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Speaker 1: Quest Love Supreme is a production of iHeartRadio. This classic episode was produced by the team at Pandora.

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Speaker 2: Hey, what's up, y'all?

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Speaker 1: This is Quest Love And as you noticed throughout June, we are celebrating Black Music Month by releasing an episode every day, So every day you're either going to hear a specially pick QLs classic. Now for Part one, Part two. In part three of my all time favorite QLs episode, this is the legendary Jimmy Jam.

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Speaker 2: Ladies and gentlemen.

00:00:41
Speaker 1: This experience with Jimmy Jam, talking with him for almost six hours was such a dream come true. We never wanted it to end. This particular episode. We talked about working with Michael Jackson, a lot of career advice in running a record label, and a lot.

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Speaker 2: Of it's so much too much information.

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Speaker 1: We really hope you enjoyed this Jimmy Jam episode as much as we enjoy doing it all right here it is part three, the QLs Classic Interview with producer Jimmy Jam. There's a question I have about rhythmination, which I often debate with with Reebe's son, Michael's nephew Austin, about the effect, the crippling effect that I feel the knowledge add on Michael Jackson, or just at least the first three.

00:01:49
Speaker 2: Songs of that record. And you know, I've watched No, No, No, but I love this, I love where this is going.

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Speaker 1: I've watched because I've watched a few interviews where he's mentioned in a kind of monastery or a way like, oh, you know, Jens. But knowing what I know about his vocal style and what it became, I felt that I felt that what control was for Prince, Rhythm Nation was for Michael into a crippling effect because soon after, literally every thing that he released post nineteen ninety was him chasing those first three songs, Rhythm Nation, uh, State of the World and the Knowledge. Well, no, no, I mean, do you know the baby Face story about when he first flew them to Neverland Wrench to work on the Dangerous record? Did he ever tell you the his first Okay, so Babyface. So when they're working on Jermaine, as you said record, and suddenly they get a call saying I'm you know, helicopter to Havenhurst And when they first get there, they're like, well, so you know, what do you what do you like from us? Like they're trying to figure out what he knows of theirs, and he says, well, I really really like Rhythm Nation. A part of me actually feels like he was nagging them, Like I think he's I think he's intelligent enough to read album credits to know the difference between Ella and Babyface and Jimmy Zeanme, Terry Lewis.

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Speaker 2: And you know they correct him. Was like, well, you know, we didn't do that right. It's like, I know, but I still like it. That's great.

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Speaker 1: So yeah, it's and again it's like, my favorite record of hers is Janet. I feel like the most important record was controlled, but I feel like the most impactful was probably at least with stylistically and how it affected Michael. I mean, when you make Michael Jackson's paradigm shift, then that says something. And I always felt as though that record crippled him in ways that he's never recovered. Like every song was like that sixteenth note, like off the Water, like everything was that, Like what was was there any feedback from him whatsoever? Or was it like in her head like it's really going to fuck him up now?

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Speaker 2: Like there was Janet. Janet never had any sort of he was never competitive. Oh she was competitive, but not towards him in any way. She never had anything that I've ever since her that she ever said that was in any way like I'm gonna show Michael on this one or anything like that. There was never anything like that her. Her respect for him was way beyond any sort of competitiveness with him. He was competitive toward her. I will say that because I can tell you. I can tell you I can I can tell you the whole scream story. That was that. But but interestingly enough, yes, the knowledge. I have a handwritten note from Michael that talks about the bridge and the knowledge and the sound that's on there, and can I can we do something that sounds like that on the bridge of our song? He had taped it to my keyboard. Because I wasn't there, he taped it to my keyboard. And I still have that. Say you still have that? I actually my brief.

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Speaker 3: Does he print or writing cursive? I'm sorry, I just need to print.

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Speaker 2: No, this was print. I think this was a magulent cursive. All have to you know what. I never actually, honestly, I didn't pay attention. Maybe it is cursive. I don't know. I didn't pay attention. I just saw the note that just said, Jimmy jam can we use the sound that's whatever that sound is and the knowledge, but I actually got it. Was funny because when we were working with with Michael uh on the on that History album, and I remember him being obsessed with IF and he really liked IF. And I remember saying, no, I said, yeah, if it's cool, Michael, I said, I don't know. I said, you know, that's the Way Love Goes was a much bigger record it was, And I said, yeah, so that's the Way Love Goes was like number one for eight weeks or something. I said, you know, IF was like top five, I said, but it wasn't. I said no, I like, I really like that IF.

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Speaker 1: And it's like no, like that brace yourself, that that five second stag yes, sizzle like and that's what like. Rhythm Nason was probably the first stadium black album because even with bad just that intro maybe the way you make Me feel like, it didn't have the grandiose m HM intro of every like every song was stadium ready yeah for rhythm Na.

00:07:27
Speaker 2: Yeah, No, he definitely liked I mean he was. He told us how much he loved it, and and and wanted to and wanted to and always why would you never ask you guys to produce his records? What we did we did. We ended up doing songs on uh. Well, but after the fact, well, I mean, honestly we first of all, the records he made with Quincy Jones, to me were the greatest records ever. So I was like, I didn't even really want to work with Michael quite honestly, if he wouldn't have asked to do the Janet duet, you know, we probably never would have worked with him. That's the reason we worked with him. And it was interesting because I remember Janet or Michael called I'm trying to think where his folks called our folks or whatever, say, Michael wants to do a song as a duet with Janet and I my first thought was I'm calling it. No, it wasn't no. My first thought was I'm gonna call Janet and see is she cool? Is she aware with it? You know of this? And then my biggest thing was I feel, as a producer and also her friend and confidant, I'm there to protect her and I want to make sure that whatever the process is that's happening, that she's protecting at all times. And when I say that, it was interesting what you just said about Michael and kind of his you know, his story with La and Babyface. When when he said I really like Rhythm Nation. That's hilarious to me because I remember when we were doing and Scream, and I remember I told Janet to come to Minneapolis while we were doing the tracks because Michael said, just put together some tracks and we'll figure it out what it is. And I remember we put we put a bunch of tracks together and then we just kind of said, okay, I said, Janet, you need to just sit here. I just need your inspiration, you know. And so I remember when we did the track that ended up being Scream. I remember Janet said, that's the one he's gonna like. And I said, how do you know? And she said, because I know my brother. And I said, okay. So, but the song she really liked, and the song that we liked was ended up becoming Runaway because yeah, because he run Away. Yeah, we thought that that was yo. Yeah, we thought that was the record you know he could have right, That's what we thought. Yeah, man, so when we did so, when we did so, when we did run Away, Wow. When we did run Away, it was funny, and we didn't know it was gonna be called runaway. I mean obviously that the song didn't exist. It was just a track. But when we did the track, we just were like, wow, this feels so nice, this is so cool, right, And so she said, I remember, she said, put it on the cassette, but I hope he doesn't like it. I want it for me, And I said, okay, cool, so sirted off. We played the songs, we went to the Hit factory, flew to New York, went to Hit factory. He blasted these songs super loud, and then he would say, yeah, that sounds really good. Can I hear number two again? Please? Okay. So they'd played number two, and they played a couple other ones, and then he goes, Okay, I think I think we're gonna go with number two. I really like number two. And number two was ended up being screamed, and Jenna looked at me like I told you so, but also like I'm glad he didn't play so anyway, so the next day we went to ironically Trump Tower where he had uh where Michael had his penthouse and stuff, and we and Michael already had conceptually what he wanted. He wanted a record that lashed out at the press and everybody that doubted him or was critical of him. And that's why that track worked so well, because for him, it was the aggressiveness of doing that. Whose idea was fucking you know what? I honestly don't remember. I don't remember whether he said that as we were recording it or if. I don't think we suggested it, because I don't think we would ever. I was about to say, did you write the word stop fucking with me? No, it was it stopped pressuring me. But he wrote he wrote the lyrics on that. We didn't write the lyrics on screen. Okay, that was totally his thing. And even as he was writing the lyrics, we were like, okay, yeah, we get that. Oh, but why would you want to drudge up any animosity toward the press or anybody at this point? Because right now he was at it and he was at a really happy point of his life. He had just I don't know whether I think him and Lisa Marie had just gotten married, so he was a happy guy. Lisa couldn't have been nicer. You know. It was funny because I remember we asked Lisa, we said, what did you what did you see in Michael? You know, what did you how did you guys fall in love? And she just said he was the kindest person I've ever met in my life. And I totally got it. I was like, I get it, totally get it. And I thought, now's the opportunity to you know, if it was the runaway track or we had heard the the r Kelly track you Are Not Alone, and we were like, that should be the single. To me, it's like, that's where you're at in your life right now. Why go back and go pressure me. I gotta get the last word. He's got to get the last word. And that was the thing. And we told we told Sony, We told uh, well, it wasn't even Sony at the time. I think it was still CBS Records at the time, but we told him, we said, that's the wrongest, that's the wrong record for the first single. To me, also, I said, just strategically, wouldn't if everybody wants that duet, why give it to him at first? Give him something different? I said, he's never given the whole big record as the first one ever has throwaway song should have been and then yes, well that's what I meant. Yeah, yeah, but I mean but that was my thing was you are not alone. I said, you just gotten married to Lisa Marie. You're in love. We had already done the love thing with Janet, right. We knew that's the way love goes was the song for that album. That it was. It introduced, it said what the album was, the album was not. We argued with the record company over that. They wanted it for the single and we're like, no, but if it's like the last of rhythm names. But remember the last impression you had of Janet was love will never do without you. So going from that too, that's the way love goes is the next logical step. And they almost talked her out of it. Thank god for Chuck d and Hank Shockley who we played the record for, and they told us, yeah, that if is cool, but that that's the way love goes. Man, it's like some shot ship. She wanted to know. I'll tell you, I'll tell you. I'll tell you what I can real hopefully, real quick. I can tell you what happened. We had finished the whole album. We were the last song we did with State, not State of the World, but new Agenda with Chuck did right right, So we're finishing up. We finished it like three in the morning when Janet had left. Janet had left for about two three days to meet with virgin about you know whatever. And of course now we're the climate of biggest recording delever Ton of pressure and whatever. When Jordan Harris and Jeff A. Roff were the two guys who were running Version when we were working on the album, they came to town one day and they said, we just want to hear whatever you're working on. That particular day we were working on IF. To crank that up. I turned it on. They were blown away. They left. They said that we don't need to hear anything else. We're good, right. So in their minds from that day forward, IF was the single because that's what they heard, and it was so straight down the middle of Janet from what Janet was on Rhythm Nation. They hadn't heard any of the other songs, didn't know any of the concepts. So that's the way Love Goes had a long kind of you know life because in creating the song, because when I did the song, I was like my whole thing was. First of all, I'm the biggest James Brown fan ever. Right, Papa Don't Take No Mess was one of my favorite songs. I said, if I could take Papa Don't Take No Mess, put chords over it like a real song and chak Hord changes stuff and make it all still work with the with the thing, if I could put the impeached President's sample in it. I was trying to make like the ultimate hip hop you know, like like a record Mary J. Blige would make, was what I was trying to make on that record, right, but with the texture the Janet would sing on right. And I remember there was this guy named Mark Mazzetti used to work at A and M Records, and Mark Mazzetti. Okay, so so Mark came up. You know she she was on Virgin, but he just he came up and he said, hey, I know she's not on our label. Can I hear something you're working on? And I said, oh, yeah, well I just finished this track and I played him That's the Way Love Goest track and he went crazy. He said, oh my god, this is the greatest. Oh my god, I'm so I wish I was working this record whatever whatever, anyway, played it, played it for Janet. Janet goes, it's okay and I said wow, I said, oh really, she said, yeah, it's okay. So anyway, I said, okay, cool. So then about you know, a couple of weeks later, we were taking a break over Christmas and uh, she said, just put everything on a cassette for me to listen to. I said, okay, cool. So I put the track on the cassette right when she got back. A couple of weeks later, she landed. I said, what song do you want to start with? She said, oh my god, that track? That track, Oh my god. And I said, what track are you talking about? That track you gave me? Oh my god, the track you gave me, I said, the one you don't like? Oh, I was no, I love that track. Oh my god. We listened to it and over. So something about she was in Anguila, so something about being in Guila on the beach and whatever, and something about it connected. And I think what also happened she was over there with a bunch of her dancers and stuff, and I think they all heard it and were like kind of like what they did in the middle, and that was kind of that. That's what I think kind of happened over there.

