Speaker 1: Quest Love Supreme is a production of iHeartRadio.
Speaker 2: What's going on, y'all? This is another episode of Quest
Speaker 2: Love Supreme. I'm your host Quest Love. We're here with
Speaker 2: Team Supreme Laya. Hello, Hi, how are you this morning?
Speaker 3: I'm so excited because it's two of my favorite drummers
Speaker 3: of all time are on the same call. It's really
Speaker 3: kind of mind blowing. I'm losing my ship.
Speaker 4: Thank you all.
Speaker 2: I'm Pete Bill. How are you from your weekend excursion? Yeah,
Speaker 2: I'm good.
Speaker 5: I'm slick to be here too. I always feel like
Speaker 5: the episodes where we get like real drummer heavy are
Speaker 5: always kind of fun to watch. You sort of like
Speaker 5: half sweat, half not sweat. The whole thing is great.
Speaker 5: There's like lots of emulation, lots of it's awesome because
Speaker 5: like we do with like real heavy chopping drummers and
Speaker 5: like groove drummers, all kinds of drummers.
Speaker 2: I'm excited about it. I'm into it. There you go,
Speaker 2: all right? Yeah, Well, as Bill has already cuge you guys,
Speaker 2: then we can call the Davy give the drummers some
Speaker 2: Yaho episode. Our guest today, for four plus decades, has
Speaker 2: been blown on my minds. Basically, it's only apropos that
Speaker 2: we say give the Drummer sum because it's so weird.
Speaker 2: That title has been such an important calling card for
Speaker 2: people of our craft, but I've yet to see anyone
Speaker 2: actually title their album give the Drummer some until now.
Speaker 2: As I said, for legendary decades of drumming behind some
Speaker 2: of the greatest acts of our time. I will say
Speaker 2: that the majority of the earth might know her via
Speaker 2: her tenure with Lenny Kravitz, but there's so much more.
Speaker 2: Even though I've known of her legend for all my
Speaker 2: professional life, we've never had a direct conversation, and it's
Speaker 2: time to break that ice. Yes, ladies and gentlemen, please
Speaker 2: welcome to the quest Love of Supreme, the one and
Speaker 2: only Cindy Blackman Santana. Thank you, what's going.
Speaker 4: On so much? It's such an honor to be here
Speaker 4: with you. I'm very excited.
Speaker 2: Were you located right now? What part of the world
Speaker 2: are you?
Speaker 4: And doing great? And I'm in Las Vegas right now?
Speaker 2: Okay, you're in Vegas?
Speaker 3: Okay, yeah, I just saw her. Tony Is that an
Speaker 3: AMP back there to Tony Williams Play or Die?
Speaker 2: Yes? Oh, yes, I believe that's album.
Speaker 3: That's an album album.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 2: Do you reside in Vegas right now?
Speaker 4: Or yes?
Speaker 2: Yeah, explain to me, because you know, I literally like
Speaker 2: just got off the plane an hour ago from Los
Speaker 2: Angeles and that was the first time now even though
Speaker 2: there was an event happening. Of course, this taping is
Speaker 2: way after. But I was coming back from the Emmys,
Speaker 2: and I'm seeming to notice that La is getting rather
Speaker 2: uh empty, if you will, Everyone is relocating to Las Vegas.
Speaker 2: What is it about Vegas that I don't know? Because
Speaker 2: or am I only visiting the Times Square of Vegas
Speaker 2: not seeing the rest of Vegas? What is it about
Speaker 2: Vegas that's calling the professional world? Because that's pretty much
Speaker 2: where everyone's living now.
Speaker 6: There's a lot going on in Las Vegas. I mean,
Speaker 6: it's definitely the Times Square. It's lights and glitz and glamour.
Speaker 6: But firstly, outside of Las Vegas, and we live like
Speaker 6: thirty minutes from there from the Strip, it's very peaceful,
Speaker 6: it's very calm. I think that, you know, a big
Speaker 6: draw for a lot of people is that it's a
Speaker 6: hub because you get people coming from all over the world,
Speaker 6: you know, to come to Las Vegas for you know,
Speaker 6: casinos and shows and whatever.
Speaker 4: So you know, there's a big.
Speaker 6: Chance to get a lot of exposure globally just by
Speaker 6: being here because of the amount of people in traffic
Speaker 6: and you know, the types of people that you're run into.
Speaker 4: So for business, it's good for that. Also, the cost
Speaker 4: of living is a lot lower, like significantly, right.
Speaker 6: Yeahficantly lower, and so you know, if you want to
Speaker 6: have like, you know, some space and get a building
Speaker 6: and do something, it's much easier to do it here.
Speaker 6: So a lot of people are flocking here, and it's
Speaker 6: pretty amazing because you know it's I was thinking, you know,
Speaker 6: recently and you akin this to Los Angeles, the traffic
Speaker 6: is becoming like Los Angeles.
Speaker 2: Yeah. I was going to say, is there a concern
Speaker 2: that Vegas will soon like the property values will go up? Like, well,
Speaker 2: the gentrification effect hit Vegas, like at first it was
Speaker 2: everyone's little secret and then everyone's moving there, So is
Speaker 2: there a concern that this is no longer like the
Speaker 2: little secret anymore? Or because even now I know that
Speaker 2: there's two major movie companies that are absolutely like setting
Speaker 2: up shop inside of Las Vegas. So for all intensive purposes,
Speaker 2: I would think that by twenty twenty eight, Vegas will
Speaker 2: pretty much just be Hollywood. So is there is there
Speaker 2: a concern that that is what it's going to turn to?
Speaker 2: Thus people will be like, all right, well let's let's
Speaker 2: go to Arizona. Now that Vegas has been.
Speaker 3: Arizona is already a plan B for some people they
Speaker 3: call athletes.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I was going to say, Arizona is the athlete.
Speaker 2: So probably New Mexico.
Speaker 3: Well, New Mexico, That's what I was just about to say.
Speaker 3: And Mayor during COVID, a lot of artists moved to
Speaker 3: New Mexico, right trip, and Cindy, did you know about that?
Speaker 6: A lot of people are moving to New Mexico and
Speaker 6: things push out, you know, I mean I saw that
Speaker 6: happen in New York City because you know, you had Manhattan,
Speaker 6: which is a hub, and then you know, people started
Speaker 6: pushing out into Williamsburg and to Brooklyn, other parts of
Speaker 6: Brooklyn rather and other boroughs, and it just keeps pushing
Speaker 6: out and pushing out and pushing out.
Speaker 4: And that's what's happening here. I mean, it's becoming a real.
Speaker 6: Kind of collective space for some many people in so
Speaker 6: many different areas. You know, of business, of arts, you know,
Speaker 6: so that's probably gonna happen.
Speaker 2: Are you in a Joshuita Tree kind of isolated place
Speaker 2: or is it the city.
Speaker 6: We're not Joshua Tree, but almost, you know, I mean,
Speaker 6: because we're like, as I was saying, thirty minutes out
Speaker 6: from the strip. So you know, we're enough far enough
Speaker 6: away from that that we don't have to know about
Speaker 6: any of that if we don't want to, you know.
Speaker 6: And it's interesting because here there's a there's a community
Speaker 6: of people who want to help society, who want to
Speaker 6: help raise consciousness level. Because you think of Las Vegas
Speaker 6: as just this. I mean I used to, because I
Speaker 6: would just like you, you know, I would come in and
Speaker 6: show sick snow, see my hotel room.
Speaker 4: Get on the bus or get on the plane and
Speaker 4: get out and that would be it.
Speaker 6: And I'm like, oh, I don't like this because I
Speaker 6: don't like smoke, I don't like all that, you know, damblance.
Speaker 6: So for me, it's like, Okay, let me do my
Speaker 6: show and get out of here. But living here, you
Speaker 6: see another aspect, and you see a whole other level
Speaker 6: of not only compassion but desire to really help people.
Speaker 6: You know, there's an organization called Three Squares here which
Speaker 6: feeds millions of people.
Speaker 4: I think today they've fed over four million people, especially children,
Speaker 4: like during the week and then on the weekends they
Speaker 4: give them backpacks of food to take home in case,
Speaker 4: you know, they need to eat.
Speaker 6: There's another place called cassade Louse and this minister and
Speaker 6: his wife, they started this kind of small little refuge
Speaker 6: for children because it's in an area that initially was
Speaker 6: very seedy area and the people that hung out in
Speaker 6: those areas they were doing what human beings doing they do.
Speaker 4: They still were having children. A lot those children were
Speaker 4: either mentally physically neglected or just neglected because the parents
Speaker 4: just weren't there, you know, and so what's going to
Speaker 4: happen to those children? So these people opened up.
Speaker 6: A space for them to It's not large enough for
Speaker 6: them to live there, but they can go there and
Speaker 6: get meals or just you know commune or you know,
Speaker 6: have a safe space.
Speaker 4: To go to. And you know, there are several places
Speaker 4: like that here, which is something that I didn't think
Speaker 4: I would see in las I guess, but it's a
Speaker 4: beautiful thing. So there are a lot of aspects here
Speaker 4: to this area.
Speaker 2: Yeah, anytime someone challenged me about, well, you know, next
Speaker 2: time you come to Vegas, come to Da da Da
Speaker 2: Da dah. I'll see the rot of it, you know
Speaker 2: that sort of thing. And I'm like, all right, I'll
Speaker 2: do it. And then I fall into that trap of
Speaker 2: just staying in my hotel room until you get the
Speaker 2: not where it's time to go to sound check, and
Speaker 2: then you know.
Speaker 3: It's probably a beautiful indigenous community there too, amir.
Speaker 2: I'm for it, man, I'm looking forward to this.
Speaker 4: Let us know when you want to explore. We got
Speaker 4: an area that you can come and check out.
Speaker 2: Nice. Nice, Could you tell me what is your first
Speaker 2: musical memory in life?
Speaker 6: My first musical memory is when I was in Ohio,
Speaker 6: which is where I'm from, Yellow Springs.
Speaker 4: Yellow Springs.
Speaker 2: Yeah, you know what I'll say that. You know Chappelle,
Speaker 2: he could talk anybody into anything, because that's the type
Speaker 2: of gift he has. But during the pandemic, those trips
Speaker 2: of Yellow Springs, you know, it was such a welcome
Speaker 2: relief to sort of the stress of what the pandemic
Speaker 2: was in twenty twenty, so there was half a second
Speaker 2: where I was considering getting a house in Yellow Springs.
Speaker 2: I'm still not against the idea. You know, I know
Speaker 2: that quality lives out there. I know Dave convinced a
Speaker 2: few people in this community to buy property out there
Speaker 2: and whatnot. So was it always a hippie friendly town
Speaker 2: since since the get or was that a recent development.
Speaker 4: Oh no, it's always been that way.
Speaker 6: It's always been a really cool little oasis in a
Speaker 6: very conservative state.
Speaker 2: Yeah. I was like those nine blocks exactly. Yeah, it's
Speaker 2: like a taste of heaven. Like Oh, I was like,
Speaker 2: I can get used to this. And then I took
Speaker 2: the wrong Yeah. Yeah, and I saw the wrong president.
Speaker 2: I was like right, yeah, I was like, uh no,
Speaker 2: let me, let me get back to this, the blue
Speaker 2: Blue section. Yeah. So what was your first musical memory there?
