Speaker 1: Quest Love Supreme is a production of iHeartRadio. This classic
Speaker 1: episode was produced by the team at Pandora.
Speaker 2: What up, y'all is Laiyah from teen Supreme? Okay, So
Speaker 2: it's June, and you know in his Black Music Month. Now,
Speaker 2: this month and its cause was started by my godmother,
Speaker 2: Dianna Williams, the legendary Kenny Gamble, and the great and
Speaker 2: right back in nineteen seventy nine after being invited to
Speaker 2: the White House along with the Black Music Association. Now,
Speaker 2: the Black Music Association was a group of black folks
Speaker 2: that were the best of the best.
Speaker 3: Of the music industry.
Speaker 2: I'm talking record execs, I'm talking radio people, I'm talking artists.
Speaker 2: I'm talking to everybody from Clarence Avon and Frankie Crocker
Speaker 2: to Percy Sutton, everybody in the middle right. So they
Speaker 2: all get invited to this big party on the White
Speaker 2: House lawn June seventh, nineteen seventy nine. And before the
Speaker 2: performances started, President Carter said many things addressing and reminding
Speaker 2: people of the importance of Black Music Month, and one
Speaker 2: of the things he said was end quote in many ways,
Speaker 2: the feelings of our own black citizens throughout the history
Speaker 2: of our country has been accurately expressed in the music,
Speaker 2: and it presents a kind of history of our nation
Speaker 2: when you go back and see the evolution of black
Speaker 2: music word. So, we've spoken a lot about Black Music
Speaker 2: Month on Questlove Supreme and this June we are running
Speaker 2: a different episode from the QLs archives every single day
Speaker 2: in the name, spirit and Cause of Black Music Month. Today,
Speaker 2: we are re releasing an interview with one of my faves.
Speaker 2: I'm talking about Stokely now known as Rick James. Do
Speaker 2: your thing from men Condition. This is a dope interview, y'all.
Speaker 4: Sun Supra le sub subra role called subprema so bree
Speaker 4: my roll.
Speaker 1: Something something sure, yeah, shank, Yeah, Now what coming man
Speaker 1: would I be?
Speaker 5: Yeah?
Speaker 1: If I this on blank.
Speaker 3: Roll hanging Wow, my name is Fante.
Speaker 1: Yeah, y'all know how we go?
Speaker 3: Yeah, my favorite men in the lou Yeah, asturanto something
Speaker 3: Supremo s.
Speaker 1: Ro call. My name is Sugar. Yeah, No need to squint, Yeah,
Speaker 1: because my condition.
Speaker 5: Yeah, I need a man.
Speaker 3: Something roll.
Speaker 1: Roll paid bill. Yeah, and I'm telling truth.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: When you model your bathroom? Yeah, No, news is good,
Speaker 1: come Supremo.
Speaker 2: Roll.
Speaker 6: I'm a little reluctant. Yeah, to make this confession. Yeah,
Speaker 6: but make condition. Yeah, made a bad first impression. It's
Speaker 6: all your now now.
Speaker 2: It's like yeah and it's no surprise. Yeah my first
Speaker 2: slow crime. Yeah it's pretty brown eyes.
Speaker 5: Sup Come, my name is Stokely. Yeah, some might know me. Yeah,
Speaker 5: I play a little bit of Yeah tat t.
Speaker 3: T ll come Supremo, Supreme roll.
Speaker 1: Some up roll sire. This is gonna be a good episode. Lad,
Speaker 1: welcome to Quest Team. Say hello, Hey, anyway, the god
Speaker 1: Stokely is here with us. That'sition your musicians, musicians, musicians
Speaker 1: favorite singer. I once watched D'Angelo almost get into a
Speaker 1: argument for him, like for for him choosing Stokely as
Speaker 1: one of his favorite singers. Like it was one of
Speaker 1: those minds where like usually any arguments had to near
Speaker 1: pugilistic levels. Is always over like songs or albums or
Speaker 1: this album is better than Puturely. But yeah, it's that's
Speaker 1: That's what I knew when when he went that hard
Speaker 1: for that argument.
Speaker 7: Then I was like, all right, let me, well, I
Speaker 7: think Stokely is definitely worth throwing hands over.
Speaker 1: Yeah, you were lazy gentlemen worth throwing hands over.
Speaker 5: Yeah, thank you, Now.
Speaker 1: Hit me Bill.
