Speaker 1: Pushkin, Kenny, Babyface, Edmunds is a pillar of R and B.
Speaker 1: His discography is vast and varied, and in my opinion,
Speaker 1: he's one of the greatest songwriters of all time. And
Speaker 1: as a producer, he knows how to get the most
Speaker 1: natural vocal performances from the best singers. I'm talking powerhouse
Speaker 1: vocalists like Aretha Franklin, Whitney Houston, Beyonce, Ariana Grande, and
Speaker 1: Stevie Wonder. As a label owner, Babyface created the Face
Speaker 1: Records in the late eighties with famed record exec La Reid. Together,
Speaker 1: they went on to release classic albums from Outcast, TLC
Speaker 1: and Usher, among others. Although Babyface's career is most often
Speaker 1: associated with pop and R and B hits, he started
Speaker 1: writing songs in the singer songwriter tradition, pulling from influences
Speaker 1: as surprising as James Taylor in The Beatles. He taught
Speaker 1: himself guitar in sixth grade and started writing songs about
Speaker 1: young love and heartbreak. Many of those experiences served as
Speaker 1: inspiration for the hundreds of songs he's written since. On
Speaker 1: today's episode, I talked to Babyface about those early childhood memories,
Speaker 1: and he plays a song he wrote in high school
Speaker 1: that he considers to be the best song he's ever written,
Speaker 1: and it's never been released. He also talks about how
Speaker 1: Bootsy Collins christened him Babyface and how his nickname made
Speaker 1: female fans flock to him at the end of shows.
Speaker 1: He also reveals how he was on the verge of
Speaker 1: making a new album with Whitney Houston just a month
Speaker 1: before she died. This is broken record liner notes for
Speaker 1: the Digital Age. I'm justin Mitchman. Here's my conversation with
Speaker 1: the Babyface from the Village Studios in La. How long
Speaker 1: you've been playing guitar?
Speaker 2: I started playing when I was in sixth grade, picked
Speaker 2: it up. It was my most my brother's guitar, but
Speaker 2: it was he had a little a band that he
Speaker 2: was saying, and so the guitar player let him music
Speaker 2: acoustic guitar. Brought it to the house and told us
Speaker 2: not to touch it.
Speaker 1: Out of that gos, I touched it. Anytime you tell
Speaker 1: someone don't touch So it's a long time to do
Speaker 1: with my kids. Don't touch the panel, don't touch the guitar.
Speaker 3: Yeah, don't ever, that's a good idea.
Speaker 1: How impactful you your older brothers on your music sensibility.
Speaker 2: One brother in particular, Melvin, He was impactful in the
Speaker 2: sense that he brought in that guitar. He also was
Speaker 2: in a band Caught the Soul Innovations, and he was
Speaker 2: like the front man, and it was it was just
Speaker 2: incredible to watching him. He had a great voice, and
Speaker 2: I think that's that clearly made me think that maybe
Speaker 2: I could do something like that. You know, yeah, I
Speaker 2: wasn't sure though.
Speaker 1: What was it like seeing him perform?
Speaker 2: It was great because he was a great performer and
Speaker 2: he was like he could sing, but also and at
Speaker 2: the time, this is like sixty nine seventy, this is
Speaker 2: like when James Brown is hot and the Temptations that everybody,
Speaker 2: so you had to sing as well as you had
Speaker 2: to also be able to scream and dance like James Brown.
Speaker 3: So he used to do all of that.
Speaker 2: And it was pretty incredible to watch to see that,
Speaker 2: and ultimately he ended up joining group after seven. And
Speaker 2: it's funny when I think of who he wasn't after
Speaker 2: seven the post to who he was as a kid,
Speaker 2: because he had so much more energy and just dancing
Speaker 2: and everything as a kid. So it's interesting.
Speaker 1: What do you think the evolution was for him from
Speaker 1: fiery James Brown kind of it's interesting.
Speaker 3: I think he did it really well.
Speaker 2: But then there was some other people in the neighborhood,
Speaker 2: this guy named Alvin Omanson who is really good at
Speaker 2: James Brown. So they used to kind of spar off
Speaker 2: at each other, and I beat him one day, so
Speaker 2: I think he decided I'm just gonna singh So doing
Speaker 2: them splits that wasn't easy.
Speaker 1: Yeah, was it a competitive thing with you guys? Like
Speaker 1: when you saw was it was it like I want
Speaker 1: to I want to do that, but better?
Speaker 2: It was never competitive to me. I always thought that
Speaker 2: he had the better voice. I always thought my brother
Speaker 2: Kevan had the better voice. I was always just kind
Speaker 2: of like songwriter and and just you know whatever, if
Speaker 2: I can make my song sound good, And I was
Speaker 2: always easy, comfortable to be in the back, so it
Speaker 2: was I didn't have to take the lead. So in
Speaker 2: that sense, I never competed.
Speaker 1: What was one of the earliest songs you you loved?
Speaker 2: I think one of my first memories, uh, I remember
Speaker 2: in sixth grade there was I mean, obviously I love
Speaker 2: the Jackson five when they came out, but I also
Speaker 2: was loved Smoking Robinson the Miracles, and as a matter
Speaker 2: of fact, one of the first songs I sang in
Speaker 2: front of a class, I sing two songs, this song
Speaker 2: I'm a Girl Watcher and Smoking Robinson is here I
Speaker 2: Go Again. And me and like three other guys, we
Speaker 2: created a little singing group and sing in front of
Speaker 2: our class in sixth grade. And that was also the
Speaker 2: same year that I between sixth and seventh grade, when
Speaker 2: I sang for my brother's band.
Speaker 3: They had an event at.
Speaker 2: My high school, one of those mixers, and they needed
Speaker 2: somebody to sing of Michael Jackson songs. So my brother
Speaker 2: auditioned myself and my brother.
Speaker 3: Kevin, and I won. I don't know how I won.
Speaker 3: I won, And then you.
Speaker 2: Know, I sang Who's Loving You in front of this crowd.
Speaker 2: And that's and the thing that's what's always funny. I
Speaker 2: can remember for the longest time when I would hear
Speaker 2: I Want You Back, because that's the music that they
Speaker 2: would play as I walked on the stage, and I
Speaker 2: get so nervous just the thought of hearing that and
Speaker 2: to walk up on that stage, I just be I
Speaker 2: turned to mess, my heart beat beating hard, and every
Speaker 2: now and then when I hear it done good to
Speaker 2: do it could still get me just a little bit
Speaker 2: to this day.
Speaker 1: Really, Yeah, that's one of the most joyous songs of
Speaker 1: all time.
Speaker 3: Oh showtime.
Speaker 1: Do you think do you think you've ever gotten over
Speaker 1: that sort of I don't know if it's stage fright or.
Speaker 3: I think not.
Speaker 2: I think it's an interesting thing, those stage fright and
Speaker 2: those triggers, those things that make you that you can't control.
Speaker 2: And I think ultimately I thought I learned how to
Speaker 2: control it. And then a few years ago I did
Speaker 2: Dancing with the Stars, and I found myself right back
Speaker 2: in that same place where I couldn't get rid of
Speaker 2: the nerves.
Speaker 3: Yeah, you know.
Speaker 2: And then for the longest time, to this day, there's
Speaker 2: a song that we did. I did a remix of
Speaker 2: the X Fi House theme, and so now when I
Speaker 2: hear X Files, I get a little.
Speaker 1: That song has been kicking my ass for years anyway, terrifying.
Speaker 2: So it's funny. It's funny how how these triggers can
Speaker 2: work for you. Yeah, music triggers.
Speaker 1: Yeah, Smoking Robinson, that's a great in terms of a songwriter.
Speaker 1: I think we.
Speaker 2: Forget how Smokey was amazing and just and he just
Speaker 2: did it so natural that I think that's about how
Speaker 2: we forget because it was like a conversation for him. Yeah,
Speaker 2: you know, and so he clearly was a huge inspiration.
Speaker 3: In that way.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Yeah, because you were playing guitar, did you gravitate
Speaker 1: more towards that music, like a Bill Withers or anything.
Speaker 2: Like that, or I liked Bill Withers, but when I
Speaker 2: was playing. When I started playing, Bill Withers wasn't around,
Speaker 2: and I didn't learn how to play the guitar to
Speaker 2: learn what other guitar players were doing. My brother he
Speaker 2: come on, he came home and played these chords. So
Speaker 2: he started that it wasn't that part, and I added
Speaker 2: that later, but it was first, and I was like,
Speaker 2: looked at it. I was like, that's crazy. And then
Speaker 2: I would go and when he'd leave, I'd go in
Speaker 2: another room and pick up the guitar and try to
Speaker 2: do it. The other thing is he was right handed,
Speaker 2: so it was a right handed guitar. So that's why
Speaker 2: to this day I played upside down.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 2: And so at one point he came to me and said,
Speaker 2: when he finally he catched me playing it, he walked
Speaker 2: in and he goes, I don't care what you do,
Speaker 2: you will never be able to play that as good
Speaker 2: as me, And that made that pushed me to work
Speaker 2: harder at doing it, and unfortunately was not here anymore.
