00:00:00 Speaker 1: Quest Love Show is a production of iHeart Radio all Right. So, with the exception of Darius Rutgers episode, I don't believe that we here at QLs via Questlove Supreme or The Quest Love Show has had a bonafide, bonafide country music artists in our presence. I've had the pleasure of playing drums with our guest today at of all places, the Essence Festival. I knew then that I wanted to have her as a guest on the show. Our guest today has definitely created a lane for herself where I guess one seemingly really didn't exist, and one fast needs me about her story is not just you know, all the accolades that she's had, the Grammy nominations, or the TV appearances, the high profile appearances magazine covers, YadA, YadA, YadA, But it's it's the journey that sometimes the path to finding your voice means that you got to get it, you know, out of your comfort zone and step into a space that wasn't exactly built with you in mind, and deciding that you're going to own that space and be there anyway, and that you know, there's a lot of commonality. I guess I felt commonality just in my experiences, so I definitely wanted to have this conversation. And her music, especially with songs like black Like Me Remember her Name, of course, sparked conversations that country music is basically has been on my sideline view a sort of avoiding. She miraculously hosted the the CMAS. Oh ACMs, I'm sorry, it's all. 00:02:06 Speaker 2: They all sound the same. There's ACMs and the CMAS, the Academy of Country Music Awards, and I did. 00:02:12 Speaker 1: Not know the difference between. Yeah, okay, I got it. Of course I was there to watch her seeing the national anthem at the super Bowl. She's built a global audience. We're definitely talking about China, something that was not on my Bengo card. We're just going to talk about the journey of our guest today, the one and only Mickey Guyden. 00:02:33 Speaker 3: Thank you for coming on the Quest Loft Show. How are you there? 00:02:36 Speaker 2: I am so good. You know I am a huge Quest Love fan, so it is an honor to be able to sit here and speak with you. Really, you are a legend in my household. 00:02:47 Speaker 1: I appreciate that. 00:02:48 Speaker 3: Thank you so much. 00:02:49 Speaker 1: So right now, where are you speaking to us from? Are you at home or on the road? 00:02:54 Speaker 2: Where you actually in Los Angeles, California. I'm taking a little bit of break since I've been and I came back from China, so I'm here in Los Angeles, California. 00:03:03 Speaker 1: Got it? Okay, Well, I'll just ask, and I guess I shouldn't be surprised, being as though for the last thirty years, I can definitely say that the roots have been like at least in twelve very specific places like the Lincoln cent or whatever, like where we're the first yeah pop act to be there. You know, you think, like so late in the game, like how are the roots playing places that some of these big platinum artists haven't played? But I'm in surprise as a bound. What is in China that is common with what I would know as country culture. 00:03:40 Speaker 2: Or just absolutely nothing? There is nothing in common. I guess. The biggest country song in China is Country Roads take Me Home by John Dimver. That song, believe it or not, is massive out there. A lot of people learned English listen to that song, so that song is very endearing to the people out there. But even how I even got out there, I got out there, it's just so random and I would never ever ever do something like this, but it was this show called The Singer, and so I went on it. And it's like basically like Master Chef, but for musicians. So it's like professional musicians all over the world, including China. 00:04:25 Speaker 1: Oh wait, you're the contestant. You're not the job I was. I was not. 00:04:29 Speaker 2: I was a contestant. Chante Moore did it the year before me. 00:04:32 Speaker 1: Jesse J. 00:04:34 Speaker 2: Yeah, jesse J did it in twenty eighteen. 00:04:36 Speaker 1: So even established people can. 00:04:39 Speaker 2: Yeah. It's the craziest thing. It gives you all whole different audience that you would never be you know, open to, especially on my side of country music. And that was kind of my uh reason for doing it. I was like, well, why can't I bring country music out to China? 00:04:57 Speaker 1: So who presented this opportunity to you? 00:05:01 Speaker 2: They found me, they asked yes, And at first I was like, absolutely not. Is this a scam? Is what I thought it was? 00:05:09 Speaker 1: Right? 00:05:10 Speaker 2: I was like, there's no waya what are you talking about? 00:05:13 Speaker 3: Right? 00:05:13 Speaker 2: And when I saw that Chantey Moore did it, I was like, you know what, why not? Why not let me try to do this and let's see what this is all about? And it was the craziest experience of my life. 00:05:26 Speaker 1: So what was the results? Did you see an instant change? 00:05:30 Speaker 2: And yeah, and it's a change. And the audience that I was performing for, like it gave me a whole different audience to sing for. Like you can think about it. Every week I was singing in front of like about one hundred and fifty million people. It was like the super Bowl every week. It was crazy. It was there's so many people in China and there's so many avenues of being heard, and I was just trying to find another additional space to be in front of and that was my motivation. It's crazy, and it's I mean, you look at the way the world is going, and especially with a lot of artists in Asia, like you've got the whole k pop movement that is massive, Like there's you know, like I don't think we paid attention to as much as we should have to that whole area. And I think every single artist should do that if you have. 00:06:22 Speaker 1: Not, you know, on my side of the fence, especially with hip hop, I mean, you know that's all of Asia is like our third biggest market. Yeah, but I just never you know, I kind of felt like country music was limited to in my mind, you know, kind of you're not the big signiction line. But it's worldwide. I never knew this, never not It. 00:06:45 Speaker 2: Is not worldwide. You're very much so spot on. It is not worldwide, like this is uncharted territory. 00:06:53 Speaker 3: You know you're pioneering. 00:06:55 Speaker 1: Okay, that's good, like yes, so. 00:06:58 Speaker 2: And I've had you to be likeas. 00:07:01 Speaker 1: No other country artists have ever considered doing the show or I think the one that I. 00:07:05 Speaker 2: Could really see being successful out there is like a Casey Musgraves. I'm not sure. I don't have the data to be able to tell you. I don't know. I just saw it as a huge opportunity for me. I just was like, wow, that's a and so I did a tour out there, just like a test tour to see what that was like in February, and it was absolutely incredible. Like there's a whole world out there that you can be a part of. And I guess I'm pioneering that too. 00:07:37 Speaker 1: There you go, there you go. Could you tell me what your first musical memory is, man, the very first thing you remember about music and either to three years old. 00:07:50 Speaker 2: It was definitely church for me. I remember just being in church and singing in the angel choir, then singing in the Celestial choir. That that was my very first memory of music. 00:08:03 Speaker 3: How old were you when you first started singing in the church. 00:08:07 Speaker 2: I was probably about five or six, so I think around like six or seven is when I started having memories of church. 00:08:15 Speaker 3: And what city did you grow up in? 00:08:17 Speaker 2: I grew up in So I grew up around all around Texas, but Arlington, Texas, and Waco, Texas, Moody, Texas, really small towns. That's where I grew up. 00:08:30 Speaker 1: What are your general memories of childhood. I'll tell you go back in time to your earliest days, Like what are the first things visually that you see, even if it's the smallest thing, not like going to a fair, just your curtains. Maybe I don't know visually, you know. 00:08:47 Speaker 2: I definitely my room. My bedroom was a big memory for me. I'm an introvert, so I spent a lot of time in there, like that was something I really loved my grandma's Those are huge memories. Those are a lot of times my first like thoughts, like the gravel roads and Crawford, Texas, or the gravel roads driving up to Moody Texas. That long stretched drive that we would drive to go see my grandma, the roads going to see Reesal, Texes. Those are a lot of my memories. 