Speaker 1: Quest Love Supreme is a production of iHeartRadio.
Speaker 2: Yo, Yo, what's up y'all is Questlove And as you
Speaker 2: heard me last time. You know, we've been talking about
Speaker 2: giving people their flowers, and I gotta keep that going
Speaker 2: because honestly, one episode is not enough. We're doing it
Speaker 2: this time in the month of May because it may flowers,
Speaker 2: all right. So see, given flowers isn't just about respect.
Speaker 2: It's about public record. It's about making sure the people
Speaker 2: who build the calls, carried the weight, who broke the ground, who.
Speaker 1: Inspired us, don't get lost.
Speaker 2: In the noise because we live in a moment where
Speaker 2: things fast and legends can fade if we're not intentional
Speaker 2: about keeping their names alive. So yeah, this part is
Speaker 2: all about them, and I want to challenge myself and
Speaker 2: you to think about the folks who may not get
Speaker 2: magazine covers, but who change the way we hear, think
Speaker 2: and move. Here a few more moments from QLs where
Speaker 2: we honored some great ones. Twenty twenty four, I had
Speaker 2: to sit down with another hero. Team Supreme sat down
Speaker 2: with Narda Michael Walton, who was a crucial member of
Speaker 2: the Mana Vishu Orchestra before becoming a hip producer for
Speaker 2: Whitney Houston, Franklin, Mariah Carey, Starship and so many others.
Speaker 1: At the beginning of.
Speaker 2: Part one, I got to ask him one of those
Speaker 2: always wanted to know questions about about his are you know,
Speaker 2: especially as a guy who was tasked with getting the
Speaker 2: best out of our superstars.
Speaker 1: I'm bringing everything I ever learned from you, man, so
Speaker 1: now you know what it is.
Speaker 2: I'm also realizing I've met you briefly before, and I
Speaker 2: will say that there are very few human beings that
Speaker 2: have an instantaneous disarming chip that I wish I had.
Speaker 1: You have a level of.
Speaker 2: Calm that I now know that. Of course, your resume
Speaker 2: is that impressive because I believe that you have a
Speaker 2: sort of calming element, because you produced some people that
Speaker 2: I would believe would be some of the hardest people
Speaker 2: personality wise to even step with. I've said no to
Speaker 2: a few of these people, were just like drumming with
Speaker 2: them or any of those things, because I couldn't bear
Speaker 2: to think of the thought of, you know, of dealing
Speaker 2: with that. But can I ask you, like, what when
Speaker 2: did you develop this personality of just calmness? Like you
Speaker 2: have a very disarming like, have you ever gotten angry
Speaker 2: in your life?
Speaker 1: Oh?
Speaker 3: Yeah, sure, sure I do, of course I do. It's
Speaker 3: just that I learned, like what you're speaking about in
Speaker 3: production and working with other people that I wanted to
Speaker 3: get their best and I realized that the love aspect
Speaker 3: was really powerful. It is really powerful. And then you
Speaker 3: mentioned meditation, So through meditation and the love aspect that
Speaker 3: became the most important part, and that the person I'm
Speaker 3: working with could feel that love to do their best,
Speaker 3: and then that would just make everything just go forward.
Speaker 3: So I kind of just pray, swim, you know, get
Speaker 3: myself together physically, and then getting that spirit that the
Speaker 3: person you really feel like, oh you're not here to
Speaker 3: fight with me, You're gonna be that great music. Then
Speaker 3: they start singing whatever they're gonna do, and the endorphins
Speaker 3: kick in and they were gone. But that spirit of
Speaker 3: love is really really important. That's what I want to
Speaker 3: say to you about that.
Speaker 4: Do you have a pre studio ritual that you do
Speaker 4: or something like the kind of get ready to get
Speaker 4: into this.
Speaker 3: You know, you can see behind me, I have a candle,
Speaker 3: two camels here and a candle up there. You know,
Speaker 3: I burn a little in sense every now and again,
Speaker 3: I usually bring a gift to the person I'm working with,
Speaker 3: just kind of make them feel the love on a
Speaker 3: physical level. A teddy bear flower, something sweet. And I
Speaker 3: want to say one more thing about what you're asking about,
Speaker 3: because it's really important for me. That Probably the most
Speaker 3: incredible moment along this line was after I made the
Speaker 3: songs of two songs, Who's Theming Who Until You Say
Speaker 3: you Love Me? And here and flew back to Detroit,
Speaker 3: Michigan to meet Aretha. It looking in her eyes is scary.
Speaker 3: That would that would scare you? That would that scared me?
Speaker 3: But there again, you know, I let her know in
Speaker 3: my spirit, my eyes, my love, I'm not here to fight,
Speaker 3: I'm not here to make a problem. I want I
Speaker 3: want to serve you, I love you, and help us
Speaker 3: make the best music. And then once the music comes
Speaker 3: on and then she starts opening up and singing, then again,
Speaker 3: like I said, it just gets happy. And then then
Speaker 3: it's like, well, what do you want to eat? You
Speaker 3: want cheeseburger? You want you know, fried chicken?
Speaker 1: What you want?
Speaker 5: And all that sounds happening.
Speaker 2: See, I wish I'd known you previously. Steve can attest
Speaker 2: to this. You know, of course I'm still here at
Speaker 2: the tonight show and lovely and I've only had one
Speaker 2: client sort of put us through the ringer to the
Speaker 2: point where I just walked away. And you know, unfortunately,
Speaker 2: I've had the pleasure of playing practically with every person
Speaker 2: I've ever idolized. But when it came to a refa
Speaker 2: and the alpha level of testing that we were put.
Speaker 1: Through, I failed that test. Oh you know, it was like.
Speaker 2: My ego was there because in my mind, I'm like, well,
Speaker 2: I'm holding up the tradition, like we are holding up
Speaker 2: the tradition of Cornell Duprix and Bernard Purty like her seventies,
Speaker 2: her seventies crack band, And you know, she wanted to
Speaker 2: have a long talk, and she wanted us to audition
Speaker 2: and all this stuff, and.
Speaker 1: You know, I just now regret that move. But I
Speaker 1: was just like, well, no, I'm fine.
Speaker 2: If you want to sing behind your karaoke track, then
Speaker 2: go ahead and do so.
Speaker 1: And she did so.
Speaker 2: And it could have been magic, but you know it
Speaker 2: was definitely I didn't know about what you just said,
Speaker 2: Like we're dealing with people and how to disarm them
Speaker 2: and all that stuff, and so.
Speaker 1: All right, y'all.
Speaker 2: In twenty twenty two, I sat down with Steve roon
Speaker 2: and a special.
Speaker 1: One on one.
Speaker 2: I'm molded so much of my drumming after Steve, but
Speaker 2: aspects of his journey and style were unknown to me,
Speaker 2: and this conversation went on over three hours and became
Speaker 2: a two parter filled with so much joy. Here's where
Speaker 2: Steve talks about going from playing with Bloodstone.
Speaker 6: To the Average White Band, which is how.
Speaker 1: I learned about it.
Speaker 2: I've heard many accounts of how Robbie passed away and
Speaker 2: how you got into the group. Yeah, but I've never
Speaker 2: heard an official version from official band member. How did
Speaker 2: Robbie pass away? And how did you get the gig
Speaker 2: for the Average White Band?
Speaker 7: Well?
Speaker 8: You know where were you know, we're friends. I was
Speaker 8: supposed to go to that party. I was supposed to
Speaker 8: meet um with that party. But I was, I was,
Speaker 8: I was. I was doing the film, doing the film.
Speaker 5: With the You're in that movie?
Speaker 9: No, I played, Well, I might be in them, but
Speaker 9: I did the move music for it.
Speaker 1: So did it ever come out?
Speaker 9: Yes, yes, I I think I have it. I think
Speaker 9: I got that found it.
Speaker 1: Oh my god, Okay, yeah, they're trained.
Speaker 2: Yes, when they when they were promoting that album on
Speaker 2: Soul Train. Uh, Don Cornelli showed like a minute of
Speaker 2: the clip where they're riding in the train and they're
Speaker 2: in the bunkers.
Speaker 1: And yeah, doing show tunes and whatnot.
Speaker 9: And so it is funny.
Speaker 8: I mean I had to go there and be on
Speaker 8: set with them and then and then we go we
Speaker 8: do re called music.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so you're all over that record.
Speaker 2: Yeah, wow, that's not you on Natural High.
Speaker 9: Money money is better. No, okay, it's not me a master,
Speaker 9: but but money is money. Badass. Something actually said it
Speaker 9: to me. That's why I started looking for it. I
Speaker 9: forgot all about it.
Speaker 1: Wow, we did that.
Speaker 9: All the best things in life, fore right, I get it.
Speaker 8: So so I was doing I was doing that, and
Speaker 8: and they were playing that.
Speaker 9: They were doing a run at the Troubador, and Robbie
Speaker 9: called me.
Speaker 8: Up and he said, come on, man, come and go
Speaker 8: and be a party on It was Sunday night or something.
Speaker 9: So I got to work. If I can, I'll be there.
Speaker 9: And and and as fate would have it, I didn't.
Speaker 8: I didn't go. Okay, and and and the next morning
Speaker 8: I woke up and my my my drum tech then
Speaker 8: guy that was working for me, guy named Terry Merchant.
Speaker 1: Mm hmm.
Speaker 9: He said, Steve Robbie.
Speaker 8: Stead Yeah, And I say, what did you Because Robbie,
Speaker 8: Robbie and I used to go out drinking together. Robbie
Speaker 8: was the hell of a drinker. And he said, no, no, no,
Speaker 8: he's dead, you know, he an overdose. Robbie wasn't so
Speaker 8: much of a drug taker. I could say, there wasn't
Speaker 8: so much of a drug. He's more of a drinker, right,
Speaker 8: But Robbie, this is this was the thing was Robbie.
Speaker 9: Robbie could drink.
Speaker 8: I'd seen Robbie drink Butler vodka and then he just
Speaker 8: switched to Scotch, right.
Speaker 9: And I get sick. But I never saw Robbie throw up.
Speaker 9: Never saw him he would pass out right.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 8: And from from my understanding, because I wasn't there for
Speaker 8: a lot of what when when, the whole just there
Speaker 8: for the aftermath, was that he was at this party
Speaker 8: and everybody did this guy was saying some he's some cocaine, right,
Speaker 8: And so Robbie wouldn't do anything small.
Speaker 9: He was not that sort of a person either.
Speaker 1: He went bigger.
Speaker 8: Yeah, when he went and he went, he went bigger
Speaker 8: and and everybody, everybody else that did it got sick,
Speaker 8: and Robbie went home, went to sleep, and it stayed
Speaker 8: in his system. It was it was heroin and it
Speaker 8: was cut with strychnine, and it killed him. Jesus Christy's simple,
Speaker 8: you know, you know, I mean we talk a lot about,
Speaker 8: you know, accidental drug overdoses, you know, sometimes the house
Speaker 8: I'm saying at the moment, there was three guys that
Speaker 8: died of a fentanyl overdoses and and one of those,
Speaker 8: one of those guys was his was his nephew.
Speaker 9: Right, and uh, and accidental.
Speaker 8: I don't think anybody goes does any of that stuff
Speaker 8: to die, you know.
Speaker 9: I mean, if they want.
Speaker 8: To do that, they say, I'm I write a suicide note,
Speaker 8: right exactly, you did this to me, and then they're
Speaker 8: just do an enormous lot and they're dying. And I
Speaker 8: think they were recreation. I don't think that this guy
Speaker 8: even had a problem. And I think there was just
Speaker 8: three buddies that decided to go and around, let's let's
Speaker 8: try that stuff and see what it does.
Speaker 1: And unfortunately, yeah, it's a killer.
Speaker 9: It wasn't like that in the sixties. I can tell
Speaker 9: you that right now.
Speaker 8: But I don't think anything any of the drugs nowadays
Speaker 8: like they were in the sixties and seventies, and it's
Speaker 8: a it's a different animal. So, you know, Robbie, it
Speaker 8: was a tragic, a tragic accident.
Speaker 1: It did.
Speaker 8: It was a lot of pains, probably still being felt today.
Speaker 8: You know, I hadn't spoken to his widow in over
Speaker 8: twenty years. And she called me last.
Speaker 1: Week really England.
Speaker 8: Yeah, wow, he did, and and and she she was
Speaker 8: telling me that she she just just now has come
Speaker 8: to terms with the fact to be able to just say,
Speaker 8: you know, this is what it was, and not much
Speaker 8: point running around feeling resentment. And years of running around
Speaker 8: feeling resentment.
Speaker 1: It just make yourself that broke her heart for all
Speaker 1: those years, forty five years. It just wow, she read married.
Speaker 9: But yeah, still painful.
Speaker 8: Yeah, you know, Robbie was a great guy and a
Speaker 8: great drumma and a great guy.
Speaker 2: How how long does time go by before you're getting
Speaker 2: the phone call to join the average white band? And
Speaker 2: before they call you, are they trying to at least
Speaker 2: maintain the status of the name of the group and
Speaker 2: find a white guy that's funky.
Speaker 9: No, Well, I tell you.
Speaker 8: What happened was was this was that was that when
Speaker 8: when I found out about Robbie being being dead, I
Speaker 8: went and I called, I got hold of Hamish and
Speaker 8: I went over to the hotel and sat over the
Speaker 8: hotel with everybody.
Speaker 9: And we were all.
Speaker 8: Drinking because that's what we did with the Scots, and
Speaker 8: and and I said to them, listen, you know, Robbie
Speaker 8: wouldn't want you guys to stop now. You know, you
Speaker 8: just gotten to get this airplay with picked up the
Speaker 8: pieces that's happening for you. I don't know how this
Speaker 8: is all going to know, but you guys, you know
Speaker 8: you shouldn't shouldn't stop.
Speaker 5: Fare was talk of maybe we should stop the group.
Speaker 8: Well it was it was everybody was sitting around sort
Speaker 8: of like it was all over. You know, It's like
Speaker 8: it's not over, it's you know. And so I said,
Speaker 8: if there's anything I can do, let me know, and
Speaker 8: and and and I was under contract to Bloodstone, right,
Speaker 8: so what what I would do is Stick super and myself.
Speaker 8: What would happen if I couldn't do it, if I
Speaker 8: was working with a Budstone, Sticks would go and play
Speaker 8: with them.
Speaker 9: Yeah, And then.
Speaker 5: Sticks briefly joined the average white band.
Speaker 9: They played no average white man.
Speaker 8: So he go and play the gig and then and
Speaker 8: then if he could, if he couldn't do it, I
Speaker 8: do it. And then and and you know, I go
Speaker 8: and play with them. They were auditioning people s I R.
Speaker 8: There's drummers all black, white, I mean, didn't matter. They
Speaker 8: were just looking for a drummer, okay, with sticks and
Speaker 8: sticks and I would go. We'd go to the auditions
Speaker 8: and we'd sit there in the s I R. And
Speaker 8: they drummer would come in. They start playing with them,
Speaker 8: and they say, okay, no, they ain't working, and they
Speaker 8: would get more and more depressed, you know, And so
Speaker 8: either sticks or myself would go up and we jam
Speaker 8: with them and they come back to life again.
Speaker 9: And then they wheel in another drummer. And then we'd
Speaker 9: sit there and we'd watch them, and they would go there.
Speaker 1: Any any drummer of note that tried to audition for
Speaker 1: the band that didn't.
Speaker 8: Make nobody, nobody that I knew, But that was a
Speaker 8: lot of kids wanted to play. They would, you know,
Speaker 8: it was it was a big audition to go to
Speaker 8: and so and so I had to play this gig
Speaker 8: with them down at Long Beach at Long Beach Arena,
Speaker 8: at the old Long Beach Arena, and we down there,
Speaker 8: we sit down and come out, we start to play.
