speaker 4: the interview. I don't know where he was saying, this
Speaker 4: is not L's group, Barge.
Speaker 1: And but did he not know that wasn't your decision
Speaker 1: or design?
Speaker 4: About as much as he knew what a good idea
Speaker 4: to be kicking around.
Speaker 1: On stage, it didn't matter. He was gonna do it regardless.
Speaker 4: Yeah, wow, you know, And it just got that way, man,
Speaker 4: And it was inevitable. I had to go solo. It
Speaker 4: was really became inevitable then because I wasn't just gonna
Speaker 4: stop because what was happening. But see, I couldn't do
Speaker 4: anything when when when a record he owns you both
Speaker 4: collectively and individually, you have to play ball. But you're
Speaker 4: just gonna be shelved, you know what I mean.
Speaker 2: So my number one question about this record is you
Speaker 2: didn't write not one of these songs, that.
Speaker 4: One the first solo as all right.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, why did you not? You know, did you
Speaker 2: not have anything up the pike or.
Speaker 4: Like no, No, I had songs written, but I was
Speaker 4: told but not to do them. We got some songs
Speaker 4: from other writers that we want you to sing, and.
Speaker 1: So does that stifle your creativity?
Speaker 4: It put a damper on my spirit and your confidence? Yeah,
Speaker 4: because I really didn't get no explanation for it. It was
Speaker 4: just like, let's do.
Speaker 1: It, wow, don't you know?
Speaker 2: I know, like the average the Bards fan won't maybe
Speaker 2: not list it, but you know, at least with me,
Speaker 2: someone in love always are like those I don't know,
Speaker 2: like I just love I love the ship out of
Speaker 2: the songs too. Even though you didn't write them those
Speaker 2: and they got much play on black radio. Still, you
Speaker 2: know what I mean, Like it's kind of hard to
Speaker 2: argue with it because I love those songs.
Speaker 4: But still, you know, those are the exceptions of what
Speaker 4: I of my list of likes, and don't like Love
Speaker 4: Always Someone and even Who's on Down and our Rhythm
Speaker 4: other Night. And I don't believe that you always have
Speaker 4: to write a song. You know you can, you can
Speaker 4: explore other writers. But this was the case where you know, no,
Speaker 4: don't write, let somebody else do it. That was That's
Speaker 4: that's a different approach there. But Love Always the great
Speaker 4: Burke Backer At and Curl Beer Sacre. Actually, man, no,
Speaker 4: tell me if you can hear this, because Bert told
Speaker 4: me that he pattern that song after all this love.
Speaker 2: Really so Burn and Carols specifically they wrote pattern love Always.
Speaker 5: After that's some ship.
Speaker 1: I'm sorry I can't hear it.
Speaker 6: I understand, but they patterned off of his song that
Speaker 6: he wrote, but he wasn't allowed.
Speaker 1: To butt him write the irony Burn.
Speaker 5: Them not the bird. I'm burd I'm talking about the lab.
Speaker 6: Town, talking about Motown, Yeah, okay, from back and rights
Speaker 6: ship and I'm not I'm not saying I'm about no Burke.
Speaker 4: We see. I don't know whose idea it was, but
Speaker 4: I don't know. I can't point finger at anybody. I
Speaker 4: just it is what it is. But it was an honor.
Speaker 4: These are some of the great things that happened that
Speaker 4: make up for some of the not so great things
Speaker 4: happen to have Burt Bacaret sitting in front of me
Speaker 4: telling me something like that, I mean, you know, I'm
Speaker 4: a Berrett. I mean, I love all this healthy bars,
Speaker 4: I love all this love. And I wrote a song
Speaker 4: Kurl and I and we patterned it after all this love,
Speaker 4: and it's called Love Always. And I was like, really
Speaker 4: again one of those times I didn't get it, but
Speaker 4: I got it. I was with hear can you hear that?
Speaker 4: Because I've been listening. I'm like, well, I mean, I
Speaker 4: don't see the pattern though I don't see.
Speaker 1: There's a texture. There's texture. That's the first year that
Speaker 1: d X seven came out.
Speaker 2: So even though you use the real no, you use
Speaker 2: the real friend of the roads, but it's it leads.
Speaker 1: It leads with the with the well processed road sounding thing.
Speaker 5: But you know, era right a mirror like it's not
Speaker 5: like that that lead ballad from the movie Tap.
Speaker 4: But yeah, I love with that song on the first time, Yes,
Speaker 4: Honey and jameson Bright.
Speaker 1: Wait did you did?
Speaker 2: Jake Graydon and Peter will produce that first record entirely.
Speaker 4: The first album solo album. What el most people Wait
Speaker 4: a minute, Peter, Who's Johnny was on the Rhythm of
Speaker 4: the Night?
Speaker 2: Now, who's Doohnny? Who's Johnny was on your your first
Speaker 2: solo record?
Speaker 1: It was right?
Speaker 2: No, but working with Jay Graydon, who's like, who's the
Speaker 2: A and R at Motown? That decides like, Okay, this
Speaker 2: is going to be your producer, And did you at
Speaker 2: least get.
Speaker 1: A I don't like the song, I don't like this song.
Speaker 1: What else you got? What else you got? That sort
Speaker 1: of thing, like.
Speaker 4: I don't know who. That's the thing about it. When
Speaker 4: we talked about the conflict of interests right between Tony Jones,
Speaker 4: Susany Patz and Motown.