00:09:20 Speaker 1: What was the domestic situation in your house? Are you the only child? Did you have siblings? Oh? 00:09:24 Speaker 2: Yes, I have two siblings. I have three siblings. Excuse me, I've got two sisters and a brother. 00:09:29 Speaker 3: Where do you fall in? 00:09:31 Speaker 2: I'm in the middle. I'm the upper middle. So I've got two younger sisters and my brother is the oldest. But really I'm the oldest. You know, there's always we're mature daughter, the eldest daughter is the things. Yeah, for sure, it's me and my youngest sister. She's like an old woman too. 00:09:49 Speaker 3: So do they have musical talent as well? 00:09:52 Speaker 1: Or is this just you? 00:09:53 Speaker 2: Well, my whole family sings, besides my mom. She would hate for me to say that, but my mom can't sing at all, like at all, But we all we're all in the choir together, we all say. But I was the one that pursued it the most in my family. 00:10:08 Speaker 1: You say you traveled all around Texas. Is your father in the military or like so my dad. 00:10:14 Speaker 2: I don't know what The equivalent of that is like he was an engineer and he was VP of customer relations of a company called my dad was he did well for himself. It's encore, it's I don't know what where are you at, Laura. 00:10:31 Speaker 3: I'm in New York right now? 00:10:33 Speaker 2: Whatever the electric company is that major? Most New Yorkers use. That was what my dad was in Texas. 00:10:40 Speaker 3: Okay, I got it. 00:10:41 Speaker 1: What television show would you say best describes your childhood as a kid or was there a character or a television show that you imagine that. 00:10:53 Speaker 2: So all say, I mean it sucks, like what has happened to that family? That we were like the Cosby's for sure, Like. 00:11:00 Speaker 3: The Bulls are still alive? 00:11:01 Speaker 2: Okay, great? The Huxtables, we were like the Huxtables. Yeah, like that, we were like that, or you know, definitely family matters family. We were definitely like that. That was what our family was like. Okay, blue collar, hardworking. My mom didn't work. My mom was a homemaker. But that was our family. 00:11:20 Speaker 1: Okay, And mind you, So this is one of the episodes in which I'm torn between because I want to know everything about your career, but I also I'm hyper aware and I think there's another commonality that we might have, Like oftentimes, when you're in a position in your career, you're instantly tagged as the person that has to be the spokesperson for everything. For saying that, and so sometimes I just want to know silly stuff that you never get asked before. 00:11:51 Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, I appreciate you for wanting to do that, because that was kind of a thing for me. 00:11:57 Speaker 1: Yeah, I know, you got to ask about what you put anything click baity, like, yeah, what's your opinion on this? 00:12:04 Speaker 3: What's your pinion? 00:12:04 Speaker 1: You know, if you're like I have. 00:12:06 Speaker 2: I feel no I am o Marion, I feel no ways. 00:12:09 Speaker 3: Right now, there you go, There you go. So that said, uh is there? 00:12:17 Speaker 1: This is rather than random? Do you have a weird food combo that you swear by? 00:12:24 Speaker 2: A weird food combo that I swear by? 00:12:27 Speaker 1: Yes, I'll tell you what. 00:12:28 Speaker 2: So my mom she's dealing with like some like gluten allergies, So she's trying all these different meals. She got a sweet potato and put this like avocado like spread on it that was really really really good. I don't know what was on it. I have no idea, but it was like sweet potato there's a baked sweet potato and they put this like, I don't know, this really flavorful like avocado spread thing on it, and I tore it up. It was really really good, and I've been thinking about it a lot, and it's actually a really good food combo that I was really surprised. 00:13:09 Speaker 3: All Right, I'm gonna look for that. However, if you eat one meal forever, what would it be like, eat one meal for forever? 00:13:18 Speaker 1: What is your all time favorite? 00:13:21 Speaker 2: So my family they used to make this meal back in the day. It was called Growmy Beans and Corn, so it's growny beans and corn. I've been eating this since I was a little girl, so it's groundy. It's like the black beans in that little black jar black can with corn drained the corn and taco sea thing and yeah and. 00:13:43 Speaker 1: She so that's not chili and that's not chilians and corn. 00:13:48 Speaker 2: I think they call it bullshit is what they call it. It's a Southern thing, but it is really really good. That's something I used to eat all the time and I still do. 00:13:57 Speaker 3: What song reminds you of high school dances? 00:14:03 Speaker 2: Oh? Man, I don't know why this song reminds you of Probably because it was in love of basketball. But what was that song that was in love of basketball? 00:14:12 Speaker 1: God, Michells, you made a fool of me. No, I was like, that's depressing. 00:14:20 Speaker 2: No, No, what is it called? I Want to Be Here? 00:14:23 Speaker 1: You know? I Want to be Yes by Roger Trautman. 00:14:27 Speaker 2: Yes. I never danced to it in a high school dance at all, but that song always made me think about a high school dance. 00:14:34 Speaker 1: You know, being as though I went to school with boys to men. I just realized something, We've never had a high school dance at Creative and Performing Art school. Wow. What Yeah, I've never been to I mean besides the prom, besides junior prom and prom, like, we've never had like sop hops or. 00:14:57 Speaker 2: I think I did either. Actually all the times like homecoming. I went to Mansfeld High School. Yeah, we had homecoming. 00:15:05 Speaker 3: We had uh, we didn't even have. 00:15:07 Speaker 1: That, y'all. 00:15:09 Speaker 3: Oh wow, Yeah, it's weird, like we did everything that's. 00:15:12 Speaker 2: A Texas thing like Texas like homecoming. 00:15:16 Speaker 3: And football games and stuff. 00:15:18 Speaker 2: Yeah, the moms, those big moms that people. 00:15:21 Speaker 1: Would wear, right, Okay, I don't know what that is, never know what that was. 00:15:26 Speaker 2: I'm going to show you a picture of a mom. If you can't look at one, I. 00:15:30 Speaker 3: Will google mom m Um. Yes, okay, and they're. 00:15:35 Speaker 2: So ugly, but these are the things that people wear, yeah, mum, Like this is the stuff that people would wear. 00:15:42 Speaker 1: Oh wow wow. 00:15:45 Speaker 2: And like the bigger it was, the more that guy really cared about you. 00:15:50 Speaker 1: Yeah, just like a a dress. 00:15:55 Speaker 2: That's that's the status thing. If you had a big mom like you were like the person I know, I. 00:16:00 Speaker 1: Know, And that's that's a traditional thing. Like you're looking forward to going to your first mom dancing? 00:16:06 Speaker 2: Yeah, oh yeah, give your dressed everything you had Homecoming king, Homecoming queen. 00:16:13 Speaker 1: Wow. 00:16:13 Speaker 2: Okay, people in the South know what I'm talking about for sure. 00:16:18 Speaker 1: In high school, who is your celebrity crush? 00:16:21 Speaker 2: Oh man, I definitely had a crush on Probably Kobe Bryant. Okay, I loved that group. Immature but Marcus Houston. 00:16:32 Speaker 1: Right, okay, nice? Or then they became immature Yeah yeah clever? Oh my god, did you have an embarrassing all or aim name. 00:16:47 Speaker 2: My parents were super super strict with us. I never got to do any of that. 00:16:51 Speaker 1: You didn't none of it? No, really, like no, Yeah, when did you first like get acclimated with like life on. 00:16:58 Speaker 2: Line and I never did the chat rooms. I never did that ever. I know, I know that's shocking, but I my parents were like, absolutely not. I wasn't really sheltered. They didn't let me do anything or go anywhere. 