Speaker 1: Quest Love Supreme is a production of iHeartRadio. This classic
Speaker 1: episode was produced by the team at Pandora.
Speaker 2: What up, y'all is Laiyah from Team Supreme. Okay, So
Speaker 2: it's June, and you know it is Black Music Month. Now,
Speaker 2: this month and its cause was started by my godmother,
Speaker 2: Dianna Williams, the legendary Kenny Gamble, and the great ed
Speaker 2: right back in nineteen seventy nine after being invited to
Speaker 2: the White House along with the Black Music Association. Now,
Speaker 2: the Black Music Association was a group of black folks
Speaker 2: that were the best of the best of the music industry.
Speaker 2: I'm talking record execs, I'm talking radio people, I'm talking artists.
Speaker 2: I'm talking to everybody from Clarence Avon and Frankie Crocker
Speaker 2: to Percy Sutton, everybody in the middle right. So they
Speaker 2: all get invited to this big party on the White
Speaker 2: House lawn June seventh, nineteen seventy nine. And before the
Speaker 2: performances started, President Carter said many things addressing and reminding
Speaker 2: people of the importance of black music. Monk, and one
Speaker 2: of the things he said was end quote in many ways,
Speaker 2: the feelings of our own black citizens throughout the history
Speaker 2: of our country has been accurately expressed in the music,
Speaker 2: and it presents a kind of history of our nation
Speaker 2: when you go back and see the evolution of black
Speaker 2: music word. So we've spoken a lot about black music
Speaker 2: months on Questloves Supreme, and this June we are running
Speaker 2: a different episode from the QLs archives every single day
Speaker 2: in the name Spirit and Cause of Black music.
Speaker 3: Mom Next up.
Speaker 2: We are honoring a legend who has transitioned and so
Speaker 2: we continue to honor him, the amazing James m Two men.
Speaker 4: So, uh, after you want to gram me for the closer,
Speaker 4: I get to you. Correct, I hope you did.
Speaker 5: Yeah, yeah, I stumbled for a minute because you know
Speaker 5: that I never cared about that. Really, I didn't care
Speaker 5: about that. I don't even know where that thing is, man,
Speaker 5: what that's five? They tell you, my son. So I
Speaker 5: had it somewhere. So I was somewhere out and Fire
Speaker 5: told me one day he was practicing, you know, trying
Speaker 5: to be Michael Jackson, he said, and he spun and
Speaker 5: he overspun and the thing fluck flung out his fingers.
Speaker 4: And broke broke the ground.
Speaker 5: So he was like, like, really, oh God, what I'm
Speaker 5: to say? He tried to glue it and when I
Speaker 5: got home mess I don't really care about that because
Speaker 5: I was so offended that back then. Why was I offended?
Speaker 5: Back then? They didn't give the Black Awards on television.
Speaker 5: It was doing the commercial now, well your hip hop
Speaker 5: caught it. But R and B was like, we don't
Speaker 5: announce we won the best arm B Record of the
Speaker 5: Year and it was doing the commercials And they come
Speaker 5: back and said, well, earlier to night we announced. It's
Speaker 5: a messive. Man. I don't know, but I never really cared.
Speaker 5: I don't have gold records and platinums on my hanging nowhere,
Speaker 5: am I right? Yet they're in the basement in a
Speaker 5: box in my garage. What look, man?
Speaker 2: What is hanging on the what's hanging on? I'm just
Speaker 2: I was just curious. Now you said, I'm like, what
Speaker 2: kind of aids?
Speaker 5: Anything that you like? I don't have. No, I'm not
Speaker 5: into I'm not a collector. I don't want to. You know,
Speaker 5: saund that that that adventurous. But I see something I
Speaker 5: like it.
Speaker 4: Did you did you work on, uh the what you're
Speaker 4: gonna do from with my love and album with Steffani
Speaker 4: emails or what you're gonna do with or is it
Speaker 4: sweets and station? Now? Yes, first four. So you guys
Speaker 4: did put your body in and all that stuff, and
Speaker 4: that's my ship. I'm sorry.
Speaker 5: I boom boom boom boom.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I really should my notes and I'm just speaking
Speaker 4: as an off the Cup fan. So what is it?
Speaker 4: What's it like working with an artist of Stephanie's statute
Speaker 4: where like, almost in my head, I think in that
Speaker 4: time period I would put her okay and as far
Speaker 4: as the the the challenge difficulty category, I would put
Speaker 4: her in almost Patty in the same basket, where it's like,
Speaker 4: you know, the talent is there, you know the voice
Speaker 4: is there, and you know that a lot of their
Speaker 4: a lot of their varieties based on the the gymnastic yeah,
Speaker 4: the high note in the in the fanciness of it.
Speaker 4: But it's like when you're making pop records, you gotta sing.
Speaker 4: The song has to be right and disciplined. So how
Speaker 4: do you discipline a sing a singer like Stephanie Mills
Speaker 4: that's able to sing synk rings around you and just
Speaker 4: tell it, look stick to the.
Speaker 5: Well, here's the entry again, story behind everything that wasn't
Speaker 5: Stephanie's first's album. A lot of people don't know that. Okay,
Speaker 5: she had an album before that that was written and
Speaker 5: produced by two of my main inspirations, Burt Backrack and
Speaker 5: how David.
Speaker 4: Wait on twenty she was on Another Lady.
Speaker 5: Yeah, okay, look it up. So these cats, well, I
Speaker 5: had three inspirations. First was Curtis Mayfield, then it was
Speaker 5: Burt back David, then was Holland oser In Holland, and
Speaker 5: then later on obviously Gambling Huff and Tom Bell. But
Speaker 5: and Tom Bell kind of took Backrack and David and
Speaker 5: blackened it more. But it was sorry but I don't know, no,
Speaker 5: I don't know what it was on. But so I'm like, damn,
Speaker 5: I gotta come behind cats that all that, you know,
Speaker 5: Dion Warwick all that. I was like, oh my god,
Speaker 5: the mistake that they made. They produced her like she's done,
Speaker 5: She's not dem she's something else. So we have a
Speaker 5: first meeting with Stephanie. I had just left Roberta. We
Speaker 5: were finished. I told her this is the last tour.
Speaker 5: I didn't have nothing that there wasn't no work. But
Speaker 5: the whole band quit when I quit, and I was like,
Speaker 5: I ain't got no work from nobody, and I get
Speaker 5: the call. It said me and Reggie. I said, man,
Speaker 5: we had partnered with Famous Music. We did a publishing
Speaker 5: a fifty fifty things. So they called and said, man,
Speaker 5: look have you ever produced anything. I said, yeah, but
Speaker 5: none of us been released. I ain't produced nothing, man
Speaker 5: but a headache. So they sent us back then you
Speaker 5: would get seed money to do demos. So they sent
Speaker 5: I think maybe fifteen grand do three songs. First three
Speaker 5: songs we cut what you're gonna do with my loving
Speaker 5: put your body in it and deeper inside your love.
Speaker 5: And I remember telling them if you can't hear this,
Speaker 5: and to Watha singing all the references demo, you have those, no, no, no,
Speaker 5: but see, let me tell you one of the everybody
Speaker 5: has a little things that they do. One of the
Speaker 5: things that we did that was kind of different in
Speaker 5: recording back then, I recorded with the synth players being there.
Speaker 5: They were part of the rhythm section. To Watha sang
Speaker 5: on every take. I wanted the musicians to be playing
Speaker 5: with the feeling. So everything you ever heard coming out
Speaker 5: of Philisheim and all that is to Watha singing the leads,
Speaker 5: you know here comes to everybody's in But you're playing
Speaker 5: with greater voice to.
Speaker 4: Do it to.
Speaker 5: But it made it made it even warmer. And and
Speaker 5: and the cats play, you know with more So.
Speaker 4: When Stephanie Mills and subsequently Phil Simon are getting these
Speaker 4: demos so on you're saying that on the you know
Speaker 4: how to Love Me Full the Time and demo, she's
Speaker 4: ghosting like she's studying listening to how.
Speaker 5: To wout every song we ever did to Watcher's recording.
Speaker 5: While maybe sometimes you got six takes, she's singing on
Speaker 5: every take because I wanted that emotion there. And when
Speaker 5: you get it and you send it that you know
Speaker 5: to the whatever you know that you getting ready to do,
Speaker 5: so they know how the song goes. But what better
Speaker 5: reference now?
Speaker 4: And in your crew? First of all, how did you
Speaker 4: guys decide and short of them in the Chard way
Speaker 4: of things, how did you guys decide the name of
Speaker 4: the group is going to be? And two man, I
Speaker 4: didn't like why not Lucas?
Speaker 5: No, we did well. I went when I went to Epic,
Speaker 5: we was gonna name the band Mindbender. I mean because
Speaker 5: everybody was on p funk. You know, we do the
Speaker 5: costumes and it was a guy who had the promotions
Speaker 5: at epic named Paris Ealy and Paris said no man,
Speaker 5: he said him too, May And I was like, are
Speaker 5: you crazy? People? You know today mister Muttmin was here,
Speaker 5: I mean made that was so weird. We're talking about
Speaker 5: nineteen seventy eight. And he said, no, this is what
Speaker 5: we'll do. He said, I know it's people don't know
Speaker 5: how to pronounce it. He said, we'll call it.
Speaker 4: He said.
Speaker 5: The one thing about that, he said, once you know
Speaker 5: that name, you'll never forget it. And he said, and
Speaker 5: we'll put the albums out with it phonetically spelled out
Speaker 5: how to say it, dash t oo dash m a y.
Speaker 4: It's on your first album. I have a copy of
Speaker 4: the album, which is like M two main pronounced yeah.
Speaker 5: And I you know, because I felt weird about it
Speaker 5: because I didn't It was like, man, I don't want none.
Speaker 5: That's not what the group was about.
Speaker 2: The people in the group.
Speaker 5: Well, I thought the cast would go yo man, but
Speaker 5: they were like okay, because they it makes it's something
Speaker 5: about it that does make sense. Well, I mean, I
Speaker 5: didn't go to that deep, but it was that. But
Speaker 5: that's how that's that. I didn't have nothing to do
Speaker 5: with that.
Speaker 4: It's just like, okay, man, okay, there's a question about
Speaker 4: your record, and I understand, I guess, and I got
Speaker 4: your first album maybe when I started like my first
Speaker 4: round digging, like in the late eighties. So when I
Speaker 4: discovered there were albums before the Juicy Fruit, why didn't
Speaker 4: you guys ever think of making yes a complete song?
Speaker 5: Erica actually get ready to say Erica Bad called me, yeah,
Speaker 5: and she said, that's one of my favorite That was
Speaker 5: the sludy seconds. Yeah. Well, you know what, I'm also
Speaker 5: kind of humorous. And if you notice, the first time,
Speaker 5: I think we got to play for the people, and
Speaker 5: then the next time we played that's when I you know,
Speaker 5: I hated astrology. Man, what are you what you're signed?