Speaker 1: Okay, that whole I don't know who?
Speaker 2: It was just to let our listeners know, Jake Graydon
Speaker 2: like wrote everything. Yeah, like just like George Benson that
Speaker 2: that mid eighties George Benson A right, the Breakaway record
Speaker 2: and all that stuff exactly.
Speaker 1: Yeah, like he was involved in all that. David Foster.
Speaker 4: He also wrote After the Love Is Gone for Earth
Speaker 4: Wind and Fire.
Speaker 1: Yeah, David Foster. David.
Speaker 4: But Jake Grayden, I do like him though. He's a
Speaker 4: good producer. Did you know Jay Graydon? Uh? He produced
Speaker 4: the song on me and the song that Prince wrote
Speaker 4: that I did with Kenny Rodgers.
Speaker 1: You're My Love. Yeah, wait a minute, time out. What's
Speaker 1: the connection there?
Speaker 4: Okay, Prince wrote the song for Kenny Rodgers right and
Speaker 4: wanted me to sing the ad lives around it and
Speaker 4: Jay Grayden said, well, he's not gonna do it, and
Speaker 4: that's you that you sing Oh.
Speaker 2: I said, okay, so you're singing on that.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I'm singing around him.
Speaker 1: I didn't know that, you know, I'm not. I've heard
Speaker 1: Prince's demo of it.
Speaker 2: I've not heard the actual It's beautiful final Kenny Rodgers one.
Speaker 1: I got to look that up.
Speaker 4: Yeah. I come in halfway through the song and I'm
Speaker 4: singing around him and Jay Graydon And he did a
Speaker 4: good job with that one. He did. He did a
Speaker 4: good job. He's a great producer. Man.
Speaker 2: Okay, question, since you mentioned real love is real love?
Speaker 2: Directed had someone specifically and because you gave in that song.
Speaker 1: There's two obvious references.
Speaker 2: There's a there's kind of a Janet reference, and what
Speaker 2: I assume is a Jodie Watley reference.
Speaker 4: Was that?
Speaker 1: Was it directed to someone specifically? Wait? Did I hit that?
Speaker 1: I hit a nerve? You wrote the lyrics, you wrote
Speaker 1: the song.
Speaker 4: Look at it? Okay?
Speaker 2: You can always say I can't answer that question too,
Speaker 2: like you're not obligated to answer.
Speaker 4: Depends on which part. I don't mind answering this.
Speaker 1: Wait, did I hit on something?
Speaker 2: Because I don't feel like real I never once felt
Speaker 2: that Real Love was just a random song based on
Speaker 2: those lyrics. I was like, wait a minute, that's a
Speaker 2: reference to Da Da Da Da. That's a reference to
Speaker 2: data da. This song is about someone? Am I right?
Speaker 4: Yeah? Yeah, you're right.
Speaker 1: You turned this into a new show. It's like quest
Speaker 1: Left song Detective.
Speaker 2: Right now, people, I just did the radio raheem fist
Speaker 2: pump in the air after I won.
Speaker 1: The radio battle. You're like a friend.
Speaker 2: If you cannot if you cannot name the person, what
Speaker 2: what can you tell us about that song?
Speaker 4: It was? Uh? They it was puppy love at first,
Speaker 4: and uh.
Speaker 1: Am I the first person to ask this question.
Speaker 2: Yes, yes, it's so obvious, though, like, how come no
Speaker 2: one has ever bothered to ask you this question?
Speaker 4: But it's not my relationship, just about somebody else.
Speaker 2: Never mind your brother. Who Oh okay, I I thought
Speaker 2: you were being intercessory. I thought you're being a kind.
Speaker 1: Of for you.
Speaker 4: I'm just no, I'm just making it now so obvious.
Speaker 4: That's okay.
Speaker 1: I don't stop talking.
Speaker 4: No, no, no, no, not like that, not like that.
Speaker 4: I'm just I'm making it more mysterious. I don't want
Speaker 4: to kill the mistiak of it.
Speaker 1: It's like talking to a mirror.
Speaker 3: This was like, okay, very securitous.
Speaker 4: I mean, you know we we haven't really said it yet.
Speaker 4: So let them figure it out. Okay, you think they will? Oh?
Speaker 1: Man, I wish I knew now. I feel like fante
Speaker 1: no I finkure, I know what it is said?
Speaker 4: Who do you think you said? I'll admit they.
Speaker 1: Find Take ahead, Janet and James, Jenny, you and your brother. Okay,
Speaker 1: there it is?
Speaker 4: Wow?
Speaker 1: All right? So so album, so so, the Gemini album.
Speaker 2: Nice sege, thank you, so.
Speaker 3: The Jymedi album, you everything you're writing again? Now, how
Speaker 3: did you get the rains back? I would say, how
Speaker 3: did you how did you get the rains back? How
Speaker 3: did you get controlled back again? In terms of writing
Speaker 3: your own material, Well.
Speaker 4: Let me see, in terms of putting it on.
Speaker 1: The album, you mean right right right releasing.
Speaker 4: Because uh I don't know. Actually, well, you know what Motown.
Speaker 4: A new staff came into Motown. Actually a new staff
Speaker 4: did oh under the direction of Devorah Sandrich. She was
Speaker 4: head of the ANR department at that time, and the
Speaker 4: ANI department took over all of the recording sessions. So
Speaker 4: she she came in. She as a fan, so she
Speaker 4: was like, pro al right, and uh so I was back.