Speaker 2: But I wanted to ask him because I always thought
Speaker 2: that was mean for him to say. But at the
Speaker 2: same time, it just occurred to me just here recently.
Speaker 2: Maybe he was saying that because I was left handed
Speaker 2: right and I would never be able to finger it
Speaker 2: the way that he could finger it, so I won't
Speaker 2: get it quite the same.
Speaker 3: And now it's a mystery.
Speaker 1: It's wild that you play so like left handed as beautifully.
Speaker 1: I just I don't know how you do it.
Speaker 3: Well, I think it's it's however you pick up anything.
Speaker 2: If you don't know the rules, then the rules don't count.
Speaker 1: Absolutely.
Speaker 2: There are certain things just that it might be easier
Speaker 2: for me to do with there's certain things that are
Speaker 2: harder for me to do when it's the right handed.
Speaker 2: So you just got to figure out your way around it.
Speaker 1: But I think once I realized you played upside down,
Speaker 1: and when I listened to your music, your songs sound
Speaker 1: in a way so different that sometimes I feel like, oh,
Speaker 1: it makes sense that it's upside down, like it's the
Speaker 1: or is there less rooted in the bass, And you
Speaker 1: know it's just just interesting. I hear looseness, you know.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean there's probably something to that. I think.
Speaker 2: I always like to say, even when I played and
Speaker 2: learn things on the piano I play, I'm not really
Speaker 2: a piano player. I learned things to support my songwriting,
Speaker 2: and that's what I did. Then I turned that into
Speaker 2: my first song. You know, the song you just played,
Speaker 2: song I just played. That was like I ended up.
Speaker 2: I didn't write Here I Go again, I go here
Speaker 2: I go falling in love again. That was my first song,
Speaker 2: and I wrote it for a girl because I was
Speaker 2: like in love and stuff, and.
Speaker 3: So the guitar really was just an instrument.
Speaker 2: For me to get these songs out of me. And
Speaker 2: so I wasn't really trying to learn any songs that
Speaker 2: were on the radio, and it was all just songwriting.
Speaker 2: So I was just learning chords to support all my
Speaker 2: little songs.
Speaker 1: Wow, And for you, songwriting was about writing songs for
Speaker 1: the girls you were in love with, crushes.
Speaker 2: On crushes, and it was it was purely kind of
Speaker 2: an escape. So to say, wow, it wasn't anything but that.
Speaker 2: I didn't think they were going to go anywhere. But
Speaker 2: that was the that was the drive, and you would.
Speaker 1: Have been like eleven twelve, ten, eleven twelve, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2: So started in sixth grade, start picked up, picked it up.
Speaker 2: Then then by the time eighth grade came, I was
Speaker 2: kind of folks swinging and had a number of little
Speaker 2: bands I was part of, and a lot happened in
Speaker 2: a short amount of time I was. When I look
Speaker 2: back at it, it's kind of crazy to think of
Speaker 2: how much we did as a little band, because obviously
Speaker 2: you will not find today thirteen and fourteen year olds
Speaker 2: having a band, yeah and trying to play music that way,
Speaker 2: and yeah, not even in in rock. You know, it's
Speaker 2: hard to find that period. And back in the day
Speaker 2: for us, that was we were all trying to be
Speaker 2: in a band.
Speaker 1: Yeah. You know, how did you get to Manchild, which
Speaker 1: was your first group you put a record out with?
Speaker 2: Yeah, And in high school, starting as a sophomore, I
Speaker 2: joined this well created this band that we called Tarny Silver,
Speaker 2: and we played from my sophomore year to my senior year.
Speaker 3: We played everything.
Speaker 2: We were like the go to band for the mixers,
Speaker 2: the proms and everything, and.
Speaker 3: In fact, we had did it so much.
Speaker 2: One year, I think it was my last year as
Speaker 2: a senior, there was another guy that was challenging us.
Speaker 2: Decided to challenge us because he said he wanted to
Speaker 2: play at the mixer that year the homecoming, and I said,
Speaker 2: I'm fine, we don't, but people were saying, well, no,
Speaker 2: we think we want tarns Silver to play.
Speaker 3: So I think their band was called Destiny, and so we.
Speaker 2: Actually had a school vote about what band will played
Speaker 2: for the homecoming and we won.
Speaker 3: It was quite disappointing to him, but dave Man.
Speaker 1: Was his name.
Speaker 3: But we played.
Speaker 2: We played all those things, and that was playing these
Speaker 2: colleges on the weekends. We played for you know, IU
Speaker 2: and Purdue and ball State.
Speaker 3: So we were like semi popular.
Speaker 2: So my senior year, the drummer that we had a
Speaker 2: guy named Rayferd Griffin, who's actually was a really good drummer.
Speaker 2: He went on to play with Jean Lupatti and George
Speaker 2: Duke and Stanley Clark, so he was an incredible player.
Speaker 2: He was an incredible player. He was like way too
Speaker 2: good for us. So he was in our band and
Speaker 2: he was getting ready to go away to college, and
Speaker 2: then our saxophone player he was getting ready to go
Speaker 2: away to college. So the band was gonna break up.
Speaker 2: And it was my senior year, and all of a
Speaker 2: sudden I woke up. I realized and my other friends
Speaker 2: they were all getting ready to go to college as well,
Speaker 2: and I hadn't prepared.
Speaker 3: I was just like being in a band. I didn't
Speaker 3: know what I was going to do.
Speaker 2: And we had this one last show that we did
Speaker 2: at a friend's house and one of the guys, Rayfert Griffin,
Speaker 2: his brother, Reggie Griffin, was a man Child and he
Speaker 2: was an excellent musician, Like he played sacks, he played keyboards, cleaverne,
Speaker 2: and he played a guitar, excellent player. And he came
Speaker 2: and saw our show and he asked me that night
Speaker 2: if I would consider joining Manchild, And so he saved
Speaker 2: my life at that point because I had no plans,
Speaker 2: no band, and no band, and I did not know
Speaker 2: that they were on track to getting a record deal.
Speaker 2: So I really at high school. The year I graduated,
Speaker 2: I joined the band and had a record deal. That's wild,
Speaker 2: and so I got really lucky, you know, And then.
Speaker 1: I want to play I want to play one of
Speaker 1: the songs off the first record that that you wrote
Speaker 1: and sang funky situation you guys were going.
Speaker 2: Man, So, I actually wrote this when I was in
Speaker 2: Turn Silver and uh So I wrote that in high
Speaker 2: school because it was part of it was one of
Speaker 2: our one of the songs that we would actually play,
Speaker 2: you know, when we when we do these gigs. So
Speaker 2: we were obviously inspired. We were heavily inspired by like
Speaker 2: earth Wind and Fire. Then we were also inspired by
Speaker 2: the chick Corea and and Stanley Forever Turned Forever, and
Speaker 2: so we we were like, so we tried to be
Speaker 2: jazzy too, So that's what because it goes to a
Speaker 2: little jazzy and then inspired by Stevie Wonder too and
Speaker 2: all that. So all that was kind of ended up
Speaker 2: being mixed, not done very well, but still the ideas
Speaker 2: was was there, but it was part of being a
Speaker 2: little confused, not really knowing how to put it all together,
Speaker 2: not knowing how to make a hit, not knowing how
Speaker 2: to make something commercial, but just trying to make that
Speaker 2: we thought it was commercial. But that was one of
Speaker 2: the first songs that you know that man Child took
Speaker 2: from me that it's funny to hear it right now,
Speaker 2: and I can. I definitely wrote that on acoustic guitar,
Speaker 2: and I was trying to be like I was trying
Speaker 2: to be funky, you know, funky situation. But we were
Speaker 2: so influenced by earthwinder Fire, so influenced that I went
Speaker 2: to see earth Fire with the silvers and stylistics, and
Speaker 2: I actually had the chance to interview Maurice White.
Speaker 1: And you interviewed Maurice White in the seventies.
Speaker 2: Yes, I lied and said I was a news reporter
Speaker 2: and got in to meet him. And me and my
Speaker 2: friend Darryl, we were so into them Aryl Simpson.
Speaker 3: So we watched the show.
Speaker 2: And they were kind of new there, so nobody was
Speaker 2: completely familiar. It was more of a black thing. They
Speaker 2: hadn't quite crossed over yet. So when we would go,
Speaker 2: we learned their songs and play their songs live. We
Speaker 2: take their whole routines and do it. We did it
Speaker 2: so well that actually, a couple of years later, there
Speaker 2: was a friend of ours that went to was going
Speaker 2: to school in Boston, and he called us in a
Speaker 2: frantic He said, you know, you guys need to sue
Speaker 2: this group. I just saw this group and they stole
Speaker 2: all of your songs and stole your whole act.