Speaker 5: I said, coach sign, you know, And so we did
Speaker 5: that little take That was just my personal hatred.
Speaker 4: I realized it. But the groove was so monstious. Man,
Speaker 4: I'm like, y'all don't even know, like next to roy
Speaker 4: are is that?
Speaker 6: That?
Speaker 4: To me is like that could to be the beginning
Speaker 4: and the father of like some neo soul, Like that's
Speaker 4: our blueprint.
Speaker 5: Asparagus, Chill Rising Laws, my sign, Spinach the community Pea. Well,
Speaker 5: that was like we tried.
Speaker 4: Erica tried to get us to do that. I think
Speaker 4: we oh really after who was after Mama's Gone? Uh,
Speaker 4: worldwide underground, world Wide Underground. The one idea worked on
Speaker 4: before it was we we tried to make that into
Speaker 4: a jam. I mean, it's still somewhere up there, so
Speaker 4: maybe so bring it back.
Speaker 5: Talk to me about Lovelock. That's like one of my
Speaker 5: favorite song. Look god, look, so where did that come from?
Speaker 5: We were working on the album. I had that thing,
Speaker 5: you know, the magic to that record. It's Watha and
Speaker 5: we hit up there's a groove that gets we get into,
Speaker 5: especially towards the end, and I'm playing you know, acoustic,
Speaker 5: and I'm going through this Latin ding ding d tink
Speaker 5: and she just it was just magic. Man, it was magic.
Speaker 5: I mean I remember we cut that in one tape. Yeah,
Speaker 5: And you know, some sometimes that's that's how it goes.
Speaker 5: Some ship you cut recut and it just don't work.
Speaker 5: But that just and it really was a combination of
Speaker 5: arm and B and jazz, it really was. And uh,
Speaker 5: but her it's her saying and I think floord for
Speaker 5: him and I are told we did it, But it's
Speaker 5: her performance.
Speaker 6: Man, that makes total sense that flow.
Speaker 5: Now you know what I thought of it? Wow, when
Speaker 5: we did I thought I always thought of it like
Speaker 5: an airline commercial, you know, fly T zero A whatever.
Speaker 6: I love that song and thank you for that.
Speaker 4: There's there's there's a member of your team that we
Speaker 4: haven't mentioned yet. And I gotta say, man, like talk
Speaker 4: about work with Hubert Eves the third and yeah, like
Speaker 4: him being part of the team, like what.
Speaker 5: Hubert and I had played together on the jazz circuit.
Speaker 5: You know everybody in the band, okay, the first band incarnation,
Speaker 5: Basil Farrington on bass, Hubert Eves, myself, Reggie ed Tree,
Speaker 5: Moore of the guitarist, uh, Howard King Locksmith and we
Speaker 5: all were jazz musicians, so Ubert uh, you know, we
Speaker 5: played different gigs together her and so when we put
Speaker 5: the band together, we all was the band. The recording
Speaker 5: band unit came out of roberta flat. We all played
Speaker 5: with Roberta And when we left, I said, well, man,
Speaker 5: when we started getting you know, production gigs, I said,
Speaker 5: this would be the rhythm section because you got to
Speaker 5: have a sound. What's your signature? And we weren't like
Speaker 5: anybody else, you know, you had Nile and Bernard that
Speaker 5: was happening at the same time. It was a few people,
Speaker 5: but we had our own unit. The singers it was
Speaker 5: was Tawatha. Uh no, no, no, no, Sidney, Cindy was
Speaker 5: I mean Sidney on a couple of things. But the
Speaker 5: of course sisters that she's dead now a great singer
Speaker 5: out of NewYork, Brenda White, Tawatha Brenda White and wow,
Speaker 5: forgive me. Yeah. But uh, we had our own unit.
Speaker 4: And how did you discover it? To Watsa, how did
Speaker 4: she come into the circle.
Speaker 5: The first demo me and Reggyeaver cut was this group
Speaker 5: called hot Tea out of Howard University. It was to
Speaker 5: Watsa and Angela Winbush.
Speaker 4: Oh my bro, you're just sitting on that.
Speaker 5: Wow. So they were all a part of Howard it was.
Speaker 5: It was. It was a group, a group of five.
Speaker 5: No there was before there were a gospel group and
Speaker 5: uh it was five members. But I'm saying, you know,
Speaker 5: to Watha and Aelup was in it. And we cut
Speaker 5: the demo. You know, we couldn't sell it. But out
Speaker 5: of that it was to Watsa, you know, and we've
Speaker 5: been together forty one years. As a matter of fact,
Speaker 5: I'm getting ready to cut an EP order. You know,
Speaker 5: we're gonna give it a shot. I'm not doing a
Speaker 5: lot of the writing because you know, you got to
Speaker 5: know you know what time it is, you know, and
Speaker 5: it's it's you know, we got some young writers and stuff.
Speaker 5: But I'll be dealing with the melodies, you know what
Speaker 5: I mean.
Speaker 4: Okay, I'm not going to try and throw a monkey
Speaker 4: wrench in, but here's here's the monkey wrench. No, because okay,
Speaker 4: to hear, to hear, you describe it as far as like,
Speaker 4: you know, move forward, don't burn the I mean burn
Speaker 4: the bridge and don't look in the rearview mirror and
Speaker 4: let the young people lead the way. But I also
Speaker 4: feel like we need to know to kind of know
Speaker 4: the way and not let the blind lead the blind.
Speaker 5: So well, I agree.
Speaker 4: I still I don't think ideas just expiring people. So
Speaker 4: I mean, I don't want I personally don't don't want
Speaker 4: you to feel like, okay, well I don't have ideas to.
Speaker 5: No, I don't feel like that. But here's why I
Speaker 5: agree with you. In terms of what happens to black music.
Speaker 5: The professors were thrown out of class. There was this
Speaker 5: what I call a breakdown in the cultural continuity with
Speaker 5: arm bing funk and when hip hop was coming along.
Speaker 5: There was also a struggle a a in a generational
Speaker 5: struggle M younger black U k uh uh of men
Speaker 5: and older blacks. Y. My generation was looking down. That
Speaker 5: ain't music, young cats. You know y'all coming through. Man,
Speaker 5: You know f that? So I said, Man, one day
Speaker 5: I woke up and said, man, if you got all
Speaker 5: age and no youth, your glass is half full. All
Speaker 5: youth with no age, your glass is half empty. Right now,
Speaker 5: we got a half a glass of music. These conversations
Speaker 5: are what's needed. M Man. I I learned from y'all,
Speaker 5: but I can give you what I know, but be
Speaker 5: open to learn from what y'all doing. There's not enough
Speaker 5: sharing of information in black music. That's the problem. Young
Speaker 5: Black kids grow up with the history of their music.
Speaker 5: I used to watch the d grateful dead be great parents,
Speaker 5: parents and kids. Your cultural continuity is a real thing.
Speaker 5: We had a real breakdown because of the social thing.
Speaker 5: What happened. I always said, my generation began to look
Speaker 5: at y'all through other eyes, like y'all wasn't as we
Speaker 5: weren't teaching. It was a breakdown.
Speaker 4: Speaking of that jazz, all that jazz. Let's talk about
Speaker 4: that jazz. Okay, So, of course to a lot of
Speaker 4: the to the classic hip hop, uh luminaries that that
Speaker 4: are are well versed in the culture and that owns
Speaker 4: of sonics and full gear many many will We'll get
Speaker 4: out of here with that.
Speaker 5: But let's go.
Speaker 4: Dude, until you said that, I totally forgot you were
Speaker 4: the subject of that.
Speaker 5: Song youth Vader.
Speaker 4: So no, no, no, no, no, no, I don't I don't
Speaker 4: even know. I didn't know. He so talking all that
Speaker 4: jazz was about that's about here even here the hear
Speaker 4: them like sample.
Speaker 5: I'm gonna knock you out. Yeah, here's here's what happened.
Speaker 4: Wow.
Speaker 5: I co host a black talk show called Open Line
Speaker 5: Our Voices, Yeah, openly, and so we were having a discussion.
Speaker 4: What time did it come on?
Speaker 5: No no, no, no, no, no no no. This is before
Speaker 5: they ripped it up. It was a decent hour. But
Speaker 5: we were having a debate, a discussion on a debate
Speaker 5: about what was the thing that knocked knocked this out?
Speaker 5: Doing a year in review of what happened on the year,
Speaker 5: and I said, man, I've only had been done this
Speaker 5: a few times in my life. I know you. I've
Speaker 5: been up here about what five hours? Oh no, dude,
Speaker 5: start dreaming interview shadow So uh that was the word.
Speaker 5: I was good.
Speaker 4: No, please give us all the stories.
Speaker 5: So we were talking about what knocked you out. I said, well,
Speaker 5: I've only done this a couple times in my life. Well,
Speaker 5: I'm driving and something came on the radio and I
Speaker 5: had to pull over. What it was was bring the noise. Wow.
Speaker 5: Now I didn't know nothing about sampling. I'm thinking, these
Speaker 5: cats are playing in all these different keys tilious month
Speaker 5: or stepoids later on, I hooked up with Frank Shockley,
Speaker 5: I mean with Shockley, and he explained to me about sampling. Anyway,
Speaker 5: to make a long story short. In that same conversation,
Speaker 5: I said, the thing that knocked me out was public Enemy.
Speaker 5: But I also delved into a subject that nobody wanted
Speaker 5: to touch on. I said sampling. At that time, cats
Speaker 5: didn't know how to play for the most part. But
Speaker 5: that became a badge of honor. I said, wait a minute.
Speaker 5: If you want to be a lawyer, you got to
Speaker 5: know something about what law. You want to be a doctor,
Speaker 5: you gotta know something about what medicine. Why you want
Speaker 5: to be in music, but you don't need to know
Speaker 5: nothing about music. And I said, I'm not against sampling
Speaker 5: as a pit stop, don't live there. And I said,
Speaker 5: and if you're gonna sample somebody's music, pay them, that's
Speaker 5: all I said. So a lot of people got offended.
Speaker 5: And I gotta say this, Daddy or heard that he
Speaker 5: was listening to this. What here is how we started
Speaker 5: heard you on the radio talking.
Speaker 2: About rap, saying all that crap about how we sample.
Speaker 5: Give an example. We'll let you get away with that
Speaker 5: to criticize our methods how we make You said that
Speaker 5: wasn't art, So now we're gonna rip you apart. And
Speaker 5: they took it that way. That's not I was not saying.
Speaker 5: First of all, how could I say sampling is jag
Speaker 5: as much as I you know, said juicy You kidding?
Speaker 5: But I said, at that time, they weren't paying you know,
Speaker 5: the so and so. Yeah, man, So it didn't really
Speaker 5: start turning around until me, me, myself and I came
Speaker 5: out and they sampled still a man, old peg.