Speaker 6: Well, there were a couple with my dad because he
Speaker 6: didn't play an instrument, but he had a collection of
Speaker 6: records because he liked jazz. So it was me sneaking
Speaker 6: into his collection and listening and hearing the drums and
Speaker 6: not knowing what that was because I was, you know,
Speaker 6: like three and four, but really liking what I heard
Speaker 6: and being drawn to that.
Speaker 2: So you know, what were those records?
Speaker 6: Yeah, he had a lot of Ama Jamal, he had
Speaker 6: some and that was probably one of his favorite.
Speaker 4: He had Miles records, He had some Coltrane records. Those
Speaker 4: were his his like favorite three artists, you know, which
Speaker 4: was a great introduction for me. He had modern jazz quartet.
Speaker 4: You know.
Speaker 6: He had a kind of a nice little niche of stuff,
Speaker 6: and so I would sneak in there and you know,
Speaker 6: listen to probably scratch some of the albums because I
Speaker 6: was too young to really you know, take care of
Speaker 6: him well. But yeah, that's probably my first and you know,
Speaker 6: maybe my second would would be taking a piano piano
Speaker 6: lesson with my grandmother who was a classical pianist, and
Speaker 6: hanging out with my uncle, who was a musician as well.
Speaker 2: Were drums the first weapon of choice for you or
Speaker 2: what was the first instrument that you gravitated towards.
Speaker 4: Oh, definitely drums.
Speaker 6: Yeah, and I took a lesson on piano with my grandmother,
Speaker 6: But yeah, drums was always the thing that attracted me.
Speaker 2: Were you encouraged to pursue it, because I know that
Speaker 2: around the early nineties, especially once you know this long
Speaker 2: after Gina Shock and you and Sheila sort of like
Speaker 2: forged the path. But there was a period when even
Speaker 2: when I was a kid in which teachers would actually
Speaker 2: kind of maybe not being aware of how toxic it was,
Speaker 2: but you know, they would actually say like, well, you know,
Speaker 2: wanted to do the drums, like that's a girl thing,
Speaker 2: and you know that, well yeah, I mean not that,
Speaker 2: not that explicit, but.
Speaker 3: I would have never thought that about the opposite.
Speaker 2: I remember, like in third grade, like someone wanting to
Speaker 2: play the drums or whatever, and you know, kind of
Speaker 2: joke like you should you want to do the drums,
Speaker 2: like you know you want to come as in, like
Speaker 2: you should you want to come to the boys club,
Speaker 2: and that I think you plan in my head that like, oh,
Speaker 2: drums are just masculine only, which okay, is the opposite.
Speaker 6: Yeah, you know what, I got lucky because my teachers
Speaker 6: didn't say that in school, and I played in whatever
Speaker 6: little bands I could play in in school, the speech band,
Speaker 6: concert man, the pio orchestra, the orchestra, I did the
Speaker 6: electronic music class, and I didn't hear that from from
Speaker 6: those teachers. I didn't hear that from my immediate family
Speaker 6: at home. All I heard was that drums are loud,
Speaker 6: and they're expensive and we can't.
Speaker 4: Afford them, and you know, you need a lot of
Speaker 4: you know, I didn't. I didn't hear the antagonistic stuff
Speaker 4: until I started going out and doing professional gigs. And
Speaker 4: my first professional gig was when I was thirteen. I
Speaker 4: remember I was playing with this kind of funk rock
Speaker 4: trio and we.
Speaker 6: Our first gig was in this bar. This was when
Speaker 6: we moved. We had already moved out of Ohio. We
Speaker 6: were living in Connecticut at that time, so now we're
Speaker 6: on the East coast and were playing in this bar.
Speaker 6: And I started to get these comments from older men
Speaker 6: who were in the in the bar, and they were like,
Speaker 6: you know, why.
Speaker 4: Are you doing this? This is this is not you
Speaker 4: shouldn't be doing this. You're a girl.
Speaker 6: And you know, I started hearing stuff like that. It
Speaker 6: certainly affected me. You know, I was kind of like
Speaker 6: tearing up. Why would they say that to me? And
Speaker 6: so but you know what, I had a big There
Speaker 6: was a big lesson for.
Speaker 4: Me because I went home and I.
Speaker 6: Reset my drums up in the basement and I started
Speaker 6: playing and I forgot all about it, and I said, oh,
Speaker 6: so what they.
Speaker 4: Think, Madam doesn't matter at all.
Speaker 3: I got to ask, because it feels like you and
Speaker 3: Terry Lynn Carr are not that far in age group,
Speaker 3: So it seems like are things going parallel at the time,
Speaker 3: because you said at thirteen, she started around twelve.
Speaker 2: Was there ever, Were you aware of each other or yeah.
Speaker 4: Not at all. Actually, I was not aware of her
Speaker 4: until She's a little bit younger than me. But I
Speaker 4: wasn't aware of her until I went to Berkeley and
Speaker 4: I was sitting in the hallway waiting for my lesson
Speaker 4: with Lenny Nelson, and she was not a college age
Speaker 4: at this point. Maybe she was in high school. I
Speaker 4: don't remember, but I know she wasn't in college. And
Speaker 4: in walks this gentleman with this young young lady. I
Speaker 4: don't think the mother was there. I think it was
Speaker 4: just her and her father. I think they were coming
Speaker 4: to see Lenny as well.
Speaker 6: And the father introduced me and he said I was
Speaker 6: a drummer, and you know, so that's how we first met.
Speaker 2: Okay, that's what's upped. Well, you mentioned Miles earlier. When
Speaker 2: I first became aware of you, I was like, well,
Speaker 2: she must be a Tony disciple because of your relationships
Speaker 2: to the symbols, you know, Tony Williams being one of
Speaker 2: the well, you know, I call this drum style of
Speaker 2: drumming beautifully violent. He's yes, his relationships to crashings is
Speaker 2: all this, Yeah, exactly Who was your north star in
Speaker 2: terms of like your drumming top five if you will,
Speaker 2: Like who'd you gravitate towards? Who were your favorite drummers?
Speaker 4: My favorite drummers were Art Laky, Max Roach, Owen Jones,
Speaker 4: Tony Williams, and then the Fifth at that point when
Speaker 4: I was like thirteen, the fifth kind of shifted around
Speaker 4: a little bit, but you know, those were certainly the
Speaker 4: top four.
Speaker 6: And then I started to come into knowing Ray Haines,
Speaker 6: and then you know, I was listen.
Speaker 2: And still still playing and looking like he's maybe sixty
Speaker 2: eight or something.
Speaker 3: My dad, I'm gonna tell y'all for my dad is
Speaker 3: the drummers well Sandy and he's friends with Roy and
Speaker 3: he's like, I don't know why y'all would take us
Speaker 3: so long to have Royal on And I'm like, I
Speaker 3: is he read it? Can?
Speaker 2: Yes, he's fluent, like I saw Roy for his ninety
Speaker 2: ninth birthday, like it I think in five months, I believe.
Speaker 4: I love It's incredible. Yeah, he's he's so amazing. Uncle Roy.
Speaker 4: He's he's got so much.
Speaker 6: I mean, he's just done so much in the music
Speaker 6: and you know, influenced so many people. It's interesting because,
Speaker 6: you know, when I first heard those drummers that I
Speaker 6: that I mentioned, I heard Elvin first, and I heard
Speaker 6: him before hearing Art Blakey, and as a child, I
Speaker 6: thought it was swapped around in my head because I.
Speaker 4: Thought, I thought that Blakey came from Elvin, you know.
Speaker 4: And as I was listening more and as I was
Speaker 4: as my social life was expanding to you know, other
Speaker 4: friends who were also listening, they were like no. And
Speaker 4: then I started studying when I'm like, oh, okay, and
Speaker 4: then I saw that both Elvin and Roy came from Art,
Speaker 4: but they just like this, they did two different things,
Speaker 4: you know with that triplet, because Elvin played the closed
Speaker 4: triplets and Whey played those open triplets, but they both
Speaker 4: came from him and just went into kind of different
Speaker 4: directions with that, you know.
Speaker 6: So that was amazing thing to me too, to really
Speaker 6: key in on that with those two drummers. And of
Speaker 6: course I call her Blakey Everybody's daddy. Yeah, yeah, absolutely.
Speaker 6: I was really close with Art. He used to call
Speaker 6: me his daughter. I called him Papa, and you know
Speaker 6: I used to babysit for his children. So I was
Speaker 6: at the house all the time. And when I first
Speaker 6: met him, I had done a gig with two people
Speaker 6: introduced me to Art, and one was Evelyn Laky, his daughter.
Speaker 6: She was a singer and I was doing some gigs
Speaker 6: with her and she taped some of the gigs and
Speaker 6: she gave him a recording of one of the gigs
Speaker 6: that we did together. So it was through that avenue,
Speaker 6: and then it was also through Wallace Roni because Wallace
Speaker 6: started playing with him, and Wallace mentioned him to me
Speaker 6: and invited me to a record session that Art was doing,
Speaker 6: and so that he was doing with Art, and it
Speaker 6: was with this was two drummers.
Speaker 4: George Kawasaki I think his name was was.
Speaker 6: For a Japanese label, so it was George Kawasaki and
Speaker 6: the Jazz Messengers, And so I went to this session.
Speaker 6: I was hanging out and Art didn't even remember my
Speaker 6: name at that time. He just called me his redhead friend.
Speaker 2: Oftentimes, on this show, especially when we talk to musicians,
Speaker 2: if it's singers, usually the story is, you know, they're
Speaker 2: in a gospel only household and they occasionally had to
Speaker 2: sneak to listen to air quote secular music. But with
Speaker 2: jazz officionados, were you strictly just gravitated to jazz and
Speaker 2: jazz only or was anything pop having any effect on
Speaker 2: you or anything soul having an effect on you? Or
Speaker 2: was that just incidental background music for you and when
Speaker 2: you were like practicing your craft, it was only jazz music.
Speaker 4: The first stuff was kind of all the pop stuff.
Speaker 4: In fact, I was going to beat the drummer with
Speaker 4: the Jackson five. In my head, I was the drummer
Speaker 4: that I was going to be the sixth Jackson? Are
Speaker 4: you kid? I was going to be that drummer.
Speaker 6: But you know, I was lucky because I have a
Speaker 6: senior sister who loved music. She was a singer at
Speaker 6: the time. In fact, she even sang with the Brides
Speaker 6: of Funkenstein. She had like two hundred records in her collection,
Speaker 6: everybody from James Brown to the Beatles to Coltrane, Miles Yes, and.
Speaker 4: So I would raid her collection. So I grew up
Speaker 4: hearing a whole bunch of stuff like and people say, well,
Speaker 4: how can you as a jazz drummer, I want to
Speaker 4: play pop or want to play rock or want to
Speaker 4: play with Lenny or I like that music. I grew
Speaker 4: up with that, you know. So for me, the first
Speaker 4: stuff that I was practicing heavily was actually not jazz.
Speaker 4: It was rock and pop stuff.
Speaker 6: And then I started to you know, a friend of
Speaker 6: mine who was an older drummer friend of our family,
Speaker 6: he said, you know, you really got to check out
Speaker 6: Max Roach, and so he wrote out this pattern on
Speaker 6: a piece of paper which was match playing a ride
Speaker 6: symbol pattern two and four of sock symbol. He was
Speaker 6: feathering the bass drum on all fours and playing triplets
Speaker 6: in the left hand.
Speaker 4: I was like, whoa.
Speaker 2: Versus stew four? Yes, I was the only one that
Speaker 2: had to go through that.