Speaker 8: I remember this gig there was. They were also like
Speaker 8: kind of state static audience. They weren't really doing too much.
Speaker 8: And then there was this one I saw this one
Speaker 8: guy sort of started to rock, you know, so I
Speaker 8: sort of hold him, owned in on him, and it
Speaker 8: kind of spread out from him, and by the end
Speaker 8: of the show, everybody was like dancing and going crazy,
Speaker 8: and it was it was a great show. And I
Speaker 8: came off the stage and this little fella came walking
Speaker 8: up to me dapper, you know, it's really well dressed.
Speaker 9: And I said, you know, a little bed. He walked
Speaker 9: up to me and he said, You've got to be
Speaker 9: in the band.
Speaker 8: And I said, I'd love to be in the band,
Speaker 8: but I'm under contract to another band.
Speaker 9: I can't I can't do.
Speaker 10: It, you know.
Speaker 8: And he said, you're out of that band, and you're
Speaker 8: in the band, and then he walked and he walked off.
Speaker 8: And Bruce McCaskill was the manager at the time of
Speaker 8: the banner. I said, Bruce, who the hell is that?
Speaker 8: And he said, oh, That's how I'd heard. I was
Speaker 8: out of that contract and I was in average white man,
Speaker 8: just like that.
Speaker 6: All right.
Speaker 2: Oh, in twenty eighteen, Dame Funk help us get Leon
Speaker 2: Silver's on the show. And this was epic for me
Speaker 2: because there was so much I did not know. And
Speaker 2: you here's some of that here coming out of my intro.
Speaker 2: The reason why I feel as that we commit to
Speaker 2: this show. Yes, you know, we're about the whatever, the
Speaker 2: teaching of excellence and bringing people and exposing him to
Speaker 2: the audience, you know, to audience that might not know him,
Speaker 2: stuff like that, but just sometimes you just want to
Speaker 2: nerd out on your favorite and I there's so much.
Speaker 2: There's not enough that I can say about the gentleman
Speaker 2: that we have with us right now. I can say that,
Speaker 2: you know, he is. I mean, he's such a genius
Speaker 2: in every area that he's ever done in crafting harmonies
Speaker 2: and musicianship and his songwriting. I mean, he damn near
Speaker 2: it invented a genre of music.
Speaker 1: He killed disco, He literally killed disco of all the like.
Speaker 2: He invented genres and he inspired some of our greatest
Speaker 2: I told Jimmy jam that he was coming on our
Speaker 2: show and even Jimmy jam had to bow down because
Speaker 2: of all that he learned from this man. I'm about
Speaker 2: to start crying right now. Ladies and gentlemen, please welcome
Speaker 2: to the show.
Speaker 1: Leon Silver's the third yes.
Speaker 7: To be here.
Speaker 6: Man.
Speaker 1: You don't know how happy we are right now, Like.
Speaker 6: We're just shout out to dang funk shout the day.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: We have so many questions about your life, Like I've
Speaker 2: never idolized someone so much that I really don't know
Speaker 2: that much about because you rarely did interviews and things
Speaker 2: like that that matter.
Speaker 1: But let's just should we rapid fire? Do we?
Speaker 6: Just we?
Speaker 2: I want to go, Let's go through the journey. Okay,
Speaker 2: now I'm gonna say it. Let's start at the beginning.
Speaker 2: You all gotta be proud of me. I haven't said
Speaker 2: that in a while, but SA this time.
Speaker 1: Okay. So uh, I believe your entire families from Tennessee. Correct? Uh,
Speaker 1: please be wrong?
Speaker 7: Sucking everybody except me faster Agian Pat?
Speaker 1: Where were you born?
Speaker 7: I was born in South ben Indiana.
Speaker 1: Oh yes.
Speaker 7: My father was going to college out there and my
Speaker 7: mother and I was born on the campus and only
Speaker 7: stayed there three days after I was born. So I
Speaker 7: know nothing about South Ben, Indiana.
Speaker 1: I was born there for three days. I was there
Speaker 1: for three years. Wait, you born to South Ben Yeah,
Speaker 1: Memorial Hospital. Wow, that's amazing, That's that's crazy. Yeah. So just.
Speaker 2: I just want to know it all, like to talk
Speaker 2: about the beginnings in Tennessee and how music entered into
Speaker 2: that household.
Speaker 7: Well about Tennessee, I can't remember too much except Roy Rogers,
Speaker 7: so I was too. After about two years, we hit
Speaker 7: the train and came to LA. I think I was
Speaker 7: two or three years old, and La is where everything
Speaker 7: started the motown sound for me.
Speaker 1: Why did you guys move to Los Angeles?
Speaker 7: I think my father got a gig at what is it, uh,
Speaker 7: some kind of space company something. He was doing some
Speaker 7: kind of work I couldn't remember, but he his work
Speaker 7: brought us out there. And everybody wasn't born yet. It
Speaker 7: was just myself, Charmaine.
Speaker 1: Charmaine, Charmaine is the eldest sister, and you're the eldest brother.
Speaker 7: No, Olympia is the oldest of the family. Olympia and
Speaker 7: then myself, Charmaine and James Jonathan that was who was
Speaker 7: only four of us when we went to LA and
Speaker 7: it started with me was the Motown sound. I was
Speaker 7: into James Jamison on bass period and Benny Benjamin the drums. Uh,
Speaker 7: and that was my start in music. I was taking hangers,
Speaker 7: acting like high hats. I took the drunk, the little broom,
Speaker 7: the sweeping part, used that as a rim and snare,
Speaker 7: and the box spring I used, there's a kick drum.
Speaker 7: That's how I started music right there.
Speaker 2: You know, that's where most people would take the broom
Speaker 2: and make that to a guitar. You thought to make that?
Speaker 7: Yeah?
Speaker 2: Was were there any adults that were musicians that were
Speaker 2: influential in your life at that point?
Speaker 7: Or no, I'm just Jamison and Benny Benjamin. I didn't
Speaker 7: know nobody yet. That was only about six or seven
Speaker 7: there at seven.
Speaker 1: What was it about that music that called you the bass?
Speaker 7: I got a guitar when I was like, we did
Speaker 7: we just did four part harmony because I was teaching
Speaker 7: everybody this Lower Scudder's commercial back in the day, and
Speaker 7: my brother was three years old but he held four
Speaker 7: part harmony. So we was doing this Lower Scudder's commercial
Speaker 7: and my father heard us and started teaching us some
Speaker 7: four freshman type harmony back in the day. That high
Speaker 7: lows and all that, and so we did it real easy,
Speaker 7: and he got a manager and they put us on
Speaker 7: we would called the Little Angel, right, and they put
Speaker 7: us on Spike Jones arc Link letters show all these
Speaker 7: names from back in the day. And that's where my brother,
Speaker 7: he was three when we did our first TV show,
Speaker 7: and he held he gave everybody our parts when we
Speaker 7: forgot him, so he As far as harmony is concerned,
Speaker 7: how did you.
Speaker 2: Guys even know how to notate harmony? Because well, one
Speaker 2: thing I think our audience should know is I feel
Speaker 2: like the one distinction that separated you guys from any
Speaker 2: of your contemporaries Jackson stair Steps, whoever was young at
Speaker 2: that time, was you guys had the most unusual harmony
Speaker 2: structures ever.
Speaker 1: Was that from not knowing?
Speaker 2: Like who taught you those dissonant and chromatic harmonies that
Speaker 2: weren't average?
Speaker 7: And I think, uh, well, my father was into the
Speaker 7: four freshmen and the high lows and all that. So
Speaker 7: he he saw us doing three part harmony and one
Speaker 7: lead on this Lorscuddis commercial and I gave him their parts,
Speaker 7: but it was you know, simple stuff like you know,
Speaker 7: and he saw we can hold a no, not get off.
Speaker 7: So he started giving us harder songs, songs like It's
Speaker 7: a Blue World, and uh, well I forgot the name
Speaker 7: of those songs, but uh it was four and five
Speaker 7: part harmony, and we stayed on it and didn't get off.
Speaker 7: I don't know why. My mother could have been an
Speaker 7: opera singer. She was studying for a minute, So I
Speaker 7: guess that's why we Uh we just felt we can
Speaker 7: do it, and we just did it. You know. It
Speaker 7: wasn't no or whatever. We just did it and stayed
Speaker 7: on the notes. And I actually was the worst holding
Speaker 7: the note. Really yeah, James was the best, and then
Speaker 7: it was Charmaine, then Olympia than me. I was last.
Speaker 7: I always forget my note, you know. But James had
Speaker 7: the ear for holding the notes, and he was the youngest.
Speaker 1: What year was this this was?
Speaker 7: I was like I was like seven six.
Speaker 1: But I mean, like in what year was it? Like,
Speaker 1: probably was.
Speaker 7: This sixty fifty nine or something like. I was born
Speaker 7: in fifty three, so okay, around fifty nine or something
Speaker 7: like that or sixty.
Speaker 2: So there wasn't even a template out at the time
Speaker 2: to or besides maybe Frankie Lymon and the teenagers, which
Speaker 2: is more like fifty seven to fifty, But there were
Speaker 2: no kids groups or that sort of thing to no.
Speaker 7: Just Frankie Lyman, what's your name? Sounded kind of like
Speaker 7: a kid little anthe any back then I listened to
Speaker 7: him for a minute.
Speaker 2: Yeah, So were you guys instantly in pursuit of the
Speaker 2: next level? Was just to find a record deal? Or
Speaker 2: was it just like we did this television show and
Speaker 2: that's it.
Speaker 7: Well, back then we didn't have no leads. It was
Speaker 7: off harmony, so we would just stand there and sing,
Speaker 7: no personality, no charisma or nothing, just singing holding the notes.
Speaker 7: And we were so young that I guess the crowd
Speaker 7: thought it was amazing that we were singing that kind
Speaker 7: of stuff, But we was just ready to get off
Speaker 7: the stage and go play kind of thing. But I
Speaker 7: loved music. I was the one teaching him and actually
Speaker 7: sometime making him saying. But I got into the motown thing,
Speaker 7: and then from there we didn't get into seriously making
Speaker 7: moves to record companies till I was around I guess
Speaker 7: thirteen or fourteen or fifteen, something like that, because that's
Speaker 7: when when the Jacksons came out. That's when I got
Speaker 7: serious and I started teaching that. When my brother, because
Speaker 7: he had the most powerful voice, and I was he
Speaker 7: said I can't say. I said, well, just nothing gain.
Speaker 7: You won't do nothing unless you practice it. He had
Speaker 7: the tone. So I work with him every day and
Speaker 7: practice till after a year or so he was riffing
Speaker 7: and all that.
Speaker 2: You know, so all your brothers and sisters are literally
Speaker 2: coming out the wound one by one during this period.
Speaker 2: You're just waiting for them to get of age. And
Speaker 2: like everybody, there.
Speaker 7: Was nobody that came in my family that couldn't hold
Speaker 7: a harmony. They could do that before they could do
Speaker 7: a lead. We had to practice our leads. So as
Speaker 7: far as when they give them apart, they'd hold it
Speaker 7: and we sing to somebody else's part, they would keep
Speaker 7: and never blend into the other person's part or anything
Speaker 7: like that. We all had that, I guess, But the
Speaker 7: leads we had to work on, and Edmund worked him
Speaker 7: and Foster. But Edmund worked the hardest. Uh, and his
Speaker 7: tone reaped the benefits because I worked at it at home.
Speaker 7: And then when we got with Freddie Perrin, Uh, he
Speaker 7: heard Edman's voice right off the bat.
Speaker 1: So but that was the one in the Capitol years.
Speaker 7: Jumping too fast, go ahead.
Speaker 1: So what label was Pride associated with MGM?
Speaker 7: Yeah, a friend of Mike Curb, which was Mike Wiener Curb.
Speaker 7: Mike Curb was running MGM when we were signed and
Speaker 7: he was only twenty four years old.
Speaker 1: Wait, so the Mike Curb congregation. That's one of my
Speaker 1: favorite breakdews exactly, the coming down.
Speaker 11: Yeah, oh my god.
Speaker 7: Yeah, he was cool.
Speaker 11: He uh.
Speaker 7: He was the one that really hit me with the
Speaker 7: commercial thing because I was doing I was really kind
Speaker 7: of into back then that social conscious type writing, the
Speaker 7: you know, because the Black Panthers was out and all
Speaker 7: that stuff, so socially conscious music was kind of in,
Speaker 7: and I was into that from a third grip from
Speaker 7: this this history teacher, Mr Simon. But he was the
Speaker 7: one that told me, well, Leon, your music has to
Speaker 7: be more commercial, you know. And I was on that tip, like, well,
Speaker 7: what do you know? You only do pop music, you know,
Speaker 7: you know, cause we knew how MOL I mean, MGM
Speaker 7: was as far as motown was. And he's like, you're right,
Speaker 7: but even if I do pop music, it has to
Speaker 7: be commercial. You're doing R and B. It's it's got
Speaker 7: to be as commercial and I didn't want to hear that,
Speaker 7: but I did it, and I started changing after I
Speaker 7: had that meeting because he wanted to give. He made
Speaker 7: up pride after that because he told he told us
Speaker 7: to do this song called what It Takes, an old
Speaker 7: Barry Gordy song, and he wanted us to do it,
Speaker 7: and we did it, and it you know, it wasn't nothing.
Speaker 7: You know, it didn't do nothing. And this meeting with me,
Speaker 7: I didn't know it at the time, was to get
Speaker 7: inside whoever was the head of leader of the group
Speaker 7: type of thing. And I was more like trying to
Speaker 7: tell him, we know what we're do and just let
Speaker 7: us do it, because I realized they put us on
Speaker 7: the shelf for the Osmonds because they didn't Yeah, but
Speaker 7: we didn't know that when we signed, and they didn't tell,
Speaker 7: you know, we just we didn't have no records out
Speaker 7: for a year. We didn't even go in the studio
Speaker 7: for a long time after the Osmonds was out. But
Speaker 7: you know, I understand the marketing thing. You know, they
Speaker 7: didn't want no other competition out there, and we were
Speaker 7: a family group that could sing harmony and all that,
Speaker 7: so they signed us.
Speaker 2: Well, then I got to ask then if, because I
Speaker 2: know with one bad apple not. At one point did
Speaker 2: MGM say, hmm, this sounds close like ABC. All right,
Speaker 2: Silvers here you go, like this should be for you
Speaker 2: instead of the Osmond's or no.
Speaker 7: The Odumans were signed already and they were specially targeted
Speaker 7: to be the off the other side, a white group
Speaker 7: family group and a black family group. That was I
Speaker 7: understand the marketing after, but we didn't know that was
Speaker 7: the case till, like, you know, years later. And I
Speaker 7: didn't believe it even after people was telling me because
Speaker 7: I wasn't caring about that, you know, as long as
Speaker 7: we can come out, that was my thing. So their
Speaker 7: whole thing was done, and all of a sudden we
Speaker 7: heard them out and they was on MGM. Nothing was
Speaker 7: told or anything, uh and it just came out, you know,
Speaker 7: and I actually liked the record. I thought it was
Speaker 7: you know. But Mike Curb was cool because he made
Speaker 7: a pride and well he got his friend Michael Veener.
Speaker 1: To uh incredible bar because Incredible Bargle band.
Speaker 7: Oh yeah yeah, and that was a funny story too.
Speaker 7: But he they were schoolmates, Curb and Mike Veener, and
Speaker 7: he always wanted to get into record business, and Mike
Speaker 7: Curb gave him that shot and gave us put us
Speaker 7: on another label because MGM was more pop than anything.
Speaker 7: They never had no R and B groups on MGM,
Speaker 7: so Pride was the label that he put us on.