Speaker 4: Old peg, that's what.
Speaker 5: But during that time they weren't paying James and all
Speaker 5: the people. Man. Only when I did the juicy food deal.
Speaker 5: With Puffy and I gotta say this. I was doing
Speaker 5: New York undercover. I was me and Andre Heral were
Speaker 5: meeting and and and Andre said, look, my Puffy wants
Speaker 5: to holler at you for a minute. So Puffy comes in.
Speaker 5: Hey to him, I said, buff, what's up? He said, Man,
Speaker 5: I want you to meet my artist. He said, Biggie
Speaker 5: small Biggie comes in, sweetheart man, I said, boom. He said, look, man,
Speaker 5: I want to sample juicy food. Man, I'll say this
Speaker 5: about Puffy. We sat down. In a few minutes, we
Speaker 5: did a page and a half. It ain't no long conversation.
Speaker 5: You get a dollar, like you fifty cents. That's all
Speaker 5: it is. I said. But a lot of that became
Speaker 5: a thing. And I because I was the only cat
Speaker 5: talking about that, and that record came out, I became
Speaker 5: and I was doing handles and stuff and oh man,
Speaker 5: you hate hip hop. I'm like, nod that answer your question.
Speaker 5: And me and Daddy O are fabulous friends. Now okay,
Speaker 5: go ahead, okay, So okay, So I want to know
Speaker 5: when Madonna enters the picture, why was Reggie the only
Speaker 5: person and producer?
Speaker 2: Not you?
Speaker 5: We broke up, Damn. Here's here's timing. No, not really.
Speaker 5: I did the Juicy Food album. Ain't I ain't sorry.
Speaker 5: Here's what happened. There's a point when you're partnering, you're
Speaker 5: starting to have other.
Speaker 4: Thoughts.
Speaker 5: You've exhausted what that partnership was supposed to do. I
Speaker 5: remember earlier I said, well what kept things together? Well, success,
Speaker 5: like the saying is success needs no explanation, fair can
Speaker 5: never be explained. So damn when I started, success needs
Speaker 5: no explanation, and failure can never be explained.
Speaker 4: He's like outquoding fante. You a coffee table book. I
Speaker 4: would read it just like I'd read It's.
Speaker 5: Like I was starting to hear that I was done.
Speaker 5: I remember I always tell the story man. One day
Speaker 5: I sat down at the piano man to write, and
Speaker 5: I started tears started coming down my eyes. I didn't
Speaker 5: know what was happening. And then I realized, Man, this
Speaker 5: sounds like all of the.
Speaker 6: Ship you was just done before.
Speaker 5: And I was like, oh my god. I felt wrights
Speaker 5: blockade and I said, you got it. What I say, man,
Speaker 5: that it was time for that bridge to be burned.
Speaker 5: I didn't. I didn't hear strings and horns with the
Speaker 5: big arrangements to lush. I was hearing what I call
Speaker 5: neo minimalism, how to take this and make it sound
Speaker 5: like that? Then that was a Juicy Food album. On
Speaker 5: that song, man, there's only four inches. I say, yeah,
Speaker 5: it's not it sounds like this, But I was hearing
Speaker 5: something different. Reggie was feeling something different. He hooked up
Speaker 5: with Madonna. I was doing Juicy Fruit. He did Madonna, so.
Speaker 4: He didn't work on the third and two May record.
Speaker 5: What was that one? Oh? Okay, no, no, so that
Speaker 5: was you? Yeah, yeah, I think what I did. I
Speaker 5: might have said one of the tunes we did, but
Speaker 5: it really wasn't.
Speaker 4: No.
Speaker 5: No, that's all me. Oh man, okay, but that wasn't like.
Speaker 4: It was a you know, some anger. No, it was like, yeah,
Speaker 4: where is Reggie? To this day you rarely hear of
Speaker 4: him on the scene or I don't know.
Speaker 5: Reggie's cool. We talked with matter fact, we just talked
Speaker 5: the other day. I just decided, like you said, it's
Speaker 5: not a lot of I don't do even do these
Speaker 5: kind of you know, I five and my daughter have
Speaker 5: convinced me. No, man, you seventy man, come on man,
Speaker 5: you split this information goals. I just decided I just agreed,
Speaker 5: Just agreed. Was it last week we started shooting the
Speaker 5: unsung on My Life?
Speaker 2: And this is crazy too?
Speaker 5: Well, it's kind of nuts. Yeah, it's kind of nuts. Uh.
Speaker 5: It's from everything from my father who's ninety Wow, you
Speaker 5: know too, you know, young cats, you know, and and
Speaker 5: and sisters you know. But I've been around a long time.
Speaker 5: I've been doing this fifty years. Man.
Speaker 4: That's that's crazy. It's not even long enough for me.
Speaker 4: There's more, there's more to do, So, you know, I
Speaker 4: don't even know if you're aware of this, but I
Speaker 4: was going to say that a lot of a lot
Speaker 4: of hip hop heads. Of course, you know, a lot
Speaker 4: of people would think that Juicy is your go to record.
Speaker 4: But what I was telling Fonte earlier upstairs was.
Speaker 6: That and I didn't know this was your record.
Speaker 4: It was this was when uh, for some reason kick
Speaker 4: apri Oh exactly record like that's his go to intro record,
Speaker 4: his freestyle record for rappers, like he's been spinning that forever.
Speaker 4: And I never what song is that. It's called Biggest Theme,
Speaker 4: Biggest Beat.
Speaker 5: It's from I scored this Native Native. It was a movie,
Speaker 5: your first movie I did, And.
Speaker 4: I can't find it nowhere, but like kick Capri must
Speaker 4: have at least like eight copies of the Red Yeah.
Speaker 5: Yeah, when the album the what do you call them?
Speaker 5: Soundtrack not the soundtrack scores. Yeah, it wasn't no like
Speaker 5: soundtracks became songs later, but there was this score and
Speaker 5: kid jumped on it. And I remember telling keV. I
Speaker 5: remember grand Master Flash called me, said, mall the tunes.
Speaker 5: I want to come by and holler at you. So
Speaker 5: he came over to Jersey. I live in South Orange
Speaker 5: and so grand Master was telling me, Man, he said, man,
Speaker 5: you know why we like your music? He said it's holy.
Speaker 5: He said, I don't mean like religious holy. He said,
Speaker 5: you got a lot of holes. We can take snippets.
Speaker 5: And I didn't really, you know, fully understand. I did understand,
Speaker 5: but not fully. And uh, Miles introduced the idea to
Speaker 5: you for space Hey man, quotations, there you go? And
Speaker 5: where was I going? Man? Oh oh with biggest, biggest
Speaker 5: them and uh so that's what prepared me for New
Speaker 5: York Undercover.
Speaker 4: How was it? Uh? In in that sort of.
Speaker 5: I didn't mean to make that, making the transition. I
Speaker 5: should have waited.
Speaker 4: So we're working in uh that medium of television and scoring, Like,
Speaker 4: how easy was that to episode for episode? I personally
Speaker 4: it's easy to you or no, I find it hard. Yeah,
Speaker 4: So what was the pressure like of deadline?
Speaker 5: First? Okay, with truth be told? I breathed. I get
Speaker 5: to l a that the pilot is done. You don't
Speaker 5: have to do a visual music for a pilot. I
Speaker 5: go out there maybe to put a couple of things on.
Speaker 5: It was me and I took a brother because I
Speaker 5: didn't know scoring for television. When I said, you know,
Speaker 5: I didn't know, I want to I got to know.
Speaker 5: And this thing came up quick. When Andrew called me,
Speaker 5: so dun Pearson was like my go to guy. He
Speaker 5: was a music director for with h O Jay's and
Speaker 5: so I said, so when we talk and I want
Speaker 5: to know, what's the Q? What's you know how to
Speaker 5: read at the time? You know? Because frames? How many
Speaker 5: frames per second? And I go out there, man, dick
Speaker 5: Wolf said, Man on we arrive on Friday, Dick Wolf says, man,
Speaker 5: I need a theme Monday. First of all, I don't
Speaker 5: even have any instruments. What do you but you know? No, no, no, no.
Speaker 4: No, this is a true story. It was gonna be
Speaker 4: Saturday man.
Speaker 5: I called my brother and he called uh uh uh
Speaker 5: brother that programmed everything for us. He did the uh
Speaker 5: uh the Chronic.
Speaker 6: Album Colin Wolf.
Speaker 5: No, oh, man, this is crazy program. Uh but you
Speaker 5: look going the credits for the team me done and
Speaker 5: this brother did the team. But because I knew I
Speaker 5: wanted we originally we were supposed to have a cat
Speaker 5: that was gonna Andre said he had a guy that
Speaker 5: we're gonna do all the beats. The night before we
Speaker 5: leaving to go to La I go to his crib
Speaker 5: because when I called him, I said, man, you know
Speaker 5: we're leaving tomorrow. He said, well tunes. I'm not comfortable
Speaker 5: because I wasn't gonna do beats, you know, like right right,
Speaker 5: because I knew one thing I didn't want to do
Speaker 5: nothing old and this was a chance to really put
Speaker 5: a sound on television that had never been done. So
Speaker 5: the night before we leave, he drops out. So my
Speaker 5: brother gets to get the brother I got. You gotta
Speaker 5: look it up with his name, and we do that.
Speaker 5: It's the brother that did the chronic program the Chronic
Speaker 5: and I take it they uh look up for the
Speaker 5: theme in New York on the cover writing credits.
Speaker 4: Uh, it's just showing your name is the writer.
Speaker 5: That's bullshit. I'm telling you it's it's just incorrect. It's
Speaker 5: done piercing myself in the Southern. But so they reject
Speaker 5: the theme. I bring the theme Monday morning. First of all,
Speaker 5: they were shot, you know, man, look I'm talking about no,
Speaker 5: I gotta have this. They rejected it. There was a
Speaker 5: woman named rock sand Lapel that worked at Universal.
Speaker 4: Gregory Royal up the ball boss Bill.
Speaker 5: So yeah, because I did not want to, you know,
Speaker 5: I no, never, I don't do that, she said. Dick
Speaker 5: Wolf rejected it. She said, send me over that. That's
Speaker 5: when we were you know, Dad's she said. I said, oh, man,
Speaker 5: because I'm like, this is the best I can do.
Speaker 5: I'm not because it was fresh, nothing like that. You
Speaker 5: know who's playing the Saxon. That's the brother from earth
Speaker 5: Wind and Fire and you no, no, no, no, no,
Speaker 5: not that, not that earth Wind the original. So I'm like,
Speaker 5: I'm fried man. So I sent it over to her.
Speaker 5: It's a true story. She takes it to the to
Speaker 5: the head the president of the television at Universal. She
Speaker 5: calls me back, she said, I just played it for
Speaker 5: the president. He said, this is exactly what we need
Speaker 5: for this urban show and he said, also tell him
Speaker 5: to mate. Thank you for Juicy Free man. Yo, that
Speaker 5: is no dude, you don't understand.