00:17:15 Speaker 1: I'm also a shelter kid, So there's a lot I didn't know that I found out long after my high school days. 00:17:21 Speaker 2: Don't you hate that? Like there was like so much that I missed out on. 00:17:26 Speaker 1: I've said the story before, which maybe like the last time I saw Bismarcky before he passed, he was sitting in on the Tonight Show, and even though he was joking, he's like, Dad, quest like, when did you become a suit? Which, like, you know, if you're creative, the worst thing that someone could tell you is that you're a suit, meaning you're such a straight edge, you know, like I've always been the odd guy out of a well. Next question to you was have you ever cut school? 00:18:02 Speaker 2: Or one time? 00:18:04 Speaker 1: Wait? But was it was a senior cut day because that doesn't count? 00:18:07 Speaker 2: No, no, I really and it wasn't cut school the whole day. It was just one class. 00:18:11 Speaker 1: Yeah, and you got away with it. 00:18:13 Speaker 2: I got away with it. 00:18:15 Speaker 1: Oh, okay, one time. 00:18:18 Speaker 3: Okay, why did you have to cut? 00:18:20 Speaker 2: Well, I didn't have to, so I became I ran track okay. And there was one guy who was like the track stars. It was Enrique. He was like the distance track guy. 00:18:30 Speaker 1: Yes, okay and I were. 00:18:32 Speaker 2: Really great friends and we cut school that one day. He was the one guy that had a car and we all cut. I think it was like maybe like the last class of the day. 00:18:42 Speaker 1: Oh just one early, an extra hour, you don't have to go? 00:18:47 Speaker 2: Yeah, I know, like so that does that even really count? 00:18:51 Speaker 1: No lame, no extra I was good because it's really really lame. I was you're every kid in America. I have to be home if the Oprah theme was coming on and I is not home, Yeah that was that was Yeah. 00:19:04 Speaker 2: So yes, like the door hinges are coming off, Like my door is coming off, the hinges, like I won't have a door to my room. 00:19:11 Speaker 1: Oh no, privacy your parents before they did that to me for like a month. Yeah wait, what kind of trouble did you get into? 00:19:18 Speaker 2: Don't even remember. I was probably on the phone past ten o'clock. 00:19:23 Speaker 3: Got you. Yeah, yeah, wow, terrible dude. 00:19:28 Speaker 1: You know how many times Tarik would call the house like Tarika knows. Everyone knows not to call my house after nine thirty pm. Look, my dad's like six foot four and just a very scary man. I mean I joke like he was a Joe Jackson drill sergeant father. 00:19:47 Speaker 2: Yeah, my mom and dad were very much on that too. 00:19:49 Speaker 3: Yeah, people knew my parents didn't play. 00:19:51 Speaker 1: But like Tik would routinely called me to like play me some rap song he just heard that. 00:19:57 Speaker 3: It'd be like ten oh one or whatever, and together I'll be like hello. He'd be like hello, and I gotta call Yeah, I gotta call you tomorrow too. 00:20:13 Speaker 2: I thought my husband, I got the exact opposite, Like I got such a you can't tell that about him now, but how he was like he was wild and all loose. 00:20:24 Speaker 3: And how when did you guys first meet? 00:20:26 Speaker 2: We first met when I was nineteen. He's my best friends step brother, okay, and I don't like him back then, I didn't even think about him like that. But he was just so rough around the edges, and I, like you was not, and so I just never. 00:20:46 Speaker 1: Thought And then here was always the person that you least expect. It's like, I like when that works out, I do too. I like what that has never worked out in my. 00:20:56 Speaker 2: Favorite I mean you never nothing worked out of my favor, to be honest, but that this one did. 00:21:14 Speaker 1: Is there a fashion trend that you regret ever following in your life in your teen years? 00:21:22 Speaker 2: Oh my god, Like when everyone was wearing those super super low jeans where their ass cracks were sticking out, I was like that, you're from Texas? 00:21:32 Speaker 3: Were you a walking house of dairion? 00:21:35 Speaker 2: I couldn't afford the house of airon? Okay, Like that was not in my prim Oh that. 00:21:40 Speaker 3: Was a luxury Okay, I didn't know. 00:21:42 Speaker 2: Yeah, you know, maybe like the like you know in the South, like Doc Martin sandals were a huge thing where they look like turtle shells on your foot. I guess there's a lot of shoes that look like that now, But there are these specific Doc Martin sandals that I couldn't afford. So I went to Walmart and got the Walmart version of them. And I'm really regretful that I followed that trend. Anything Abercrobie and Fitch, I'm regretful of that too. 00:22:08 Speaker 1: Really. Okay, yeah that's your fashion food boss, Yeah for sure. Can you describe the first concert experience that you had. 00:22:18 Speaker 2: I'm trying to even remember. Like I said, I didn't get to do a lot in my life. I definitely went and saw Marii Carrey, And one thing I always did at any concert I went to. I went to Maria Carrey. I think I went to like a justin Timberlake, Cristiangulo, and I went to a key urban concert, And I think the one thing I always did was turn around and look at the lights when they would have that moment where people would look at Yeah, I would always turn around and look at the audience that That's something I would always do like that every single time. It was just such a beautiful experience to feel like, oh that could be me. 00:22:53 Speaker 1: Okay, well, yeah, you're playing the seeds of manifestation. So usually when people grow up in the church, and especially down. 00:23:01 Speaker 2: South, a gospel something. 00:23:04 Speaker 1: Well, I was going to say, what was the secular music rule in your household? Were you allowed to listen to regular music or. 00:23:15 Speaker 2: Had that on lock like we had to listen to gospel or some kid there was it's so embarrassing some of the stuff in my life. 00:23:25 Speaker 3: Man let it out, let it out. 00:23:27 Speaker 2: There was this like I was just very much so that I was the start of that like right Christian nationalism thing that was going on, like that all weren't. 00:23:41 Speaker 1: Well, my god, the parents were raised by their parents, raised by their parents. 00:23:48 Speaker 2: You have if you have not seen this documentary, it is so triggering, like the religious trauma. My god. It's called Jesus Camp. It is on. If you I'm it will like make your eyes start twitching because of like I'm like I was in that like the vacation Bible. 00:24:07 Speaker 3: School, you know, yeah, summertime. 00:24:10 Speaker 1: They would try to have us organized trips to Haiti to become like future missionaries, praying. 00:24:17 Speaker 2: To God like I am the sinner Lord. I'm six, Yeah, I am a sinner Lord, Like, forgive these thoughts in my head. 00:24:24 Speaker 1: I'm gonna tell you how I got out of it. 00:24:28 Speaker 3: They took me out of it. 00:24:29 Speaker 1: So when Tarika and I finally got our first record deal and I came to church, like right when like our videos started to get played on like MTV, and the elders of the church I could tell by the the little judgment will look on their eyes. They were like, so a mirror are you uplifting the Lord in the this music of yours? Yes? 00:24:56 Speaker 2: I am. 00:25:00 Speaker 1: If ever, there was a symbolic version of check please. 00:25:08 Speaker 3: Yeah, that was that moment for me where you know, I'm glad. 00:25:14 Speaker 1: I had that moment like literally, see this is the thing you're You're not, You're you're pioneering. But I think the reason why you resonate with a lot of us is because like we see ourselves in your journey instantly, Like anything to do with someone that's isolated in a very specific situation, I hone in for it because I know that feeling. I know that feeling of you know, of code switching. My code switching has to code switch. And this is not even just in hostile environments, in liberal environments, in black environments, in my family environment. 00:25:55 Speaker 3: No, I'm not selling out. 00:25:56 Speaker 1: I'm still you know, like there's so many things that I I have to do, so I understand those things. 00:26:04 Speaker 3: Oh wait, when did you move to Los Angeles? 00:26:06 Speaker 2: So I moved right out of high school. Right out of high school, I was nineteen, and. 00:26:11 Speaker 1: You were that compelled to like go out and follow your dreams. Yeah, but what was it about La that called you the sun? 00:26:20 Speaker 2: It seemed like it was the you know, I looked at like all the different places where music was. I looked at Atlanta, I looked at New York, and I looked at Los Angeles. Nashville was not even a thought for me, and so I saw that as the easiest of the three as far as music because I didn't want to be in Atlanta because that was still too close to the South for me, and I was just kind of running from Texas from the religious. 