Speaker 4: The kid was back, baby, it was. And you know
Speaker 4: you remember that the era that that's when New jack
Speaker 4: Swing was kicking in real high.
Speaker 1: Yeah, you had your two dancers.
Speaker 4: Yeah he's kicking.
Speaker 1: Here we go again. Here we got you was kicking it.
Speaker 1: Bring it back.
Speaker 2: Let's Judy from Time Life, because you're from life. The
Speaker 2: duty from Time Life my prerogative microphone.
Speaker 1: Noh, I was you know, what's the last time you
Speaker 1: jumped up from the drug and started dancing. I think
Speaker 1: I'm not making it fun. He was taking it.
Speaker 4: I wasn't Bobby Brown or Michael Jackson. But you know,
Speaker 4: I did.
Speaker 1: Look, what did you do?
Speaker 4: Wait?
Speaker 1: Speaking of back? Speaking of back, we have to mention
Speaker 1: back on the block.
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, yeah, Secret Guard kicked myself.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I forgot about it until right now. Can you
Speaker 2: speak of that as that that whole experience. I think
Speaker 2: I've seen you guys only perform that song once on
Speaker 2: the I guess the Soul Traine Awards.
Speaker 1: But what was that? What was that process like.
Speaker 2: Doing that, doing the song and just working with James
Speaker 2: and and and Barry White and and Yeah, I'll.
Speaker 4: Be sure it was a trip because Quincy, he tricked me.
Speaker 1: There seems to be a theme going on your brother trick.
Speaker 4: Yeah, you're seriously tricky because I guess you know, just
Speaker 4: call me a trick.
Speaker 2: Okay, are you trying to tell us that you thought
Speaker 2: this song was all to yourself?
Speaker 4: No?
Speaker 1: Oh, but I did.
Speaker 4: I did think that I was doing a warm up
Speaker 4: in the mic. I did.
Speaker 1: Oh.
Speaker 2: No, guys, you we got I don't know. No, but wait,
Speaker 2: this this is not the first time we heard the story. Besides,
Speaker 2: besides performing late at night, Quincy is world famous for
Speaker 2: just like even your warm ups are being recorded.
Speaker 1: And okay, is that what?
Speaker 5: Alb be sure? Said too.
Speaker 1: So two other people said this about Quincy as well.
Speaker 1: Oh it was. It was great feeling gangs.
Speaker 3: He said on the Yes on the one hundred Ways solo,
Speaker 3: he was sleeping in the studio and Quincy was like, hey,
Speaker 3: playing come back later, and they just woke him up
Speaker 3: and he played that line. And that's that's what made
Speaker 3: it on the record.
Speaker 2: Well, you know what, but Quincy said, Quincy himself said
Speaker 2: that you get a better honest performance when the person
Speaker 2: doesn't know that they're.
Speaker 4: Being Yeah, yeah, but you know. And then again, I'm
Speaker 4: guilty of being the professions too much. So we probably
Speaker 4: would have been there all day. I remember we were
Speaker 4: up for two days though. Before we went in to the
Speaker 4: studio writing a song. We were at Rob Tipperson's house
Speaker 4: and I was nervous because he had that all this
Speaker 4: rock Rollers. They were just walking around. We're trying to
Speaker 4: write a secret guard to rock Rollers. I'm looking an
Speaker 4: old boy?
Speaker 7: Is that nice?
Speaker 4: But and then uh, Me and side Garrett and Quincy
Speaker 4: we just up, I mean literally two days. We would eat,
Speaker 4: take a quick nap, and get right back to right
Speaker 4: because he had a deadline he was trying to beat.
Speaker 4: Then we went straight to the studio to sing it.
Speaker 4: I was like, you're kidding me, right, Quincy, We're going
Speaker 4: straight to the studio to sing. Well, you're playing right?
Speaker 1: Paying What was he?
Speaker 3: What was he working with Quincy and even Rod? What
Speaker 3: were they more sticklers of in terms of songwriting? Were
Speaker 3: they really like big on like melody or.
Speaker 1: Was it lyrics?
Speaker 3: Like in terms of words, which would be what would
Speaker 3: they be kind of be more particular about?
Speaker 4: No? Everything really everything, every part was equally important because, uh,
Speaker 4: the wrong word within a verse could throw the vibe off,
Speaker 4: and then when it came to singing, the wrong expression
Speaker 4: of it, of that word while you're sing could mask
Speaker 4: the whole verse up, you know. And it was the
Speaker 4: same with Quincy. Was like that with musicians too. You
Speaker 4: have to have a certain personality about your playing. You
Speaker 4: had to be it had to be a personality when
Speaker 4: you play, you know what I mean. You had to
Speaker 4: sing on the bass, you had to sing on the drums.
Speaker 4: It was just everything was just musical and movement with him.
Speaker 1: Did you uh did at the time?
Speaker 2: Did you know from the gate that you were writing
Speaker 2: a song for three other singers in addition to yourself?
Speaker 2: Did you know that you were writing specifically for Al
Speaker 2: and for James and for Barry.
Speaker 4: White, not not for l because it was supposed to
Speaker 4: be for Michael. Michael was supposed to do it.
Speaker 1: And uh word, yes.