Speaker 3: Okay, should I ask that? Should I just leave this
Speaker 3: moment in between?
Speaker 2: Y'all? It's an exercise in which you can divide your brain,
Speaker 2: and most drum teaper teachers do this. So I was
Speaker 2: going to say, like in my era of drumming, well,
Speaker 2: it was the worst one. You go to this place
Speaker 2: and you see this drum set in the corner and
Speaker 2: it's sort of like, let me at it, let me
Speaker 2: add it, and the teacher be like no and then
Speaker 2: turns over there. It's like a practice pad. No, and
Speaker 2: then you gotta sit there and do put you know,
Speaker 2: your siny jump set over there. But he's like in
Speaker 2: the year you get to play on that. And so
Speaker 2: there's an exercise that can teach you how to do
Speaker 2: different polyrhythms and so in other words, there's this exercise
Speaker 2: where your foot is doing a four to four meter
Speaker 2: left right left right left, right, left right. So while
Speaker 2: you're doing that left right left, your hands are doing
Speaker 2: three one two two one two three, want two three,
Speaker 2: want two three, And it's it's teaching your limbs, your hands,
Speaker 2: and your feet to have yeah, yeah, and muscle memory
Speaker 2: also at the same time. So but I would have
Speaker 2: to do that for an hour. Literally, he would just
Speaker 2: read the paper. It's like, all right, go do you
Speaker 2: think for an hour? Literally left right right, right, right,
Speaker 2: right left left right left left right left left right
Speaker 2: left left, and your foot's doing right left, right, left
Speaker 2: right left right left right left at the same time.
Speaker 2: So it's allegedly supposed to make you a better drummer.
Speaker 2: House burning down. What five albums would you say, like,
Speaker 2: what albums define your childhood?
Speaker 4: They would be supreme, they would be four and more.
Speaker 2: M Miles Davis four more, Yes, Miles.
Speaker 4: Davis four more. And if I go back a little further,
Speaker 4: I'd have to say probably I used to listen to
Speaker 4: Chaka Khan and Rufus a lot. So which album what's
Speaker 4: the one would tell me something good on it? X
Speaker 4: Rufus Rax to Rufus.
Speaker 6: And there were a couple of Betty Davis albums that
Speaker 6: I used to listen to.
Speaker 4: All the time.
Speaker 2: You to Betty Davis at the time, and oh yeah.
Speaker 4: Because my sister, like I said, she was a singer
Speaker 4: and that was one of her favorites. So I was
Speaker 4: listening to Betty Davis all the time.
Speaker 6: I'm a huge Betty Davis fan, Love love Betty Davis.
Speaker 4: Yeah, so there'll be a few. And then I used
Speaker 4: to listen to Sometown Power Records a lot.
Speaker 2: Dave all right, David.
Speaker 4: David Gal used to listen to earth Wind and Fire
Speaker 4: a lot. Okay, I saw them live actually a little
Speaker 4: a little bit later. But you know, those were some
Speaker 4: of the records that I listened to. And of course
Speaker 4: I listened to every single Jackson Fire record, you know,
Speaker 4: when I was really young. Those were some of the
Speaker 4: records that I listened to in the very very very beginning.
Speaker 2: Right, Sure, when did you leave Yellow Springs?
Speaker 4: When I was eleven?
Speaker 2: Okay, where did you move?
Speaker 4: Connecticut? We moved to Bristol, Connecticut was the first place.
Speaker 4: And at that point I had had little toy drum.
Speaker 6: Sets, never a real drum set yet, you know, just
Speaker 6: getting these little kids that would justinege yeah, just break
Speaker 6: up in like a day or two, and then I
Speaker 6: have to beg for another one and have to wait
Speaker 6: until my parents would give me another one.
Speaker 4: And then when we moved to Connecticut, that's when I
Speaker 4: got my Eventually, that's when I got my first student
Speaker 4: model kit. But before that, when I didn't have a
Speaker 4: drum kit, I found a little friend who was a drummer,
Speaker 4: and I used to go to his house.
Speaker 6: He lived across the fence from us, and there was
Speaker 6: a hole in our fence in the fence of separating
Speaker 6: these two neighborhoods, and seed to crawl under that fence
Speaker 6: and go to his house, and we would put on records.
Speaker 6: Like he was really into David Garbaldi, so we would
Speaker 6: put on Tower Power records and we both plays.
Speaker 4: Yes, he played to.
Speaker 6: The song, and then I would play to the song,
Speaker 6: and then you know, we would go and you know,
Speaker 6: it was really cool. He was pretty cool young kid
Speaker 6: because he was already studying with Tyrone Lampkin and and
Speaker 6: he was telling me, you know, like you know what
Speaker 6: they were going through rudimentally. And then I joined a
Speaker 6: fife and drum corps. So that actually was the first
Speaker 6: band that I played in, was a fife and drum corps.
Speaker 4: What is that, Cindy?
Speaker 3: A fife and drum call?
Speaker 4: Is that like a drum corp? You know, little little flutes, jones,
Speaker 4: you know, the marching stuff.
Speaker 3: Yeah, okay, gotcha.
Speaker 2: Got So that's not like Florida A and N level right,
Speaker 2: Austin the six up in the air and turn around
Speaker 2: and playing. That's the way I like it. It's more
Speaker 2: like reenacting of of the Forefathers. Okay, wow, you're an anomaly.
Speaker 2: So you've not mentioned the word church yet, so you've
Speaker 2: had no beginning or foundation, like playing in your church choir,
Speaker 2: none of those things. Like, yeah, it's very unusual to
Speaker 2: find a black musician that somehow I didn't have to
Speaker 2: go through that path of that journey, So you never
Speaker 2: like were a player in a church or any of
Speaker 2: those things.
Speaker 4: I did play a little bit in my church.
Speaker 6: And I started out in the choir and we were
Speaker 6: singing something and I was belting out something so loud,
Speaker 6: and the guy was like hey. He was like, hey, hey,
Speaker 6: you know, and I said, usually i'd really rather played drums.
Speaker 6: And he said you play drums and I said yeah.
Speaker 6: So they let me bring my drums down and I played.
Speaker 6: And so I did that for a little bit. I
Speaker 6: didn't do that too much, but I did that a
Speaker 6: little bit, just myself.
Speaker 4: And and the and the organist. But also I played
Speaker 4: a team bit with my grandmother because she's played pipe
Speaker 4: organ in her church, which was in a different town.
Speaker 4: So I wasn't, you know, doing that a lot.
Speaker 6: But you know, she she would bring me in like
Speaker 6: for these special events, like you know, for Christmas.
Speaker 4: You know the drummer little drummer boy. Now it's the
Speaker 4: drummer girl. You know, stuff like that. So I played
Speaker 4: with her in her church as well.
Speaker 3: Wait, we didn't ask where are people from city? I know,
Speaker 3: y'all you're from Ohio, but where are your people from?
Speaker 4: Ohio, Kentucky, Okay, all mid Midwest basically, also.
Speaker 2: The entire families from Yellow Springs or the Midwest.
Speaker 4: Yeah, Midwest like Chicago.
Speaker 3: Oh, y'all don't have any Southern roots.
Speaker 4: Okay, okay, no, no Southern roots.
Speaker 3: No wow, yeah right.
Speaker 2: This is the first for everything. I like when we
Speaker 2: get musicians from no church, no South, this is awesome.
Speaker 2: Is insane. At what point do you find other musicians
Speaker 2: that you want to play with.
Speaker 4: I started in junior high school playing with the stage band.
Speaker 4: We had a concert band. And in high school I
Speaker 4: played with this again, the stage band, the concert band,
Speaker 4: the orchestra, and then I played also in the pit orchestra,
Speaker 4: which you know, we played for performances, you know, they
Speaker 4: would do like like Broadway type performances, but high school level.
Speaker 6: So I played in that, and in high school is
Speaker 6: probably when I started, you know, finding other people who
Speaker 6: were my age. At thirteen, really, the first band that
Speaker 6: I played with was all older musicians, you know, a
Speaker 6: guitarist and bassist who were friends with my older sister.
Speaker 6: I met them through through her and started playing with them.
Speaker 6: But right after that I started finding.
Speaker 4: Young cats who were my age.
Speaker 6: But there was definitely a difference in my taste for
Speaker 6: music and then kind of their taste for music. Because
Speaker 6: we had so many records and so much music that.
Speaker 2: Was you were way more evanced.
Speaker 4: Well, the music was you know, on the cusp of
Speaker 4: of you know, certainly it was adventuresome and you know,
Speaker 4: innovative because I was able to be exposed to the innovators,
Speaker 4: you know, Art and Max and Roy and Miles and
Speaker 4: Coltrane and all these incredible people, and a lot of
Speaker 4: my peers, you know, they were into Kansas and Chicago
Speaker 4: and Tower of Power and stuff like that, which was
Speaker 4: all cool, and you know, we used to play those songs.
Speaker 4: There was a bass player who was heavily into that stuff,
Speaker 4: and we became friends, really best friends, and he would
Speaker 4: leave his amp and his base at my house and
Speaker 4: so we would play, like especially in the summer, every day.
Speaker 4: That's what we were doing.
Speaker 6: We put on records and then we would play put
Speaker 6: on records and play play to the record. Okay, now
Speaker 6: we got that, let's play it ourselves, you know. So
Speaker 6: we were doing that all the time. And then there
Speaker 6: were some scattered musicians around the area that I lived
Speaker 6: in who were also into jazz and also into you know,
Speaker 6: like pushing the envelope a little bit. But I really
Speaker 6: didn't get into that kind of community that was full.
Speaker 4: Of cats my age that wanted to do that until
Speaker 4: I went to Berkeley.
Speaker 2: So at one point did you think, like, wow, like
Speaker 2: I'm the only young person I know that plays like
Speaker 2: how an adult plays, because I went through that kind
Speaker 2: of all my life. Like my dad was an old
Speaker 2: these duop singer, so I grew up with them, all
Speaker 2: of his musicians, and you know, I started playing with
Speaker 2: my dad when I was twelve, and you know, they
Speaker 2: make a big deal of it in concert, like, oh
Speaker 2: my god, a twelve year old wonder gun like, so
Speaker 2: I kind of you know, by fourteen fifteen, I had
Speaker 2: the swagger like, yeah, I'm the only young kid that
Speaker 2: sounds like you old cats. And then my first day
Speaker 2: of school at Performing Arts in Philadelphia, you know literally
Speaker 2: the no, not the first day, the second day, the
Speaker 2: second day already like Miles Davis is calling for like
Speaker 2: Christian McBride and Joey Francesco to like giggle with him.
Speaker 2: And you know the day that Kenny Kirkle and I
Speaker 2: think got into a situation in Joey Francisco at the
Speaker 2: likely out to me like literally come to my school.
Speaker 2: I thought I was hot shit. And then by the
Speaker 2: first week and you know, mind you like boys to
Speaker 2: men also go to this school. Like suddenly I'm getting
Speaker 2: a wake up call, Like, uh, not only are people
Speaker 2: your age and younger like musicians, but they're like dusting
Speaker 2: your ass right now. You can't rely on you being
Speaker 2: Lee Andrews's little kid like at Radio City Music all
Speaker 2: like my little thirteen year old son, like, hey dad,
Speaker 2: you know, like so it was a wake up call. Actually,
Speaker 2: you know what, this is an apropos episode. I've had
Speaker 2: two wake up calls courtesy of Cindy Blackman and just
Speaker 2: hitting me right now. I went to that part later
Speaker 2: because I as I was saying about my experiences in
Speaker 2: high school, like thinking out I was hot shitting you know,
Speaker 2: suddenly real musicians are dusting me. It gave me a
Speaker 2: wake up call. But then it just hit me that
Speaker 2: you're responsible for two wake up calls for me.