00:17:49
Speaker 1: So when that happened, she said tribe to or.

00:17:57
Speaker 2: Yeah, not actually, but yeah, but that was that was sort of the idea. So anyway, we actually did this song and we all agreed that that was sort of the direction of the album. Like that was the first you know, kind of Entrea what the album was going to be. When she went to La, we warned her, We said, they're going to try to talk you in if I already know it, and she said, no, it's cool, but you know what, a second single maybe whatever, It's okay, cool. She comes back, she goes, yeah, the single changed to if. We were like, don't don't you know? And they were like and she told me all the reasons, Oh we can do a big dance video and it's Janet returns and it's whatever, and we're like no, but we know that's changed my whole perspective of that record, right if came out. Yeah, So anyway, so now, okay, so we fast forward. We're finishing New Agenda. So three o'clock in the morning, I said Janet, I said, can we play them the two records? Thinking this singles? And she said, oh, yeah, that'd be great. I said, okay, cool. So we went in in the studio. I played That's the Way Love Goes and they listened to it and they were like vibing. And we played IF and they were vibing and we were like, okay, so what do you think and they said, well, yeah, that that IF man, that you know, that just sounds like Janet. Man, you know that's that you know, that's that janis back, and you know, we get it man. It's it's it's like, you know, it's like and as he's saying that, I'm just going like, no, right, and she's looking at me, like Jane's looking at me like see you know whatever, and I'm like damn. And then they go, but but what was that other song called That's the Way Love Goes? That other song? You know what that song is like, that's like some shah Day shit. That's like when shah Day puts a record out, you know, and it is no fanfare to it. It's just like she just got the CD and she just kind of slips it down on the table and you go, oh, what is that. Oh it's a shiny record. Let's check that out. You know. He said, that's like that ship and he said, that's something about that, and I looked at her like and that was it, and that was so the decision was made. And thank god they were there and said that because then she said, she like came back to her senses and she said, okay, yeah, that's the way Love Goes is a single, and yeah, it changed the whole direction of what the record would have been. And so yeah, I mean, you know, there's all kinds of things like that that happened. Man, it's it's like it's like we can sit here and talk. We ain't even got to damn two thousand have we. Which, by the way, everybody clowned us about the length of the of the Bull interview that we did. Whatever that was, Yeah, whatever that is, And it was funny because I said, yeah, but you know the problem is is that you can really pick an era and spend a couple hours talking about it if you want to go in depth with it, it's tough to really do it because I said, we've just been around too damn long. That's the that's the problem. And there's a story that leads to another story that leads to another story. But there's so many angles of things of the way they turned out. At the end of the day, I say about all of this, it's God that does this flows through us. Luckily we've got the blessing to actually do it. But I guarantee you there's song, there's chord changes and songs we were talking about. Somebody asked me the other day about come back to Me, the bridging come back to Me.

00:21:51
Speaker 4: It's the same as money came by love?

00:21:54
Speaker 2: Is it? That's money can mean fine, Oh you're right, Yeah, you're right, Yeah, you're sort of well, you're right. I mean, you're right. There are there are the same There are the same chords in there, absolutely the same chords. But I don't know where those chords came from, right because when I was doing come Back to Me, the track for that, that is not where I would go for a change. Like if somebody said, oh, we need a B section, I wouldn't have gone to that, you know. And even sometime today, you know, if somebody says, hey, play such and such and such. I love the change in that song, and I can't remember what it was. We were Brunel Mars the other day, who, by the way, can sing every damn song we've ever done and really well, which is which is something? But we were doing I don't know whether it was coming back to me or one of the other that might have been abanded years something, and we were he was singing, and he went to the change, and I'm like going, oh wait, I don't wait. What was what was I thinking that day? I don't even know, but it was what whatever was planted in me that day that made me come up with those changes. So at the end of the day, man, it's just, uh, you know, it's just a blessing. And I get to do it with somebody who I love to see every single day. And uh, but there's so many twists and turns that you can't really get stuck on yourself about it because there's so many other factors, man, like if Chuck d wouldn't have been in our life or Hank Shockley wouldn't have been in our life at that moment, it would have taken a different turn, and and that stuff we can't control, you know. So there's a lot of good fortune that that happens.

00:23:49
Speaker 4: What's your day to day like now?

00:23:50
Speaker 5: Like in terms of you and Tary writing songs, like, what's the typical day like?

00:23:54
Speaker 4: In your life.

00:23:55
Speaker 2: Wow, Well, a typical day in our life is a lot of family kid raising. Quite honestly, we have our kids go to the same school. Six Well, I have a six I have sixteen year old twins and he has a sixteen year old son. But he has a thirty six year old son. You know, he's Terry has been busy for a while.

00:24:17
Speaker 1: Yeah, ain't nobody bad.