Speaker 4: Like wait a minute, that was Thursday night.
Speaker 5: Like that was like that song always put me in
Speaker 5: like the best move because it was like, I mean,
Speaker 5: New It's Gonna Come was my favorite show and it
Speaker 5: like starts off dark, but then it goes into that
Speaker 5: that sax line is really beautiful and that's the jazz
Speaker 5: parte and.
Speaker 4: It just said, like I just know, like I heard
Speaker 4: that song and I just know it's Thursday and tomorrow's Friday.
Speaker 6: And this ship about.
Speaker 4: The thing is is that I thought you were going
Speaker 4: someone else, somewhere else with the story, as in, you know,
Speaker 4: we did an original theme that they didn't like. Then
Speaker 4: we came up with them. I didn't realize that they.
Speaker 5: Heard this, rejected this well, and then took it back.
Speaker 5: Here's what happened. We're talking true. There was some friction
Speaker 5: with Dick and Andre. Andre was originally a co co
Speaker 5: executive producer, and uh, there was some business all out.
Speaker 5: I was kind of left out there hanging in the
Speaker 5: middle of it. So Dick and I became very close,
Speaker 5: but Initially he's looking at me as part of this
Speaker 5: and I'm like, no, I'm not. That's my man. He
Speaker 5: brought me in, but I'm serious about this, and he
Speaker 5: looked kind of looked at me like uh. And plus
Speaker 5: he had his man, Mike Post. You gotta remember, Yeah,
Speaker 5: so he was kind of forced to have to deal
Speaker 5: with me, especially after the president of the of the
Speaker 5: studio said no, man, this is what this is what
Speaker 5: we want and I'm into no ego here, man, But
Speaker 5: Mike Post can't do what. I couldn't do that because
Speaker 5: to me, TV music was so staved and stale. And
Speaker 5: here's the chase scene I'm talking about, you know, soprano
Speaker 5: sacks and stuff. You hadn't heard that. Plus I'm doing
Speaker 5: Natalie's I'm scoring this show and then I'm reproducing songs
Speaker 5: for the club scene. Now let's talk about.
Speaker 4: Natal please, yes, let's talk about it.
Speaker 5: Natalie's in the script. The original script was just the
Speaker 5: place where the cops, you know, uh my Leak and
Speaker 5: Michael hung out the original if you watched the first season,
Speaker 5: Gladys Knight is Natalie. She owns Natalie's. She was the
Speaker 5: father's of Michael's father's ex girlfriend. I'm sitting there. I said, man,
Speaker 5: you know what could be interesting New York Undercover the
Speaker 5: first years nineteen ninety four, if you think about it,
Speaker 5: ar Senior Hall had been taken off. There was no
Speaker 5: place to hear or see a black R and B band.
Speaker 5: I said, man, you know what we can do. I'll
Speaker 5: bring in young current artists and redo a classic, bringing
Speaker 5: the classic artists to redo their hits. Airgo one twelve
Speaker 5: after the Lover Is Gone, Mary, Natural woman U Joe
Speaker 5: to Cy.
Speaker 6: They do lately?
Speaker 5: Was that? No?
Speaker 3: No?
Speaker 5: That was.
Speaker 6: What did Josy do?
Speaker 5: They on the Cold Joint because they put y'all you
Speaker 5: put out an album, I'll put out the well I did?
Speaker 5: I did? I did? Uh? Uh? What's the brother? Josy
Speaker 5: the lead Casey I later produced if you think Jason's lyric.
Speaker 5: But so I'm doing, man, I'm saying all this answer
Speaker 5: to your question, brother, I was doing putting in twenty
Speaker 5: hours a day, man, because first of all, I had
Speaker 5: to figure out what's gonna be my sound. All the
Speaker 5: equipment had changed. I'd been off the scene for a
Speaker 5: few years, so I had called all these cats. I'm
Speaker 5: going through thousands of sounds to find out what what'll
Speaker 5: be my go to sounds? How I'm gonna put these beats,
Speaker 5: you know, Because I had to figure all that on
Speaker 5: on on, on the fly and then produced. I worked
Speaker 5: it out finally by the third season, I wrote, scored
Speaker 5: the whole show in two days, did the whole Natalie
Speaker 5: in a day and a half. But it's like third day.
Speaker 4: Well, in a day and a half, you had all
Speaker 4: those artists line up one by one, knocked them out.
Speaker 5: No no, no, no per episode, no no, per episode.
Speaker 5: It was an assistant inam lie on the floor and
Speaker 5: I will talk about, well, who can we get next?
Speaker 5: So we reach out and uh, once we get the artists,
Speaker 5: I would say, okay, this is the song we do
Speaker 5: you know? Uh? And I go in recut those songs,
Speaker 5: those songs, those aren't records, those are all you know, remakes,
Speaker 5: you know, And you got.
Speaker 2: Websites dedicated to the top twenty Natalie perform Ntie.
Speaker 4: Natalie's was till Jordan, what you want to do for love?
Speaker 5: Oh? I forgot all this love well and and and
Speaker 5: jael Vert I remember that one.
Speaker 3: Uh.
Speaker 5: I've been so many places.
Speaker 4: Song for you, A song for you? So can I
Speaker 4: assume that. That's when made the the the relationship with
Speaker 4: Mary for I'm Going down. Uh look, man, did you
Speaker 4: do the New York undercover stuff first? Or did you?
Speaker 4: Because I know you produced when we first met, you produced.
Speaker 5: Yeah, yeah, yeah yeah. Here's the interesting thing. A lot
Speaker 5: of the young artists after we worked together because they
Speaker 5: never worked with the old head you know, that's Traight
Speaker 5: and Escape s w V the earlier take. They never
Speaker 5: a lot of them never really worked with a vocal producer,
Speaker 5: you know. And I found that out, and so they
Speaker 5: would ask me. They come and to New York on
Speaker 5: the cover and say, yo, man, could you cut on
Speaker 5: my album?
Speaker 2: Because Erica did stay on here? And I was like,
Speaker 2: was that before after she put that on her album?
Speaker 5: Before she did New York? That's on New York? I
Speaker 5: did redid that for di'angelo on the get.
Speaker 4: Off the Yeah you did change?
Speaker 5: Yeah, And that's getting crazy.
Speaker 4: And how so, how do you like doing vocals? I
Speaker 4: hate doing vocals.
Speaker 5: I love it. That's that's that's my ultimate That's the tip.
Speaker 4: I will be calling you from now on the tip of.
Speaker 5: The iceberg is vocals. I always say this, every hit
Speaker 5: is a nursery rhyme. But you got to learn how
Speaker 5: to make it your nursery rhyme. There's no hit that
Speaker 5: you can't home. There's no hit record that you heard
Speaker 5: that you can't hum the melody even if you don't
Speaker 5: know the words. It's nursery rhymes.
Speaker 4: Already known next year's retrospective episode that it's gonna be
Speaker 4: Bill's favorite episode literally taking notes.
Speaker 5: But think about that, that that concept. There's no hit
Speaker 5: that you ever heard that you love that you couldn't Yeah,
Speaker 5: what was your What was it like producing k C vocals?
Speaker 5: Because that was when he was like, okay, bothly kse
Speaker 5: that comes. The first night we worked, said sometimes you
Speaker 5: don't nail it. But what I always did if we
Speaker 5: don't nail something on the first night, I make a
Speaker 5: copy of what you did and then give you right
Speaker 5: behind that a version with no vocal so you could
Speaker 5: work out. So casey, the first night we didn't quite
Speaker 5: get it, I'm like cool, ma ain't no problem. Came
Speaker 5: back about three nights later and we nailed it. The
Speaker 5: reason why I'm saying that was so special, I'll never forget.
Speaker 5: He asked me, said, man, I'm too making I call
Speaker 5: my parents. He called his parents and put the phone
Speaker 5: up to the speakers. He said, Man, I'm doing Bobby
Speaker 5: Womax song and he nailed it, man, And I was
Speaker 5: just so proud of you know, he was a hard worker, Mary,
Speaker 5: hard worker. The Angelo is off the hook.
Speaker 7: Notice he didn't say hard work, no no, no, no
Speaker 7: no no no.
Speaker 4: I meant.
Speaker 5: And I know that YouTube. I was supposed to work
Speaker 5: on the album that you did.
Speaker 4: We're still here.
Speaker 5: That's my that's my man, that's my man. We're still
Speaker 5: and I'll never forget to see. I was doing, uh
Speaker 5: working with D'Angelo and Spike Lee called me. I mean
Speaker 5: he called me to do the thing with Dangelo for
Speaker 5: the get was to get on the bus. So we're
Speaker 5: in the studio and Spike calls me, said, man tunes,
Speaker 5: I'm gonna send some Obis. He said, I just got
Speaker 5: Curtis's song grant a New World Order. We were in
Speaker 5: the studio, man, he rushes it over. Now. I told you, man,
Speaker 5: my main influence, my first influence was Courtis. So I
Speaker 5: put the the the C d N and I hear
Speaker 5: this man and I said, stop it. I said, turn
Speaker 5: all the lights off. Mm hmmm. Sat out there to listen. Man.
Speaker 5: It wasn't a dry eye, and I realized this cat recorded.
Speaker 4: It on his back.
Speaker 6: He was paralyzed, And.
Speaker 5: I said, this cat got more soul. The reason why
Speaker 5: I'm saying this fast forward during New York under Cover,
Speaker 5: I called Curtis for an episode to do that in
Speaker 5: New World Order. I didn't redo it that we actually
Speaker 5: used the CD. We alone in the room, in the
Speaker 5: dressing room before that before he takes a ship, and
Speaker 5: I tell him I'm telling him getting a chance to
Speaker 5: tell Curtis. I mean, we knew each other over the
Speaker 5: years before that, but I had an opportunity to tell him,
Speaker 5: you what my main inspiration man to want to write.
Speaker 5: And for some reason there was a moment was nobody
Speaker 5: in the room but me and him. I don't even
Speaker 5: know how that happened. And I said, and I didn't
Speaker 5: really even have a right to ask him me. I said, Curtis,
Speaker 5: you paralyzed. I said, what do you miss most? And
Speaker 5: what right do I have that? I mean, you know,
Speaker 5: you think my guy says sax Or, I can't walk,
Speaker 5: you know, he told me man and I broke down
Speaker 5: in tears. He he said, man tooms, I can't play
Speaker 5: my guitar damn oh I know. Now fast forward again,
Speaker 5: about a year after he dies, I'm sitting at the crib.
Speaker 5: I get a call, uh from uh Warner Brothers said,
Speaker 5: somebody's here wants to talk to you. I don't know
Speaker 5: who it was. Put him on. It was Curtis's publicist
Speaker 5: who was there that night. She said, I too made.
