1
00:00:00,360 --> 00:00:03,680
Speaker 1: Quest Love Show is a production of iHeart Radio.

2
00:00:21,280 --> 00:00:24,200
Speaker 2: Ladies and gentlemen, what's up? This is the Quest Love Show.

3
00:00:24,440 --> 00:00:28,600
Speaker 2: This is the Double Love Show. I guess where this

4
00:00:28,680 --> 00:00:35,400
Speaker 2: is the love I mean, yeah, I'm meeting the love

5
00:00:35,479 --> 00:00:37,800
Speaker 2: Kate right now. We're talking to the Love Kate. What

6
00:00:37,840 --> 00:00:40,040
Speaker 2: can I say, Ladies and gentlemen from the d m V.

7
00:00:40,760 --> 00:00:42,800
Speaker 2: All right, So, whenever I mentioned the d m V,

8
00:00:43,960 --> 00:00:46,000
Speaker 2: it's like, only DMV people know what that means.

9
00:00:46,000 --> 00:00:48,360
Speaker 3: Anywhere else that's the department vehicle.

10
00:00:49,120 --> 00:00:51,199
Speaker 2: But I'm like, is it a thing where it's just like,

11
00:00:51,400 --> 00:00:53,080
Speaker 2: is that really your tri state area?

12
00:00:53,159 --> 00:00:55,640
Speaker 1: Like do people call that area of the d m V.

13
00:00:56,320 --> 00:00:58,400
Speaker 3: Yeah, but I would never say it on the record.

14
00:00:59,680 --> 00:01:03,440
Speaker 2: God, because everyone thinking of the Department of the got

15
00:01:03,480 --> 00:01:04,200
Speaker 2: you got.

16
00:01:04,000 --> 00:01:06,160
Speaker 3: The DMV for life?

17
00:01:06,760 --> 00:01:11,959
Speaker 2: Well, you know, our guest today is a singer, songwriter, activists,

18
00:01:12,440 --> 00:01:16,840
Speaker 2: a legendary radio show host. I'm an hr I'm I'm

19
00:01:16,880 --> 00:01:18,880
Speaker 2: secretly jealous when I heard you got that gig man.

20
00:01:19,160 --> 00:01:22,880
Speaker 2: I'm like, he has worked with a lot of our favorites,

21
00:01:22,920 --> 00:01:26,640
Speaker 2: of course, start with Jazz, Jeff Body, James, Jill Scott,

22
00:01:27,040 --> 00:01:30,080
Speaker 2: my own band The Roots. Actually, you're the last voice

23
00:01:30,120 --> 00:01:35,199
Speaker 2: on the last official Roots album so much. Of course,

24
00:01:35,240 --> 00:01:38,040
Speaker 2: we know him as the Love King, so I respect

25
00:01:38,040 --> 00:01:41,200
Speaker 2: that title. His latest EP, of course, is The Quiet

26
00:01:41,200 --> 00:01:45,280
Speaker 2: Storm Lover Own. Yes, right now, he's a part of

27
00:01:45,840 --> 00:01:49,720
Speaker 2: what I'm am sure is going to be like one

28
00:01:49,760 --> 00:01:52,520
Speaker 2: of the top tickets of twenty twenty six they say

29
00:01:52,560 --> 00:01:56,840
Speaker 2: Yes tour with Flower Tree and Teacher Moses representing the

30
00:01:56,880 --> 00:02:02,040
Speaker 2: Department of Motor Vehicles to the fullest right here, welcome,

31
00:02:02,440 --> 00:02:02,840
Speaker 2: all right.

32
00:02:02,880 --> 00:02:06,160
Speaker 1: So I have to ask you this question. What is

33
00:02:06,360 --> 00:02:07,360
Speaker 1: love truly?

34
00:02:09,080 --> 00:02:11,560
Speaker 4: Oh man, I'm gonna ask you a lot of weird questions.

35
00:02:11,600 --> 00:02:15,400
Speaker 4: It's a connection spiritually with the Creator. It's God for me.

36
00:02:15,520 --> 00:02:19,079
Speaker 4: It's a connection to community. It's random acts of kindness

37
00:02:20,000 --> 00:02:23,480
Speaker 4: in it's prayers form when nobody's watching. Besides this, you

38
00:02:23,520 --> 00:02:26,440
Speaker 4: know the universe and the Creator and got that part. Yeah,

39
00:02:26,560 --> 00:02:29,679
Speaker 4: When it's not performing, it's not When it's not performative, yeah,

40
00:02:30,000 --> 00:02:34,840
Speaker 4: you know, it's painful. It's a brutal truth and looking

41
00:02:34,960 --> 00:02:37,960
Speaker 4: yourself in the mirror, diving deep within.

42
00:02:39,040 --> 00:02:40,760
Speaker 2: You're saying that to the dark places.

43
00:02:40,400 --> 00:02:44,480
Speaker 3: In your mind and shadow work and a lot of things.

44
00:02:44,919 --> 00:02:45,400
Speaker 1: All right.

45
00:02:45,480 --> 00:02:48,680
Speaker 2: So yeah, again, you're you're taking the Love King title

46
00:02:48,720 --> 00:02:52,160
Speaker 2: because I think there's too much pressure on me. But

47
00:02:53,120 --> 00:02:56,880
Speaker 2: to be the love king, I think that one should

48
00:02:56,880 --> 00:03:01,280
Speaker 2: be able to name for me five songs that must

49
00:03:01,280 --> 00:03:06,360
Speaker 2: be on every mixtape. Like for me, my first job

50
00:03:06,400 --> 00:03:10,480
Speaker 2: as like a mixtape master is the roots tour bus,

51
00:03:10,880 --> 00:03:14,880
Speaker 2: especially in the lean years when like nineteen of us

52
00:03:15,560 --> 00:03:17,560
Speaker 2: had to be on a tour bus really just made

53
00:03:17,600 --> 00:03:21,440
Speaker 2: for like thirteen again, I'm talking about like us living

54
00:03:21,480 --> 00:03:26,080
Speaker 2: on the road. The mixtape was always just like the

55
00:03:26,080 --> 00:03:29,800
Speaker 2: moment of relief. Initially, Hub, our bass player, was the

56
00:03:29,880 --> 00:03:33,799
Speaker 2: king of what we called the mellow tapes, where he'd

57
00:03:33,800 --> 00:03:36,640
Speaker 2: be the first on the bus and he would have

58
00:03:36,800 --> 00:03:41,280
Speaker 2: like at least six or seven ninety minute tapes of

59
00:03:41,440 --> 00:03:46,920
Speaker 2: like what we call the Sunday afternoon cleaning music Royers

60
00:03:47,760 --> 00:03:50,400
Speaker 2: Steve like the usual Suspects and whatnot. And then like

61
00:03:50,440 --> 00:03:53,320
Speaker 2: I took over once I realized, like, oh well, I'm

62
00:03:53,320 --> 00:03:56,080
Speaker 2: tired of hearing everybody that was sunshine every time I

63
00:03:56,080 --> 00:03:59,120
Speaker 2: get on the tour bus. So what five songs do

64
00:03:59,160 --> 00:04:02,080
Speaker 2: you think must be on every mixtape of love?

65
00:04:03,640 --> 00:04:04,520
Speaker 3: Stevie wonder?

66
00:04:05,560 --> 00:04:07,720
Speaker 2: What's on ass as?

67
00:04:08,160 --> 00:04:12,160
Speaker 1: Okay, you're going fast? Are we going faster? Slow?

68
00:04:14,040 --> 00:04:16,360
Speaker 4: Let's lets let's go, Let's go, let's go slow, let's

69
00:04:16,400 --> 00:04:18,760
Speaker 4: go Joinie. I get five sons to Stevie wanted to

70
00:04:18,839 --> 00:04:24,479
Speaker 4: joy inside my tears. Shot a cherished today, okay. Marvin

71
00:04:24,520 --> 00:04:26,039
Speaker 4: Gaye distant Lover.

72
00:04:26,440 --> 00:04:28,760
Speaker 1: Okay, that's my that's three three.

73
00:04:28,560 --> 00:04:32,760
Speaker 3: And three, Luther van Dross.

74
00:04:32,520 --> 00:04:34,520
Speaker 2: Which one house is not a home?

75
00:04:34,839 --> 00:04:37,080
Speaker 1: Okay? All right? And I got my one?

76
00:04:37,080 --> 00:04:39,520
Speaker 4: I got my one left right, yep, I'm gonna go

77
00:04:39,600 --> 00:04:42,080
Speaker 4: with uh Prince Darling.

78
00:04:42,160 --> 00:04:52,920
Speaker 1: Nikki. Damn what that's the record?

79
00:04:53,000 --> 00:04:56,320
Speaker 2: Scrashsmas, my camera, touch yourself?

80
00:05:00,440 --> 00:05:01,799
Speaker 1: Yeah, I was not expected.

81
00:05:02,040 --> 00:05:05,039
Speaker 2: In my mind, I'm like, okay, well he scandalous when

82
00:05:05,080 --> 00:05:06,760
Speaker 2: you are in love or do me?

83
00:05:06,839 --> 00:05:08,840
Speaker 1: Baby? You went there? All right?

84
00:05:09,680 --> 00:05:11,719
Speaker 4: Of course I have to have some other things there

85
00:05:11,760 --> 00:05:14,000
Speaker 4: to make it, to make it, to make it click,

86
00:05:15,880 --> 00:05:16,680
Speaker 4: to make it all work.

87
00:05:16,720 --> 00:05:20,159
Speaker 2: You see what happens, It happens, all right. So what

88
00:05:20,320 --> 00:05:23,080
Speaker 2: was your first musical memory in life?

89
00:05:23,600 --> 00:05:23,800
Speaker 1: Oh?

90
00:05:23,839 --> 00:05:29,039
Speaker 4: Man, it was Green Hill Preschool and there's this photo

91
00:05:29,120 --> 00:05:31,960
Speaker 4: of me conducting. I think it was like it was

92
00:05:32,000 --> 00:05:33,159
Speaker 4: like the kids choir.

93
00:05:35,160 --> 00:05:35,800
Speaker 1: Yeah, it was.

94
00:05:35,839 --> 00:05:38,640
Speaker 4: So it's just like this photo, this nostalgica photo of

95
00:05:38,640 --> 00:05:41,360
Speaker 4: my mother, you know the photos we have on the wall, right, Yeah,

96
00:05:41,480 --> 00:05:44,360
Speaker 4: you know it's like twenty photos of it in.

97
00:05:44,279 --> 00:05:44,960
Speaker 1: The whole wall.

98
00:05:45,279 --> 00:05:48,480
Speaker 4: Okay, yeah, so I would probably say that. And then

99
00:05:48,520 --> 00:05:50,960
Speaker 4: my dad was always on the road. So there was

100
00:05:51,040 --> 00:05:52,760
Speaker 4: one night he was like in town. I literally got

101
00:05:52,760 --> 00:05:54,960
Speaker 4: to see him for like five minutes. It was like

102
00:05:55,800 --> 00:05:57,920
Speaker 4: the beast five minutes of my life. See my dad

103
00:05:57,920 --> 00:06:00,919
Speaker 4: every day, So different household, but my life. And he

104
00:06:01,000 --> 00:06:04,400
Speaker 4: was actually on tour with Stevie this particular time, and

105
00:06:05,400 --> 00:06:08,600
Speaker 4: I just remember like, ooh, this is amazing, like the

106
00:06:08,600 --> 00:06:12,039
Speaker 4: concert and walking into this concert hall, Camember we were

107
00:06:12,960 --> 00:06:17,120
Speaker 4: we went in DC. If this is in DC, like

108
00:06:17,160 --> 00:06:20,360
Speaker 4: around nineteen eighty an he wanted was he on tour

109
00:06:20,440 --> 00:06:23,160
Speaker 4: Gil Scott heron or because I know that he did

110
00:06:23,160 --> 00:06:24,520
Speaker 4: a series of shows in d C.

111
00:06:25,320 --> 00:06:26,599
Speaker 3: Gil might have been on that show.

112
00:06:27,000 --> 00:06:31,279
Speaker 2: So initially, the whole history of Master Blaster Jamming is

113
00:06:31,360 --> 00:06:35,280
Speaker 2: that Stevie was a big giant Bob Marley fan, and

114
00:06:35,440 --> 00:06:38,120
Speaker 2: they decided in nineteen seventy nine, after like the Secret

115
00:06:38,120 --> 00:06:41,640
Speaker 2: Life of Plants sort of settled now it's hotter than

116
00:06:41,760 --> 00:06:44,560
Speaker 2: July time, and him and Bob Marley going to go

117
00:06:44,600 --> 00:06:48,920
Speaker 2: on tour together and Bob had cancer complications and whatnot,

118
00:06:49,040 --> 00:06:51,720
Speaker 2: and so then Gil Scott Heron filled in for him,

119
00:06:51,720 --> 00:06:53,960
Speaker 2: but I know he did a slew of a lot

120
00:06:54,000 --> 00:06:57,840
Speaker 2: of shows in the DMV era, mainly to garner up

121
00:06:57,880 --> 00:07:02,440
Speaker 2: support for King's birthday. Like, so your father is a

122
00:07:03,120 --> 00:07:05,440
Speaker 2: do Okay, the cellis yep Okay.

123
00:07:05,839 --> 00:07:07,679
Speaker 1: Who else? Do you know who he played with.

124
00:07:07,640 --> 00:07:10,760
Speaker 4: Or Julius Hempfield, A couple of different I know he

125
00:07:10,800 --> 00:07:13,160
Speaker 4: played with David Murray, all different different trios.

126
00:07:13,600 --> 00:07:18,920
Speaker 2: Okay, give me your your fondest memory of growing up

127
00:07:19,040 --> 00:07:19,680
Speaker 2: in d C.

128
00:07:20,560 --> 00:07:24,920
Speaker 4: Probably just hearing like the Go Go, Like Go Go

129
00:07:25,120 --> 00:07:27,880
Speaker 4: was always in the midst of things. But I wasn't outside,

130
00:07:28,000 --> 00:07:29,360
Speaker 4: you know what I mean, Like as you know, I

131
00:07:29,400 --> 00:07:31,000
Speaker 4: was outside as a kid, But like you know, I

132
00:07:31,000 --> 00:07:32,400
Speaker 4: didn't jump off the poort. I didn't go to my

133
00:07:32,440 --> 00:07:35,680
Speaker 4: first go go to. I was like maybe like twenty twenty,

134
00:07:35,760 --> 00:07:37,680
Speaker 4: twenty one, nineteen, you know what I mean. So I

135
00:07:37,720 --> 00:07:40,400
Speaker 4: didn't get the experience like going to the Go Go

136
00:07:40,440 --> 00:07:43,080
Speaker 4: at fifteen fourteen, sixteen seventeen, you know.

137
00:07:43,320 --> 00:07:45,440
Speaker 1: All right, So I caught rare essence.

138
00:07:46,120 --> 00:07:48,760
Speaker 2: We just we happen to be in DC one night

139
00:07:49,040 --> 00:07:52,040
Speaker 2: and it was like a three show thing we were doing,

140
00:07:52,120 --> 00:07:54,560
Speaker 2: and like we were there for four days, so we

141
00:07:54,560 --> 00:07:57,679
Speaker 2: had like one of these nights off and I realized

142
00:07:57,720 --> 00:08:01,440
Speaker 2: I'd never been to a go go show before. And

143
00:08:01,520 --> 00:08:03,120
Speaker 2: I was like, all right, well, let me go to

144
00:08:03,160 --> 00:08:06,000
Speaker 2: my first go go experience because my manager went to

145
00:08:06,120 --> 00:08:09,440
Speaker 2: college and the DMV area, you know, Layah, like we

146
00:08:09,560 --> 00:08:12,840
Speaker 2: know everyone in the you gotta go to a go

147
00:08:12,840 --> 00:08:16,280
Speaker 2: go show. And this is this is definitely after the pandemic,

148
00:08:16,360 --> 00:08:19,160
Speaker 2: so maybe like twenty twenty one. Oh wow, okay, and

149
00:08:19,360 --> 00:08:23,560
Speaker 2: so there's this new wave of go go like whatever

150
00:08:24,160 --> 00:08:28,240
Speaker 2: trap and drill are to boombat hip hop, Like it's

151
00:08:28,280 --> 00:08:30,720
Speaker 2: a whole nother bounce beat. The bounce beat, Yeah, it

152
00:08:30,800 --> 00:08:34,840
Speaker 2: was a whole nother rhythm, and like I didn't realize

153
00:08:34,880 --> 00:08:38,120
Speaker 2: that the heartbeat of go go, which you know hates

154
00:08:38,160 --> 00:08:40,559
Speaker 2: when I say this because we always argue. I argue

155
00:08:40,559 --> 00:08:43,559
Speaker 2: and say that, you know, go Go's based off of

156
00:08:43,920 --> 00:08:49,920
Speaker 2: Grover Washington Juniors, mister Magic Dun Dunk Dun Dunk, Yeah.

157
00:08:50,360 --> 00:08:54,000
Speaker 1: And I would say, where's that from? Layah? Anyway, So

158
00:08:54,120 --> 00:08:54,720
Speaker 1: the whole.

159
00:08:54,480 --> 00:08:58,679
Speaker 2: Point is they didn't play that bounce Like I was like, wow,

160
00:08:58,720 --> 00:09:02,160
Speaker 2: I never went to a go go show, which just

161
00:09:02,240 --> 00:09:07,560
Speaker 2: the prime rhythm of go go was never played, like

162
00:09:07,600 --> 00:09:10,520
Speaker 2: it was a whole another and I was like, oh, okay,

163
00:09:10,559 --> 00:09:14,040
Speaker 2: so now there's a transition period where that rhythm where

164
00:09:14,040 --> 00:09:17,640
Speaker 2: they slowed it down way down, almost like halftime exactly.

165
00:09:17,920 --> 00:09:19,679
Speaker 2: So like when did you go to your first go

166
00:09:19,679 --> 00:09:20,120
Speaker 2: go show?

167
00:09:20,480 --> 00:09:23,520
Speaker 4: And my first go go experience was Rare Essence at

168
00:09:23,559 --> 00:09:25,560
Speaker 4: the time. I was a writer at that period of

169
00:09:25,559 --> 00:09:29,240
Speaker 4: my life and Droopy Rest in Peace, Droopy and he

170
00:09:29,280 --> 00:09:32,480
Speaker 4: had his hit or Sam. They took me to my

171
00:09:32,520 --> 00:09:35,559
Speaker 4: first rare essence go go experience.

172
00:09:35,640 --> 00:09:36,520
Speaker 1: Miss Kim was in the.

173
00:09:36,480 --> 00:09:41,040
Speaker 4: Band at the time, was there? It was I think

174
00:09:41,080 --> 00:09:43,560
Speaker 4: Mickey was there at the time. They were taking me

175
00:09:43,600 --> 00:09:46,560
Speaker 4: to me white Boy and to write for you know,

176
00:09:47,240 --> 00:09:49,800
Speaker 4: white Boy took a liking to me and my penmanship,

177
00:09:49,800 --> 00:09:51,520
Speaker 4: and the goal was for me to write for Kim

178
00:09:51,920 --> 00:09:54,360
Speaker 4: and write records for the band. But that was my

179
00:09:54,480 --> 00:09:57,360
Speaker 4: first experience. I think it was that. I think we

180
00:09:57,440 --> 00:10:01,920
Speaker 4: did the Black Hole. Okay, maybe black Hole or Tunnel.

181
00:10:01,920 --> 00:10:04,160
Speaker 4: I can't remember what venue was, but I just remember

182
00:10:04,240 --> 00:10:09,160
Speaker 4: like going and instantly being like it was turned out.

183
00:10:09,320 --> 00:10:12,640
Speaker 2: Can one make a good living as a go go

184
00:10:12,760 --> 00:10:15,360
Speaker 2: musician playing in the absolutely?

185
00:10:15,400 --> 00:10:17,120
Speaker 4: I mean it was you got to remember at this

186
00:10:17,160 --> 00:10:19,360
Speaker 4: stage it was already a national, global thing, you know

187
00:10:19,400 --> 00:10:20,959
Speaker 4: what I mean, because you know.

188
00:10:21,559 --> 00:10:23,640
Speaker 2: But for the most part, I know that they stick

189
00:10:23,720 --> 00:10:28,520
Speaker 2: to DC. Yeah, I mean, I mean maybe Virginia, Yeah yeah, yeah.

190
00:10:28,520 --> 00:10:32,040
Speaker 4: But like you talk about the success of of EU,

191
00:10:32,520 --> 00:10:36,360
Speaker 4: you know, school Days and that whole movement on top

192
00:10:36,440 --> 00:10:41,040
Speaker 4: bands making seven figures six figures a year, not having

193
00:10:41,080 --> 00:10:43,200
Speaker 4: to leave the city or leave it, you know. Besides,

194
00:10:43,280 --> 00:10:46,199
Speaker 4: when you want to do a destination trip or you know,

195
00:10:47,040 --> 00:10:51,679
Speaker 4: what's unique about the go Go community is that your

196
00:10:51,720 --> 00:10:54,199
Speaker 4: super fans they follow you. So you have go go

197
00:10:54,280 --> 00:10:57,400
Speaker 4: live in Miami. You got you know, there are annual

198
00:10:57,440 --> 00:10:59,160
Speaker 4: trips that have been happening for.

199
00:10:59,200 --> 00:11:01,040
Speaker 2: So they do come outside.

200
00:11:01,280 --> 00:11:03,760
Speaker 4: Yeah, it's been I mean, they have a go Go,

201
00:11:03,760 --> 00:11:06,520
Speaker 4: Go Go night in Japan. I went to my first

202
00:11:06,520 --> 00:11:09,160
Speaker 4: time going to what my first time going to Japan

203
00:11:09,960 --> 00:11:13,440
Speaker 4: as Raheem Devna Artists. We were coming in and I

204
00:11:13,520 --> 00:11:16,560
Speaker 4: ran into Sweet Shari and Chuck Brown, like Chuck was

205
00:11:16,640 --> 00:11:20,840
Speaker 4: leaving Japan from playing and had been there maybe two

206
00:11:20,920 --> 00:11:25,560
Speaker 4: three weeks. Sold out every night, Like it's a phenomenon.

207
00:11:25,600 --> 00:11:26,040
Speaker 1: You know, Go Go.

208
00:11:26,200 --> 00:11:28,920
Speaker 4: I would say, go Go is equivalent to what for

209
00:11:29,040 --> 00:11:33,680
Speaker 4: DC to what you know, Big Trombone Shorty is to

210
00:11:34,240 --> 00:11:36,920
Speaker 4: New Orleans, you know what I mean? And to see

211
00:11:36,920 --> 00:11:39,680
Speaker 4: how you know some of these bands been together, you know,

212
00:11:39,800 --> 00:11:43,200
Speaker 4: rare essence is what fifty years and maybe you know

213
00:11:43,720 --> 00:11:45,120
Speaker 4: Backyard Band with Big G.

214
00:11:45,520 --> 00:11:47,959
Speaker 3: I think they got thirty forty years in now.

215
00:11:48,040 --> 00:11:52,720
Speaker 2: Like So as far as like music venues are concerned, yeah,

216
00:11:52,760 --> 00:11:56,640
Speaker 2: like right now, would you say that DC is still

217
00:11:57,640 --> 00:11:59,920
Speaker 2: strong in the game as far as having music outlet

218
00:12:00,080 --> 00:12:02,960
Speaker 2: because the thing is is that the reason why the

219
00:12:03,040 --> 00:12:07,920
Speaker 2: Roots really existed, or at least to the to the

220
00:12:07,920 --> 00:12:11,800
Speaker 2: the fast lane that we got ushered in on, was

221
00:12:11,880 --> 00:12:15,720
Speaker 2: that there were no music venues in Philly. So it

222
00:12:15,800 --> 00:12:18,040
Speaker 2: was like you had the creative, let's go on the

223
00:12:18,040 --> 00:12:23,120
Speaker 2: streets now. I meant, had the Roots come out fifteen

224
00:12:23,320 --> 00:12:26,360
Speaker 2: twenty years later, we would have probably been like, all right.

225
00:12:26,360 --> 00:12:29,960
Speaker 1: Let's get a YouTube page and do that.

226
00:12:30,120 --> 00:12:33,480
Speaker 2: But you know, we only played the streets and busks

227
00:12:33,520 --> 00:12:37,480
Speaker 2: because there was no place to play. And only then

228
00:12:37,720 --> 00:12:40,320
Speaker 2: people were like, you know, they did did the whole

229
00:12:40,320 --> 00:12:41,960
Speaker 2: thing like, well, you know, you know, we're not into

230
00:12:42,000 --> 00:12:45,640
Speaker 2: rap music, but we like you guys, and we were

231
00:12:45,679 --> 00:12:48,079
Speaker 2: suddenly like the first rap group to play like all

232
00:12:48,120 --> 00:12:50,600
Speaker 2: these if we were a rock band.