00:24:25
Speaker 2: Sorry, but Terry. Terry taught me everything that I know about parenting. And he's like the most unselfish, giving person ever in life. And uh so I got a chance to watch him raise his kids and then I had mine. But then he remarried and had more kids, you know, because he just he's the kind of person that should should have kids. And he always said that to me because I went through most of my life I figured I was never going to have kids. I just I didn't want kids. And he said, jam, you know, you have to have kids. And I'm like why and he said, because you have so much to office. And he says, and somebody's got an offset all the knucklehead kids, so you need to raise some good kids so we kind of have some balance. And I thought, okay, Yeah, he's absolutely right. And I always feel like with my kids, it's like, y'all better do something with your life because there's no there's no.

00:25:21
Speaker 4: Excuse, you know.

00:25:24
Speaker 2: So that's that's the thing. So anyway, a lot of our life is being uber driving kids to school in back. My daughter just got her license, so that's scary as she's sixteen. I have an older son at Arizona State University and he's I think going to transfer ad end of the year maybe, but we'll see whatever he wants to do. But I mean a lot of it is just spending kids time. The nice thing is I wake up and now the way studios are studios in your laptop now. So I have an office at home, and anytime I come up with an idea, and thank goodness, the idea is just keep coming for some reason, and I can just walk over to my laptop and I have my little keyboard and stuff, and I can just bang an idea out. And sometimes I don't even develop it. I just kind of I just kind of put a little idea down and I just kind of leave it. And then what happens most of the time is Terry will take my hard drive and he'll say, hey, jam let me get something off to your hard drive. Okay, cool. He'll go through, listen to everything, and the next thing, you know, we'll have We just did a People Bryson album, Wow, And he pulled some songs off of my hard drive that I swear to god he because we were trying to well, we never talked about how we work together, but this is this is one example. So he said, man, you got I'm we need some stuff for people. Man, but I want it to be like R and B. But it's got to be forward, you know, it's got to be whatever whatever. And it's like, okay, cool. He said, you got anything like that? And I said, nine got anything like that? I said, but I'll figure something out. So anyway, he takes my hard drive, he goes down to it, he records people. He comes back two songs that I had done I don't know, five years ago or something, just as kind of a thing. One of them I was singing on, which was pretty bad. And and anyway, he's got people on these songs. These are like I probably are singles on the album. And but he hears it and he goes, I mean one of them he played for people and people like lost his mind. He said, oh my god, I love this, and so Terry's like, okay, yeah, you know, so sometimes it just happens like that. But that's the great thing about having a partner, you know. Even that's even we talked about a little bit earlier. What have you done for me lately? So Terry walked in the studio when I was cutting the track, and the part that ended up being used was actually the bridge to the song. It was like a whole different song. Wait what what It was a whole different song, but the bridge went ding ding ding ding ding ding thin thing. So what is your name? I don't even remember now, I don't remember what the main part of the song is. I just know Terry walked in and he said, oh I like that, dun I like that. And I said, oh, no, that's just the bridge of the song, Terry. The real song goes like this. And he said, no, no, no, no, just right to that bridge. You know what he told you? Right?

00:28:27
Speaker 6: I have a question, have you ever had to deal with writer's block or does having a partner kind of prevent that from him?

00:28:33
Speaker 2: It helps, It helps a lot because normally we don't have it at the same time. But yeah, you definitely go through writer's block. You go through I mean, we've done it so long now that we've gone through a ton of periods where we just thought, oh, we're never ever going to write another song again. It's just it just ain't there. Terry went through it for a while, and I remember though, it was because the stuff that was being offered us to do was not inspiring. And who did you say no to? Oh? Many people, many, many, many, many many people. Everyone, not everyone, huh Stevie Wonder. No, we never said who did you say you felt didn't make sense to do?

00:29:22
Speaker 1: Like the Prince come to you guys one day and like you guys got something or I mean like no, we actually were Michael Jackson's situation.

00:29:30
Speaker 2: Like well, I mean early early on Madonna, Donald Ritchie at one point in time, I mean in the no because he wanted one song and we wanted to do more than one song. We didn't feel like we could do oh dance initially well initially right around that, right after that, probably right after Dancing on the ceiling or right around that time. Yeah, I mean he was, he was huge, but we just didn't feel like we were going to make an impact with one song that we didn't. When we thought lot of him, we didn't think of him as one song. We thought of him as the Commodore's linel Rich album. We thought of him as the you know, the yeah, oh we did, you know, but we did, though, we did an album with him that did absolutely nothing. What wait we stop red headphone? Man? I know about this? Louder Louder than words? Right? Uh? What's a lot of the world? Yeah, great cover? Yeah, that's right. You did the entire album, no, no, but we did the great the good songs on there, which so don't so don't want to lose you? Okay, you got that on your on your laptop of yeah songs, look, so don't want to lose you now. And we did a song called say I Do, which he actually got married to when he got married, say I Do. And we did a song that one of my favorites called take You Down that we actually sampled. Uh. I think it was What's the Name of Ecstasy by the Ohio? Wow? What wait? Louder than words? Yeah, louder than words? What us this? So here's so, Here's the funny thing about Lionel is that when he finally did come to us, and we said, no, we want to do more than one song, and he said, okay, cool, He said, I get it. Whatever, I'll come to Minneappol. It was a whole different Linel at that point, right, I will come to Minneapolis, I'll do I'll work with you guys, whatever you guys want to do. We said, hey, we miss the linel the Commodore's Lionel. Can we do a Commodore's Lionel song? And he said yeah, yeah, he said absolutely, we got it. We got it, and so I remember when we played it for him, and I think I had sung the demo, which not very good, and he started cracking up. He just laughed and I said, yeah, I know, I don't sing really good and he said, no, man, it ain't that. He said, what's weird about it is that that is so me. But I can't write that song. You guys can write it. I can't write that song anymore. But the fact that you all wrote that for me, he said, I'm totally with it. So anyway, that album got caught up with I remember a record company thing with pol I think it was PolyGram at the time, and it just kind of got caught up in a bunch of in a bunch of crap and we actually played with him at the PolyGram convention. Okay, so that was cool, but you know, I mean, that's for me, the greatest compliment that we get is when we got a chance to work with the classic artists, the people like we grew up with, and we got to work with Barry White, and we got to work with Barry White was the best. We played a song for Barry White. We did the song called come On for Barry White, and you know, we did the whole big long love unlimited intro and the whole big thing right, and we said when it got done, we say, hey, what do you think man? And he said, sounds like me. And that's that's the best complim. When we did a song called You're All I Need for the Isisley Brothers, and I remember Ernie was listening to it and he said, hey, man, you got an acoustic guitar and we were like, yeah, yeah. He said, man, man, hook me up. Hooked me up. He said, I already know where this is going. I already know where the chord changes are going. And when you do that and you like somebody so much, but you can kind of get into their heads and make them feel like the song is for them. That's the best man, particularly with you know, like I say, with the classic artists, because you have a chance to actually study and know and as a fan, you know, just with anybody, you know where they went wrong, where they made the left turn. You just talked about it. With Michael he made a left turn at one point and he got into Rhythm Nationland and he never recovered that was his left turn that he made. Or it can be any of your favorite artists. It's like, ok, they get to a certain point, then they make a left turn and it's like, if you can just bring them back. We worked with When It Fire. We did a song called Pure Elimination. Okay, and that's the last record by the way that Maurice White sang on and we insisted did he sing?

00:34:09
Speaker 4: And that sounded like that was a great that was a great song.

00:34:12
Speaker 2: But the point was so earth Wind and Fire comes to us and they go, man, we want to get back on the radio, and we were like, you're on the radio all the time. The reasons that's the way to worcept them. You're on the radio. No no, no, we want you know, we want to be on the radio. I said, no, no, So what does it tell you that those songs are being played on the radio? So what does radio want to hear from Earth, Wind and Fire those type of songs. And so we did Pure Gold and you know it was a very popular record in the whole thing.

00:34:45
Speaker 5: Yeah, man, y'all, you guys have always kind of been like I can compare You'll call you like the Shang Song of.

00:34:51
Speaker 4: Music because like.

00:34:56
Speaker 5: Mott was the character who could morphine to like any of the other characters. Because the record y'all did disrespectful for Mary Jay. Yes, I would have bet my firstborn child at Rich Harrison did that record?

00:35:09
Speaker 2: Right? And love Rich Harison?

00:35:11
Speaker 5: I mean, and I was just so I was just curious as to how you channeled that, Like where does that come from?

00:35:17
Speaker 4: Like in order to get it?