Speaker 7: But I'll he's not going to tell us, no, no, no, no, Okay, storyteller,
Speaker 7: All right, Number one, do you remember the first time
Speaker 7: we played together?
Speaker 2: Okay, So I always wanted to ask you. So there
Speaker 2: was this thing. This had to be maybe three months
Speaker 2: after nine to eleven. I remember this being like, so
Speaker 2: you remember that that two month three month post nine
Speaker 2: to eleven. Are we in the Book of Revelations? Is
Speaker 2: this the apocalypse? Is this you know that feeling that
Speaker 2: we also said in twenty twenty, like, oh, is this
Speaker 2: the end of the world. But there's a really surreal
Speaker 2: period after nine to eleven. New Yorkers were real nice
Speaker 2: to each other and hey, how are you making? You
Speaker 2: know that sort of thing. It was a very surreal
Speaker 2: feeling in the air. Someone had said it might have
Speaker 2: been there's two fashion weeks in New York, so this
Speaker 2: might be February of two thousand and two. But they
Speaker 2: wanted you and I to just do a one on
Speaker 2: one drum thing at this boutique thing and I just said, yeah, sure,
Speaker 2: you know, and didn't prepare for it. And I remember
Speaker 2: we briefly spoke backstage, like so what are we supposed
Speaker 2: to do?
Speaker 3: They're like, y'all briefly spoke before you went on.
Speaker 2: And it was I mean, liyah, like even before position
Speaker 2: it's not I'm sorry, right, just act like that's quest
Speaker 2: love Supreme, Like literally I show it like minister, like, hey, yeah,
Speaker 2: you do it, like that's kind of And I was like,
Speaker 2: so what do we do and she's like, uh, we
Speaker 2: just play And I was like, uh okay, yeah I
Speaker 2: could do that.
Speaker 3: And man, okay, y'all need to talk to us through this,
Speaker 3: like I need to.
Speaker 2: She went from zero to autobone two hundred miles an hour.
Speaker 4: No cheap.
Speaker 2: Could you not keep up? Happen? Giant steps? You went
Speaker 2: to baby steps?
Speaker 4: Have it?
Speaker 2: Do you remember the do you remember the first time
Speaker 2: in life like out of shape where like you're like
Speaker 2: you went jogging, you remember the first time like you
Speaker 2: jigged your first mile? Do you want to die? And
Speaker 2: it was like you've It was like some Gi Jane
Speaker 2: basic training thing like dog.
Speaker 4: There was a second at the end of you got
Speaker 4: me like, all right, fuck it, dude.
Speaker 2: There was a digital clock that was in the corner
Speaker 2: and that was the slowest I ever saw seconds go by,
Speaker 2: and like forty three seconds went by, and I was like, oh,
Speaker 2: I'm gonna die like she it was the fastest. It
Speaker 2: was the loudest, fastest thing ever. And that night, I
Speaker 2: will say, was the night. And that night, yeah, I
Speaker 2: was four thirty eight at my most weight. Oh okay,
Speaker 2: and I got through that gig by the skin of
Speaker 2: my teeth and I remember going back to my hotel
Speaker 2: and just looking at it was one of the moments
Speaker 2: where you look yourself in the mirror and you're just like,
Speaker 2: it's not gonna work. It wasn't a rock bottom lowe place,
Speaker 2: but I definitely remember by like minute six, I don't
Speaker 2: know how she does this, Like I've never gone this.
Speaker 2: Like my level of drum solo is like maybe two minutes,
Speaker 2: maybe three minutes and that's it. But I was like, one,
Speaker 2: my drumming technique is way under advanced, under cooked. I
Speaker 2: gotta work on that.
Speaker 3: And seeing that it looks like Cindy gives more of
Speaker 3: her body too in the as she's drumming, like she
Speaker 3: just the your whole body, all your limbs.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I was watching just like, oh wow, she puts
Speaker 2: her Like are there times where it's just like you
Speaker 2: feel this pressure that you have to go from zero
Speaker 2: to nine hundred bounds per hour every show you've ever
Speaker 2: done in the rest of your life, Like, is there
Speaker 2: a pressure where you just don't feel like doing that? No,
Speaker 2: not for me.
Speaker 4: I loved ninety an hour.
Speaker 2: I love it therapeutic.
Speaker 4: I loved the velocity of all of that. But you know,
Speaker 4: before we get into more of that.
Speaker 6: I just want to say that when we played together,
Speaker 6: I was like, man, this dude, I mean, and I
Speaker 6: heard you on record.
Speaker 4: I loved your playing, but to play with you your
Speaker 4: groove was so intensely beautiful, and so in the pocket
Speaker 4: I was like, okay, yes.
Speaker 2: That's all I had. Pocket. I didn't have velocity or
Speaker 2: strength or dynamic.
Speaker 4: Got let me tell you something. I loved it. I
Speaker 4: thought it was was awesome, you know, so that was
Speaker 4: You're very kind, thank you, No, it was It's the truth, man,
Speaker 4: I loved it. I thought it was so great. So
Speaker 4: for me, it was really really great to play with
Speaker 4: you and feel where you're feeling it.
Speaker 2: You know.
Speaker 6: It's interesting because I went to see Tony at the
Speaker 6: Vanguard one time, and you know you've been to the Vanguard,
Speaker 6: you know that little bench that they have, so that's
Speaker 6: drummer's row. So of course early so I could be
Speaker 6: as close to Tony as possible on drummer's row.
Speaker 4: So drums are here and I'm right here. So I'm
Speaker 4: just watching Tony, not paying attention to anything else.
Speaker 6: That's going on in the room because I'm focused on him.
Speaker 6: Of course, you know, as we all would be and
Speaker 6: there were people sitting next to me, but I don't
Speaker 6: know who they are, you know, just somebody.
Speaker 4: I don't know who it was. There's somebody on my
Speaker 4: left and you know, I'm watching him, and all of
Speaker 4: a sudden, there's like a little commotion on my on
Speaker 4: my left side. I didn't know what it was. Somebody
Speaker 4: pushed the person out of the way who was sitting
Speaker 4: next to me and sat down next to me, just
Speaker 4: plopped down and I looked and his art blaky, I
Speaker 4: tell you, it was already my papa. He sat down
Speaker 4: next to me and he put his arm around me,
Speaker 4: and so he's listening.
Speaker 6: He's watching Tony like I'm watching Tony, and he's patting
Speaker 6: on my shoulder, you know, where he's feeling the beat,
Speaker 6: and Tony's playing where he's feeling the beat.
Speaker 4: And Tony was, you know, like, so you got the
Speaker 4: middle of the beat, you got behind the beat, you
Speaker 4: got above the beat. You know, you got all these
Speaker 4: little areas where you can push. You know where that
Speaker 4: that center is, and you can push the center, be
Speaker 4: in the center, you can be behind it. And we
Speaker 4: know the cast that we love kind of where they go.
Speaker 4: So Tony is like you know either center or pushing,
Speaker 4: and so he was pushing and Art was feeling it
Speaker 4: back here. So for me to feel Art tapping on
Speaker 4: my shoulder where he felt the one was yes and
Speaker 4: where he felt the time and where Tony was playing,
Speaker 4: it was mind blowing.
Speaker 2: It was like, I'm always that person where my one
Speaker 2: is where someone's one is not. And then you're always
Speaker 2: You're always behind the ba of mere. That's your thing,
Speaker 2: that's always your thing. Yeah, and I'll be that Meedley.
Speaker 2: I mean like that's your whole. Wow, that's my wheelhouse.
Speaker 2: Can I ask a.
Speaker 5: Question to two of the greatest drummers that ever lived?
Speaker 5: Like when are you timekeeper? And when are you musician?
Speaker 5: When are you melodic instrument? When are you rhythmic instrument?
Speaker 5: I feel like that to be always in drummers who
Speaker 5: do a lot of it, Like how do you feel
Speaker 5: yourself as a musician? I guess it's the question.
Speaker 2: So this is weird, and this is coming right off
Speaker 2: the residency. I did a blue Note this year. I'm
Speaker 2: about crossing the boundaries or whatever it makes me uncomfortable
Speaker 2: and dive into it and you know, getting out of
Speaker 2: my comfort zone. And it's been a minute since I've
Speaker 2: done a jazz gig. So I did like a week
Speaker 2: of gigs with David Murray. Also, the third lesson I
Speaker 2: learned was I'm never doing a duo sho ever again.
Speaker 2: So I did a trio show, you know, David Murray
Speaker 2: and very angry, and I realized that being in a
Speaker 2: situation where you know, you only have three musicians and
Speaker 2: it's a saxophone and a keyboard player, I'm less a
Speaker 2: heart drummer more of a brain drummer because I'm literally thinking, okay,
Speaker 2: so we don't have a guitar player or a bass player,
Speaker 2: so my foot's going to have to keep the pace
Speaker 2: on bass and the like. I'm a very calculating drummer
Speaker 2: because I'm used to being a traffic cup for the roots,
Speaker 2: and I know that drumming is purely a heart or
Speaker 2: a gut thing, and it's gut. We say the heart
Speaker 2: better marketing to say heart. But I'm not necessarily a
Speaker 2: heart drummer. So you know, I'm also wondering that same
Speaker 2: question that you just asked, Bill, because I'm gonna do
Speaker 2: a set of gigs with glasper as a duo, right,
Speaker 2: and again it's it's I think to be a drummer
Speaker 2: is also to be like super vulnerable because you don't
Speaker 2: know what's gonna happen next. It's not like you can
Speaker 2: calculate exactly what you're gonna do. So just from a
Speaker 2: psychological aspect, I'm trying to do more jazz gigs. So
Speaker 2: that I because you said you.
Speaker 3: Don't like duos and you want to do another one
Speaker 3: with Robert Okay.
Speaker 2: Well, because I can't preach the gospel and then don't
Speaker 2: practice what I preach, and I'm all about getting out
Speaker 2: of your comfort zone. Yeah, it scares me to death
Speaker 2: and I freaked out on glass for one night, like,
Speaker 2: oh no, it's gonna work, man like, because I'm thinking,
Speaker 2: you know, I'm I'm thinking, and I think to really
Speaker 2: be an effective musician, you have to stop thinking and
Speaker 2: just do. And it's so hard for me to just
Speaker 2: trust not being in control, like not planning the map
Speaker 2: out days beforehand. So do you feel as though you're
Speaker 2: the traffic cop that controls everyone or are you part
Speaker 2: of the color making of music?
Speaker 6: You know, I think it's kind of situational, depending on
Speaker 6: you know, what the situation is that you're playing. But
Speaker 6: for me, I think you're everything because you know, if
Speaker 6: you keep for me, when I keep my options open,
Speaker 6: then I have all these different pathways that I can
Speaker 6: go down, and you know, always thinking about giving the
Speaker 6: music what it needs at that time. You know, so
Speaker 6: some situations and every situation is different. I learned that
Speaker 6: from Ron Carter. You know, one situation might need you
Speaker 6: to be a certain thing, one situation might need you
Speaker 6: to be something else, and then there are some situations
Speaker 6: where you can just be kind of everything.