Speaker 3: You need to sue talk about.
Speaker 2: That's how earth Wind and Fire we were. So when
Speaker 2: I listened to that record, that's what I hear. I hear,
Speaker 2: I hear all those influences of from Earth Wind and
Speaker 2: Fire to Return Forever to Stevie Wonder, and it's all
Speaker 2: it's all mixed.
Speaker 1: And it sounded a little Parliament too. I was just
Speaker 1: really on the maybe the got some bootsy solo records
Speaker 1: or something that sounded very.
Speaker 2: Not quite yet. I think later on these records never
Speaker 2: came up. But later on I think I was, like
Speaker 2: Reggie was definitely Parliament influence.
Speaker 3: But I think we never really messed with that. We didn't.
Speaker 2: And that's the interesting thing because this band, Manchild, I
Speaker 2: always think that I missed the.
Speaker 3: Group up when I joined it.
Speaker 2: Why is that because the band was so funky before
Speaker 2: and I was just learning funk that was real fun
Speaker 2: yet that was it wasn't all the way there, but
Speaker 2: it was trying to be there, but I was just
Speaker 2: learning it. And the thing is when we were in
Speaker 2: Tarres Silver, before I was asked to join, we used
Speaker 2: to play all these as I told you before we
Speaker 2: used to play all these colleges and they were always
Speaker 2: more of a white audience. So everything we played, all
Speaker 2: they wanted to do is dance and drink and dance,
Speaker 2: and so we thought we were amazing. We're like, this
Speaker 2: is there's nothing, there's no crowd, we can't win. Before
Speaker 2: before we're over there dancing and they're running around them.
Speaker 2: You know, it's the best audience with it, and we
Speaker 2: just thought we had we was the ship. Then one
Speaker 2: day we got a gig to play for Tech High School,
Speaker 2: which was a all black school, and we got it
Speaker 2: to play for their prom and we went and started
Speaker 2: playing and they sat there with their.
Speaker 3: Arms folded looking at us like like what is this ship?
Speaker 2: You know? And we even pulled out one of theirse
Speaker 2: went for O songs I think devotion, thinking that was
Speaker 2: gonna get them. Nope, what is this its Soon as
Speaker 2: we stopped playing, they put on the Ohio players and
Speaker 2: the DJ and they was all on the floor dancing,
Speaker 2: and like realized how how unblack we were at that
Speaker 2: point and.
Speaker 3: How funky we didn't know anything about black and men.
Speaker 2: That same time period, we were asked to go down
Speaker 2: to this little club called the Inn Crowd which is
Speaker 2: where Man Child played, and they let us come down
Speaker 2: there to open up for them. We performed and they
Speaker 2: were kind to us, and then next up came out
Speaker 2: Man Child. They this is the first time seeing them,
Speaker 2: and when they came out, there was like dry ice
Speaker 2: coming out and they did this version of Chaka Khan
Speaker 2: Rufus and Chaka Khan, I'm a backbone.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I'm a woman, I'm a backbone.
Speaker 2: And so the chorus on that was I'm a woman,
Speaker 2: I'm a backbone, and they came out I'm a man child,
Speaker 2: I'm I'm a motherfucker, I'm a man. He was just
Speaker 2: so funky and so it was like, oh my god,
Speaker 2: I didn't know. And then they also included you know,
Speaker 2: returned to Forever Licks and they they were so they
Speaker 2: were very good and Chucky Bush was the key up
Speaker 2: Wheer who was who played with us for a little bit,
Speaker 2: so he was everybody was.
Speaker 3: They were like.
Speaker 2: Next level musicians. I thought that's when they were at
Speaker 2: their best. And when I joined the band, I think
Speaker 2: they were looking to stretch and go further so and
Speaker 2: try to be a little more mellowed and go other places.
Speaker 2: They had the lead singer, this guy named Flash Farrow,
Speaker 2: who was one of the best front men I've ever
Speaker 2: known and ever seen. He was like Mick Jagger, he
Speaker 2: was like he had a rough voice, so the songs
Speaker 2: that I was writing wasn't necessary for him, and I
Speaker 2: was I was singing, writing these softs love songs, and
Speaker 2: and he wasn't really feeling it, and neither was I
Speaker 2: think Bobby the drummer, and they kind of like didn't
Speaker 2: really completely like it. In fact, they gave me a nickname,
Speaker 2: which wasn't a nice nickname, but Waterfall. Really, yeah, all
Speaker 2: you do is waterfall music, you know, and you bring
Speaker 2: stop ringing that fucking ass waterfall music. And that's all
Speaker 2: I knew what to do, except every now and then
Speaker 2: try to do funky situations. But they were like such
Speaker 2: one of the best funk bands and I had ever
Speaker 2: seen and never heard at that particular point, and I
Speaker 2: feel like had they stayed kept that direction, then it
Speaker 2: might have been something else with them. And I think
Speaker 2: I changed that direction. We ended up getting a hit
Speaker 2: song that I wasn't really a party with, especially for you,
Speaker 2: that that did well. But I don't think I think
Speaker 2: it was meant. It was a place for me to
Speaker 2: learn how to how to write music. It helped me
Speaker 2: learn how to do be more urban, do more R
Speaker 2: and B. Because I was like a waterfall kid. I
Speaker 2: listened to James Taylor, and really, you know, when I
Speaker 2: go in my car on Sundays, I love to listen
Speaker 2: to James Taylor.
Speaker 3: So I did like acoustic music. I like John Denver,
Speaker 3: so I like bread great pop songs.
Speaker 2: Yeah, So I was like in the Beatles, so I
Speaker 2: would do that. I was always would be on my
Speaker 2: acoustic guitar, so things would be prettier in that sense,
Speaker 2: and then i'd write them slow songs were pretty that way.
Speaker 2: So I was just kind on a different page.
Speaker 1: When did you get into the Beatles back.
Speaker 3: The same time?
Speaker 2: It was into smoky yeah, because we had a black
Speaker 2: station that was WTLC, and then we had the pop station,
Speaker 2: which was w IP So on Sundays when I would
Speaker 2: go to church, as soon as the choir would be done,
Speaker 2: i'd go sit in the car and I wouldn't listen
Speaker 2: to TLC because it'd be just other church music. So
Speaker 2: that's when I got educated with pop music. That's why
Speaker 2: I first heard James Taylor Wow and listened to the
Speaker 2: pop stations.
Speaker 1: What were the James Taylor songs and Beatles songs that
Speaker 1: kind of pulled you in.
Speaker 3: You've Got a Friend Beatles.
Speaker 2: It was everything from I Want to Hold Your Hand
Speaker 2: to Ultimate Yesterday and everything.
Speaker 1: It was everything The Beatles did really gorgeous sound in.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it was just great copyrights. Bottom line. I was
Speaker 2: just soaking all of it in. It didn't always have
Speaker 2: a place to put it, but I still soaked it in.
Speaker 5: Well.
Speaker 1: I gotta say I want to play song for much
Speaker 1: later in your Creator you wrote and produce for Whitney Houston.
Speaker 1: I want to play because it made me think when
Speaker 1: you were talking about that, like coming out of church
Speaker 1: and with the choir and then tuning into you know,
Speaker 1: hearing James Taylor and these things. It's like in your music,
Speaker 1: I feel like I really hear like the combination and
Speaker 1: to the personalness of the singer songwriter thing. And I
Speaker 1: know you're famous for love songs, but in a lot
Speaker 1: of ways, sometimes your love songs to me feel greater
Speaker 1: than just romantic love. It feels almost like a devotional
Speaker 1: kind of thing. And Exhale, which you wrote for Whitney,
Speaker 1: always felt I want to play little that always struck
Speaker 1: me that way.
Speaker 5: Sometimes you're live, sometimes your correct life never tells up
Speaker 5: the windso lies.
Speaker 2: When you've got for rid.
Speaker 5: You a shoe were.
Speaker 1: Oh my god. If there is such thing as a
Speaker 1: perfect song, that's it.
Speaker 3: I remember.
Speaker 2: In writing this because I was thinking of songs that
Speaker 2: you've seen in the other films that were haunting, And
Speaker 2: it was a couple of years before that Bruce Springsteen
Speaker 2: did The Streets of Philadelphia and it was a haunting
Speaker 2: kind of feel. So I wanted this to have a
Speaker 2: haunting kind of thing and wasn't exactly sure I was
Speaker 2: gonna do it. And this song wasn't necessarily always supposed
Speaker 2: to happen because Whitney hadn't necessarily always agreed that she
Speaker 2: would sing on this album. So this is kind of
Speaker 2: like one of the last ones to show up, you know,
Speaker 2: because we ultimately needed a theme song for it, but
Speaker 2: until she sung, it wasn't gonna be one I did.
Speaker 2: I worked hand in hand with Forrest Whitaker, who checked,
Speaker 2: who listened to every song. So I was down at
Speaker 2: the production offices and I had my whole rig there
Speaker 2: and he bringing something for me to put some music to.