233
00:12:50,480 --> 00:12:53,160
Speaker 4: Y'all to hip hop rolling Stones and me, oh man,

234
00:12:53,320 --> 00:12:55,240
Speaker 4: thank you, like straight up, like I appreciate, Like this

235
00:12:55,320 --> 00:12:56,880
Speaker 4: is you know, before the world knew my name. I

236
00:12:56,920 --> 00:12:58,800
Speaker 4: was at the nine to thirty Club in the front

237
00:12:58,880 --> 00:13:02,439
Speaker 4: row at the Roots con service. I remember the night

238
00:13:03,080 --> 00:13:05,280
Speaker 4: where y'all came out with the what was it, the

239
00:13:05,360 --> 00:13:09,080
Speaker 4: mister Miyagi joints and like walk through the whole crowd

240
00:13:09,960 --> 00:13:13,240
Speaker 4: like yeah, so you know what I mean? So like that,

241
00:13:13,400 --> 00:13:15,600
Speaker 4: you know, I was at the Black Lilies and the

242
00:13:15,640 --> 00:13:18,080
Speaker 4: Cut with nobody, you know, just just you know, it's

243
00:13:18,120 --> 00:13:18,839
Speaker 4: part of my story.

244
00:13:18,880 --> 00:13:20,320
Speaker 1: I talk I talk about it often.

245
00:13:20,360 --> 00:13:23,240
Speaker 2: You know, DC is our number one market.

246
00:13:23,360 --> 00:13:25,920
Speaker 4: Yeah yeah, And the reason why DC loves you guys

247
00:13:25,920 --> 00:13:29,240
Speaker 4: so much is the connection of like live music and

248
00:13:29,240 --> 00:13:33,120
Speaker 4: what it's the live exchange of energy live like there's

249
00:13:33,160 --> 00:13:36,880
Speaker 4: nothing like it. There's nothing like seeing your top go

250
00:13:36,880 --> 00:13:40,880
Speaker 4: go bands in DC or anywhere and hearing the music

251
00:13:41,120 --> 00:13:43,000
Speaker 4: is nothing like a roots experience, you.

252
00:13:42,960 --> 00:13:44,640
Speaker 1: Know, thank you. I appreciate that.

253
00:13:45,400 --> 00:13:50,160
Speaker 2: Is there any unspoken pressures as a native.

254
00:13:51,520 --> 00:13:56,840
Speaker 1: There to represent go go or nah? Not at all?

255
00:13:56,880 --> 00:13:58,920
Speaker 4: I mean you know it's funny man, you know now

256
00:13:58,960 --> 00:14:03,319
Speaker 4: and that half a century living out my childhood, drunitless

257
00:14:03,520 --> 00:14:06,480
Speaker 4: like my bucket list stuff like I'm you know, from

258
00:14:06,520 --> 00:14:08,880
Speaker 4: doing a Choiet Storm to I have a go go band.

259
00:14:09,040 --> 00:14:12,200
Speaker 1: It's called the Crank Crusaders. I didn't know this.

260
00:14:12,440 --> 00:14:12,640
Speaker 2: Yeah.

261
00:14:12,720 --> 00:14:12,920
Speaker 1: Yeah.

262
00:14:13,360 --> 00:14:15,720
Speaker 4: We do a First Sunday's event at the conver Station

263
00:14:15,880 --> 00:14:18,600
Speaker 4: Tavern every first Sunday unless I'm on the road, you know,

264
00:14:18,640 --> 00:14:21,360
Speaker 4: on tour, and we'll kind of either navigate around and

265
00:14:21,440 --> 00:14:24,280
Speaker 4: take the month off or you know, pick another Sunday,

266
00:14:24,640 --> 00:14:26,960
Speaker 4: which we may be increasing the Sundays.

267
00:14:26,560 --> 00:14:28,600
Speaker 1: Right, you know, but I've been in a go go band.

268
00:14:28,640 --> 00:14:31,720
Speaker 4: We've been you know, shout out to Bootsy Vegas, Yazra

269
00:14:31,880 --> 00:14:36,400
Speaker 4: who I know, you know, yaz was on the front line,

270
00:14:36,920 --> 00:14:38,360
Speaker 4: you know what I mean, like all the rest of

271
00:14:38,360 --> 00:14:41,360
Speaker 4: the guys in the band, and it's been an experience

272
00:14:41,440 --> 00:14:44,160
Speaker 4: like the first this band has actually been together since

273
00:14:44,640 --> 00:14:50,120
Speaker 4: like twenty nineteen. You know, we've talked about principal members

274
00:14:50,160 --> 00:14:54,160
Speaker 4: and going through different you know, musicians. Our big show

275
00:14:54,320 --> 00:14:56,920
Speaker 4: was like twenty nineteen at the Kennedy Center. It was

276
00:14:57,000 --> 00:15:01,560
Speaker 4: it was Raheem DeVaughn and Backyard Band right New Year's Eve,

277
00:15:01,880 --> 00:15:05,000
Speaker 4: And I use that as an opportunity to introduce Crank

278
00:15:05,040 --> 00:15:06,840
Speaker 4: Crusaders to DC.

279
00:15:07,200 --> 00:15:08,880
Speaker 3: You know, and then boom covid hit.

280
00:15:09,480 --> 00:15:10,920
Speaker 1: So that was your last creative product.

281
00:15:10,960 --> 00:15:12,040
Speaker 2: I was so said I was the last.

282
00:15:12,160 --> 00:15:15,800
Speaker 4: We were still figuring out the records and creating and

283
00:15:15,840 --> 00:15:17,800
Speaker 4: you know, and you know, we're building a catalog or

284
00:15:17,840 --> 00:15:19,680
Speaker 4: we haven't put out official album yet, which is in

285
00:15:19,800 --> 00:15:22,480
Speaker 4: under the you know, in the works right now, and uh,

286
00:15:22,560 --> 00:15:25,680
Speaker 4: you know, we just lost one of our main producers.

287
00:15:25,720 --> 00:15:28,800
Speaker 4: Rest in peace that I can and uh, you know,

288
00:15:28,880 --> 00:15:31,680
Speaker 4: but from the minute I saw a rare essence, I

289
00:15:31,720 --> 00:15:32,760
Speaker 4: always wanted to be part of.

290
00:15:32,760 --> 00:15:33,720
Speaker 1: A go go band, you know.

291
00:15:33,920 --> 00:15:37,440
Speaker 2: Okay, So, and I'm mainly just I'm not even asking

292
00:15:37,480 --> 00:15:41,760
Speaker 2: us for interview, like because I just I'm so obsessed.

293
00:15:41,360 --> 00:15:42,080
Speaker 1: With that culture.

294
00:15:42,120 --> 00:15:45,520
Speaker 2: But I wouldn't even know I'm gonna get us. I

295
00:15:45,520 --> 00:15:49,000
Speaker 2: see it almost like as akin to jazz or another

296
00:15:49,080 --> 00:15:51,880
Speaker 2: genre where a lot of times, I mean I've.

297
00:15:51,720 --> 00:15:55,040
Speaker 1: Seen cats, I've seen non jazz cats like Okay, well,

298
00:15:55,040 --> 00:15:56,400
Speaker 1: I can sold it good, so let me.

299
00:15:56,760 --> 00:15:58,880
Speaker 2: But there's there's a whole nother nuance that you have

300
00:15:58,960 --> 00:16:02,240
Speaker 2: to know about that culture. And for go go at least,

301
00:16:02,240 --> 00:16:06,840
Speaker 2: I know, it's it's groove, its format, it's cover songs,

302
00:16:07,520 --> 00:16:08,280
Speaker 2: it's a lot.

303
00:16:08,160 --> 00:16:08,720
Speaker 1: Of those things.

304
00:16:08,760 --> 00:16:12,040
Speaker 4: So when you are and it's letting the beat ride,

305
00:16:12,080 --> 00:16:14,200
Speaker 4: Like that's what That's what I want to know. How

306
00:16:14,240 --> 00:16:16,000
Speaker 4: do you know one of the main things I had

307
00:16:16,000 --> 00:16:17,520
Speaker 4: to learn and I'm still and it's still a learning

308
00:16:17,520 --> 00:16:20,920
Speaker 4: process for me. Like like sometimes my you know, my

309
00:16:20,920 --> 00:16:23,400
Speaker 4: my band members, you know, my front line member, he

310
00:16:23,480 --> 00:16:27,560
Speaker 4: gets pssed with me because you know me because he's like,

311
00:16:28,200 --> 00:16:31,080
Speaker 4: I'm so used to being a conductor, right, and being

312
00:16:31,120 --> 00:16:34,600
Speaker 4: the orchestrator and being the leader. What I do love

313
00:16:34,640 --> 00:16:37,000
Speaker 4: about being part of the Crank Crusaders is and being

314
00:16:37,040 --> 00:16:38,760
Speaker 4: in this go Go band is like, you know, the

315
00:16:38,760 --> 00:16:41,400
Speaker 4: pressure is not on me to always lead, and it

316
00:16:41,480 --> 00:16:43,240
Speaker 4: puts me in a position to follow, which makes me

317
00:16:43,280 --> 00:16:47,480
Speaker 4: a student to have to learn, you know where we're

318
00:16:47,520 --> 00:16:53,120
Speaker 4: in rehearsals and you know, we rehearsed once a week literally.

319
00:16:52,760 --> 00:16:54,760
Speaker 1: Like you know what I mean.

320
00:16:54,800 --> 00:16:58,240
Speaker 4: Like it's just it's just a discipline, right, and uh

321
00:16:58,720 --> 00:17:01,840
Speaker 4: so we're always experimenting with the different you know, whether

322
00:17:01,880 --> 00:17:04,879
Speaker 4: it's bounce beat or you know, the first time I

323
00:17:04,920 --> 00:17:07,040
Speaker 4: heard them saying like, all right, we're gonna do this record,

324
00:17:07,200 --> 00:17:09,800
Speaker 4: and Bootsy's communicating with like the drummer he's like and

325
00:17:09,840 --> 00:17:11,840
Speaker 4: they're saying Oh yeah, we're gonna do the mister Magic beat,

326
00:17:11,920 --> 00:17:13,640
Speaker 4: or we're not gonna do the mister magic. Like, let's

327
00:17:13,680 --> 00:17:16,159
Speaker 4: do the mister magic. I didn't get it, now, you know,

328
00:17:16,359 --> 00:17:18,200
Speaker 4: right high sight twenty twenty.

329
00:17:18,240 --> 00:17:19,639
Speaker 2: Now I get it. So when you said it, I

330
00:17:19,680 --> 00:17:22,199
Speaker 2: just kind of like chuckle. But in other words, like

331
00:17:23,280 --> 00:17:27,320
Speaker 2: I listen to mixtapes and the leader won't say anything

332
00:17:27,320 --> 00:17:29,440
Speaker 2: for like thirty two bars and just let the beat right.

333
00:17:30,119 --> 00:17:32,240
Speaker 2: And I'm trying to you know, I'm not watching on videotape,

334
00:17:32,280 --> 00:17:34,760
Speaker 2: but I'm just imagining, like, so what does the rest

335
00:17:34,760 --> 00:17:36,480
Speaker 2: of the band do? They just what you know, what

336
00:17:36,520 --> 00:17:39,840
Speaker 2: it is, But it is to be in the room

337
00:17:39,840 --> 00:17:42,000
Speaker 2: and the experience, because what you're probably hearing is a

338
00:17:42,000 --> 00:17:44,640
Speaker 2: lot YEA. Remember you're probably hearing a live recording aka

339
00:17:44,760 --> 00:17:47,359
Speaker 2: to PA tape right right, And what's happening in that

340
00:17:47,400 --> 00:17:52,359
Speaker 2: moment is the walls are sweating, it's packed wall to wall.

341
00:17:53,640 --> 00:17:56,679
Speaker 4: The ladies, you know, are doing a thing. You know,

342
00:17:56,920 --> 00:17:59,600
Speaker 4: it's it's a party, man, it's a vibe. It's not

343
00:17:59,680 --> 00:18:03,639
Speaker 4: it's not just you're hearing the after effect of a

344
00:18:03,720 --> 00:18:06,879
Speaker 4: night that can't be duplicated, you know, thinking, you know,

345
00:18:07,080 --> 00:18:11,880
Speaker 4: I will compare it to like a theater theatre of Broadway, right,

346
00:18:12,040 --> 00:18:14,880
Speaker 4: versus doing film and television, which I've done both right,

347
00:18:15,119 --> 00:18:18,880
Speaker 4: and theater is very improvisational. Like theater is very much

348
00:18:18,960 --> 00:18:24,160
Speaker 4: read the room in the moment, because I remember resting

349
00:18:24,160 --> 00:18:28,080
Speaker 4: the Love Jones musical years back, and literally a fight

350
00:18:28,119 --> 00:18:33,960
Speaker 4: broke out because there was some guy there on a

351
00:18:34,960 --> 00:18:41,080
Speaker 4: date with his wife. When his lady came in, he was,

352
00:18:41,200 --> 00:18:42,639
Speaker 4: he was on a date, he was, you know what

353
00:18:42,640 --> 00:18:48,280
Speaker 4: I mean. It was a situation and I think you're so.

354
00:18:48,280 --> 00:18:52,000
Speaker 2: So we're doing light and so MC light is.

355
00:18:51,960 --> 00:18:55,000
Speaker 4: Doing your line and we're doing our lines, and literally

356
00:18:55,080 --> 00:18:57,480
Speaker 4: a fight breaks out or something, and it's just like

357
00:18:57,920 --> 00:19:00,440
Speaker 4: it became and we turned it into a moment because

358
00:19:00,440 --> 00:19:01,320
Speaker 4: the show bus go on.

359
00:19:13,200 --> 00:19:15,320
Speaker 1: What is your shout out getting? Like? Because I know

360
00:19:15,400 --> 00:19:19,520
Speaker 1: that any effective go go vocalists has to know all

361
00:19:19,520 --> 00:19:20,440
Speaker 1: the areas.

362
00:19:20,119 --> 00:19:22,840
Speaker 4: Yet I get to be a team member and not

363
00:19:23,040 --> 00:19:24,399
Speaker 4: have to, Like you don't have that pressure.

364
00:19:24,480 --> 00:19:26,800
Speaker 3: Yeah, so you know Boosey does. He's a lead talker

365
00:19:27,000 --> 00:19:27,520
Speaker 3: of the band.

366
00:19:27,560 --> 00:19:30,720
Speaker 4: So it's just his job is to conduct the band,

367
00:19:30,800 --> 00:19:34,040
Speaker 4: communicate with us, lead us. You know, read the room,

368
00:19:34,160 --> 00:19:36,400
Speaker 4: know who's in the room. Sometimes you know, you work

369
00:19:36,480 --> 00:19:38,879
Speaker 4: the room before you get to know your fans. I mean,

370
00:19:39,119 --> 00:19:41,040
Speaker 4: I'm sure that even if you don't know the names,

371
00:19:41,080 --> 00:19:44,760
Speaker 4: I'm sure that that with the super fan cult following

372
00:19:44,920 --> 00:19:48,080
Speaker 4: Basic y'all have, like you, it's people that y'all have

373
00:19:48,160 --> 00:19:50,840
Speaker 4: been coming to see y'all for since the beginning. Like

374
00:19:50,920 --> 00:19:52,320
Speaker 4: you know what I mean, you don't there's no way

375
00:19:52,359 --> 00:19:54,800
Speaker 4: you don't, you know, unless you just in it for

376
00:19:54,840 --> 00:19:57,639
Speaker 4: the wrong reasons that you don't connect or no, you know,

377
00:19:58,240 --> 00:20:00,560
Speaker 4: and you have boundaries. But sometimes that's that's right though,

378
00:20:00,640 --> 00:20:03,359
Speaker 4: no doubt, because you have to have you know, their boundaries.

379
00:20:03,400 --> 00:20:03,600
Speaker 1: You know.

380
00:20:04,080 --> 00:20:07,000
Speaker 4: Fan is short for fanatic, you know what I mean.

381
00:20:07,200 --> 00:20:11,480
Speaker 4: So you know, but I watched like the communities and

382
00:20:11,560 --> 00:20:14,399
Speaker 4: all these bands have different communities, which is you know,

383
00:20:14,440 --> 00:20:16,840
Speaker 4: you have some of them where they share certain communities, right,

384
00:20:17,359 --> 00:20:21,199
Speaker 4: but Backyard has a very distinct crowd that comes to

385
00:20:21,240 --> 00:20:23,360
Speaker 4: see them, right, right, and they might come to see

386
00:20:23,359 --> 00:20:25,520
Speaker 4: them four or five nights a week. And that's what

387
00:20:25,600 --> 00:20:28,200
Speaker 4: the vibe is, you know, It's all I've never seen

388
00:20:28,240 --> 00:20:30,600
Speaker 4: anything like it, you know what I mean, other than

389
00:20:31,320 --> 00:20:35,080
Speaker 4: you know, how I would describe you know, say, like

390
00:20:35,440 --> 00:20:38,720
Speaker 4: social media now or Instagram, right how you know, we

391
00:20:38,840 --> 00:20:42,000
Speaker 4: build these communities and people support them, and you know,

392
00:20:42,240 --> 00:20:44,200
Speaker 4: they can never get enough of what you put out.

393
00:20:44,320 --> 00:20:47,159
Speaker 2: You know, I'm asking a lot of this simply because

394
00:20:48,240 --> 00:20:50,760
Speaker 2: for those that you know don't get access to the

395
00:20:50,840 --> 00:20:54,880
Speaker 2: roots as much as you know, we went from two

396
00:20:54,960 --> 00:20:57,719
Speaker 2: hundred nights on the year. Yeah, we do normal now

397
00:20:57,760 --> 00:21:00,520
Speaker 2: we probably do maybe fifty shows a year like a

398
00:21:00,560 --> 00:21:04,560
Speaker 2: regular group. But a lot of these gigs we've been doing,

399
00:21:04,640 --> 00:21:06,159
Speaker 2: we've been on the jam band circuit.

400
00:21:06,320 --> 00:21:08,560
Speaker 4: Yeah, And for me, like I know that Go Go

401
00:21:09,160 --> 00:21:11,439
Speaker 4: is Black people's jam band circuit.

402
00:21:12,200 --> 00:21:15,000
Speaker 2: And a lot of these like especially in the Northeast,

403
00:21:15,320 --> 00:21:20,439
Speaker 2: like above Connecticut, above New York, Connecticut and Massachusetts and

404
00:21:20,440 --> 00:21:22,879
Speaker 2: Maine and whatnot, Rhode Island.

405
00:21:23,000 --> 00:21:24,360
Speaker 1: They have like a lot of these.

406
00:21:25,760 --> 00:21:30,440
Speaker 2: Festivals, like hippie festivals for jam bands all day long.

407
00:21:30,720 --> 00:21:34,439
Speaker 2: And for me, I don't know how it's going to happen,

408
00:21:34,480 --> 00:21:37,280
Speaker 2: but I'm trying to figure out, like between New Orleans

409
00:21:37,480 --> 00:21:41,920
Speaker 2: and d C. Wondering how come the two worlds have

410
00:21:41,960 --> 00:21:43,240
Speaker 2: never collided to at.

411
00:21:43,160 --> 00:21:47,439
Speaker 4: Least it's happening organically. And that's why why you know,

412
00:21:47,520 --> 00:21:50,840
Speaker 4: we we know myself in Bootsy. First of all, this

413
00:21:51,040 --> 00:21:53,320
Speaker 4: is it's a little it's more personal for us. Bootsy

414
00:21:53,480 --> 00:21:56,040
Speaker 4: was experiencing you know, he was he had a he

415
00:21:56,080 --> 00:21:59,720
Speaker 4: had a death date, like stage four cancer and it

416
00:21:59,800 --> 00:22:02,439
Speaker 4: was a phone conversation like, hey man, you beat the cancer. Man,

417
00:22:02,480 --> 00:22:05,000
Speaker 4: You're gonna start a gogle band. And he's been cancer

418
00:22:05,040 --> 00:22:07,280
Speaker 4: free for some years now, and he was like I

419
00:22:07,280 --> 00:22:09,159
Speaker 4: remember when he rang the bell and I'm like, all right,

420
00:22:09,200 --> 00:22:12,000
Speaker 4: well time start the band. Figure ot, we're gonna name it.

421
00:22:12,160 --> 00:22:15,119
Speaker 4: And you know here we are the crank Crusaders.

422
00:22:15,160 --> 00:22:18,280
Speaker 1: You know, so ill to see this. I can't wait

423
00:22:18,320 --> 00:22:18,679
Speaker 1: to see this.

424
00:22:18,760 --> 00:22:21,280
Speaker 2: Yeah, speak of which, what was the first live show

425
00:22:21,359 --> 00:22:22,680
Speaker 2: that you ever attended?

426
00:22:23,760 --> 00:22:27,800
Speaker 3: Okay it was New Year's Eve? Okay, Whitney Houston.

427
00:22:28,840 --> 00:22:29,600
Speaker 1: That's impressive.

428
00:22:30,280 --> 00:22:32,800
Speaker 4: Wait was Whitney there? Did she perform? I feel like

429
00:22:32,840 --> 00:22:34,840
Speaker 4: she performed. I can't remember she was on a ticket,

430
00:22:35,160 --> 00:22:37,520
Speaker 4: but Bobby was there. I think maybe it's a new addition.

431
00:22:38,440 --> 00:22:39,360
Speaker 4: I know it was Whitney.

432
00:22:39,800 --> 00:22:40,399
Speaker 1: Bobby.

433
00:22:40,960 --> 00:22:43,840
Speaker 2: Wait, it became an item in ninety one. Well, you

434
00:22:43,880 --> 00:22:44,800
Speaker 2: were like twenty when.

435
00:22:44,680 --> 00:22:48,639
Speaker 4: You saw your first contract, so it had this is

436
00:22:48,720 --> 00:22:51,639
Speaker 4: like maybe they weren't a thing then, Okay, you know

437
00:22:51,680 --> 00:22:53,800
Speaker 4: what I mean. But it was it was like, uh,

438
00:22:54,320 --> 00:22:57,840
Speaker 4: when you leave in DC, which is also like kind

439
00:22:57,880 --> 00:23:00,960
Speaker 4: of destination. Definitely a teenager though I was in high

440
00:23:00,960 --> 00:23:03,000
Speaker 4: school because I remember miss pat was the one that took

441
00:23:03,080 --> 00:23:06,159
Speaker 4: us to see this particular concert. Really yeah, she was

442
00:23:06,200 --> 00:23:09,160
Speaker 4: like the neighborhood mom. You know what was the impact

443
00:23:09,280 --> 00:23:11,960
Speaker 4: of you seeing this concert. It's one thing to I

444
00:23:12,000 --> 00:23:15,760
Speaker 4: guess hear the music live and hear the records and

445
00:23:15,840 --> 00:23:17,680
Speaker 4: you know, and sing them in the shower, And there's

446
00:23:17,720 --> 00:23:20,360
Speaker 4: another thing like to see the artist. So the only

447
00:23:20,400 --> 00:23:22,879
Speaker 4: thing I probably could have wished for was better seats.

448
00:23:22,960 --> 00:23:25,800
Speaker 4: But like tripping off that as a kid, you're like

449
00:23:25,880 --> 00:23:27,120
Speaker 4: at the concert, you know what, I'm.

450
00:23:27,040 --> 00:23:27,760
Speaker 1: Happy to be there.

451
00:23:28,920 --> 00:23:33,399
Speaker 2: I always ask what television show or movie would you

452
00:23:33,440 --> 00:23:37,840
Speaker 2: say best describes what your childhood experiences were like growing up?

453
00:23:38,720 --> 00:23:41,359
Speaker 3: I don't know, man, I can't say that. I can't

454
00:23:41,359 --> 00:23:44,200
Speaker 3: say that there was one really yeah.

455
00:23:44,480 --> 00:23:46,880
Speaker 1: All right, there's no character that you wish you were

456
00:23:47,240 --> 00:23:49,040
Speaker 1: like watching TV or any of those things.

457
00:23:49,160 --> 00:23:49,840
Speaker 2: Absolutely.

458
00:23:49,960 --> 00:23:52,119
Speaker 4: I mean I would probably say good times because I

459
00:23:52,160 --> 00:23:53,920
Speaker 4: spent the school years with.

460
00:23:53,960 --> 00:23:57,520
Speaker 1: My mom did the DNVA my dad was in.

461
00:23:57,640 --> 00:24:01,320
Speaker 4: My dad was in Jersey in Newark, Jerseys between East

462
00:24:01,359 --> 00:24:04,040
Speaker 4: East Orange and Newark, so when he was in it

463
00:24:04,119 --> 00:24:06,440
Speaker 4: but he was in the Newark Okay, so it's kind

464
00:24:06,480 --> 00:24:09,000
Speaker 4: of like I should just say middle class, you know.