Speaker 3: Can you give us some examples of the people are thinking, Like,
Speaker 3: so when you're doing your jazz thing or when you're
Speaker 3: doing it with with Lenny, Like when you're with Lenny, are.
Speaker 2: You free or are you like all those things?
Speaker 6: Lenny's thing is is it's rock funk, and it's you know,
Speaker 6: you're playing that group. You're gonna slam that groove and
Speaker 6: play that until cows come home with some exciting things
Speaker 6: that you're doing feiel wise around that when it's needed,
Speaker 6: but you're basically playing the groove. And and you know,
Speaker 6: Lenny's thing is is parts. You know, you're playing the
Speaker 6: parts from the records that he's recorded. So for me,
Speaker 6: I just made those parts my own as you know,
Speaker 6: I own them.
Speaker 4: You know. Okay, you played it on the record, but
Speaker 4: this is mine right now, you know.
Speaker 6: So that's the way I approach that. And then I
Speaker 6: would add little things, you know, kind of just to
Speaker 6: lift the music because now we're playing live, and also
Speaker 6: to satisfy myself, you know, to interject something. But that
Speaker 6: situation where you know the end game and the goal
Speaker 6: is the groove and to be exciting.
Speaker 3: That's coloring. So in the mirrors terms, that would be
Speaker 3: when you're in that situation, you're doing more of the coloring.
Speaker 3: You don't have to be traffic copping.
Speaker 6: No, you're traffic copping because you're playing. You're playing the groove,
Speaker 6: you know, and basically sticking to that. But there are
Speaker 6: situations where so like when I play with Carlos, you
Speaker 6: have that because every music has to feel good, right,
Speaker 6: so you have that, but also you're allowed to expand
Speaker 6: and expound and be a little more free. And so
Speaker 6: then that means you can interject. With my own band,
Speaker 6: I do a combination of stuff because I love grooving,
Speaker 6: but I also love interjection. I love having conversation. I
Speaker 6: love stating the groove, but I also love hearing it
Speaker 6: in my head and playing around it, you know, and
Speaker 6: I think, you know, it's important to understand that the
Speaker 6: groove is not just up to the drummer. It's up
Speaker 6: to everybody. So you know, there are times when you
Speaker 6: swap roles with people. You know, you pass the ball around,
Speaker 6: you know, like maybe bass player is the one who's
Speaker 6: who's holding it down and you're kind of flowering around,
Speaker 6: and then maybe you're both doing it at the same time.
Speaker 6: There's a lot of different ways to approach the music
Speaker 6: when you're playing in situations that are i'll say freer
Speaker 6: or you know, able to allow interjection and and you know,
Speaker 6: kind of freedom of conversation and some situations that's not
Speaker 6: apropos for but in other situations is.
Speaker 4: So that's what I was saying earlier.
Speaker 6: It's kind of situational depending on you know, what you're playing,
Speaker 6: who you're who you're playing with. You know, like let's
Speaker 6: say you're dating someone you know, and you're dating this
Speaker 6: guy and and he likes sci fi movies, so with him,
Speaker 6: you're going to go see sci fi movies. But then
Speaker 6: if you're dating some other person following year, and you
Speaker 6: know they don't like movies, they like opera, So then
Speaker 6: maybe you're going to go to an opera with this person.
Speaker 6: It's just situational, So it just depends on you know,
Speaker 6: what situation is and what you do, what you like
Speaker 6: as a combination, you know, in terms of a group.
Speaker 4: Yeah, you're just.
Speaker 2: Question because I think the very first album of yours
Speaker 2: in which I became aware was the Code writ project
Speaker 2: with Steve Coleman. At any point, were you being wooed
Speaker 2: by the the em Bass collective at all to to
Speaker 2: to join them in based being a Steve Coleman or
Speaker 2: a Gosby uh, Jerry Allen Cassandra, I guess is a
Speaker 2: member of Embass basically the jazz, the jazz, native tongues,
Speaker 2: the like. Were they were they trying to recruit you
Speaker 2: to be part of their click or you know I
Speaker 2: talked to.
Speaker 6: Steve about that a little bit at one point, but
Speaker 6: you know I had a different click. I was in
Speaker 6: another click who was Click then Wallace, you know his
Speaker 6: whole team. That was kind of my click Wallace, and
Speaker 6: you know that that kind.
Speaker 4: Of took because we were just so into Miles and Tony,
Speaker 4: you know, that was our thing. So that was kind
Speaker 4: of where my head was at and you know, I
Speaker 4: didn't really want to know about much else at that point.
Speaker 2: Yeah, Man wilesce fn that I got to work with
Speaker 2: him briefly on Commons Electric Circus album. Man incredible player,
Speaker 2: like he even the moment in March of twenty twenty
Speaker 2: where we were trying to figure out whether or not,
Speaker 2: like if COVID was going to be like a real
Speaker 2: thing or just like a thing where it's like, Okay,
Speaker 2: we're just in the house for a couple of days
Speaker 2: and they'll spray some raid outside and then we'll be
Speaker 2: cool and you know, like that sort of thing. While
Speaker 2: its was one of the first casualties of COVID that
Speaker 2: made me know that instantly this is this is serious.
Speaker 2: Can you describe your years of playing with them? Like
Speaker 2: what was he like?
Speaker 4: He was a true musician, a true student of the music,
Speaker 4: and somebody who was unrelentless in wanting to push his
Speaker 4: own envelope in terms of a player, a musician, and
Speaker 4: push the envelope of the music. You know, he was
Speaker 4: really incredible. Like, you know, we were in a relationship for.
Speaker 6: Like eleven years and it would be a race in
Speaker 6: the morning to see who got to their instrument first,
Speaker 6: Who got to the piano first, Who got to the
Speaker 6: record player first? You know, it was incredible because this
Speaker 6: guy was just really, really so inspired.
Speaker 4: You know, he just lived the music.
Speaker 2: You know.
Speaker 4: It was really amazing to see. And you know, he
Speaker 4: was such a genius, you know, his harmonic knowledge, his
Speaker 4: knowledge of the drums. I don't know if you ever
Speaker 4: talked to him about drums, but his knowledge of the
Speaker 4: drums was incredible.
Speaker 6: I could talk to him about drumming in more depth
Speaker 6: and detail than I can talk to most drummers about.
Speaker 6: I mean, this guy was really into the music music, okay.
Speaker 4: Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, And I learned so much from him.
Speaker 6: I learned harmony from him, I learned, you know, about
Speaker 6: playing in an ensemble to him from him. You know,
Speaker 6: it's just so many things that he was. She's already
Speaker 6: very advanced at at such a young age, you know.
Speaker 6: So for me, you know, for for my peer group,
Speaker 6: to me, he was like the genius of.
Speaker 4: Of of my peer group.
Speaker 2: Okay, you said something, and it quasi triggered me, and
Speaker 2: I gotta ask you this. Okay, So I purposely, purposely
Speaker 2: in my professional life, in my romantic life, was like
Speaker 2: I'm never ever dating a creative Yes, in my same field. Yes,
Speaker 2: And you know because I've watched like singers together they
Speaker 2: harmonized in twenty four to.
Speaker 8: Seven, And like, there's one rule I've ever had, like
Speaker 8: I don't care how fun yeah the individual is.
Speaker 2: Yeah, like no, and seriously, there there have been some
Speaker 2: conversations had recent like well what was it about me? Like,
Speaker 2: and I've always had I've always had an anti musician
Speaker 2: creative policy.
Speaker 3: I mean, all human beings do not to mention musicians,
Speaker 3: and me are keep in mind that all girls get
Speaker 3: told not to date musicians. I'm a door of oh
Speaker 3: because we're dogs, right, So exactly, so I'm saying yes,
Speaker 3: all of that, and I.
Speaker 2: Think a lot of that had to do with it
Speaker 2: because there have been some times where like I would
Speaker 2: always gun for like adjacent, like the assistant, you know,
Speaker 2: someone that's kind of someone that understands the industry, not
Speaker 2: a total civilian, but just not What is it like
Speaker 2: to be in a relationship on purpose? Yeah, on purpose
Speaker 2: with a creative because to me, I feel like that's
Speaker 2: that's oil and water. I feel like that's church and state.
Speaker 2: Like when I come home, I want to And it's
Speaker 2: weird because you know, I'm seeing someone right now that's
Speaker 2: like a movie head, and I actually like discussing movies
Speaker 2: with her and those sort of things, and like we
Speaker 2: have movie nights and all the discussions and depth and
Speaker 2: listen to podcasts together about filmmaking techniques and all those things.
Speaker 2: But yeah, with music though, oh man, I will feel
Speaker 2: so claus tophobic being a relationship where like first thing
Speaker 2: in the morning you want to talk music and but
Speaker 2: for you, how does that work? Like?
Speaker 3: And you make it look good, she makes it look
Speaker 3: at ud.
Speaker 4: You're tracking me up right now. I gotta tell you, man,
Speaker 4: you're making me laugh so hard.
Speaker 6: The relationship that I had with with with Wallace was
Speaker 6: incredible because you know, we were so young. We were
Speaker 6: like twenty you know, we got together and we were
Speaker 6: just going for it all the time, and so.
Speaker 4: It was very inspiring to me. The issue became when
Speaker 4: the relationship split.
Speaker 6: It's like, okay, now we do you know and not
Speaker 6: only did you know we split as a couple, but
Speaker 6: you know my music partner we split, and okay, this
Speaker 6: is not happening to I'm never.
Speaker 4: Doing that again. I am never dating a musician ever again,
Speaker 4: because you know, when if it does split then.
Speaker 6: You know, it's like, well wait a minute, Okay, this
Speaker 6: is not happening, you know. So at that point I
Speaker 6: was like, okay, this is I'm not gonna do that
Speaker 6: again ever ever. And so the next person that I
Speaker 6: diated was not a musician at all. You know, I
Speaker 6: loved music, but was not a musician.
Speaker 2: Was that weird?
Speaker 6: No, because the person was this person was was very supportive,
Speaker 6: you know, so that it wasn't weird because he loved.
Speaker 2: Music, you know, but I'm weird in terms of like,
Speaker 2: you know, if you want to talk about Tony Williams's
Speaker 2: uh you know net for TD you know what I mean, She's.
Speaker 6: Those conversations didn't happen, not like that, because it would
Speaker 6: it would be like the way that he would describe something,
Speaker 6: you know, it would it was interesting to me to
Speaker 6: hear his take.
Speaker 4: On stuff because he was so not a musician. You know.
Speaker 6: He would say, well, that person sounds like would sounds
Speaker 6: like would that sounds like what?
Speaker 3: You know?
Speaker 4: So it was just kind of funny to me. You know.
Speaker 4: So my my end depth music conversations were with my friends,
Speaker 4: my music friends. They were not with that person because
Speaker 4: that just didn't happen, which is okay too, which is
Speaker 4: okay too. That was okay.
Speaker 6: But you know then when I when I met Carlos,
Speaker 6: I was like, there's a lot in common, but it
Speaker 6: wasn't you know. It was more the spiritual path that
Speaker 6: he was on that grabbed me because I hadn't.
Speaker 4: Been with some time and I was missing that. That's
Speaker 4: what I was looking for most. The fact that he
Speaker 4: was a musician was secondary.
Speaker 6: The spiritual path one one for me because that's what
Speaker 6: I was looking for, somebody on a spiritual path.
Speaker 4: I needed that, you know, right. And the music thing
Speaker 4: with him.