Speaker 2: And that's and he'd give me a reference to something
Speaker 2: that he wants something like that was never a reference
Speaker 2: for anything like this, but everything else there might have
Speaker 2: been a reference to. And then I had to kind
Speaker 2: of write for the scene and see if it would fly.
Speaker 2: And I think almost every time I did something, he
Speaker 2: always liked it. And we did all this without Clive
Speaker 2: being a part of it, yeah, which was very chancy,
Speaker 2: but it was for the film. So but this was
Speaker 2: the first time I actually ended something in the Clive
Speaker 2: with Clive had note notes.
Speaker 1: I don't have Clive ears, but yees still, I know
Speaker 1: that's a perfect song.
Speaker 3: Well it just felt good, you know. And it was
Speaker 3: also at.
Speaker 2: An interesting time with Whitney because she wasn't singing as
Speaker 2: strong and there's you know, the big songs, so it
Speaker 2: was it was nice to come in and do something
Speaker 2: chills going for the big you know, I'll always love You,
Speaker 2: So it was it was great to do a left turn.
Speaker 1: Like there's so much wisdom in that. And I mean,
Speaker 1: what is what does the song like that come from?
Speaker 2: It comes from watching the movie, comes from watching and
Speaker 2: watching the relationship with these girls and imagining what what
Speaker 2: Whitney's character would say to those those people. So a
Speaker 2: lot of times you find wisdom and just watching people
Speaker 2: and and and watching how they how they love, or
Speaker 2: how they hurt and how they fuck up, you know,
Speaker 2: and and there's something that you can you can take
Speaker 2: from that. And the one thing I would say today
Speaker 2: is that in terms of writing, with what I say
Speaker 2: in writing today, I see a lot of kids like
Speaker 2: I think, Scissors like an excellent writer because it's not
Speaker 2: just our melodies, but her words and how she says,
Speaker 2: how her words are today, how people would talk and
Speaker 2: how people think. She does it in such a clever way.
Speaker 2: And I'm like a student of that at this particular point,
Speaker 2: learning that because we were able to write simpler things
Speaker 2: before and say these words, and the simplicity of it
Speaker 2: was enough. Today it's got to be a little bit more.
Speaker 2: It's a little bit more clever and a little bit
Speaker 2: more how people think and how people talk today, it
Speaker 2: doesn't we don't talk the same way, we don't hear
Speaker 2: the same way. And so I think because of that,
Speaker 2: I won't say easier to do it. It was just
Speaker 2: of the time.
Speaker 1: I think it was just different. I mean, it's funny
Speaker 1: because I don't think people in the nineties necessarily talk
Speaker 1: like people in the fifties or sixties either, But there
Speaker 1: was a universality still to music that could you know, But.
Speaker 2: I do think things have changed. Don't know that obviously
Speaker 2: that music still connects to people today, and kids are
Speaker 2: read still finding it and they don't necessarily it still
Speaker 2: talks to them. It's just that when you're doing something today,
Speaker 2: you need to talk to them how they talk on
Speaker 2: their level.
Speaker 1: We're going to take a quick break and then we'll
Speaker 1: come back with my conversation with Babyface. We're back with
Speaker 1: more of my conversation with Babyface. What was the creation
Speaker 1: of Girls' Night Out? Like, I could hear a Babyface
Speaker 1: on this new record, but to your point, I can
Speaker 1: definitely also hear you trying to do what you do
Speaker 1: within the context of what the singers now are doing.
Speaker 2: Yeah, the actual concept of Girls Night Out came from
Speaker 2: my partner who helped me put the record together, So
Speaker 2: Rika and So she had come to me and said,
Speaker 2: you know, that's the way it did versus h and versus.
Speaker 2: I got so many more new followers and a lot
Speaker 2: of younger ones, and so she was like, you know,
Speaker 2: you got to figure out a way to connect with them.
Speaker 2: You got you know, you can't just do what you've
Speaker 2: done before because they won't really speak to them. So
Speaker 2: maybe the best way to connect with them when you're
Speaker 2: writing and everything is to work with younger artists like Excel.
Speaker 2: Maybe you work with girls again, yeah, and you connect
Speaker 2: that way. But don't just write it for them. Write
Speaker 2: with them, you know, collaborate with them. Make sure you're
Speaker 2: speaking their language and they speak and you guys can
Speaker 2: actually work together. And that's ultimately what it came down to.
Speaker 2: We went in the studio with each artist basically had
Speaker 2: a data do it, a data write it, and a
Speaker 2: data basic get the basic recording.
Speaker 1: You'd bring in a concept maybe and then we start
Speaker 1: right there, go fresh. Was it nerve wracking and going
Speaker 1: like that?
Speaker 2: No, it was it was either going to work or not.
Speaker 2: You know, there was no pressure. It was like, you know,
Speaker 2: we tried and if it doesn't, it didn't work. There's
Speaker 2: some people came we couldn't figure it out, and some
Speaker 2: people we figured it out, but we have to come
Speaker 2: back and finish it up in terms of odubtion. But
Speaker 2: the basic idea of every song was always done in
Speaker 2: that day. Wow, And that was kind of the magic
Speaker 2: of it a little bit. I mean, look, do I
Speaker 2: feel like I did an album full of hits? No,
Speaker 2: I did an album full of moments, and those moments
Speaker 2: that we whatever happened in that moment, that's what That's
Speaker 2: what we came out with, and we tried to make
Speaker 2: it the best that it could be.
Speaker 1: Would you think about music previously like that, like, oh,
Speaker 1: is this an album full of hits versus or were
Speaker 1: you always doing moments?
Speaker 2: Well, sometimes you do want to necessarily do hits. You
Speaker 2: do want to do something that's going to really kind
Speaker 2: of hit everybody, hit everybody in the room, and if
Speaker 2: it's not there, then you want to keep working on
Speaker 2: it and get it, you know. And we didn't have
Speaker 2: that luxury. We just kind of like, this is it,
Speaker 2: this is a moment, and we'll.
Speaker 3: Roll with it.
Speaker 2: Yeah, So in that sense, I do I think I
Speaker 2: could have maybe even made it better, yeah at the time,
Speaker 2: but we just took that moment and that was kind
Speaker 2: of like the experience yehself, you know, That's what I'm saying.
Speaker 2: And because of that, you know, also not just working
Speaker 2: with you know, the girls, but also working with some
Speaker 2: younger producers that come with tracks and things that allowed
Speaker 2: me to also kind of like get into that and
Speaker 2: build from there as well. So it was all an
Speaker 2: effort of trying to speak to an audience that I
Speaker 2: don't normally speak to, but speak to them through another
Speaker 2: form of artistry.
Speaker 3: So to say, yeah, collaboration.
Speaker 1: Yeah yeah, out of any of those collaborations, do you
Speaker 1: think you forged any you know, lasting relationships.
Speaker 2: Yes, no question, And I'm sure we'll do more work
Speaker 2: together and that that's great. So I think that the
Speaker 2: process was fun and the results was, you know, came
Speaker 2: out nice.
Speaker 1: So it came out great. I got to say, like,
Speaker 1: you know, it's interesting. Rolling Stone recently put out like
Speaker 1: a list of like two hundred greatest singers. I looked
Speaker 1: at the list and I was like, yeah, it's not
Speaker 1: it's like something like I'll read that one that makes
Speaker 1: sense to me and some of the things. But I
Speaker 1: sort of making just jotting down, like what do I
Speaker 1: think are my favorite singers? And I started putting them down.
Speaker 1: I'm like, man, you know, like maybe it's just a
Speaker 1: time thing. But I didn't really have anyone beyond the nineties,
Speaker 1: and I did sort of think of I don't think
Speaker 1: it was because I'm biased towards that music. But and
Speaker 1: not that there's no good R and B singers. Now
Speaker 1: there's some great singers, but there's no vehicles. Sometimes I
Speaker 1: think these days for like for a great vocalist to
Speaker 1: show how great their vocals are. But it sounds to
Speaker 1: me on this record like you really I don't know,
Speaker 1: I realized, like, man, you really know how to work
Speaker 1: with singers, because these days there's a lot of effects
Speaker 1: on voices and things, but you still found a way
Speaker 1: to kind of create something where they could really drive
Speaker 1: the song.
Speaker 3: Man.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think it's it's that's just emotion, so and
Speaker 2: it's it's not about how many rips you do or anything.
Speaker 2: It's really just about our emotion.
Speaker 3: Can you get on it? Yeah, I feel like you've
Speaker 3: been given something.
Speaker 2: There are a lot of really good vocalists girls that
Speaker 2: can sing today. There's a lot of them, and it's
Speaker 2: like there weren't that many back in the day, you know,
Speaker 2: where we could just count on. You know, there was Brandy,
Speaker 2: there was Monica, there was Whitney, you know, Deborah Cox,
Speaker 2: and you know we had a few, but not as
Speaker 2: many as there are today. There's so many girls that
Speaker 2: can really blow and what people that we don't know
Speaker 2: and even as many just as many that you can
Speaker 2: find on on TikTok or the singing wasn't like that before.