00:35:18
Speaker 2: It comes from it comes from Uh, it comes from respect of of people like that of Rich Harrison. I remember hearing what was the record Amrie one thing, No, No, No, the very first Fall in Love? Oh my god. Okay, so of records that changed my life as far as just appreciation of production and the songs and what that was one of them. I mean there's there's probably I mean, I don't know, I've never I always think about it, but then I never do it. But like there's certain songs on You by the way, well, there's certain songs that there's certain songs in my life they'd really changed and I go back, I can go back, way way far. But I mean I remember happening on to a Brenda Russell.

00:36:10
Speaker 7: Album, right, so good okay, and think it over, and those songs on that, those major seventh chords on that record, in the way it's put together changed the way I wrote music totally.

00:36:23
Speaker 2: Right, I can think of hearing just trying to think it's something to come to mind. Just a Touch of Love by Slave totally changed the way that whole that drum, that Steve Arrington with that little hiccup tie hat thing that you know ended up watching You and all that other stuff. But just to Touch of Lovers Man, that was such an amazing record and her and star Leading Young's voice and that whole thing was just amazing. Right, So there's certain records like that that just do that to me. And so yeah, so the Amaree record did that to me. That record was just like come on so and the My Life album by mary Ja was like that, Like I stopped everybody in our in the studio and made them listen to that album, like you gotta listen to this. You liked it. I loved it. That's crazy.

00:37:15
Speaker 1: That's the first day we met, by the way, or at least that I remember, I am, yeah in DC.

00:37:22
Speaker 4: Really I loved it, loved I didn't believe that again, I can see it.

00:37:28
Speaker 2: Why wouldn't I like it? Well because.

00:37:32
Speaker 4: It was karaoke.

00:37:33
Speaker 1: It broke so many rules, Like we were like just that month of us being in a van and analyzing every record as we're going from gig to gig, we got My Life record. We were just dumbfound it because all we kept asking was is this allowed?

00:37:54
Speaker 2: She allowed it?

00:37:55
Speaker 1: Now if it were rappers singing over Everybody Loves the Sunshine and be.

00:37:58
Speaker 2: Like, okay, that's normal.

00:38:00
Speaker 1: But we never heard a singer sing over break theeas And we didn't know how to feel about that record, like we were just like we just kept asking. Well, soon thereafter I was like, if you ask if this is allowed, then it must be right.

00:38:23
Speaker 5: Because she started because she was kind of on the what's the four one one remixes. That was kind of the dress rehearsal for My life because that was when she started.

00:38:32
Speaker 2: No.

00:38:32
Speaker 1: But we just I never thought like, Okay, I'm listening to everybody loves the Sunshine. She's just changing like it was. I was so conflicted to be happy. Yeah, I was so conflicted that.

00:38:47
Speaker 2: Jam.

00:38:47
Speaker 8: Can you still listen to records and not listen to them clinically? I always ask these guys that, like, can you just listen to.

00:38:53
Speaker 2: A record I analyze everything and.

00:38:57
Speaker 8: Just hear the goodness, the emotion that it looks side of the technicalities of the break b how many.

00:39:02
Speaker 2: Sort of That's a great question. I think I can. I definitely get the emotion of records. I was listening. Ironically, there's a record by there's a guy like an EDM, guy like Porter Robinson, and I love his chord structures and his textures that he does. And there's a song he had out about four or five years ago. No, it wasn't even four five years ago. It's maybe two or three years ago that I remember he played at Coachella and it was the first time I taken my kids to Coachella, and I remember we walked into the tent and that song came on, and my kids put their hands in the air, and I just was like, wow this because everybody was like, well EDM is just kind of soul list and it's whatever. But it hit my kids and I actually put a little snippet of it. I sent it to my kids today because we're going to Coachella tomorrow, and I sent them that little snippet and they both like sent me back a bunch of smiling faces because there was this moment where And I never have analyzed that song because it's I'm not an idiom. I don't really do idiom, but that song, Yes, the emotion in that song, there was no I didn't have a desire to try to dissect it. I just something about it all. And it could have been the moment, or because I was with my kids, or because there was a shared experience or whatever. But yeah, I don't I think I probably can listen to things without doing it. The thing that is I don't like is when I can hear the plan that somebody had for the song. That bugs me. If a song is put together really well, it's like a magic trick or something like if a magic trick has done really well. You don't see the magic. You don't see the magic. It's just like, oh shit, wow, that was cool. But if you know what it is, what they're trying to do, and some songs are so I'm gonna push a button here to try to get this emotion and then I'm gonna do this here because and I'm gonna use this sound here because it's reminds people of this here and it's almost like a laboratory.

00:41:09
Speaker 5: That's like I said, I've never been inspired by inspirational music ever, like anyone that says like the well not I mean optimixic.

00:41:18
Speaker 4: No, that's that. That wasn't That was a song that was inspirational, but it wasn't.

00:41:22
Speaker 5: Like I'm going to try to inspire you like a lot of like I don't want to say Christian music, but music that seeks to like be like self help books in music form.

00:41:33
Speaker 4: I hate that shit.

00:41:38
Speaker 2: Wow.

00:41:42
Speaker 1: So how well rounded are you? How well rounded are your kids with music? Or do you leave them to their devices?

00:41:51
Speaker 2: They school you all of that, all all of the above and all in and all in different ways. I mean, I'm around my sixteen year olds all the time. My older, my older one. I remember his probably his most influential phase of music before he kind of I won't say matured, but I guess matured is the right word. Anything that little John did where it was where it was a loop of a synthesizer low and then high. So if it was snap your fingers, it was every song had that same pattern. He loved all those songs, right, and he eventually got he's more. He's interesting now. He's much more of an ed M guy. Now he's into the all the DM stuff.

00:42:43
Speaker 1: So I mean, what did they think of what your life was like? Do they understand that?

00:42:49
Speaker 2: Yo?

00:42:49
Speaker 1: I know you'll see me his dad, but I'm the ship kind of that new.

00:42:57
Speaker 2: Like, what do they think of when they No, they don't, they don't. They have no, they don't get it. No, not at all. So the time means none of them. Well, no, they enjoyed the time. Now. It was interesting when.

00:43:10
Speaker 6: We before after the Rihanna performance.

00:43:13
Speaker 2: No, after the Rihanna performance we did because the time didn't exist, because we didn't really my kids weren't born until ninety six. We did. My first one was ninety six, the twins were two thousand, so we didn't do the We had done the Panemonia Molment what ninety but we hadn't done another album since then, so they didn't really know the time. So it was just yeah, a band I used to play with, but they had no you know, thought about what it was. Yeah, no reference. I remember the first time I took we did a song with Sting called my Funny Friend in Me from a it was from a Disney movie. I can't remember what it's called now, and we at the end of the premiere of the movie, they raised the curtain and we actually performed with Sting, and I remember my son, who probably four at the time, he loved it, like he thought that was so cool that I was, but he didn't know who Sting was. He just thought that it was cool that after this movie there was a band on stage. Right. Eventually he got it and he went with us, like to Janet, because he was old enough. I mean he was what five, I think when when Janet did or six when Janet did the Velvet Rope not Velvet Rope but All for You tour. So when we took him to Hawaii with us when we did the HBO thing and the whole thing, take me to that chair. No, she had Kevin Garnett in the chair though, Yeah, she did it. She did it so anyway. So yeah, but my younger, my younger boy is he's everything. He's the Coachella Sponge Like I took him and he was everything. At that year was a c d C. He loved a c d C. He loved Tyler the Creator, he loved.

00:44:56
Speaker 1: I was gonna say, viz a c DC. It was because of rocket tar rock band or no, no guitar.

00:45:03
Speaker 2: I was wondering if it. Yeah, right, because his kids are into Yeah, why do you know this? Yeah? Why do you know the songs? That's interesting? No, he always for some reason, he always had a very big palette of he was always an old soul. Like he would listen to led Zeppelin, but I mean he'd hear me play it. But then he'd go seek and find more stuff. That was always his thing. Like he'd like he ended up liking the Black Keys because he liked led Zeppelin, and then he you know, and he would make the connections on stuff. He was very very much at an early age. Now he's sixteen. His he's literally discovered now the Michael Jackson off the Wall album now is his probably his favorite album of all time. He thinks sonically it's the best record ever made. And you let him discover it. Yeah, you forced it, know I no, No, I let him discover it. I got in the I got in the car. It's funny. I got in the car the other day. So after the Grammys, we went to this one after party aeg. There are people that own the stables and and all that. We went to their party. They were playing all this kind of old school music and they played bad Mamma Jamma. They played knee deep funkadelic. Right. He had never heard these songs in his life. Right. He's asking me, Dad, who is this? And I said, oh, bad Mamajama Carl Carlton. Ok okay, Dad, who's this? Not just needy funkadelic? Okay cool. About two weeks later, I'm taking him to school. He's playing Funkadelic, but not knee deep. He's playing like this album cuts, That album cuts, right. Bad Mammajamma is like his favorite song ever. He's telling me, how lyrically, what's the lyric? There's a lyric in the song that he loves. What is it? What is the line, yes, the look at her anatomy line whatever that line is poetry most excited excited feeling an anatomy. Yeah, he loved that, he said, man, those are great lyrics. I'm like, okay, cool. So he loves so, he loves that. He loves the like I say, he's into the Michael Jackson thing. He the other day he found heat Wave. He said, Dad, doesn't this sound just like Michael Jackson song? I said, that's because Rod Temperton wrote it. So then he went on a Rod Temperton binge. Right, So he's that kid that Yes, he got me and I love that right, and me too. I mean I was the same way, So I see myself in him. So anyway, he's totally into that stuff. But after he gets through that stuff, Travis Scott, big tar whosy vert is okay to him, He's really, He's really Travis Scott is his that's his all time favorite. He likes Kanye a lot, he likes Drake a lot. He liked the early weekend stuff, the mixtapes, weekend stuff. But he's but he likes Sam Fa. He likes a little dragon. No. He loves oh love, Oh No. He's he's got a very like I said, he's got a very wide music.