Speaker 5: We've been trying to find you for over a year.
Speaker 5: Curtis when he died, told me to make sure that
Speaker 5: we thanked two people, you and Eric Clapton. I don't.
Speaker 5: I'm like, I don't want, I don't know what what
Speaker 5: to thank me? What are you talking about? He said?
Speaker 5: The last two weeks well, Curtis was making transition to death.
Speaker 5: He had us play his performance in New York on
Speaker 5: the cover over that helped him make his transition. And
Speaker 5: now I dropped the phone because I'm the man that
Speaker 5: inspired me.
Speaker 6: You inspired him, help him.
Speaker 5: I can't even say I helped him. But she said
Speaker 5: two people we wanted to think. I mean, can you
Speaker 5: imagine that cycle yes, getting yes, getting heavy in here,
Speaker 5: I say this and I didn't touch on this. Got
Speaker 5: Remember who I've lost? I lost Teddy, I lost Phyllis,
Speaker 5: I lost Donny Hathaway. I work with these people.
Speaker 3: Man, measure your soul, measure like aunt may name side
Speaker 3: should be.
Speaker 8: And I'm so happy you not together.
Speaker 5: No such thing as bad for I'll tell you you love.
Speaker 4: What's up?
Speaker 5: So, like I tell you question, vocals is my thing.
Speaker 4: That's that's why I have power to you.
Speaker 6: Brother.
Speaker 4: I can barely get through this episode.
Speaker 5: Look, that's why. Look vocals, that's why we're talking. Man,
Speaker 5: that's that's extra. So you know how you know that line.
Speaker 5: There's no denying. Okay, now Phyllis's used to Okay, that's
Speaker 5: the take. I ain't. I'm like, no, man, it's good,
Speaker 5: but there's something we can get better. I think we
Speaker 5: took that note maybe about four or five times. I did.
Speaker 5: It's just something because I heard I was gonna put
Speaker 5: an extra reverb on it and let it just melt.
Speaker 5: And then when you listen to that mix, it just
Speaker 5: goes so after she finished it. Motherfucker's that it. That's
Speaker 5: a that's a classic story. A cat named David Nathan
Speaker 5: was there that night. He was right and just doing
Speaker 5: an article on Phyllis for Blues and Souls I think
Speaker 5: it was, and he talks about that moment, you know,
Speaker 5: and yeah, man, but that was phyllis. I loved it.
Speaker 5: I loved it. Now I'm gonna give you another story
Speaker 5: if you don't mind, y'all got your j'n.
Speaker 6: I got to make old man Roland hey Man keep going.
Speaker 5: Back together again.
Speaker 4: I don't know if we walked out here and we've
Speaker 4: been in the group chat Piers.
Speaker 5: We're working on that, Donny. Most people know, you know,
Speaker 5: had some mental challenges. You're emotional, and that night he
Speaker 5: was having he was struggling, you know, and he broke
Speaker 5: down and ran out the studio to the bathroom. So
Speaker 5: I go out of the control room and I opened
Speaker 5: the bathroom door. He's in the corner crying, I mean, sobbing.
Speaker 5: So I was like, oh my god. So I got
Speaker 5: I went down on the floor and kind of crawled
Speaker 5: up next to him. I said, brother, what's what's happening?
Speaker 5: He said to him, they trying to kill me. I said, who,
Speaker 5: He said, They're trying to kill me. They got my
Speaker 5: brain hooked up to a machine. Now I'm teared up.
Speaker 5: So I stayed in there with him for a few minutes.
Speaker 5: So I said, I'm gonna let him have his I said, look, Donnie,
Speaker 5: tell you what you when you feel like you're ready
Speaker 5: to take it, hit it, you know, just come on.
Speaker 5: So he came out. He tried it, and I knew
Speaker 5: he couldn't. I stopped the session. That was a Saturday night.
Speaker 5: I said, man, we just come back Monday, man, he said, tunes,
Speaker 5: I'll kill this. About five thirty that morning, phone rings,
Speaker 5: I pick up. Somebody's crying. I said, well, who's this?
Speaker 5: She said, this is Roberta. She said to him too,
Speaker 5: Donnie's dead. Wow, he jumped that night.
Speaker 6: Shit.
Speaker 5: So here's why I always emphasize that. Of everything I've
Speaker 5: been so fortunate to be involved with Back Together Again,
Speaker 5: it's the deepest piece. The last two songs that Donnie
Speaker 5: did Closer, I mean that were popular and Back Together Again.
Speaker 5: I had a part and this great artist, the last
Speaker 5: two songs he did I was involved with. What was
Speaker 5: so the vocal? What was the okay, just the trick.
Speaker 5: I'm telling you this, So Back Together Again wasn't finished.
Speaker 5: If you listen to this mix after I leave, Donnie
Speaker 5: only did the first uh no, the first yeah, the
Speaker 5: first release. We can uh make it better, try to
Speaker 5: make it.
Speaker 4: It got to be Wait, is it people.
Speaker 5: No, no, no, mess up, Yo, you're right here. Okay, listen.
Speaker 5: So back in the day, man, I mean, y'all have
Speaker 5: the advantage of technology. Wasn't no physically cut the tape
Speaker 5: with with with the razor blade. So what I did
Speaker 5: was make a copy of the first edited in the
Speaker 5: second time. That's the same performance. And if I didn't
Speaker 5: tell you that, you would have never known the other
Speaker 5: trick because he had died, we couldn't do it a tag.
Speaker 5: So when they come back, the only thing that's emphasized
Speaker 5: in the background the burden don't come back Donny, because
Speaker 5: I knew it would be stupid. So the whole tag,
Speaker 5: it is just the instrumental in the background being being manipulated.
Speaker 4: I would have.
Speaker 5: Never ever thought about that.
Speaker 4: Yo, how do we almost get this episode?
Speaker 5: And not a question? I just forgot that was did
Speaker 5: you do heavens? No?
Speaker 3: No?
Speaker 5: No, okay, okay, no, that that was wait before me.
Speaker 5: So just like I said, question, listen to that. And
Speaker 5: if I didn't tell you that, it just sounded like
Speaker 5: it was done.
Speaker 4: Like that, I mean without you being over analytical since
Speaker 4: since you kind of opened it. Because I know nothing
Speaker 4: about Donnie Hathaway as a person and that sort of thing.
Speaker 4: And I don't exactly as the greatest ever.
Speaker 5: And he hasn't been reduced to a footnote. There's not
Speaker 5: even a good documentary. Only he was every singer's favorite singer.
Speaker 4: Yeah, but yeah, I mean was he Was he a
Speaker 4: normal cat with a extraordinary voice? Was he an a
Speaker 4: centric cat?
Speaker 5: Well? Remember I meet him on the Closer. He had
Speaker 5: already had a couple of nervous breakdowns.
Speaker 4: I never knew none of that stuff.
Speaker 5: Yes, so here was the deep part. And then this
Speaker 5: is literally the first time I meet him. I'm at
Speaker 5: Roberta's apartment to come to Tombes. Come over and want
Speaker 5: you to meet Donnie. And we're talking. This is a
Speaker 5: literal thing. We're talking. He said tunes. Look at that gorilla,
Speaker 5: And I'm like, wow, how we gonna do a record?
Speaker 6: Okay?
Speaker 5: I sit down and played the song. He said, move over.
Speaker 5: I played it once he sat down, played the exact
Speaker 5: voicings of every quart. Then I realized he's a genius.
Speaker 5: He had photo that that thing. And then later I
Speaker 5: found out his roommate in at at Howard Leewill Hudson
Speaker 5: said he ran out and bought sketches in Spain when
Speaker 5: it came out, and then you had it, you know,
Speaker 5: we had the photograph. He played it down, he listened
Speaker 5: to it in one night. The next day he was
Speaker 5: playing all the cuts from sketches in Spain, so that's
Speaker 5: what he had. The communications was off when he said
Speaker 5: at the at the keyboard man or stepped in front
Speaker 5: of the mic. You heard it. You heard it. So
Speaker 5: I didn't know him other than that way.
Speaker 2: That's so interesting that both of them were mental illness.
Speaker 2: I was just saying Phyllis too. It's just interesting in
Speaker 2: two different kinds.
Speaker 5: Of Kenny called me when you know, when t when Phyllis,
Speaker 5: you know, took her life, and he told me she
Speaker 5: was obsessed with she was dated. She's all these young
Speaker 5: you know, she didn't think that the singers looked up
Speaker 5: to her, the m the Mary's and them.
Speaker 4: That's see it.
Speaker 7: It's funny you say that, cause I was just coming around,
Speaker 7: like learning who she was. Around the time that she passed.
Speaker 7: I think, don't wanna change the world, had just been
Speaker 7: a hit or whatever. So I was just getting into
Speaker 7: Phyllis and then like you know a few months later,
Speaker 7: I'm here, I'm gonna listen to the radio and they
Speaker 7: come over and saying, you know, singing philis Heimon is
Speaker 7: Yea is committed.
Speaker 5: You know, so we do it wasn't you know? I
Speaker 5: loved me? If you noticed there was never a second
Speaker 5: na to Maine Lucas production with Phyllis. Why was that?
Speaker 4: Clive?
Speaker 5: No, Clive was begging me, no, this is what happened.
Speaker 5: Clive was like, I took what I took the record
Speaker 5: to him and planning it for him. He spins around,
Speaker 5: and look, I respect Clive cause he's serious about the music.
Speaker 5: So he spins around and he's got back to us.
Speaker 5: You know. I give him the the the the dat
Speaker 5: to play listen to the whole album every song. He
Speaker 5: spins back around. He said, well, I'm too may me
Speaker 5: and registered he's he said, I'm too many personally, I'm
Speaker 5: a little disappointed. Alright, So so what I went through
Speaker 5: the mars, I don't care. I told him right there.
Speaker 5: I said, man, that's fine, I don't care. I said,
Speaker 5: I'll tell you what. This would be the biggest record
Speaker 5: she's ever had. The record comes out, it is out
Speaker 5: for two weeks. I'm let I'm at the crib. I
Speaker 5: get a call from Phyllis's manager. I forgot the brother's name.
Speaker 5: He's passed, but I knew him. He was a friend
Speaker 5: of Indugal's. He's the original cat that called me about Hey, man,
Speaker 5: maybe we can do he said. There was an interview
Speaker 5: that came out. He said, I'm calling you man because
Speaker 5: we cool. I don't want nobody else to tell you.
Speaker 5: I forgot the name of the magazine. He said, go
Speaker 5: get it. Phillis did an interview, man, and he said,
Speaker 5: and she's dogging you, I was saying, And I was like,
Speaker 5: so you know me. I jumped in the car, man,
Speaker 5: I shoot, go get it. I had to come over
Speaker 5: to New York. I didn't I get back to the crib.