Speaker 7: Got a well KEG. Johnson, got a black promoter and
Speaker 7: Mike Veener was the head of Pride and we hit
Speaker 7: with Fool's Paradise our first record. Well it was R
Speaker 7: and B hit, you know, didn't get no pop play,
Speaker 7: but uh that was that. And when we started practicing,
Speaker 7: we went on the road and things were happening quick
Speaker 7: because we had the big naturals and people automatically oh
Speaker 7: another Jackson's and we had the bigger naturals. So can you.
Speaker 1: Those your natural Yeah?
Speaker 2: Yeah, okay, I had to know it for his wags
Speaker 2: or not because they were so perfect silvers afros for me,
Speaker 2: the real standard of the afro, not the Jackson five
Speaker 2: like that.
Speaker 1: You know. Well, we we.
Speaker 7: Had a concept. I thought, if you would we would
Speaker 7: go to bed instead of with the natural flattening it up,
Speaker 7: we would brush our hair up and take rubber bands
Speaker 7: and have a unicorn going up and go to sleep
Speaker 7: like that and we took the rubber bands off. It
Speaker 7: would just lay out like that.
Speaker 6: Wow.
Speaker 7: So that was our.
Speaker 2: You think, I ain't gonna do this, only braid my
Speaker 2: hair so can have that effect.
Speaker 1: I was like, damn, I could just unicorm my ship.
Speaker 1: You're fired, Thank you?
Speaker 11: I love you? Oh man?
Speaker 2: So uh knowing or you know, I don't. I don't
Speaker 2: know how big of a presence the Jackson Five were
Speaker 2: in you guys's life as far as like VA's the
Speaker 2: goal or if it was some sort.
Speaker 7: Of eclips it was, but it was oh, sorry, no, well.
Speaker 2: I'm asking like, was there a thing like well until
Speaker 2: we reached the status of the Jackson Five, like we
Speaker 2: haven't made it yet or that sort of thing.
Speaker 1: And at least with the Pride Records.
Speaker 7: It wasn't openly said because we were kind of controlling
Speaker 7: are We were writing our songs, we were doing our
Speaker 7: own harmony. We didn't have a corporation, and like guys
Speaker 7: that knew what they were doing, you know too, so
Speaker 7: we learned everything. So it was like a great feeling
Speaker 7: each level of it. So we wasn't even thinking. We
Speaker 7: were just happy to be in it really and doing
Speaker 7: our own music.
Speaker 4: So those prior records were was that you in the
Speaker 4: studio like just pretty much doing everything?
Speaker 1: How much was that? How much?
Speaker 7: But Jerry Butler had three guys, well two Cake Johnson
Speaker 7: and Jerry Peters working with his company, and he sent
Speaker 7: them first to meet us, and he met us at
Speaker 7: the six Flags Magic Mountain doing a show, and backstage
Speaker 7: after the show he brought his records. I guess that
Speaker 7: he wanted well that he did want us to hear
Speaker 7: from Jerry Butler, telling him to let him hear this.
Speaker 7: And I had my base ready in an amp and
Speaker 7: we were all sitting in a line, well in a circle,
Speaker 7: half circle, and we knew he was coming, so we
Speaker 7: was prepared to play our songs and he said I
Speaker 7: heard you all right, Keg did, and we looked at
Speaker 7: each other and said yeah yeah, And he said, okay,
Speaker 7: let me hear something. So we started playing Fool's Paradise
Speaker 7: at the w recor, our first record, and I started
Speaker 7: off with the base du and then Charmain started singing
Speaker 7: and we all you know, and Keg just walked over
Speaker 7: to the trash can and then okay, that's one, let
Speaker 7: me hear another one. And through through the records in
Speaker 7: the trash.
Speaker 12: In front of us.
Speaker 1: You know, we like that.
Speaker 7: We was teenagers. We was like, we looked at each other. Yeah,
Speaker 7: so that was great. We clicked right off the bat,
Speaker 7: you know when he did that.
Speaker 2: You know so well, even though buying these records and
Speaker 2: seeing the production and stuff, I knew that you wrote
Speaker 2: the songs, but yeah, I was trying to figure out,
Speaker 2: like how much production control you had these songs.
Speaker 7: I was learning then I didn't want to produce. I
Speaker 7: didn't even play on it, and I didn't want to.
Speaker 7: He asked me, did cagg was the producer, but it
Speaker 7: was supposed to be It was Keg and Jerry Peters
Speaker 7: that were the producers. Jerry Butler wasn't going to produce,
Speaker 7: but it was his company that was hired, and uh,
Speaker 7: some things went down. But Keg was the producer, and
Speaker 7: he asked me, did I want to play on it?
Speaker 7: Because he liked everything he heard, uh, and he was worried.
Speaker 7: He wasn't going to tell Jerry. Now I didn't notice
Speaker 7: at the time, but he was. He wasn't going to
Speaker 7: tell Jerry till later. Oh wow, because Jerry was busy still,
Speaker 7: he was still hot with his career. He was on
Speaker 7: tour and all that stuff. So, uh, we was actually
Speaker 7: in the studio cutting this stuff before Jerry even knew that.
Speaker 7: We didn't do his record. But I didn't know this.
Speaker 7: I just heard it from a phone conversation with my mother,
Speaker 7: Mike Wiener, and Keg because Keg was with Jerry and
Speaker 7: they were about to get rid of him, because Jerry
Speaker 7: came in and came down, and I remember I had
Speaker 7: to go in the studio and he was telling me, now,
Speaker 7: this is what I wanted y'all to do. And he
Speaker 7: played a way worse bubblegum record than one Bad Apple,
Speaker 7: and I like that. This was horrible. It was bubblegum.
Speaker 7: So I was like, you know, I was from the
Speaker 7: Nickason Garden and Watts, so yeah, I wasn't even trying
Speaker 7: to hear it. But I liked Jerry Butler, so I said, well, yeah,
Speaker 7: we're not doing that.
Speaker 1: That's all I said.
Speaker 7: I didn't want to say nothing else because I liked him.
Speaker 7: I just, you know, let me cut to the chase
Speaker 7: and I play around, we ain't doing it, and he said,
Speaker 7: oh why not? Yeah, it's too bubble gum, that's all
Speaker 7: I said. And he said, oh, okay, you sure, that's
Speaker 7: all he said. I said yeah, and he let it go.
Speaker 7: He just made sure everything went through his company, KEG,
Speaker 7: and then was gonna get fired. But I liked the
Speaker 7: way he handled hisself with us when he threw the
Speaker 7: records in the trash. So I stood up for him.
Speaker 7: I told him, Oh, if you get rid of KEG,
Speaker 7: we ain't doing nothing.
Speaker 1: Okay.
Speaker 7: I didn't know what I was I was, but I
Speaker 7: meant what I said. I was only about but eighteen, No,
Speaker 7: I was seventeen or something. But I was the one
Speaker 7: that everybody was listening to, and they like KEG, and
Speaker 7: we were doing our own things. So I just told
Speaker 7: Mike Wiener, Hey, if you get rid of KEG, we
Speaker 7: ain't doing nothing. We'll go somewhere else.
Speaker 4: Before y'all got into the studio, how were you writing
Speaker 4: your songs like foods preadicce writing them on base at home?
Speaker 7: On base? Oh, I would use the bass excuse me
Speaker 7: as a harmonic to the melody that I would sing.
Speaker 8: Uh.
Speaker 7: Always. I wouldn't do it as a you know a
Speaker 7: lot of people stay on E for the funk type thing.
Speaker 7: I would use it as a keyboard. I would always
Speaker 7: play the bass a harmonic to my melody and then
Speaker 7: the chords would you could you could hear different ones,
Speaker 7: you know as you listening to the melody and the bass.
Speaker 2: So are a majority of the songs that you write?
Speaker 2: Do you write it on bass? Verse before? You never
Speaker 2: on piano?
Speaker 7: Never on Okay, now I do because you know you
Speaker 7: got a studio in your hand. Now you know you
Speaker 7: could do anything. Really, But back then, if I did
Speaker 7: a melody, I immediately went to the bass and did
Speaker 7: the harmonic bass line because that was like my keyboard.
Speaker 11: So for.
Speaker 2: For those first four three or four initial Silvers albums,
Speaker 2: that didn't catch you on the way that showcase quote
Speaker 2: on once you guys went to Capital, But.
Speaker 1: Was it at all shocking to you that.
Speaker 2: Those records would be discovered in a new light in
Speaker 2: the era of rare groove culture and hip hop sampling,
Speaker 2: Like because even though in your mind you might think like, oh, well, okay,
Speaker 2: those first few records weren't hitting like you know, our
Speaker 2: Capital years.
Speaker 1: But for a lot of us, yeah, that's the holy grail.
Speaker 6: Oh my god.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean the first album alone with with uh
Speaker 1: wish I could talk to you.
Speaker 2: I'll never be ashamed, Like there's least like in my eyes,
Speaker 2: like that first Silver Records has at least six six
Speaker 2: or seven gems on it that we see in the
Speaker 2: light of sampling and how it's so was it at
Speaker 2: all shocking to you that, like some thirty five years later,
Speaker 2: forty years later, that suddenly like even in my DJ
Speaker 2: said like I'll play only one can win, as.
Speaker 1: So that is ain't shocking it all?
Speaker 7: Well, actually I felt great. I mean it was like
Speaker 7: an honor for and then I started thinking, how does
Speaker 7: that happen?
Speaker 8: You know?
Speaker 7: And then the only thing I could think of is wow,
Speaker 7: it was young people that picked that up. And I
Speaker 7: was young at the time when I wrote it. So
Speaker 7: it's like twenty years later that same spirit that you
Speaker 7: know musical DNA if you will, you know, only the
Speaker 7: young could hear that, because I was like, wow, that
Speaker 7: must be it. The same thing with Missing Me, all
Speaker 7: those songs that were sampled I wrote when I was
Speaker 7: younger than eighteen.
Speaker 6: Right, No, that's that's a whole twenty minute conversation just
Speaker 6: on that song.
Speaker 2: Yes, well what's started man with? Yeah with misdemeanor, Like,
Speaker 2: how how did you come with that?
Speaker 13: Uh?
Speaker 7: Wow? I didn't I the base came first. Uh, I
Speaker 7: was just I was stomping my foot and I was
Speaker 7: just hitting mm hmmm mmmmm. No, I was just doing
Speaker 7: the first one first, mm hmmm mm hmmm.
Speaker 5: Oh.
Speaker 7: And then I started repeating those two over and over
Speaker 7: and I would hit my foot kind of hard on
Speaker 7: the ground like a kick. And I had one of
Speaker 7: them old. It was I think it was a Signo
Speaker 7: cassette player. They only made one. It had one big
Speaker 7: giant speaker. It was a Mono radio cassette player. Man,
Speaker 7: it had the perfect compression for that mic. Because I
Speaker 7: recorded that baseline stomping my feet with that cassette. Man,
Speaker 7: it was the best sound ever. I did everything. I
Speaker 7: went and bought two of those iPhone.
Speaker 14: Yeah, that's what the that's what the iPhone sounds like now.
Speaker 2: And sort of I track a lot of my drums
Speaker 2: up withut the iPhone, like on the floor, like thirteen
Speaker 2: feet away from me, and it's the same perfect man.
Speaker 7: So I just loved that. I kept that cassette till
Speaker 7: it evaporated.
Speaker 4: You know.
Speaker 7: It just had that the misdemeanor vibe on it. And
Speaker 7: I just recorded that and then said the hook. I
Speaker 7: don't remember if I had the words already I did,
Speaker 7: probably didn't, I was, and I knew because I listened
Speaker 7: to that melody lower octave with the base and the
Speaker 7: same register, and it's wrong. It's the most horrible melody
Speaker 7: with the baseline because it's one of them notes that
Speaker 7: if you do an octave high you can get away
Speaker 7: with it. It sounds cool, almost funky, but if you
Speaker 7: do it in the same register like an octave lower,
Speaker 7: the worst thing to your ear. You couldn't. I hated
Speaker 7: it when I when I heard it like that, But uh,
Speaker 7: I knew what I had When I actually did the
Speaker 7: melody with the baseline, it sounded great. I just knew
Speaker 7: I had something that would people would like. I don't
Speaker 7: know why. It just had a feeling vibe, you know.
Speaker 1: And how old was Foster when he cut that?
Speaker 7: He was wrong? I think ten? Uh turn.
Speaker 6: Like ten years old? The funky shit out.
Speaker 1: Were you were?
Speaker 2: Because of the pristine level of musicianship that a lot
Speaker 2: of the Pride era records were under. Were you guys
Speaker 2: always using the same musicians in the studio or was
Speaker 2: it did you have a relationship with these musicians or
Speaker 2: was just like who's here today?
Speaker 7: We met him? Because we wanted to be at every session,
Speaker 7: so it was mainly Chuck Rainy on bass or what
Speaker 7: oh Man Felder, those two were the bass players.
Speaker 1: Those guys were just.
Speaker 7: Moon like no, they were the top.
Speaker 1: But I'm just saying like, like, yeah, well, Keig Keg and.
Speaker 7: Jerry Peters they were real good producers back then. They
Speaker 7: did Uh, Gray, what's that song that friends of friends
Speaker 7: of distinct? Yeah, they did that and uh you got
Speaker 7: me going? And and so Keig Johnson and Jerry Peters
Speaker 7: were formidable producers themselves. So and Jerry Peters was great
Speaker 7: keyboardist and arranger. So they knew all the top musicians.
Speaker 7: And I'd go to every session. David t was main guitar.
Speaker 7: Uh Felder. They'd switch up on keyboard guys because there
Speaker 7: was a lot of them, but it was always kind
Speaker 7: of jazz oriented.
Speaker 1: Guys, is there still alive?
Speaker 7: Yes he is.
Speaker 1: Wait, it's just hit me. Was it one of your
Speaker 1: brothers or three? Somehow? You guys were actually involved in
Speaker 1: the Jackson five.
Speaker 7: Cartoon Edmund he was Marlon's voice.
Speaker 1: Okay, here's a voice of Morl.
Speaker 2: Yeah all right, So in this next clip, I literally
Speaker 2: tell hip hop pioneer Lady B. Why I'm giving her
Speaker 2: her flowers. Her work on radio, which reached me in
Speaker 2: nineteen eighty one, literally set me on a course, which
Speaker 2: is why you know of a quest love Today.
Speaker 1: What's cool is Lady B gives Laiah some flowers here too.
Speaker 2: One of my favorite nights of yours was the the
Speaker 2: aforementioned Uh Steady be versus.
Speaker 5: Will Smith battle.
Speaker 2: Yeah, find dude, Okay, So Will Smith will forever, he'll
Speaker 2: for ever had my respect because he somehow got the call.
Speaker 2: He freestyled that Steady Bee was a munchie chi and
Speaker 2: I just remember at that point Steady Bee actually wanting
Speaker 2: to fight Will and them.
Speaker 15: Like, and I did not help matters any because I
Speaker 15: thought it was the funniest is I ever heard. And
Speaker 15: I think the fact that we all laughed made him
Speaker 15: really angry.
Speaker 5: Yo, we were all laughing.
Speaker 15: But that was the era when Shante stepped off that stage.
Speaker 15: That was the era when you had to come off
Speaker 15: off the top of your head and just you just
Speaker 15: had that. That was actually what you call free styling.
Speaker 15: That was freestyling people environment.
Speaker 2: They underestimated Will because they were like, well, you're not
Speaker 2: real hip hop, you're suburban.
Speaker 5: You talk all proper.
Speaker 15: First of all, he lived in my neighborhood that he
Speaker 15: wasn't out there gang banging and talk about it bee
Speaker 15: grabbing his jawn and acting. And you know, we didn't
Speaker 15: come up in a one parent household. We didn't learn
Speaker 15: how to respect women and stuff. Just because he wasn't
Speaker 15: raised like that, why not mean he wasn't a part
Speaker 15: and just as authentic and true to hip hop as
Speaker 15: everybody else. That is what I love the most about him.