465
00:24:09,240 --> 00:24:11,000
Speaker 4: But I would go spend time with Dad and it

466
00:24:11,040 --> 00:24:13,240
Speaker 4: would end up in backsin terrist projects. So I got

467
00:24:13,240 --> 00:24:16,560
Speaker 4: a chance to see like which was like walking distance

468
00:24:16,560 --> 00:24:20,000
Speaker 4: from the Colonnades where when he moved back into Newark, Like,

469
00:24:20,200 --> 00:24:21,679
Speaker 4: you know, I spent a lot of time. Even when

470
00:24:21,720 --> 00:24:23,159
Speaker 4: he lived in East Orange, we spent a lot of

471
00:24:23,240 --> 00:24:25,280
Speaker 4: I spent a lot of time with my cousins. And

472
00:24:25,560 --> 00:24:28,360
Speaker 4: you know that's in the housing projects. Yeah, so so

473
00:24:28,880 --> 00:24:31,880
Speaker 4: you know I saw that whole crack era. I saw light,

474
00:24:32,359 --> 00:24:34,000
Speaker 4: you know what I mean, eighty eight or I would

475
00:24:34,040 --> 00:24:37,320
Speaker 4: see you know, you see different you see different rappers

476
00:24:37,359 --> 00:24:40,159
Speaker 4: and you know Caine and you know back then you

477
00:24:40,200 --> 00:24:43,239
Speaker 4: know coming through you know what I mean. And I

478
00:24:43,240 --> 00:24:46,520
Speaker 4: saw my first shootouts there, you know, as a kid,

479
00:24:46,600 --> 00:24:48,120
Speaker 4: you know what I mean. But most important, I saw

480
00:24:48,119 --> 00:24:50,760
Speaker 4: a lot of love in those housing projects. I saw

481
00:24:50,800 --> 00:24:52,840
Speaker 4: a lot of love. I saw a family, you know,

482
00:24:52,880 --> 00:24:54,840
Speaker 4: and it's and it's something I just always look forward to,

483
00:24:55,600 --> 00:24:56,919
Speaker 4: you know what I mean. So it wasn't nothing to

484
00:24:56,960 --> 00:24:59,639
Speaker 4: play hoop hoops on the I mean I played basketball

485
00:24:59,720 --> 00:25:01,800
Speaker 4: on the regular basketball court. But when we were when

486
00:25:01,840 --> 00:25:03,840
Speaker 4: I was there, we played the hoops on the crates.

487
00:25:03,880 --> 00:25:05,240
Speaker 2: The crates.

488
00:25:04,880 --> 00:25:09,399
Speaker 4: They try to take the crates right, cut the bottom

489
00:25:09,480 --> 00:25:12,640
Speaker 4: out real good, you know, and then you know.

490
00:25:13,040 --> 00:25:14,480
Speaker 1: I'm gonna create. I'm gonna creat Master.

491
00:25:14,680 --> 00:25:17,200
Speaker 3: Yeah, you know you're Michael Jordan at that point.

492
00:25:17,600 --> 00:25:21,320
Speaker 1: Can you name me three albums that changed your life?

493
00:25:21,960 --> 00:25:26,399
Speaker 4: Quincy Jones, it's Cusey Jones' album Saved the Which album

494
00:25:26,960 --> 00:25:29,359
Speaker 4: was that, Marvin's album or Quincy's Save the Children?

495
00:25:29,400 --> 00:25:29,719
Speaker 1: All right?

496
00:25:29,760 --> 00:25:33,880
Speaker 2: So Save the Children was a It's funny you mentioned this, yeah, because.

497
00:25:33,720 --> 00:25:35,639
Speaker 1: I don't think the world news about it.

498
00:25:36,160 --> 00:25:39,240
Speaker 2: For all of you that have showed me love for

499
00:25:39,320 --> 00:25:45,560
Speaker 2: Summer Soul, there's a film that was directed by sons

500
00:25:45,600 --> 00:25:49,960
Speaker 2: father Stan Lathan, and it's called Save the Children, and

501
00:25:50,000 --> 00:25:57,560
Speaker 2: it's basically Jesse Jackson's operation Push Expo in Chicago. This

502
00:25:57,640 --> 00:26:01,760
Speaker 2: is nineteen seventy two, and pretty much all the luminaries

503
00:26:01,800 --> 00:26:05,760
Speaker 2: were there, the Jackson five, Marvin Gay. There's a very

504
00:26:05,760 --> 00:26:11,200
Speaker 2: curious moment where you know, times haven't changed much. Sammy

505
00:26:11,280 --> 00:26:14,760
Speaker 2: Davis Junior decided, I guess the mind stage. James Brown

506
00:26:14,800 --> 00:26:16,760
Speaker 2: did the same thing, like they were coming from the

507
00:26:16,800 --> 00:26:18,879
Speaker 2: mind state of like, Okay, well we're trying to get

508
00:26:18,880 --> 00:26:22,680
Speaker 2: a seat at the table, so let me endorse Nixon

509
00:26:23,280 --> 00:26:28,440
Speaker 2: so that way I have I can have influence on him.

510
00:26:28,440 --> 00:26:30,119
Speaker 2: And you know, I mean, their intentions were good, but

511
00:26:30,240 --> 00:26:34,960
Speaker 2: it's also like, clearly that was just for the other side.

512
00:26:34,960 --> 00:26:36,879
Speaker 1: It was for the photo op of it and got it.

513
00:26:36,920 --> 00:26:39,880
Speaker 3: That's when they label him to uncle Tom right exactly.

514
00:26:40,080 --> 00:26:46,360
Speaker 2: And so Sammy Davis Junior shows up and I'm telling you,

515
00:26:46,520 --> 00:26:50,240
Speaker 2: that was the most I mean, the way he ate

516
00:26:50,320 --> 00:26:52,360
Speaker 2: that bullet, like imired him for it.

517
00:26:52,560 --> 00:26:54,359
Speaker 1: That was the hardest seven minutes to watch.

518
00:26:54,920 --> 00:26:57,840
Speaker 2: He walked on that stage and like the Jackson five

519
00:26:58,000 --> 00:27:00,239
Speaker 2: just came off and they are losing and everything, and

520
00:27:00,280 --> 00:27:02,560
Speaker 2: so you know, and then I remember that and he's

521
00:27:02,640 --> 00:27:04,560
Speaker 2: like he let it calm down, and then he and

522
00:27:04,560 --> 00:27:07,199
Speaker 2: he's and then he's sing the most defiant version of

523
00:27:07,240 --> 00:27:08,040
Speaker 2: I Gotta be Me.

524
00:27:09,320 --> 00:27:11,399
Speaker 1: And it kind of went from this.

525
00:27:13,040 --> 00:27:17,080
Speaker 2: To this too, like he he really sold it. But yeah,

526
00:27:17,160 --> 00:27:21,280
Speaker 2: Saving Children was It was on Motown, so that's yeah,

527
00:27:21,320 --> 00:27:22,560
Speaker 2: it was. It was a great live.

528
00:27:22,400 --> 00:27:27,639
Speaker 4: Record, I would say, Saving Children Michael Jackson thriller album

529
00:27:27,800 --> 00:27:30,720
Speaker 4: and a two way tie self titled earth Wind and

530
00:27:30,720 --> 00:27:34,280
Speaker 4: Fire album, Okay, And I wasn't supposed to be listening

531
00:27:34,280 --> 00:27:37,679
Speaker 4: to it, but Prince Purple ring, I would think I

532
00:27:37,720 --> 00:27:41,159
Speaker 4: was just drawn to to the movie, to the film,

533
00:27:41,240 --> 00:27:42,760
Speaker 4: to the like you know.

534
00:27:42,760 --> 00:27:44,720
Speaker 3: It was there were things that they were.

535
00:27:44,600 --> 00:27:47,200
Speaker 4: Going on that what I was seeing as a child,

536
00:27:47,240 --> 00:27:49,520
Speaker 4: that I could identify to you know, that that he

537
00:27:49,600 --> 00:27:50,959
Speaker 4: was going through as you know.

538
00:27:51,600 --> 00:27:53,320
Speaker 3: Yeah, it was just it was just everything to me.

539
00:27:54,160 --> 00:27:57,040
Speaker 2: Like you know, so as far as singers are concerned,

540
00:27:57,280 --> 00:28:00,399
Speaker 2: who's your north star? Who is the singer for which

541
00:28:01,280 --> 00:28:04,159
Speaker 2: you I want to know the moment that it was

542
00:28:04,240 --> 00:28:07,359
Speaker 2: like the calling of this is what I want to do?

543
00:28:07,440 --> 00:28:10,280
Speaker 4: Three way time Marvin Princeton and Michael Jackson right around

544
00:28:10,280 --> 00:28:14,520
Speaker 4: at nineteen eighty four eighty five, Yeah, you know what

545
00:28:14,560 --> 00:28:18,520
Speaker 4: I mean, Like I remember seeing the Award Show and

546
00:28:18,680 --> 00:28:22,439
Speaker 4: just like definitely Michael and seeing him on when in

547
00:28:22,440 --> 00:28:26,720
Speaker 4: American Musical. Yeah, and like that's what I got the

548
00:28:26,720 --> 00:28:29,760
Speaker 4: bug I want to do that, Like I could not

549
00:28:30,000 --> 00:28:33,520
Speaker 4: remember where I was, what I had on, you know

550
00:28:33,560 --> 00:28:34,000
Speaker 4: what I mean?

551
00:28:34,119 --> 00:28:36,040
Speaker 3: And that's where I caught the like the bug.

552
00:28:36,080 --> 00:28:38,200
Speaker 1: All right, So this is what I'm curious about.

553
00:28:38,320 --> 00:28:42,600
Speaker 2: So my early friendship with DiAngelo was based on the

554
00:28:42,680 --> 00:28:46,440
Speaker 2: trauma that we had over Marvin Gay. So you know,

555
00:28:46,520 --> 00:28:50,720
Speaker 2: before April first of eighty four, I pretty much you know,

556
00:28:50,760 --> 00:28:55,959
Speaker 2: I lived in a very large record house, and Dad's

557
00:28:56,000 --> 00:28:58,520
Speaker 2: records was just old people's stuff, and my records was

558
00:28:58,560 --> 00:29:01,880
Speaker 2: the cool stuff. And so I always looked at Marvin

559
00:29:02,680 --> 00:29:05,400
Speaker 2: kind of with an eye roll like old people like

560
00:29:06,120 --> 00:29:08,440
Speaker 2: aunt comes over and start playing the OJ's and Marvin

561
00:29:08,480 --> 00:29:13,280
Speaker 2: Gay and stuff, and I'm just like And when he

562
00:29:13,520 --> 00:29:16,600
Speaker 2: passed away, when he was murdered by his dad in

563
00:29:16,680 --> 00:29:20,000
Speaker 2: eighty four, I mean, one of that gave me nightmare

564
00:29:20,040 --> 00:29:22,440
Speaker 2: effects because I'm twelve at the time, and I'm trying

565
00:29:22,440 --> 00:29:25,440
Speaker 2: to wrestle with the fact that, like, wait, your.

566
00:29:25,560 --> 00:29:28,440
Speaker 1: Father's allowed to kill you? Like I didn't learn about

567
00:29:28,480 --> 00:29:28,840
Speaker 1: that part.

568
00:29:28,880 --> 00:29:29,760
Speaker 2: I was heartbroken.

569
00:29:30,320 --> 00:29:32,000
Speaker 3: I remember that. I remember it distinctly.

570
00:29:32,400 --> 00:29:33,840
Speaker 1: I want no, no, no, no, but go ahead.

571
00:29:33,880 --> 00:29:36,120
Speaker 2: But I want to know what was it about, because

572
00:29:37,360 --> 00:29:40,200
Speaker 2: when I finally came to Marvin, there was a lot

573
00:29:40,200 --> 00:29:45,640
Speaker 2: of fear there, you know. And how did you come

574
00:29:45,680 --> 00:29:48,320
Speaker 2: to Marvin, Like was there any fear or knowledge of

575
00:29:48,360 --> 00:29:49,840
Speaker 2: like what happened to his life or.

576
00:29:49,920 --> 00:29:54,680
Speaker 4: Oh absolutely again, parallel things that I saw, you know,

577
00:29:55,280 --> 00:29:59,760
Speaker 4: one degree separation in my family that I've experienced as

578
00:29:59,760 --> 00:30:02,680
Speaker 4: an adult now, you know, from childhood into adulthood.

579
00:30:03,520 --> 00:30:05,800
Speaker 3: But I just revered them. I like, I thought it

580
00:30:05,840 --> 00:30:07,120
Speaker 3: was just so brilliant how.

581
00:30:07,000 --> 00:30:10,840
Speaker 4: He could go from the from the bedroom to you know,

582
00:30:11,400 --> 00:30:14,800
Speaker 4: speaking as a you know, social activist, you know, musically,

583
00:30:15,360 --> 00:30:17,000
Speaker 4: I was drawn to him. I was drawing to Bob

584
00:30:17,040 --> 00:30:18,720
Speaker 4: Miley for the same reason, you know, knowing that he

585
00:30:18,760 --> 00:30:22,720
Speaker 4: started out as a top forty artist and then transitioning

586
00:30:22,760 --> 00:30:26,720
Speaker 4: into strictly socially conscious music. It's something earlier in my

587
00:30:26,760 --> 00:30:29,240
Speaker 4: career that I just proud of myself in doing and

588
00:30:29,280 --> 00:30:32,240
Speaker 4: saying that that's what I would I had to do that,

589
00:30:32,360 --> 00:30:34,640
Speaker 4: you know. I remember the night that Marvin Gaye passed.

590
00:30:34,640 --> 00:30:38,120
Speaker 4: I remember the night that melvill Linzy like announced it.

591
00:30:38,160 --> 00:30:40,720
Speaker 4: I remember being heartbroken. I remember that defect the Red

592
00:30:40,760 --> 00:30:42,880
Speaker 4: Fiat that I rode in with my mother. We were

593
00:30:42,920 --> 00:30:45,400
Speaker 4: just leaving the movie theaters. I can't remember what we saw,

594
00:30:45,960 --> 00:30:48,000
Speaker 4: but coming out of the movie it was it was it.

595
00:30:47,920 --> 00:30:48,800
Speaker 1: Was an eerie night.

596
00:30:48,920 --> 00:30:51,960
Speaker 4: It had rained, had just finished raining, so there was

597
00:30:52,000 --> 00:30:55,360
Speaker 4: a light rain and it was just like hearing Melvilenzi

598
00:30:55,400 --> 00:30:57,640
Speaker 4: say it on the airwaves, like I'll never forget it

599
00:30:57,720 --> 00:31:03,720
Speaker 4: like you know, and during COVID kind of giving you

600
00:31:03,760 --> 00:31:07,600
Speaker 4: an exclusive here me. During COVID, me and Kenny Dope

601
00:31:07,680 --> 00:31:11,560
Speaker 4: Cazales came up with the craziest idea to remake the

602
00:31:11,760 --> 00:31:16,320
Speaker 4: entire to remake an entire Marvin Gaye album, which which

603
00:31:16,360 --> 00:31:17,880
Speaker 4: will be coming out.

604
00:31:19,920 --> 00:31:21,560
Speaker 3: I want to say, we.

605
00:31:21,480 --> 00:31:24,760
Speaker 4: Have remade an entire Marvin Gaye album. I sang all

606
00:31:24,760 --> 00:31:27,520
Speaker 4: the vocals over. And this was during COVID, So this

607
00:31:27,600 --> 00:31:31,000
Speaker 4: was my first time. So imagine COVID going on and

608
00:31:31,040 --> 00:31:34,600
Speaker 4: then taking your first ride to the studio and being

609
00:31:34,680 --> 00:31:37,360
Speaker 4: outside and getting gas.

610
00:31:36,720 --> 00:31:39,000
Speaker 3: And like being living.

611
00:31:39,920 --> 00:31:44,000
Speaker 4: Yeah yeah, like you know, being super annoyed about what

612
00:31:44,120 --> 00:31:47,760
Speaker 4: you're touching, and then going and being around like shit

613
00:31:47,880 --> 00:31:52,040
Speaker 4: down and other human people, like a cough is like

614
00:31:52,080 --> 00:31:54,880
Speaker 4: a gun. Yeah, I remember, this is like a uzzi.

615
00:31:55,240 --> 00:31:57,880
Speaker 4: Like my first interaction and hugging. So I hugged someone

616
00:31:58,320 --> 00:32:00,960
Speaker 4: and then being like it was intense, you know what

617
00:32:00,960 --> 00:32:03,600
Speaker 4: I mean. Shout out to Raquel rob Brown that you

618
00:32:03,640 --> 00:32:06,400
Speaker 4: know we we she came to the studio and it

619
00:32:06,440 --> 00:32:08,600
Speaker 4: was like we're not supposed to hug, right, but I

620
00:32:08,600 --> 00:32:12,640
Speaker 4: remember like a freedom in doing that, right and and yes,

621
00:32:12,920 --> 00:32:15,440
Speaker 4: over the course of a few days. It was deep

622
00:32:15,520 --> 00:32:19,080
Speaker 4: man to remake these records and to because you know,

623
00:32:19,120 --> 00:32:22,400
Speaker 4: we didn't have all the masters. You know, we didn't

624
00:32:22,400 --> 00:32:25,200
Speaker 4: have everything's not split up, you know, but you know, yeah, yeah,

625
00:32:25,240 --> 00:32:27,520
Speaker 4: there's a lot of masters and things floating around out

626
00:32:27,520 --> 00:32:30,040
Speaker 4: there there. So so Kenny gave me what he had

627
00:32:30,080 --> 00:32:32,640
Speaker 4: access to and then the master master. Yeah, and then

628
00:32:32,640 --> 00:32:34,080
Speaker 4: I had to do all of these things. I had

629
00:32:34,120 --> 00:32:36,040
Speaker 4: to do this shiit off the ear, you know what

630
00:32:36,080 --> 00:32:41,480
Speaker 4: I mean. And in that process of recording it, it

631
00:32:41,600 --> 00:32:46,000
Speaker 4: was like wow, like I felt like I said, I

632
00:32:46,040 --> 00:32:49,680
Speaker 4: would never say this publicly, but I felt like it

633
00:32:49,720 --> 00:32:51,320
Speaker 4: was left behind for me to do it.

634
00:32:51,880 --> 00:32:55,360
Speaker 1: Like in the moment, it was like really like like eerie,

635
00:32:55,440 --> 00:32:57,520
Speaker 1: you know, what did you learn about that process?

636
00:32:57,680 --> 00:33:02,640
Speaker 2: So even even in listening to some of the reels

637
00:33:02,640 --> 00:33:05,000
Speaker 2: that I got probably the best example. I don't know

638
00:33:05,000 --> 00:33:06,880
Speaker 2: if you have access to any of the Hear My

639
00:33:06,920 --> 00:33:12,080
Speaker 2: Dear reels, but you know, we acknowledge that Marvin's like

640
00:33:12,200 --> 00:33:17,320
Speaker 2: the well the someone will say the background master. I

641
00:33:17,320 --> 00:33:19,920
Speaker 2: will actually say he's the master at hiding plaining sight.

642
00:33:20,400 --> 00:33:25,280
Speaker 2: Oh absolutely. And when you listen to if you ever

643
00:33:25,320 --> 00:33:28,240
Speaker 2: get a chance to hear Sparrow.

644
00:33:29,160 --> 00:33:29,760
Speaker 1: A cappella.

645
00:33:31,320 --> 00:33:35,840
Speaker 4: Once you take the music away, I'm like, wait, this clashes.

646
00:33:36,360 --> 00:33:39,680
Speaker 4: But he is a very unique way his time. His

647
00:33:39,840 --> 00:33:44,680
Speaker 4: timing is crazy. Yeah, it's correct. Like his timing was crazy,

648
00:33:44,920 --> 00:33:49,320
Speaker 4: Like I have no formal training, right, and I remember

649
00:33:49,360 --> 00:33:51,680
Speaker 4: I did. It was a record I did in particular

650
00:33:52,200 --> 00:33:57,160
Speaker 4: with Frederico from DC I want Butcher of Frederico's last name,

651
00:33:57,640 --> 00:34:01,800
Speaker 4: but it's this record we did called Never Never Land

652
00:34:02,280 --> 00:34:05,520
Speaker 4: right ever And he says to me, like, yo, how

653
00:34:05,520 --> 00:34:08,680
Speaker 4: did you do what you did on this record? The

654
00:34:08,719 --> 00:34:11,480
Speaker 4: way he was explaining it was like scientifically or like

655
00:34:12,040 --> 00:34:15,600
Speaker 4: musically as it relates to like musical theory, it ain't

656
00:34:15,600 --> 00:34:18,160
Speaker 4: supposed to be able to be done or feel like

657
00:34:18,200 --> 00:34:20,719
Speaker 4: the way it feels. Like the timing and just like

658
00:34:21,160 --> 00:34:24,239
Speaker 4: my choice of where I laid the vocal and what

659
00:34:24,360 --> 00:34:26,759
Speaker 4: I heard over top of it, And I thought I

660
00:34:26,920 --> 00:34:31,919
Speaker 4: was the ship until I set out to remake these

661
00:34:31,920 --> 00:34:37,160
Speaker 4: songs and like start listening to the timing and wanting

662
00:34:37,200 --> 00:34:41,120
Speaker 4: to honor still making it mine, you know what I mean,

663
00:34:41,200 --> 00:34:45,160
Speaker 4: and breathing life into it right in hopes that you

664
00:34:45,200 --> 00:34:48,560
Speaker 4: know it'll be received. How that was received, But it

665
00:34:49,239 --> 00:34:54,360
Speaker 4: just man the timing and then the relevancy more importantly

666
00:34:55,080 --> 00:34:57,840
Speaker 4: of where they've been, meaning you know, our parents and

667
00:34:57,840 --> 00:35:01,560
Speaker 4: our grandparents and where we y are now and at

668
00:35:01,560 --> 00:35:04,000
Speaker 4: the stage we were when I we made these songs,

669
00:35:04,160 --> 00:35:05,759
Speaker 4: you know, at the stage of where we were when

670
00:35:05,760 --> 00:35:08,640
Speaker 4: I set out to do my version of a uh

671
00:35:08,680 --> 00:35:10,920
Speaker 4: you know, of a socially conscious record, and you know,

672
00:35:11,080 --> 00:35:14,759
Speaker 4: like like bulletproof, you know, and how I fought for that.

673
00:35:15,280 --> 00:35:15,520
Speaker 2: Yeah.

674
00:35:15,600 --> 00:35:17,960
Speaker 4: I think that there are certain things that there are

675
00:35:17,960 --> 00:35:20,640
Speaker 4: certain records that are out there that shouldn't be touched.

676
00:35:20,640 --> 00:35:22,399
Speaker 4: And then I think that there's certain things that are

677
00:35:22,440 --> 00:35:25,279
Speaker 4: like left behind for us to make sure that we

678
00:35:25,360 --> 00:35:27,879
Speaker 4: breathe life into them so that it's never a race

679
00:35:27,920 --> 00:35:28,520
Speaker 4: from history.

680
00:35:28,840 --> 00:35:31,040
Speaker 1: When do you think the project will be finished?

681
00:35:31,360 --> 00:35:34,600
Speaker 4: The project is finished the right time. It's going to

682
00:35:34,640 --> 00:35:37,759
Speaker 4: be coming out on bbe okay and I'm in it

683
00:35:37,840 --> 00:35:41,960
Speaker 4: talks about some visual stuff with Cootie and cheek, you

684
00:35:42,040 --> 00:35:42,480
Speaker 4: know what I mean.

685
00:35:42,560 --> 00:35:55,279
Speaker 1: So, what was the.

686
00:35:55,320 --> 00:35:59,399
Speaker 2: Journey that led to you getting a record deal on Jive?

687
00:35:59,520 --> 00:36:00,840
Speaker 2: Like getting inside the system.

688
00:36:01,320 --> 00:36:05,200
Speaker 3: I always wanted to be a artist, you know.

689
00:36:05,239 --> 00:36:08,120
Speaker 4: I always found myself wanting to be part of things, right,

690
00:36:08,520 --> 00:36:10,880
Speaker 4: So I did different groups and things that was part

691
00:36:10,920 --> 00:36:12,200
Speaker 4: of they swing.

692
00:36:12,400 --> 00:36:15,280
Speaker 3: All in the Mind was the first group.

693
00:36:15,760 --> 00:36:17,279
Speaker 4: All in the Mind was the first group that was

694
00:36:17,360 --> 00:36:20,560
Speaker 4: kind of formed out of like comp and State University.