Speaker 6: Is there and we talk about it all the time,
Speaker 6: but he's such a sage with other things that is
Speaker 6: just a whole another level of stuff that goes on.
Speaker 6: So sometimes we're not talking about music. We're talking about philosophy,
Speaker 6: we're talking about spirituality. We're talking about you know, things
Speaker 6: that we both want to do, you know, uplifting the.
Speaker 4: Consciousness of humanity. So it's a whole nother thing, and
Speaker 4: we do it through music, yes, but we also do it,
Speaker 4: you know, he does it through streams and through talking
Speaker 4: to people in different ways. You've spoken to him, you know,
Speaker 4: So it's a whole other level. Now with him, it's
Speaker 4: a whole other level of depth and dimension in what
Speaker 4: we talk about.
Speaker 2: You know, I don't know this is an outline question
Speaker 2: or whatever, but assuming that your life partner is Carlo Santana,
Speaker 2: I would always imagine that, like, for me, the most
Speaker 2: ideal situation. So yeah, it kind of when I had
Speaker 2: my first conversation with him, was also a little bit
Speaker 2: past the pandemic where I have my spiritual waking as well,
Speaker 2: and you know, got into the things I used to
Speaker 2: laugh at. I used to look at cats like Carlos,
Speaker 2: like burntal hippie and you know, all that stuff. And
Speaker 2: then suddenly I morphed into the person I used to
Speaker 2: laugh at. I you know, like started doing yoga and
Speaker 2: started meditating, and started sound baths and like all those
Speaker 2: things I used to laugh at people. And for me,
Speaker 2: when I went to my first sound bath, I was
Speaker 2: just like, yo, this is like, this is an ideal
Speaker 2: musical situation. I wouldn't mind being in. That's not a
Speaker 2: job or me playing a gig, but like the idea
Speaker 2: of watching people play. You know, there were Klimba's there,
Speaker 2: there were various bells and koshy bells and all those
Speaker 2: things or whatever. Do you guys like routinely do circles
Speaker 2: of music together as a couple or like with groups
Speaker 2: of people or not like that, you know, No, never, Okay,
Speaker 2: I was having a romantica.
Speaker 4: We don't do any of that stuff.
Speaker 6: I mean, we listen to stuff, you know, and you know,
Speaker 6: he comes up with all these playlists and we go
Speaker 6: through that kind of stuff. And of course he loves
Speaker 6: the drums, so we talk about the drums, and but
Speaker 6: it's not like we're doing music circles or even jamming
Speaker 6: all the time. That's you know, like I have drums
Speaker 6: in the house, but I really play in the house.
Speaker 6: I go to the studio to play because I like
Speaker 6: to focus and be and he likes to sit in
Speaker 6: the living room and play, so he plays there.
Speaker 4: And I go to the studio and play.
Speaker 6: So which is actually good because then you're giving the
Speaker 6: person their own space, you know. So we have this
Speaker 6: stuff where we come together, and then we also have
Speaker 6: our own space to explore the way we want to
Speaker 6: or you know, just be alone with our instruments, which
Speaker 6: is something that as you know, you're a musician too,
Speaker 6: and you know, we need that that's it's part of
Speaker 6: the deal.
Speaker 2: I was asking because like there's a period where Don
Speaker 2: Cherry would often involve all this family into recordings. Like, yes,
Speaker 2: he recorded it and released it, but I know that
Speaker 2: the genesis of a lot of those recordings were just
Speaker 2: like being at home doing chanting around the house and
Speaker 2: you know that that sort of thing. So in my mind,
Speaker 2: I don't know, I just imagine you two as this
Speaker 2: utopian couple.
Speaker 6: I'll tell you actually, and you're you're sparking a memory.
Speaker 6: We only did we did do something like that one time,
Speaker 6: and it was Carlos's idea.
Speaker 4: We had a bunch of family over. This is when
Speaker 4: we lived in California. We had a bunch of family
Speaker 4: over and you know.
Speaker 6: Without getting into detail, there was something that needed to
Speaker 6: be kind of healed, and so Carlos' suggestion was that
Speaker 6: we everybody started playing kunga's and playing drums, and so
Speaker 6: everybody was was playing a drum or, you know, picked
Speaker 6: up a percussion thing. That's the only time we've ever
Speaker 6: done that, and it was kind of like a very
Speaker 6: healing experience because that was what was needed. But you know,
Speaker 6: we're not like the music circle, you know, kumbaya people.
Speaker 2: Sorry, because my next question was, so we're gonna come.
Speaker 5: Yeah, that was totally an invite for a dress that
Speaker 5: they drop circle invice like so bad.
Speaker 4: Wait, wait, it needs to happen. It looks like if
Speaker 4: you if you came over to the house, we'd probably
Speaker 4: do it with you.
Speaker 2: Yeah, but that's it. I specifically said to him that
Speaker 2: when I decide or make the decision to do my
Speaker 2: first ayahuasca journey, I wanted him to be present to play.
Speaker 3: I thought you hadn't already done that a mirror.
Speaker 2: Oh no, no, no, no, I'm not there. I'm still
Speaker 2: I'm still in the shallow part of the okay, the shallow.
Speaker 3: On that note, though, can I ask Cindy, like on
Speaker 3: a daily as far as like a routine of what
Speaker 3: it takes spiritually and physically for you to present what
Speaker 3: I see right now? Is there something that you.
Speaker 2: By the way, yeah, like, but I need to know
Speaker 2: this is a very thing, yes for sure. Yeah.
Speaker 4: I do a lot of different stuff.
Speaker 6: So I've always been into Like, through school, my thing
Speaker 6: was sports and drums, So I've always been into being healthy.
Speaker 6: My again, my older sister who had all those records,
Speaker 6: she also got me into juice singing at a very
Speaker 6: young age and to you know, eating a healthy way.
Speaker 6: So I do a lot of exercise. I was into
Speaker 6: yoga a lot at one point. I haven't been into
Speaker 6: yoga lately, but you know, at this point, I do
Speaker 6: tai chi. You know, I've done other martial arts too.
Speaker 6: Right now it's tai chi. I do supplements. I drink
Speaker 6: a lot of water, you know, I try to rest.
Speaker 6: I get into meditation. I'm a vegan.
Speaker 3: I saw you perform at the VMAs, and I was
Speaker 3: wondering in those situations, you know, twenty years later, there
Speaker 3: are a lot of baby Cindy Blackman's now, Like folks
Speaker 3: were very purposeful in having a female drummer and their
Speaker 3: bands and things of that nature. So I'm wondering, like,
Speaker 3: in those situations like the VMAs, do you get a
Speaker 3: lot of the young female drummers coming to you and saying,
Speaker 3: oh my god, you're my hero. How do you do
Speaker 3: the things that you do and all of that?
Speaker 4: Or not?
Speaker 3: Literally? I had that thought of the VMA's. I was like,
Speaker 3: there should be fan a fan out for Cidy Blackman
Speaker 3: right now behind stage?
Speaker 4: Was it, Oh, thank you?
Speaker 6: I've had some of that, you know, And it's always
Speaker 6: an honor if if if somebody says that they were,
Speaker 6: you know, inspired by you or influenced by you or whatever,
Speaker 6: because you know that's part of it. You know, you
Speaker 6: want the music to grow and you want the music
Speaker 6: to live on, and you want people to have no
Speaker 6: fear with going for some a young a young boy.
Speaker 4: Or a young girl or or you know, a person
Speaker 4: who just feels that they've been disallowed to get into
Speaker 4: some sort of creative endeavor that they're inspired by. You know,
Speaker 4: you want you go for it. So that's always an
Speaker 4: honor to know that and get any of that. And
Speaker 4: if that's the case, I feel good about that.
Speaker 2: How easy was it for you? Because I do know
Speaker 2: that if one thing's that that jazz musicians are known
Speaker 2: for are their seriousness or their earnestness. And you know,
Speaker 2: Branford told me how his life had to adjust once
Speaker 2: he had to let his community know that he was
Speaker 2: going to play with Sting. You know, certain people felt
Speaker 2: betrayed and you know that sort of thing. But you know,
Speaker 2: Branford is also kind of in the zero fox lane
Speaker 2: in playing with Lenny. Did your community ever sort of
Speaker 2: scoff at you, like, well, you're a serious musician, why
Speaker 2: would you want to do these things? Or whatever? Like
Speaker 2: what was the general was there resistance on your part
Speaker 2: or how did Lenny convince you to even play? Because
Speaker 2: I know that for the first part of Let Love Rule,
Speaker 2: Zorro was Lenny's original drummer, and then you came in
Speaker 2: shortly thereafter.
Speaker 4: Yeah, some people kind of scoffed at it, you know,
Speaker 4: at why would you want to do that? You know?
Speaker 6: But as I was saying before, I grew up with
Speaker 6: a lot of different musics in my house, so I
Speaker 6: like a lot of different musics.
Speaker 4: I liked playing in these stadiums with him, and I
Speaker 4: could see.
Speaker 6: Everybody dancing and everybody groove, and I liked being responsible
Speaker 6: for making people feel that good from making people want
Speaker 6: to dance, making people want to move.
Speaker 4: I like being in that seat, you know.
Speaker 6: And when I first played with him, I actually didn't
Speaker 6: even really know who Lenny was because I hadn't I
Speaker 6: know his music, Yeah, I didn't. I mean I was
Speaker 6: I wanted to play with Miles Davis, and I wanted
Speaker 6: to play with Freddie Hubbard.
Speaker 4: You know, this is that was my focus. I was like,
Speaker 4: how can I I want to do that. That's what
Speaker 4: I want to do.
Speaker 6: And so I was not thinking about playing rock or
Speaker 6: playing pop or funk or anything like that at that time,
Speaker 6: because I was just focused on doing that. And Antoine turned.
Speaker 4: Me on to Lenny, you know, and it was like, Oh,
Speaker 4: I have this this this friend who's he's a rock
Speaker 4: and roll guy who likes Gretz drums and caslogion symbols.
Speaker 6: Do you want to meet him? I'm like, wow, he's
Speaker 6: got ears. Okay, I'd love to meet him.
Speaker 4: And he likes that that I know.
Speaker 6: And he's like, yeah, he likes Miles and he likes Coltrane.
Speaker 6: I'm like, okay, that sounds like a cool person. You know,
Speaker 6: I'd love to meet him. And he said, well, he's
Speaker 6: been looking for a drummer for like a year and
Speaker 6: a half. You know, maybe I don't have his number,
Speaker 6: but he calls me every once in a while, and
Speaker 6: if he's still looking, you know, would you be interested
Speaker 6: in talking to him? And I said, yeah, he sounds cool.
Speaker 6: And at that point I still.
Speaker 4: Hadn't heard his music and he and he said, well,
Speaker 4: you know, he's the guy who he was.
Speaker 6: Married to to Lisa Bone and I'm like, okay, yeah,
Speaker 6: I know Lisa because I know the Cosby Show.
Speaker 4: We grew up on that.
Speaker 6: And I actually just played for him on the phone,
Speaker 6: you know. Like some months later, Antonine called me just
Speaker 6: like I got Lenny. I got Lenny on the line
Speaker 6: and and so he kind of did a three way
Speaker 6: or oh, let me said do you have drums in
Speaker 6: your house? And I said yeah, and he said, well
Speaker 6: play something.
Speaker 4: So I said okay, and I got on and I
Speaker 4: started playing. I played for a long time, like maybe
Speaker 4: long time for a phone call, like.