Speaker 3: All right.
Speaker 6: So, so I was watching video solo one day and DONNYE.
Speaker 6: Simpson is hyping up this new group straight out of Minneapolis.
Speaker 1: How were you at the time?
Speaker 3: Twelve?
Speaker 6: Yeah, that was So he's about to throw this video.
Speaker 6: He's like, yeah, they sign of Jimmy Dame Terry Lewis's label.
Speaker 6: I'm all hyped up because you already said Minneapolis Jimmy
Speaker 6: jam Terry Lewis.
Speaker 3: So I'm on board. So the video for are You
Speaker 3: Free comes on and I did not like that song.
Speaker 6: I didn't like the video, but then pretty Brown Eyes
Speaker 6: came out then forev Your.
Speaker 1: Eyes, and I realized that, so it's all good.
Speaker 3: Yeah, that first single like was not it was. I mean,
Speaker 3: I liked are You Free? But it definitely didn't.
Speaker 5: But we still ain't Free.
Speaker 3: Yeah. When's the last time I did that in concert?
Speaker 1: Man?
Speaker 8: We did the Disneyland grad Nights and probably ninety two.
Speaker 8: We've remixed it, Like I'm saying, it would like, you know,
Speaker 8: if I would like glass or something like that, we
Speaker 8: just can't let's play, you know, it just kind of
Speaker 8: a different yeah, you know, but yeah, well, thank you
Speaker 8: for coming.
Speaker 1: On the show, Thanks for having man, I know, that
Speaker 1: at least Fire Burges is losing her mind right now.
Speaker 3: Man, I told her fire.
Speaker 1: Shout out the Fire.
Speaker 3: Yeah you know, yes, yes, she took me to my
Speaker 3: first Man Condition concert.
Speaker 1: Wait what okay?
Speaker 3: Oh wait, I'm years old? Like this is like look
Speaker 3: at album.
Speaker 1: Okay, shut out the fire.
Speaker 5: Yes, I want new bad I get it, I get it.
Speaker 1: I said, sorry, but y'all y'all good, y'are good? Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: you know so you okay, I don't want to see
Speaker 1: the city, but I'm saying so can B two in
Speaker 1: ninety nine? Were you born in Saint Paul?
Speaker 3: Yes, from downtown.
Speaker 1: So yeah, my you know often uh, the I guess
Speaker 1: the death of the Black Band is something that I
Speaker 1: was hearing of a lot, especially. I mean, I guess
Speaker 1: at least between both of our groups were coming out
Speaker 1: in like the three year range. That's one thing I've
Speaker 1: always heard from journalists and never thought about. But even more,
Speaker 1: I mean, us being a hip hop was not like
Speaker 1: a saving grace, but you know that was our marketing,
Speaker 1: you know. But you guys were basically the last literally
Speaker 1: the last of the of the caboose, So you know, one,
Speaker 1: why even develop a band knowing well, knowing it that
Speaker 1: it was in endangered species.
Speaker 8: Well, we didn't know, I mean things, we were just
Speaker 8: doing what was in front of us. Of course, you know,
Speaker 8: Brother Prince and all the groups said at that time
Speaker 8: that were coming out and everybody was flocking to Minneapolis,
Speaker 8: and we were first getting our deal. We went out
Speaker 8: to la and they were like, why you guys here,
Speaker 8: It's like everything's happening back in Many. So we we
Speaker 8: were just developing and doing what we did, playing at
Speaker 8: you know, virginal music, and it just so happened, you know,
Speaker 8: called the attention to Jam and Lewis, And at that time,
Speaker 8: you know, bands were on their way out, you know,
Speaker 8: so vocal artists were in you know, Joe to cy
Speaker 8: Boys and men. That kind of thing was so you know,
Speaker 8: but I think Jam and Lewis they kind of knew,
Speaker 8: you know, them coming from a band, if they understood
Speaker 8: what we're trying to do, so it probably wouldn't have happened.
Speaker 5: Otherwise we would have, you know, would have fell on
Speaker 5: deaf ears and all that.
Speaker 1: So, so, what what's your childhood h like during this pero?
Speaker 1: You born in like six sixties, right, six seven? Yeah, and.
Speaker 5: So yeah, Saint Paul Minnesota.
Speaker 3: I grew up.