Speaker 7: That I did not know.
Speaker 4: It was going to be me, Michael, James, and Barry White.
Speaker 4: And wow, I don't know what happened.
Speaker 2: I can't remember, but wow, set up, set up.
Speaker 1: I could imagine what happened. We're not on a video.
Speaker 6: Wow.
Speaker 1: Now, I just had the process process that because if.
Speaker 3: You listen to Al's verse, I mean listen to als verse,
Speaker 3: you know, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 5: You know what.
Speaker 7: He said he was.
Speaker 10: He said he was a stylist.
Speaker 4: All right, you know is a great songwriter.
Speaker 10: Ain't she talk about it? She's really had her on
Speaker 10: the show too.
Speaker 4: Yeah, yeah, she's she's boss.
Speaker 1: Wow.
Speaker 2: So was the Soul Train Awards the only time that
Speaker 2: you guys performed that together as a force for some
Speaker 2: well sorry as alb sure, James, Ingram, l DeBarge, and
Speaker 2: Barry White.
Speaker 1: Yes, the four of you, like the four horsemen. That
Speaker 1: even makes it worse.
Speaker 4: No, no, it's okay. Yeah, that was the first time. Uh,
Speaker 4: it was the only time we did the together. Yeah, yeah, okay,
Speaker 4: never mind.
Speaker 1: That was a moment. That was definitely a moment.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 2: So with uh with through the storm, in the storm
Speaker 2: and in the storm, forgive me in the storm. Yeah,
Speaker 2: well one you you left Motown and moved to Warner,
Speaker 2: But what what finally made you decide to go with
Speaker 2: Maurice White as a production partner on this record?
Speaker 4: Lack of confidence and where and where I was trying
Speaker 4: that in the storm is I wouldn't say it's all
Speaker 4: over the place, but it's many fastest of my influences. Okay, Honestly,
Speaker 4: my brother Bobby and Chico had just got locked up
Speaker 4: and those were.
Speaker 1: My uh your yeah, yeah, okay, and.
Speaker 4: To this day Chico when I was still like that.
Speaker 4: But I was lost, man, I was lost, and uh
Speaker 4: it was like they took him away from me, and uh,
Speaker 4: not to mention what they were going through being locked up,
Speaker 4: but you know, I don't want to sound selfish, but
Speaker 4: I really needed them and uh just just for me.
Speaker 4: You know, I know how to write, I can write well,
Speaker 4: but I just needed them for me. And I was
Speaker 4: hurting because they were hurting because what was happening to him.
Speaker 4: So it did something to me, quest it did something
Speaker 4: to me and and I'm the type of person I'll
Speaker 4: never let die. I'm never going to give up, right,
Speaker 4: It's just it's not in me, so my determination to
Speaker 4: keep going. I ran into Maurice White and the album
Speaker 4: was almost it was already recorded, but it wasn't finished.
Speaker 4: He heard it and we both thought about it at
Speaker 4: the same time. It's like I could tell he was
Speaker 4: thinking of the same thing, Maurice, you got to finish this
Speaker 4: with me. Man. He said, all right, little bro, I'll
Speaker 4: do that.
Speaker 1: Wow, that's what's up.
Speaker 4: So we talked to Warner Brothers about it and we
Speaker 4: started the budget all over again. I was shocked at
Speaker 4: it was a whole different EPI. He started to budget
Speaker 4: all over again and we did it. Man and Maurice.
Speaker 1: Uh was Benny Medina? Was this the Benny Medina era
Speaker 1: of ye?
Speaker 4: Yeah? And Benny was? That was my man? Thank you, Benny. Man.
Speaker 4: It was great working with Maurice White. Man. I can't
Speaker 4: even get into first of all, you know, I admired
Speaker 4: him so much and uh sit next to him. You know,
Speaker 4: he really he really did have a know. I would
Speaker 4: say he really did have a glow. He always had
Speaker 4: this light his light face. Man, I mean every day
Speaker 4: he was like he was just his glow was on
Speaker 4: him talking about wisdom. He was full of wisdom. Man,
Speaker 4: soft spoken, and he knew what he was doing.
Speaker 3: Man, man, you have you probably I don't know if
Speaker 3: you remember this, but you have inadvertently given me one
Speaker 3: of the greatest pieces of game about the music business
Speaker 3: that I don't even you probably don't remember saying this.
Speaker 3: But a good, real good friend of mine, my brother,
Speaker 3: my collaborator, Eric Roberson.
Speaker 1: He was signed to Warner Brothers at the time.
Speaker 3: I guess it was around the time that you were
Speaker 3: promoting in the Storm and he went out with you
Speaker 3: on a promo tour. This is I mean, god, man,
Speaker 3: this has got to be like ninety one, ninety two.
Speaker 1: I mean, this is, you know, a forever ago.
Speaker 3: But he said that he would just that time working
Speaker 3: with you and touring with you because he was signed
Speaker 3: to Warner But I think he just had like a
Speaker 3: single out, so it wasn't like he was, you know,
Speaker 3: up on.
Speaker 1: The totem pole or whatever.
Speaker 3: But you know, he was just out touring with you
Speaker 3: and he said, man, he picked up so much from
Speaker 3: you while y'all were out And he said about that album,
Speaker 3: which is interesting to hear you talk about it now.