Speaker 2: Also the difference in terms of like how even with
Speaker 2: how it used to be so rare to find whether
Speaker 2: it's a white kid or that they could sing sing
Speaker 2: and really have riffs, and that changed completely, Like you
Speaker 2: can find so many of these kids, like these young
Speaker 2: white kids that can like clearly blow and that.
Speaker 1: It sounds like they grew up on gospel.
Speaker 2: Yeah sometimes and that was clearly just left for you know,
Speaker 2: initially there was Tina Marie who was that?
Speaker 3: Who was that girl? Then?
Speaker 1: Yeah?
Speaker 2: Yeah, and she know she was more. Yeah, she got
Speaker 2: a little past sometimes at least a Stan spill got
Speaker 2: a little bit of a pass, but not clearly not
Speaker 2: like not like Tina, I like Tina, not like Celine
Speaker 2: Dion came and just kind of tore it up and
Speaker 2: to really have like could move their voice where where
Speaker 2: Whitney was like okay, she could sing so and that
Speaker 2: that all changed And I think I think it was
Speaker 2: McDonald's anyway, you.
Speaker 1: Think it was McDonald's.
Speaker 3: I'm thing happened. Something was in the water.
Speaker 2: But I think overall just I mean, what the real
Speaker 2: answer is that black music and R and B. So
Speaker 2: it became so infectious that when people listened to things
Speaker 2: enough that it becomes part of them. Yeah, you know,
Speaker 2: And the same thing applies for even like overseas, even
Speaker 2: for like the K pop Yeah, kids.
Speaker 1: Say, man, come on, and that was you man. I mean,
Speaker 1: I feel like we should say that flat out because
Speaker 1: you may not want to, you know, and others and others.
Speaker 2: I was in the group with other people and others
Speaker 2: my question help help influence.
Speaker 1: It's like there's a point R and B was on
Speaker 1: the charts as like race music, you know, by the.
Speaker 2: Nineties, nineties it was it was all included. Nineties it
Speaker 2: was there was not really you could you couldn't tell
Speaker 2: the difference hardly between the R and B chart and
Speaker 2: the pop chart.
Speaker 3: Yeah, because what was black was also pop as well.
Speaker 2: Yeah, Bobby Brown and boised them in and you know,
Speaker 2: even I had some things that were in pop at
Speaker 2: the top tens that I didn't even I didn't know
Speaker 2: that Whipping Piel.
Speaker 3: Was a top ten popping of the year nineteen. I
Speaker 3: didn't know.
Speaker 2: I didn't know it even touched that stuff so because
Speaker 2: I always thought of it just R and B. So,
Speaker 2: but there was a point where it was that now
Speaker 2: it's it's changed again. Where I mean, hip hop is
Speaker 2: the one thing that's you always got to keep watching
Speaker 2: things as you know, know how things will slight. But
Speaker 2: the influence is crazy and it has been and always
Speaker 2: has been. So when when speak people speak of the
Speaker 2: future of R and B in the future, just black
Speaker 2: music in general, it's always here because it's always influencing.
Speaker 1: It always is. And know what's funny, man, It's like,
Speaker 1: you know, rock and roll and hip hop take a
Speaker 1: lot of air out of the room and look great,
Speaker 1: you know, no doubt. But when you think about it,
Speaker 1: R and B really is like the great American art
Speaker 1: form because if you go back nineteen forty, Louis Jordan,
Speaker 1: the nineteen fifties, Ray Charles, nineteen sixty, you got Motown stacks,
Speaker 1: all this great Atlantic artists in the seventies with you know,
Speaker 1: Stevie Finley really come out earth Wind and Fought, and
Speaker 1: you know in the eighties, come on, man, R and
Speaker 1: B is kind always right there.
Speaker 2: It started here, It's in everything. So it always has
Speaker 2: been so, and I think that's that people get. They
Speaker 2: get tunnel vision on just one particular sound and one
Speaker 2: particular thing. I love the changes, and I love to
Speaker 2: see people experimenting with it and and growing making letting
Speaker 2: it grow.
Speaker 1: So can't play a deal song Sweet November. I'm gonna
Speaker 1: play a little, just a little bit of it. I
Speaker 1: feel like this has something to do with with your name.
Speaker 6: But time that will read bad love that.
Speaker 1: Wow, man, that's that's a great song.
Speaker 2: I wrote that right out of high school. Out of
Speaker 2: high school, yeah it was. It was because I was
Speaker 2: a man child. So second year or something seventy eight
Speaker 2: or so, seventy eight seventy nine, right in that time.
Speaker 3: So this was a girl. It was like this one girl.
Speaker 3: She was like the most.
Speaker 2: While we were in high school, we were really good friends,
Speaker 2: and there's no way I would have ever thought I
Speaker 2: would have been with her. But when I got out
Speaker 2: of high school, we we started talking and then we
Speaker 2: actually started dating.
Speaker 3: I remember Daryl was like, how how was this even happening?
Speaker 3: How do you have her?
Speaker 2: And then I remember we went to go see Brookshields
Speaker 2: Endless Love. We saw Endless Love together and then something happened.
Speaker 3: I think right before we were going away in Manchild.
Speaker 2: All of a sudden she stopped calling me and I
Speaker 2: couldn't I couldn't reach her, and I don't know what happened,
Speaker 2: but it was just like we're just like broken up.
Speaker 2: And then there was no cell phones. There was no
Speaker 2: good you couldn't return the phone, and.
Speaker 1: The social media.
Speaker 3: It was just done. And I was really messed up
Speaker 3: about it.
Speaker 2: And and that's when I wrote this, you know, because
Speaker 2: you know, that was the time period. It was in
Speaker 2: the fall, and sudden I was thinking maybe maybe when
Speaker 2: I come back, maybe maybe this November, we'll get back
Speaker 2: together and find it. So that was actually a love
Speaker 2: song that was written way back then.
Speaker 1: And would you have written the words or would you
Speaker 1: write the words for piano and wrote it's at the piano?
Speaker 2: Yeah, wow, So.
Speaker 1: Because it's kind of beautiful even just divorced from the music,
Speaker 1: if you just look at the words like high level.
Speaker 1: You know.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it was when autumn first arrived you when my
Speaker 2: lady we're dating.
Speaker 1: It was the second ign of attom. We shared a feeling.
Speaker 2: Yeah, come on, that's it's like we started dating and
Speaker 2: then all of a sudden, we like I remember, it
Speaker 2: was raining and like it looks like something's going.
Speaker 3: To happen here.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's like which that's an interesting song because that
Speaker 2: the history of this song too. It's also that it's
Speaker 2: the song that ultimately got me to be able to
Speaker 2: sing on the Deal album because I did this. I
Speaker 2: recorded this song, did the demo. I had always always
Speaker 2: had the song, but when I got in the Deal,
Speaker 2: I actually demoed it. And this isn't very far from
Speaker 2: the demo at all. And so when we were working
Speaker 2: on the second album for the Deal, Redick call Away
Speaker 2: from Midnight Star was supposed to produce her album and
Speaker 2: he did not because they had fell out with our
Speaker 2: manager and our manager was the same manager they had,
Speaker 2: so they didn't want to do anything everything to do
Speaker 2: with us. So it was suddenly in our hands, me
Speaker 2: in LA's hands too. Did Griffy said you guys should
Speaker 2: produce it, and we were a little afraid, but we
Speaker 2: thought we'd try. And this song I had submitted to
Speaker 2: dig Griffy to see if I could place it on
Speaker 2: the Whispers. I also sent the song, gave the song
Speaker 2: to Luther hoping that he would sing wow, and he
Speaker 2: never answered on it, but I got it case tape
Speaker 2: to him so he would potentially do it too, And
Speaker 2: so it never got to the Whispers because Dick Griffy
Speaker 2: had heard it and he said, who is this? LA
Speaker 2: told him this is you know, Kenny. I wasn't babyface
Speaker 2: yet and he goes, this is Kenny, goes, so why
Speaker 2: give this whispers? Why don't you guys do this song
Speaker 2: on your album? And then La says, well, we don't
Speaker 2: have anybody that can sing it, and said, what are
Speaker 2: you talking about? You got who's singing this? He said, oh,
Speaker 2: it's Kenny singing it. He said, well, how come he singing?
Speaker 2: He said, because he's not the lead singer. And Dick
Speaker 2: said that's stupid. He should be singing. Then LA had
Speaker 2: to have a group meeting to see if I could sing,
Speaker 2: and once they had the group meeting, they voted me
Speaker 2: not to sing. Still, I had no problem with it
Speaker 2: because I wasn't trying to be a singer. Every time
Speaker 2: I was doing these songs. It wasn't like I was
Speaker 2: thinking I was gonna do a record with it. It's
Speaker 2: just me writing songs.