00:26:51 Speaker 1: Well wait a minute, Okay, you're from Texas. And I've gone on record to say that if there was any place in the world if I had to move and leave the northeast Philly, New York that's my home base, Austin, Texas would actually be my second choice. Yeah, clearly. See. And I hate the term liberal because you're human, Yes, you're You're a non impressive human, even in those blue friendly cities like Austin that never appealed to you, like let me just move. 00:27:29 Speaker 2: To Well, Austin at that time didn't even have the music scene that it has now, Like the scene now is like it's like it blew up, like Nashville. Like Austin and Nashville at the time, I guess the reason why, like Nashville was even called music city, was not because of country music those two cities at the time, Like from my recollection, I wasn't hearing like music scene like that. 00:27:54 Speaker 1: But clearly you felt some sort of oppressive Yeah, anything in Texas. 00:28:00 Speaker 2: I was like, get me out, just get me out. Got you And you know there was acting and stuff like that too, Like there was just an entertainment hub that I felt like, Oh, I could do something there. 00:28:14 Speaker 1: How was secular music received in your household? Now, most people in your profession were not allowed to listen to anything secular. 00:28:25 Speaker 3: Oh that was me same, Okay. 00:28:28 Speaker 2: I had to listen to don't say DC talk No, absolutely not, absolutely not, and we like that's a whole other thing too, man. But you know I listened to a lot like BB and C. C Widens were heavily on rotation, a like envy and that leads to Whitney. 00:28:51 Speaker 1: So you can sneak your way to yeah, like I. 00:28:54 Speaker 2: Snuck it a little bit. My grandma was a huge like she loved Dolly Pardon, So when I would go were her house, she would have Dolly Pardon, Kenny Rogers VHS tapes hanging on the back of the door, along with roots. So that's what I would watch what I wentever her house, okay, and so then I discovered Brandy. Obviously you like the nineties. What a time, What a time. There were so many just great great songs and great music. 00:29:26 Speaker 1: Okay, thank you, Okay, this will always wanted to know are real singers allowed to do karaoke? 00:29:33 Speaker 3: And are you a karaoke person? 00:29:37 Speaker 2: Absolutely? But I don't really sing, yes, I say, are you a supporter? 00:29:43 Speaker 3: No? 00:29:43 Speaker 1: No, no no no. 00:29:44 Speaker 2: I cannot stand going to karaoke and you have that one person that is like. 00:29:51 Speaker 1: And you gotta kill shit. Yeah, when someone someone kills shit at karaoke, that's. 00:29:55 Speaker 2: Not fun, like you root it for everybody. 00:29:57 Speaker 3: I like karaoke. 00:29:58 Speaker 1: When someone can't sing. 00:30:00 Speaker 2: It's the best. My go to is Britney Spears, all right, So Britney is your Britney Spears is my that's your go to, She's my go to? 00:30:09 Speaker 3: What's song? 00:30:10 Speaker 2: Sometimes? Oops? I did it again? Those are like and I want you a whole voice, like it's a that yeah, oh yeah, I don't. You can't. You don't. You don't really sing karaoke like that just ruins it to me. 00:30:26 Speaker 1: Okay, I understand that most singers, professional singers tell you like you got to sing from your gut? Is her thing more of a nasal throat thing, Like can you tell when a singer singing from their gut versus I'm always hearing that. 00:30:41 Speaker 2: You can is gut and throw to me. 00:30:45 Speaker 3: Well, she has to come in the door like the kool aid man. 00:30:49 Speaker 1: Yes, she ends somewhere of the Rainbow Battle of bel Version as her first note instead of you know, you know. 00:30:56 Speaker 2: The last note right right, Britney spears is. I don't think it's nasal. I think it's in her throat. It's so much air, So I think. 00:31:06 Speaker 1: There's do you know why that's a rule, Like when vocal trainers or coaches say, you know, you must sing for me a diaphragm as opposed to your throat, Like are you just never supposed to sing from your throat? Or people say it's amateur hour if you're singing from your throat and not your diaphragm. 00:31:26 Speaker 2: You know, I mean, I'm not a jessej type singer, So I don't know. I don't want to. I don't know what's right. I think whatever sounds amazing and what you feel, you know, I'm you know, I'm not a technical singer, like that. So I think, whatever you feel. I think there's so many different great voices, whether you can belt or not right, that I think are so great. Like there's some people that just have incredible tones and vocals. Like I was just thinking about ammelru before we even. 00:32:01 Speaker 1: Like, ah everything, she's a great, man, She's. 00:32:05 Speaker 2: Oh great, Like I think she has such a combination of everything, like the tone, the throat, the belt, all of it, the notes. 00:32:16 Speaker 3: In high school, she was killing it man, like she's like, what was that song that. 00:32:21 Speaker 2: She released that like had everybody to choke holden like two thousand and four. 00:32:26 Speaker 3: So many, like I know one of her. 00:32:29 Speaker 1: It's a song that always gets played at weddings. Well, I mean there's see I'm a deep cut person. Yes, So even though like there's for real like and uh am I now blinking on all male songs. 00:32:43 Speaker 2: We're all blanking. It's fine. 00:32:45 Speaker 1: Oh get up, make me hold make me whold was always my. 00:32:47 Speaker 2: Favorite, really really really good. 00:32:50 Speaker 3: Yeah, she really gets to display her for real for real. 00:32:55 Speaker 1: Yes, But like also I think with singers, like the filler songs are where they really get to display what they are because oftentimes if it's the single or whatever, you have to sort of follow this, Yeah, this restrictive rule of what is compatible for radio and public consumption, and then the other seven songs you could do whatever you want to do. Like that's I. 00:33:20 Speaker 3: Judge people based on their their singles. 00:33:23 Speaker 1: Yeah, what song? 00:33:25 Speaker 2: Are you. 00:33:27 Speaker 3: Not embarrassed? But what song do you love? 00:33:31 Speaker 1: That is like, oh god, people will kill me if they know, like I love the song so much? 00:33:37 Speaker 2: Or oh man, you know Jesse McCartney had me in h oh my god. 00:33:45 Speaker 3: Yes, what was it about Jesse McCartney? 00:33:48 Speaker 4: He had that one song, I don't want a pretty face. I want anyone I my love to go ways. Oh you because you're beautiful. 00:33:59 Speaker 2: That song is so and it could be a country song now, which is crazy. 00:34:02 Speaker 1: So beautiful soul is your Yeah. 00:34:05 Speaker 2: I love beautiful soul. I even loved this really that that freaking one wish by Ray J. 00:34:17 Speaker 1: Did you watch Versus? That was one for the history books? 00:34:22 Speaker 2: Oh man, that's he used to be a crush of mind when I was little, Like I would watch Brandy music videos just to see her brother. 00:34:34 Speaker 3: Really, I'm going to tell you something. 00:34:37 Speaker 1: If one thing absolutely in sentences me that people really aren't up on, well, you know, I say this all the time about Brandy's first album. Brandy's first album was such. 00:34:51 Speaker 2: One of the most incredible. 00:34:53 Speaker 1: It was a game changer simply because like I think that most people think that you know that okay, kids or teenage music should be more bubblegum based or whatever. And she was breaking like so many harmony rules that like I only reserved for. 00:35:11 Speaker 3: People like Prince Oh. I'm like, yo, what does this fourteen fifteen year old know about? 00:35:19 Speaker 1: Like I didn't even know you could do like chromatic background vocals and even the first song on the first album. 00:35:25 Speaker 3: So when ray J got a deal, was that baby? 00:35:30 Speaker 2: Was that baby? That was the first song? Right? 