Speaker 3: He said that he told you, like, yeah, well, you know,
Speaker 3: I like the album. It's a good album. And he
Speaker 3: said that your reply to him was, well, I mean, yeah,
Speaker 3: it's it's not just a good album, it's a money album.
Speaker 3: And we make money albums so that we can get
Speaker 3: to make good albums.
Speaker 1: I was like, God, damn, this shit real.
Speaker 3: You know me, so to hear you describe it that way,
Speaker 3: and like he told me his story and again I
Speaker 3: have I don't know if you remember this at all,
Speaker 3: but he was telling me about how y'all were doing
Speaker 3: the show and it was something with I guess in
Speaker 3: sound check and the engineer wasn't getting the sound right
Speaker 3: or whatever, and you know most artists would like be
Speaker 3: you know, be hollering and just be going off and shit.
Speaker 3: And he said, you know, y'all were sitting there, and
Speaker 3: he said, you just kind of talked to the guy
Speaker 3: and just went over and just you know, fixed the
Speaker 3: sound and like open it up.
Speaker 1: And he was amazed that you knew how to work
Speaker 1: the board like that. He was like, Yo, they don't
Speaker 1: really knows this shit.
Speaker 3: And so he said afterwards, man, you came over to
Speaker 3: the you came over from the board, and y'all were
Speaker 3: sitting down and eating dinner, and and he said, he
Speaker 3: asked you, like yo, well, like you know, how did
Speaker 3: you learn how to do this?
Speaker 1: And he said, you told him.
Speaker 3: Listen, man, he said, I could go, I could wild
Speaker 3: out and be all crazy. He said, but if I
Speaker 3: did that, I wouldn't be able to sit here and
Speaker 3: have this meal and have this fellowship with you here,
Speaker 3: if I was trying to do somebody else's job, you
Speaker 3: know what I mean. And you know, man, it was
Speaker 3: just and I mean, this is Eric he told me
Speaker 3: these stories. I mean, this has got ten eleven years ago.
Speaker 3: I mean, this is you know, a while back, and
Speaker 3: it was even before then. But he just I just
Speaker 3: always it made me even more of a fan of you,
Speaker 3: of just you just really being a class act in
Speaker 3: that way and just always kind of seeing the bigger picture.
Speaker 3: And that was Those are two pieces of a game
Speaker 3: that I've carried with me, you know, throughout my career.
Speaker 1: And I just want to thank you for that. Man.
Speaker 4: Man, that's that's amazing.
Speaker 1: Man.
Speaker 4: I really I really thank you for telling me that,
Speaker 4: because it's good to know that I put some good
Speaker 4: things out there like that, you know, and you just
Speaker 4: reminded me of some good values and things. You know,
Speaker 4: Thank you for that.
Speaker 1: Thank you always.
Speaker 2: I do want to know, like what have you looking
Speaker 2: looking back at at your four decades and this career,
Speaker 2: what have you learned? And like do you have any regrets?
Speaker 2: Because oftentimes, and you know, I know that you've you've
Speaker 2: been open and transparent about succumbing to to narcotics and
Speaker 2: whatnot in your career.
Speaker 1: And but the thing is that you know, I also.
Speaker 2: Didn't want to paint this as a I don't ever
Speaker 2: think of your story whatever, as a tragedy story whatever.
Speaker 2: And I know oftentimes when you're doing press or whatever
Speaker 2: and news things and like that's the first thing they
Speaker 2: bring they bring up or whatever. But just in your
Speaker 2: four decade journey, what what?
Speaker 1: What? What?
Speaker 2: What can you say that you've learned that you still
Speaker 2: keep with you today? And are there any regrets in
Speaker 2: in in your journey and everything that you've went through.
Speaker 4: What I've learned is that's very important. It has played
Speaker 4: a very role in my life. Was this business, this
Speaker 4: this this show business that we're in. There's life first,
Speaker 4: there's there's really fans are fans of are borrowed this
Speaker 4: fa quest love fans, Algiebargs fans, Michael Jackson fans. But
Speaker 4: fans are borrowed from one city to another, from one
Speaker 4: show to another.
Speaker 5: Uh.
Speaker 4: I've seen a lot of entertainers, Yeah, a lot of entertainers.
Speaker 4: I've seen a lot of entertainers. Sure, you have to
Speaker 4: they they tripped. They don't know how to handle the thing.
Speaker 4: They trip. Ah, you could tell they got in it
Speaker 4: for the wrong reason, you know, right, Uh it it
Speaker 4: It breeds a lot of jealousy. That's a breeding ground
Speaker 4: for jealousy right there, and as they call it, hatred
Speaker 4: and hating.
Speaker 1: M But.
Speaker 4: Fans are broad but before they're fans of people and
Speaker 4: every everybody. Everybody needs love, man, everybody needs love. I
Speaker 4: don't know it. It's hard for me to look at
Speaker 4: people as fans and groupies because I see I see people,
Speaker 4: I see souls and Uh, what I've learned is that
Speaker 4: never never, never get there. I'm trying to explain this, right,
Speaker 4: we never always always always be on your way. Never
Speaker 4: arrive where you think this is it. I've arrived, I've
Speaker 4: made it. Yeah, never never do that. Always be on
Speaker 4: your way even when you reach what you intended to
Speaker 4: either go as you intended to reach, still still be
Speaker 4: trying to get there. You know, open, you keep your
Speaker 4: mind open, you know. I think that's a lot of
Speaker 4: the reason why, well, I'm here right now today, I'm
Speaker 4: even sitting with you, you know, m because like you said,
Speaker 4: you mentioned my age already in this show, But in
Speaker 4: all these years, I'm here and uh, and I think
Speaker 4: each generation can be accepted and they can accept you.