Speaker 15: That's when Will was the first one, you know who
Speaker 15: made me. His lyrics made me smile. I call it
Speaker 15: happy hip hop, and everybody else was all bravado. I
Speaker 15: got a big back Cadillac. I got to know you
Speaker 15: don't you live in your mama house?
Speaker 5: I stopping right, you know what I mean?
Speaker 1: Fat?
Speaker 15: But Will was like the first one. I mean, you
Speaker 15: know it was it was. It was funny, it was
Speaker 15: fun it made you smile, and then you put a
Speaker 15: dope DJ like Jeff with him and it was just
Speaker 15: the greatest combination ever.
Speaker 5: Wow, I can I can go on and on nerding
Speaker 5: out forever.
Speaker 16: It's been beautiful seeing your friendship too, and how it's
Speaker 16: evolved and stuff. You Jeff and Will and how they
Speaker 16: still come out and support you.
Speaker 10: That shit is dope.
Speaker 15: I just texted the guy us on the movie set
Speaker 15: with him. I'm like, tell well, I need a one
Speaker 15: minute video of him congratulate me.
Speaker 5: For my fortieth.
Speaker 15: They got text back. He's doing it as soon as
Speaker 15: he gets out of such and such and I'm like,
Speaker 15: thank you.
Speaker 5: He lives for Instagram posts, So you know, no, ja
Speaker 5: you missed?
Speaker 15: Was my thirtieth. He came home to surprise me, like
Speaker 15: I didn't even know he was coming to the show.
Speaker 5: Really.
Speaker 15: He performed with Salt and Pepper. He did what a man.
Speaker 15: He performed with Chuck and Flave. He got out there.
Speaker 15: He was a whole s one w He did a
Speaker 15: lot of guy. He just stayed on stage all night
Speaker 15: and wait and there's more. It rained torrential rain. It
Speaker 15: was like the hip hop woods Stock. People did not leave.
Speaker 15: They stayed in the rain. Will was shaking me. Are
Speaker 15: you having as much fun as me? I'm like, I
Speaker 15: don't think.
Speaker 4: Wow.
Speaker 15: He stayed on stage all night and surprised me. It
Speaker 15: was the dopest thing ever.
Speaker 2: Well, you deserve all your flowers, you know, eighty one.
Speaker 2: You just you literally introduced me to the world that
Speaker 2: I get to.
Speaker 5: That I built it in an empire.
Speaker 11: That says a lot.
Speaker 5: I want to thank you for that.
Speaker 16: And forget about your radio mentees around here, because she
Speaker 16: got a lot of those in the world too.
Speaker 15: Oh yes, I love that one. That's that's my little
Speaker 15: mini lady because she only and does she sit up
Speaker 15: there and and act like she asked. But you ain't
Speaker 15: let nobody say nothing to her either. She was the
Speaker 15: only one that stabbed and he was to speak up. Yeah,
Speaker 15: that's right.
Speaker 1: He watched me.
Speaker 15: He watched me get one right there, proud of that
Speaker 15: one right there, and you watch me get fired to girl.
Speaker 15: So it's all good.
Speaker 1: You have any you got any children?
Speaker 2: Like?
Speaker 15: No, I I tried, but my sister again, I talk
Speaker 15: about her so much. She's been going for two years now. No,
Speaker 15: my sister, uh gave me kids and then my old
Speaker 15: man passed away on me and he left me kids.
Speaker 15: So am I a mother and a grandmother? Yes, to
Speaker 15: every extent of the word. I have taught them to walk, talk,
Speaker 15: potty trained school meetings.
Speaker 13: I am a mother and.
Speaker 15: I am a grandmother. And I know I literally you know.
Speaker 15: I remember when my sister took ill she had a
Speaker 15: stroke and I was taking care of her in her
Speaker 15: latter years, and the doctor asked her, you know, you
Speaker 15: don't have a high blood pressure or anything. You don't
Speaker 15: do you worry about anything. It says you have three
Speaker 15: children and seven grandchildren. She says, no, I don't do that.
Speaker 5: My sister does.
Speaker 12: And she makes it like she.
Speaker 15: I raised her kids. She was my She called me
Speaker 15: her baby daddy. She sent me cards on Father's Day.
Speaker 16: Wow, you the dopest daddy. Yeah, but that's dopey. Yes,
Speaker 16: they walk right past their mother. Come to me crazy,
Speaker 16: all right.
Speaker 2: So when The Roots signed their record deal in November
Speaker 2: of nineteen ninety three, our manager Richard Nichols wanted us
Speaker 2: to instantly get this record out of the way, and so,
Speaker 2: I believe because of the cheaper rates, we recorded like
Speaker 2: around like Christmas.
Speaker 1: Week, believe these songs.
Speaker 2: To mix them, we had, you know, we recorded the
Speaker 2: songs in early December and then we uh mixed them
Speaker 2: right after Christmas and New Year to get the EP
Speaker 2: out by April. We were trying to move fast, and
Speaker 2: so this is around the time when Tribe had just
Speaker 2: released Midnight Maratis, their third album. They recorded at Battery
Speaker 2: Studios because Battery was the studio owned by Jive Records,
Speaker 2: their label. We chose Battery Studios because that's also where
Speaker 2: Bob Power Tribes engineer.
Speaker 1: Wanted to mix our record.
Speaker 2: We love the way that Bob's drums sounded on Tribe albums,
Speaker 2: and it was like, hey, we want the same treatment.
Speaker 2: So that's how influential Tribe was. There was a legendary
Speaker 2: show with Dayla Soul, Soul's of Mischief and a tribe
Speaker 2: called Quests that I believe was at the Ritz and
Speaker 2: Union Square. Trek and I went to this concert. It
Speaker 2: was like, I consider that the last time that Tarik
Speaker 2: and I were civilians, and I remember that night. I
Speaker 2: remember saying, like I joke when we walk home, I said, Yo, man,
Speaker 2: you know what's crazy. The next time we come back
Speaker 2: to the United States, like we will have had an
Speaker 2: album out, Like we won't be civilians anymore.
Speaker 1: We're gonna be you know.
Speaker 2: Celebrities, stars. Like we had hope in the air that
Speaker 2: we were gonna like just come out of the box
Speaker 2: and like blow everyone away.
Speaker 1: That's that's that's what we that's what we planned on.
Speaker 2: So we kind of went to the day La Soul
Speaker 2: tribe called Quest Soul's a Mischief concert and just when
Speaker 2: the mosh pit and jumped around and ah, man, it
Speaker 2: was awesome.
Speaker 1: But basically it was just like I believe that Q
Speaker 1: Tip had come to Battery Studios to do a quickie
Speaker 1: remix to Oh My God.
Speaker 2: They were gonna do like a different version of it
Speaker 2: on stage that night, and if I recall correctly, they
Speaker 2: were using the mini rippert in loop that that's the
Speaker 2: second song on the Adventures in Paradise album.
Speaker 1: So if you listen to a Boom Boom, that's.
Speaker 2: Look up Minie Rippleton Adventures in Paradise and the song
Speaker 2: after Baby This Love I Have.
Speaker 1: I remember them looping me like I was like eavesdropping
Speaker 1: from the hallway.
Speaker 2: I'd like, go to the bathroom, but then sneak down
Speaker 2: the studio see and put my ear up against the
Speaker 2: wall to hear them loop in something.
Speaker 1: And they were gonna they.
Speaker 2: Were just making like a show debt for that particular
Speaker 2: New Year's performance, And you know, I was real shy
Speaker 2: as talk to them, even though you know they've seen.
Speaker 1: Us, Hey, y'all doing yeah, yeah, y'all the roots, y'all dope.
Speaker 2: But then I saw him in the hallway man, and
Speaker 2: it was like five weeks old, and I was like, yo,
Speaker 2: that three measure loop you do on Electric Relaxation, Like
Speaker 2: what is that about? Like it was unusual to not
Speaker 2: be an even four bar loop, Like if you listen
Speaker 2: to Electric Relaxation, it's a three bar loop. And I
Speaker 2: was just getting like two overly like nerdy and analytical.
Speaker 2: And he told me then that was the red flag.
Speaker 2: Like he's like, yo, like you talk like a journalist,
Speaker 2: you don't talk like a human being. And so I
Speaker 2: got a I got put in time out until about
Speaker 2: three albums later. Like you know, I saw him a
Speaker 2: little bit for the do You Want More? Period, but
Speaker 2: not that much because every time I saw him, it's
Speaker 2: just that likequestions to ask. And then he warmed up
Speaker 2: to us towards the end of ill Adelph Half Life
Speaker 2: and wanted to be on the album. And you know, man,
Speaker 2: he's he's my hero man, So big up to Q Tip.
Speaker 2: Here Frante gives Q Tip some flowers and he runs
Speaker 2: with it with a thoughtful response. Then we started playing
Speaker 2: clips and getting antidotes.
Speaker 4: I will say to if you were one of the
Speaker 4: one of my favorite producers in the sense that you
Speaker 4: always the way I've always described it is like you
Speaker 4: always kept a foot in both worlds, Like you could
Speaker 4: do a Midnight Marauders, but then could do the infamous
Speaker 4: you know what I'm saying, Or you could do like
Speaker 4: a Craig mac remix, and like you always found a
Speaker 4: way even when you work with big mainstream acts of
Speaker 4: the time, you still found a way to put your
Speaker 4: stamp on what you were doing. And I think that's
Speaker 4: and in my opinion to me, that always kept you
Speaker 4: kind of you. Never to me, never came across as
Speaker 4: like that bitter guy like a lot of the old
Speaker 4: chat So you know.
Speaker 1: What it is, you know why?
Speaker 13: And he could tell you it's not even a big secret.
Speaker 13: It's DJ right, don't you find it?
Speaker 2: I mean like djing' I'm smart about it now because
Speaker 2: I wasn't DJing as heavy since maybe the last three
Speaker 2: or four records where I'm now aware of it. Yeah,
Speaker 2: now now I know why Dre, Like when I saw
Speaker 2: straight out of Compton and realize the environment that Dre
Speaker 2: was DJing at at that roller skating rink where it's
Speaker 2: like you.
Speaker 1: Play the wrong record, that's ass.
Speaker 2: Now realize, oh, that's why all of Dre's stuff is
Speaker 2: taking no prisoners with with his singles and stuff like
Speaker 2: it has to just got to hit grab you by
Speaker 2: the throat.
Speaker 1: Now I realize that, yeah, that's That's the.
Speaker 13: Other thing about it too, is that it's it's you
Speaker 13: get to see what works and why, you know, because I,
Speaker 13: you know, I think that you and I we maybe
Speaker 13: I think we come from the same philosophy when we
Speaker 13: spend you know what I'm saying, It's like, you know, current, current,
Speaker 13: a little bit back on another one, throwback, temple wise,
Speaker 13: tempo match, baseline match and boom now current you know current,
Speaker 13: you know, just to try to mix and then sometimes
Speaker 13: you know that the crowd may not know the throwbacks,
Speaker 13: but you just want to see the reaction if if
Speaker 13: it's one of the yeah, because if it if it
Speaker 13: doesn't stop the grooving that you see who's moving it
Speaker 13: to it. It's a great study, you.
Speaker 1: Know, psychological stuff.
Speaker 2: If you're just tuning in, We're getting a hip hop
Speaker 2: history lesson with rapper, actor, producer DJ and member of
Speaker 2: a tripal Quest Q Tip. The reason why I brought
Speaker 2: up the record collection is because m the era of
Speaker 2: when you guys finally get your debut record out.
Speaker 8: Uh.
Speaker 2: First of all, the long ass title of People's Instinctive
Speaker 2: Travels and the Paths of Rhythm.
Speaker 13: Why I mean Captain Beef.
Speaker 1: Difficult?
Speaker 13: Yeah, I mean you know we title we need to
Speaker 13: stick the fuck out.
Speaker 1: When other options for the debut album before was the
Speaker 1: you know either or we always had like three to
Speaker 1: choose from it, they decided.
Speaker 13: Like, okay, now, were just like, yo, this is what
Speaker 13: it is.
Speaker 1: Okay. So in the era of you guys making that record.
Speaker 2: Well as a music producer, the first thing, the reason
Speaker 2: why I have a dividing line between the renaissance era
Speaker 2: of hip hop and the classic era of hip hop
Speaker 2: and the thin line that's in between is the fact
Speaker 2: that you guys managed to miraculously avoid James brown Well
Speaker 2: using anything from Break B Lose Ultimately and Breaks Collection,
Speaker 2: which all right for our listeners, Break Be Lou shout Out,
Speaker 2: What's Up?
Speaker 11: Lou?
Speaker 1: Lou Floores.
Speaker 2: Wisely came up with a Wikipedia or a cliff notes,
Speaker 2: if you will, of records.
Speaker 13: And Street Beat Lenny Street BT Lenny too.
Speaker 2: Yeah, Street B Lenny shout out of all the records
Speaker 2: that Bam and HERK and Flash and Theodore would spend
Speaker 2: back in the day, and when this compilation came out
Speaker 2: in late nineteen eighty five through nineteen eighty nine, pretty
Speaker 2: much I'll say sixty percent of most hip hop relied
Speaker 2: on these breaks for their daily diet, all these you know,
Speaker 2: synthetic substitution and peached the President. God made me funky.
Speaker 2: It was just to the point where the average record
Speaker 2: take like take a producer like Herbie Lovebug his productions
Speaker 2: on saying, like a filler cut on a kid in
Speaker 2: play record, You.
Speaker 1: Tell that's why?
Speaker 8: You mean?
Speaker 2: He used the drums from here and the loop from
Speaker 2: there and the baseline from there, you know, all on
Speaker 2: the same record where you really didn't do any heavy digging.
Speaker 2: So this is the first time, or at least with
Speaker 2: with the native tongues, this is the first time that
Speaker 2: I'm hearing loops that aren't on that compilation. And it's like,
Speaker 2: oh God, I gotta do some work to figure out
Speaker 2: what this is. Was that was that already a rule
Speaker 2: that like no substitution, no funky drummer, no impeach the President.
Speaker 6: Yeah, we were.
Speaker 5: It was.
Speaker 13: It was a crew of us, right like it was
Speaker 13: me Africa, the beat nuts.
Speaker 17: Who is the music head of the beat nuts. They
Speaker 17: both are who's your go to well made juju?
Speaker 13: I mean because that was my men, like in senior
Speaker 13: year high school, like we were me him Rashad.
Speaker 11: Yep.
Speaker 13: They all went to the No no, no, we all
Speaker 13: went to different schools, but we were all like meet
Speaker 13: up at the hubs and ship, like we just knew
Speaker 13: niggas from when you know, we was getting up getting
Speaker 13: beats and ship and you'd see dudes and be like, Yo,
Speaker 13: that dude got because we always there was a there
Speaker 13: was a small group of us who was like anti
Speaker 13: break beat, you know what I mean, Like we had
Speaker 13: to have the right ship, you know what I mean,
Speaker 13: like all right, the.
Speaker 1: Large professor substitution.
Speaker 7: Huh.
Speaker 1: But not once did you feel like all.
Speaker 13: Right, oh yeah, well after after you know, after we've
Speaker 13: established ourselves in that way, you didn't come back. There's
Speaker 13: been times I've used substitution kicks and ship like that
Speaker 13: and like.
Speaker 1: No, that's whatever, you can't tell yeah okay, or.
Speaker 13: Like you know, and like Pete would use he would
Speaker 13: use substitution a lot, you know, some of them ships.
Speaker 13: Just as a producer, you'd be like, yo, that ship
Speaker 13: is still that is that James brown Snea is still rocking.