Speaker 1: What you do.
Speaker 2: And so Dick Grify came back said, well, if this
Speaker 2: ain't on the album, if he ain't singing it, then
Speaker 2: you guys ain't got no album. So that's how I
Speaker 2: was able to sing Sweet November on that album.
Speaker 1: What were they saying, you can't sing you that it's
Speaker 1: a beautiful vocal.
Speaker 2: They didn't want me to sing because they were already
Speaker 2: two lead singers.
Speaker 1: Got it okay, So it was a it's a power thing.
Speaker 2: Yeah, you know, like, look, we got our singers. We
Speaker 2: don't need any any more confusion.
Speaker 3: And I got that. I wasn't.
Speaker 2: I did not join the group to be a singer
Speaker 2: at all, and so Sweet November is ended up being
Speaker 2: that song that you know, it's a heartfelt song with
Speaker 2: a song that ultimately got me to start singing in
Speaker 2: the group to begin with.
Speaker 1: And it kind of solidified your name right.
Speaker 2: Well, the name had nothing to do with that. The
Speaker 2: name just came because everybody in the deal had a
Speaker 2: great name. It was La, Ko d Carlos Stick and
Speaker 2: Kenny Edmands and we were looking around trying to find names.
Speaker 2: We tried Romeo not really it, and a couple other
Speaker 2: names they were doing. Nothing was sticking until one day
Speaker 2: La and Ko were in the studio working with Bootsy,
Speaker 2: helping Bootsy do a demo and I walked in the
Speaker 2: studio and Bootsy looks at me, he goes, Babyface, and
Speaker 2: that was kind of like where it started. I didn't
Speaker 2: like the name. I thought it was a little soft,
Speaker 2: and I didn't like it all, but he said Babyface anyway.
Speaker 2: So then this was probably in eighty five, so much
Speaker 2: after the song. So we're like now eighty five, we're
Speaker 2: out on tour. So d goes one night. I would
Speaker 2: sing this song every night. One night you'd go, that's
Speaker 2: Kenny Edmans, give it up to Kenny Edmans, and you know,
Speaker 2: there'd be a little bit of love, a little bit
Speaker 2: of something. But then one night he said give it
Speaker 2: up to Babyface. It was a completely different reaction, and
Speaker 2: that night a whole bunch of girls came back looking
Speaker 2: for Babyface. I sung that song every night the same
Speaker 2: I swear it was not any different, but singing it
Speaker 2: as Babyface suddenly made it a whole other thing, which
Speaker 2: just taught us a lesson of just being commercial and
Speaker 2: name and everything branding, you know. So it was a
Speaker 2: lesson and I became very comfortable when the girls came back.
Speaker 3: I was comfortable with having the new Babyface at that point. Yeah, yeah, questions.
Speaker 1: So that song was really personal. Yeah, exhale was more
Speaker 1: from watching the movie.
Speaker 3: Watching the movie.
Speaker 1: You don't necessarily have to write from personal experience, you can,
Speaker 1: you can, you can watch others, and.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's really about watching others and how they how
Speaker 2: they feel, and how they imagining having to go through that.
Speaker 2: I'm always asked, how are you able to write for women? Yeah,
Speaker 2: and I said, if you just kind of think of
Speaker 2: it and think of whatever they go through and think
Speaker 2: out how you'd feel, you know, it's not that hard
Speaker 2: to figure out.
Speaker 3: Damn, that's fucked up, I feel, you know, think all
Speaker 3: right about that, you know.
Speaker 2: And as a kid that was always falling in love
Speaker 2: and thinking I was in.
Speaker 1: Love, feeling like you were in love.
Speaker 2: You know, that's what it was. My very first song
Speaker 2: was about a girl named round the new bould always
Speaker 2: say her name, and that was in here I Go
Speaker 2: falling in love again. And the second song that I
Speaker 2: wrote that I clearly remember was about the same girl,
Speaker 2: which was two years later, from sixth grade to eighth grade,
Speaker 2: because she broke my heart what's called the Better Taste
Speaker 2: of Life. Oh those are feelings that I that I
Speaker 2: had and everything was exaggerated. I had written a song
Speaker 2: called so Shy, So there were pieces. There would be
Speaker 2: pieces of things, of songs that I would write. I
Speaker 2: wrote a song called Anita, wrote a song called Shelley.
Speaker 2: One of the best songs I ever wrote was a
Speaker 2: song called Last Song Forever, which was I wrote that
Speaker 2: when I was in my senior year, never recorded. I
Speaker 2: think so. I think I let a group recorded as
Speaker 2: they turned into a gospel.
Speaker 1: Do you remember any of it?
Speaker 3: Yeah?
Speaker 1: Could you play a little of it?
Speaker 3: I don't know what my voice is like right now.
Speaker 5: When I think Spanish, I remember a special feeling sweet Shore.
Speaker 3: Then I think.
Speaker 5: Spanish show moments. Those were special times. You told me
Speaker 5: you can.
Speaker 3: You know when.
Speaker 4: This will blown away? I hope you know my now,
Speaker 4: my love will always. I love you for usually know
Speaker 4: man love King and no Beeta LEAs song for ound.
Speaker 4: I gotta love you.
Speaker 1: Then not do right now?
Speaker 2: And that's a little Pisa anyway. So that was in
Speaker 2: my senior year. I wrote that song for a girl
Speaker 2: that that liked be for a long time. And it's funny,
Speaker 2: it's interesting. It was it was a it was a
Speaker 2: white girl that liked me and in high school at
Speaker 2: that time, it was like, you don't you don't do that.
Speaker 2: And we were friends and we and we did music together.
Speaker 2: We liked doing music together, and Darryl and everybody would
Speaker 2: go to her house and write, write music and create music,
Speaker 2: and so we always vibe with each other. And she
Speaker 2: really got a crush on me. She was like, she
Speaker 2: lived really close to the school and I lived so
Speaker 2: far away. She was like asking, let me come over
Speaker 2: to your house and pick you up and take you to.
Speaker 3: School in the morning.
Speaker 2: And she went to do everything in the world for me,
Speaker 2: and I was like, that's great, but I didn't want
Speaker 2: this girl to that same inund neighborhood picking me up
Speaker 2: and stuff. And so I was like and I just
Speaker 2: realized at the point I was like being very it
Speaker 2: was almost like reverse racism to a certain extent for me.
Speaker 2: And I was like, well, what about a lot of heat.
Speaker 2: I'm sure what a brought heat? And back then they
Speaker 2: call you times and stuff like that. Yeah, but in
Speaker 2: our school that was you know, it wasn't like it
Speaker 2: was it never happened, but it would sometimes. So one
Speaker 2: point she had gone away to on a spring trip,
Speaker 2: so she went down to Florida or something, and when
Speaker 2: she was gone, I really missed her. So I thought
Speaker 2: to myself, you know what, forget it.
Speaker 3: I don't care.
Speaker 2: I don't care what color she is, I don't care
Speaker 2: any When she comes back, I'm going to tell her,
Speaker 2: let's do this. And she came back. She had a tan,
Speaker 2: she was fine as but I waited too long. When
Speaker 2: she came back, she had changed at that point. She
Speaker 2: wasn't interested anymore because she had tried and she finally
Speaker 2: met someone else. I waited too long, and then that
Speaker 2: was it. And then I wrote that song, and it
Speaker 2: was just interesting to me because it was like, you know,
Speaker 2: when someone's pushing for you to like you and trying
Speaker 2: to like you, and you're pushing them away for reasons,
Speaker 2: not because of how you feel, but because of what
Speaker 2: everybody else thinks. And when if I had it just
Speaker 2: not cared about that, yeah, then it maybe it would
Speaker 2: have been different. But then it had that not happened,
Speaker 2: I don't know if I'd written the song, so you
Speaker 2: wouldn't have.
Speaker 1: The best song you ever wrote. How many other great
Speaker 1: songs do you have sitting.
Speaker 3: I'm not sure.
Speaker 2: There's a lot of things I can remember back in
Speaker 2: those days, just stuff I've written on the guitar. I
Speaker 2: can go through things to see songs that I've written
Speaker 2: over the years I don't necessarily love, but it feels
Speaker 2: like a lot of the things that I wrote that
Speaker 2: were heartfelt from the guitar. I don't necessarily think they're
Speaker 2: commercial songs, but their songs that I love. You know.
Speaker 1: Yeah, you did that record playlist like maybe fifteen or
Speaker 1: so years ago. It was kind of more like it
Speaker 1: was sort of more just you an acoustic in a way.
Speaker 1: It was covering some of the songs some of the
Speaker 1: things that inspired me, you know, But doing a record
Speaker 1: of like that with originals would be Yeah, maybe it
Speaker 1: would be cool capture.
Speaker 2: A moment right throughout it all, there were songs that
Speaker 2: would I would write and these feelings that I would have,
Speaker 2: you know, as a kid, And that's what the whole
Speaker 2: idea of Waterfall came from doing things like that.