Speaker 4: It could be if you just look at people as people,
Speaker 4: not not fans and groupies. You know what I'm saying.
Speaker 4: I'm saying because I've heard this a lot from other entertainers. Man, groupie,
Speaker 4: this groupy that, Well, they're people, man, you know, andybody,
Speaker 4: they're supporting you.
Speaker 1: And without those people, you wouldn't be who you are.
Speaker 7: I call them bill payers to right.
Speaker 4: But there's a need. There's a need, especially now with
Speaker 4: with you know, so called pandemic going on. There's a need.
Speaker 4: People have needs, man. And when you're in a position
Speaker 4: where you can reach a lot of people, what you're
Speaker 4: gonna do, how are you gonna treat that? You know
Speaker 4: what you what are you gonna do with that?
Speaker 5: You know?
Speaker 3: How has the pandemic, like, you know, being kind of
Speaker 3: being at home and not being able to tour and
Speaker 3: go out. Uh, how has that affected you and what
Speaker 3: is that giving you time to kind of reflect going
Speaker 3: over the past year or so.
Speaker 4: Well, But it's good.
Speaker 1: It's to save money, listen, sh real, it's like a
Speaker 1: whole another down income.
Speaker 4: It don't hurt. Don't hurt to have something put up.
Speaker 7: Away from Amazon, mamason.
Speaker 4: But you know, thank god, I haven't gotten you know,
Speaker 4: the virus, but I know some people that have. But
Speaker 4: you know, I wear my mask and I stay away
Speaker 4: from people, you know six feet.
Speaker 10: But a large family have like a bi weekly zoom
Speaker 10: Like how do y'all stay connected?
Speaker 1: Which we always want to say with kids now and
Speaker 1: everything grandkids, Like yeah, we all.
Speaker 4: We have our own places. You know, my children they
Speaker 4: they only man, they only worse than I am.
Speaker 6: Dad.
Speaker 4: If you don't come over without your.
Speaker 1: Mad I just a different question. She go the bars
Speaker 1: Chico's album A long time.
Speaker 3: No, how involved I totally forgot how involved in where
Speaker 3: you in the production of the album.
Speaker 4: That's one album I'm most proud.
Speaker 1: Of very I was about to say you were there.
Speaker 4: She came and got me. That was during my time
Speaker 4: of my narcotic situation. And uh, she came and got
Speaker 4: me and he said, I need you to produce this
Speaker 4: album with me. I'm scignis Kadar. That's where I'm gonna
Speaker 4: come up with albu. So it woke me up, man,
Speaker 4: because you know she was my man. It woke me up,
Speaker 4: and it gave me something too to do to live for,
Speaker 4: you know, to a reason to want to come up
Speaker 4: out of the rut that I was in. Right and
Speaker 4: he got me back in the studio. I started seeing
Speaker 4: the microphones again, started getting that feeling again, and the keyboards,
Speaker 4: and the guy was limited with him. He said, whatever
Speaker 4: you want, man. We had so many keyboards We've rented
Speaker 4: in every keyboards everywhere man our board gear, and you
Speaker 4: know we just consumed that budget.
Speaker 5: Man.
Speaker 10: But yes, loves still Good?
Speaker 7: Do we do we go love still Good?
Speaker 1: Igging me well, cheek or I.
Speaker 9: Can I ask the history of There was always a
Speaker 9: piano and we always keep a tape running all the time,
Speaker 9: constant studio, no matter what it's on record, something is
Speaker 9: so Chico got the studio late this day and I
Speaker 9: was already there playing these chords.
Speaker 4: To egging me. And then when Chica walked in. Uh,
Speaker 4: I didn't know it, but I heard him in the
Speaker 4: back of me singing and the microphone was right there
Speaker 4: in the control room. That was the gist of the
Speaker 4: lead vocal right there from the control If you notice,
Speaker 4: you hear me in the background saying yeah and all
Speaker 4: that stuff. Yeah.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 4: They tried to compress it out, but it's still there.
Speaker 4: But he wrote that song just standing over my shoulder
Speaker 4: singing while I was playing on scores. It just it
Speaker 4: just flowed, man, from the beginning to the end, just
Speaker 4: like that. And then love Still Good. That was very
Speaker 4: very personal with him.
Speaker 7: About the brother line. I still every time I hear it,
Speaker 7: I tear up.
Speaker 4: Yeah. I didn't even come to the studio that day
Speaker 4: when he did that. He said, he said, he I
Speaker 4: want to be in the studio by myself today. I
Speaker 4: got something something I'm going through.
Speaker 1: It was a heavy Marvel influence on that one too,
Speaker 1: like real kind of trouble man, you know.
Speaker 4: But man, that was a great album.
Speaker 8: Man.
Speaker 4: That's yeah.
Speaker 3: When you when you talk about you and your brother,
Speaker 3: because you know both of y'all have had, you know,
Speaker 3: your struggles like with addiction, and stuff. Uh, how does
Speaker 3: it work in terms of you know, at the time,
Speaker 3: you know, he came and kind of pulled you out,
Speaker 3: and then is it ever a time like say, if
Speaker 3: he's down, you know, if if if he's if he's
Speaker 3: not sober and you are sober, Like, how does that work?