00:48:25
Speaker 4: My son, my son, who is also.

00:48:28
Speaker 2: Sixteen, So Coachella is like perfect for him, Like he's gonna be he's gonna love it. Like he's already got his list of of folks he wants to see Schoolboy Q Kendrick Lamar. You know he's got his He's got his folks.

00:48:45
Speaker 5: One question I have for you was in regards to just like your we talk about all your hits, uh some of your misses. I guess, like you know records that you've done that you know maybe didn't do what you want him to do and what you learned from and like when you and Terry might sit back and say, you know what, that didn't really hit the mark and this is why it didn't hit the mark.

00:49:11
Speaker 2: That's a good question. I'm sure there's a lot of them. I don't think a lot about them.

00:49:17
Speaker 5: Well, I mean, like was expected to if I'm project like whatever like.

00:49:25
Speaker 1: So that I did, Like it was the little down there to shape.

00:49:31
Speaker 2: But that's right, it was it was so u no raj no listen Rajene was good. It wasn't. I don't think it was great, like listening to it now, like some things I go back and listen to and I go, man, that was really some great ship we did, or you know, at least I think that, and some things I go back and listen to and I go, that's okay. But I would have done that different, and I would have done that. Rogen is one of those records I probably would have done, you know, a little different than we did it. But also we didn't have at that point in time. We just didn't have the backup with the label, so maybe the record could have been better. I don't think it probably reached its potential, but I don't think we probably made the best record. And that's that's in all honesty. But yeah, I mean it happens a lot when records don't do it. I'll tell you one of the ones that was really surprising to me, But it had nothing to do with us, because I think it's a great record is God till It's gone by Janet And And what happened with that record was, wait, it went straight to number one. Something happened that we don't know about it. Well, it went straight to number one. Urban pop radio didn't touch it. Yeah, wait, what didn't touch it like it didn't exist, didn't touch it. And and here's the thing that's interesting about it, We since that when we made it, because Janet had always straddled that line very carefully. I remember when we were we went to a marketing meeting at the end of the well, yeah, toward the end of the Janet album, right, and we had already had you know, uh, that's the way love goes if again because of Love were the four singles I think. And then so it was now what is the fifth single going to be? And there was a cut on the album called where Are You Now, which we thought would be a great single on the radio all the time before the album. That was the problem. It had already been played so much on the radio that they were scared that they couldn't get you know, the Judges arts. It charted, Yeah, it was. It was like it was like a top literally a top ten record just on airplay. And so anyway, we went to this meeting and uh, you know, we're sitting in there and there they have all their charts and their graphs, and you know, summertime we should go up tempo. Maybe we go with Throb. That would be a great one. And whatever, and they had all their graphs and all their their stuff. And Janet had told us before we went in the meeting, and us at that time was my It was myself and actually Renee or second husband, I guess. So anyway, we had gone in there, and so she was waiting for us. She said, when you guys are done, we'll go eat. I'm like, okay, cool. So we called her and we said are you close and she said yeah. And I said, why don't you come in and listen to these what these guys are saying, because I know what you're thinking for the single, but they're not anywhere near it, right, And she said, okay, cool. So she comes in and everybody gives her whole spiel and everything and you know, whatever, whatever, whatever, whatever, and this is why this and it's up tempo and it's summer and here's what we do and blah blah blah, and Janet goes, well, I want to thank everybody very much for obviously everybody's put a lot of work into this, and I really appreciate that. And I think the next single should be anytime anyplace room is silent. And somebody goes, yeah, great, sure, okay, yeah, so what do you think should we get a remix going Nerd? Who do you think we could do? That's what I said. I said, I think R Kelly could probably do a really good remix. And then they were like, oh cool, okay remix, Okay, yeah, that's good. Yeah. Where the B side came in?

00:53:14
Speaker 6: Is this also where the B side came in, which it is one of my favorite.

00:53:19
Speaker 2: Jane because we said, because their whole thing was a concern, we don't have a tempo record in the summertime, we said, we'll just do a B side, temple B side, So start this is a song about summertime, right exactly.

00:53:33
Speaker 4: Let me just spell it out for you.

00:53:37
Speaker 2: Yeah.

00:53:37
Speaker 5: One of the records that I was surprised that, like didn't go wash Man when I need somebody.

00:53:46
Speaker 4: I thought that. I was like, man, this ship is sensitivity on steroids.

00:53:49
Speaker 2: I love this. Thank you. I did too. I I loved Whosa Mac and didn't it didn't. It didn't connect.

00:53:56
Speaker 6: I used to about the single and used to rock the instrumental more than the to be honest.

00:54:02
Speaker 2: Well, we always saw Ralph as sort of a you know, sort of a Marvin Gaye ish type thing, so that was our attempt to kind of do that kind of Marvin Gay, you know, kind of trouble man type, you know, cinematic thing, and you know, at the end of the day it didn't work. When when I need somebody, Yeah, that kind of surprised me. But honestly, the label at that point in time wasn't in to Ralph at that point, just for a lot of reasons, and so we just kind of knew it was going to kind of fall flat at that point.

00:54:32
Speaker 4: How do you feel about this?

00:54:33
Speaker 2: How do you feel about.

00:54:34
Speaker 1: The the well you executive produced the new edition playing you and amazingly yes, I agree, Yes, I mean, how do you feel that now that a whole new generation has latched dooring and you know, like my friend's kids are.

00:54:55
Speaker 2: You know, discovering this group, and how how do you? I love it? I love it because to me, that's what music really should be. It should connect us, it should connect generations, it should connect races, that should connect ethnicities, religions, and you do. That's what music is. It's the ultimate connector. And to me, it's the most divine art of all the arts. And the reason I say that is Maine something else. That's if I say to you questlove, where were you on this date in nineteen ninety Do you know what you were doing?

00:55:36
Speaker 1: I'm that Mary Lou Henner person that can you can name it date and I can tell you.

00:55:41
Speaker 2: What I realize.

00:55:42
Speaker 1: Okay, because music and soul train episodes like connect.

00:55:46
Speaker 2: Yes, but what's right because of the music? Yes, yeah, that's that's my point.

00:55:51
Speaker 6: I say it's to my mom all the time that it's it's my time machine.

00:55:54
Speaker 2: It's how I remember things. It's how I transport you, transport you. If I play you a song from the day eight, it transports you. You remember everything about.

00:56:02
Speaker 4: It and it smells.

00:56:05
Speaker 2: Yeah, absolutely, Like I can go back to, like even because we talked about earlier what I grew up listening to and it was like a bunch of pop music. But I can go back to like stuff like a strawberry alarm clock or the Turtles or you know all these right, And I remember that they will play me the Turtles Happy Together or whatever, and I remember the school bus they're taking me to a field trip, and you know that kind of stuff. I mean, it's like it's all exists in your head, but you can access it. What's the key that accesses it music that's divine. There's no other explanation for that.

00:56:50
Speaker 8: So question because you said earlier when we first started this interview, there's gonna be a movie at some time, at some point, if we can't get through this story in full hours.

00:57:04
Speaker 2: It's gonna be the new route. Now that.

00:57:08
Speaker 1: Certain unfortunate situations have occurred in the past year, Yes, where does that leave the original seven in terms of being the time, in terms of doing the movie or you I'm going to have to see one of the smoke clears with the States.

00:57:29
Speaker 2: And yeah, I don't. Honestly, I don't think we've even thought about it. I don't even I don't think it's been a thought mine as well, be I mean you saw.

00:57:39
Speaker 1: Well, okay, if Steven were still at BT, I think it could be a possibility or could have been a possibility.