Speaker 6: Maybe five minutes, and then I got off and I said,
Speaker 6: this one speaker is small, and I wasn't playing soft.
Speaker 4: I could you hear it? You know, was the clear?
Speaker 6: And he said, yeah, I'm in La. Can you fly
Speaker 6: out here right now? And I said okay, I wasn't
Speaker 6: doing anything. And so next morning, at like six am,
Speaker 6: I had a flight and he said, you know, pack
Speaker 6: for two days, come out, no strings attached, just playing
Speaker 6: with my band, see how it feels, and then I'll
Speaker 6: send you home.
Speaker 4: And I said, oh cool, I've never been to La.
Speaker 4: This would be a chance for me to meet some
Speaker 4: new musicians. I'll go and just play and then I'll
Speaker 4: come home.
Speaker 6: And I went out, and his manager or somebody, when
Speaker 6: they found out that I was coming, they made an
Speaker 6: announcement and called like an audition. So when I got there,
Speaker 6: we went to the place where he was staying and
Speaker 6: there were no instruments there, like they were getting some
Speaker 6: rental gear from sir somewhere and they hadn't showed up yet.
Speaker 6: And I'm sitting there waiting and I see it can't
Speaker 6: come in with like, you know, a base rom pedal.
Speaker 6: I saw somebody else come in with a stick bag,
Speaker 6: and first I was thinking, well, that's an odd way
Speaker 6: to bring in the drums. And I was like, wait
Speaker 6: a minute, No, no, these are drummers.
Speaker 4: Like forty drummers showed up to audition for him, and
Speaker 4: I had jet like so I was like, okay, still
Speaker 4: no gears here. I'm gonna go outside and just chill
Speaker 4: out for a minute. So I went outside on a launcher.
Speaker 6: And I fell asleep and the assistant. Lenny's assistant came
Speaker 6: and she was like, Cindy, Lenny started the auditions. He
Speaker 6: wanted you to play first, but you know he couldn't
Speaker 6: find you, so he already started. You gotta come now,
Speaker 6: So I was okay, I came and you know, I.
Speaker 4: Auditioned and played, and fortunately for me, he said, okay, no,
Speaker 4: this is the auditions over.
Speaker 6: I'm gonna tell yeah, and which was for me. But
Speaker 6: but then his manager was like, yeah, but you got
Speaker 6: like thirty nine other people out there. Kind of not
Speaker 6: cool if you don't hear them. So you know, he
Speaker 6: heard them, and he heard one other guy in there
Speaker 6: that he liked. And then there was a drummer coming
Speaker 6: from London, Michael Lee. He arrived the next day. So
Speaker 6: the following day Lenny had me play and other drummer play,
Speaker 6: and me play other drummer play.
Speaker 4: He still chose me.
Speaker 6: Then he had me do the same thing with Michael
Speaker 6: Lee and he still shows me, which was you know,
Speaker 6: an honor and got you know, rest in peace.
Speaker 4: Michael Lee. He was a great drummer. He ended up
Speaker 4: playing with.
Speaker 6: Robert Plant and he passed really early, so that's why
Speaker 6: I say rest in peace. He was really fantastic. But
Speaker 6: at any rate, you know, at that point, it had
Speaker 6: already been the two days, so I already used up
Speaker 6: whatever clothing I had for my little two day stay.
Speaker 3: I was about to ask you what you were.
Speaker 4: I ended up staying for for two weeks and learning
Speaker 4: his music, and at the end of that we did
Speaker 4: are you Gonna Go My Way? Was the esthetic?
Speaker 3: Was y'all aesthetic just natural? I'm just saying visually, was
Speaker 3: the aesthetic always just natural? Y'all walked in with whatever
Speaker 3: you look like, and this is it was?
Speaker 4: Like, yeah, yeah, it was. It was.
Speaker 6: It was really pretty natural because you know, I had
Speaker 6: my little astro and my little yeah, you know, that
Speaker 6: was kind of his vibe, and so it was it
Speaker 6: was pretty natural right away.
Speaker 2: He knew of you already because I remember reading a
Speaker 2: write up and Vibe magazine about you before you joined Lenny.
Speaker 2: I think Tate interviewed you. Either Tate or Dreamhampton interviewed it.
Speaker 2: I forget who it was, but like, did he not
Speaker 2: know about you already or was that the first time
Speaker 2: both of you were kind of getting into each other.
Speaker 4: I remember that that Vibe interviewing, and I don't know,
Speaker 4: I don't to my recollection, he didn't know of me
Speaker 4: beforehand before Antoine mentioned me, you know, to my recollection,
Speaker 4: you know he did, he didn't.
Speaker 2: But can you talk about Antoine who used to play
Speaker 2: on that Letterman still correct.
Speaker 4: No, no, no, Antoine Roney Wallace's brother an Okay, I
Speaker 4: thought you knew Antoine.
Speaker 6: Yeah, okay, but yeah, Antoine his brother, who's a saxophone player.
Speaker 6: That's the person who hooked Lenny and I up together.
Speaker 4: But you know, you know, we we did that. We
Speaker 4: did that video.
Speaker 6: And then after he and the bass player, the guitar player,
Speaker 6: and his manager and assistant, they walked me outside and
Speaker 6: Lenny said, so you want to join my band?
Speaker 4: And I said, yeah, when does it start? And he
Speaker 4: started laughing. He said it started two weeks ago.
Speaker 2: So you never went home, you know, not really?
Speaker 4: I mean I went I went home.
Speaker 6: We actually rehearsed in New Jersey, and I was living
Speaker 6: in New York at the time, so I kind of
Speaker 6: did go home, and then we just rehearsed.
Speaker 3: I don't want this to sound reductive, but this is
Speaker 3: commonality between y'all cannot just be overlooked.
Speaker 2: Okay, outside of.
Speaker 3: The drum thing, y'all have been the most consistent afrowares
Speaker 3: of our time. Can we talk about this? Can we
Speaker 3: talk about why we've been so consistent, Cindy, Can we
Speaker 3: talk about how hard it is to maintain this in
Speaker 3: a sweaty drum environment where things are shrinking, cans are shrinking. Yeah,
Speaker 3: the Afro strengths in the water people.
Speaker 2: I too wanted to know, like, did that gig also
Speaker 2: come complete with your because it's not until working here
Speaker 2: at thirty Rock in which pretty much every day is
Speaker 2: a day at a high ends line.
Speaker 3: Because that hair did not always look like that's beautiful
Speaker 3: on that head right there, right now about you here?
Speaker 2: Oh thank you changes it's ways and jes th Rock. Yeah,
Speaker 2: I was about to say, where was your Why.
Speaker 4: Stay so consistent? I like the Jesus and barries. You know.
Speaker 6: It's funny because and not many people know this, but
Speaker 6: when I did that video, Lenny wanted me to shave
Speaker 6: my head for that video, and I you know, there
Speaker 6: was probably a couple of reasons, but he wanted me
Speaker 6: to shave my head.
Speaker 4: And I was like, oh no, I can't do that,
Speaker 4: you know. And I called my mom, I'm saying and
Speaker 4: we were at the video and they were waiting on
Speaker 4: me to shave my head. Oh my god, I want
Speaker 4: to change everything. And the manager was like, hey, this
Speaker 4: video is expensive. You gotta get this head shaved so
Speaker 4: we can move on. And I went found a phone
Speaker 4: and I called my mom. I said, Mom, they want
Speaker 4: me to save my head. And she said, Cindy, if
Speaker 4: you shave your head, your grandmother were rolling her grave.
Speaker 4: You cannot, you cannot shave your head. I'm like, okay,
Speaker 4: and I said, you know, I can't do it. I
Speaker 4: can't shave my head. And you know, in Lenny's defense.
Speaker 6: You know how we go through and this is really
Speaker 6: kind of a full disclosure that I've actually talked about.
Speaker 6: Uh So, meir, you gotta blame you for this, this
Speaker 6: me saying this, you know, you're bringing something out of me.
Speaker 4: In other words.
Speaker 2: Okay, but yeah, you know how we we do with
Speaker 2: our hair.
Speaker 6: You know, we we put stuff in our hair, you know,
Speaker 6: chemical and stuff. And I put some chemical on my
Speaker 6: hair and it really messed my hair up. So I
Speaker 6: think that's why he probably wanted me to shave it.
Speaker 6: I don't know, but you know he liked that look,
Speaker 6: you know, and he he showed me there was one
Speaker 6: woman in the video, a sister.
Speaker 4: Who had kind of my complexion, and she had a
Speaker 4: shaved head. Was look at her, see how beautiful she is.
Speaker 4: You'll be beautiful like that. I'm like, yeah, let's go
Speaker 4: on her, but it's not you know, my head looks
Speaker 4: like on the air.
Speaker 9: But yeah, so I you know, for that for that video,
Speaker 9: I actually wore like a little afro wig, you know,
Speaker 9: because yeah, and then we started with just my my hair.
Speaker 6: As it became more of the afro that you know,
Speaker 6: I liked. It was just my afro, you know, I
Speaker 6: would just let my hair out and just you know,
Speaker 6: be be that. But I was always into an afro,
Speaker 6: like from when I was young, you know, I always
Speaker 6: had my afro out just because I liked that style.
Speaker 6: And one of my heroes, who was my older sister,
Speaker 6: she was like the first person in Yellow Springs who
Speaker 6: got an afro.
Speaker 4: She was like an innovator with the pioneer.
Speaker 2: Okay, she was.
Speaker 3: She was.
Speaker 4: I remember the day that she.
Speaker 6: Let her hair just you know, be free, and she
Speaker 6: came home walking down the street and all I saw
Speaker 6: was this hair, one like this, and I was like, whoa, she's.
Speaker 4: The coolest thing I've ever seen. Look at that hair.
Speaker 2: Wow.
Speaker 4: I thought it was awesome.
Speaker 3: Another musician didn't answer on your side of me, but
Speaker 3: that's fine.
Speaker 2: Both when I did the Motown Philly video, when boys
Speaker 2: men asked me to be in Motown Philly video. You know,
Speaker 2: my hair was out, but it was like it wasn't
Speaker 2: short like a box or whatever, you know, like I
Speaker 2: couldn't stop this from growing. It always grew. So night
Speaker 2: before I was like, I'm gonna braik my hair and
Speaker 2: believe it or not, that was super radical. That was
Speaker 2: like walking down fifty second Street West Philly, people look
Speaker 2: like them snakes in your head.
Speaker 3: Like man, because you have plats, not cornrows. You have
Speaker 3: flat plats, right, And it was like I was Medusa,
Speaker 3: like yeah, I see yeah, right.
Speaker 2: But for nineteen ninety one, that was such a radical,
Speaker 2: rebellious hairstyle, So I did you know it's weird. The
Speaker 2: day that we had to shoot the album cover for
Speaker 2: Do You Want More? I wanted to pick my afro out,
Speaker 2: but the girl that does my hair wasn't home at
Speaker 2: the time because she was a student at Temple University,
Speaker 2: and we shot in the more like that that album
Speaker 2: cover for Do You Want More? I think was shot
Speaker 2: like maybe like one in the afternoon or whatever. We
Speaker 2: just made the photo dark. But it wasn't until she
Speaker 2: got out of school at five pm that she ran
Speaker 2: the Sigma to take my afro out. So the back
Speaker 2: of do you want more? When we're in the alleyway,
Speaker 2: I'm my afro out, but the front cover I my
Speaker 2: my plaid. So nah, I figured it was a new beginning.