Speaker 4: Uh?
Speaker 1: In terms of you and your brother, he.
Speaker 4: Knows he can come to me anytime. My brothers in
Speaker 4: terms of the drug situation, the sobriety thing, I'm not
Speaker 4: really around them that much. I'm kind of doing my
Speaker 4: own thing, you know. But you know, I love them all,
Speaker 4: I really do. I love them all and I'm there
Speaker 4: for him and you know that. But I'm not really
Speaker 4: I'm not really into that where they where they at?
Speaker 1: And is that more of a protection thing for you
Speaker 1: kind of like a self preservation thing.
Speaker 4: It's more people growing apart. It's more people growing apart
Speaker 4: and their lifestyle and my lifestyle is you know, I'm
Speaker 4: still pursuing my real They they are they cool?
Speaker 2: Right In the industry, who do you count as your
Speaker 2: your your friends are your inner circle as far as
Speaker 2: the industry is concerned, Like, who who have you been
Speaker 2: able to lean on?
Speaker 6: Uh?
Speaker 2: If it's not your family, like as far as like
Speaker 2: industry people that are that are you're tight knit with?
Speaker 4: Nobody comes to mind right now. And I'm just kidding.
Speaker 4: Darius McQuary is real good for nobody, real tight uh
Speaker 4: and uh And I don't have a whole lot of
Speaker 4: celebrity friends that that I hang out with because you know,
Speaker 4: we be tripping. I like keeping it on and keeping
Speaker 4: it real and uh, you know when I go home,
Speaker 4: I look in the mirror and I see a real person,
Speaker 4: and you know, you feel me right, I feel you,
Speaker 4: And it's hard for me to be wrong people that
Speaker 4: look in the mirror and still see somebody else celebrity.
Speaker 4: Yeah you, but but there are some real people in
Speaker 4: this in this game too that they keep it real.
Speaker 5: You know.
Speaker 4: You know what I'm saying, questions, you know, and uh,
Speaker 4: quest that's one of the guests that I hang out with.
Speaker 1: Are you in Quick? Do y'all still y'all still really
Speaker 1: deal with each other?
Speaker 4: Quickly school quick?
Speaker 6: Uh?
Speaker 4: He's been doing some touring and uh, especially with this pandemic. Man,
Speaker 4: I ain't hardly seeing nobody. Yeah, me and Quick are
Speaker 4: cool man.
Speaker 2: Okay, Yeah, So I guess my last question is what
Speaker 2: is your next statement or when will your Well, first
Speaker 2: of all, congrats on we didn't really get to stay
Speaker 2: that much or talk at all about second Chance. But
Speaker 2: even with your you know, the nominations and whatnot and.
Speaker 1: And making a fine record. Was it was a great record. Uh,
Speaker 1: what are your playing? As far as doing any more
Speaker 1: music material.
Speaker 4: I'm going to you know what, i'ma have to put
Speaker 4: something out soon because I'm in the studio all the time.
Speaker 4: I'm always recording. I'm not recording an album, you know
Speaker 4: what I'm saying. I'm just recording songs.
Speaker 5: Don't matter.
Speaker 4: I know I'm saying.
Speaker 1: Right, you could just put out one jam well too. Yeah, right,
Speaker 1: it's whatever now it's perfectionist.
Speaker 4: Thing to me is hold me back. I gotta let
Speaker 4: I gotta loosen up.
Speaker 7: It's hard to reprogram.
Speaker 4: I got songs, man, I mean recent songs, and uh
Speaker 4: they're bad too. They're bad too. They're bad man, you're
Speaker 4: like them.
Speaker 1: Let's let's go yo.
Speaker 4: Ell.
Speaker 7: It's never a time when we're not waiting on songs
Speaker 7: from you, like never.
Speaker 4: Okay, exactly here comes, I'm coming with it. I'm gonna
Speaker 4: come with it. Get over then I'm gonna do Uh,
Speaker 4: I'm I'm gonna do some touring as soon as the
Speaker 4: world back up.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I was gonna say, how were you pleasantly surprised
Speaker 2: by the kind of feedback that you got over that
Speaker 2: that clip of.
Speaker 4: I was? I was? It was a last minute decision
Speaker 4: for me. I said, Okay, I'm gonna do it.
Speaker 1: And where was that done? It was in a record shop?
Speaker 1: Where was it? Was it in California or ye?
Speaker 4: And he's done the record shop, record shop, slash studio,
Speaker 4: slash entrepreneur's right here, it's placed.
Speaker 1: I'm in right now, Okay, okay, curious. Yeah, I loved
Speaker 1: Yeah that clip?
Speaker 5: Was that? Was that?
Speaker 1: That really real rap? Like no bullshit? That concert? That
Speaker 1: just you know, that imprompted things you did? I was
Speaker 1: versus it's the Shane Oh really wow, man, you.
Speaker 7: Did do versus?
Speaker 4: How about I did verses with Jett?
Speaker 7: Stop playing.
Speaker 4: Jack? I mean, the catalog is is different and it
Speaker 4: hurts much, but hey, how many? I mean it'd be interesting.
Speaker 7: It will be interesting now, But y'all I have to
Speaker 7: tell some stories already.
Speaker 1: Yeah, we gotta have some stories.