00:57:46
Speaker 5: But no, we were joking, like on the New Edition's story. We were on Twitter joking like, yo, if they did a Jimmy jam and Terry Lewis story, that shit could be a Netflix original thirteen episodes.

00:58:02
Speaker 4: Like dad Ass that you could be.

00:58:05
Speaker 1: I don't even consider it, Like we don't have to be chronological. I think if you just picked thirteen experiences that are somewhere between ninety to two hours.

00:58:17
Speaker 2: I mean people can handle it, right, or an hour?

00:58:21
Speaker 4: An hour? Yeah?

00:58:22
Speaker 1: Fuck it, I mean we're here for nine hours. Yeah, it's just I feel like, yes, a thirteen episode arc.

00:58:33
Speaker 2: That would be cool of Jam and Lewis, Like, just.

00:58:38
Speaker 1: That would be awesome. Okay, listen, we have to stop. Oh wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, just grant us because I know that. Look, I know you're being super polite. I appreciate you for granted.

00:58:51
Speaker 2: This is a five hour interview, so look, I just want to make sure we broke the record. I want to guess. So look, can we all just get one question each? Oh? Man?

00:59:08
Speaker 1: Okay, one question each? Mine is rather short, and this goes back to nineteen eighty two? Okay, did you ever question the abrupt ending of I Don't want to leave you? H Did you ever question that?

00:59:27
Speaker 2: No? Even now you don't question it. No, I remember it, but I don't question it. Was that supposed to be something else or just not that I know of. I wasn't involved, like I say, I wasn't involved in making the record though, so I don't know it's whatever it was. But never like, hey, well, why did you never know? I think the leader on the tape came up and that was wasted. My question, who's next? Boss Bill?

00:59:59
Speaker 6: A few years ago, there was a project you guys announced called the Jam and Lewis Project. I guess it was going to be the solo record. Is that still happening?

01:00:05
Speaker 2: Yes? And what's what's this the latest from that? Okay? So the latest is the project is pretty you know we've been we've been working on this project you could say, since the Secret album. So so we never we always thought it would be great to do our own album, but we never put aside the time to do it, like we would always try to kind of do it in between other things, and we felt like we were kind of selling ourselves short because you'd always clear the decks for a project and do it. And as a matter of fact, when we did Unbreakable, that time period was when we were going to really finish the Jam and Lewis record, but we put it aside to do Unbreakable because that was the right thing to do. So we are pretty much recorded and actually had already mixed the record. But the technology we used to mix, where you the surround technology to mix the record, and we are going to go with a different uh technology now to do it because it's been developed now that we've waited another couple of years. The songs won't be dated because the songs are all sam loose. Well yeah, I mean, they're just they don't they don't have an expiration date. They're not trendy. There's nothing trendy about any of the songs. Baby Face.

01:01:27
Speaker 6: It actually said that you guys had a couple of songs that you produced on him. We are some of those going to be included, Yes, okay, yes, sir.

01:01:33
Speaker 2: And and the thing is about it is that I think conceptually the album is simply artists that we really like doing the songs. We want to hear them do. Okay. So baby Face is a great example of I will say without spoiler well, now without a spoiler alert, I just I don't like to I'm not a brag guy or boast guy or anything like that. But I will say I will say the baby Face records the baby Face record, because it's just gonna be one that you'll hear. Uh, the baby Face record you hear will be the best baby Face record you've heard since whatever your favorite baby Face record, whatever, whatever, it was, your favorite baby Face record. And I will say that about all the artists on there. Tony Braxton, it will be the best Tony Braxton record you've heard. Your favorite one. Mary J. Blige will be your favorite Mary J. Blige record you've heard. Usher record will be the favorite Usher record you've heard. Mariah record will be the best Mariah record you heard. Janet record will be the best Janet record you heard. And we even go back to Alexander Neon cherrell S o s band newly recorded songs. They are all himeless songs. Okay, we will say got you got you? Whose whose origins have? You know? Started at some point but are finishing now you know some some of them been you know. I'll give I give you one example. I'll give you one example. So the Alexander O'Neil song. We did this song as the idea of the song was a follow up to Saturday Love. Alex sang his part Cherrelle never sang hers until Lord until six months ago. Wow.

01:03:33
Speaker 6: So eighty seven Alexander O'Neil is dueting with twenty seventeen sir.

01:03:37
Speaker 2: That's there you go, and that and there is and therein lies the beauty of what the record is because the months. Yeah so sometimes so sometimes that's that's just the way the things that things happen, and you know, and the technology allows us obviously to take you know, we have stuff all on tape and we have analog tape and all that stuff, and of course we we digitize it and make it sound a little better, so that sounds good. But then the the other piece of it is a techno technological piece, which is just as you could do with a Blu Ray movie right where you're listening to like the director's commentary, if you want to listen to it in that way, the way the record is made. We're doing that on this right the way I'll listen to it. Yeah, So we're doing that on this record. So the commentary of the artists, ourselves, the engineer, whatever, and we talk about the choices we make and so on and so forth. So if you want to listen to it like that, you can. Otherwise you can just listen to it as a regular album. I can't wave for that. Yeah, it's gonna be and we think that and we think it does a few things. We think that and we're going to do it in volumes because we actually now when people got win we were doing it, then people started coming to us and going, wait, why why aren't I have part of it? You know that kind of thing. So now we have a Now we have a stokely record. I feel like DJ Khaled. Yeah, So I mean it's it's like that kind of thing. But and you're gonna call it the Jimmy Jame. It's just gonna be. It's just gonna be. Yeah. Right now, it's just called Jam and Lewis Volume one. I think it's what No, Jam Lewis Project Volume you know, should be Lewis and Jam.

01:05:15
Speaker 4: All right, Who's I go?

01:05:18
Speaker 2: Quickly?

01:05:19
Speaker 5: More Money soundtrack? The New Style? Was that something that you guys? Well, first off, is that you saying the new Style?

01:05:26
Speaker 2: Is that you? Yes?

01:05:27
Speaker 4: Okay? And also is that you saying the blackness? I thought it was.

01:05:35
Speaker 5: Did you guys ever do any more kind of club stuff like that? Or was that like gonna be a side project or something? Was that was or was that just something I did for the movie?

01:05:42
Speaker 2: Okay? So that was We did a song with Janet that never came out called beat Crazy, and one of the lines in the songs. She said, control my mind, and we just took We just took that piece and then we just looped it and you hear it right at the beginning, but it slowed down, I think, and then the mine, just the saying mind mine, and then we just built a track around it because they needed it for a scene in the movie.

01:06:15
Speaker 4: They needed uh why.

01:06:19
Speaker 2: They just need us. They just needed and so we just whipped it up. It was like, literally, I don't know, two hours whipped us up and that was it.

01:06:26
Speaker 9: Oh wow, Yeah, next, I gotta go, we'll talk about all the hits that you know are hits straight up? Have you ever gotten tunes that like you kind of and they wind up being hits too?

01:06:38
Speaker 2: Well? Saturday Love is definitely one of them that we talked about that one earlier, trying to Redhead step Child Saturday Love.

01:06:44
Speaker 5: Man, No, I mean, I just I just never It's one of those things that's so simple you just think like, no, this can't be it.

01:06:51
Speaker 4: But that's totally.

01:06:52
Speaker 2: Funny, right right, we're suckers. Yeah, I'll take it. I love it. I get it now, I get it. I get it. I get white people. White people liked it. But no, we definitely have had some other ones like that. I'm just not I'm just not recalling them, but we've definitely had somewhere. I hadn't really thought that much of them, but somebody said, oh man, that should be the single and whatever, and we're kind of like, okay, and then it actually did well. Yeah, here's we felt pretty good about. If it is in love, there's I mean, most of the songs we feel good about. The Funny thing is when people come up to me sometimes and they'll say, oh man, I love everything you did, and I go.

01:07:32
Speaker 4: I don't even love everything I did.

01:07:35
Speaker 2: Everything is that everything's good, It's just not. I mean, that's just that's life. But I mean, you always have good intentions for stuff, but it doesn't always. It doesn't always happen. I'll tell you. The most excruciating record to make was there was a hit was Karen White Romantic?

01:07:52
Speaker 4: Because that was the number one hit, number one?