Speaker 13: We got to boot, you know what I mean. But
Speaker 13: back then, early on, it was just about it was
Speaker 13: about the hunt, nigga, you know saying the hunt. You
Speaker 13: know that ship just had to fight. It was just
Speaker 13: like and then we got so on and we would
Speaker 13: travel out of town and flights. Me and Paul would
Speaker 13: get fucking rent cars.
Speaker 6: And be driving Pittsburgh.
Speaker 13: Yeah, all types of ship.
Speaker 1: You would go to Jerry's and Pittsburgh.
Speaker 7: Yep.
Speaker 13: I went to Jerry's.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's yeah.
Speaker 2: If any beat nigger, there's seven Pilgrimage like Mecca Pilgrim,
Speaker 2: but Jerry's you'll never get past.
Speaker 1: Like the letter D and or C right right, right right,
Speaker 1: that's how large is where houses.
Speaker 13: But the crew was it was like Juju and and
Speaker 13: this is the crew like we all would know each other.
Speaker 13: We always go to spots and ship. It was Juju
Speaker 13: Diamond large myself Africa, Pete, I said Paul, right, Paul,
Speaker 13: prem had already bought a store. He already had everything. Wow,
Speaker 13: he had a store. Oh Latif Latif, I said Rashad, No,
Speaker 13: it was we was we was Mark already had he's
Speaker 13: a og so he was already. So Prem had the
Speaker 13: record store that he bought when he was in Texas
Speaker 13: and came and they just shipped him every like forty
Speaker 13: thousand records of some crazy ship. So he had everything,
Speaker 13: and Mark had everything. So we were all putting our
Speaker 13: shits together kind of at that time, you know, at
Speaker 13: the same time, you know. But it was the hunt.
Speaker 1: It was the hunt.
Speaker 13: It was like Game of Thrones and some shit.
Speaker 6: Dude.
Speaker 2: See, I'm glad you're saying this because even though my
Speaker 2: career came in the tail end of it, many a
Speaker 2: record dealer had the fear of their eyes when like,
Speaker 2: because I would just straight up ask them because they like,
Speaker 2: record dealers will do this thing where it's like, all right,
Speaker 2: they know what kind of money's walking in, right Jack.
Speaker 1: So they'll look at me.
Speaker 2: They'll look at me and like, okay, a mirror's good
Speaker 2: for ten thousand. So they have a system where it's
Speaker 2: like they'll give you all right, that's ten, that's twenty,
Speaker 2: that's ten, that's twenty, that's ten, that's twenty.
Speaker 1: No, that's right.
Speaker 2: But then they know you're itching and I'm like, so
Speaker 2: that's it, and they'll be like, well, you know, I
Speaker 2: got a shipment that just came.
Speaker 13: In last night, and all the warehouses up the block.
Speaker 1: Right, oh, take you over the block. Yeah that's all that.
Speaker 1: I got some dresses over here. Yeah. No, but that's
Speaker 1: what it's like. And then there's just a point I
Speaker 1: would tell them to just cut to the chase, like
Speaker 1: and that's the.
Speaker 2: Thing as a record collector, you never tell them like, look,
Speaker 2: only got a thousand, Just cut to the chase and
Speaker 2: give me the good ship, because no, they'll just do
Speaker 2: the same ship the tens, the twenties, the tens, the twenties,
Speaker 2: the tens, the twenties.
Speaker 1: Were you out there?
Speaker 2: And then they'll be like they you They will usually
Speaker 2: say like Pete Rock was always the thing, like well, yeah,
Speaker 2: we were holding some of the stuff for Pete Rock.
Speaker 1: You know, I'll give you an extra yeah. But then
Speaker 1: you're like you get desperate and not realize this wouldn't
Speaker 1: even be true. No, no, no, no, I realized then
Speaker 1: I realized that was the hustle.
Speaker 2: And then finally I found a guy where he's just like, look,
Speaker 2: this is worth a hundred, worth one fifty. This is
Speaker 2: you know, in those type of things, So of course
Speaker 2: those prices would be jacked up because they would use
Speaker 2: it like stuff already.
Speaker 11: So like like a.
Speaker 1: Prime example the Manti Alexander in Happiness.
Speaker 2: All right, so before you use that for Gangster bitch,
Speaker 2: I know that the album was worth like ten bucks now,
Speaker 2: but because Gangster like he cutes him, single handedly brought up.
Speaker 1: The stocks on all well, not just the stuff people.
Speaker 13: I feel bad a little bit because it just happened
Speaker 13: like okay boom.
Speaker 1: So yeah, my generation is now paying the extra on.
Speaker 6: A new Tribe album.
Speaker 13: I use this this for whatever. What is the Nairobi Yeah,
Speaker 13: like that ship is rocketed already.
Speaker 16: But give me an example of like from once it
Speaker 16: came to whence they got once Tip touched it?
Speaker 17: No all the time, like oh Jesus Christ, I've read
Speaker 17: Ramp is a five dollars record.
Speaker 2: I don't even think there's an original Ramp record. Like
Speaker 2: every Ramp album I've seen is. I just felt like
Speaker 2: they Yeah, they finally just printed it in the name
Speaker 2: of the interest of finding the Benina apple bum sample.
Speaker 6: So how much is that now, Ramp three hundred?
Speaker 2: Well you for an original press never seen an original
Speaker 2: pressing of Rent, But uh, Eugene McDaniels, I've never seen
Speaker 2: I've never seen the headless heroes under two hundred bucks original.
Speaker 1: Playing that. I played that ship.
Speaker 2: The first argument Stacey and I ever had over music,
Speaker 2: first Tasty Trees, Stacey and I ever had over music
Speaker 2: was over that record.
Speaker 1: She by the time we got to that song, she
Speaker 1: was like you.
Speaker 18: This is the latest song on McDaniel's debut album. I
Speaker 18: played everything, No, No, No, the sam just before news
Speaker 18: for this.
Speaker 1: For the tip Us it was jagget a dagger. It
Speaker 1: was jagged dagger. You know, we was having a ball.
Speaker 1: That's going on the mic. Weird enough.
Speaker 2: Jack of the Dagger was such a dig at mic.
Speaker 2: Jagger like stealing black music.
Speaker 1: The loop was so dope. One of the one of
Speaker 1: the last dates that we did on when Lauren.
Speaker 6: Released that, did you play that as he walked out?
Speaker 2: No, no, no, no, man, you know what he can't Yes,
Speaker 2: he was scheduled, he was scheduled to be on the show.
Speaker 1: We prepared that song and.
Speaker 2: Then he okay, okay, he didn't do it, but yeah,
Speaker 2: when he comes, dude's dagger like what they gonna do
Speaker 2: the research on it?
Speaker 1: Anyway.
Speaker 2: Last the last date, the last date of this Lauren
Speaker 2: Hill tour when she did that unplugged record Smoking Groups tour.
Speaker 1: I remember that right.
Speaker 2: So it was Thanksgiving night in Seattle and I played
Speaker 2: the Parasite and blasted it because I DJ before she
Speaker 2: came on dog the look on the art it was
Speaker 2: the best.
Speaker 1: I might have to play you. Yes, I gotta Can
Speaker 1: I play a whole song? Please?
Speaker 11: The whole song is like that.
Speaker 1: We can't not right now.
Speaker 13: I mean if you can put a little bit, just
Speaker 13: skim through, skim through certain.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I think it's a good close. We'll close the
Speaker 1: show with it. Okay, we will close the show. That's fair.
Speaker 13: Can we talk over it? And then is the show
Speaker 13: like Mystery Science Theater?
Speaker 1: That is kind of what we do. That's all we do,
Speaker 1: all right?
Speaker 2: So what making this? Making the record the debut? Yeah,
Speaker 2: people's I call it Peter Peter Ptour, Peter making that record.
Speaker 2: What is because this is a group of super producers.
Speaker 2: I mean it's a group of multiple c's, but it's
Speaker 2: also a group of super producers.
Speaker 1: How what is the what is the agreed upon method
Speaker 1: of making joints?
Speaker 16: Like?
Speaker 1: Is it just yo? I got this loop?
Speaker 11: I got this loop.
Speaker 1: I like that loop.
Speaker 2: Okay, let's work on that is it, you know, do
Speaker 2: you just come in with the finished product like I
Speaker 2: like this does a least say, Yo, what do you
Speaker 2: think about this?
Speaker 12: Yeah?
Speaker 1: That joints nice? I'll do that. It's kind of okay
Speaker 1: in the beginning, what it like? What's it like on
Speaker 1: the first album?
Speaker 13: Like in the beginning, Uh, A lot of it was
Speaker 13: demos that I'd done over the prior, I'd say five
Speaker 13: years maybe.
Speaker 2: Okay, I'm calling I'm calling an artible storytime with Q tip.
Speaker 2: All right, I'm just gonna play ten seconds of random
Speaker 2: tribe joints and you tell me, like, what comes to
Speaker 2: mind when you made this?
Speaker 1: Like, well, if you remember any details.
Speaker 13: The read it, read it the page, see what it says,
Speaker 13: read it? I mean running away roy is you know
Speaker 13: it's one of my favorite This.
Speaker 2: Shake catches a lot of slack like I I'll read,
Speaker 2: I'll read you know, like uh uh lists like Ego
Speaker 2: trip list or whatever, where of course this didn't description
Speaker 2: and was of course, so it catches flak as in
Speaker 2: weird debut songs by.
Speaker 6: Groups that were later god doubt.
Speaker 2: But there's nothing wrong with this loop. This is not
Speaker 2: my go to song to spend. But I was never
Speaker 2: mad at this loop or the.
Speaker 6: Place of the ending. It felt like a good ending
Speaker 6: for the album.
Speaker 12: Yeah.
Speaker 1: I used to run that joint and that was actually
Speaker 1: the B side was even funnier. Pubic B side talking
Speaker 1: smack comics.
Speaker 6: It was funny.
Speaker 1: It was like, it's very skipped to my loop.
Speaker 6: No, no, no, you know what it was.
Speaker 13: I had two years earlier. There was a store on Bleika,
Speaker 13: the street where you get all the fucking prints unreleased joints.
Speaker 13: Well not Bob's, but it was another joint.
Speaker 1: It was Generations.
Speaker 13: It was not Unbleaker, but it's off you know where
Speaker 13: all the chest stores. I think it was across the
Speaker 13: street and down the black from Mock Moods.
Speaker 1: I think there's a story where Prince actually walked in
Speaker 1: to that store and.
Speaker 13: Walked out with all this ship. Yeah, that had Yo,
Speaker 13: It's ill because I was in there. I would always
Speaker 13: hit there after school because Karena and I would always
Speaker 13: be in the village and ship and I would always
Speaker 13: go get I was just a huge Prince fan. So
Speaker 13: I had heard movie Star, heard Bob, George, super Califern
Speaker 13: at the front, whatever the fuck you know all of
Speaker 13: that ship. Like, I was just like stuck. I remember
Speaker 13: playing movie Star for Africa and he and we're in
Speaker 13: like eleventh grade and we're like mocking the ship and
Speaker 13: listening to all this unreleased Prince Ship, and this was
Speaker 13: like kind of like one of the.
Speaker 1: Who's you know about George?
Speaker 13: You know what I like doing all that silly ship.
Speaker 13: Underneath it is the BT Express beat, you know what
Speaker 13: I mean. I mean it's it's clearly tuned out. But
Speaker 13: it was also still an overage of disco kind of
Speaker 13: house parties that were still going on. You know, you
Speaker 13: still have Frankie Knuckles, Ip, still had Larry Levan doing
Speaker 13: parties back then, even though their houses had closed, and
Speaker 13: maybe Frankie was doing back and forth from Chicago to
Speaker 13: New York. So body, Body and Soul was being established,
Speaker 13: re established, So it was still a disco thing that
Speaker 13: was happening.
Speaker 1: Have you ever got to see Larry spin Yeah or
Speaker 1: his systems? Yeah?
Speaker 13: Well I saw him at Limelight.
Speaker 1: Okay, did he control the system there?
Speaker 13: I don't think. So this is towards because.
Speaker 2: When you DJ, you have the world's loudest base cabinets ever.
Speaker 2: And I know that he always you You're always aiming
Speaker 2: for a paradise.
Speaker 13: Yeah, I'm trying to go for that, man.
Speaker 1: Yeah, okay, I'm a stickler for that.
Speaker 13: But the first real big system I think I heard
Speaker 13: was in.
Speaker 10: The world what was the last record that you played
Speaker 10: yours in the club?
Speaker 1: And you was like, oh what feeling you play?
Speaker 8: What?
Speaker 19: Yeah?
Speaker 1: Wow, See, now that's weird.
Speaker 2: I have a rule against playing because every time I
Speaker 2: play the roots ship.
Speaker 1: Is the fastest for.
Speaker 13: Yeah, I don't, I don't.
Speaker 1: But no, but I'm saying they got this already.
Speaker 2: It's already established that you're the establishment of that level.
Speaker 2: Like you know, there's at least five tribe songs that
Speaker 2: are the mount rushmore go to songs of a party start.
Speaker 2: So even when you were djaying like it's embarrassing to
Speaker 2: play what's the captain obvious one like scenario, I.
Speaker 13: Don't play none of it obviously.
Speaker 2: So even when you were DJing in let's say nineteen
Speaker 2: ninety three and you put scenario on, knowing the motherfucker's
Speaker 2: gonna go out, they mind like is this still like
Speaker 2: a weird thing?
Speaker 13: Like yeah, I don't, I don't.
Speaker 1: I don't do that. I can't do that. I'll play,
Speaker 1: Oh you'll play some obscure shit.
Speaker 13: I'll play something more if like especially if it's like
Speaker 13: a I have a groog rowing or whatever. Like let's say, okay,
Speaker 13: so what is somewhere like one hundred and five bp
Speaker 13: M or some ship.
Speaker 1: I know what you're gonna say, what, No, I was doing?
Speaker 3: Do it? Do it?
Speaker 2: Do it? I was going to say you you would
Speaker 2: probably player no footprints foot I feel like you would
Speaker 2: play footprints a not to play print club song. But okay,
Speaker 2: you taught me this term part of my French niggaig.
Speaker 13: Nigga drums, nigga drums that he nigga drums, nigga drn.
Speaker 6: I need that dry.
Speaker 1: No, he's just it's just he taught me that term.
Speaker 1: He's just like it's like that's the secret.
Speaker 2: Like the music smooth, but the beat is so cracking
Speaker 2: and hard and just hard like it's it's it's like
Speaker 2: Freddy Fox punching you in the news.
Speaker 1: It's this ship over on top right, while like in
Speaker 1: my head, why was Freddy Fox? Yeah? The hip hop?
Speaker 2: Yeah, like damn it, we're getting a pound from busting rhymes,
Speaker 2: you know, like it's yeah, no, when busted pigs you up,
Speaker 2: it's you gotta hide your.
Speaker 1: Hands like him, him and the Angelo, Him and Angelo
Speaker 1: the like he pulls your finger like a thing.
Speaker 13: But he did is relentless deal do it all night.
Speaker 1: For two hours every since Primo says the same thing
Speaker 1: he has like he had after every two minutes. DM Buster,
Speaker 1: the reason why I get.
Speaker 2: Pounds out because they will pull your joints out of sockets,
Speaker 2: giving you.
Speaker 15: A pounds so hard test your manlihood.
Speaker 1: It's just now, it's just pounds.
Speaker 2: Man.
Speaker 1: It does.
Speaker 2: Somebody Q Tip work with his Diamond D, another legendary
Speaker 2: MC producer. Whereas Diamond D says the best producer on
Speaker 2: the Mic twenty twenty three, we linked in Atlanta and
Speaker 2: got to tell Diamond what he means in the cannon
Speaker 2: of hip hop production, sampling.
Speaker 1: And album Make It.
Speaker 11: Dog.
Speaker 2: The resume is scrown like some of my my my
Speaker 2: favorite producer moments comes from this gentleman years. I mean,
Speaker 2: we all of his records, Suns, Blunts and hip hop Hatred.