Speaker 5: It was one of them things. The cat doing the
Speaker 5: interview was into I hate this. You know, he's doing
Speaker 5: this R and B. I expected more jazz, and Phillis
Speaker 5: kind of played into it. So yeah, yeah, yeah, I did.
Speaker 5: You know, but I too, May has his way, you know.
Speaker 5: I wanted to use my musicians and my background singers,
Speaker 5: but he has this system. Yeah, most people do, you know?
Speaker 5: And I read it, man, And I never was angry
Speaker 5: with Phillis. But what I knew was I couldn't do
Speaker 5: another record because I couldn't write for you. How can
Speaker 5: I write for you? And I know your original vibe is.
Speaker 6: You don't believe it. Yeah, you don't trust me.
Speaker 5: Fortunately about four weeks later. Okay, but what is the
Speaker 5: point I'm making? See, producers, you can always produce somebody else.
Speaker 5: An artist has to live on the successful failure of
Speaker 5: that record. That's how they work, that's how they get bookings.
Speaker 5: And I just knew I couldn't put my heart in it.
Speaker 5: So rather than do a BS record and look, it
Speaker 5: was some big paper on the table, it wasn't.
Speaker 4: It's just it so, I mean, not in retrospect, even
Speaker 4: after the fact that the records are proven hit. You know,
Speaker 4: you guys never spoke after that, like, hey, no, Phyllis
Speaker 4: called me. We got some magic, so should we?
Speaker 5: But okay, what's the magic? We did it? The magic
Speaker 5: was captured, but I know you didn't.
Speaker 4: Maybe she was just scared. See, well, that's that's what
Speaker 4: I'm want to ask. You were geniuses, and I know
Speaker 4: again we rarely put women in the genius category or whatever.
Speaker 4: We over use the word. But you know, artists are
Speaker 4: so troubled and you you, I mean you went through
Speaker 4: a slew of them, so I'm certain that to get
Speaker 4: the magic performance you got to observe them and their
Speaker 4: hanger onto the break room, whatever drug activity.
Speaker 5: First of all, on vocals, my rule was, there's nobody
Speaker 5: in this room. Nobody, because I tell you the vocal.
Speaker 5: When you're doing vocals, that's when the microscope and if
Speaker 5: if you singing and you're looking through that glass, you're performing.
Speaker 5: If people in there, you can't help it. I don't
Speaker 5: want to performance, I want to delivery. So nobody's ever
Speaker 5: allowed to be in there, so you don't have that
Speaker 5: distraction on vocals, makes sense, That's so that's that's the
Speaker 5: first time i' heard the scribe that way, because I've
Speaker 5: heard so many other producers say that they're trying to
Speaker 5: capture a performance. But I'm not trying to capture, man,
Speaker 5: I'm trying to deliver delivery, you know. C O D.
Speaker 4: There you go? Did we miss anything?
Speaker 5: Now?
Speaker 4: Now I'm afraid to wrap it up because okay, so
Speaker 4: was it true that Wrigley tried to come after you?
Speaker 5: Yeah, they want to sue me. Wait what juicy fruit?
Speaker 4: So wait, how did time out? How did you know
Speaker 4: about this from your.
Speaker 5: In Japan. I think it's the first time I mentioned
Speaker 5: it public because I said, I don't there's not a
Speaker 5: lot of take don't tape the stuff of me. So
Speaker 5: I get a call, big big law firm represented Wriggleyes.
Speaker 5: So I gotta go up.
Speaker 2: Man.
Speaker 5: I walk in this room. Man the table as long
Speaker 5: as this block, I mean, lawyers on both sides. So
Speaker 5: they going through. They got the album cover, they're going
Speaker 5: through all this. So they start questioning me, and you
Speaker 5: showed up with no no lawyer. I didn't need nothing
Speaker 5: cause I knew WHEREY was gonna go and I had
Speaker 5: check made it. I knew where I was going. Uh so,
Speaker 5: because I knew ultimately it was gonna get to mister
Speaker 5: to me, what do you mean when you say you
Speaker 5: can lick me everywhere? I said, well, obviously it's not
Speaker 5: about gum. I said, it's about all sex. I ain't
Speaker 5: never seen some of red faces in my life. That
Speaker 5: was the end of the interview for me. It was like, okay, okay,
Speaker 5: please leave. You know, but I understood where they was
Speaker 5: going and I knew I just knew what they was
Speaker 5: gonna say. But it ain't know, you know, and that
Speaker 5: I hate to even keep talking about that line, but
Speaker 5: y'all have no idea d how crazy it was. We
Speaker 5: couldn't even cut the video. They made me yes, And
Speaker 5: I hated that because Epic was just so scared of that.
Speaker 5: And at that time, one of the things I was
Speaker 5: proud of we as far as single sales, we were
Speaker 5: doing what Michael was doing with that record, and that
Speaker 5: record really never crossed over to pop and my my
Speaker 5: thing is man. And remember that was also the beginning
Speaker 5: of black videos where you had to People will tell
Speaker 5: you had to take them some of the blackout and
Speaker 5: I never did that. And when we did, you mean,
Speaker 5: you mean he turn that off of here?
Speaker 3: Right?
Speaker 5: We go? Okay, I go through the struggles of hiring
Speaker 5: a black production team to do you mean he we
Speaker 5: walk out on the set the first day we flew
Speaker 5: out to California to do it. In the audience, it's
Speaker 5: eighty five percent white people couples and about fifteen percent
Speaker 5: black couples. I said, look, man, I got to be
Speaker 5: honest to my audience. I said, you don't see Bruce
Speaker 5: Springsteen singing, you know, brother, you know eighty five percent?
Speaker 5: I said, be honest to your audience. And so I said, man,
Speaker 5: we gotta shoot do it tomorrow. The cat said no, Man,
Speaker 5: well you know, I said, well, I'll pay for it.
Speaker 5: We ain't do it. I'm not doing this to the
Speaker 5: people that loved our music. So we never did that.
Speaker 5: I watched a lot of groups to try to get
Speaker 5: on MTV, and only other voice that was out there
Speaker 5: with that was Rick James. MTV wouldn't play any black
Speaker 5: videos until you know the famous thing when the Epics
Speaker 5: Sony said they pull all their videos if they didn't
Speaker 5: play Billy Jean. That's how crazy it was. But I
Speaker 5: saw a lot of cats. The music got real square.
Speaker 4: You tell the truth. Because back when, like I used
Speaker 4: to be really addicted to Lee Bailey's radio score letscope, Yeah,
Speaker 4: and uh, I remember there really being a man just
Speaker 4: like an instant backlash of like when Cameo really started
Speaker 4: to get their.
Speaker 6: Pop shit on word up and.
Speaker 4: Especially with the Candy video, Like people were calling Lee
Speaker 4: Bailey complaining like, how come no brothers, how come little
Speaker 4: sisters in these videos?
Speaker 5: And oh no, that was a no no, that was
Speaker 5: a no no. Now. Look and I'll tell you that now,
Speaker 5: Juicy Fruit, there was barely any black videos. The only
Speaker 5: place I saw black videos was what's the Brother Ralph? Yeah,
Speaker 5: and you had to have that was Channel Video thirty one.
Speaker 5: But when we did Juicy Flu, we was on tour.
Speaker 5: We flew in cut that like a d a day
Speaker 5: and I wasn't into the complexion. That didn't matter, and
Speaker 5: it's it's just like non racial looking a woman. And
Speaker 5: I said, well, okay, what we're doing this video? Boom?
Speaker 5: Then I noticed that was really what started being And
Speaker 5: my daughter came to me, Benian, my youngest daughter, she
Speaker 5: was about five or six. One day she said, Baba,
Speaker 5: you know that's father. And she said, I guess I
Speaker 5: can't be in no videos because she's chocolate. And she
Speaker 5: was referring to a prince. She said, everything I see, well, no, no,
Speaker 5: I'm not saying no, you ain't right, but I mean
Speaker 5: I'm saying that became the thing for this bullshit they
Speaker 5: call crossover. I said, this is bullshit crossover and can't
Speaker 5: get black. That's what's happening here. It ain't getting back.
Speaker 5: You can't get black because why do blacks have to
Speaker 5: always cross over? I mean, I said, you don't ask
Speaker 5: the Rolling Stones man, you know, they got to do funk.
Speaker 5: Although they were funky, but all that onus was on
Speaker 5: us and I spoke out on it and it was like,
Speaker 5: oh man, this cat is out. No, it wasn't, Dad.
Speaker 5: This is the truth. This is the truth, the truth.
Speaker 5: And so you mean he obviously there's a brown skinned
Speaker 5: woman in the lead. And I did that on purpose
Speaker 5: and it was awful because a lot of young sisters
Speaker 5: got messed up. And I helped Nelson did a book
Speaker 5: called The Deaths of Rhythm and Blues, and uh, I
Speaker 5: was you know, we were talking a lot during that time.
Speaker 5: Videos helped kill arm b man, not kill it, you know, literally,
Speaker 5: but it was like the visual became on in the audience.
Speaker 5: You know, I said, man, so, so what slid Stone
Speaker 5: and how he looked al green, how he looked No,
Speaker 5: it's how they made us feel. Then it became your
Speaker 5: brand and I got a thing with that. It's funny
Speaker 5: you mentioned that because the thing that I remember the
Speaker 5: most as a kid, because usually fruit came out. I
Speaker 5: think I was like eighty four eighty, so I was four,
Speaker 5: So I remember that record and the thing I can
Speaker 5: remember was the braids and like the on the braids
Speaker 5: and how the thing I was I was looking at
Speaker 5: I was like, man, they ain't got Jerry Curls was
Speaker 5: like yo, I was like, I'm fucking with this already.
Speaker 5: It was so funny man, because they played us, they
Speaker 5: played us in the movie Biggie movie. Oh it was
Speaker 5: Rick James looking. I said, I bit that, but that
Speaker 5: was like a rough because Duatha called me when she saw.
Speaker 4: So being as being as though I guess some almost
Speaker 4: twenty plus, almost twenty five years later, Uh, the aftermath
Speaker 4: of Juicy and what it's meant to the hip hop generation.
Speaker 4: Whereas now you know, people hear Biggie's voice yeah, as
Speaker 4: the default version before they even think of the original.
Speaker 5: Didn't know most of them didn't even know the original.
Speaker 4: Right, So with Uh, as many times as that song
Speaker 4: has been interpolated and sampled, is it at least the
Speaker 4: the I know, the myth of the I'm always hearing
Speaker 4: these guys on doing interviews or whatever, like Steely Dan
Speaker 4: might make a joke about like that sort of thing.
Speaker 4: Is it is? And I'm not exact figure whatever, but
Speaker 4: is the myth true of like, hey, just one great
Speaker 4: hit that's used by the Juicy has been the least
Speaker 4: using ninety maybe a hundred plus Yeah.
Speaker 5: My favorite version was Akisha Coles missing Yeah, let it go, yo, man,
Speaker 5: I don't know the playing, but I should will on you.