00:35:32 Speaker 4: No? 00:35:32 Speaker 1: No, well, no, no, no, I mean the first song on the first album, which is moving on, Oh, moving on. Every go round she would add a different harmony on top of it. So by the end of it, you know, we were sitting in the vanlight, yo. Like the roots were very much the musical snobbery that everyone thought we were in the first five years, like judging everyone I maintained on tintoes that you know, when we first heard Mary jay Blige Is My Life, we were angry. We were like, wait a minute, like singers aren't allowed to sing over stuff we rap over, Like why she singing over beats? Like where's the where's the bridge, where's the arrangement, where's the coder, where's the modulation? Like I'm I was ready, Yeah, I'm ready for like singers have to be in the box of real music, whereas rappers get to take from records and sample it and so yeah, like it took about a month for us to really get over the fact that Mary J. Blige is singing over stuff that we would go for first, and I just thought that was like against the rule, like you're not supposed to do that. But ray J's first record, man, the one that came out in yeah, yeah, like it was such an incredible album that got. 00:36:56 Speaker 3: Ignored and. 00:37:00 Speaker 2: One song what did he have? Oh my god? 00:37:02 Speaker 1: Well we had a single called let It Go, which was just it was killing. But because it would like literally it was like if the roots got to produce somebody like that would have been the album. Keith Crouch, Andre Crouch's nephew, produced both ray J and Brandy's first album, and they just changed so many rules, like I consider those like really like neo soul, like pre neo soul albums before there was a tag on it, like in ninety five. Like, I consider those records and I just hate that though, that he really put out an incredible debut that the world won't. 00:37:47 Speaker 3: Get to know. 00:37:48 Speaker 2: Like I think, I always remembered him for his ad libs. He was so good at his ad libs. That was something that I always remembered because you know, like a singer is like you have to be able to add lib to songs. I even remember maybe there was an interview like back in the day where Brandy was like, you know, I get a lot of that from like ray J. He helps me with that, And I was like, what really, but that could be I could be missmemborying. So don't quote me on that. 00:38:17 Speaker 1: Okay, Well I'll ask you because usually Okay, So I'm always in a situation where if I'm backing someone and we get to the last course of the song, you know, God bless the soul. D'Angelo would be the type of guy that he would never run out of riffs or anything. And I always wonder is there an anxiety? Is there an anxiety in the last thirty seconds of a song in which oh yeah, you're supposed to ad lib and you know, do some vocal acrobags. Now, it's one thing if you're in a nowhere town, if you're in Kalamazoo, Michigan or. 00:38:54 Speaker 3: Whatever, Yeah, like who's watching you? 00:38:57 Speaker 2: But if you're in the Grammys, the anxiety and it's like singing in front of people like you or like Brandy, So, how do you. 00:39:10 Speaker 3: Get out of your head before? 00:39:12 Speaker 2: I'm never out of my head ever? Like that is a huge anxiety for me. I would like it is a huge thing for me. Really, Yeah, I'm a very insecure person. 00:39:24 Speaker 1: So do you have a a pre show routine? Like two hours before show? What is happening? 00:39:31 Speaker 3: Is it quiet backstage? 00:39:33 Speaker 2: Is it about fifteen minutes before the show? I need it quiet, Like I just need to like thinking about a point in my life where like you just have to let things go, like we as artists, Like I can't imagine being someone like Beyonce, who is literally the biggest artist in the world, and her pushing through and you know, I don't know, you always hear stuff, but I hear like how how high the bar is set for her? I can't imagine living like that and wanting that perfection. 00:40:07 Speaker 3: As a front person. Is it harder. 00:40:11 Speaker 1: Singing the song or the in between song banter with the audience? 00:40:17 Speaker 2: What is I can talk now if you need me to talk, if you need if there's an awkward moment, anything like that where I need to fill something in while they're figuring, you know, a technical difficulty or something like that. Like I'm cool with that. As far as bantering is concerned. I'm pretty good at like talking to people in the audience to this day. 00:40:39 Speaker 1: And you would think, you know, I've written books and odd stuff, but when it comes to giving speeches or just like small talk with with an audience, even DJing, Like I don't think once I've ever said I mean I quiet now DJ, and I know, well, I'm just unicating. I feel as the magic sauce for how we get to know you, you know. Yeah, And so sometimes. 00:41:06 Speaker 2: That's crazy because you're like talking with you on here, like you're really fun to talk to. 00:41:11 Speaker 1: You're talking to a six year old, like there's life from when I was born in the seventies and then twenty twenty, the old me went away and then new me showed up in twenty twenty when the pandemic happened and. 00:41:25 Speaker 2: It's sort of crazy. Like I think everybody there was like a new oh the me in twenty twenty, everybody, you know, for. 00:41:33 Speaker 1: The first two years, I had a shame of I mean just in general, I think as humans, we are programmed to feel bad for feeling good. Anything that makes us feel good, there's guilt. There's guilt we feel yeah, and so yeah, it probably took me two years just to get over that hump and get to there. 00:41:57 Speaker 3: So yeah, I think all of this. 00:41:58 Speaker 2: Changed during the Yeah, that's so crazy that you're saying that about the like feel bad for feeling good, because right now I'm taking like I've had some personal issues that I've been dealing with in my family to the point where I've just had to like take a beat. I knew I needed to take a minute because I didn't have any thoughts in my head right like nothing, like you know, usually if I'm working, if I'm doing whatever, I'm keeping myself up till you know, four am, and I still will wake up at four am like clockwork. I don't know why that is, but I would have just like thoughts of like how I could be better. Oh, I'm shit that what I did that day or like all these constant thoughts and now nothing like I have nothing like, no ideas, no nothing. And I knew that that's when I needed to take a minute. I have been nesting, I have been decorating. I got a fish. 00:42:59 Speaker 1: I was gonna say, are you a cat person or a dog? 00:43:01 Speaker 2: I have two cats, two dogs, a fish named Titan. He's a little beta fish that I really like. And I've been feeling really good, and I was like, should I be feeling like this? Should I be like I need to be doing this. I need to be figuring these things out and where my next opportunity is at and what I can do to be better and what's this next thing list in my head? And it's okay to just take a minute. 00:43:26 Speaker 1: You're actually doing the right thing, all right. So this is a question I'm in dying to ask. So we are about a year and a half, maybe two years post what I would call a Cowboy Carter deluge or watershed moment. There's at least a group chat, like in my mind, the best of my imagination is that there's kind of a secret X Men, super Friends of r v S HVD or Pretty Spencer and Willie Jones and Camee Brown, Chaboozi and you and Yola and all the throw Darius in there and the shout out to those who I didn't commit to memory. But the post Cowboy Carter moment shining a light on you guys. Now I've heard of you pre Cowboy Carter. You know, I just thought it was Charlie Pride and Darius Rutgers. I didn't think that black people were in the country, even though I know the banjil came from Africa and all those things. 00:44:40 Speaker 3: So are there any artists. 00:44:42 Speaker 1: Bubbling under that you're aware of that we should be looking out for and has that moment in which getting that exposure to a whole new world? 00:44:53 Speaker 3: Like, was that a real thing? Was it as real as I thought. 