Speaker 2: I thought I was pioneering something. And then two weeks later,
Speaker 2: Snoop wore his afro out at the American Music Awards.
Speaker 2: I was like, damn it, that's what I said.
Speaker 3: Most consistent, y'all are the most consistent. I appreciate y'all.
Speaker 2: I'm just hard to hit it, thank you.
Speaker 3: But I like it.
Speaker 4: I like it. I like the afro and you know,
Speaker 4: I liked the afro pick. You know. I was like, okay, yeah,
Speaker 4: you go, brother like you. Yeah.
Speaker 2: You know one musician that is fun of sort of
Speaker 2: elevating women who play instruments. Of course, not with us,
Speaker 2: brother brother Nelson Princes. Has he ever asked you to
Speaker 2: play for him ever?
Speaker 6: I never played with Prince well, I mean the only
Speaker 6: time I played with him was was when he sat
Speaker 6: in with Lenny.
Speaker 2: Wow, that's crazy because I know for him, like his
Speaker 2: wheelhouse is elevating women who play instruments.
Speaker 4: And so we almost did, but it didn't happen.
Speaker 6: It was right around you know, It was actually we
Speaker 6: were supposed to play together in an audition setting, you know,
Speaker 6: me auditioning for him, But it was the day that
Speaker 6: Michael Jackson passed.
Speaker 4: Oh that just crashed the whole groove. You know, that
Speaker 4: just crashed the whole vibe. And then it never happened
Speaker 4: after that, you know, but it was that day and
Speaker 4: I just never forget the look on his face because
Speaker 4: if you were there with him.
Speaker 2: When he found out, mm hm shit, how did I
Speaker 2: affect them?
Speaker 4: Yeah? It was it was the energy was not good.
Speaker 4: It was like, oh my god, it was like a shock.
Speaker 4: It was like complete sadness.
Speaker 6: It was like, you know, probably I would imagine and
Speaker 6: I didn't he didn't say it, but I would imagine
Speaker 6: it was probably like him looking at himself because his
Speaker 6: own mortality.
Speaker 4: It happened, and you know, when he passed, it was
Speaker 4: like all I could think of was like, wow, you know,
Speaker 4: I wonder what was really going through his head that
Speaker 4: day that Michael Jackson passed. I mean that was a
Speaker 4: pretty that was a shocker.
Speaker 3: Yeah, they have been battling for so long, I bet ith, Yeah,
Speaker 3: like just in a friendly French like.
Speaker 6: Hmm, but I mean inspired contemporaries, because you know, both
Speaker 6: were just so incredible and innovative in their in their
Speaker 6: own way. He's I mean, there's no way that anybody
Speaker 6: could ever listen to anything Michael Jackson and not say
Speaker 6: that he was not only a genius, but that he
Speaker 6: was incredible, you know, from the dancing to you know,
Speaker 6: the obviously that incredible voice. You know, and when you
Speaker 6: listen to him as a child, it's like Smokey Robinson
Speaker 6: said it, he said, you know, man, are you a
Speaker 6: child or I don't think so.
Speaker 4: I think you're a midget.
Speaker 2: Exactly.
Speaker 4: I know.
Speaker 2: He was a massive fan of Lenny's, Like, has he
Speaker 2: ever seen you guys in concert? Like, did you ever
Speaker 2: get to meet him, Michael or Michael Prince?
Speaker 4: I never got to meet him, unfortunately, and I don't
Speaker 4: think he's ever been to He's he never went to
Speaker 4: a concert.
Speaker 6: Because we would have known if he was there, like
Speaker 6: a big figure. So yeah, he never Prince, yes, he
Speaker 6: said him with us a couple of times. A few
Speaker 6: times actually at some some gigs and then at a rehearsal.
Speaker 6: We were rehearsing for the Rock and Roller Is Dead
Speaker 6: album and Lenny and Prince were hanging out and Prince came.
Speaker 4: It was actually yeah, with his perfume. That was to
Speaker 4: remember that his his valet came in to the studio
Speaker 4: before he did and he was sprayed.
Speaker 2: That's wild. I don't know that.
Speaker 6: It was so funny. He was spraying this before Prince
Speaker 6: came in. You know, I guess he's preparing the room.
Speaker 6: And then Prince came in and he and he sat
Speaker 6: in on organ. He played with us. It was really cool.
Speaker 6: He brought his guitar, he had us all of his gear,
Speaker 6: but he decided to play organ instead, so that that
Speaker 6: was pretty cool too.
Speaker 2: What I have to say that it's somewhere back then there.
Speaker 2: I still occasionally I'll wear it, but yeah, I saw Princess.
Speaker 2: You can tell. This is a weird thing to admit.
Speaker 2: You could tell a person's uh oil routine based on
Speaker 2: their bathroom where it again that I'm talking to you.
Speaker 2: You know, a big part of my vanilla smell is
Speaker 2: having gone in Lenny's bathroom once in Miami and saw
Speaker 2: Zoe's vanilla oil. And now we're the same thing. All
Speaker 2: all the oils that Prince wears.
Speaker 4: That's a lie. Are you serious? Those are the oils
Speaker 4: that he wears.
Speaker 2: I know, I know the combination of oils.
Speaker 3: So what you got from Bergamot and Paul, what you got.
Speaker 2: You know, just the best of Harlem, you know, some
Speaker 2: petulias and uh no, no, no, not Money in the
Speaker 2: Street and Blue Nile. Now that's that's a little two
Speaker 2: fifty secon street.
Speaker 3: But was there ever a situation where there was a
Speaker 3: jam session with you and Sheila on the stage at
Speaker 3: the same time with me? Yeah, well not really.
Speaker 4: I was playing with Lenny at one point in we
Speaker 4: were playing at the House of Blues in l a
Speaker 4: and she she sat in, but that was on drums,
Speaker 4: so we weren't playing together.
Speaker 1: That's what I meant.
Speaker 4: Lennie invited her to sit in and I was cool
Speaker 4: with it.
Speaker 6: So she sat in on something recently last year playing
Speaker 6: at again in the House of Blues. But here in
Speaker 6: Las Vegas, she was in the audience and I think
Speaker 6: Carl Parasso brought her up and she was at the
Speaker 6: percussion his station, playing you know, some percussion, and I
Speaker 6: think that's the that's the closest it's ever been.
Speaker 2: Who's the most challenging musician that you've played with? Because
Speaker 2: I know that going into different situations. You don't know,
Speaker 2: this is more laid back, like, there's more groove, there's
Speaker 2: more aggressive sounding. This soft sounding like for you, who's
Speaker 2: like probably the most challenging project that you've you've played with.
Speaker 4: Most challenging. That's interesting from.
Speaker 2: The roots, that'd be really funny, No, don't.
Speaker 6: Don Pullan was was challenging for me because.
Speaker 4: It was also a great learning experience. I've played with
Speaker 4: him for three years and before he passed, and it
Speaker 4: was incredible because he was so strong on the piano,
Speaker 4: so it gave me a.
Speaker 6: Chance to use volume and you know, intensity, but it
Speaker 6: still had to be under the acoustic piano. He wasn't
Speaker 6: the electric instruments, so you know, you had to be
Speaker 6: able to figure out how to be intense at every
Speaker 6: dynamic level.
Speaker 4: That was a pretty amazing experience for me. That was
Speaker 4: one one, just one.
Speaker 2: For you, Like this journey that you've had in music
Speaker 2: and creativity, Like, what is there left that you want
Speaker 2: to achieve as far as your life's work is concerned.
Speaker 4: More explorations with my composition. I'm in the process of
Speaker 4: recording a record now and we're adding strings to it,
Speaker 4: which the strings are done by someone else. Eventually I
Speaker 4: would like to do the strings. I mean, you know,
Speaker 4: we're getting into that kind of area where I mean me,
Speaker 4: I'm getting into that kind of area where I want
Speaker 4: to expand on not only what I'm playing, but you know,
Speaker 4: composition and then what I'm adding to those compositions, like
Speaker 4: with strings or different things.
Speaker 6: For the arrangements. That's somewhere that I that I want
Speaker 6: to go. And you know, I want to keep pushing
Speaker 6: the envelope of raising my my level. I mean, and
Speaker 6: not to compete with anybody, but just for me, you know,
Speaker 6: to keep getting better and better. Yeah, just keep pushing
Speaker 6: myself because.
Speaker 2: I have to.
Speaker 4: You know. It's just it's kind of just embreded me
Speaker 4: to want to better myself at every turn.
Speaker 6: You know, so little things that I see, you know,
Speaker 6: you really need to you know, up your game in that.
Speaker 6: You know, you really need to upgrade this. You know,
Speaker 6: how about pushing the level of this or making that better.
Speaker 6: Oh you know I heard that, and that's okay, but
Speaker 6: it can be so much better, you know.
Speaker 4: So I'm really kind of hard on myself.
Speaker 2: Well you know, even when you're not trying, you're pushing people.
Speaker 2: I was going to say in the story for the end,
Speaker 2: but I told already, But no, I thank you for
Speaker 2: even a role that you know you played in my
Speaker 2: life and in my health.
Speaker 4: Mm hmm, wow, you know what, I love you so
Speaker 4: much that I am overwhelmingly honored to hear any of that,
Speaker 4: because you know, I really think you're You're amazing.
Speaker 6: You're you know, your your groove and your whole focus
Speaker 6: when you play is awesome. You know, the different projects
Speaker 6: that you get into doing, the films that you're doing,
Speaker 6: the books, it's just you know, you're just really like
Speaker 6: very inspiringly all rounded in the stuff that you're doing.
Speaker 6: So it's it's wonderful because we need we need influences
Speaker 6: that are positive, not just for right now and right
Speaker 6: now is always important, but for for the generations coming up.
Speaker 6: You know, they need people to look up to and
Speaker 6: to look at and and kind of be able to
Speaker 6: trace steps of who have done things that push the
Speaker 6: envelope in in many ways. And and you're one of
Speaker 6: those people. So you know, I really appreciate it.
Speaker 4: What are you doing?
Speaker 2: Thank you? And yes, yeah I took that compliment. She knows, No,
Speaker 2: I love compliments anyway, No that I'm taking it in
Speaker 2: I didn't cringe. Thank you Sidney Blackman Santana for joining
Speaker 2: us today Course Love Supreme. I'm paid Bill, Thank you, Lia,
Speaker 2: thank you, I'm quest Love. Shout out to the crew
Speaker 2: Jake and uh Britt, Sugar Steve missed a good one
Speaker 2: and we'll see you next to go around y'all.
Speaker 3: Thank you, Hey, Thank y'all be listening to cust Love Supreme.
Speaker 3: This podcast is hosted by an Afro, a mouth, an engineer,
Speaker 3: and a man with too many jobs aka a Mere
Speaker 3: quest Love Thompson, Why You Saint Clair, Sugar, Steve Mandel
Speaker 3: and unpaid Bill Sherman. The executive producers who get paid
Speaker 3: the big bucks a mere Ques Thompson, Sean g and
Speaker 3: Brian Calhoun asked them for money. Produced by the people
Speaker 3: who do all the real work Britney Benjamin, Jake Payne,
Speaker 3: and Yes, why are you a Saint Clair? Edited by
Speaker 3: another person who does the real work, Alex Conroy and
Speaker 3: those who approved the real work. Produced for iHeart by
Speaker 3: Noel Brown.
Speaker 1: West Slop's Supreme is a production of iHeart Radio. For
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