Speaker 2: I got to ask you about your your sophomore hatred,
Speaker 2: passionate infidelity like Dome Piece, the Gotham, and now your
Speaker 2: brand new joint the review which is excellent work. You've
Speaker 2: been doing quality, excellent work and sometimes it's easy to
Speaker 2: sort of take for granted. People do excellent work and
Speaker 2: they often get overlooked, and when top five lists and
Speaker 2: top ten lists are named, and you know, sometimes a
Speaker 2: person is so effortless that you tend to forget their contributions.
Speaker 1: But you know, that's what quest Love Supreme is for.
Speaker 1: So that's it.
Speaker 2: Let's welcome the one and only, finally, finally, Diamond. Am
Speaker 2: I allowed to call you Diamond D? Now?
Speaker 7: Of course?
Speaker 1: Okay, number one? Can you please?
Speaker 12: We allowed?
Speaker 1: No?
Speaker 6: No, no no.
Speaker 1: But here's the deal.
Speaker 2: I two versions of the album when it was like
Speaker 2: Diamond stump blumped in here and then there was Diamond.
Speaker 19: Well it was Diamond and psychoch Neurotics, Diamond Diamond psychoch Neurotics.
Speaker 2: So what was the situation with your name? It was
Speaker 2: there another Diamond D like back in the day that I.
Speaker 12: Don't know what.
Speaker 19: I'm not sure, but I think it might have been
Speaker 19: originally somebody that was signed to Weston Records of New York.
Speaker 6: Yeaheah. They did Tony Gardener at Heartbeat, like.
Speaker 12: You know, hot Shot was on that table, but I
Speaker 12: think somebody had the name.
Speaker 2: Yeah, okay, so yeah, well you know this is my
Speaker 2: favorite nerd out moment on Quest Love Supreme. So I'm
Speaker 2: gonna start from the beginning. What was your first musical memory?
Speaker 2: Time out? Let me go to og style. Where were
Speaker 2: you born?
Speaker 12: I was born in Manhattan, New York hospital.
Speaker 1: Wow, I never heard any Yeah, get to get to
Speaker 1: it all right, New York all right. Was raised in
Speaker 1: the Bronx. Okay, your first musical memory sitting.
Speaker 12: In my uncle's room and him just playing music.
Speaker 19: He had a large vinyl collection, So I was just
Speaker 19: sitting in his room, like eight nine years old, just
Speaker 19: didn't play records.
Speaker 1: What was he playing?
Speaker 19: Everything? Mostly mostly funk, jazz, soul, you know what I mean?
Speaker 19: Shouts out to Gary was he was?
Speaker 2: He very meriticulous with the collection, Like I've had an
Speaker 2: older cousin that was that way.
Speaker 1: But you couldn't touch the wax and.
Speaker 19: You know, yeah, definitely fresh, yeah, definitely. You know, you
Speaker 19: know you have to hold a record like this with
Speaker 19: both hands. He's very meticulous about his vinyls. And then
Speaker 19: you know, when I came along with the DJ and
Speaker 19: you know, we had to put our hands on the.
Speaker 1: Record, I was gonna say, how okay.
Speaker 2: So I've sometimes I try and explain to people the trouble,
Speaker 2: you know, I mean Teezy now that hip hop is
Speaker 2: and it's about to be in its fiftieth year for
Speaker 2: us also to take for you know, for granted its
Speaker 2: development and how you know far it's come. But you know,
Speaker 2: I try to explain to people that a lot of
Speaker 2: those pioneers, you know, Flash, got so much kickback or
Speaker 2: pushback if you will, you know, because the general idea
Speaker 2: is that you're going to destroy the needle or destroy
Speaker 2: the belt driver or the turntable.
Speaker 12: Like putting your fingers on the grooves. Those are big
Speaker 12: no nose.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I got punishment trying to uh, you know, like
Speaker 2: my first introduction in scratching, of course was you know,
Speaker 2: grand Master Flash on the wheels of steel and you know,
Speaker 2: trying to practice on my dad's you know, while he's
Speaker 2: not looking and see what happens and you get in trouble.
Speaker 2: But yeah, like how do you discover what that is
Speaker 2: in the bronx and where you like privy to any
Speaker 2: of those like block parties or anything.
Speaker 12: Oh yeah, they were like right outside, explain it.
Speaker 1: Take it.
Speaker 19: Growing up in Farvest projects me Fat Joe lor f Ness,
Speaker 19: we would all see DJs like you're in the same buildings,
Speaker 19: still the same same complex. But we would see guy
Speaker 19: like Grant with the Theadore mainly Theatre, Suntime Flash. At
Speaker 19: that point they were already making records, but we were
Speaker 19: able to just go downstairs and just see these jams
Speaker 19: going on in the parks.
Speaker 1: What was it? What was it like seeing?
Speaker 2: Because I'm assuming that you're too young for Harlem World
Speaker 2: or right, so I'm assuming that you're eleven or twelve
Speaker 2: year olday seem it? So what how does the trickle
Speaker 2: effect happen to you? Like where tapes the thing instantly
Speaker 2: or how do you get the information just.
Speaker 19: Watching it firsthand? You know, you've seen people out there,
Speaker 19: you know, with boxes, you know, recording or whatever. But
Speaker 19: we you know, I saw the firsthand, you know, when
Speaker 19: Flash made Grand Master Flash in the Wheels Steals, I
Speaker 19: had already seen him do some of that, you know,
Speaker 19: outside in the parks, cutting up good times, you know,
Speaker 19: shit like that. But just being close in proximity to
Speaker 19: it is what drew me and in fact quest when
Speaker 19: I was a little kid, whenever I saw the DJ
Speaker 19: reach for the damn right, I'm somebody album cover by
Speaker 19: the JB's you know, I would lose my mind because
Speaker 19: I knew he was gonna play blow your Head, and
Speaker 19: that sticked. Like even now as an adult, that always
Speaker 19: sticks out to me. A lot of times people ask me,
Speaker 19: you know, what's the first song to draw you into
Speaker 19: hip hop?
Speaker 12: I mentioned blow your Head.
Speaker 19: It's not a rap record, I know, it's just a
Speaker 19: break bead that was real popular, and as little kids
Speaker 19: we would lose our fucking mom when that shit came on.
Speaker 1: The hip hop legends continue.
Speaker 2: Eric Sherman and I had a one on one a
Speaker 2: few months ago in late twenty twenty four, and I
Speaker 2: told the EPMD co founder what a lot of fans say,
Speaker 2: even though he's from New York, he's kind of a
Speaker 2: G funk pioneer and creating a sound that was later.
Speaker 1: Popularized out of La Let's Listen.
Speaker 2: It wasn't often, especially back in eighty eight, where you
Speaker 2: would see a summit meeting of frus from opposite sides
Speaker 2: of the coast or you know, wherever they were from,
Speaker 2: like normally birds of a feather flocked together. And seeing
Speaker 2: Nwa in the Big Paypack video, it was like such
Speaker 2: a big deal for us, like yo, EPMD knows Nwa,
Speaker 2: like craz That's how me and Reek were like watching
Speaker 2: your TV reps like you are a g Funk pioneer
Speaker 2: that never got the credit, and you are also a
Speaker 2: neo soul pioneer that never got the credit. But do
Speaker 2: you think that because of the sort of the thick
Speaker 2: texture of your production for those like first two EPM
Speaker 2: D records where like the.
Speaker 1: Zap collaps, we like.
Speaker 2: Like that spoke to the West Coast more than any
Speaker 2: more than Public Enemy could have because it's touring.
Speaker 20: Don't forget this, it's touring, you know, So so you
Speaker 20: know that was a la was one of my biggest
Speaker 20: markets because the way they thought me. And when you
Speaker 20: hear Snoop telling the story, Snoop said, he drove to
Speaker 20: Britwood looking for me in Parish, right, because they don't
Speaker 20: forget this in Britwood in California. So he's so he's
Speaker 20: in Britwood thinking that we're from the suburbs.
Speaker 1: Oh okay, okay. So he told the story a.
Speaker 5: Couple of times.
Speaker 20: But anyway, being on tour, but me and Cube was tight,
Speaker 20: like like I had seven roses Zukie when I went
Speaker 20: to LAQ picked me up.
Speaker 5: He had seven roses Zukie, you know.
Speaker 20: And again at the end of the day, me and
Speaker 20: Dre was two people that was on both sides stample
Speaker 20: in Parliament.
Speaker 5: Don't forget them.
Speaker 20: He was doing it first in eighty seven before me
Speaker 20: and Parish even came out. It wasn't like, okay, people
Speaker 20: credit me. Like if you talk to dub C, he
Speaker 20: has say, yo, I gotta get the the West Coast.
Speaker 20: Hat to Eric sermon, because they showed us how to
Speaker 20: rap on this music. So while we was playing Roger,
Speaker 20: they rhyming on Roja. While we was playing Riding High,
Speaker 20: they were rapping on Riding High. So all the stuff
Speaker 20: that they hearing on the way that Me and Paris
Speaker 20: did the Funk records were different than what they was
Speaker 20: doing it, so it kind of gave them a blueprint.
Speaker 20: If you hear people talk, they say Dre enhanced the
Speaker 20: stuff I did by playing live. So if you hear
Speaker 20: woman to Woman fan but then be Bett, I just
Speaker 20: sampled it right. He did California Love and we played them.
Speaker 20: Now it's bigger so and then once epm D broke up,
Speaker 20: he was able to go to Roger too.
Speaker 1: You know, things of that nature.
Speaker 2: How are you developing your production skills and your rhyming
Speaker 2: skills in eighty seven in time for like your debut record,
Speaker 2: because you know, like how long did the epm D
Speaker 2: exist before you guys actually got strictly business.
Speaker 20: To the public one year see the ones that's fast.
Speaker 20: The one thing that you that we didn't know. We
Speaker 20: didn't know what the producer was. We thought every record
Speaker 20: you heard was done by that person.
Speaker 1: God, it's not crazy.
Speaker 20: So we're doing what we think we're supposed to be doing.
Speaker 20: We didn't know about we was producers. We never heard
Speaker 20: that word. We just wanted to make a record. So
Speaker 20: we took the break beach that we had that parents
Speaker 20: had out of DJ, took records from each other houses,
Speaker 20: the whole nine, and that's how we formulated epm D.
Speaker 5: You know, we made what was in front of us,
Speaker 5: not knowing what we were doing.
Speaker 1: Don't forget.
Speaker 12: We didn't know how to.
Speaker 5: Make a chorus.
Speaker 20: So Will Starklov called the awesome two All your two
Speaker 20: came and said, let me get that seven minutes to
Speaker 20: funk record because we just had the record looping. So
Speaker 20: when it's my thing, we said, it's my thing, there's
Speaker 20: nothing there, so Teddy ted said, give me, and he said,
Speaker 20: give me that record, so he found that for tip
Speaker 20: boom for tim boom, and then that fam f F
Speaker 20: bet So caught me how to format a chorus. I
Speaker 20: would never even known how to due a chorus or format.
Speaker 20: It was caught to me by the author too.
Speaker 1: So there was a version of It's My Thing that
Speaker 1: didn't have no version of this.
Speaker 20: Reportant record came out. The label was telling us that
Speaker 20: we needed to have a chorus and to know the
Speaker 20: chorus get ready to come in?
Speaker 1: Got it okay?
Speaker 9: Because all we had was it It's My Thing louder.
Speaker 20: All we had was that we didn't have the drum
Speaker 20: roll and the the horn to be like the boy
Speaker 20: can drop down and come back to the raps. We
Speaker 20: end up had to split it up so there's a
Speaker 20: chorus and then there's a part you riy on. And
Speaker 20: once we learned that, I went nuts and I started
Speaker 20: doing get down, get down. Time keeps on slipping. So
Speaker 20: now I was just knowing what to do now, And
Speaker 20: then when saying came out, I was like, to what
Speaker 20: you're saying.
Speaker 10: Now, we're in it.
Speaker 1: Now you're not a format of song.
Speaker 11: I get it.
Speaker 1: Curtis Blow was on qols in late twenty nineteen.
Speaker 2: He's a rap pioneer, with The Breaks being the first
Speaker 2: gold certified rap record and this clip, which celebrates Curtis.
Speaker 2: He also makes a point to honor the late Larry Smith,
Speaker 2: one of hip hop's first and most important producers, who
Speaker 2: sadly passed away.
Speaker 1: In twenty fourteen.
Speaker 16: I know, since you were the first to ever tour
Speaker 16: like this internationally, there had to be like some mistakes.
Speaker 16: There had to be like some moments where you and
Speaker 16: you and Russell were like, okay, so we're not going
Speaker 16: to do this like that again. Like there were just
Speaker 16: so many new things to you, guys, Like did you
Speaker 16: even know about writers? Did you know?
Speaker 13: Like what didn't you know that you learned in your first.
Speaker 1: How many lost pass for?
Speaker 10: Yes, I had to learn it all.
Speaker 1: I learned it all on Where's your Traveling?
Speaker 10: I was like that guy. Oh it was incredible.
Speaker 8: I was.
Speaker 10: I was the most sought after live act because it
Speaker 10: was just me and my DJ, just two people, two people,
Speaker 10: two turntables in the microphone. Really, yes, so not the
Speaker 10: first to start the choerage right right, So you're easy
Speaker 10: to work with. But then Russell in eighty one, Oh, boy. Yeah,
Speaker 10: so here he comes with Larry Smith. Larry Smith was
Speaker 10: playing bass, play bass on the breaks and Christmas rap
Speaker 10: and so.
Speaker 2: Larry Smith produced Orange Crust was the band for all
Speaker 2: those for Christmas rap.
Speaker 10: No no, no, no, no no, not Orange Crushed. That
Speaker 10: came after Russell took forty thousand dollars of my money
Speaker 10: and bought all his banning and he gave it to Larry.
Speaker 10: Larry bought the band equipment and they said, all right,
Speaker 10: you're going out with the band. I'm like, what how
Speaker 10: could you do that? I didn't okay this? He said, wait, hey,
Speaker 10: I'm the manager.
Speaker 5: Manager.
Speaker 1: You built Larry Larry uh Smith's career.
Speaker 10: Well budget that.
Speaker 13: Larry.
Speaker 10: I got to give props to him because he was
Speaker 10: excellent musician, incredible producer.
Speaker 12: You know.
Speaker 10: I remember many of the nights we sat up and
Speaker 10: talked about, you know, my sound and trying to get
Speaker 10: a sound that was in between James Brown and Chic
Speaker 10: and Larry was the man. He was definitely the man.
Speaker 1: I love him so who worked on like Christmas rapping
Speaker 1: and rapping blow.
Speaker 10: And yeah that was Larry. Larry was on the bass,
Speaker 10: but you had John Trope. I was on guitar, And
Speaker 10: we had Jimmy Braylile who actually went on to become
Speaker 10: a len drum a Lin drum programmer, and uh, he
Speaker 10: was on drums. And you know, so during that time,
Speaker 10: you know, we recorded in the studio like the seventies
Speaker 10: in the sixties, it was a live band, you know
Speaker 10: what I mean. And and and we had to rehearse
Speaker 10: and you know, let's play it one more time and
Speaker 10: record it and hopefully it would come out.
Speaker 14: Okay, I'm sorry, And we do White Guy in the
Speaker 14: Corner As a question, John Tropia.
Speaker 10: Yeah, the guitarist. Yes, so was he the guitar.
Speaker 14: He's a to me, he's the famous jazz guitarist.
Speaker 10: Right, and he's on the breaks.
Speaker 1: Wow, that's his work.
Speaker 10: That's his work on the break.
Speaker 21: On run DMC stuff that was not well Edie did Martinez,
Speaker 21: Eddie Martinez.
Speaker 14: And wow, no, I need to process. I'm not schooling
Speaker 14: on anything. I don't know too much about about him.