00:44:57 Speaker 2: It was, as we all thought it was. But in the same breath, it's just real as we thought it was. You know, there was the overwhelming veil that was lifted that shows that country music stills are ready to accept, you know, the way that the country music community accepted Post Malone versus you know, Beyonce versus Shaboozi, Like those are very eye opening things, you know, Little nas X two. But it seems like you know, but it does seem like, I mean, this is a tale as old as time. Like black women, no matter how successful you are, no matter how powerful you are, they will accept a black man or a white man obviously from whatever, more than they'll accept a black woman. Like that's just it just is you know you have I mean, prime example is like Jasmine Crockett trying to be a senator. She's well overqualified. Yes, I know this, but still people can't accept or fathom black leadership from a woman in. 00:46:17 Speaker 1: Norther Do they know that black women were single handedly the reason why the very few wins that we got in democracy was that I was part. 00:46:25 Speaker 2: Of the ninety two percent. 00:46:26 Speaker 1: I was. 00:46:27 Speaker 2: I was on in the middle of tour, and I flew where I was registered to vote just to make sure that I could vote, and flew back and do what I had to do. And that was, like, I mean, that's very indicative in this Beyonce, Cowboy Carter and post Malone argument. I mean, granted, Post Malone did really go through the Nashville channels, and I don't know if that would be different for Beyonce, but Beyonce doesn't have to Beyonce doesn't do literally whatever she wants to do. 00:47:00 Speaker 1: You're going to be an amazing support system for people, you know that come after. And you know often I say that being a pioneer, like there's two people in the industry in my opinion, the pioneer and then the person that comes after the pioneer. Yeah, I guess just gets to enjoy all this. And you're you're in the back the carpentry, you're laying. That's the red carpet down and right you're you're laying you're laying the foundation. 00:47:29 Speaker 2: There was a person laying the foundation before me. You know, there was Linda Martel. She laid the foundation before me. 00:47:37 Speaker 1: You know I. 00:47:39 Speaker 3: You still feel it. 00:47:40 Speaker 2: Yes, very much. So again, we don't I don't want to make this about that because this has. 00:47:46 Speaker 3: Been We don't, but I just always want to get known. 00:47:49 Speaker 2: You have to be honest, I definitely. I think it's very important to be honest with this whole conversation because it has to be real. I mean, country music doesn't barely accept women. I know, Like they'll say, oh we have such and such and such and such as always three and they just switch them out right. It's no different if anything's even worse, and like the way that you see this is such a hard conversation, but from my observations, the way that this administration sees women is the way that country music sees women, of course, and the women that support the system. 00:48:31 Speaker 3: The house master's tools, and the. 00:48:32 Speaker 2: They support their oppressors, right, they fight for the system more than anybody, and I can't help them. They've got it if that's what they want to do, if they want to continue to be oppressed, that is not on me to be fighting for that. 00:48:49 Speaker 1: Okay, So in a world where there is a remote control, yeah, and you get to press pause and literally sneak into the master's system and change just three things so that when you press pause again, that becomes part of the regular fiber and memories are erased. What three things do you desire to change that I'm not aware of? And you know, maybe I am aware of it. 00:49:22 Speaker 2: There's an underlying gate keep, and it's like the things that happen between closed doors. 00:49:28 Speaker 3: And so here's the weird thing, all right. 00:49:31 Speaker 1: The foundation of all this is that my best friend in high school and I started a band and we just wanted to be famous and play all the places and all those things. And then, as I told you, even before the pandemic, around twenty fifteen, this other thing started to happen where I realized like, oh, I have other talents. Yeah, And then for me the sort of the arrival moment of me as a filmmaker, like my whole imposter syndrome, like well, I'm really not a filmmaker, and then like you went an oscar, then it's like, oh shit, I might be a filmmaker. So suddenly I started to get all the power I dreamed of having, and the fame and all those things. 00:50:17 Speaker 3: I got it for filmmaking. 00:50:20 Speaker 1: But secretly I go home at night and cry, like feel like a failure because I'm like, wait. 00:50:24 Speaker 2: A minute, which is insane to me. I'm glad I'm not. 00:50:28 Speaker 1: The only one though, Oh dude, the grass is always green on the other side. So for me, it was always like damn, what kind of world do we live in? Where, like, you know, I can call Spielberg like that and get a meeting and get things to happen. But the world knows me as this music savant. The world knows me as this two hundred thousand record collecting master, music disciple of the best musicians ever, Like, why can't I compile fourteen songs on a particular album that will take me to the place where Oh man, I wish I was doing that, damn Like I want that opportunity. And it took me the last six years to learn that I was in my own way. But asking you this, I also realized, and Jimmy jam taught me this is that someone is going to have to infiltrate and sneak on the inside to change the system. Yeah, the wavy system is now, and you know, and I almost see the country world as its own bubble it is. And I watch you and I'm just like, man like the things that she has to keep internally just to see her career through so that she can get the power to even change the system. I know, you have to go through this unspeakable, isolated journey with yourself that probably not even your husband get under and he's probably your best friend in the world. Yeah, so is it worth it to really step into the house of the system to try to change it as yourself? Like do you what do you have dreams of? As far as like the legacy part. 00:52:15 Speaker 2: Of this, you know, I get. I mean, it's kind of like what you said, like I build the foundation and then this person, which I mean I believe, like Beyonce did, Like you know, I worked so hard for something. Beyonce did come through and she like shattered the ceiling. She broke the ceiling like I was over there tapping on it and she just like a rocket ship she came and blasted that. But it's like there's one thing I don't have the ability to do, and that's changed the hearts of people, Like I can't. You can't change the hearts of people. Like if that was something I could go in there and like change, that would be it, and I don't have the ability to do that. 00:52:59 Speaker 1: Do you see a generally difference in like for hip hop, there's definitely some rules of hip hop that I knew. 00:53:07 Speaker 3: Gen X is not. Like gen X was very big on this whole, like yo, dog, who's the gay rapper? Like that was like such a major thing. 00:53:15 Speaker 1: Whereas like now in twenty twenty, like that's like, Yo, how could we be so neanderthal and ask backwards to make that our point of priority? But you know, I realized it's generational and now that I'm looking at gen Z and soon it will be Jen Alpha and Jen Beta, and you know, so on and so forth. Do you see somewhat of a generational change for. 00:53:43 Speaker 3: The better in younger people? 00:53:46 Speaker 1: Because also, if you grow up an impressive household, I would imagine that. 00:53:50 Speaker 2: At least something like country music is still like it seems like I've stepped back in time. Like they say country music is twenty years behind everyone else. I mean in this case, maybe forty. Like they're still back with our parents in the Git Bloomer. 00:54:06 Speaker 1: Era, so it was nineteen seventy seven. 00:54:08 Speaker 2: That's kind of how it feels. It feels like we're there. It feels like we're still in nineteen you know, like even like yeah, like nineteen ninety two with you know, no secular music at all. 00:54:22 Speaker 3: Hopefully, when all said and done, like your career will at. 00:54:27 Speaker 1: Least push us to the millennial god, I hope. So hypothetical question, if the person you are right now could travel back twenty years when you are a teenager seeing your girlfriends on one of six in part promoting their their music three l W Yeah, a group that you were a founding member of. I don't want to know what it felt like to sit there and watch them on television kind of live your your jump start your dream. 