Speaker 4: You can't be like, well, I mean, I'm just trying
Speaker 4: to think of something interesting.
Speaker 1: You know, right, but yeah, but even more than versus,
Speaker 1: I think.
Speaker 2: Just you at offend the roads, just singing man like
Speaker 2: and then the way that you know, especially with you know,
Speaker 2: Prince's very last concerts were in that way, was just
Speaker 2: him and the piano. It was something really intimate about that.
Speaker 2: And I feel like it's something that's like super needed
Speaker 2: right now. So I hope that when this world opens up,
Speaker 2: you know, eldbares, you can that's interesting do that.
Speaker 1: No background singers off for real to pull off, you
Speaker 1: gotta have real chops to do. You gotta be able
Speaker 1: to play.
Speaker 4: Honestly, I didn't know anybody would be interested in that, dude.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and we love this with you one when you
Speaker 2: have a catalog and you could do cover songs and
Speaker 2: you could do your brothers, like, yeah, I beg of you.
Speaker 1: Be a long show. I beg of you.
Speaker 2: Whoever talks you into the comeback thing and all right,
Speaker 2: let's audition band members and no, I need my background singers. No,
Speaker 2: I'm telling you there's something so magician you alone.
Speaker 1: Think about how low that overhead is. Bro think about.
Speaker 4: Yes, I was on a on a on a computer
Speaker 4: or something.
Speaker 1: No, we singing. We will be singing.
Speaker 5: For free.
Speaker 1: I was singing all the harmony. You did all this, man,
Speaker 1: I was singing all the harmonies. Bro what not only
Speaker 1: not only will the audience sing it? They'll pay this,
Speaker 1: like they'll pay trust me, you get to keep all
Speaker 1: the money trust.
Speaker 5: Me on this.
Speaker 1: But yeah, we're all trust me sing along with elder bars.
Speaker 1: That's man. Come on, this is great.
Speaker 4: My assister able, she always tells me that all the time,
Speaker 4: and and other people tell me that too.
Speaker 5: But you're just getting here, Like, how long have you
Speaker 5: been on social media?
Speaker 4: Now?
Speaker 7: You said how long?
Speaker 4: Yeah? Oh about three four months?
Speaker 10: Oh, child, that's why he feeled his way.
Speaker 7: He got to get his gotta get his legs.
Speaker 4: He don't know how much he loved me off here
Speaker 4: if he have the account.
Speaker 1: I just it was just there, right, yeah, I yeah.
Speaker 2: I beg of you when when this world opens up,
Speaker 2: just you by yourself at a piano, just do a
Speaker 2: limited run.
Speaker 1: See how the trust me? Okay, that's what the world
Speaker 1: needs right now.
Speaker 2: Look, we can keep you here for twelve hours, man,
Speaker 2: but you know we've had you for the longest and
Speaker 2: you're in the studio right now, so we'll let you
Speaker 2: create your magic. But I thank you from the bottom
Speaker 2: of my heart for even real considering this when you
Speaker 2: when you d md me, I thought I still even
Speaker 2: though I knew it was you, I still thought it
Speaker 2: was fake. Like I had to ask a couple of
Speaker 2: people like, wait, it's just a real elder barge, this
Speaker 2: can't be.
Speaker 1: Thank you, man, Thank you for everything. You're truly like
Speaker 1: one of my favorite signats.
Speaker 8: Man, I thank you on behalf of me and my
Speaker 8: father and all the sundays we spent listening to all
Speaker 8: this love like you have no ideas the soundtrack of
Speaker 8: this whole life, Like just thank you and everything afterwards.
Speaker 7: But thank you told me to tell you that.
Speaker 1: Yeah, man, just your story.
Speaker 3: Man, it's just you know the way that you just
Speaker 3: you know, keep persevering, and you know you just keep
Speaker 3: surfacing and keep coming back and still sounding great, and
Speaker 3: you know, you know you fall down, you get up,
Speaker 3: you keep it pushing, and you know we love you
Speaker 3: and appreciate you.
Speaker 1: Brother. Just thank you for all that you've contributed. Man,
Speaker 1: Thanks you real, thank you.
Speaker 10: Com one of these flowers and your face flowers.
Speaker 1: More flowers, Bill all flowers, greenhouse, Let's do it. I
Speaker 1: bought the Rhythm of the Night forty five when it
Speaker 1: came out. Steve, if we let you out of this, I'm.
Speaker 4: Sorry he's been talking the whole time. He talks too much.
Speaker 1: I was on mute. Yeah, shut up, Steve.
Speaker 2: All right on behalf of the team Supremelo Broke Bill
Speaker 2: and Sugar Steve. I'm quest Love. Thank you very much,
Speaker 2: El DeBarge. We're definitely gonna work together to bro.
Speaker 1: Hey, I can't insist. Thank you very much. I appreciate
Speaker 1: it all right. If this is another classic episode of
Speaker 1: Quest Love Supreme, yall. We'll see in the.
Speaker 5: Next round another one.
Speaker 4: Hey, this is Sugar Steve.
Speaker 1: Make sure you keep up with us on Instagram at
Speaker 1: q l S and let us know what you think
Speaker 1: you should be next to sit down with us.
Speaker 4: Don't forget to subscribe. You are a podcast.
Speaker 1: Must Love Supreme is a reduction of iHeartRadio. For more
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