695
00:36:20,680 --> 00:36:22,719
Speaker 4: So we're taking you back to like nineteen ninety three

696
00:36:22,840 --> 00:36:27,279
Speaker 4: and like going to Coppin and ninety three summer.

697
00:36:27,000 --> 00:36:28,760
Speaker 1: Of ninety three. Where'd you go to high school?

698
00:36:28,800 --> 00:36:30,720
Speaker 3: I went to High Point in Beltsville, Maryland.

699
00:36:30,800 --> 00:36:33,760
Speaker 2: You're the first DC person that I know with talent

700
00:36:33,840 --> 00:36:36,640
Speaker 2: that didn't say Duke Ellington, Oh wow, yeah, did you

701
00:36:36,680 --> 00:36:37,279
Speaker 2: want to go there?

702
00:36:37,400 --> 00:36:39,680
Speaker 1: Or like, were you pursuing music in high school?

703
00:36:40,160 --> 00:36:41,000
Speaker 3: I totally didn't.

704
00:36:41,400 --> 00:36:43,839
Speaker 1: Wait, you didn't have what did you realize we had

705
00:36:43,840 --> 00:36:44,720
Speaker 1: a voice? I was.

706
00:36:44,840 --> 00:36:47,240
Speaker 4: I realized I had a voice in the elementary school.

707
00:36:47,280 --> 00:36:49,040
Speaker 4: But I was just you know, there was ever things

708
00:36:49,080 --> 00:36:51,880
Speaker 4: going on. Life was life, and I was very shy,

709
00:36:52,239 --> 00:36:55,840
Speaker 4: you know, stand offish, and I mean, of course like

710
00:36:55,960 --> 00:36:57,879
Speaker 4: once I'm like, man, if I know what I know now,

711
00:36:57,920 --> 00:37:01,000
Speaker 4: and I would been singing in high school. So no church,

712
00:37:01,120 --> 00:37:05,279
Speaker 4: no little church background, but definitely had the voice. I

713
00:37:05,320 --> 00:37:10,919
Speaker 4: remember I remember distinctly being sixth grade, Calventon Elementary. Don't

714
00:37:10,920 --> 00:37:13,879
Speaker 4: remember the music teacher's name, but we were having one

715
00:37:13,920 --> 00:37:16,560
Speaker 4: on one she was going up the scales, and she

716
00:37:16,760 --> 00:37:18,840
Speaker 4: just was like, Yo, your voice, you're special.

717
00:37:19,560 --> 00:37:23,080
Speaker 1: You're gonna do something one day. But did your family

718
00:37:23,120 --> 00:37:23,880
Speaker 1: know you other voice?

719
00:37:24,000 --> 00:37:28,200
Speaker 4: Nah? When I when I when I told my dad

720
00:37:28,239 --> 00:37:30,360
Speaker 4: and my mom, you know, first year of college that

721
00:37:30,400 --> 00:37:32,680
Speaker 4: I'm dropping out after three semesters, They was like, you're

722
00:37:32,680 --> 00:37:33,200
Speaker 4: doing what?

723
00:37:33,560 --> 00:37:35,600
Speaker 3: Like what like you're going to do music?

724
00:37:35,680 --> 00:37:35,880
Speaker 2: You know?

725
00:37:35,920 --> 00:37:38,399
Speaker 1: Do we have the same story, Like you're gonna do what?

726
00:37:38,960 --> 00:37:40,880
Speaker 4: I mean, it was a whole thing, Like I couldn't

727
00:37:41,000 --> 00:37:43,920
Speaker 4: you know, it was a whole thing, dude. I retreated

728
00:37:43,960 --> 00:37:49,200
Speaker 4: to grandma's. Grandma, Yeah, Grandma's gonna God blessed her soul.

729
00:37:49,200 --> 00:37:51,560
Speaker 4: But that you know, I didn't. And I slept on

730
00:37:51,560 --> 00:37:55,759
Speaker 4: some couches too, because you know, I grew Grandma's you

731
00:37:55,840 --> 00:37:56,319
Speaker 4: know what I mean?

732
00:37:56,880 --> 00:37:58,160
Speaker 1: You know this audience knews.

733
00:37:58,560 --> 00:38:00,680
Speaker 2: The inside joke is my dad didn't know about the

734
00:38:00,760 --> 00:38:02,200
Speaker 2: Roots until our second album.

735
00:38:02,760 --> 00:38:05,560
Speaker 1: Wow do you want more? Because look, my dad was

736
00:38:05,600 --> 00:38:09,439
Speaker 1: like a singer. I think we've had the same Yeah.

737
00:38:09,520 --> 00:38:12,560
Speaker 2: Man, it's crazy that we're just chopping it up now

738
00:38:13,080 --> 00:38:14,400
Speaker 2: after like being in circles.

739
00:38:14,440 --> 00:38:18,319
Speaker 4: But so I drop out in the process of like

740
00:38:18,440 --> 00:38:21,600
Speaker 4: being there for three years. I befriend people in because

741
00:38:21,640 --> 00:38:23,640
Speaker 4: I was going to Coppon State. So I'm in Baltimore City,

742
00:38:23,640 --> 00:38:27,000
Speaker 4: so I'm in the war working baker. I'm like spending

743
00:38:27,080 --> 00:38:29,120
Speaker 4: time like a couple of blocks down from the school,

744
00:38:29,239 --> 00:38:32,279
Speaker 4: and had a buddy that wrapped and we would we

745
00:38:32,320 --> 00:38:33,520
Speaker 4: had to make shift studio.

746
00:38:33,640 --> 00:38:35,600
Speaker 3: We're doing the tricks with the.

747
00:38:35,560 --> 00:38:40,360
Speaker 4: Tapes and just all the things that drop out.

748
00:38:40,800 --> 00:38:42,759
Speaker 3: Moved back to Grandma's in Hyattsville.

749
00:38:43,520 --> 00:38:46,919
Speaker 4: Always was a kid though in high school that would

750
00:38:46,960 --> 00:38:48,160
Speaker 4: read the credits and stuff.

751
00:38:48,400 --> 00:38:51,000
Speaker 3: So I'm singing around the house and that type of thing.

752
00:38:51,080 --> 00:38:56,560
Speaker 4: So I'm a huge fan of Chuckie Thompson, like I like,

753
00:38:56,800 --> 00:38:58,239
Speaker 4: and then when I found out he was from DC,

754
00:38:58,640 --> 00:39:00,439
Speaker 4: I'm like, I gotta, I gotta. I got to find

755
00:39:00,480 --> 00:39:05,320
Speaker 4: him right all right, and ended up infiltrating chuck Life.

756
00:39:05,440 --> 00:39:05,600
Speaker 1: You know.

757
00:39:05,880 --> 00:39:08,160
Speaker 2: There was some girls I used to hang out with

758
00:39:08,320 --> 00:39:09,600
Speaker 2: that went to Howard University.

759
00:39:09,920 --> 00:39:11,040
Speaker 1: They went, you know, they went to.

760
00:39:11,000 --> 00:39:15,760
Speaker 3: Howard McDonald, right. They had a crib at this time.

761
00:39:16,200 --> 00:39:20,600
Speaker 4: By Dude's album just hits, right, So yeah, yeah, so

762
00:39:20,760 --> 00:39:24,560
Speaker 4: her album just hits. That's like the whole Like I'm

763
00:39:24,640 --> 00:39:27,000
Speaker 4: kind of hanging out this crib. One of the girls

764
00:39:27,040 --> 00:39:31,200
Speaker 4: happens to work as an intern at Chuck Life at

765
00:39:31,280 --> 00:39:33,560
Speaker 4: Chucky Studio, which he has in Southeast at the time,

766
00:39:34,320 --> 00:39:39,440
Speaker 4: and I get over there one day and never Guru

767
00:39:39,600 --> 00:39:42,960
Speaker 4: was there at the time, Young and Google's there kind

768
00:39:42,960 --> 00:39:48,200
Speaker 4: of you know Tracy Leaves popping Nonchalant early in my

769
00:39:48,880 --> 00:39:52,520
Speaker 4: you know, songwriting career, and like Nam was one of

770
00:39:52,560 --> 00:39:53,960
Speaker 4: those people who took an interest in me.

771
00:39:53,960 --> 00:39:55,839
Speaker 3: I used to roll with not like heavy shout out

772
00:39:55,840 --> 00:39:56,600
Speaker 3: to Nonchalant.

773
00:39:57,880 --> 00:39:59,839
Speaker 4: We just kind of just like we like reached out

774
00:40:00,120 --> 00:40:02,960
Speaker 4: recently on like social media. But she was just like

775
00:40:03,640 --> 00:40:05,879
Speaker 4: somebody was just like always in my corner, would pick

776
00:40:05,960 --> 00:40:09,440
Speaker 4: me up and dropped me off, and she had access

777
00:40:09,520 --> 00:40:12,399
Speaker 4: to studios, let me come in there and record, and

778
00:40:12,840 --> 00:40:15,319
Speaker 4: but I was over there where Chucky was at and

779
00:40:15,960 --> 00:40:18,480
Speaker 4: just like just engulfed myself in that situation.

780
00:40:18,800 --> 00:40:20,839
Speaker 2: How were you trying to enter the game as a

781
00:40:20,840 --> 00:40:22,279
Speaker 2: songwriter as a singer.

782
00:40:22,600 --> 00:40:26,680
Speaker 4: As a songwriter first to then get in there as

783
00:40:27,200 --> 00:40:28,560
Speaker 4: the singer, right, gotcha?

784
00:40:28,760 --> 00:40:31,120
Speaker 3: Always part of different little quirky groups and things.

785
00:40:31,120 --> 00:40:32,920
Speaker 4: And then I went to a place called bar Nunne

786
00:40:32,920 --> 00:40:36,399
Speaker 4: one night, okay, and bar nunn changed my life because

787
00:40:36,440 --> 00:40:38,400
Speaker 4: that's where I started to go in bar None was

788
00:40:38,440 --> 00:40:41,239
Speaker 4: our version of Black Lily, but it happened like once

789
00:40:41,280 --> 00:40:45,640
Speaker 4: a week, okay, right, and bar none. The list was

790
00:40:45,719 --> 00:40:50,200
Speaker 4: ran by Roquel rob Brown, who's a poet who I

791
00:40:50,400 --> 00:40:54,880
Speaker 4: reconnected with Sacksville, Philly, and I reconnected with her a

792
00:40:54,880 --> 00:40:57,839
Speaker 4: few years back and she's, you know, to to say, hey,

793
00:40:57,880 --> 00:40:59,719
Speaker 4: like you need to do your first album, and you

794
00:40:59,719 --> 00:41:02,960
Speaker 4: know he's often doing her thing now, right, Yeah, So

795
00:41:03,440 --> 00:41:07,800
Speaker 4: I do part none. I end up winning this contest.

796
00:41:08,080 --> 00:41:10,680
Speaker 4: In the process, I've become part of a group called

797
00:41:10,760 --> 00:41:14,440
Speaker 4: Urban AF thirty one, which was like we put out

798
00:41:14,600 --> 00:41:16,520
Speaker 4: that was my first official album. It's a project out

799
00:41:16,560 --> 00:41:18,719
Speaker 4: called The Healing that You Can Find, and then we

800
00:41:18,760 --> 00:41:21,760
Speaker 4: did a follow up project called The Antidote. I connect

801
00:41:21,800 --> 00:41:26,120
Speaker 4: with Hilton Felton's son, w Ellington Felton, you know West.

802
00:41:26,440 --> 00:41:28,799
Speaker 4: Some of us call him dub l. He has many

803
00:41:28,960 --> 00:41:32,719
Speaker 4: many attributes. We form a group called The Crossroad. So

804
00:41:32,760 --> 00:41:35,440
Speaker 4: now I'm in like two groups in DC. I'm in

805
00:41:35,480 --> 00:41:39,320
Speaker 4: the Urban AF thirty one is like DC Wu Tang

806
00:41:39,600 --> 00:41:43,600
Speaker 4: kind of vibes, but very high level socially conscious. It's

807
00:41:43,640 --> 00:41:47,680
Speaker 4: like a fusion of like Dad preis Wu Tang and

808
00:41:47,719 --> 00:41:52,160
Speaker 4: I'm like the only singer and these guys which is

809
00:41:53,600 --> 00:41:57,960
Speaker 4: some of the members of that group. They went on

810
00:41:58,040 --> 00:42:03,560
Speaker 4: to be a man shout out to why you Diamond?

811
00:42:03,760 --> 00:42:07,280
Speaker 4: Yeah is that Yeah? So he's one of the original

812
00:42:07,280 --> 00:42:11,000
Speaker 4: members of They had their whole crew called the Remains

813
00:42:11,040 --> 00:42:13,360
Speaker 4: Super Talented man. It's just you know, we didn't have

814
00:42:13,360 --> 00:42:16,000
Speaker 4: the outlets in the city. Bar None is another place

815
00:42:16,000 --> 00:42:19,400
Speaker 4: where I met. Two guys pulled up on me one

816
00:42:19,480 --> 00:42:21,440
Speaker 4: night by the name of keV.

817
00:42:21,320 --> 00:42:24,480
Speaker 1: Brown and Cy Young, legendary keV Brown.

818
00:42:24,520 --> 00:42:27,120
Speaker 4: So keV Brown and so Young put me to the

819
00:42:27,160 --> 00:42:30,320
Speaker 4: sign and say, hey, we want to take to Philly

820
00:42:30,360 --> 00:42:31,840
Speaker 4: to meet DJ Jazz Jeff.

821
00:42:32,080 --> 00:42:33,040
Speaker 1: That's tally made.

822
00:42:33,200 --> 00:42:35,680
Speaker 4: And now now, prior to that, I got so englfed

823
00:42:35,680 --> 00:42:38,960
Speaker 4: in the open mic scene. I would do none on

824
00:42:39,000 --> 00:42:42,839
Speaker 4: Monday nights. I would do warm Wednesdays in Baltimore. And

825
00:42:42,880 --> 00:42:44,960
Speaker 4: then I found out about Black Lily, so I'd come

826
00:42:45,000 --> 00:42:46,719
Speaker 4: to Black Lily because I feel like Black Lily was

827
00:42:46,760 --> 00:42:48,920
Speaker 4: like once a month or I could only get out there.

828
00:42:48,800 --> 00:42:49,319
Speaker 3: Once a month.

829
00:42:49,800 --> 00:42:52,360
Speaker 2: No, we were weekly, but it was something that was

830
00:42:52,400 --> 00:42:53,919
Speaker 2: it was like, well, there was a New York one

831
00:42:54,000 --> 00:42:55,760
Speaker 2: and a Philly one. I was coming to the Philly

832
00:42:55,800 --> 00:42:56,920
Speaker 2: one at the five Spot.

833
00:42:57,080 --> 00:43:00,960
Speaker 4: Yeah, and it was just like, oh man, it was like, hey, okay,

834
00:43:01,000 --> 00:43:04,400
Speaker 4: so let me I want your perspective this all right.

835
00:43:04,280 --> 00:43:06,680
Speaker 1: This is you're saying this, yes.

836
00:43:06,960 --> 00:43:10,200
Speaker 2: Because for me this two Faces of Black Lily pre

837
00:43:10,320 --> 00:43:14,719
Speaker 2: things fall apart Black Lily, which was basically in my crib.

838
00:43:15,440 --> 00:43:18,200
Speaker 1: And yeah, pretty much every one in that room eventually

839
00:43:18,200 --> 00:43:21,480
Speaker 1: got a record record deal. Like you know, Jasmine was like, yeah,

840
00:43:21,560 --> 00:43:24,320
Speaker 1: nine years old. Hell's this nine year old game my crib.

841
00:43:24,960 --> 00:43:28,080
Speaker 2: And you know, by the time Malik started bringing beans

842
00:43:28,080 --> 00:43:30,799
Speaker 2: in them around like my bucks, burning beadies on my

843
00:43:30,840 --> 00:43:33,520
Speaker 2: couch and whatever, and beer on the floor whatever, Like

844
00:43:33,560 --> 00:43:34,000
Speaker 2: I was like.

845
00:43:34,040 --> 00:43:34,520
Speaker 1: Get out.

846
00:43:34,640 --> 00:43:37,840
Speaker 2: So then that's how once it came to the five spot,

847
00:43:38,800 --> 00:43:43,040
Speaker 2: we had to go on tour and just basically fund it.

848
00:43:44,280 --> 00:43:46,440
Speaker 1: But occasionally if we're home.

849
00:43:46,360 --> 00:43:49,000
Speaker 2: Or whatever, play a song or two whatever, just to

850
00:43:49,280 --> 00:43:53,640
Speaker 2: you know, keep up appearances. But I mean, for the

851
00:43:53,760 --> 00:43:57,880
Speaker 2: outsider coming in, is this like a game of double

852
00:43:57,960 --> 00:43:59,840
Speaker 2: Dutch in which you're trying to figure out it was

853
00:43:59,880 --> 00:44:02,080
Speaker 2: like game with Thrones?

854
00:44:02,560 --> 00:44:05,400
Speaker 1: Okay, tell me it was. Everything was cutthroat.

855
00:44:05,800 --> 00:44:06,200
Speaker 2: Oh man.

856
00:44:06,280 --> 00:44:09,760
Speaker 4: It was just like, first of all, it's very intimidating

857
00:44:09,800 --> 00:44:12,960
Speaker 4: to be out of your element, right, I'm like jumping

858
00:44:13,000 --> 00:44:17,480
Speaker 4: on the Amtrak hiding in the restroom to get.

859
00:44:17,280 --> 00:44:18,560
Speaker 1: Everyone, hides in the restaurant.

860
00:44:18,640 --> 00:44:21,000
Speaker 4: Yeah, I mean ship man, That's how he did it.

861
00:44:21,160 --> 00:44:23,759
Speaker 4: You know, you did what you had to do. And

862
00:44:23,800 --> 00:44:25,799
Speaker 4: then you know, finding my you know, I'm in I'm

863
00:44:25,840 --> 00:44:28,040
Speaker 4: out of my element. I'm in Philadelphia, like you know

864
00:44:28,080 --> 00:44:31,680
Speaker 4: what I mean. But I found the spot. This is

865
00:44:31,680 --> 00:44:35,400
Speaker 4: a nostalgic spot. Then the getting in and then and

866
00:44:35,440 --> 00:44:38,239
Speaker 4: just the vibe. But like I think I might have

867
00:44:38,360 --> 00:44:41,000
Speaker 4: got on the mic once or twice, but it would

868
00:44:41,000 --> 00:44:45,880
Speaker 4: be like at the end people walking now like like

869
00:44:45,960 --> 00:44:49,040
Speaker 4: who are you? Like? But it was, oh, every time

870
00:44:49,080 --> 00:44:51,520
Speaker 4: I went, it was like something nostalgic happening. And it

871
00:44:51,600 --> 00:44:53,600
Speaker 4: was like and then and then if you're lucky you come.

872
00:44:53,719 --> 00:44:55,640
Speaker 4: I come on a night like you're there, or like

873
00:44:56,400 --> 00:44:58,640
Speaker 4: some of the guys from the band are actually there,

874
00:44:58,760 --> 00:45:01,759
Speaker 4: or like I remember hearing Jasmine there for the first time.

875
00:45:01,800 --> 00:45:03,960
Speaker 4: I want to say, like she was like how did

876
00:45:04,000 --> 00:45:04,879
Speaker 4: she even get in the club?

877
00:45:04,960 --> 00:45:07,720
Speaker 2: She used to sleep in the back of the car

878
00:45:07,960 --> 00:45:10,000
Speaker 2: with her dad, and it's time for her to do

879
00:45:10,040 --> 00:45:10,680
Speaker 2: her three songs?

880
00:45:11,040 --> 00:45:13,520
Speaker 3: And yeah, and then like how does how does this?

881
00:45:13,640 --> 00:45:14,879
Speaker 3: Who is this little girl?

882
00:45:14,920 --> 00:45:17,440
Speaker 4: And how would she who ends up being my label

883
00:45:17,480 --> 00:45:20,759
Speaker 4: mate later on Jive Records, and like, you know, I

884
00:45:20,840 --> 00:45:22,560
Speaker 4: knew her mom, her first manager.

885
00:45:23,080 --> 00:45:24,000
Speaker 2: It was just dope.

886
00:45:24,120 --> 00:45:26,959
Speaker 4: Like I remember seeing Kendrick there for the first time.

887
00:45:27,840 --> 00:45:30,760
Speaker 4: It was a lot of talent man and you know, again,

888
00:45:30,800 --> 00:45:32,760
Speaker 4: I was one of those guys that was like reading

889
00:45:32,800 --> 00:45:35,080
Speaker 4: the credits. I was a Roots fan anyway, so I'm

890
00:45:35,160 --> 00:45:37,719
Speaker 4: like it was it was a vibe, you know, so

891
00:45:37,840 --> 00:45:41,000
Speaker 4: when you're there, are you like, who do I connect

892
00:45:41,000 --> 00:45:42,160
Speaker 4: with to get to the next time.

893
00:45:42,520 --> 00:45:44,359
Speaker 3: I'm totally just trying to figure it out.

894
00:45:44,480 --> 00:45:46,480
Speaker 2: It was a it was a meat market because literally,

895
00:45:46,960 --> 00:45:50,160
Speaker 2: once it really started to catch on, like it started

896
00:45:50,160 --> 00:45:53,000
Speaker 2: getting ridiculous where like one night, like Janet would come

897
00:45:53,200 --> 00:45:55,759
Speaker 2: with her musical director, Yeah, and then we come back

898
00:45:55,840 --> 00:45:58,680
Speaker 2: the next week and like, oh, seven musicians aren't here,

899
00:45:59,160 --> 00:46:02,160
Speaker 2: and then someone else comes, yeah, and they take three

900
00:46:02,239 --> 00:46:05,960
Speaker 2: musicians yeah, Mary J. Block Like literally started becoming like

901
00:46:06,080 --> 00:46:07,200
Speaker 2: almost a market.

902
00:46:07,520 --> 00:46:10,200
Speaker 4: So what ended up happening was because I had the

903
00:46:10,320 --> 00:46:12,719
Speaker 4: Urban AF thing, Urban AF thirty one thing going on

904
00:46:13,120 --> 00:46:16,279
Speaker 4: that started to kind of like really start thanks to

905
00:46:16,320 --> 00:46:19,160
Speaker 4: d Chase and started get popping and move around doing colleges,

906
00:46:19,480 --> 00:46:23,759
Speaker 4: and my end for Philly was Jen Bragg and what's

907
00:46:23,800 --> 00:46:26,560
Speaker 4: the brother her part They to do a lot of parties.

908
00:46:26,640 --> 00:46:30,360
Speaker 4: It was Jen and uh ah man, forgive me forgiving

909
00:46:30,400 --> 00:46:32,560
Speaker 4: a name. That's where I started to kind of like

910
00:46:33,440 --> 00:46:34,239
Speaker 4: learn like.

911
00:46:34,440 --> 00:46:37,440
Speaker 1: Philly, you know what I mean. And because actually I

912
00:46:37,520 --> 00:46:38,840
Speaker 1: thought you were from Philly.

913
00:46:38,960 --> 00:46:39,200
Speaker 2: Nah.

914
00:46:39,320 --> 00:46:42,560
Speaker 4: I was going to Philly and Baltimore. And like I said,

915
00:46:42,560 --> 00:46:46,120
Speaker 4: I was doing that circuit so much Monday's bar none

916
00:46:46,320 --> 00:46:50,400
Speaker 4: Wednesdays Wednesdays in Baltimore and Philly that people started to

917
00:46:50,440 --> 00:46:52,200
Speaker 4: think that I was from Philly. People thought that I

918
00:46:52,239 --> 00:46:55,680
Speaker 4: lived in Baltimore. But when I met keV Brown and

919
00:46:55,760 --> 00:46:59,799
Speaker 4: Cy Young that night and they took me to Jeff Morpheus,

920
00:47:01,320 --> 00:47:05,760
Speaker 4: Jeff Morpheus Professor X, you know, like that's.

921
00:47:05,560 --> 00:47:07,520
Speaker 1: Where it all opened up, you know what I mean.

922
00:47:07,600 --> 00:47:09,920
Speaker 4: That's where he had the studio for Fourth Street and

923
00:47:10,800 --> 00:47:13,799
Speaker 4: you know all the rooms going. That's where I met

924
00:47:14,040 --> 00:47:16,600
Speaker 4: Eric Roberson for the first time. You know, he has

925
00:47:16,640 --> 00:47:18,880
Speaker 4: this story he tells where he feels like I was

926
00:47:18,920 --> 00:47:21,759
Speaker 4: writing the songs with the two pins, but I didn't

927
00:47:21,840 --> 00:47:22,239
Speaker 4: use a pen.