01:07:55
Speaker 2: Yeah. But my question the whole time we were making the record, why aren't Ala and Babyface making this record? It does kinda sound like a totally totally does I tried to make the record they would have made. That was the idea that was excruciating and Terry was married to her that that was tough. And then nothing and nothing against Karen, but man, that was just an excruciating record. A project it just was because it because it was a record that was an example of a project that I didn't feel we should be doing, you know. I kind of felt like, why why aren't Alien Babyface doing the project? You know, and for whatever reason, they weren't doing it. But it was funny because I felt that way about another project, and that was when we did with Mary Jay. We did Love Is All We Need and uh and everything and uh and I remember I did do everything that's right, yeah, and I and I remember when Mary came came to Minneapolis and she and we played her stuff and it was the stuff we were playing her I thought, was like really good, but it was assuming that she was working with Puffy, so we weren't playing her any sample stuff. It was just like this different kind of stuff. And she was like, yeah, that's okay, that's okay, that's okay, that's okay. And we said, well, what are you looking for? And she said, you know something that sounds like me And we're like okay, well okay, Well here listen to this, and I said, she said something that sounds like me, and I said, like what and she said, you know, like you know, like my life, like you know, like that kind of vibe. And we were like, oh, but isn't Puffy doing those kind of records on you? And she said, I'm not working with Puffy and we said, oh okay in that case, and we put out we need and then instantly that track came on and she got up and started dancing and she said, oh, yeah, this is it. This is it right here, this is it. And I was like, oh you like that? Okay? When we got this other one and she was like, oh yeah, this is it, and we were We've been good ever since.

01:10:01
Speaker 5: So y'all be beautiful for her too, though, right you know the beautiful Yeah, thank you. I'm shocked that it was on the Stella Sounds track.

01:10:08
Speaker 2: Yeah, I'm shockautiful.

01:10:10
Speaker 1: I'm shocked that you guys play pre made work and the artist are with it, because a lot of the time I get resistance from people, uh, because they want it made in real time or to feel part of this immersive process sure and not like oh okay, let's just pull something out.

01:10:32
Speaker 2: The you know the work and no, no, no, but we had done them for her with her in mind. We just didn't think that's what she wanted. We thought we just assumed. When they said you're gonna do you guys want to work with Mary J. Blige, I was like yes and no because yes because I'm her biggest fan and no because I'm her biggest fan, Like, I don't want to screw it up with her. I don't want to be the person that kills MARYA j his career because she's coming off of My Life, which is one of my favorite records. So the way we approached it was like, well, if we were making a record with her, this Rick James sample would be dope, and this stylistic sample would be dope. But we know Puffy's already going to take care of that, so we're not going to do that. But we just worked him up anyway. So they were ready, but they weren't off the shelf. We've never been off the shelf, guys, whatsoever, never, never, never, never. We tailored, always tailored everything to the artist. That was always very important to us to Dopton. Yeah, except for people, yeah no, but even that stuff is obviously Taylor because that's see, that's one of those things where Terry just knows what he's looking for because Terry was working intimately with people. I never did any vocals with people. Terry did that, and so Terry knew what he was looking for and he heard it in the track and the way he flipped the track was totally not what I was thinking for it. But it turned out real cool. You know, It's like, Okay, damn, that wasn't what I was hearing. And he actually took like my melodies and stuff and some and some stuff, but he just made it just fit. You know, at the end of the day, as long as it fits, that's the that's the big thing. But you're right, some people want to be involved. Some people just want you to hand them a record. There's there's I remember we worked with a Kisha Cole and remember she came to the studio and she said, yeah, she says, what am I play me something? And I was like, no, We're gonna make up something right now. Huh what do you mean? And I said, no, we're gonna make up something right now. Like I'm gonna play some stuff. See whether you like this key, you like this key. Yeah, yeah, but what do we But where's the track? It's like, no, We're gonna make the track right now, like you like, please please? No. It was great and we ended up doing a song. Oh my god, it's slipping my mind the name of the record, but it was. It came out real cool, and at the end of it, she said, that's the first time ever anybody's made a record like that with me, like just with me just putting input into it and actually you know doing it. Usually I just walk in and people play me a bunch of tracks and that's what I do. And I'm like, we try not to do that. We try to try to create it. We might have something on standby that we think might work just to kind of jump start something if we ain't got something going. But nah, we like that, you know, Taylor make it.

01:13:20
Speaker 8: You know, you know I was going to do it really because I didn't want to keep us here longer. Okay, fine, I did want to know today, like, are there any singer, what songwriters producers in this R and B field that you feel like, you know what?

01:13:37
Speaker 3: I feel like they they're taking the baton like.

01:13:41
Speaker 2: They hmm, that's a that's a great question. I don't. I feel like I think there's a bunch of batons, so I'm gonna keep.

01:13:51
Speaker 3: Mine right, keep yours h But other.

01:13:55
Speaker 2: People with a baton, well, I mean you know.

01:13:57
Speaker 3: That are ready to that are ready to receive, when you're ready to hand.

01:14:01
Speaker 2: I don't think I'm ever gonna hand it. I think I'm gonna go down with my with my baton. I don't you know what I think it's I know what the word would be. I think in a way it's a little bit arrogant to think that we have a baton that we would hand to somebody anyway, Like I don't even think of it.

01:14:18
Speaker 3: So then let me re raise this question. Then, are there anybody?

01:14:21
Speaker 8: Is there anybody that moves you in a way they make them move you?

01:14:24
Speaker 2: Today makes tons of people, tons and tons of people that Yeah, No, there's a lot. There's a lot of people that I really that I really really like, but all for different reasons in different ways. I mean, Bruno's top of my list. I think Bruno is uh, Bruno is interesting because Bruno we actually helped Bruno with with some of his grooves, and we are yeah for free. No, I don't mean he borrowed them from us. I mean we actually went in the studio where helped him with some stuff on the last record, on this one. Yeah. Yeah, well, in fact that that song, oh wow, well we got. What we did for him is we got him out of a rut. Okay, he tends to. I remember the first time we ever went to the studio, he played us this song and I can't remember what it was, and he said he had been working on the bass part for six months, and he played it and we were like, okay. I said, yeah, yeah, but something about that bass part. Man, I've been trying to I've been dealing with this for about six months man, and whatever, whatever, whatever, And Terry looked at me and I just said, plug in the bass. I plugged in the bass, and thirty minutes later we had the bassline. And he said, oh my god. He said, that's why I need y'all. And I said no. I said no, I said, that's easy. But I said, you're trying to recreate what we've already done. I said, so that's easy. So no. I mean, I think the attention was that we would actually do something that The thing that happened, though, honestly, was he is very meticulous, like he's somewhere between Prince and Michael. Right, so Prince is one day like, okay, if a girl answers, don't hang up. For instance, on Vanity six, that song was started and finished the same day, like right, you go on, you play the bad You know, Terry played the bass, Prince I think Prince played the no More played the drums on that, or Princes played the drums, I can't remember. I think Prince might have played the drums on that. Anyway, I put a little keyboard part on and he took my keyboard part off. Okay, fine, so they go through the you go through the whole day. You do the thing. He wrote it, he had the girls. I think the girls might have sang it on a different day. But the track's done and there's no three thinking it or whatever. You just move right on to the next thing. The Michael Jackson way of working is you do the song and at the end of the day he would say, make me a dad. Okay, next day we come back. What do you think, Michael, can we turn the hand claps up a little bit? Sure? Okay, hand claps are up. We're good. Oh yes, make me a dad, and that could go on for a week. And it's like Michael in the same place we've been. We just turn the handclaps up. Are we good to go? Because we have other songs that we want to do right. Bruno is somewhere between there. Right, he's very spontaneous, but then he thinks it through to death. Now at the end of the day, the end result is great, and the end result comes off very spontaneous. But all of Bruno's stuff is a series of loops. But it's just done very well, very subtly, and very well. Twenty four Carrot, he played it for us. He said, I don't know. He said, it's this. He said, he knew it. He said, this is my single, twenty four kid. I got the video concept, I got the every this is my single. We said, okay, he said, but I ain't. He said, the problem is that doesn't make me want to dance. He said, okay, what song makes you want to dance? And he said, well, I really like I can't remember even what the songs he said, and I said, I said, okay, cool, I said, plug me in right, So what we I just took the track and made it into a sound alike of a song he liked to dance to. And then we played it and he said, oh, hell yeah, and he loved it right, and he said, okay, I get it. Then he tried to put like the chords and stuff that he had before back in it. And I said, well, now you're just going back to what you already had, and he said, y yeah, you're right, You're right, You're right. Okay, cool, right. Three four months later, twenty four, Carrot is done. He doesn't use what we did, but he went He took not so much what we did, but he took up the kind of the inspiration or the idea of it, but figured out how to then incorporate what he wanted in the song, which were the little stabs and the little you know, those kinds of little things like that. And you know, so we didn't. So what we did is I think we got him unstuck from the rut and got him to look at it in a different way. But we didn't technically, we didn't produce anything. So I think we were just more I think, as it turned out, kind of a sounding board or whatever. And we did that for a few things for him, and that's fine. I enjoyed the process. He's amazing. I think he's probably my overall, my favorite dude. And he's you know, he's obviously an artist, but I think he's one of the artists that in any era would be he'd be good, he'd be a great artist in any Uh. Do we have everything out of our asistance? I mean, I still wanted to ask about that. I'm sorry, Steve, I forgot about you. Oh yes, shocker.