Speaker 8: I don't want you men? How n the stand by
Speaker 8: you stay home mad? I can't explain many times I trush,
Speaker 8: how many times I crashed thinking about mine wings, couldn't
Speaker 8: get it down.
Speaker 9: Someone in love compound don't want love you the right
Speaker 9: way anyways?
Speaker 4: So do you have to for each time that song's
Speaker 4: do you have to determine the percentage that you wanted
Speaker 4: that song?
Speaker 2: Like?
Speaker 4: Whereas okay, if.
Speaker 5: Depended you know what depended on how much of it
Speaker 5: they use? The thing that was interesting about Juicy, Like
Speaker 5: I said when I wrote it, the beat wasn't the
Speaker 5: main thing, but if you think about it, it's probably
Speaker 5: the most identifiable beat in R and B.
Speaker 6: My favorite use of it was one guy.
Speaker 5: Yeah God, that was That was That was the That
Speaker 5: was the first version, I mean the first time.
Speaker 4: That it was sample was twice right, because he used
Speaker 4: it twice on that you see. Matter of fact, he
Speaker 4: was a three times twice? Isn't this dj? Oh my god?
Speaker 4: He used to three times on the album.
Speaker 5: This DJ was a different This DJ was twice on
Speaker 5: that first. Oh yeah he did, okay, yeah, okay, welcome
Speaker 5: for the uh like the West Coast really taking it
Speaker 5: the West Coast really, I always felt the West Coast
Speaker 5: hip hop was funk. Yeah, you're more so than the East.
Speaker 4: He just more jazz, yeah yeah, and more fun.
Speaker 5: And so they vibed right away. And I always think,
Speaker 5: young people, this is how I found out that I
Speaker 5: think we had something with Juicy. I'm I'm sitting at
Speaker 5: the create a cat named Scott Folks who helped them
Speaker 5: the remix twelve inches and back then twelve inch meant
Speaker 5: you're still using the original, you ain't bringing the other
Speaker 5: or redoing it, and yeah, you just is extended. And
Speaker 5: he said, Man, Tunes, I want you to come with
Speaker 5: me to this club up in the Bronx. It was
Speaker 5: with grand Master Spunk, the first hip hop club, the Roxy.
Speaker 5: So he said, man, can you come this weekend? I
Speaker 5: said yeah, Man, he said, I'm gonna come and pick
Speaker 5: you up. I said, but you want to be ready
Speaker 5: around ten He said no.
Speaker 4: Round three.
Speaker 5: He said, man, I'm gonna take you. Man. He said, man,
Speaker 5: they spend Juicy around four thirty. I want you to
Speaker 5: see the hip hop generation's response to it. I never
Speaker 5: thought that you could dance the juicy or just and
Speaker 5: the floor just And I said, it's just that you
Speaker 5: write something.
Speaker 4: He was making a ballot.
Speaker 5: No, I thought I was making this.
Speaker 4: It's kind of a chill out.
Speaker 5: Yeah it's a barberie you see. Yeah, this late, But
Speaker 5: I'm into these chords.
Speaker 4: Right in your head? Is Juicy a ballot with some
Speaker 4: behind it?
Speaker 5: No, it's it's my, it's it's it's my. It's my
Speaker 5: speed zone, mid temple fi, mid tempo funk.
Speaker 4: But as you're creating it, are you you're just thinking like, Okay,
Speaker 4: there's some filler on the album.
Speaker 5: Or no, Like we had finished the album. The album
Speaker 5: was done. I had cut this, all the songs. I said.
Speaker 5: What happened was that night everybody went back home. I
Speaker 5: called everybody back up. After I laid that. Somebody came
Speaker 5: back about one o'clock in the morning. We cut that
Speaker 5: cut it that night.
Speaker 4: Literally.
Speaker 5: One thing, one rule I have when I'm writing, whatever
Speaker 5: hook that comes to my head, that's always the first hook.
Speaker 5: That's the hook. And I'm listening back as we laid it,
Speaker 5: I said, Juicy, sometimes what I like to do now
Speaker 5: that record, Twatha was on tour. Was still with U
Speaker 5: Roxy Music.
Speaker 6: Oh wow.
Speaker 5: She was in Europe, damn. So we had a couple
Speaker 5: of days off some fluor back from uh London. So
Speaker 5: we cut the vocals that night. I'm writing a verse
Speaker 5: as she's performing, like the first verse. So she's performing
Speaker 5: it and I'm writing the second verse. I said, I
Speaker 5: wanted to put some pressure on myself. I wrote the
Speaker 5: lyrics literally that night while she's singing, h we you know,
Speaker 5: we wrapped it up. She flew back, you know, and
Speaker 5: you know is that you uh? Is that your voice?
Speaker 5: I needed?
Speaker 4: Girl?
Speaker 5: We had so much. If you notice, I would do
Speaker 5: these little outtakes like when you me and he it's
Speaker 5: the monogamy mix.
Speaker 4: Uh, just to reiterate, yeah.
Speaker 5: So we just let that do do do bitter, but
Speaker 5: do do do? I said, look, man, let's just go
Speaker 5: in and just freestyle like we're talking.
Speaker 8: You know.
Speaker 4: Well uh.
Speaker 5: Oh man, Look, I just want to thank this is
Speaker 5: such I want to thank y'all so much. This has
Speaker 5: been This is this is.
Speaker 4: Layer layers upon layers upon layers of wisdom that you've
Speaker 4: given us.
Speaker 5: And well that was given to me. I ain't got nothing, man,
Speaker 5: You're challenged, but I'm challenging. Man, look all the cats
Speaker 5: that was blessed to be around.
Speaker 4: Man Fronte, what did you learn today?
Speaker 2: Bro?
Speaker 5: Oh my god, he's like a walking sage. It's so
Speaker 5: much like so much game. Like I hope people like
Speaker 5: really listen to this interview. And it's not even it's
Speaker 5: I mean, you're talking music, but it applies just to
Speaker 5: life life, you know what I mean. Like, it's not even,
Speaker 5: it just applies to so many things. I'm just listening to. Yeah, Man,
Speaker 5: just thank you, just thank you for the music.
Speaker 4: I grew up on your music.
Speaker 6: I've been a lifetime longtime fans.
Speaker 5: You know, and thank you. And like I said, man,
Speaker 5: it just needs to be more of this exchange of
Speaker 5: generational information.
Speaker 4: Man on pay Bill, what did you learn this episode?
Speaker 4: I would say for an atheist, that was very religious
Speaker 4: experience I learned. Are you ready?
Speaker 5: Yeah? Stop playing what you know, play what you don't know?
Speaker 4: Simplexity, Yeah, Webster's lookout, no leaning right now. We got
Speaker 4: half a glass of music, which I love. And every
Speaker 4: height is a nursery rhyme, which is my fucking life. Literally,
Speaker 4: Uh I remember your name?
Speaker 10: Yeah, I reiterate with both of both of them. Said,
Speaker 10: and the successful transition from jazz to R and B
Speaker 10: the natural transition at.
Speaker 6: That exact moment, uh, you know.
Speaker 10: Unforced because you see a lot of bands and artists
Speaker 10: try and keep up with the time so forth. But
Speaker 10: it seemed like you were at the right age, maybe
Speaker 10: at the right time, with the right amount of experience
Speaker 10: to do it legitimately, to do R and B with
Speaker 10: with real musicality and with with jazz in it.
Speaker 6: So yeah, that's pretty cool.
Speaker 4: Boss, Bill. W did you learn today?
Speaker 6: Man?
Speaker 7: I learned that so many great moments in music history
Speaker 7: you just seem to happen is afterthoughts, Like you know,
Speaker 7: Juicy Fruit, which is I was telling the mirror before
Speaker 7: we started. It's one of the first songs I ever
Speaker 7: remember hearing as a kid like that an Atomic Dogs.
Speaker 7: So who knows, that's probably why I turned out the
Speaker 7: way I did. But yeah, it just seems like it's
Speaker 7: it's fascinating how like we hear all these stories about
Speaker 7: these songs and these these these moments that we we've
Speaker 7: kind of come to to fetishize, you know, in our lives,
Speaker 7: and it just turns out they were just kind of
Speaker 7: throwaway moments in most people's lives.
Speaker 4: You weren't really thinking about it. You just did it.
Speaker 7: And you went on with it and changed the change
Speaker 7: the world. So I think that's something that's that's good
Speaker 7: to always keep keep in mind, is you know, you
Speaker 7: never really know what you're doing until after you've done it.
Speaker 5: And the people, the people de tming that. You know,
Speaker 5: music don't come from you, it comes through you. You know.
Speaker 5: I always equated, like you're watching the television, those images
Speaker 5: are not coming from that box. It's the signals that
Speaker 5: that box is picking up. So I never was challenged
Speaker 5: with the ego thing. And plus, man, look who I
Speaker 5: played with? How dare I even think? Look, I ain't
Speaker 5: did nothing, man, compared to the cats that raised me. Man,
Speaker 5: then that's how you got to look at it. I
Speaker 5: see cats get a hit and trip, and if you know,
Speaker 5: if you don't put the work in, the worst thing
Speaker 5: in the world is a one hit wonder. Because you
Speaker 5: get a hit, you don't know how to get back there,
Speaker 5: because you ain't got no railroad tracks.
Speaker 2: Damn everybody to go back and listen to this episode
Speaker 2: A creative process, intuition into technique and everything. Just coffee table.
Speaker 5: One last story, Yes, real quick one more story, one
Speaker 5: more story, because I just thought about this while y'all
Speaker 5: were talking, and I appreciate everything y'all said, Man, I
Speaker 5: really do. How many songs could get lost? The close
Speaker 5: I Get to You? Roberta invites me over to the
Speaker 5: listening session. I'm an urticant is there. I'm sitting on
Speaker 5: the couch, you know, and I'm just nobody, you know.
Speaker 5: He listens to the whole album. It's the President of Atlantic,
Speaker 5: true honest to God's story. He says, I love everything,
Speaker 5: but the closes I Get to You. To this day,
Speaker 5: I always thank Roberta because she rumbled. I heard it.
Speaker 5: They went out in the hallway, it got loud. To
Speaker 5: keep it on the album? He wanted to take it off.
Speaker 5: He said, I'll never forget. When he came back, he said,
Speaker 5: it's boring and repetious. Okay, So he comes back in
Speaker 5: and says, all right, we'll keep it on, but it's
Speaker 5: never be a single. Name me the first single off
Speaker 5: that album close Close, No, No, it wasn't the first thing.
Speaker 4: Oh that's what it is.
Speaker 5: It was first single still deep.
Speaker 4: No, you can't you've heard this point technically, Tell me
Speaker 4: what was the first song.
Speaker 5: I don't even remember. Yeah, I think in real life
Speaker 5: you can look this up right now. I think it
Speaker 5: was something called the twenty fourth of December. Oh yeah,
Speaker 5: and I said that'll be over on the twenty fifth.