928
00:47:22,400 --> 00:47:24,520
Speaker 3: I was just doing everything off the brain, and.

929
00:47:24,480 --> 00:47:25,680
Speaker 2: It was just it was like a kid.

930
00:47:25,719 --> 00:47:27,360
Speaker 4: It's just a kid in a candy store, you know,

931
00:47:27,400 --> 00:47:29,720
Speaker 4: at that point, I haven't physically sat down and written

932
00:47:29,719 --> 00:47:32,960
Speaker 4: a song pinned the paper in a very in decades.

933
00:47:33,080 --> 00:47:35,360
Speaker 2: That's literally was my next question. I was like, what

934
00:47:35,440 --> 00:47:38,759
Speaker 2: is your songwriting process? Yeah, it's just to sit there

935
00:47:38,800 --> 00:47:39,520
Speaker 2: and channel with it.

936
00:47:39,600 --> 00:47:42,440
Speaker 4: Yeah, it's improvisational, like I sit there and it's having

937
00:47:42,440 --> 00:47:45,080
Speaker 4: a great engineer, you know, shout out the face.

938
00:47:45,760 --> 00:47:45,920
Speaker 1: You know.

939
00:47:45,960 --> 00:47:48,759
Speaker 4: I prefer to like record one place or you know,

940
00:47:48,920 --> 00:47:51,360
Speaker 4: or I've grown into the understanding like the vibe is

941
00:47:51,400 --> 00:47:52,680
Speaker 4: in you. You should be able to you know, if

942
00:47:52,719 --> 00:47:54,080
Speaker 4: you have people that are there in the room that

943
00:47:54,120 --> 00:47:56,360
Speaker 4: are professional and know what to do, the vibe is

944
00:47:56,360 --> 00:47:58,920
Speaker 4: in you. So I'll meet an engineer in LA and

945
00:47:59,600 --> 00:48:02,840
Speaker 4: like insane, Okay, like I'm he reminds me of my engineer,

946
00:48:02,880 --> 00:48:04,360
Speaker 4: and we'll lock in and then when I need to

947
00:48:04,400 --> 00:48:07,560
Speaker 4: do things in LA, I'm known for doing recording after

948
00:48:07,680 --> 00:48:12,080
Speaker 4: concerts and going to the studio and.

949
00:48:10,920 --> 00:48:12,000
Speaker 1: And vibing out right.

950
00:48:12,120 --> 00:48:17,239
Speaker 4: And but yeah, my process is very improvisational. I would

951
00:48:17,239 --> 00:48:20,080
Speaker 4: describe it as like a you know, it's like a download.

952
00:48:20,280 --> 00:48:23,520
Speaker 4: You know, it doesn't necessarily come I've heard Al Green,

953
00:48:23,880 --> 00:48:26,080
Speaker 4: I think describe it the same way, where it doesn't

954
00:48:26,080 --> 00:48:30,000
Speaker 4: come from me. But through me, and I just I

955
00:48:30,000 --> 00:48:32,880
Speaker 4: honor it. To borrow a quote from Eric robertson, you know,

956
00:48:33,000 --> 00:48:35,160
Speaker 4: I know that every time I write a song, I

957
00:48:35,200 --> 00:48:37,040
Speaker 4: know that God is real.

958
00:48:37,800 --> 00:48:40,280
Speaker 3: Is this, you know, the Creator is as a real.

959
00:48:40,120 --> 00:48:43,080
Speaker 4: Thing, and it makes you really want to respect the

960
00:48:43,120 --> 00:48:45,399
Speaker 4: gift even more so to make sure that you use

961
00:48:45,440 --> 00:48:47,600
Speaker 4: it for the right reasons.

962
00:48:47,880 --> 00:48:48,080
Speaker 1: You know.

963
00:48:48,560 --> 00:48:51,200
Speaker 2: So there's a real I forget what song that Stevie

964
00:48:51,280 --> 00:48:55,800
Speaker 2: Wonder is doing, but because he doesn't traditionally write lyrics

965
00:48:55,800 --> 00:49:00,279
Speaker 2: down or whatever, usually when he's tracking, so you listen

966
00:49:00,280 --> 00:49:03,480
Speaker 2: to like some of those reels or whatever, he'll get

967
00:49:03,520 --> 00:49:06,080
Speaker 2: to the end of the song and then it's always like,

968
00:49:06,239 --> 00:49:09,319
Speaker 2: oh garyl keep the tape rolling, and he'll just sit

969
00:49:09,360 --> 00:49:11,960
Speaker 2: there and he'll be on the roads, and then suddenly

970
00:49:12,040 --> 00:49:13,040
Speaker 2: you'll hear things like.

971
00:49:19,640 --> 00:49:22,879
Speaker 1: You got it, you got that real quick.

972
00:49:22,960 --> 00:49:23,920
Speaker 3: Another one comes to me.

973
00:49:24,440 --> 00:49:27,279
Speaker 2: You always hear like a sparkling like keep the tape on,

974
00:49:27,360 --> 00:49:34,440
Speaker 2: I got an idea like it's But I admire that

975
00:49:34,560 --> 00:49:38,480
Speaker 2: process more than anything because and I do think that

976
00:49:39,040 --> 00:49:42,439
Speaker 2: writing on the spot is probably the most honest way

977
00:49:42,480 --> 00:49:46,160
Speaker 2: to channel what you feel. So you'll say that eighty

978
00:49:46,280 --> 00:49:49,400
Speaker 2: ninety percent of the time it's yeah, ninety nine percent.

979
00:49:49,560 --> 00:49:52,760
Speaker 4: You know, there's records where different stages of my career

980
00:49:52,760 --> 00:49:55,880
Speaker 4: with somebody delivered me a record like a neo record

981
00:49:55,960 --> 00:49:58,520
Speaker 4: and that you know that I love and traditional. Yeah,

982
00:49:58,520 --> 00:50:00,160
Speaker 4: I'm like, I want to cut this, you know, I

983
00:50:00,160 --> 00:50:03,799
Speaker 4: mean right, but and even then, like you know, they're

984
00:50:03,840 --> 00:50:05,319
Speaker 4: not there, so I got to do it off the

985
00:50:05,360 --> 00:50:08,680
Speaker 4: ear and and and figure it out.

986
00:50:08,840 --> 00:50:12,480
Speaker 2: That said, because I think anyone else would have just

987
00:50:12,600 --> 00:50:16,440
Speaker 2: chosen the number ten. How hard was it to construct

988
00:50:16,600 --> 00:50:17,360
Speaker 2: the twenty.

989
00:50:17,160 --> 00:50:18,080
Speaker 1: Lessons of Love? Then?

990
00:50:19,280 --> 00:50:22,120
Speaker 2: What in terms of well, I mean, because the thing

991
00:50:22,239 --> 00:50:26,080
Speaker 2: is is that you're giving twenty lessons of love. But oh,

992
00:50:26,239 --> 00:50:27,960
Speaker 2: it was just a concept thing.

993
00:50:28,440 --> 00:50:31,959
Speaker 4: So twenty Lessons of Love came about, you know, shout

994
00:50:31,960 --> 00:50:35,200
Speaker 4: out to my business partner, Tone Walters back and forth

995
00:50:35,239 --> 00:50:36,399
Speaker 4: talking and you.

996
00:50:36,320 --> 00:50:38,200
Speaker 1: Know, I know too in a long time, you know.

997
00:50:38,280 --> 00:50:41,880
Speaker 4: He Groove Gumbo is where we first like met, right,

998
00:50:42,000 --> 00:50:45,400
Speaker 4: and we were bouncing ideas for the tour, and he

999
00:50:45,440 --> 00:50:47,799
Speaker 4: said at this point, I'm like, you know, I'm at

1000
00:50:47,800 --> 00:50:50,080
Speaker 4: a stage in my life where I like input and

1001
00:50:50,960 --> 00:50:53,719
Speaker 4: I've realized you can't do it all and figure out everything, right,

1002
00:50:53,800 --> 00:50:55,600
Speaker 4: So he's like, yo, twenty lessons of love and I

1003
00:50:55,640 --> 00:50:57,279
Speaker 4: was like, yo, I love that because you know, he

1004
00:50:57,360 --> 00:50:59,839
Speaker 4: was coming off the twenty year anniversary of The Love Experience. Yes,

1005
00:51:00,080 --> 00:51:01,759
Speaker 4: and I said, the only thing is missing is not

1006
00:51:02,000 --> 00:51:03,160
Speaker 4: it's not there's no record.

1007
00:51:03,320 --> 00:51:03,880
Speaker 1: I got to do that.

1008
00:51:04,200 --> 00:51:06,399
Speaker 3: That's an ill record right there, you know. And that's

1009
00:51:06,400 --> 00:51:07,040
Speaker 3: how it happens.

1010
00:51:07,280 --> 00:51:10,160
Speaker 4: Once that right one thing, Now, Nah, once that happens,

1011
00:51:10,440 --> 00:51:12,200
Speaker 4: I'm a hell been on getting it done. So I

1012
00:51:12,200 --> 00:51:15,800
Speaker 4: immediately called my man KP from the colleagues, who's in Atlanta,

1013
00:51:16,200 --> 00:51:19,400
Speaker 4: and said, Hey, I wanted to feel like this, you know,

1014
00:51:19,440 --> 00:51:21,440
Speaker 4: I want to honor I feel like the nineties for

1015
00:51:21,560 --> 00:51:23,280
Speaker 4: R and B was the best, one of the best

1016
00:51:23,360 --> 00:51:25,799
Speaker 4: errors ever. Maybe it's just because that's where I you know,

1017
00:51:26,160 --> 00:51:28,440
Speaker 4: I feel like that birthed me, It raised me, you know,

1018
00:51:28,600 --> 00:51:31,360
Speaker 4: so many ways, right, And I told him what I

1019
00:51:31,360 --> 00:51:34,360
Speaker 4: wanted it to feel like, and he sent me the track.

1020
00:51:34,400 --> 00:51:38,040
Speaker 4: And you know, we communicate well together musically, so he

1021
00:51:38,120 --> 00:51:40,000
Speaker 4: sends me the track, and like once he sent it,

1022
00:51:40,040 --> 00:51:41,759
Speaker 4: I went to the studio and just like it just

1023
00:51:41,840 --> 00:51:43,759
Speaker 4: it really came out. I probably cut that record in

1024
00:51:43,840 --> 00:51:47,560
Speaker 4: like three four hours and then like revisited, you know

1025
00:51:47,560 --> 00:51:48,840
Speaker 4: what I mean, And then I'll be on to the

1026
00:51:48,880 --> 00:51:51,200
Speaker 4: next thing, or you know, I'm definitely in a space

1027
00:51:51,239 --> 00:51:54,839
Speaker 4: of like being a perfectionist at what I do now,

1028
00:51:55,000 --> 00:51:57,000
Speaker 4: where you know, I can walk away from it and

1029
00:51:57,120 --> 00:51:59,840
Speaker 4: go back to it and hear it, and you know,

1030
00:52:00,239 --> 00:52:03,640
Speaker 4: try different things, and you know, ask myself what's missing

1031
00:52:04,120 --> 00:52:04,959
Speaker 4: or what's too much?

1032
00:52:05,520 --> 00:52:06,520
Speaker 1: Right? Great?

1033
00:52:06,600 --> 00:52:09,799
Speaker 2: Good at editing, Oh yeah for sure, Yeah that's what

1034
00:52:09,920 --> 00:52:10,399
Speaker 2: where I'm weak.

1035
00:52:10,440 --> 00:52:12,160
Speaker 1: I got to have everything but the kitchen sinking.

1036
00:52:12,200 --> 00:52:14,640
Speaker 4: Yeah, you're so dense, yeah yeah, yeah, so so so

1037
00:52:14,719 --> 00:52:17,479
Speaker 4: and just you know, and just understanding sound and where

1038
00:52:17,480 --> 00:52:20,560
Speaker 4: I am as where I've grown and continue to grow

1039
00:52:20,560 --> 00:52:23,080
Speaker 4: as a vocalist and as a writer. But even like

1040
00:52:23,360 --> 00:52:26,600
Speaker 4: back when I really started locking in with Jeff before

1041
00:52:26,640 --> 00:52:31,760
Speaker 4: the deal at Jive, I just realized that how important

1042
00:52:31,760 --> 00:52:35,319
Speaker 4: time is, and it's nothing. There's no worse feeling than

1043
00:52:35,400 --> 00:52:37,840
Speaker 4: being an artist and wanting to be in the studio

1044
00:52:38,360 --> 00:52:41,440
Speaker 4: and knowing you have to leave because your time is up.

1045
00:52:42,400 --> 00:52:45,319
Speaker 3: Right, you know what I mean? Like that right there?

1046
00:52:45,360 --> 00:52:47,799
Speaker 4: So I always told myself and have myself had it

1047
00:52:47,840 --> 00:52:51,360
Speaker 4: in my mind that like whenever the opportunity presents itself,

1048
00:52:51,400 --> 00:52:54,000
Speaker 4: that doesn't have to be like that, that I'll just

1049
00:52:54,040 --> 00:52:55,920
Speaker 4: be in there as much as I want, you know,

1050
00:52:56,000 --> 00:52:57,400
Speaker 4: so by the time, you know, when I got to

1051
00:52:57,400 --> 00:53:01,120
Speaker 4: deal with Job Records back in two thousand and you're like, I.

1052
00:53:01,080 --> 00:53:01,600
Speaker 1: Did that right.

1053
00:53:01,680 --> 00:53:04,800
Speaker 3: I'm just finishing answering your question when I got.

1054
00:53:05,960 --> 00:53:06,759
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, you know.

1055
00:53:06,800 --> 00:53:08,600
Speaker 4: So when I got the deal back in two thousand

1056
00:53:08,640 --> 00:53:11,680
Speaker 4: and two, I had so much going on Urban after

1057
00:53:11,680 --> 00:53:16,360
Speaker 4: thirty one, the Crossroads with West Felton. At that stage,

1058
00:53:16,400 --> 00:53:19,880
Speaker 4: the Magnificent had already came out from meeting Jazzy Jeff,

1059
00:53:19,920 --> 00:53:22,839
Speaker 4: I met Kenny and Louis for the first time. We

1060
00:53:22,840 --> 00:53:24,640
Speaker 4: were working on V's album at the time.

1061
00:53:25,280 --> 00:53:25,839
Speaker 1: You know what I mean.

1062
00:53:26,440 --> 00:53:28,359
Speaker 4: Jeff sent me out on a mission to go work

1063
00:53:28,400 --> 00:53:30,319
Speaker 4: with Kenny to write a record for V. It was

1064
00:53:30,360 --> 00:53:32,759
Speaker 4: like a house record that I did and went to

1065
00:53:32,800 --> 00:53:34,680
Speaker 4: just make, you know, just kind of produce the vocal

1066
00:53:34,760 --> 00:53:36,840
Speaker 4: on it. And then I'm like working with V and

1067
00:53:36,880 --> 00:53:39,400
Speaker 4: I'm like, man, he don't need me to do nothing.

1068
00:53:40,960 --> 00:53:43,000
Speaker 1: Is just dope, right.

1069
00:53:43,280 --> 00:53:46,640
Speaker 2: And Kenny, that's my big bro, Like we got what

1070
00:53:46,760 --> 00:53:49,400
Speaker 2: was it like working with Kenny. He's so legendary.

1071
00:53:49,520 --> 00:53:52,520
Speaker 4: Kenny and his guys at the time diego with them.

1072
00:53:52,960 --> 00:53:56,080
Speaker 4: Kenny was the first person to show me my worth

1073
00:53:56,480 --> 00:54:00,440
Speaker 4: and value. Okay, as an artist and where I went

1074
00:54:00,480 --> 00:54:01,759
Speaker 4: to go. You know, I went out there to go

1075
00:54:01,800 --> 00:54:04,560
Speaker 4: do the thing that Jeff sent me out there to do.

1076
00:54:04,800 --> 00:54:09,080
Speaker 4: And then he was like blown away and was just like, yo, yo,

1077
00:54:09,160 --> 00:54:10,760
Speaker 4: you just did that at the top of your head

1078
00:54:11,440 --> 00:54:13,399
Speaker 4: and da da da da, and he was like yo.

1079
00:54:13,680 --> 00:54:15,960
Speaker 4: He pulled up some stuff and was like, yo, can

1080
00:54:16,000 --> 00:54:17,920
Speaker 4: you I think it was kind of like let me

1081
00:54:17,960 --> 00:54:19,000
Speaker 4: see what you do with this.

1082
00:54:19,120 --> 00:54:21,440
Speaker 3: And it was like oh, and I was like boom,

1083
00:54:21,440 --> 00:54:22,799
Speaker 3: and I was like you got another one?

1084
00:54:23,080 --> 00:54:24,799
Speaker 2: And then you know what I mean.

1085
00:54:24,840 --> 00:54:26,719
Speaker 4: And then we started it and I started to go

1086
00:54:26,800 --> 00:54:30,080
Speaker 4: back and forth and do things. And the first the

1087
00:54:30,120 --> 00:54:31,759
Speaker 4: thing I did for him I came up with it

1088
00:54:31,880 --> 00:54:35,120
Speaker 4: was but he was like, yo, how much you need

1089
00:54:35,280 --> 00:54:37,480
Speaker 4: for this or whatever? And I probably was like give

1090
00:54:37,520 --> 00:54:42,600
Speaker 4: me like two three hundred or whatever. And Kenny was

1091
00:54:42,640 --> 00:54:46,120
Speaker 4: like nah be he was like and he set me

1092
00:54:46,200 --> 00:54:48,120
Speaker 4: down and the like, I feel like he was the

1093
00:54:48,160 --> 00:54:51,440
Speaker 4: first one, one of the first to it was like

1094
00:54:51,560 --> 00:54:52,719
Speaker 4: three maybe three.

1095
00:54:52,520 --> 00:54:53,560
Speaker 1: Four five bands.

1096
00:54:54,160 --> 00:54:54,680
Speaker 2: You know what I'm saying.

1097
00:54:54,719 --> 00:54:56,239
Speaker 4: I ain't never seen that, and I ain't never had

1098
00:54:56,239 --> 00:54:59,799
Speaker 4: nobody like sit me down and like and it wasn't

1099
00:54:59,800 --> 00:55:01,560
Speaker 4: like I'm giving you three four bands and I'm finna

1100
00:55:01,600 --> 00:55:04,359
Speaker 4: take advantage of you or hey, along with just three

1101
00:55:04,400 --> 00:55:06,600
Speaker 4: four bands, I need you to sign this paperwork right here,

1102
00:55:06,680 --> 00:55:09,359
Speaker 4: and they taking half of your publishing. And just like

1103
00:55:09,840 --> 00:55:11,799
Speaker 4: it was, it was just never no weird business. It

1104
00:55:11,880 --> 00:55:15,319
Speaker 4: was just like big homie brotherhood love and the same

1105
00:55:15,360 --> 00:55:16,560
Speaker 4: thing with Jeff, you know what I mean?

1106
00:55:16,600 --> 00:55:18,640
Speaker 1: And why got all this going on?

1107
00:55:18,760 --> 00:55:21,879
Speaker 4: I still got managers down and I have already been

1108
00:55:21,960 --> 00:55:25,840
Speaker 4: on the road and left and quit from working with genuine.

1109
00:55:25,880 --> 00:55:30,480
Speaker 4: Genuine was my first introduction to the industry in terms

1110
00:55:30,520 --> 00:55:35,359
Speaker 4: of superstar status, like and this.

1111
00:55:35,280 --> 00:55:38,040
Speaker 1: Is a songwriting with them or singing background, singing.

1112
00:55:37,800 --> 00:55:41,399
Speaker 4: Background, okay, you know which he had this? I met

1113
00:55:41,400 --> 00:55:43,319
Speaker 4: Cliff and Jerry. So because I was still in DC

1114
00:55:43,440 --> 00:55:45,440
Speaker 4: and I still was doing things, I still was working

1115
00:55:46,160 --> 00:55:49,719
Speaker 4: on wanting to be that independent artist. But there's all

1116
00:55:49,719 --> 00:55:52,080
Speaker 4: these part of different things. I just had multiple things

1117
00:55:52,120 --> 00:55:52,600
Speaker 4: going on.

1118
00:55:53,239 --> 00:55:55,400
Speaker 2: So what was that like in your version of twenty

1119
00:55:55,400 --> 00:55:57,480
Speaker 2: Feet from Stardoms? So do you learn?

1120
00:55:57,520 --> 00:55:59,920
Speaker 4: So I got these managers, is in my ear who

1121
00:56:00,560 --> 00:56:02,600
Speaker 4: who I'm loyal to at this point? And they and

1122
00:56:02,640 --> 00:56:05,960
Speaker 4: they you know, and they're actively shopping a record deal

1123
00:56:06,040 --> 00:56:09,040
Speaker 4: for me with these records that I've done with Jeff

1124
00:56:09,440 --> 00:56:12,440
Speaker 4: Right Records, I've done with them right stuff I've done

1125
00:56:12,480 --> 00:56:17,840
Speaker 4: with Kenny Right. But they're also kind of like probably

1126
00:56:17,880 --> 00:56:20,200
Speaker 4: on pins and needles because they've had other artists that

1127
00:56:20,200 --> 00:56:23,359
Speaker 4: they've worked with who are not loyal, Like I.

1128
00:56:23,360 --> 00:56:24,879
Speaker 2: Am gotcha, you know what I mean.

1129
00:56:24,920 --> 00:56:27,920
Speaker 4: So I'm going, I'm going like so I think I'm

1130
00:56:27,920 --> 00:56:30,080
Speaker 4: probably you know, maybe every time I go to Philly

1131
00:56:30,080 --> 00:56:31,759
Speaker 4: out of New York, they don't know if I'm going

1132
00:56:31,800 --> 00:56:33,759
Speaker 4: to you know, it gets a little convoluted.

1133
00:56:33,840 --> 00:56:35,200
Speaker 1: I got all this going on.

1134
00:56:35,200 --> 00:56:37,560
Speaker 4: And what are you doing with the you know, you're

1135
00:56:37,560 --> 00:56:41,400
Speaker 4: doing the head wrap stuff? It's the Urban A thirty

1136
00:56:41,400 --> 00:56:43,960
Speaker 4: one and you know heving help us all.

1137
00:56:44,080 --> 00:56:47,000
Speaker 2: And you know, for us it's always the backpack versus

1138
00:56:47,200 --> 00:56:48,879
Speaker 2: ya in commercial so.

1139
00:56:49,320 --> 00:56:51,000
Speaker 4: And my thing it's like I do it, and my

1140
00:56:51,040 --> 00:56:52,680
Speaker 4: thing is like I do it all. You know, I

1141
00:56:52,719 --> 00:56:53,560
Speaker 4: had to figure it out.

1142
00:56:53,680 --> 00:56:55,520
Speaker 2: You know, are they looking down on head wrapping? Like

1143
00:56:55,640 --> 00:56:58,120
Speaker 2: I mean, yeah, I mean, I'm gonna say they're looking

1144
00:56:58,160 --> 00:56:58,719
Speaker 2: down on it.

1145
00:56:58,719 --> 00:57:02,000
Speaker 4: It's just like it's that era where that's where you know,

1146
00:57:02,040 --> 00:57:04,879
Speaker 4: I think me and West with the Crossroads was made

1147
00:57:04,920 --> 00:57:08,040
Speaker 4: us so unique is that you know we would come

1148
00:57:08,120 --> 00:57:10,920
Speaker 4: up with different turn jiggy conscious or you know what

1149
00:57:11,000 --> 00:57:12,759
Speaker 4: I mean. It's like, you know what I'm like, Why

1150
00:57:12,800 --> 00:57:16,800
Speaker 4: can't I have my v's on and my you know,

1151
00:57:17,400 --> 00:57:19,720
Speaker 4: my role like that my mama gave me.

1152
00:57:19,800 --> 00:57:20,439
Speaker 2: You know what I'm saying.

1153
00:57:20,880 --> 00:57:23,240
Speaker 4: Why can't I have a love for R and B

1154
00:57:23,400 --> 00:57:25,560
Speaker 4: the same way that I do for soul music right

1155
00:57:26,040 --> 00:57:28,560
Speaker 4: or rock? And you know when you listen to my

1156
00:57:28,600 --> 00:57:30,960
Speaker 4: first album, it's a fusion of a lot of different things.

1157
00:57:31,000 --> 00:57:32,600
Speaker 3: It's kind of fast forwarding.