00:55:17 Speaker 2: It was wild. 00:55:19 Speaker 1: But what would you now if you were given sixty seconds to literally time travel I'm big on astro traveling and time traveling and dreaming. If you could go back sixty seconds the first time you're watching three L promiseif on on you don't know how much I love that song. 00:55:41 Speaker 2: I love that song too. I'm not gonna lie I really did. I listened to that song. 00:55:46 Speaker 1: I did, but at the time, and look, I had the same thing with Motown Philly. Motown Philly is coming on every second. My dad was not making me feel good about my life watching my schoolmates become these celebritials. Yeah, yeah, and it's you know, like that that could have been like he was very much a backstage debt like that. 00:56:08 Speaker 3: What would you tell yourself in those sixty seconds. 00:56:12 Speaker 1: That you don't know at the time, when you're watching your girlfriend's air quote live the Dream, and that's. 00:56:19 Speaker 2: Sixty seconds, I would say, just hang on, your time will come. That you were kept from feeling like when I watched it all go down, like watching what happened to the toy? Like that could have been me. 00:56:36 Speaker 3: Would you have been on Power. 00:56:38 Speaker 2: No, well I would not have been no, no, no, like when they broke up. No, no, I know, I know, yeah, no, I would not have been on Power. Jory's got something that I will never happen. That girl, right, that girl, she's got something that's just so amazing. But like I like, I hold on your time will come. 00:56:56 Speaker 3: But at the time when it was happening, were you like, oh, man, like, what the hell like this? 00:57:02 Speaker 2: It's so weird? Like I did feel I mean fomo was not a word, yes, but I did have fomo about it when I watched it. But I also felt really cool that I experienced a little bit of it. I was only in their group for a summer, Like I was not really in their group. I was like maybe a month, like I was not. It's like you can say and now I can say that now yes as a grown ass woman. Back back then, you know, it's so weird, Like it's hard to remember how I felt. But yeah, hold on your time will come. That's what That's what I would say, hold on your time will come. 00:57:42 Speaker 1: What is your songwriting process like or at least in the in the road to getting your record deal and whatnot? How much agency are you given to really express how you feel? Because you know, again the way you enter my life. 00:57:57 Speaker 3: Everyone was like, yo, you're just something. 00:57:59 Speaker 1: You know, they played black White Me and all these things. How autobiographical was better than you left me? Like? Is songwriting the release that, yes, you get because you can't. 00:58:14 Speaker 3: Express to us or feel safe to express to us. 00:58:18 Speaker 2: I have a really hard time with confrontation because you know, I grew up in that because I said so Era, you know, I definitely was punished by a belt and I would never get to explain myself. I never got to express how I. 00:58:35 Speaker 1: Was feeling, only speaking when you're spoken to. 00:58:38 Speaker 2: Yeah, you know. And I understand our parents, I mean, you're doing you're doing what you were told. But now if you're going to tell your kid to do something, there needs to be a wide and you need to explain it, and you need a lot of your kids to explain themselves. So because of that type of discipline, I don't express myself in the moment well at all. If there's a confrontation, I shut down and I'm silent. 00:59:06 Speaker 3: Can I ask, do I get this a lot? 00:59:08 Speaker 1: Do you get it? 00:59:09 Speaker 3: Accused of being passive aggressive? 00:59:11 Speaker 2: Oh? Passive aggressive? Like you don't care. And like my husband, he's a lawyer, so he can express exactly how he feels at the very moment, and I am just like and I just shut down, and then people think that you don't care. And it's just that I need to process the fifteen things that you said to me. I need to go take a shower, and I need to talk to myself and speak out loud what I would say, and then I could come back to you. Sometimes I even have to put it in a note. I can't even speak it out. I have to write it down then read how I feel about it because I. 00:59:47 Speaker 3: Can't mickey like you. 00:59:49 Speaker 1: I mean, I'm I'm already fan, and I don't mean that just like I said, I was like, yeah, I'm a fan, but now I'm really shocked that the commonality thing is that it's confirmed things. I'm in a new relationship right now, so even then, you know, I'm trying to readjust this post therapy a mirror and learn how to communicate. And because I will hold a grudge, oh and I'll take it out. 01:00:15 Speaker 2: I will. 01:00:16 Speaker 1: I will take it out on myself before I take it out on other. 01:00:19 Speaker 2: People, because and that causes so much suffering. 01:00:22 Speaker 1: Oh real stelf like sickness. Yeah, that's where cancer comes from. Yes, and so wow, that's okay. 01:00:31 Speaker 2: So the one time I stood up for myself, like in front of the president of my label at the time, it took so much out of me. I was sick for two for three days. I couldn't get out of bed for three days because that release of energy was so overwhelming. Like I was sick, I was nauseated, sick. 01:00:51 Speaker 3: Was what was your label's response to first. 01:00:54 Speaker 2: Hearing they respected me. I didn't yell, I didn't do anything but the lead of me telling this this box, this white man that stop as a black woman, stop saying my songs are R and B when you are putting trap beats and all of your songs on country radio. Like stop it right now. Like you can never say that to me again, is what I said. 01:01:22 Speaker 3: Ah. 01:01:23 Speaker 2: Yeah, do you. 01:01:24 Speaker 3: Remember your first professional gig. 01:01:27 Speaker 2: Yeah, my first professional gig as far as touring, I had opened up for Brad Paisley and that was scary. 01:01:34 Speaker 3: How was that? 01:01:36 Speaker 2: It was amazing? Like he was fantastic, like one of the kindest human beings ever, like so lovely and but I remember, well, there was one point we were out. 01:01:52 Speaker 5: There and this guy was holding up this Confederate flag right up to him, and every time he came around, like you know, Brad would have to leave on the other side that he wanted no part of it, Like he wanted none of that, Like he hated it. 01:02:08 Speaker 2: But I had to see it. You know, he felt horrible. That's not how he thinks, that's not what he believes. Like these Wow, let me tell you some of these people, man, the hatred in their heart. I'm like, are you a spawn of the devil? Like you're a spawn of Satan? Have you? 01:02:27 Speaker 3: Okay? 01:02:27 Speaker 1: So now in building your audience, is your audience truly your audience? 01:02:31 Speaker 3: Now? 01:02:31 Speaker 2: Like is there Culy? Is my audience? Like I can talk about Ady and everything. I've got a heavily gay audience. Okay, you know, like anybody that feels marginalized and accepted is my my audience? 01:02:45 Speaker 3: Are you the character and what are you going to tell her? 01:02:48 Speaker 5: Yeah? 01:02:48 Speaker 2: Okay, but the song was written by all women, and we're all the character of that. 01:02:53 Speaker 1: Well, yeah, I know there's there's a composite, but it's one thing like there's some songwriters I know when which you know, that they've not given up, but you know, you hear the cynicism and their songwriting. But I mean because of that six so almost closely with this could be a dream deferred. This is yeah, like how do you tell someone to hang on to a dream? But this could be a dream deferred? And I always wondered, like even and you're pursuing that, like is I'm not asking about your peer group, but even like with family members or do you have a friend circle that. 01:03:31 Speaker 3: You can lean on? 01:03:33 Speaker 2: Like A yeah, actually one of those people that I really lean on. And you know, I mean maybe we're similar in this, but I don't trust a lot of people because as soon as you give them who you really are, people will never say that, they'll never do that, but they always use some of the hardest moments against you. And I would never do that to anybody. Like so it's really hard for me to open up. I have a very very very few people that really really really know like my deepest insecurities, my. 01:04:11 Speaker 1: Vulnerabilities, all of them. 01:04:14 Speaker 2: And one of those people over the years that I've that has gotten a lot of that that I've called crying before. And I don't like crying to people. The only person I'll do that too, is like my mom or like my dad. I hate crying in front of people, but that's Britney Spencer. 