Speaker 4: That is the correct answer.
Speaker 5: So so the album back then, you know, the album
Speaker 5: comes like six or seven weeks after the first single.
Speaker 5: When the album dropped, the DJ's demanded close.
Speaker 2: Get this man a star on the Philly Walker fang.
Speaker 5: That's another thing.
Speaker 4: Yeah, that's oh yeah. I was going to say that
Speaker 4: I learned that you're from Philadelphia and nobody knows. Most
Speaker 4: Philadelphians don't know you're from Philadelphia.
Speaker 5: Do you think that is because you're quiet? I will absolutely.
Speaker 6: Make sure we got to talk about the connection with Jesus.
Speaker 4: I forgot. I was gonna say his career.
Speaker 6: Just put that right over there.
Speaker 5: That's good, that's good.
Speaker 4: I was gonna say, we we didn't talk about the
Speaker 4: career in Radio two.
Speaker 5: Uh well real quick Bloud uh my sun Fire and
Speaker 5: uh and dmu uh we're managing be Loud. I met
Speaker 5: be Loud, it brought him to the house. They had
Speaker 5: the demo for the first album, and I listened to
Speaker 5: it and I and he and I talked. He came
Speaker 5: in the basement and we were talking. I said, man,
Speaker 5: why do you have harmonies on every line? I said,
Speaker 5: if you do that, I can't. I don't know what
Speaker 5: the hook is. I said, your hook has got to
Speaker 5: be I said, you're not comfortable singing and you know
Speaker 5: what you because he had harmonies on everything. So we
Speaker 5: talked and then uh they had cut uh soul system,
Speaker 5: so uh fire came to me and UH said, look bye, Byn.
Speaker 5: You know there was no melody, the hook was already there.
Speaker 5: Uh you must be bye. But that do do do
Speaker 5: do do do do do do do do do do
Speaker 5: do do do do do do So I put put
Speaker 5: the melody on that and that was this great experience.
Speaker 5: He's he's a monster. He's a monster, and.
Speaker 4: Shout out the quest loving the video.
Speaker 5: You know, yeah, how I cut How I cut vocals? Slyestone,
Speaker 5: Slidestone showed me something. He lived with me for about
Speaker 5: six months and.
Speaker 4: We wait, wait, wait, and like I'm going to four hour.
Speaker 4: How does slid Stone wind up in your house? And
Speaker 4: we've heard many on this show. How do you want?
Speaker 5: Slidestone? And I cut some tracks? I have what year.
Speaker 4: Like eighty five, eighty four.
Speaker 5: No, no No. After that we also co produced a
Speaker 5: couple of tracks on a track on the Barcade called
Speaker 5: just like a Teeto Tatter. Oh man, we gotta get
Speaker 5: called me. One day I was at the crib and
Speaker 5: a differend of mine, uh called me, uh Tyrone Brunson.
Speaker 4: He did the sur Yes is he from Philly?
Speaker 5: No, he's from DC. And Tyrone he was out somewhere
Speaker 5: and he said, man, look, man, I'm here with Slidestone.
Speaker 5: He wants to know can he talk? You know, would
Speaker 5: you talk to him? So slide gets on the phone.
Speaker 5: He said, man, I help. I heard that. You know
Speaker 5: you you cool, you know, but you know you have
Speaker 5: cats talk. He said, man, can I come out and
Speaker 5: holler with you? Man? I said, cool? So I send
Speaker 5: him a ticket, oh boy, and he came and uh.
Speaker 5: He stayed with me for about six months and we
Speaker 5: went in the studio. Absolute genius.
Speaker 2: Like on a roommate basis.
Speaker 5: I have a house. We were in a roomy he
Speaker 5: you know, Oh, I'm sorry you had a large well no, no, no, no,
Speaker 5: I don't have no mansion. That's that's that's for Hollywood.
Speaker 5: But uh, but large enough. Yeah, yeah. And then uh,
Speaker 5: but I got a chance to see Funk genius and
Speaker 5: he came to me. He said, Man, cause I want
Speaker 5: you to show me them cards. He called him blankets.
Speaker 5: He said, you play blankets, Slide and Miles was gonna
Speaker 5: do something when I'm this is when I'm with Miles
Speaker 5: on the Uh. And then Slide told me when he
Speaker 5: came to say, he said, I was gonna do it.
Speaker 5: He said, but then I got scared. He said it
Speaker 5: was Miles. He said, but now I'm getting a chance
Speaker 5: to work with you. So he said, like it's kind
Speaker 5: of you know, So I would show him these chords
Speaker 5: and he showed me more about Funk than I could
Speaker 5: have ever learned. So, like I said, I always say, man,
Speaker 5: I'm just channeling. This cat worked twenty seven hours a day. Man.
Speaker 5: He had a little cassio and he was making songs.
Speaker 5: We cut about four demos and I haven't.
Speaker 2: When's the last time you spoke to him?
Speaker 5: I think Slide called me about eight years ago. I
Speaker 5: have been talked to him. So were you and Twatha?
Speaker 5: Were y'all ever married or romantic? Anything goes you know, Okay,
Speaker 5: I'm not going in them houses.
Speaker 4: Man, Wait when you mentioned the Marquees. Yeah, when did
Speaker 4: you work with them?
Speaker 5: That was eighty nine on the Animal album Just cat
Speaker 5: here man scary, just like I got the Internet. I see,
Speaker 5: I'm old. I'm not ancient, just like a Teeto title. Man,
Speaker 5: it's a funky jam. Matter of fact, when Angelo Dangelo
Speaker 5: called me.
Speaker 4: It's probably his song, yo, he I was like, wait,
Speaker 4: did you even.
Speaker 5: Find he will? But it's fun if you have a
Speaker 5: play it, man, just.
Speaker 4: He will know? All right? Is there any artists that
Speaker 4: almost was and didn't happen that we I don't want
Speaker 4: to close.
Speaker 5: I know we're going to close your book.
Speaker 4: Who did you work with that didn't happen, almost happened,
Speaker 4: could have happened.
Speaker 5: No, that's a great question though, because when I stopped,
Speaker 5: did you reject an artist?
Speaker 4: Did someone come to you and say, hey, I want
Speaker 4: you to reduce it and you were like, I'm good. I
Speaker 4: never sha.
Speaker 5: And I don't mean like in the new I'm talking,
Speaker 5: Oh my god, lucor.
Speaker 4: What here we go?
Speaker 5: Oh my god? Yeah.
Speaker 7: I try to put I try to put that out
Speaker 7: of memory to that if I did that.
Speaker 5: I met Luther through to Watfa. Yeah, singing on he's
Speaker 5: doing backgrounds on uh giving on up that album. I
Speaker 5: think with that second album, searched the Rainbow that assault Yeah,
Speaker 5: damn of course voice okay, yes. Lutheror also put the
Speaker 5: backgrounds on do Do Yes, that's Lucor. Lucor also sang
Speaker 5: on that it's searched in the Rainbow Seekers. There's a
Speaker 5: song on there. Oh man, he put it, he put
Speaker 5: so Luther comes to me, we gotta deal with Warner Brothers.
Speaker 5: There was a singer named Marxi Dan. How do you
Speaker 5: know that that's that's to do that with to Watha right,
Speaker 5: but it's on that album. Yeah, yeah, but mark the day.
Speaker 5: So Luther wants like, yo, man, what I want you
Speaker 5: to I was like, no, because I'm doing this. But
Speaker 5: you know, you don't you never think because if I
Speaker 5: had done him, that doesn't mean it would have been
Speaker 5: the same result it was. It happened like it's supposed
Speaker 5: to happen. Yeah, but Luther, thank you keV.
Speaker 4: I mean what period like when he first got signed
Speaker 4: first album. Damn, so it could have been you instead
Speaker 4: of Marcus Miller Hawkins Villa.
Speaker 5: He's the first album is singing on She sang on
Speaker 5: every Lucier song. I mean every album.
Speaker 4: Yes she is.
Speaker 6: She's out with Dave Matthews now right, she.
Speaker 4: Used to be.
Speaker 5: No, man, let's not even go there. Man, Look no,
Speaker 5: I mean in jest. She has been with everybody.
Speaker 4: Dude, she's been. I've played with her three times and she.
Speaker 5: Told me to mention it didn't y'all stopped calling.
Speaker 4: I didn't realize until Lenny brought her back.
Speaker 5: She told me what she's like.
Speaker 4: You just noticed me.
Speaker 5: Now I've been here. She told me. When you first met,
Speaker 5: when she told you her name, you said yo and
Speaker 5: embrace it and told the cats she was like.
Speaker 2: Was she happy?
Speaker 5: Look? And you talk about her history? Lenny Kravitz, Stilly Dan,
Speaker 5: Dave Matthews, David Bowie, Resa Franklin.
Speaker 4: Where's she originally from?
Speaker 5: That's how we met. She was in the in the
Speaker 5: group Hot Tea and There Way to Howard. So I
Speaker 5: was living you know, I was living in North So
Speaker 5: I said his number. So when you finished, give me
Speaker 5: a call. She graduates, comes back and we're starting to
Speaker 5: get a couple of little things happening to me and Reggie,
Speaker 5: and she comes back and we get to Stephanie album.
Speaker 5: So she was vocal contractor on every every record.
Speaker 6: That's amazing.
Speaker 5: You need it, man's amazing. That's a history you really
Speaker 5: need to know. Well, because background singing is an art
Speaker 5: form that's getting lost to.
Speaker 4: Actually going to see her in four days. So I
Speaker 4: will I shall be stalking. Okay, yeah, I'm so afraid
Speaker 4: the end of this episode.
Speaker 5: That's a great word.
Speaker 4: We got to lose the stories we got.
Speaker 5: That was cav Thank you. I forgot Luke.
Speaker 4: Okay, all right, I learned everything all the things. Yeah,
Speaker 4: you're from Philly, and I learned that Philly doesn't know
Speaker 4: that you're from Philly.
Speaker 5: That's crazy, man.
Speaker 4: But we'll be at the Walk of Fame induction whatever
Speaker 4: to get you.
Speaker 5: Yeah, yes, okay, well, well you know, if it happens cool,
Speaker 5: if you don't, it will definitely have good.
Speaker 4: I'm good it will happen. We thank you for coming
Speaker 4: and sharing everything. Thank you so much for me having
Speaker 4: Sugar Steve and I'm paid Bill, and I'm Boss Bill,
Speaker 4: new Boss Bill. I'm Boss Bill. I don't know anyway,
Speaker 4: Like it's like in fant Ticcolo and Quest Love and
Speaker 4: James and Too May. We will see you on the
Speaker 4: next go round of whats Love Supreme?
Speaker 1: West Love Supreme is a production of iHeartRadio. This classic
Speaker 1: episode was produced by the.
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