01:19:30
Speaker 10: You didn't forget about me. The two times I spoke tonight, you said, shut up all that's not forgetting about some ready. No, I have one question. Me and Bill Sherman over here. We recently started a singing group called the Sounds of Jewess, and we could use.

01:19:46
Speaker 2: A track or two, Just a track or two. Just whip it up, Jesus Christ.

01:19:55
Speaker 6: Okay, So is it true there's a rumor going around that Control Album and Rhythm Nation and them wanted Janet to do an album with outside, with producers other than you guys.

01:20:06
Speaker 2: Is that true?

01:20:08
Speaker 4: Uh?

01:20:09
Speaker 2: Well, there's some truth in it. She did. She did. She did go in the studio and and and make some records with some other folks that I know.

01:20:17
Speaker 4: She did something with.

01:20:20
Speaker 2: I was just guessing that yeah, yeah, but yeah, there was a little, uh, I don't know what I call it. There was a few bumps in the road between Control and Rhythm Nation for sure, and uh. But Clarence Avon solved that problem. Mentioned his name earlier about five hours ago in the in the broadcast yesterday. But but no, we had we we you know, it was one of those interesting things where you know, Janet heard we were saying something about her and whatever, and we heard she was saying something about us and whatever. And she finally called me and she said, Jimmy, do you want to do the record? And I say, yeah, you want us to do the record? She said yeah, And I said, okay, fine, and I called Clarence and I just said Clarence, I said, we want to do the record, so let's can we get this done? And Clarence called up Jerry Moss and said, Jerry, give them a million dollars and let's go. And that was it. We were and we were literally in the studio making Miss You Much, which was the first song we recorded on the on the Rhythm Nation album, like in the next week.

01:21:24
Speaker 6: So the stories of songs like You Need Me was that a leftover from the Rhythm Nation sessions or the period in between.

01:21:32
Speaker 2: Uh you need Me? Okay, now refresh my memory. You need Me ended up being a B side miss to miss you much. You Need Me was during the Wow, that's a great question. When did we record that?

01:21:47
Speaker 1: Well, sounds like it's from the era, so yeah, no, no, it definitely it's I don't know, I don't know. It's probably between Control it definitely. No, it definitely wasn't one of the Control songs, did I think so?

01:21:59
Speaker 2: I think it was. It was probably part of the Rhythm Nation.

01:22:02
Speaker 6: So I was asking if it was like a before Rhythm Nation actually officially started or.

01:22:09
Speaker 2: That's a really good question. I'm gonna have to I'm gonna have to find that out myself. I truly don't remember then.

01:22:14
Speaker 6: Like the other BC has, like Skin Game, where those after the album was already.

01:22:18
Speaker 2: Done, yes, and after the album was done, and these.

01:22:22
Speaker 5: Love Groove and Play, well that was the decade.

01:22:27
Speaker 6: Yeah, those were all done after the album was albums were completed.

01:22:31
Speaker 2: Yees, seventies Love Groove, I remember, I remember we did that. That was a day. We did that in a day, and we just did a groove. We just did a groove and I said, just talk and she said okay.

01:22:41
Speaker 1: And how does that work? Especially with the interludes and especially with the morphing. I mean we always joke about the orgasms every album, yeah, right.

01:22:53
Speaker 2: Except no but well yeah, yeah, but how like how hard or to go from.

01:23:05
Speaker 1: The shinness of funny how time Flies, which I'm sure was hard to do. Was the room completely empty? Like how did you get.

01:23:15
Speaker 2: That out of her? Yeah? The room was completely empty, like all those the vocals on all the I mean I did all the vocals on those records, and the room was always dark, and we always just we just, I don't know, trusted each other. I guess I would put it like that. But Janna would say just the way she was. She would say things and they would come out wrong. You know, how you say something and it comes out in a sexual way, or you can be you know, it can be misconstrued as that. Jana would always do that, And even on the end of oh the end, well, yeah, funny how time Flies? At the end of it, she's talking in French, right, and then she says one more time, an American, I don't know that you are an English You hear yep. So one more time was her asking did I want another take?

01:24:06
Speaker 4: But it sounded like le.

01:24:08
Speaker 2: So I just left it gay as another day. Yeah it is. So there's a there's a lot of that kind of thing that that goes on. But she, you know, she's an actress. She can put herself in the mood for sure, and if the track is right, it's always but it's about the vibe. My favorite one of those was, because I remember I totally shocked people, was would you mind? Yes? Would you mind? That's yeah, yeah, would you mind? Would you mind? Was? Would you mind? And I'll tell you the other great thing about would you mind was that Rock Wilder did that track? And I remember when we did, I gave like all the producers. We worked with a whole bunch of different producers on that record, but Rock Wilder was the only one that actually ended up making that was.

01:25:00
Speaker 4: A twenty year old.

01:25:03
Speaker 2: Joe. Okay, no, no, no, no, you no, it wasn't all for you. It was all for you. It was it was all for that moment. Yeah, yes, yes, yes, okay, yeah, yeah, all for you. And we did. We did what we did is we did like account of a camp we called a flight Time summer camp. We had a bunch of different producers come up. We put them in different rooms, which kind of happens nowadays. It's funny everybody does writing camp things. So we did that. So we we put everybody in the rooms. We said, let's see what you come up with. And I remember we liked what rock Wilder had done with uh Missy and a couple other folks, and we were like, okay, we'll put you in a room. So then you say to him, Okay, here's what we want. We love what you do. Don't do that. We wanted you to come up with something different, specifically for Janet. And it's a what a weird thing to ask somebody, right, And so I remember and I said, okay, what do you need man? And he says, I just need an MPC and a XP sixty and I can't remember the other keyboard he had, but that was it. I think it was XP sixty. So I just needed XP sixty with the with the Asian card and the the something card the jung I didn't remember what he called it. There was two different kind of sound cards you could get and he says, I just need these, right, And so I'm like, okay, cool. So these other producer I'm not even gonna mention names. These other producers are like bringing in orchestras, doing all kinds of crazy stuff in one studio, bringing in black at Rodney. No it ain't Rodney, black lights and fog machines and all kinds of craziness. No, no, not Rodney. And then another producer, or actually set of producers were very prolific and came up with probably twenty different ideas, but none of them were quite and they never really caught right Rock Wilder, I walked next door and I hear do do Do Do Do Doom Do Doom Do Do Doom Boo boo boo do do Do Do Do do doo, And I go, what the fuck? I said, dude, what is this? He said, oh, this this is concept uh whatever? And I said okay. And I just called Janet right away and I said okay. I said, Rock's the dude. Listen to this right And he had the kind of the thing and we put you know, we put a couple of little things on it to make it a little more her. But and then I gave her I said, I hear this melody, and I said, but I don't. You can write it whatever it is. I said, but when you get to the course, it should just be whatever you want to do to somebody, right, So if you say I just want to and I give her the melody the rhythm of it. She came back the next day and I was like, oh, and we were at record plan I think in La, recording this and she he just nailed this thing. And I can't remember who. It might have been, Robin think Er, somebody was in the studio next door or something and came in and was like, what are y'all working on? And it's like, oh, we got this new Janet song, let me check it out, and never listened. It was him, and I can't remember who all else was with him. It might have been Jordan Knight. We might have been working with Jordan Knight. Give it to you, yes, yeah, joint Yeah. So anyway, they were oh my god, yeah, yeah, I'm sorry, good yeah. But that said, it was just it was just of all those songs that was that one is really my probably my favorite one of those types of records. That one was just so good. But man, hats off the rock for that one. Man, because he really brought some. He did exactly what we said, we like you do something that's not you, that's her that you know whatever, and he totally total brought Yeah. Thank you very much. Jimmy jam Man.

01:29:01
Speaker 4: Giveth but yeah, thank you.

01:29:08
Speaker 1: On behalf of Boss Bill, Sugar Steve, Unpaid, Bill.

01:29:13
Speaker 2: By and Fontiicula. This is a special.

01:29:20
Speaker 1: Meredith Baxter Bernie editions of Course Love Supreme.

01:29:24
Speaker 2: We'll see you on the next go round. Thank you.

01:29:33
Speaker 1: Quest Love Supreme is a production of iHeartRadio. This classic episode was produced by the team at Pandora. For more podcasts from iHeart Radio, visit the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.