01:04:29 Speaker 1: Nice. Well, I mean you're gonna look as a person who again like we to get out on ourselves first before we let the world see it. I highly recommend this. Like I've just allowed crying in baseball maybe like four years ago. Like no, but it was to the point where I didn't know how. Literally I literally didn't know how to cry, Like I was so good at at Yeah that literally I became world famous for just having no emotions. 01:05:00 Speaker 2: You know, but there's so many emotions you just like sometimes like and I'm at a point like even crying like in front of people, Like it's I have to be really really really really really really really upset, like to do that. 01:05:16 Speaker 1: I got you, all right. My last three questions are you a bucket list person? And what is the bucket list that you really want to accomplish? 01:05:28 Speaker 2: You know, I used to be a bucket list person, but I am not a bucket list person anymore, because. 01:05:35 Speaker 3: There has to be a dream that you want achieve. 01:05:37 Speaker 2: Yeah, you know, I it's so weird. It's so weird. Like I had all these you know, I thought I had all these things I wanted to achieve, Like I was Grammy nominated while I was pregnant, and I was expecting, like to be Grammy nominated, and then I had to, you know, go to the Grammys after just giving birth, and like I was emotional and I was pumping at the time, and you know, like all the things that happened when a woman has a baby, and like winning a Grammy was the one thing like I wanted so so so bad. But the thing that I've seen as I've gotten older in life, and you know, people have so much They hold so much value and like things and like trophies, and it's like, well what does that mean. Yes, it's an accolade, but what stake does it really really have in your life? And I think after giving birth to my son, almost losing my son, like that's the only thing that matters to me, Like it really is, like I've I've gone and done some of the most amazing things I've seen at the super Bowl, like that was that was a dream and I did achieve that, and afterwards, I was like, well, still feel like myself. 01:06:58 Speaker 1: The grass is always going to be green on the other side, and then whatever you achieve, you'll shrug it off because there's something else, yeah, of the pike that you want. Wait, okay, So I don't know if this is still a dream for country artists, But have you ever played the grand Ole Opry? 01:07:15 Speaker 2: I have played the grand Ole Opry. 01:07:17 Speaker 3: Is it just the lure of playing the place? 01:07:19 Speaker 1: Or like it is. 01:07:23 Speaker 3: So the point of Sisters. You know they got nominated back in seventy four at the Grammy. 01:07:27 Speaker 1: Yeah, they told you know, they were the first, I guess black women to play the grand Opery and set. 01:07:34 Speaker 3: So what was the feeling like? 01:07:37 Speaker 2: It was definitely magical at the time, Like I was so nervous. I'd spent maybe four or five years in Nashville at the time pounding the pavement. I had management at the time that was I don't want to say this, but I feel like they were like having two older white men trying to understand a black woman that they were putting me in I'm a I'm a circle and they were trying to fit me in a square. And I had dealt with so much of that. So when I finally got to sing up the grand Ole Opry, I didn't know what you would equivalate that too. 01:08:16 Speaker 1: It's like surviving the Apollo that. 01:08:20 Speaker 2: Yeah, it's like like if you you know, if that's how you were discovered they write it wasn't Jazz and Sullivan on Apollo, Like if that was like the way for you to get you know, discovered and gets your chance. It's it's kind of like that. It's like a rite of passage into country music. And it's just this I don't know how to describe it. It's just something that's it's a tradition in country music that you know a lot of people with Dolly Pardon Charlie Pride, like it's it's a history thing, got it. 01:08:55 Speaker 3: What is the hardest creative block that you've overcome. 01:08:59 Speaker 2: I think the hardest creative block that I overcome. I think it's right now. When I say I don't have thoughts in my head, that's what I mean. 01:09:06 Speaker 3: I would do anything to be you right now. 01:09:08 Speaker 1: Like even as I'm talking to you, I'm thinking about editing this film, and I gotta make this phone call and I make sure my plane tickets are ready to so much. 01:09:17 Speaker 3: I want to know what that's like. 01:09:19 Speaker 2: It's quite lovely, really. 01:09:23 Speaker 3: Like to just well, is there a fear that you can't come back? 01:09:27 Speaker 2: Or yes, there's that. There's a huge fear of that for sure. And I'm I'm taking that thought and I'm putting it over there because I've worked my ass off. 01:09:39 Speaker 1: You'll be fine for a. 01:09:40 Speaker 2: Very very long time. And I do. And I am starting to get thoughts in my head and thoughts that I'm like, Okay, is this stupid? Is this dumb? And then I'll say it in a meeting and people are like, oh, I like that idea, and I'm like, oh so, so I'm just trusting this creative block moment of just letting it be what be. 01:10:02 Speaker 3: Well, I think that's a good thing and I think you'll be focused. All right. 01:10:06 Speaker 1: So my last question to you, all right is when all is said and done, what's the one thing that you really hope people say about you. 01:10:18 Speaker 2: I hope people say that she saw me, like really really really saw me. You know, this industry, this world, I feel like people are so narcissistic and me, me, me, me me. That is something that I hate so much about society, about the individualism is it's a beautiful thing to be able to have that freedom, but it also stops people from seeing other people. And I hope that people say that about me, that she really saw me, and like really really saw me. 01:10:58 Speaker 1: Well, Mickey Guidan, I appreciate you and your artistry. I definitely see you, you know, And I'm not even trying to cosplay that. You know, I came in under countries DNA. A line share of all the country that I've been listening to is sort of sparked off of you and me not knowing that black people were in the spaces at all or if I had anything. But you know, just in following your store and your journey, I mean, I'm cheering for you in the authentic way, not the Tyra Banks angered way. I'm cheering for you for real, and I understand so much and appreciate what you go through and even the things that I don't even fathom or or or wish upon another human being. I mean, I really appreciate that you are there in the trenches, really really building a save space for someone to come in twenty thirty and twenty four and twenty five and still be here to do it, you know. 01:12:09 Speaker 3: And so I'd hope that you. 01:12:11 Speaker 1: Take these brave steps and also take time off for yourself and to just thank you that I could have just said thank you and that's it all right people. This is the Quest Love Show and we will see you on the next program, thank You. Quest Love Show is hosted by ME Premier Quest Love Thompson. The executive producers are Sean g Brian Calhoun and Me. Produced by Britney Benjamin and Jake Payne. Produced for iHeart by Noel Brown, Edited by Alex Connwill iHeart Video support by Mark Canton, Logo's graphics and animation by Nick Paloe. Additional support by Lance Colman. Special thanks to Kathy Brown. Special thanks to. 01:13:10 Speaker 3: Sugar Steve Mandel. 01:13:13 Speaker 1: Please subscribe, rate, review, and share The Quest Loum Show wherever you stream your podcast, make sure you follow us on socials that's at q LS. Check out hundreds and hundreds of QLs episodes, including the Quest Love Supreme Shows and our podcast archives. Quest Loup Show is a production of iHeartRadio.