Speaker 14: I just have a few records.
Speaker 3: You know.
Speaker 13: He don't get blown away easily.
Speaker 1: But it is Curtis. That's just really yeah, weird, unexpected,
Speaker 1: unexpected name.
Speaker 10: Yeah, yeah, but he's he's a legend, definitely a legend,
Speaker 10: and you know, I seeing him in the studio because
Speaker 10: of my producer, JB. Moore was also a guitar player,
Speaker 10: and he couldn't do the guitars right the way we
Speaker 10: wanted it and the way he wanted it actually, and
Speaker 10: so when John came in and played it perfect, perfect
Speaker 10: rhythm and it was just immaculate, you know.
Speaker 5: Drives him.
Speaker 1: So for your first album, like, whose idea was it
Speaker 1: to do? Like taking care of business.
Speaker 16: To the girl? What's the other one?
Speaker 1: That the slow one that's like.
Speaker 6: All I want.
Speaker 10: Fir.
Speaker 2: People don't even credit that as the first love ballot.
Speaker 2: So it's like for you, you were making a format
Speaker 2: that was palatable. The radio was like Frankie Crocker on
Speaker 2: your mind, like okay, the label saying we need something
Speaker 2: that you know.
Speaker 10: Right, Well, it was all by design, of course.
Speaker 13: You know.
Speaker 10: We wanted to, you know, have a fusion and with
Speaker 10: other forms of music because they was so brand new,
Speaker 10: this thing hip hop and rap, you know, so why
Speaker 10: not rap over a rock and roll song? Why not
Speaker 10: have a reggae rap? Or I was the first to
Speaker 10: do a country in Western rap, that Way Out West song.
Speaker 10: You know, you know, we we we just tried to
Speaker 10: be different and try to give something new.
Speaker 16: In retrospect, though, do you see how like free you
Speaker 16: were in that moment, Because I feel like a lot
Speaker 16: of EMC's today out the gate couldn't just say I'm
Speaker 16: producing that in this different genre.
Speaker 13: I'm like, they won't they want to be allowed to.
Speaker 10: Well here's the thing. I always wanted to be a singer,
Speaker 10: and I remember singing those singing songs that every album
Speaker 10: I put on, the singing But listen, folks, it took
Speaker 10: me a couple of weeks to do those.
Speaker 2: In Philadelphia Party Time, very big record, yes, which of
Speaker 2: course you know well that Tracy Lee like try to
Speaker 2: bring try to bring that back. So that was the
Speaker 2: first time I ever heard Full Force on record. So
Speaker 2: how did you how did you hook up with those
Speaker 2: guys as far as like did they produce that record?
Speaker 1: Were they just the band or like what was how
Speaker 1: did you guys.
Speaker 10: They became producers after that because we sat in the
Speaker 10: studio and talked about you know, uh JB. Moore and
Speaker 10: Robert Ford and what they were doing on my stuff
Speaker 10: and how they wanted to do the same thing but
Speaker 10: differently more funkier or more creative. Uh so they were incredible.
Speaker 10: I met them through JB. Moore and Robert Ford and
Speaker 10: very very, very talented musicians and singers, and it was
Speaker 10: incredible just to be a part of that. But the
Speaker 10: Go Go song, talk about it, trouble for Wow Tub
Speaker 10: that was EU. So here it is on my birthday
Speaker 10: I turned twenty one years old. I had the number
Speaker 10: one record in the country, and so I'm going down
Speaker 10: to play the Capital Center down in d C. So
Speaker 10: I had my band, remember the Orange Crushed band. I
Speaker 10: ain't got ten bollies and oh man, we got like
Speaker 10: eight eight nine pieces.
Speaker 9: Right.
Speaker 10: We rolled down to the Capital Center and I'm headlining
Speaker 10: this concert and they have all these local bands there
Speaker 10: and I didn't know what they were, you know what
Speaker 10: it was. So I'm walking the spot. I'm here first time,
Speaker 10: that first time I'm here in Go Go you were you.
Speaker 10: The whole crowd is going crazy. I'm saying, oh, I'm
Speaker 10: about to tear this.
Speaker 3: Right.
Speaker 10: So they were going crazy and it was a band
Speaker 10: called Trouble Funk. Then another band came on, EU Freeze. Right,
Speaker 10: they went on the same thing, but now and the
Speaker 10: crowd is going crazy again, even more crazy. So I'm like, wow,
Speaker 10: Chuck Brown, was it?
Speaker 12: Oh my god?
Speaker 10: Right the Godfather he comes out and tears up the
Speaker 10: spot too. So it's my turn. So I locked it,
Speaker 10: let me music up. I throw on Christmas Wrapping and
Speaker 10: we're playing Christmas Wrapping. The band is tight, clean and everything,
Speaker 10: but the crowd is like this looking at us, like
Speaker 10: I'm like, oh my gosh, we better get to the breaks,
Speaker 10: and you know, quick on this one here right, So
Speaker 10: I'm speeding through the set and then we throw on
Speaker 10: the brakes, clap your hands over here, right right, and
Speaker 10: then like still right, number one record in the country.
Speaker 10: And so that night I got my butt tore up
Speaker 10: three or four different times. And for me, it was
Speaker 10: like my mom's always said they you can't beat them,
Speaker 10: join them.
Speaker 1: Hell yeah.
Speaker 10: So I got all that numbers.
Speaker 1: Nice. Nice.
Speaker 10: Next year, I called my boys sugar Bear.
Speaker 1: And the Sugar Band didn't playing on parties.
Speaker 10: We did a party time, damn. Okay, yeah, okay, And
Speaker 10: it's just wonderful to have them in the studio just
Speaker 10: doing that thing live.
Speaker 16: And how many pieces in the studio in that moment.
Speaker 10: Oh yeah, it was like seven eight pieces.
Speaker 8: Yeah.
Speaker 16: And so you were the first for that too. I'm
Speaker 16: guessing the first to do a go go collapse.
Speaker 2: Well, no, because Flash of them did. They did a
Speaker 2: live version. Well, they actually signed Trouble Funk two Sugar Records.
Speaker 2: The first live Go Go that I've.
Speaker 1: Heard was Trouble Funk Live on Sugar Hills. So the
Speaker 1: Robinson's got there early on that.
Speaker 10: And then actually actually the first sample loop right was
Speaker 10: on the song If I Ruled the World, and and
Speaker 10: the sample was Trouble Funk. You know that pump pump, pump.
Speaker 1: Push.
Speaker 10: I took the percussion part and laid it under If
Speaker 10: I Wrote the World.
Speaker 2: Okay, okay, how did that feel for you to have
Speaker 2: that song come back and for people to learn that
Speaker 2: you're you know, you're the origin of of of that
Speaker 2: particular song, because that's all means so much too.
Speaker 1: I like your harmonies, fans, and.
Speaker 10: You got that harmonies.
Speaker 5: Okay right there?
Speaker 1: You know it was you and Allison Williams actually right,
Speaker 1: that's Alison singing.
Speaker 10: Yes, yes, yes, that ters and Audrey Wheeler yes.
Speaker 12: Yes, yes, and so harmonies were better.
Speaker 11: It was.
Speaker 10: It was awesome. It's it's the ultimate and flattery to
Speaker 10: hear your song on the radio that you recorded some
Speaker 10: time ago. I remember when Sony sent me the tape.
Speaker 10: They sent me a cassette tape, and it was awesome.
Speaker 10: I sat there and played the tape in my car
Speaker 10: for about three hours, kept rewinding and rewinding it.
Speaker 1: You know.
Speaker 10: It was like, Oh my god, that's gotta be Laurence Hill.
Speaker 10: That's gotta be Lauryn Hill.
Speaker 12: You know.
Speaker 10: So I called them back. I said, look, Sony, you
Speaker 10: guys got a big, major, major, monster hit on you.
Speaker 10: You better put all your promotion in this because this
Speaker 10: is going platinum. It went, It went triple platinum.
Speaker 16: Now did you think that were too close or.
Speaker 10: The same thing? But I didn't hear it. I didn't
Speaker 10: hear that song. Like like I sat and you know,
Speaker 10: listened to If I Rule the World because I feel like.
Speaker 16: The checks are the same, like that Songlain the World
Speaker 16: right about next to close it.
Speaker 10: It was huge yet one song of the year. I
Speaker 10: think in nineties something Jesus Christ.
Speaker 1: I forgot about next.
Speaker 16: Christ, that song like the song that you get annoyed
Speaker 16: because it just played all the time that the dance.
Speaker 1: For you know, as a DJ, I need that song,
Speaker 1: so I get it.
Speaker 2: What better place to close than with the legendary Jimmy
Speaker 2: jam We spoke for like seven hours, and really it's
Speaker 2: all flowers. But here's the one area that I especially like.
Speaker 2: This is serious of life goals here. Yeah, let's just
Speaker 2: we're starting from the where were you born, sir?
Speaker 11: Minneapolis, Minnesota.
Speaker 1: Okay, what part of what part of Minneapolis?
Speaker 11: I grew up South Minneapolis, So you know, I can
Speaker 11: say like forty first in Portland Avenue, which doesn't mean
Speaker 11: a lot to anybody, but you know, if you think
Speaker 11: of downtown, it's like, you know, First Street, Second Street,
Speaker 11: you know, First Avenue, so on and so forth. I
Speaker 11: lived forty one blocks south of downtown.
Speaker 2: I feel like when any black person is from the
Speaker 2: south side of town, south side of east side, that
Speaker 2: means something going on.
Speaker 1: Like what part of what was the town part of
Speaker 1: town to not go to? In Minneapolis?
Speaker 11: Uh well, okay, if you were black, the northeast was
Speaker 11: where to not go to. It was called actually the
Speaker 11: northeast is what we called it. Where the white people lived. Yeah.
Speaker 1: Yeah, every town has the white people.
Speaker 11: The white people didn't didn't necessarily want us to be there,
Speaker 11: you know, because white people live every I mean, let's
Speaker 11: face it, back, growing up I think the state population
Speaker 11: was something like three percent black, and maybe it was
Speaker 11: eight percent black in Minneapolis or something like that. So
Speaker 11: pretty much white people were everywhere. But certainly, uh, you know,
Speaker 11: everybody was very tolerant, I guess, I would say, and
Speaker 11: it was very progressive town. But as you can tell
Speaker 11: from the music, it came out of there. I think
Speaker 11: that's had a lot to do with it. But no,
Speaker 11: I mean, really, the north side probably is where the
Speaker 11: folks were. You know, I was one of the only
Speaker 11: South side guy. I mean in Prince obviously because we
Speaker 11: went to school together and stuff. But on the north
Speaker 11: side of town you had you know, Morris Day, Jellybean,
Speaker 11: Terry Lewis, you know, and you had the community center
Speaker 11: called the Way, which everybody used to rehearse at and
Speaker 11: that kind of thing. So it was a lot more
Speaker 11: happening on the north side of town, I would say
Speaker 11: that on the south side.
Speaker 2: So in your formative years, how many of your contemporaries
Speaker 2: and peers that you were professional with would you see
Speaker 2: on a regular basis?
Speaker 11: Everybody? Man, it was a it was a small community,
Speaker 11: it was it was. It was a lot like I
Speaker 11: always say that Purple Rain, the movie was a kind
Speaker 11: of a It was fiction, but it was it told
Speaker 11: a lot of truth. And that was there was like
Speaker 11: a couple of clubs you could play at, and there
Speaker 11: was more bands than the clubs could hold. So it
Speaker 11: made for a very competitive situation where if your band
Speaker 11: wasn't firing, you just wouldn't be playing in the club.
Speaker 11: And so that's the way we grew up. So there
Speaker 11: was like the Elks Lounge. There was a club called
Speaker 11: the Nakarima. Nakaima was actually American spelled backwards. And you know,
Speaker 11: the Cozy Bar was another place. There was a place
Speaker 11: called the Flame, and you know, so between you know,
Speaker 11: back in that day, you had you know, my band,
Speaker 11: I had a band called Mind and Matter, Terry had
Speaker 11: Flight Time. We were together and then we were apart.
Speaker 11: We were you know, we were going back and forth
Speaker 11: a lot. And then Prince had Grand Central. Morris had
Speaker 11: a band called the Enterprise Band of Pleasure at one point,
Speaker 11: you know, so on and so forth. So what happened
Speaker 11: was there was all these bands, but there's only a
Speaker 11: couple of places to play. But all of those guys,
Speaker 11: and particularly people like and and really the best, probably
Speaker 11: the baddest dude up there was Sonny Thompson.
Speaker 2: Everyone speaks of Sonny Thompson like he's God. Yeah, Like,
Speaker 2: what is it about, what is the legend of Sonny Thompson.
Speaker 11: Well, Sonny Thompson. I remember back when I first met Terry,
Speaker 11: and I remember we put our little band together and stuff,
Speaker 11: and then they used to do these big outdoor festivals
Speaker 11: at a place called the Philliswheetlely, which is a big
Speaker 11: community center, and they used to do these outdoor concerts
Speaker 11: and I remember seeing they had a band, actually the
Speaker 11: original band that was called the Family. Sonny Thompson was
Speaker 11: in that band. But I'd never seen a brother play
Speaker 11: the guitar like that.
Speaker 1: I mean, he just was like.
Speaker 11: He was like legendary. He was like the dude. And
Speaker 11: on top of it, he had the attitude like if
Speaker 11: you didn't like him or you didn't like the way
Speaker 11: he was playing, he was gonna come down to kick
Speaker 11: your ass. Right, So he'd played the gig and stuff,
Speaker 11: and then afterwards if he'd like, look at it you
Speaker 11: and you'd say to him, oh man, he killed it, Sonny. Man,
Speaker 11: that was amazing, because you better say that. But the
Speaker 11: good news was he always what he was. He was amazing,
Speaker 11: and he was a dude. Did everybody just kind of
Speaker 11: stopped and stared and went, damn.
Speaker 1: What was his style of playing?
Speaker 11: He was a great rhythm player. He played with a
Speaker 11: lot of aggression.
Speaker 5: You know.
Speaker 11: The thing I always said about about Prince and the
Speaker 11: way he played is I've never seen anybody attack instruments
Speaker 11: the way Prince did. Like he literally attacked the instruments
Speaker 11: louder or just toned well, you know he would. I
Speaker 11: mean I always say, like, for instance, Terry, you know,
Speaker 11: Terry's a great bass player, There's no doubt about it.
Speaker 11: But you know how we always use the analogy like
Speaker 11: in basketball, people that make you better. Prince was that person, right,
Speaker 11: So Terry would be playing a bass part and Prince
Speaker 11: would take the bass from Terry and go, no, play
Speaker 11: it like this, and then he'd play it, and then
Speaker 11: he'd had Terry the bass back, and Terry would look
Speaker 11: at the bass like he'd never seen it before. You know,
Speaker 11: It's like damn, you know so that but that was
Speaker 11: the way Sonny was, and I think Prince got a
Speaker 11: lot of that from Sonny. Attack of the instruments, And
Speaker 11: it's the same with the keyboards. We used to break
Speaker 11: keyboards all the time because it wasn't like you would
Speaker 11: just hit the keyboard politely. It was like we were
Speaker 11: doing all kind of swoops and wow wow on all
Speaker 11: that kind of stuff, Like we would break keyboards. I
Speaker 11: mean that kind of stuff. I mean that was the
Speaker 11: way he wanted you to play. And so I mean
Speaker 11: that that kind of attitude, to me was the thing
Speaker 11: that you know, set him apart, along with a whole
Speaker 11: lot of other things, but it really set Prince apart
Speaker 11: for sure.
Speaker 2: What were the what was a gold club to play
Speaker 2: in Minneapolis at the time, Like, was First Avenue a
Speaker 2: dream that was unattainable?