1158
00:57:32,640 --> 00:57:35,280
Speaker 4: I knew that the love experience could be received a

1159
00:57:35,360 --> 00:57:37,440
Speaker 4: lot of different ways and it could be confusing. And

1160
00:57:37,480 --> 00:57:39,680
Speaker 4: that's where really the R and B Hippie Do Soul

1161
00:57:39,760 --> 00:57:42,520
Speaker 4: rock Star title came from. And they when people I

1162
00:57:42,960 --> 00:57:47,000
Speaker 4: came up with that because I knew that if I

1163
00:57:47,040 --> 00:57:50,880
Speaker 4: couldn't explain it or formulated into words, and I didn't

1164
00:57:50,880 --> 00:57:52,960
Speaker 4: just want to be like neo soul like I knew

1165
00:57:52,960 --> 00:57:55,480
Speaker 4: where that came from. And it was nothing wrong with that, right,

1166
00:57:55,920 --> 00:57:58,360
Speaker 4: but I knew that that was like I come from

1167
00:57:58,400 --> 00:58:01,960
Speaker 4: an era of like and grew up like where you

1168
00:58:02,000 --> 00:58:06,919
Speaker 4: don't bite somebody's titles or you know what I'm saying

1169
00:58:06,920 --> 00:58:11,360
Speaker 4: phrases you know or sound right. So I feel like

1170
00:58:11,400 --> 00:58:13,160
Speaker 4: there was a time period with that started. I'm not

1171
00:58:13,160 --> 00:58:14,760
Speaker 4: gonna say who I feel like started that, but.

1172
00:58:15,200 --> 00:58:18,840
Speaker 3: It was that was it, But it was.

1173
00:58:18,920 --> 00:58:21,840
Speaker 4: And I sample things too, So I love sampling, right,

1174
00:58:22,280 --> 00:58:27,520
Speaker 4: But there's nothing more dope and original than like original music,

1175
00:58:28,080 --> 00:58:31,280
Speaker 4: gotcha right? And I was drawn to both, right, So

1176
00:58:31,760 --> 00:58:33,960
Speaker 4: I figured out a way to diffuse it too. So

1177
00:58:34,040 --> 00:58:36,080
Speaker 4: being on the road with like Genuine, which is more

1178
00:58:36,160 --> 00:58:41,000
Speaker 4: like a conventional R and B but also futuristic. You

1179
00:58:41,040 --> 00:58:44,680
Speaker 4: gotta remember G's first two three albums like he was

1180
00:58:44,720 --> 00:58:47,440
Speaker 4: part of He was part of a movement that changed

1181
00:58:47,520 --> 00:58:51,200
Speaker 4: music sonically. That don't happen every day, right, that don't

1182
00:58:51,240 --> 00:58:54,760
Speaker 4: happen every decade. Yeah, you know what I mean. So

1183
00:58:54,920 --> 00:58:58,320
Speaker 4: like that whole Missy player, you know what I mean.

1184
00:58:58,320 --> 00:59:00,080
Speaker 4: So I was getting I was in the best of

1185
00:59:00,040 --> 00:59:03,960
Speaker 4: worlds because I get to be kind of like underneath

1186
00:59:04,000 --> 00:59:08,520
Speaker 4: that experience that and sing the songs that you know

1187
00:59:08,680 --> 00:59:10,800
Speaker 4: that I loved singing, and you know that I was.

1188
00:59:10,840 --> 00:59:12,919
Speaker 3: I was a genu Wine fan when I got the gig,

1189
00:59:13,400 --> 00:59:13,520
Speaker 3: you know.

1190
00:59:13,840 --> 00:59:15,640
Speaker 4: And you know, he don't get the credit and the

1191
00:59:15,720 --> 00:59:19,080
Speaker 4: roses and his prom and I think he was like, yeah,

1192
00:59:19,120 --> 00:59:21,680
Speaker 4: all the all them cats was like wanted to beg

1193
00:59:22,040 --> 00:59:24,400
Speaker 4: or if they never said it or whatever, but like

1194
00:59:25,040 --> 00:59:27,480
Speaker 4: before there was a Chris Brown, before there was you know,

1195
00:59:27,640 --> 00:59:29,680
Speaker 4: and and while there was this they were like, but

1196
00:59:29,760 --> 00:59:31,960
Speaker 4: G was like that guy, like I was. I was

1197
00:59:32,000 --> 00:59:34,760
Speaker 4: there before differences, I was there after. I was there

1198
00:59:34,880 --> 00:59:38,440
Speaker 4: you know when before he met so late after like

1199
00:59:38,880 --> 00:59:41,320
Speaker 4: on tour with him with Janet Jackson and Backstreet Boys

1200
00:59:41,320 --> 00:59:43,320
Speaker 4: and in sync, Like what's bigger at the time?

1201
00:59:43,920 --> 00:59:44,720
Speaker 1: What was that like?

1202
00:59:44,960 --> 00:59:46,520
Speaker 3: Oh, it was crazy.

1203
00:59:46,720 --> 00:59:48,640
Speaker 4: It was crazy, like it was it was It was

1204
00:59:48,680 --> 00:59:51,960
Speaker 4: like it let me know that I had to quit

1205
00:59:52,000 --> 00:59:54,160
Speaker 4: because I could. I had to make a decision because

1206
00:59:54,160 --> 00:59:57,320
Speaker 4: I would you know, people give their lives to artists,

1207
00:59:57,560 --> 00:59:58,840
Speaker 4: you know what I mean, Like, you know a lot

1208
00:59:58,840 --> 01:00:00,800
Speaker 4: of times we don't look at the fact that the

1209
01:00:00,840 --> 01:00:05,680
Speaker 4: people who helped be helped shape it right. And so

1210
01:00:06,120 --> 01:00:08,200
Speaker 4: although I enjoyed that and I loved that, I remember

1211
01:00:08,560 --> 01:00:11,040
Speaker 4: distinctly like the last gig I did was in Vegas,

1212
01:00:11,040 --> 01:00:13,160
Speaker 4: and I made a decision on that ride back that

1213
01:00:13,320 --> 01:00:15,880
Speaker 4: like I wanted to be, I wanted more. I knew

1214
01:00:15,880 --> 01:00:17,800
Speaker 4: that it was out there was something out there, There

1215
01:00:17,840 --> 01:00:19,960
Speaker 4: was a driving force still was out there for me.

1216
01:00:20,280 --> 01:00:24,320
Speaker 1: A lot of people would get stuck. We comforted living and.

1217
01:00:24,280 --> 01:00:27,320
Speaker 4: Yeah, so I was actively, you know, always coming back

1218
01:00:27,360 --> 01:00:29,760
Speaker 4: and forth to New York and doing showcases and things

1219
01:00:29,800 --> 01:00:32,880
Speaker 4: like that, and Cliff Jones Jerry Vonn shout out to

1220
01:00:32,880 --> 01:00:36,920
Speaker 4: Cliff and Jerry Cliff was shopping songs and shopping artists.

1221
01:00:37,000 --> 01:00:39,720
Speaker 3: He went into Job Records to shop.

1222
01:00:39,480 --> 01:00:42,360
Speaker 4: A totally different artist that he was hell bent on

1223
01:00:42,680 --> 01:00:45,480
Speaker 4: getting in the record deal for and played a couple

1224
01:00:45,480 --> 01:00:47,600
Speaker 4: of my records and they were like, what's that?

1225
01:00:47,960 --> 01:00:49,920
Speaker 2: Go back to that, who's that whatever?

1226
01:00:50,320 --> 01:00:52,840
Speaker 4: And then you know, they started doing their homework and

1227
01:00:53,480 --> 01:00:56,120
Speaker 4: I had a buzz and we got They said they

1228
01:00:56,120 --> 01:00:58,240
Speaker 4: wanted me to come to Jive Records to do a showcase,

1229
01:00:58,560 --> 01:01:01,600
Speaker 4: which was supposed to be for fifteen minutes and it

1230
01:01:01,680 --> 01:01:03,320
Speaker 4: ended up being like an hour and a half that

1231
01:01:03,360 --> 01:01:06,880
Speaker 4: I performed and yikes, they were, you know, this is

1232
01:01:06,920 --> 01:01:10,960
Speaker 4: this is like this is right after like the whole

1233
01:01:11,680 --> 01:01:14,640
Speaker 4: r Kelly and the Olympics and the tape and you

1234
01:01:14,680 --> 01:01:17,240
Speaker 4: know what I mean, And this is kind of the

1235
01:01:17,480 --> 01:01:20,120
Speaker 4: kind of like everybody's wasn't there but everybody Pete at

1236
01:01:20,120 --> 01:01:21,920
Speaker 4: THEIA Parry might have.

1237
01:01:22,720 --> 01:01:25,000
Speaker 2: But no, no, no, I mean physically there was He's still

1238
01:01:25,440 --> 01:01:27,520
Speaker 2: it was oh yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah yeah.

1239
01:01:27,560 --> 01:01:31,400
Speaker 4: So I remember feeling like though in the process, you know, Jeff,

1240
01:01:31,440 --> 01:01:34,400
Speaker 4: this was Jeff's old label though, right, and I feel

1241
01:01:34,400 --> 01:01:36,920
Speaker 4: like I was concerned about it, like sucking up the relationship,

1242
01:01:37,080 --> 01:01:37,720
Speaker 4: you know what I'm saying.

1243
01:01:37,760 --> 01:01:39,080
Speaker 3: I had a lot of respect for him.

1244
01:01:39,240 --> 01:01:41,400
Speaker 4: He told me to What I don't think he knew

1245
01:01:41,440 --> 01:01:44,120
Speaker 4: was that he had equipped me for to kind of

1246
01:01:44,160 --> 01:01:45,840
Speaker 4: go in there to know what I needed to do.

1247
01:01:45,920 --> 01:01:47,360
Speaker 4: So I already knew I was going to be there

1248
01:01:47,480 --> 01:01:50,760
Speaker 4: for a good time, not a long time, gotcha, right,

1249
01:01:50,920 --> 01:01:53,280
Speaker 4: And you know high Sight twenty twenty, I was, you know,

1250
01:01:53,840 --> 01:01:56,480
Speaker 4: I was only I did my first deal in two

1251
01:01:56,520 --> 01:01:58,520
Speaker 4: thousand and two. The album came out in two thousand

1252
01:01:58,560 --> 01:02:01,720
Speaker 4: and five. That right there, that three year span showed

1253
01:02:01,760 --> 01:02:06,920
Speaker 4: me everything I needed to see to know. Okay, because

1254
01:02:06,960 --> 01:02:08,240
Speaker 4: you get the deal and then you get in the

1255
01:02:08,240 --> 01:02:11,040
Speaker 4: building and then you realize, like, oh then it starts.

1256
01:02:11,600 --> 01:02:13,360
Speaker 4: This is just the this is just the start.

1257
01:02:25,520 --> 01:02:28,400
Speaker 2: Once you knew you were getting a deal, how long

1258
01:02:28,600 --> 01:02:32,800
Speaker 2: was it before you realized, Okay, now this ship is real.

1259
01:02:32,960 --> 01:02:35,640
Speaker 2: Because there was a point where for us, you know,

1260
01:02:35,680 --> 01:02:37,720
Speaker 2: we got our advanced and started acting.

1261
01:02:38,480 --> 01:02:39,880
Speaker 3: It was real when I got the advance.

1262
01:02:39,960 --> 01:02:42,440
Speaker 4: But I got the advanced, and I ain't tell nobody

1263
01:02:43,200 --> 01:02:45,200
Speaker 4: first move I made. Somebody put me on the Tarry

1264
01:02:45,240 --> 01:02:48,520
Speaker 4: Reid hmm. And I got with Terry Read and I

1265
01:02:48,560 --> 01:02:50,680
Speaker 4: put the money up or whatever. But then, but what

1266
01:02:50,720 --> 01:02:53,760
Speaker 4: I would do, though, is I would always go to

1267
01:02:53,800 --> 01:02:56,000
Speaker 4: the like I was. I had that club, like going

1268
01:02:56,000 --> 01:02:59,440
Speaker 4: to the club, and like I started and started to

1269
01:02:59,520 --> 01:03:02,600
Speaker 4: deal with trying to dibble and dabbling bottle service and

1270
01:03:02,600 --> 01:03:05,560
Speaker 4: how fast were you broken? Oh man, nah, it ain't

1271
01:03:05,560 --> 01:03:08,800
Speaker 4: get not because I did have some put up over

1272
01:03:08,800 --> 01:03:10,880
Speaker 4: there with Terry, like it ain't you know what I mean.

1273
01:03:11,320 --> 01:03:12,800
Speaker 4: Like I was able to hold on to what I

1274
01:03:12,800 --> 01:03:14,240
Speaker 4: got for the you know, a couple of years. But

1275
01:03:14,320 --> 01:03:15,280
Speaker 4: it was just it was, you know, I had a

1276
01:03:15,480 --> 01:03:18,440
Speaker 4: I had a little green camera ninety six camera that

1277
01:03:18,520 --> 01:03:20,920
Speaker 4: I bought. I didn't like, I didn't realize, like you know,

1278
01:03:21,320 --> 01:03:23,680
Speaker 4: back then, I really had to. I had a financial literacy,

1279
01:03:23,720 --> 01:03:27,800
Speaker 4: so I didn't know about you know, the taxes and

1280
01:03:27,920 --> 01:03:30,440
Speaker 4: all like you know, and or to get the car,

1281
01:03:30,600 --> 01:03:33,080
Speaker 4: like I remember Cliff and Jerry telling me like man,

1282
01:03:33,120 --> 01:03:35,360
Speaker 4: you gotta you gotta you can't be riding around here

1283
01:03:35,400 --> 01:03:37,880
Speaker 4: and that you gotta look you gotta look the part,

1284
01:03:37,960 --> 01:03:39,160
Speaker 4: you know what I'm saying. And that's when I went

1285
01:03:39,200 --> 01:03:41,400
Speaker 4: and got like a truck, like we got my avalanche.

1286
01:03:41,440 --> 01:03:45,919
Speaker 4: But like that three year span out went through two

1287
01:03:46,160 --> 01:03:49,200
Speaker 4: mergers and one selling of the company, you know what

1288
01:03:49,240 --> 01:03:51,920
Speaker 4: I mean. So just just that boom that happens right

1289
01:03:51,960 --> 01:03:52,840
Speaker 4: after I do the deal.

1290
01:03:53,280 --> 01:03:54,160
Speaker 3: So you don't even know.

1291
01:03:54,280 --> 01:03:57,640
Speaker 4: So you hear the whispers, but you don't know if you're.

1292
01:03:57,520 --> 01:03:59,120
Speaker 3: Gonna even stay, you know what I'm saying.

1293
01:03:59,440 --> 01:04:01,439
Speaker 4: And if you got to management or teams like keeping

1294
01:04:01,440 --> 01:04:03,040
Speaker 4: it funky with you, they gonna let you know, so

1295
01:04:03,040 --> 01:04:04,920
Speaker 4: they which they did, you know, and they let me

1296
01:04:04,960 --> 01:04:07,280
Speaker 4: know and then and then and then they had a split,

1297
01:04:08,160 --> 01:04:10,160
Speaker 4: you know, the managers had to split and not like

1298
01:04:10,240 --> 01:04:12,120
Speaker 4: right after you know what I mean, Like I had

1299
01:04:12,120 --> 01:04:14,720
Speaker 4: to just choose a side. I had to pick a

1300
01:04:14,800 --> 01:04:17,120
Speaker 4: side that which which I had never been in that

1301
01:04:17,200 --> 01:04:21,160
Speaker 4: situation before things, you know, learning about loyalty, you know,

1302
01:04:21,520 --> 01:04:25,320
Speaker 4: being paranoid about the money and not at how it

1303
01:04:25,360 --> 01:04:27,520
Speaker 4: can change you or change the people around you.

1304
01:04:28,040 --> 01:04:29,120
Speaker 3: It was like bet on you.

1305
01:04:29,480 --> 01:04:32,040
Speaker 4: And that's you know, that's where I started doing the mixtapes,

1306
01:04:32,640 --> 01:04:34,200
Speaker 4: you know what I mean. And I was the first

1307
01:04:34,280 --> 01:04:38,160
Speaker 4: you know, the first singer soul, R and B singer

1308
01:04:38,200 --> 01:04:40,680
Speaker 4: to make to make to make mixtapes. And I did

1309
01:04:40,760 --> 01:04:44,200
Speaker 4: that because of that's coming back and forth in New

1310
01:04:44,280 --> 01:04:47,480
Speaker 4: York seeing what fifty was doing with g Unit, right,

1311
01:04:48,080 --> 01:04:50,960
Speaker 4: and that's where I got the whole blueprint, watching fifty

1312
01:04:50,960 --> 01:04:53,480
Speaker 4: with g Unit and watching Mike Jones, and I had,

1313
01:04:54,000 --> 01:04:56,160
Speaker 4: you know, and the mixtapes with is what you know

1314
01:04:56,240 --> 01:04:59,439
Speaker 4: and getting them out to the DJs, and then got

1315
01:04:59,440 --> 01:05:03,560
Speaker 4: the burner and burning and burning the tapes and selling

1316
01:05:03,560 --> 01:05:05,640
Speaker 4: them out the trunk and out the north face and

1317
01:05:05,680 --> 01:05:07,320
Speaker 4: the winter and going in the club.

1318
01:05:07,400 --> 01:05:08,640
Speaker 3: It was a period of time. I go in the

1319
01:05:08,720 --> 01:05:10,000
Speaker 3: club and like you.

1320
01:05:10,040 --> 01:05:13,640
Speaker 4: Got Gilbert's arenas by getting a couple and throwing me

1321
01:05:13,680 --> 01:05:14,440
Speaker 4: a stack.

1322
01:05:14,440 --> 01:05:15,800
Speaker 3: Real quick, you got you know what I mean.

1323
01:05:15,880 --> 01:05:18,440
Speaker 4: I leave the club with like like a dope man,

1324
01:05:18,720 --> 01:05:21,400
Speaker 4: like the dope man with you know, five six, you know,

1325
01:05:21,920 --> 01:05:24,439
Speaker 4: thousand dollars like and not in in a half an hour,

1326
01:05:25,040 --> 01:05:26,600
Speaker 4: I just posts up at the bar and you got

1327
01:05:26,600 --> 01:05:29,080
Speaker 4: that value one, you got that value two. I didn't

1328
01:05:29,120 --> 01:05:30,720
Speaker 4: realize what I was doing at the time, but I

1329
01:05:30,760 --> 01:05:33,040
Speaker 4: was creating my own destiny. I was creating an ownership.

1330
01:05:33,760 --> 01:05:36,360
Speaker 4: I was doing album I was doing Street Team promo.

1331
01:05:36,880 --> 01:05:39,240
Speaker 4: I didn't realize that, you know, I was providing. It

1332
01:05:39,280 --> 01:05:41,320
Speaker 4: was like, you know, merch in its own cool way.

1333
01:05:41,800 --> 01:05:42,440
Speaker 3: But I learned that.

1334
01:05:42,480 --> 01:05:44,160
Speaker 4: I mean, I learned that from like bar None and

1335
01:05:44,280 --> 01:05:46,560
Speaker 4: and like my guy Wes Felton, you know what I mean,

1336
01:05:46,600 --> 01:05:49,520
Speaker 4: and seeing him have something that was you know, I

1337
01:05:49,600 --> 01:05:53,440
Speaker 4: realized early I'm doing open mics. People want to take

1338
01:05:53,480 --> 01:05:56,919
Speaker 4: you home with them. Have something that that people can

1339
01:05:57,320 --> 01:05:58,080
Speaker 4: that's tangible.

1340
01:05:58,840 --> 01:06:02,120
Speaker 2: So that lead me to like at the time when

1341
01:06:02,160 --> 01:06:06,160
Speaker 2: I was on a major, like I would have nightmares

1342
01:06:06,560 --> 01:06:09,840
Speaker 2: about us getting dropped and no, I'm not going back

1343
01:06:09,840 --> 01:06:12,560
Speaker 2: on to my mama, you know that whole thing, which

1344
01:06:12,720 --> 01:06:16,520
Speaker 2: I'll say that a lot of that sort of just

1345
01:06:17,400 --> 01:06:20,400
Speaker 2: the fear of getting dropped back when you just have

1346
01:06:20,560 --> 01:06:22,840
Speaker 2: one thing to do, which you know, now I have options,

1347
01:06:23,040 --> 01:06:26,000
Speaker 2: So like I'm now creating from my heart and not

1348
01:06:26,120 --> 01:06:31,800
Speaker 2: from out of fear. How liberating did it feel or

1349
01:06:31,840 --> 01:06:35,920
Speaker 2: how frightening was it once you were without the backing

1350
01:06:35,960 --> 01:06:39,520
Speaker 2: of a major and now you're deciding I'm gonna do

1351
01:06:39,560 --> 01:06:41,800
Speaker 2: this on my own as an independent.

1352
01:06:41,680 --> 01:06:44,040
Speaker 3: That started in twenty ten, and it was cool. It

1353
01:06:44,160 --> 01:06:45,960
Speaker 3: was never no fear factor.

1354
01:06:46,000 --> 01:06:48,000
Speaker 4: It was the fact that I already at that stage,

1355
01:06:48,000 --> 01:06:49,840
Speaker 4: I already knew I had built something. I had already

1356
01:06:49,840 --> 01:06:52,800
Speaker 4: built something prior to getting signed a job.

1357
01:06:53,000 --> 01:06:54,160
Speaker 1: Yay, like you know what I mean?

1358
01:06:54,760 --> 01:06:56,920
Speaker 4: So you know I mean, I guess that's why I

1359
01:06:56,960 --> 01:06:59,240
Speaker 4: worked the way that I work now. I never want

1360
01:06:59,280 --> 01:07:01,760
Speaker 4: to go back to that that fear, like it's still lingers,

1361
01:07:01,920 --> 01:07:03,760
Speaker 4: like you know what I mean, especially if you don't

1362
01:07:03,800 --> 01:07:08,280
Speaker 4: have like the financial literacy and to know, you know,

1363
01:07:08,680 --> 01:07:10,560
Speaker 4: it's one thing to make the money, it's another thing

1364
01:07:10,600 --> 01:07:12,520
Speaker 4: to know how to you know, be able to touch

1365
01:07:12,520 --> 01:07:15,400
Speaker 4: it when you need it. And then you know, wise

1366
01:07:15,920 --> 01:07:18,720
Speaker 4: manager once told me, when you make the decision based

1367
01:07:18,800 --> 01:07:22,200
Speaker 4: upon money, you're going to always make the wrong decision

1368
01:07:22,240 --> 01:07:26,320
Speaker 4: typically you know you know so. But yeah, I feel

1369
01:07:26,360 --> 01:07:28,440
Speaker 4: like at that point I had the matrix figured out.

1370
01:07:28,440 --> 01:07:29,920
Speaker 3: I got out of my deal. I didn't get dropped.

1371
01:07:29,960 --> 01:07:31,560
Speaker 4: I got out of the deal because they didn't want

1372
01:07:31,560 --> 01:07:33,840
Speaker 4: to honor the next period that I would have been

1373
01:07:33,880 --> 01:07:36,120
Speaker 4: going into, which would have been a seven figure period.

1374
01:07:36,640 --> 01:07:37,680
Speaker 1: You know, if you.

1375
01:07:37,640 --> 01:07:40,880
Speaker 4: Talk about the advance and then the promo budget and

1376
01:07:40,920 --> 01:07:43,760
Speaker 4: the album budget and all the things. And I distinctly

1377
01:07:43,760 --> 01:07:46,840
Speaker 4: remember Peter Thea sitting me down and saying like, hey, like,

1378
01:07:47,280 --> 01:07:50,200
Speaker 4: we're not selling the records we used to sell it anymore.

1379
01:07:50,480 --> 01:07:51,479
Speaker 1: If we got our.

1380
01:07:51,400 --> 01:07:54,720
Speaker 4: Hands on you five years prior to when we did,

1381
01:07:55,560 --> 01:07:58,360
Speaker 4: you would be huge. You would be a household name

1382
01:07:58,520 --> 01:08:02,160
Speaker 4: more than what you are now, Like you would be huge.

1383
01:08:02,880 --> 01:08:06,360
Speaker 4: But the reality is people aren't being by records like

1384
01:08:06,400 --> 01:08:06,920
Speaker 4: they used to.

1385
01:08:07,560 --> 01:08:09,000
Speaker 3: The business model is changing.

1386
01:08:09,560 --> 01:08:12,320
Speaker 4: I know we're supposed to do give you this, and

1387
01:08:12,360 --> 01:08:14,960
Speaker 4: do this, but did you think you could do an

1388
01:08:14,960 --> 01:08:17,840
Speaker 4: album three hundred thousand And I'm sitting across from them,

1389
01:08:17,840 --> 01:08:20,639
Speaker 4: like absolutely I could do that. You know, I probably

1390
01:08:20,640 --> 01:08:24,280
Speaker 4: just might do the whole album for twenty bands fifty bands,

1391
01:08:24,280 --> 01:08:27,360
Speaker 4: and then use a portion of it to get the

1392
01:08:27,479 --> 01:08:29,800
Speaker 4: radio record going and you know what I mean, and

1393
01:08:29,840 --> 01:08:32,479
Speaker 4: all the things. But it was like, nah, I want

1394
01:08:32,479 --> 01:08:35,000
Speaker 4: which I was supposed to give me though, right, like right,

1395
01:08:35,400 --> 01:08:37,160
Speaker 4: And it was just that thing like, well, we can't

1396
01:08:37,160 --> 01:08:41,240
Speaker 4: do that, so we'll give you to December thirty first, two.