Speaker 1: We're gonna pause for a quick break and then come
Speaker 1: back with the rest of my conversation with Babyface. We're
Speaker 1: back with the rest of my interview with Babyface. You
Speaker 1: didn't mention her name with the girl that you wrote
Speaker 1: Sweet November four. Do you ever know what happened to her?
Speaker 1: Did you ever figure that out?
Speaker 2: Yes? She lives in Indianapolis. And did I ever follow
Speaker 2: up and ask about what happened?
Speaker 3: I did.
Speaker 2: She said she had just met someone else and felt
Speaker 2: really bad about how it ended, and I don't really care.
Speaker 2: I even met with round the new boat. I met
Speaker 2: with her from the whole sixth grade thing. That's a
Speaker 2: whole long story. And I actually talked to her as
Speaker 2: well because I wanted to see I was so interested
Speaker 2: to find out if my memory was the same. Yeah,
Speaker 2: did did things happen the way that I thought they happened?
Speaker 1: Did they kind of remember the same?
Speaker 2: It was pretty close? Pretty close, It was pretty It
Speaker 2: was pretty pretty hon it, which was mind blowing to
Speaker 2: me that I, you know, that I really remembered it
Speaker 2: kind of the right way.
Speaker 1: So wow, it seems like you carry things, you know,
Speaker 1: like with you.
Speaker 2: My memory of those days stay with me because there
Speaker 2: was something very powerful about when you're young and when
Speaker 2: you're in love and how powerful that is, and that
Speaker 2: that feeling you want to die, you know. That's like
Speaker 2: when I wrote Breathe Again, I was writing from that
Speaker 2: perspective of like thinking, you know, if you leave me,
Speaker 2: I'll never breathe again, and that kind of desperate thing
Speaker 2: that kids feel because it's the first time and it's
Speaker 2: like everything is, you know, amplified by a million yes.
Speaker 2: And I used to love to go to that space sometimes.
Speaker 2: If I'm writing a love song, a heartfelt love song,
Speaker 2: then it's great to go to that space too, you know,
Speaker 2: as a reference, you know, for those feelings, so.
Speaker 1: You can conjure up that.
Speaker 2: So as I carry these stories, I carry those feelings too, amazing,
Speaker 2: you know, and able to call on those in that way.
Speaker 1: We should listen to just a bit of breathing. I
Speaker 1: love hearing your songs, if you're cool with it.
Speaker 2: That song was when I was writing it. I did
Speaker 2: the music first, and I was writing in and I
Speaker 2: was actually writing it for another artist, writing for an
Speaker 2: artist named MacArthur who was Melvin Gentry, who was part
Speaker 2: of a Nice Star. And initially I was coming up
Speaker 2: with the track for his album. And then as I
Speaker 2: did that and those chords came to me and those
Speaker 2: lyrics in my hand said oh no, this is not
Speaker 2: for him, this is this is a tony song, you know,
Speaker 2: and then all of a sudden, it just you know,
Speaker 2: like flushed in the whole idea of it. And I
Speaker 2: was able to go back to that that little kid,
Speaker 2: you know, that was like destroyed in eighth grade and
Speaker 2: and thinking of those words. And that's that's how you know,
Speaker 2: you go to those moments, and that's how you can
Speaker 2: revisit those feelings again and again. It doesn't always have
Speaker 2: to be what's going on in your life now. It
Speaker 2: could be about either watching someone or going back to
Speaker 2: his actual feeling that you may have had someone.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Wow, you tell me about your relationship with Darryl Simmons,
Speaker 1: Like a strong partnership you guys have. Man.
Speaker 3: Daryl's a great guy. Darryl.
Speaker 2: I know him since I was in I think ninth grade.
Speaker 2: He used to come over to my house. He was
Speaker 2: friends with my brother when I was in eighth grade
Speaker 2: and he used to come over. And his memory of
Speaker 2: me was that he had heard that I had a
Speaker 2: microphone and they had a band, and I think I
Speaker 2: had a microphone and my brother Michael played guitar as well,
Speaker 2: and so they started this band and I was still
Speaker 2: playing guitar a little bit, but the guitar electric guitar
Speaker 2: I had, I shared it with my brother Michael and
Speaker 2: Michael would take the guitar and leave it on at
Speaker 2: rehearsal all the time.
Speaker 3: It's the wrongest in the world.
Speaker 2: But it was when I first kind of met there
Speaker 2: where he was like wanting me to be in the band.
Speaker 2: But my brother Michael, he voted against it because he
Speaker 2: used to want me in it. So it was a
Speaker 2: little bit later where we met me and my other
Speaker 2: friend and manual officer where we had just became this
Speaker 2: little singing thing called the Elements, and we had this
Speaker 2: group called the Elements, which all of it's a long story,
Speaker 2: but basically Daryl joined that group and we became, you know, friends.
Speaker 2: And I was always a writer and Daryl sometimes would
Speaker 2: be around helped me write. And then sometimes it wasn't
Speaker 2: that he would help me write, it's just that his
Speaker 2: being there, mate, all of a sudden, I would think
Speaker 2: of something sometimes, as you have a person that doesn't
Speaker 2: know I always write the songs, but them just being
Speaker 2: there all of a sudden, you think of something that
Speaker 2: you wouldn't have thought of. You know, it's just their energy.
Speaker 2: It kind of helps in songwriting.
Speaker 1: I think it was a communication thing. That's just like
Speaker 1: the way you guys communicated.
Speaker 2: Yeah, It's just one of the kind of thing, is
Speaker 2: I don't you just might think of a word that
Speaker 2: you might be joking around something, and then all of
Speaker 2: a sudden, the word hits you. They helped kind of
Speaker 2: help you get your creative juices going. It's not always
Speaker 2: particularly always just songwriting and stuff. Sometimes it's just their vibe.
Speaker 2: And you know, we've been friends ever since. I've a
Speaker 2: few friends, a couple of friends for sure that I've
Speaker 2: known since I was a kid, you know, and that's
Speaker 2: rare to have, you know, to be friends with people
Speaker 2: for that long.
Speaker 1: Well, especially when you're in inhabiting the world that you're
Speaker 1: you're in and must be really grounding and great.
Speaker 2: It's it's it's a blessing in that way, and not
Speaker 2: everybody is in it. Like it's just having somebody from
Speaker 2: Indianapolis that kind of knew you when you're growing up
Speaker 2: and and seeing you change, you know, seeing seeing you
Speaker 2: go through the changes in your life and who you've
Speaker 2: become and who you were at the time.
Speaker 1: Do you still write with them ever?
Speaker 2: We don't write that much together, but we talk all
Speaker 2: the time.
Speaker 1: Yeah, when was the last time you guys got together?
Speaker 2: And I think I mean that was part of the love.
Speaker 2: Marriage divorce intended the return of the tender love. He
Speaker 2: doesn't writing with me there in the last ten years
Speaker 2: or so. Yeah, it's I think when you're a writer
Speaker 2: that's writing today and you're constantly writing with younger writers,
Speaker 2: the writing kind of changes and so you lean towards
Speaker 2: other people in terms of like when you because because
Speaker 2: they're they're speaking differently, and if you're not doing it
Speaker 2: on a continuous basis, what you have to offer is
Speaker 2: in quite the same.
Speaker 1: So yeah, yeah, I do want to ask all the
Speaker 1: great singers you work with. You wrote a song that
Speaker 1: Aretha did Willing to Forgive.
Speaker 3: Yeah, there was a hit for her.
Speaker 1: What was working with Aretha?
Speaker 2: Like? That was surreal to actually go in with the
Speaker 2: Aretha Franklin. And she was so nice to me. She
Speaker 2: wasn't always nice to everybody, so that's why I felt privileged.
Speaker 2: She was such a pro. She like, you get you
Speaker 2: maybe get one, you maybe get three runs down maybe,
Speaker 2: but she'll come and say I'm gonna do it once,
Speaker 2: I'm gonna do it twice, and that's it, you know.
Speaker 1: And could you kind of direct her beforehand, say hey,
Speaker 1: you know.
Speaker 2: Every now and then she might let you, but for
Speaker 2: the most part she just kind of like she'd do
Speaker 2: her homework and then she she'd go. I mean, she
Speaker 2: would have been with me and we were able to
Speaker 2: do some things. But I think probably my fondest experience
Speaker 2: with Rita was doing Hurt psych hel Xcel the way
Speaker 2: she she's that was a one time through. That was
Speaker 2: one time wow, and it was just unbelievable. Oh and
Speaker 2: I think my best work with her, and I ended
Speaker 2: up doing kind of the greatest hits records with her
Speaker 2: with we were doing covers and stuff, but to be honest,
Speaker 2: her voice wasn't quite the same anymore. It was like
Speaker 2: you could hear what she could what she was trying
Speaker 2: to do, but it wasn't quite the same anymore. But
Speaker 2: so having her have done that with her psych hell,
Speaker 2: she loved the song and she and she's singing like
Speaker 2: she loved it.