Speaker 11: No, Actually, here's an interesting thing. Yeah, Now First Avenue
Speaker 11: was actually the first place that actually allowed like black
Speaker 11: bands to play.
Speaker 1: So there was a quiet segregation or oh it was
Speaker 1: not in your fleece, Oh it was, I.
Speaker 11: Guess, I guess you could say it was quiet. I mean,
Speaker 11: if you were a band and you were trying to
Speaker 11: play somewhere, you knew there were that were just unattainable,
Speaker 11: you just weren't going to play that club. And I
Speaker 11: thank god to this day that that happened because what
Speaker 11: it did as history has always shown with black folks
Speaker 11: is from adversity comes all good things. You know, you
Speaker 11: look at what you don't have, and then you figure
Speaker 11: out that you can't go the easy route that everybody
Speaker 11: else is going, and then you figure out a way
Speaker 11: to go get it done. So what we used to
Speaker 11: do back in the day, we knew we couldn't play
Speaker 11: I can't remember even the names of the clubs, but
Speaker 11: there was all these very fancy white clubs and they
Speaker 11: all had white bands, but they were all playing R
Speaker 11: and B music, which was ironic. We knew we couldn't
Speaker 11: play those clubs. So what we would do is, for instance,
Speaker 11: there was a hotel downtown called the Dykeman Hotel. It
Speaker 11: was a hotel that was probably about a year away from,
Speaker 11: you know, being torn down. I mean, it was just
Speaker 11: nobody stayed there. Rooms were ratty, the whole thing. But
Speaker 11: what they had was a big ballroom. What we would
Speaker 11: do is we would take you know, we'd go to
Speaker 11: the owner of the hotel and we'd say, hey, can
Speaker 11: we rent the ballroom out. We'll give you the liquor,
Speaker 11: whatever the liquor sales are, you keep and we'll take
Speaker 11: the door. We'll charge you know, three bucks at the
Speaker 11: door or whatever. And so what it did is it
Speaker 11: forced us to become entrepreneurs because it wasn't like we
Speaker 11: just had the talent we could go play. It was like, okay,
Speaker 11: we got the talent, Now we got to figure out
Speaker 11: how we're going to go play. So we would do that.
Speaker 11: Now we now back in the day, there's no Twitter
Speaker 11: and no social media, so it was go to institut prints.
Speaker 11: That was the place you go. You print up a
Speaker 11: bunch of flyers and then you put them on people's
Speaker 11: cars and you'd say, you know, ladies get in free
Speaker 11: two for one drink. So you'd say whatever the heck
Speaker 11: you needed to say to get them to get them down.
Speaker 11: And all of a sudden, you get on Saturday night,
Speaker 11: and all of a sudden, you'd get fifteen hundred people
Speaker 11: in this ballroom. Meanwhile, the white clubs are sitting empty.
Speaker 11: So now they're going, wait, where's everybody at tonight? And
Speaker 11: they're like, well, they're all going to see the band
Speaker 11: you wouldn't let play at your club. And so what
Speaker 11: happened after that was there began to be a little
Speaker 11: bit of a thing where people begin to recognize that
Speaker 11: maybe there's a talent, or maybe we should let these
Speaker 11: folks in, you know, because these guys are talent and
Speaker 11: they're obviously drawing, right. But the first person to really
Speaker 11: act upon it was Steve McClellan at First Avenue who said,
Speaker 11: we'll book you guys in what was called Seventh Street Entry,
Speaker 11: which is like the little club, right, so if you
Speaker 11: were cool there, if you could get it going there,
Speaker 11: then we'll move you to the main room. But he
Speaker 11: was the one that really gave us the shot, and
Speaker 11: he gave you know, back then, it wasn't just by
Speaker 11: the way, It wasn't just black bands, but it was
Speaker 11: like new wave bands you think about, like the Replacements
Speaker 11: and the Suburbs and all of those bands. Those bands
Speaker 11: all started, those white bands all started in that Seventh
Speaker 11: Street Entry.
Speaker 1: We even mix it with those guys at all, Like
Speaker 1: would you see Replacements and m.
Speaker 11: We didn't mix it all, not I mean just because
Speaker 11: we didn't. It wasn't it. We didn't like them. We
Speaker 11: were aware of them, and I think they were aware
Speaker 11: of us. But we know we never mixed together at all.
Speaker 11: It was just kind of the same dudes from the
Speaker 11: neighborhood that we grew up with it was all of
Speaker 11: those same guys all together.
Speaker 2: So kind of jumping ahead a little bit, did you
Speaker 2: have goals to make it out of Minnesota or or
Speaker 2: was it just like, Okay, we'll just be a local
Speaker 2: band here and maybe well no, I mean I'll get
Speaker 2: a job.
Speaker 1: Like are your parents supportive of this? Or well?
Speaker 11: Okay, so two really good questions.
Speaker 1: So my parents.
Speaker 11: First of all, my dad played in a band and
Speaker 11: was always a professional musician. Used to take me to
Speaker 11: rehearsals and stuff back when I was, you know, six
Speaker 11: seven years old, and I you know, at that point,
Speaker 11: I had the music bug totally, so I got to
Speaker 11: see it. I used to used to get to go
Speaker 11: to the studio and the whole thing. But he was
Speaker 11: always he never made it really where he wanted to.
Speaker 11: He was always kind of that guy on the cusp
Speaker 11: of making it.
Speaker 5: You know.
Speaker 11: He'd get on a few back in the day, there
Speaker 11: were kind of regional records that were hits, and my
Speaker 11: dad would play on those records and then they'd ask
Speaker 11: him to go tour. But because at that point of
Speaker 11: his life he had me and he had gotten married,
Speaker 11: my mom always used to kind of frown upon, you know, like, well, no,
Speaker 11: you can't. You got responsibilities, you got family, and you
Speaker 11: got you know, you can't just run off and go
Speaker 11: on tour and that kind of stuff. And that really
Speaker 11: affected what happened with me because when I got to
Speaker 11: the point where I really wanted to do music, my
Speaker 11: mom was one hundred percent behind me because she realized
Speaker 11: that my dad never had a chance to do what
Speaker 11: he the way he wanted to do it. So she
Speaker 11: really kind of stepped out of my way and was
Speaker 11: very supportive of me. So that was huge for me.
Speaker 11: By the way, and they because they separated and so
Speaker 11: or they got divorced, and so I basically stayed with
Speaker 11: my mom. So she said, you know whatever, as long
Speaker 11: as I see you doing music, you can do whatever
Speaker 11: the heck you want to do. But you know, as
Speaker 11: long as you was serious about it and that kind
Speaker 11: of thing. So that was that was important.
Speaker 1: What was the industry in Minnesota?
Speaker 2: Like if cars were Detroit and black families were there,
Speaker 2: middle class and buying instruments and stuff, and the same
Speaker 2: for factories in Indiana and the Midwest, what was the
Speaker 2: industry in Minnesota that kept was that an industry town
Speaker 2: at all?
Speaker 11: Well, the things I remember growing up were first of
Speaker 11: all Grain and Flower. I remember Gold Metal Flower was
Speaker 11: a big company back in the day. Pillsbury was up there,
Speaker 11: big company general.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I forgot I now realize.
Speaker 4: He said that the ghetto boys thought he had came,
Speaker 4: but it was Gold Metal Flower.
Speaker 1: Now I get it. It was Flower. Thank you for
Speaker 1: serving that mystery I was made because of his accent.
Speaker 1: You know, I thought so myster.
Speaker 11: I didn't know there was a mystery.
Speaker 1: No, we had it, but I just didn't.
Speaker 11: You didn't put it together that that's what he was saying.
Speaker 11: But all of those were up there, and obviously three
Speaker 11: M was up there to Honeywell. There were some some
Speaker 11: pretty big companies up there, for sure, but just to
Speaker 11: and just to wrap the other thing we were saying.
Speaker 11: The whole idea, yes, was to get out of town.
Speaker 11: That was our focus because we knew we couldn't sit
Speaker 11: around and depend on playing in the clubs that weren't
Speaker 11: gonna let us play, And we knew that we couldn't
Speaker 11: make it playing in a club circuit where there's two
Speaker 11: or three clubs and there's eight bands or whatever it is,
Speaker 11: like that was not going to happen. So we set
Speaker 11: our sites always on making it nationally. That was our
Speaker 11: whole thing. When Prince made it out, that showed us
Speaker 11: that it can happen. And it also because he was
Speaker 11: so unique in what he did, that then brought everybody
Speaker 11: started looking at Minneapolis like, Okay, what else is up there?
Speaker 11: Because that that happens with all talents, happened with Seattle, happens,
Speaker 11: you know, that's just the thing that happens. It's like
Speaker 11: something great comes out and it's like, oh, what what
Speaker 11: else is there? What else is there? So we were
Speaker 11: definitely the beneficiaries of that. And there's a lot of
Speaker 11: great I will say, a lot of talented white musicians
Speaker 11: playing R and B music that never made it out
Speaker 11: of Minneapolis. Some of them made it out because Jesse
Speaker 11: took a couple folks with him and when he did
Speaker 11: his band Jesse Johnson Review the Peter the Peterson's. How
Speaker 11: many Peterson's were there?
Speaker 1: A lot?
Speaker 11: Yeah, that was the That was the musical family up there.
Speaker 11: I mean, just so much talent, you know, but there
Speaker 11: were but there were other ones too, And I'm just
Speaker 11: kind of I'm blanking our names and stuff, But there
Speaker 11: was a lot of talent. But because they didn't. They
Speaker 11: were very comfortable, so they had no reason to try
Speaker 11: to think outside of getting out of Minneapolis or anything
Speaker 11: like that. Like, we were so a lot of great
Speaker 11: talent up there that people didn't know about until, like
Speaker 11: I say, until that time when you know, Jesse picked
Speaker 11: up a few people and I'm trying to think Margaret Cox,
Speaker 11: who was actually Tomorrow Margie. But yeah, but Margaret Cox
Speaker 11: was insanely talented, you know, so as a singer. So yeah,
Speaker 11: people like that.
Speaker 2: So when can I assume that Funky Town was the
Speaker 2: first at least indication that an escape could be made
Speaker 2: or something could happen.
Speaker 1: Was that just like a fluke went off in your eyes?
Speaker 11: Well for us, you know, Prince was the example that
Speaker 11: you could make it because see Prince was like three
Speaker 11: years before Funky I forgot yeah towns seven but no,
Speaker 11: but but but but Funky Town was eighties and that
Speaker 11: was you know, at the height of the disco craze
Speaker 11: and when it was and actually when disco was being
Speaker 11: played on the radio, not only in the clubs, but
Speaker 11: actually the format because I'm remember we had a radio
Speaker 11: station up there that went from a rock format to
Speaker 11: a disco format, which was very controversial, but disco was
Speaker 11: hot at that point in time.
Speaker 1: But we thought, what did you grow up listening on? Like,
Speaker 1: what were you listening to?
Speaker 5: Grow?
Speaker 11: For me, yeah, well there was nothing but pop radio
Speaker 11: up there. I mean, I grew up as a kid.
Speaker 11: My earliest memories were always you know, I always loved
Speaker 11: the harmony groups. I loved Seals and Cross America America. Yeah,
Speaker 11: you know that kind of stuff. Bred that was. I mean,
Speaker 11: to this day, that's the way I stacked my harmonies
Speaker 11: because of the way they sang those songs. Back then,
Speaker 11: a little bit later in life, I liked, like, around
Speaker 11: the time I met Terry, I was really into Chicago
Speaker 11: that was. That was my favorite band ever, you know,
Speaker 11: and me and Terry both loved them. And then Terry
Speaker 11: then turned me on to when I met him, he
Speaker 11: turned me on to earth Wind and Fired, Tower of Power,
Speaker 11: New Birth I met in seventy two. Okay, yeah, so
Speaker 11: we're just so we're talking last days in time, earth
Speaker 11: Wind and Fire and Music in my mind Stevie Wonder.
Speaker 11: You know, these were the albums and Terry turned me
Speaker 11: on to those.
Speaker 1: Black radio. You didn't have no black radio experience at
Speaker 1: the age of ten, twelve.
Speaker 11: There wasn't a black radio experience for me. When I
Speaker 11: got into high school, I was really into or junior
Speaker 11: high and into high school, I was really into Gambling,
Speaker 11: huff and everything coming out of Philadelphia. Blue Magic was
Speaker 11: my favorite all time group. I know everybody was into stylistics,
Speaker 11: but Blue Magic was my group.
Speaker 1: But how could you hear it or see it?
Speaker 9: Was?
Speaker 11: Oh yeah, Soul Train definitely was on and you definitely
Speaker 11: would hear it on Soul Train. But I I remember
Speaker 11: I had a friend of mine whose dad was an
Speaker 11: executive of music Land, which is one of the big
Speaker 11: retail stores back in the day. So he used to
Speaker 11: get every single record that came out. And my thing
Speaker 11: was I was always a big liner note reader and
Speaker 11: a big label reader.
Speaker 6: So my thing was we all collector if I's A
Speaker 6: and Ville, yes, So.
Speaker 11: My whole thing was. I remember there were records that
Speaker 11: would come out and I would particularly during the Motown
Speaker 11: era because I really I really loved the Motown records,
Speaker 11: all of that stuff, the Holland Dozer, Holland, like I
Speaker 11: remember I did. I remember looking at a Supremes album
Speaker 11: at a like a family reunion or something back in
Speaker 11: sixty two or something or sixty. So I was like
Speaker 11: three or four years old, and I remember that Holland
Speaker 11: Dozer Holland it was. The album was called The Supreme
Speaker 11: sing Holland Dozer Holland Gold Record, and I the gold record, right,
Speaker 11: I had no idea what that meant. Well, I kept going,
Speaker 11: what does this mean? What do you mean they singing
Speaker 11: Holland Dozer Holland, And somebody explained to me, no, they
Speaker 11: wrote the songs. The girls are the singers, but somebody
Speaker 11: wrote the songs. And something went off in my head
Speaker 11: at that point. That always made me look who wrote it,
Speaker 11: who produced it? And so I remember like all the
Speaker 11: Motown records would be the first ones I'd always go to.
Speaker 11: And I remember like staring at the first time I
Speaker 11: heard I Want You Back and five and you know
Speaker 11: Dinah Ross and Dinah Ross presents the Jackson five, and
Speaker 11: I thought, oh, wow, that's cool. And I looked down
Speaker 11: the record. I'm like, well, I don't see Donna Ross's
Speaker 11: name anywhere on here. Right, there's some dudes called the Corporation.
Speaker 11: I got to find out who the corporation is, you know.
Speaker 11: So that was always my my thing. And and and
Speaker 11: I knew that because what I learned was there were
Speaker 11: certain there were groups I like, but it was all
Speaker 11: about who produced them.
Speaker 1: Like it was.
Speaker 11: It was like, you know, like Eddie Kendricks could come
Speaker 11: out with a song and I would be like, Yeah,
Speaker 11: that's okay. And then you come out with a song,
Speaker 11: I go, oh, I love that song. Okay, who did
Speaker 11: that song? Okay, Leonard Casting and you know, Frank Wilson
Speaker 11: and okay. And then I'd hear another song that had
Speaker 11: nothing to do with Eddie Kendricks, but I'd go, oh,
Speaker 11: I like that track. Who did that? And it'd be
Speaker 11: the same dudes, right, And and that's when I got
Speaker 11: That's when I started going, Okay, that's that's my thing.
Speaker 11: And so for me, that's what always excited me. And
Speaker 11: that's what you know, ultimately made me want to become
Speaker 11: a songwriter and a producer.
Speaker 6: All right.
Speaker 2: That was Jimmy Jim And I think you all for
Speaker 2: tuning in, and please give people their flowers while they
Speaker 2: can still smell them, all right.
Speaker 1: Quest Love Supreme is a production of iHeartRadio. For more
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