1397
01:08:41,000 --> 01:08:42,519
Speaker 3: Thousand and nine to this side.

1398
01:08:44,160 --> 01:08:46,360
Speaker 4: But I think I told them, like, I'll give you

1399
01:08:46,360 --> 01:08:50,320
Speaker 4: to the side and if it don't play out, then

1400
01:08:50,400 --> 01:08:51,400
Speaker 4: I'll go my separate weight.

1401
01:08:51,479 --> 01:08:53,160
Speaker 3: I mean, they gave me a release and then you

1402
01:08:53,160 --> 01:08:53,519
Speaker 3: know what I.

1403
01:08:53,400 --> 01:08:55,800
Speaker 4: Mean, and I think the biggest lesson in that was

1404
01:08:55,840 --> 01:08:58,240
Speaker 4: not being prepared and not having a plan, like, well,

1405
01:08:58,560 --> 01:08:59,439
Speaker 4: what's gonna be my plan?

1406
01:08:59,560 --> 01:09:03,639
Speaker 3: So I kind of like dormant for three years.

1407
01:09:03,760 --> 01:09:07,080
Speaker 4: I started doing what was a podcast before it was

1408
01:09:07,120 --> 01:09:10,080
Speaker 4: called the podcast where I did the Raheem Devan Show

1409
01:09:10,080 --> 01:09:13,479
Speaker 4: every Sunday and that like blew up. But the business

1410
01:09:13,560 --> 01:09:16,920
Speaker 4: wasn't right on that and in terms of the monetization

1411
01:09:17,040 --> 01:09:20,040
Speaker 4: of it for me. But I sat down with everybody

1412
01:09:20,080 --> 01:09:24,000
Speaker 4: from Kendrick Lamar to t I, the Bony James too,

1413
01:09:24,520 --> 01:09:28,280
Speaker 4: you know, Marsha came through Spike Lee. I mean like

1414
01:09:28,360 --> 01:09:30,840
Speaker 4: it was, it was. It was an incredible time. And

1415
01:09:30,880 --> 01:09:34,320
Speaker 4: so now when I see like the podcasting and I'm like, wow, man,

1416
01:09:34,360 --> 01:09:36,479
Speaker 4: I was I've been a blueprint for a lot.

1417
01:09:36,560 --> 01:09:39,040
Speaker 3: I didn't understand it. It didn't click.

1418
01:09:38,920 --> 01:09:43,920
Speaker 4: Until after I left one of those Jazzy Jeff Secret retreats. Yes,

1419
01:09:44,000 --> 01:09:46,840
Speaker 4: one of the playlists, Yes, one of I was like

1420
01:09:46,880 --> 01:09:49,920
Speaker 4: an early playlist attender, and he has me on this

1421
01:09:50,560 --> 01:09:53,599
Speaker 4: my trailer that was staying in in my trailers. Dj

1422
01:09:54,760 --> 01:09:59,840
Speaker 4: Z Trip, yeah, the cat who started GoPro and dj Eddie.

1423
01:10:01,040 --> 01:10:04,920
Speaker 4: Oh you know how Jeff like labels names that I

1424
01:10:05,000 --> 01:10:08,439
Speaker 4: should said the blueprint nice, but I didn't. It ain't

1425
01:10:08,479 --> 01:10:12,120
Speaker 4: clicked to like years later, like right, and I started

1426
01:10:12,120 --> 01:10:14,920
Speaker 4: thinking about like the innovative stuff that i've you know,

1427
01:10:15,080 --> 01:10:16,679
Speaker 4: done or been part of, you know what I mean,

1428
01:10:16,720 --> 01:10:20,000
Speaker 4: from being you know, doing the mixtapes or you know,

1429
01:10:20,120 --> 01:10:23,439
Speaker 4: to having a podcast before the podcast, you know, from

1430
01:10:23,479 --> 01:10:26,240
Speaker 4: twenty ten to twenty thirteen. But I needed that time

1431
01:10:26,600 --> 01:10:30,640
Speaker 4: to grow, to learn to you know, end up, you know,

1432
01:10:31,040 --> 01:10:34,080
Speaker 4: changing management. You know, we all grew the relationship, but

1433
01:10:34,120 --> 01:10:36,600
Speaker 4: were still the best of friends and do business. You know,

1434
01:10:36,640 --> 01:10:38,280
Speaker 4: I can put them on the business moves now, they

1435
01:10:38,280 --> 01:10:40,519
Speaker 4: can put me on the business moves now, but I

1436
01:10:40,600 --> 01:10:41,400
Speaker 4: never stopped.

1437
01:10:41,760 --> 01:10:46,679
Speaker 2: What's the process now? Okay, so if you're as an independent, yeah,

1438
01:10:47,840 --> 01:10:48,799
Speaker 2: what are.

1439
01:10:48,760 --> 01:10:50,320
Speaker 1: The new rules?

1440
01:10:50,360 --> 01:10:53,360
Speaker 2: What's the new lay of the land as far as

1441
01:10:54,520 --> 01:10:58,080
Speaker 2: knowing how to successfully roll out? You know, the thing was,

1442
01:10:58,120 --> 01:11:00,320
Speaker 2: for a long time, I still thought you were on

1443
01:11:00,400 --> 01:11:05,240
Speaker 2: a major because, like you one of these video of

1444
01:11:05,320 --> 01:11:07,640
Speaker 2: rollouts you had was was crazy and I was just

1445
01:11:07,680 --> 01:11:10,120
Speaker 2: like damn, like I'm want a major and they're not

1446
01:11:10,160 --> 01:11:11,200
Speaker 2: even rolling out like this.

1447
01:11:11,600 --> 01:11:14,000
Speaker 1: Maybe you were just in my algorithm like crazy.

1448
01:11:14,080 --> 01:11:17,160
Speaker 3: What's the rules? The first rule is you gotta be

1449
01:11:17,200 --> 01:11:18,479
Speaker 3: prepared to spend your own bread.

1450
01:11:19,000 --> 01:11:21,240
Speaker 4: You gotta you know what I mean, yourself. You gotta

1451
01:11:21,280 --> 01:11:23,800
Speaker 4: bet on yourself. You gotta you know, know not. You

1452
01:11:23,800 --> 01:11:25,679
Speaker 4: gotta be self contained. You gotta be able to spend

1453
01:11:25,720 --> 01:11:28,280
Speaker 4: your own bread, you know, and and and then and

1454
01:11:28,360 --> 01:11:30,719
Speaker 4: allow of times to do that. As an independent artist,

1455
01:11:31,520 --> 01:11:34,600
Speaker 4: you you may find yourself and you have to be

1456
01:11:34,720 --> 01:11:38,120
Speaker 4: uncomfortable in other areas. You gotta have to sacrifice in

1457
01:11:38,200 --> 01:11:38,839
Speaker 4: other areas.

1458
01:11:38,880 --> 01:11:39,080
Speaker 1: You know.

1459
01:11:39,680 --> 01:11:41,800
Speaker 4: As an ending, you can hire the same team that

1460
01:11:42,479 --> 01:11:44,800
Speaker 4: the major's higher. It ain't, but there's so many people

1461
01:11:44,800 --> 01:11:49,000
Speaker 4: that they can use for you know, radio promotion, it's

1462
01:11:49,040 --> 01:11:49,519
Speaker 4: not so many.

1463
01:11:49,600 --> 01:11:51,439
Speaker 1: It's radio still priority to you now.

1464
01:11:51,560 --> 01:11:56,560
Speaker 4: Absolutely radio still pays the biggest payout. Radio is relevant.

1465
01:11:57,080 --> 01:12:00,840
Speaker 4: Who cares about radio Live Nation? No, who cares about

1466
01:12:00,960 --> 01:12:05,479
Speaker 4: radio Black Promoter Collective. And I know this because that's

1467
01:12:05,520 --> 01:12:07,280
Speaker 4: where they where they're going to go to do the

1468
01:12:07,320 --> 01:12:10,080
Speaker 4: advertisement for the show you ain't popping on the radio

1469
01:12:10,200 --> 01:12:11,960
Speaker 4: and they got an ad running for you the radio

1470
01:12:12,120 --> 01:12:13,960
Speaker 4: for people to come see you, like, who's going to come?

1471
01:12:14,040 --> 01:12:14,760
Speaker 1: Who? You know?

1472
01:12:14,760 --> 01:12:17,120
Speaker 4: You know what I mean? Now, do you need radio

1473
01:12:17,200 --> 01:12:21,400
Speaker 4: to create a movement? Absolutely not can be you can be.

1474
01:12:21,560 --> 01:12:22,120
Speaker 1: You know, if you.

1475
01:12:22,080 --> 01:12:26,400
Speaker 4: Look at one of our hometown heroes, Brent Fires for example, right,

1476
01:12:26,400 --> 01:12:29,320
Speaker 4: who's from PG County, Right, huge fan of what he's

1477
01:12:29,320 --> 01:12:31,720
Speaker 4: done with his movement. If you look at like an

1478
01:12:31,800 --> 01:12:34,920
Speaker 4: artist like logic, who I discovered by the way, and

1479
01:12:35,040 --> 01:12:36,479
Speaker 4: drop the ball on that right?

1480
01:12:39,200 --> 01:12:42,519
Speaker 1: Wait what I was about? Seriously?

1481
01:12:42,720 --> 01:12:50,080
Speaker 4: Yeah, explain previous manager still big homie. Jerry Vons reaches out. Well, actually,

1482
01:12:50,400 --> 01:12:54,200
Speaker 4: Jerry and my previous partner Dreda Mayor. You know, I

1483
01:12:54,200 --> 01:12:56,000
Speaker 4: had a label at one point three since say music

1484
01:12:56,040 --> 01:12:59,240
Speaker 4: group say, oh we got this kid, and you know

1485
01:12:59,360 --> 01:13:01,720
Speaker 4: at the time, we didn't know he was you know,

1486
01:13:02,160 --> 01:13:05,280
Speaker 4: he's a black wizard. Yeah, it was a wizard, right right,

1487
01:13:05,360 --> 01:13:07,320
Speaker 4: And and so they're like, we got this white boy

1488
01:13:07,400 --> 01:13:11,720
Speaker 4: we want you to meet. And I instantly fell in

1489
01:13:11,720 --> 01:13:14,040
Speaker 4: love with him as an artist, like he reminded of me.

1490
01:13:14,240 --> 01:13:15,000
Speaker 3: He reminded me.

1491
01:13:14,960 --> 01:13:18,599
Speaker 4: Of me so much, like like his passion for it,

1492
01:13:19,040 --> 01:13:22,719
Speaker 4: his hunger for it, his humility, you know, not knowing

1493
01:13:22,840 --> 01:13:26,280
Speaker 4: how dope he he always knew he was dope, but

1494
01:13:26,479 --> 01:13:29,000
Speaker 4: just to see him growing to the confidence. And you know,

1495
01:13:29,120 --> 01:13:33,320
Speaker 4: ultimately we didn't sign him to our label because we

1496
01:13:33,400 --> 01:13:35,840
Speaker 4: had an artist that we you know, we felt like

1497
01:13:36,680 --> 01:13:39,120
Speaker 4: when my partner had an artist that we felt like

1498
01:13:39,640 --> 01:13:41,600
Speaker 4: it was too you know, it was it was in

1499
01:13:41,640 --> 01:13:45,360
Speaker 4: the same space we'd be you know, yeah, and we

1500
01:13:45,479 --> 01:13:47,840
Speaker 4: you know, it wouldn't be fair to our artists, you

1501
01:13:47,880 --> 01:13:50,000
Speaker 4: know what I mean. But I can wholeheartedly say it.

1502
01:13:50,000 --> 01:13:51,600
Speaker 4: It's not the first time I would say it or

1503
01:13:51,600 --> 01:13:55,360
Speaker 4: the last that had we done that, it might not

1504
01:13:55,400 --> 01:13:57,719
Speaker 4: even pad out for him the way it was supposed

1505
01:13:57,720 --> 01:13:59,599
Speaker 4: to play out. It played out how it was supposed

1506
01:13:59,640 --> 01:14:02,320
Speaker 4: to play out for him, and I'm like super proud

1507
01:14:02,320 --> 01:14:05,719
Speaker 4: of him and happy for him, you know. But yeah,

1508
01:14:05,880 --> 01:14:07,920
Speaker 4: I got stories like that for days, you know what

1509
01:14:07,960 --> 01:14:10,960
Speaker 4: I mean of like different you know, hey, can you

1510
01:14:10,960 --> 01:14:13,120
Speaker 4: pull up to the radio station. We got somebody we

1511
01:14:13,160 --> 01:14:17,120
Speaker 4: want you to meet and just kind of like put

1512
01:14:17,120 --> 01:14:19,920
Speaker 4: some words of encouragement on them. Looking back on it,

1513
01:14:19,960 --> 01:14:22,479
Speaker 4: I could have been involved while a you know what

1514
01:14:22,520 --> 01:14:26,200
Speaker 4: I mean, like different things, you know, But again, everybody

1515
01:14:26,280 --> 01:14:29,280
Speaker 4: has their their path and the course to take, you

1516
01:14:29,280 --> 01:14:32,800
Speaker 4: know what I mean. So I've always taken even now,

1517
01:14:32,960 --> 01:14:35,960
Speaker 4: like the big homie approach in terms of like like

1518
01:14:36,160 --> 01:14:40,120
Speaker 4: Jazzy Jeff and what Kenny and them have like you know,

1519
01:14:40,280 --> 01:14:42,280
Speaker 4: taught me and and you know the Cliff Jones and

1520
01:14:42,360 --> 01:14:45,840
Speaker 4: jer like anybody who's ever been like I take the good,

1521
01:14:46,000 --> 01:14:48,960
Speaker 4: the bad, the ugly and and and be able to

1522
01:14:49,000 --> 01:14:52,240
Speaker 4: apply that to you know, that next artist out there

1523
01:14:52,320 --> 01:14:55,439
Speaker 4: that is I want to come up that you know

1524
01:14:55,560 --> 01:14:58,960
Speaker 4: that I repost or they I slide in the DM

1525
01:14:59,080 --> 01:15:00,439
Speaker 4: just to say, hey, you're dope.

1526
01:15:01,320 --> 01:15:03,800
Speaker 2: Who is there an artist right now that we might

1527
01:15:03,840 --> 01:15:05,880
Speaker 2: not be aware of that we should be looking out

1528
01:15:05,960 --> 01:15:07,800
Speaker 2: for someone that's bubbling under.

1529
01:15:08,840 --> 01:15:10,280
Speaker 1: I mean there's so many.

1530
01:15:10,400 --> 01:15:12,519
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's so many. Man, I want to get you

1531
01:15:12,520 --> 01:15:13,880
Speaker 2: in trouble because if you name one, like what did

1532
01:15:13,920 --> 01:15:14,559
Speaker 2: you No? No?

1533
01:15:14,640 --> 01:15:14,680
Speaker 1: No?

1534
01:15:15,120 --> 01:15:19,120
Speaker 4: I mean of course, like I'm gonna always shout out

1535
01:15:19,200 --> 01:15:21,280
Speaker 4: you know my you know people that I work with

1536
01:15:21,320 --> 01:15:24,760
Speaker 4: in real time. You know like Yasarah, Who's who's on

1537
01:15:24,840 --> 01:15:26,320
Speaker 4: another run right now?

1538
01:15:26,800 --> 01:15:27,240
Speaker 2: Grenek?

1539
01:15:27,680 --> 01:15:31,360
Speaker 4: You know who put out a project on Grenek. We

1540
01:15:31,360 --> 01:15:33,600
Speaker 4: did a project. Chose the collaborators. When you do like

1541
01:15:33,640 --> 01:15:37,720
Speaker 4: collaborative records, usually like it's friends, man, it's friendships. Its

1542
01:15:38,400 --> 01:15:40,360
Speaker 4: organically happens, you know what I mean. Like I don't

1543
01:15:40,400 --> 01:15:43,400
Speaker 4: really push you know what I mean. Shout to Brendla

1544
01:15:43,439 --> 01:15:47,400
Speaker 4: McKinney in Houston, Neptune twenty one, Who's Crazy Neptune?

1545
01:15:47,400 --> 01:15:49,000
Speaker 3: I introduce you to Neptune.

1546
01:15:48,880 --> 01:15:52,320
Speaker 4: When we did the rehearsal for oh okay, yeah, yeah, yeah,

1547
01:15:52,320 --> 01:15:55,679
Speaker 4: she's Yeah, she's super dope. She currently lives in Philly,

1548
01:15:55,720 --> 01:15:58,400
Speaker 4: but it's originally from you know, from the DC area. Gotcha,

1549
01:15:58,479 --> 01:16:01,439
Speaker 4: it's so many man, Kennedy ryne In who I'm a

1550
01:16:01,439 --> 01:16:04,719
Speaker 4: super fan, you know. Shout to her and her manager,

1551
01:16:04,840 --> 01:16:07,719
Speaker 4: like they get it obviously. You know, I've been following

1552
01:16:07,760 --> 01:16:10,200
Speaker 4: and watching Larrussell for a very long time. I started

1553
01:16:10,280 --> 01:16:15,240
Speaker 4: using even do biz directed Consumer because of Larussell. Okay, right,

1554
01:16:15,439 --> 01:16:17,479
Speaker 4: and you know, yeah, those are the artists. And to

1555
01:16:17,520 --> 01:16:20,760
Speaker 4: bring it full circle, like be willing to spend your

1556
01:16:20,800 --> 01:16:24,519
Speaker 4: own bread, you know, be frugal about it. You're gonna

1557
01:16:24,560 --> 01:16:26,880
Speaker 4: need a team. You know, it's gonna be a lot

1558
01:16:26,880 --> 01:16:30,080
Speaker 4: of You're gonna have to work ten times. It's harder, right,

1559
01:16:30,600 --> 01:16:34,080
Speaker 4: and understand that we are in a director consumer era now,

1560
01:16:34,160 --> 01:16:35,720
Speaker 4: you know what I mean? Like, you know, this is

1561
01:16:35,760 --> 01:16:38,080
Speaker 4: an NFC card right here, like on the back, it's

1562
01:16:38,080 --> 01:16:40,600
Speaker 4: got like the stats and that's that's you.

1563
01:16:40,680 --> 01:16:42,280
Speaker 3: By the way, you can do it? Yeah, I was like,

1564
01:16:42,320 --> 01:16:43,040
Speaker 3: oh yeah, you can.

1565
01:16:45,280 --> 01:16:47,320
Speaker 4: You tap that to your phone, unlock your phone and

1566
01:16:47,400 --> 01:16:50,160
Speaker 4: just tap it and you can pull up literally and

1567
01:16:50,360 --> 01:16:54,360
Speaker 4: enjoy the entire album. You know, on even die Biz,

1568
01:16:54,360 --> 01:16:58,000
Speaker 4: you know I did. We're approaching like forty thousand mark

1569
01:16:58,120 --> 01:17:00,920
Speaker 4: right now on even Do Big is. You know, the

1570
01:17:00,920 --> 01:17:04,120
Speaker 4: first three weeks of me putting out the album, from

1571
01:17:04,360 --> 01:17:08,200
Speaker 4: three four weeks from February thirteenth into you know, rolling

1572
01:17:08,240 --> 01:17:10,479
Speaker 4: over into the you know, the fourth week, I did

1573
01:17:10,560 --> 01:17:14,200
Speaker 4: over twenty five thousand Director consumer you know, only a

1574
01:17:14,200 --> 01:17:16,760
Speaker 4: little over six hundred fans at the time had supported

1575
01:17:17,400 --> 01:17:20,559
Speaker 4: the platform. When we do our roots album, I know

1576
01:17:20,600 --> 01:17:23,879
Speaker 4: you guys, when we do our roots album Manifest, Yeah, yeah,

1577
01:17:24,280 --> 01:17:26,920
Speaker 4: the Roots featuring Rye. When we do the album, let

1578
01:17:26,920 --> 01:17:31,280
Speaker 4: me just say this man, as a diehard, I'll stand

1579
01:17:31,320 --> 01:17:34,800
Speaker 4: on this ten toes down. The roots are the are

1580
01:17:34,840 --> 01:17:37,799
Speaker 4: the hip hop rolling stones, and we want more music.

1581
01:17:37,840 --> 01:17:40,120
Speaker 2: We want more albums. I promise you and.

1582
01:17:41,880 --> 01:17:45,879
Speaker 4: You guys would do very well in the director consumer space.

1583
01:17:46,640 --> 01:17:48,360
Speaker 4: You know what I mean, y'all would do very well

1584
01:17:48,400 --> 01:17:50,840
Speaker 4: the director consumer space. Like you know, it's so many

1585
01:17:50,880 --> 01:17:53,200
Speaker 4: things that you can do. You know, I'll give you

1586
01:17:53,240 --> 01:17:55,160
Speaker 4: all this one for free. Just do the album and

1587
01:17:55,320 --> 01:17:57,840
Speaker 4: just put it on vinyl. Do an album where you

1588
01:17:57,880 --> 01:18:00,439
Speaker 4: can only get it on vinyl, like every this should

1589
01:18:00,439 --> 01:18:02,360
Speaker 4: be doing. I'm going to do it. Do it, run

1590
01:18:02,439 --> 01:18:04,240
Speaker 4: with it. Can everybody can do it? Like you know

1591
01:18:04,280 --> 01:18:04,639
Speaker 4: what I mean?

1592
01:18:04,920 --> 01:18:07,120
Speaker 2: Like Vinyl is back, take Cassetta back.

1593
01:18:07,520 --> 01:18:08,040
Speaker 1: Yes they are.

1594
01:18:08,120 --> 01:18:09,120
Speaker 2: They just did it.

1595
01:18:09,400 --> 01:18:12,120
Speaker 4: Vinyl just did a billion dollar evaluation this year, like

1596
01:18:12,240 --> 01:18:14,120
Speaker 4: you know what I mean, Like just in Vinyl, like

1597
01:18:14,360 --> 01:18:16,840
Speaker 4: if I never went away though, you know what I mean,

1598
01:18:17,120 --> 01:18:19,679
Speaker 4: I'm just finding I just ordered a batch of heavy

1599
01:18:19,760 --> 01:18:23,679
Speaker 4: you know, CDs as you know, and recently and bought

1600
01:18:23,720 --> 01:18:27,439
Speaker 4: burners and all the things right and disc Makers, which

1601
01:18:27,479 --> 01:18:31,080
Speaker 4: is right there, and what's like right outside Philly. They've

1602
01:18:31,120 --> 01:18:33,640
Speaker 4: been in business for eighty years. I get on the

1603
01:18:33,680 --> 01:18:35,280
Speaker 4: phone and get to talking to the guy on the

1604
01:18:35,280 --> 01:18:36,599
Speaker 4: phone and he's like, yeah, I've been here.

1605
01:18:36,720 --> 01:18:37,280
Speaker 1: I've been here.

1606
01:18:37,520 --> 01:18:40,280
Speaker 3: He's been there longer than I've been on job, you know, like.

1607
01:18:40,160 --> 01:18:41,000
Speaker 2: He's been there before.

1608
01:18:41,040 --> 01:18:43,560
Speaker 4: I was with Job Records, right of us, and I

1609
01:18:43,560 --> 01:18:45,800
Speaker 4: said and I said, I said, hey, are you seeing

1610
01:18:45,800 --> 01:18:48,680
Speaker 4: a resurgence? And he was like in CDs and he

1611
01:18:48,760 --> 01:18:52,519
Speaker 4: was like yeah, I said, I'm thinking it's like right now.

1612
01:18:52,720 --> 01:18:54,519
Speaker 3: He's like, oh no, it started during COVID.

1613
01:18:55,120 --> 01:18:58,240
Speaker 4: We had to literally make space and create another room

1614
01:18:58,280 --> 01:19:00,320
Speaker 4: where we could to be able to do with the

1615
01:19:00,360 --> 01:19:01,400
Speaker 4: supply and demand of.

1616
01:19:01,439 --> 01:19:03,759
Speaker 2: CD CD collecting.

1617
01:19:04,840 --> 01:19:07,080
Speaker 3: Yeah, CDs are I just yo, it's crazy.

1618
01:19:07,439 --> 01:19:10,080
Speaker 4: I just did a show prior to going, you know,

1619
01:19:10,360 --> 01:19:11,800
Speaker 4: last one of the last shows I did.