Speaker 1: Her voice was still her voice at that point, and
Speaker 1: hearing it in like just us in a studio space was.
Speaker 2: H It was like just like here, she just came in
Speaker 2: and she said, let's go, let's do it, and it
Speaker 2: was it was done unbelievable.
Speaker 1: You told me the story making end of the Road.
Speaker 2: So end of the Road was written for Boomerang. Went
Speaker 2: to see the movie before it was all the music
Speaker 2: was there, and there was one particular scene that I
Speaker 2: thought would have worked great, and we got the word
Speaker 2: that boyster Man might do the song. So I definitely
Speaker 2: was writing the song in a very old Philly kind of,
Speaker 2: you know way, so that whole sound of Philadelphia, so
Speaker 2: because that's where they were from, So definitely writing in
Speaker 2: that kind of like that. And so as I as
Speaker 2: I started putting it together, I had a little house
Speaker 2: in Atlanta that I would go to write up my
Speaker 2: songs for this project in general, and so I got
Speaker 2: it pretty far.
Speaker 3: I was pretty excited about it.
Speaker 2: I written that most of the words and stuff, and
Speaker 2: then I then I called Daryl over to see as
Speaker 2: to I really got one, and Daryl was like, this
Speaker 2: is one, and so I demoed it and he helped.
Speaker 3: Me finish it up.
Speaker 2: And initially I thought the song was so strong, I
Speaker 2: almost considered trying to keep it for myself, you know,
Speaker 2: but I wasn't going to be an artist on this
Speaker 2: Boomerang thing. But hindsight, there's no question it was supposed
Speaker 2: to be boised them in when they started singing and
Speaker 2: it was it was automatic.
Speaker 3: So we just flew up there to Philadelphia.
Speaker 2: They were on tour and they came in, had just
Speaker 2: one afternoon to sing it down and uh, and that's
Speaker 2: how we that's that's how we started.
Speaker 1: Is it true that wasn't vocally in the best shape
Speaker 1: Wanya was.
Speaker 2: They were on tour, so he was like a little
Speaker 2: bit of a cold and stuff like that, and they
Speaker 2: were all kind of a little bit because they were
Speaker 2: out there singing. But it was fine, you know. Obviously
Speaker 2: it was new for all of us because like we
Speaker 2: hadn't worked with a group like that before, and so
Speaker 2: coming up with these parts. They were great because they
Speaker 2: could help come up with parts on top of it
Speaker 2: and a lot of the notes were already there because
Speaker 2: I had done armies and stuff, and then they were
Speaker 2: built on top of it and created on the spot,
Speaker 2: and it felt like it just felt like it was
Speaker 2: a natural thing, you know, and it's ultimately that rolled
Speaker 2: over into you know, I'll make Love to you.
Speaker 1: Incredible. Yeah, setting up in my room at such a
Speaker 1: different groove from from from so many songs of that era.
Speaker 2: Even Yeah, it was sitting up in my room was
Speaker 2: once again going back to funky situation, you know, be
Speaker 2: trying to figure out how to do funk, you know,
Speaker 2: way years later, just trying to give something that was
Speaker 2: supposed to be just be one particular scene. I think
Speaker 2: the the music that was there in the scene first
Speaker 2: was Aliah back and forth, and I needed to have
Speaker 2: something that just kind of grooved a little bit.
Speaker 3: So that was what I came up with.
Speaker 2: And I hadn't and I knew it was going to
Speaker 2: be for Brandy, So I was trying to imagine how
Speaker 2: she would sing it, you know, Yeah, and then when
Speaker 2: she came and sing it out, blown away, how.
Speaker 3: Good she is.
Speaker 1: That's such a cool vocal mass.
Speaker 2: She's just so good. She's Brandy is so good. I
Speaker 2: think I can put Brandy up in the top ten
Speaker 2: of like singers. In terms of studio singers. There aren't
Speaker 2: very many that can they are as good as she is.
Speaker 1: Wow, they just aren't even at that young age.
Speaker 2: Even at that young age, there just aren't very many.
Speaker 2: She's like, she's a beast.
Speaker 1: Who else would you put on that list?
Speaker 2: I mean, some people you put on the list based
Speaker 2: off because their their vocals are just crazy. I mean,
Speaker 2: obviously Whitney you know, yeah, because it's Whitney Houston. What
Speaker 2: I'm talking about is not just great voice, but also
Speaker 2: somebody just knows how to really just kill it every time.
Speaker 2: It just sounds almost perfect every time. I don't know
Speaker 2: that I could. Brandy's just one of those people I
Speaker 2: think I was impressed by, you know, I was very
Speaker 2: impressed by Money Loan and when she's singing scissors, yeah,
Speaker 2: I'm ridiculous. So there are people that you know that
Speaker 2: just have it. I mean the list could probably I
Speaker 2: could probably go down and listen get more. But I
Speaker 2: would always just say that in terms of somebody I
Speaker 2: always feel that's underrated would be Brandy.
Speaker 1: Is there was there anyone you wanted to work with
Speaker 1: that you just missed? Like you mentioned the Lea, I
Speaker 1: was thinking.
Speaker 3: Child, I've always wanted to work with her.
Speaker 1: I think, isn't she making music right now?
Speaker 2: She's got yeah no, but that doesn't meaning because she's
Speaker 2: got so much pain in her voice that I would
Speaker 2: love to work with that.
Speaker 3: So that's that's the one that sticks. I always got it.
Speaker 1: I just want to play one more cut. So this
Speaker 1: this was some of the Preacher's Wife's soundtrack. My heart
Speaker 1: is calling.
Speaker 5: Because I'm trying too. But when I swear.
Speaker 1: Reservations, my spectization there, it's incredible.
Speaker 3: Man, I'd do it better today.
Speaker 1: What would you do different?
Speaker 2: The groove wasn't The groove was good, but it wasn't
Speaker 2: like Whitney was all the way on the pocket with it.
Speaker 3: Is that why it be? Uh? And I would have
Speaker 3: made this core stronger?
Speaker 1: Okay?
Speaker 3: Yeah?
Speaker 1: Was it tough working with Whitney? Like was it similar
Speaker 1: to reatha where you'd only get a couple of takes?
Speaker 3: Whitney would shot she worked.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: Our problem would be we'd be sitting around joking and
Speaker 2: laughing and stuff all the time, and okay, it should
Speaker 2: work and uh, and then we finally get it down.
Speaker 2: But a lot of times we would just be always
Speaker 2: laughing about stuff.
Speaker 1: So one of the great joys of my life is
Speaker 1: that we got three Michael albums with Quincy and then uh.
Speaker 1: But one of my I wish we could have got
Speaker 1: like a full Whitney baby face record, you know.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think there would have been a shot at
Speaker 2: that that she, you know, had she lived longer, we
Speaker 2: were certainly in talk to doing work together again.
Speaker 1: You guys were talking again.
Speaker 2: Clive had called me and and said, you know, she's ready.
Speaker 3: I think she's about ready to do this. And then
Speaker 3: she you know, you know she was.
Speaker 2: She was right on the road of turning everything around
Speaker 2: and getting it back.
Speaker 1: When was that Clive call in comparison to maybe a
Speaker 1: month before, were starting to collect songs already and not
Speaker 1: yet I was.
Speaker 3: I was waiting to see if it was true.
Speaker 2: We didn't see whether her voice was back there because
Speaker 2: I wanted to do it with her when her voice
Speaker 2: was in shape. And yeah, and I wanted it, you know,
Speaker 2: because I loved working with Whitney, you know.
Speaker 1: So was there ever a chance to do more work
Speaker 1: in the nineties, like beyond the soundtrack because it was
Speaker 1: a big gas like nineteen ninety nineteen ninety eight, and
Speaker 1: there's like a big yeah.
Speaker 2: I think we were just thinks she was just on
Speaker 2: a different page and I was on a different page
Speaker 2: at that point. You know, man, the way she interprets this,
Speaker 2: see some of Me with you one of the greatest question.
Speaker 1: Man, Well, thank you so much. We appreciate you using
Speaker 1: this was great. Thanks again the Babyface for talking through
Speaker 1: his career and playing for us. You can hear a
Speaker 1: playlist of all of our favorite Babyface songs, along with
Speaker 1: others he's written and produced. At broken record podcast dot com.
Speaker 1: You can subscribe to our YouTube channel at YouTube dot
Speaker 1: com slash broken Record Podcast. We can find all of
Speaker 1: our new episodes. You can follow us on Twitter at
Speaker 1: broken Record. Broken Record is produced with help from Leah Rose,
Speaker 1: Jason Gambrell, Ben Tolliday, and Eric Sander. Our editor is
Speaker 1: Sophie Craig. Broken Record is a production of Pushkin Industries.
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Speaker 1: Our theme music is by Kenny Beats. I'm justin Richmond.