1620
01:19:12,479 --> 01:19:14,120
Speaker 3: It was the last show I did for twenty Lessons

1621
01:19:14,120 --> 01:19:16,480
Speaker 3: of Love tour in Augusta.

1622
01:19:16,400 --> 01:19:20,160
Speaker 4: And literally I was the headliner, so I only had

1623
01:19:20,200 --> 01:19:23,559
Speaker 4: like this very small window of time to do meet

1624
01:19:23,600 --> 01:19:27,519
Speaker 4: and greet like literally five to ten minutes, and we

1625
01:19:27,600 --> 01:19:32,400
Speaker 4: did like six hundred dollars in like CDs like that quick.

1626
01:19:32,920 --> 01:19:34,799
Speaker 3: And I'm like, ah, man, if we was out.

1627
01:19:34,640 --> 01:19:37,240
Speaker 2: Here for a good hour, yep, oh, it'd.

1628
01:19:37,040 --> 01:19:41,240
Speaker 4: Been crazy, you know. And cassettes. This project is out

1629
01:19:41,320 --> 01:19:45,200
Speaker 4: right now. Quad Storm lover to may own dm me

1630
01:19:45,320 --> 01:19:47,240
Speaker 4: if you want, I'll send you personally, send you the

1631
01:19:47,280 --> 01:19:52,960
Speaker 4: link all right on Instagram, Uh, Facebook, hit me up.

1632
01:19:53,560 --> 01:19:57,800
Speaker 4: That's that's my version of j Cole being outside, right, Yeah,

1633
01:19:57,840 --> 01:19:58,799
Speaker 4: I'm outside digitally.

1634
01:19:58,800 --> 01:20:00,679
Speaker 2: I mean I'm in that. I'm I'm in the DMS.

1635
01:20:00,720 --> 01:20:14,720
Speaker 2: I'm heavy, you know what I mean. Oh, I mean

1636
01:20:14,760 --> 01:20:18,280
Speaker 2: you talked about CDs having a resurgence during COVID twenty

1637
01:20:18,320 --> 01:20:21,519
Speaker 2: twenty was definitely a Mason Dixon line if you will. Yeah,

1638
01:20:21,720 --> 01:20:27,400
Speaker 2: of life lessons, we either that's involved or devaulved.

1639
01:20:27,479 --> 01:20:29,000
Speaker 1: What did you learn in twenty twenty?

1640
01:20:29,000 --> 01:20:32,400
Speaker 4: That's where director consumer began, right, I learned to stay

1641
01:20:32,439 --> 01:20:34,080
Speaker 4: ready so you don't have to get ready.

1642
01:20:34,400 --> 01:20:34,639
Speaker 1: Man.

1643
01:20:34,720 --> 01:20:38,320
Speaker 4: I did WRINT parties. I did mortgage parties during you

1644
01:20:38,400 --> 01:20:42,240
Speaker 4: did Good Times WRINT parties. But I did online mortgage

1645
01:20:42,280 --> 01:20:45,040
Speaker 4: parties during COVID, you know what I mean? That was

1646
01:20:45,040 --> 01:20:48,120
Speaker 4: my stage it it was it was a platform called

1647
01:20:48,120 --> 01:20:50,840
Speaker 4: stage it okay, and I found out about Yeah, I

1648
01:20:50,840 --> 01:20:54,120
Speaker 4: would do it. I would literally do a concert on

1649
01:20:54,200 --> 01:20:56,559
Speaker 4: stage it. It still exists agent dot com.

1650
01:20:56,560 --> 01:20:56,920
Speaker 2: You can go there.

1651
01:20:56,960 --> 01:20:59,920
Speaker 4: You can literally set up in here, put a concert

1652
01:21:00,120 --> 01:21:03,599
Speaker 4: up on stage and set a date. They can pre

1653
01:21:03,680 --> 01:21:09,719
Speaker 4: sell tickets the whole thing and do a concert and

1654
01:21:10,040 --> 01:21:12,519
Speaker 4: you know, be safe and not have to worry about contact.

1655
01:21:12,560 --> 01:21:14,320
Speaker 3: That was you know back then, that was the thing.

1656
01:21:14,479 --> 01:21:16,559
Speaker 1: The first time you did the rollout, Like what was that? Like?

1657
01:21:17,120 --> 01:21:19,959
Speaker 4: I mean, it's always a nervousness of like, is anybody

1658
01:21:19,960 --> 01:21:23,120
Speaker 4: going to like trust the process of this? And then

1659
01:21:23,200 --> 01:21:25,320
Speaker 4: you start seeing people buy tickets and then you know,

1660
01:21:25,360 --> 01:21:27,960
Speaker 4: you do you know I'm in there doing everything myself

1661
01:21:27,960 --> 01:21:30,559
Speaker 4: because it's COVID, so I'm you know, I'm like down

1662
01:21:30,600 --> 01:21:32,719
Speaker 4: to the you know, troubleshooting they got, I got somebody

1663
01:21:32,760 --> 01:21:36,800
Speaker 4: on the phone. I'm doing the whole thing, and then

1664
01:21:36,800 --> 01:21:39,320
Speaker 4: it's a countdown the show's about to start, and then

1665
01:21:39,439 --> 01:21:40,400
Speaker 4: boom and then I'm.

1666
01:21:40,240 --> 01:21:41,400
Speaker 3: Like ticking the tracks.

1667
01:21:41,439 --> 01:21:44,000
Speaker 4: And I would do that like once a month, and

1668
01:21:44,000 --> 01:21:45,760
Speaker 4: it was like, you know, it's my sanity.

1669
01:21:45,400 --> 01:21:47,840
Speaker 1: And are they're giving you live feedback as yeah, you're there.

1670
01:21:47,760 --> 01:21:49,760
Speaker 3: In the chat. They can tip. It's a tip, they

1671
01:21:49,760 --> 01:21:50,400
Speaker 3: can tip you.

1672
01:21:51,080 --> 01:21:53,040
Speaker 4: So I already bought a ticket, So you got like

1673
01:21:53,080 --> 01:21:55,479
Speaker 4: five hundred people in there who bought a you know

1674
01:21:55,640 --> 01:21:58,600
Speaker 4: ticket for twenty dollars, right, and then they tip you

1675
01:21:58,640 --> 01:21:59,280
Speaker 4: on top of that.

1676
01:21:59,640 --> 01:22:00,680
Speaker 2: And then after you.

1677
01:22:01,320 --> 01:22:06,680
Speaker 4: Log off the after parties on Instagram and then and

1678
01:22:06,680 --> 01:22:09,559
Speaker 4: I'm playing and I'm playing music, you know, like d Nights,

1679
01:22:09,560 --> 01:22:11,680
Speaker 4: but I'm not I'm not DJing. I'm just I'm just

1680
01:22:11,720 --> 01:22:14,400
Speaker 4: triggering songs. Like I didn't realize that when I was

1681
01:22:14,439 --> 01:22:18,200
Speaker 4: doing you know, mixtape Mondays or Woke Wednesdays or sage

1682
01:22:18,200 --> 01:22:21,639
Speaker 4: and slow jams on a clubhouse before it was public

1683
01:22:22,120 --> 01:22:24,640
Speaker 4: that I was preparing myself to have the number one

1684
01:22:24,680 --> 01:22:27,320
Speaker 4: night time music show, the original choirt story that Melvillnzy

1685
01:22:27,400 --> 01:22:27,760
Speaker 4: used to do.

1686
01:22:28,320 --> 01:22:29,280
Speaker 1: That's what I'm leading to.

1687
01:22:29,520 --> 01:22:33,400
Speaker 2: What is it like to inherit such a like a

1688
01:22:33,520 --> 01:22:37,200
Speaker 2: landmark institution as the Quiet Storm.

1689
01:22:37,280 --> 01:22:41,080
Speaker 4: It's I'm humbly saying this like I didn't feel any pressure,

1690
01:22:41,680 --> 01:22:44,640
Speaker 4: but it is a lot of pressure though, Like it's

1691
01:22:44,640 --> 01:22:48,160
Speaker 4: like I know what's on the line, so I respect it,

1692
01:22:48,200 --> 01:22:48,880
Speaker 4: I honor it.

1693
01:22:49,720 --> 01:22:54,520
Speaker 3: I always try to move with authenticity.

1694
01:22:54,360 --> 01:22:55,479
Speaker 1: Of what it means.

1695
01:22:56,000 --> 01:22:59,000
Speaker 3: Gotcha what it means to the d m V Right.

1696
01:22:59,200 --> 01:23:02,960
Speaker 4: I respect what it means because I grew up listening

1697
01:23:02,960 --> 01:23:05,840
Speaker 4: to it. It's the most trippy thing to be able.

1698
01:23:05,840 --> 01:23:07,559
Speaker 4: I mean, I'm sure it was your first day like

1699
01:23:07,920 --> 01:23:12,240
Speaker 4: taking the rings. Oh man, it was just like I cried.

1700
01:23:11,800 --> 01:23:15,320
Speaker 4: I cried when I saw my contract. I had my

1701
01:23:15,360 --> 01:23:18,680
Speaker 4: holy ghost moment in the car, you know. I went

1702
01:23:18,720 --> 01:23:21,360
Speaker 4: to my mama's crib to go listen to it, you know,

1703
01:23:21,520 --> 01:23:25,080
Speaker 4: the first night. And yeah, man, I never take for

1704
01:23:25,160 --> 01:23:28,040
Speaker 4: granted even this moment right here, because I'm a huge

1705
01:23:28,160 --> 01:23:28,719
Speaker 4: roots fan.

1706
01:23:29,040 --> 01:23:31,680
Speaker 1: You wouldn't know if you know, you're not specificated.

1707
01:23:32,640 --> 01:23:35,040
Speaker 4: And so I remember getting a call one time for

1708
01:23:35,160 --> 01:23:40,840
Speaker 4: my manager that it was almost opportunity where I don't

1709
01:23:40,840 --> 01:23:42,680
Speaker 4: know if it was like Martin Luther was going to

1710
01:23:42,720 --> 01:23:45,080
Speaker 4: sit it out or Belloud was going to sit it out.

1711
01:23:45,439 --> 01:23:47,880
Speaker 3: Remember this, and I was supposed to go. I was

1712
01:23:47,880 --> 01:23:49,479
Speaker 3: supposed to go overseas with y'at.

1713
01:23:49,720 --> 01:23:52,840
Speaker 4: I remember I've been singing all the singing prods and

1714
01:23:52,880 --> 01:23:54,400
Speaker 4: then it fell through it.

1715
01:23:54,360 --> 01:23:55,439
Speaker 1: The loud was crushed.

1716
01:23:55,760 --> 01:24:00,400
Speaker 4: Sorry, man, I was like, but but yeah, like to

1717
01:24:00,439 --> 01:24:03,839
Speaker 4: break it full circle. There's moments that you have where

1718
01:24:04,040 --> 01:24:06,880
Speaker 4: you're blessed if like the people who who you like

1719
01:24:06,960 --> 01:24:10,880
Speaker 4: grew up listening to they become like your friends, are

1720
01:24:10,920 --> 01:24:14,880
Speaker 4: your associates or your mentors, you know what I mean.

1721
01:24:15,120 --> 01:24:17,880
Speaker 4: And you know when that happens, it's just like ah, man,

1722
01:24:17,920 --> 01:24:20,960
Speaker 4: it's just like so cool. That's what I you know,

1723
01:24:21,080 --> 01:24:23,479
Speaker 4: that's the feeling of like being at HU. I had

1724
01:24:23,479 --> 01:24:26,400
Speaker 4: to go by there, you know, yesterday obviously I'm in

1725
01:24:26,439 --> 01:24:29,160
Speaker 4: New York, so I pre recorded my show for tonight,

1726
01:24:29,280 --> 01:24:32,439
Speaker 4: right and I'm pre recording doing a tour, and you know.

1727
01:24:32,520 --> 01:24:33,960
Speaker 3: Like that's the other thing.

1728
01:24:34,000 --> 01:24:36,120
Speaker 4: I haven't missed a beat, like you know what I mean,

1729
01:24:36,240 --> 01:24:38,599
Speaker 4: Like I'm you know, I'm hey, I'm live, I'm remote

1730
01:24:39,160 --> 01:24:42,720
Speaker 4: from from this spot and that spot. And it's interesting

1731
01:24:42,800 --> 01:24:44,920
Speaker 4: man to see that this is overwhelming, like to be

1732
01:24:45,000 --> 01:24:47,200
Speaker 4: able to I've done numbers, and I've been you know,

1733
01:24:47,320 --> 01:24:49,559
Speaker 4: number one, and like I went from having the number

1734
01:24:49,560 --> 01:24:52,240
Speaker 4: one urban show to the number one night time show

1735
01:24:52,280 --> 01:24:56,559
Speaker 4: and like time with like white contemporary Christian radio or

1736
01:24:57,000 --> 01:24:59,680
Speaker 4: talk radio, like things that they told me, like it

1737
01:24:59,680 --> 01:25:00,360
Speaker 4: would happen.

1738
01:25:00,920 --> 01:25:04,200
Speaker 2: Right Because I don't live in the DMV area, I

1739
01:25:04,200 --> 01:25:04,800
Speaker 2: haven't heard it.

1740
01:25:04,920 --> 01:25:05,639
Speaker 1: The cool thing is.

1741
01:25:05,560 --> 01:25:07,360
Speaker 4: They got to have a free app, you know for

1742
01:25:07,520 --> 01:25:10,960
Speaker 4: Android iPhone, just download the ninety six point three w

1743
01:25:11,160 --> 01:25:12,880
Speaker 4: h U R app and you know tap in.

1744
01:25:13,200 --> 01:25:16,200
Speaker 2: So format wise, do you ever say and the songs

1745
01:25:16,240 --> 01:25:17,720
Speaker 2: that are chosen, I actually do.

1746
01:25:17,920 --> 01:25:21,080
Speaker 4: Like It's it's cool, like to be able to make

1747
01:25:21,120 --> 01:25:23,880
Speaker 4: suggestions and they actually be honored or to be able

1748
01:25:23,920 --> 01:25:26,320
Speaker 4: to be like they actually loved with us saying, Hey,

1749
01:25:26,320 --> 01:25:26,679
Speaker 4: I got.

1750
01:25:26,600 --> 01:25:28,600
Speaker 3: A record I did last night. Can I just play it?

1751
01:25:28,600 --> 01:25:31,320
Speaker 2: I was gonna say, can you can you? It was

1752
01:25:31,439 --> 01:25:34,320
Speaker 2: there was a point where I think when Busy Body

1753
01:25:34,439 --> 01:25:38,760
Speaker 2: came out, Luther Vandros would do a tour. He would

1754
01:25:38,800 --> 01:25:39,439
Speaker 2: do w D A.

1755
01:25:39,640 --> 01:25:42,720
Speaker 1: S Howard state, he would do all the black.

1756
01:25:42,479 --> 01:25:45,880
Speaker 2: Stations and sing live on the air, like three songs

1757
01:25:45,880 --> 01:25:49,080
Speaker 2: each now, haven't I haven't took it there yet. I've

1758
01:25:49,120 --> 01:25:49,759
Speaker 2: had guests.

1759
01:25:50,200 --> 01:25:52,599
Speaker 4: You know, people already know what I do when I'm

1760
01:25:52,640 --> 01:25:54,639
Speaker 4: not on air. So my thing is, like I want

1761
01:25:54,640 --> 01:25:56,639
Speaker 4: to church and state. Yeah, it's cool to be able

1762
01:25:56,640 --> 01:25:58,760
Speaker 4: to break the Kindred record though, got you what I'm

1763
01:25:58,760 --> 01:26:01,160
Speaker 4: saying last year, you know what I mean? Or like,

1764
01:26:01,520 --> 01:26:03,679
Speaker 4: you know, to break the new Eric Roberson record Every

1765
01:26:03,680 --> 01:26:07,240
Speaker 4: Sunshine Sweeter than You, Like I broke that record in DC.

1766
01:26:07,640 --> 01:26:10,880
Speaker 4: It's what Melvin was known for doing, so, you know, traditionally,

1767
01:26:11,240 --> 01:26:12,639
Speaker 4: and you know, it's one of the things I love

1768
01:26:12,680 --> 01:26:15,240
Speaker 4: about being at h u R, you know, in particular

1769
01:26:15,320 --> 01:26:18,640
Speaker 4: because the legacy, you know, fifty years plus of what

1770
01:26:19,479 --> 01:26:21,680
Speaker 4: they've created. And of course we got to give the

1771
01:26:21,760 --> 01:26:24,280
Speaker 4: legendary the Queen, you know, Kathy.

1772
01:26:24,040 --> 01:26:26,160
Speaker 2: Hughes or Roses, Yeah, for being.

1773
01:26:25,960 --> 01:26:29,840
Speaker 4: The brainchild of you know, having a vision and you know,

1774
01:26:29,880 --> 01:26:33,040
Speaker 4: and whispering that into breathing life into Melvin like that.

1775
01:26:33,120 --> 01:26:35,400
Speaker 4: You know, It's been great, man, and it's a new

1776
01:26:35,439 --> 01:26:37,200
Speaker 4: career path for me. I know at some point I

1777
01:26:37,240 --> 01:26:41,280
Speaker 4: will be syndicated and we need that.

1778
01:26:41,520 --> 01:26:43,920
Speaker 2: Yeah, like when I was of course, like you know,

1779
01:26:44,120 --> 01:26:46,080
Speaker 2: Philly had quiet storm like when I was like ten

1780
01:26:46,080 --> 01:26:49,000
Speaker 2: eleven twelve and I wasn't in the slow jams at

1781
01:26:49,000 --> 01:26:52,040
Speaker 2: ten eleven twelve, but now I can appreciate it.

1782
01:26:52,479 --> 01:26:55,160
Speaker 1: But yeah, it needs to be sitting there.

1783
01:26:55,360 --> 01:26:56,240
Speaker 2: It's interesting.

1784
01:26:57,800 --> 01:27:00,320
Speaker 4: I get stopped in the street at that venue, in

1785
01:27:00,760 --> 01:27:03,960
Speaker 4: the grocery store and just like different places. And it's

1786
01:27:03,960 --> 01:27:06,920
Speaker 4: not about being Rahiem Devin the artists. It's about being

1787
01:27:06,960 --> 01:27:10,960
Speaker 4: Raheem Devine the radio guy and radio to rest. Your

1788
01:27:11,120 --> 01:27:14,880
Speaker 4: radio will always exist, it will always matter.

1789
01:27:16,160 --> 01:27:16,360
Speaker 1: One.

1790
01:27:16,400 --> 01:27:18,200
Speaker 4: It's free, you don't have you don't need a subscription

1791
01:27:18,479 --> 01:27:21,439
Speaker 4: right right and it just connects you to community in

1792
01:27:21,479 --> 01:27:24,160
Speaker 4: a different way. With all this going on in the world,

1793
01:27:24,320 --> 01:27:27,800
Speaker 4: in the country, on the planet, Monday through Friday, from

1794
01:27:27,840 --> 01:27:32,200
Speaker 4: seven thirty to midnight, it's my opportunity to remind people

1795
01:27:32,280 --> 01:27:36,000
Speaker 4: that you know that five twenty eight mega hurts.

1796
01:27:36,560 --> 01:27:40,080
Speaker 3: Energy is a real thing. It's a frequency. Love is

1797
01:27:40,120 --> 01:27:40,679
Speaker 3: the answer.

1798
01:27:41,439 --> 01:27:43,800
Speaker 4: You're not alone, even if you are if you feel

1799
01:27:43,800 --> 01:27:47,040
Speaker 4: like you're alone, no matter you know what you went

1800
01:27:47,040 --> 01:27:50,440
Speaker 4: through today, Like this is a safe space to unplug

1801
01:27:51,080 --> 01:27:53,519
Speaker 4: and the hill and to just you know, and just

1802
01:27:53,960 --> 01:27:56,960
Speaker 4: and just be on the vibration of what we all love.

1803
01:27:57,240 --> 01:27:59,920
Speaker 4: You know, good, bad, are and different. We got to

1804
01:28:00,000 --> 01:28:04,200
Speaker 4: slow jam for every occasion and it's great man, you know.

1805
01:28:04,240 --> 01:28:06,679
Speaker 4: And I'm doing serious XM on the weekends now too,

1806
01:28:06,880 --> 01:28:07,080
Speaker 4: you know.

1807
01:28:07,640 --> 01:28:07,840
Speaker 2: Yeah.

1808
01:28:08,000 --> 01:28:11,840
Speaker 4: H U R h U R Voices Channel one forty one. Yeah,

1809
01:28:11,840 --> 01:28:15,680
Speaker 4: from ten from ten pm to twelve midnight. It's a

1810
01:28:15,720 --> 01:28:16,879
Speaker 4: quick two hour show.

1811
01:28:16,720 --> 01:28:19,240
Speaker 1: Thing, you know. Wow, you are the love king.

1812
01:28:19,439 --> 01:28:21,559
Speaker 4: Thank you, my brother, Thank you you are quest Love.

1813
01:28:21,600 --> 01:28:22,960
Speaker 4: Thank you so much man, thank you.

1814
01:28:22,880 --> 01:28:25,479
Speaker 1: For us showing us love, brother, and I appreciate it. Wait,

1815
01:28:25,760 --> 01:28:26,759
Speaker 1: I have one question.

1816
01:28:26,920 --> 01:28:27,200
Speaker 2: What's that?

1817
01:28:27,920 --> 01:28:28,000
Speaker 1: So?

1818
01:28:28,120 --> 01:28:30,160
Speaker 2: When I first met you and I know you get

1819
01:28:30,160 --> 01:28:31,200
Speaker 2: this a lot, I don't know if you get this

1820
01:28:31,240 --> 01:28:35,080
Speaker 2: a lot. I just naturally thought the way that epigenetics work.

1821
01:28:35,200 --> 01:28:37,040
Speaker 1: Yeah, I was like, oh.

1822
01:28:36,960 --> 01:28:40,599
Speaker 2: That must be William Devon's son or nephew. How many times?

1823
01:28:40,800 --> 01:28:42,800
Speaker 2: How many times do you get that? But more importantly,

1824
01:28:43,000 --> 01:28:45,840
Speaker 2: have you ever covered be thankful for what you got?

1825
01:28:45,880 --> 01:28:46,280
Speaker 2: I get it?

1826
01:28:46,320 --> 01:28:47,160
Speaker 3: I get it a lot?

1827
01:28:47,960 --> 01:28:49,040
Speaker 1: Okay say that for us?

1828
01:28:49,200 --> 01:28:49,519
Speaker 2: Yeah?

1829
01:28:49,640 --> 01:28:50,519
Speaker 1: Where your band for that?

1830
01:28:50,600 --> 01:28:53,559
Speaker 4: But hey, say say say say no more. Let's let'st

1831
01:28:53,640 --> 01:28:55,160
Speaker 4: the circle we got We got a lot of work

1832
01:28:55,200 --> 01:28:55,439
Speaker 4: to do.

1833
01:28:55,560 --> 01:28:57,679
Speaker 1: Got you for sure? Well? This is a Quest Love show.

1834
01:28:57,680 --> 01:28:58,920
Speaker 1: And I'll see our next go around ya.

1835
01:29:06,240 --> 01:29:09,719
Speaker 2: Quest Love Shows hosted by me Amir quest Love Thompson.

1836
01:29:10,640 --> 01:29:14,479
Speaker 2: The executive producers are Sean g Brian Calhoun and Me.

1837
01:29:16,080 --> 01:29:21,360
Speaker 2: Produced by Britney Benjamin and Jake Paine. Produced for iHeart

1838
01:29:21,800 --> 01:29:27,320
Speaker 2: by Noel Brown, Edited by Alex Conwoy. iHeart Video support

1839
01:29:27,400 --> 01:29:32,960
Speaker 2: by Mark Canton, Logos Graphics and animation by Nick Lowe.

1840
01:29:34,600 --> 01:29:39,360
Speaker 2: Additional support by Lance Coleman. Special thanks to Kathy Brown.

1841
01:29:40,840 --> 01:29:45,639
Speaker 2: Special thanks to Sugar Steve Mandel. Please subscribe, rate, review,

1842
01:29:45,760 --> 01:29:49,560
Speaker 2: and share the Quest Love Show wherever you stream the podcasts,

1843
01:29:49,840 --> 01:29:54,840
Speaker 2: make sure you follow us on social That's at q LS.

1844
01:29:56,240 --> 01:29:59,400
Speaker 2: Check out hundreds and hundreds of QLs episodes, including the

1845
01:29:59,479 --> 01:30:02,240
Speaker 2: Quest Loves pre shows and our podcast archives.

1846
01:30:04,760 --> 01:30:17,680
Speaker 1: Mustlam Shows. The production of iHeart radioh