Speaker 8: Doing a lot of uh, playing percussion, you know, drums,
Speaker 8: that kind of thing. So my background was more like
Speaker 8: African drumming, dance, that kind of thing. So I was
Speaker 8: there was three groups that I was that was instrumental
Speaker 8: and in my early development. There and I was a
Speaker 8: group called Black Arts Midwest and that was kind of
Speaker 8: a I'm sorry.
Speaker 5: There was a group before that.
Speaker 8: I had my first gig when I was like four,
Speaker 8: and you know, I was standing up on you know,
Speaker 8: this chair playing congress with this group called Admonden Game.
Speaker 8: My dad was a friend of his and he was
Speaker 8: from Panama, Okay, and so he took me with him.
Speaker 8: My dad didn't know whether it's yea, it sounds good
Speaker 8: than me, but I don't know, you know what, you know,
Speaker 8: if it sounds drummer's dad, you know, so took me
Speaker 8: with him, you know, so he's got good hands kind
Speaker 8: of things.
Speaker 5: So did that.
Speaker 8: There was another African dance group where just we did
Speaker 8: like African chants and you know, this was time where
Speaker 8: you had a lot of poetry and stuff going on
Speaker 8: and we were celebrating quants and back then, you know,
Speaker 8: before it was way popular, you know, yeah, yeah, we
Speaker 8: had a little you know about ron k Ring and
Speaker 8: that whole thing.
Speaker 1: And so being as though you're the first generation exer
Speaker 1: from the Twin Cities that we've interviewed from the Twin Cities,
Speaker 1: everyone else being baby boomers, a lot of their experiences
Speaker 1: was there was truly no black experience, no black radio,
Speaker 1: no vibe, no African culture, that sort of thing. So,
Speaker 1: at what point is there black identity in the in
Speaker 1: the Twin Cities. It was just small and who developed it?
Speaker 8: It was a small community. And mind you, I didn't
Speaker 8: know any different. I grew up a little different. It's
Speaker 8: because and I thought everybody was having the same experiences.
Speaker 5: Yeah, so I was.
Speaker 8: I didn't know O for a long time. I was
Speaker 8: a halfway homeschool, you know, So I go to school,
Speaker 8: but then like on the weekends, and you know, my
Speaker 8: dad were that he's both of my parents educators.
Speaker 5: Most uh English and every grade, uh specially at all
Speaker 5: that stuff.
Speaker 8: And my father's a professor of African studies, African American studies.
Speaker 8: And so I did that for like thirty thirty five years.
Speaker 8: Place called my Council College in the same po And what.
Speaker 2: Were their lessons like were they filling into gaps.
Speaker 8: Filing to get what treats me about you know, about
Speaker 8: African history, but like you're gonna learn about the horn
Speaker 8: today to the left side of Africa here and you know,
Speaker 8: just all that, you know, it was just really that's
Speaker 8: where I you know, it was like I thought everybody
Speaker 8: knew that, you know, so so I started getting teased.
Speaker 2: You learned about Africa.
Speaker 5: You know, African modis Africa.
Speaker 1: That's it means for a fight, Yeah.
Speaker 8: Exactly what. Yeah, But it wasn't so much that I
Speaker 8: got mad. It was like I was just confused on Wow.
Speaker 3: Why is that like a thing?
Speaker 7: You know?
Speaker 1: But where were your parents born?
Speaker 5: My dad's from Savannah, my mom's from Fort Dodge, Iva.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 8: The met that Wilberforce in Ohio College there, okay, and
Speaker 8: came up to make a better way in Saint Paul,
Speaker 8: you know. I mean there's a lot of opportunity up
Speaker 8: in there. So but so it was you know, a
Speaker 8: small community of black folks up there, and you know
Speaker 8: that's kind of that was my uh tribe, you say, so,
Speaker 8: I mean that was my my even still to this day,
Speaker 8: and my extended family. These are people who watched me
Speaker 8: when my parents couldn't you know, if I was on
Speaker 8: the street trying.
Speaker 5: To do you know, village.
Speaker 8: Yeah, yeah, that kind of Yeah, no matter how they
Speaker 8: rape your parents, it's like this, The streets is strong man,
Speaker 8: The streets is you know what I mean. It's we
Speaker 8: were talking about that earlier. So, I mean, you need
Speaker 8: a lot of people around you. So a lot of
Speaker 8: folks who knew my my family, my palms were like,
Speaker 8: oh nah, I ain't messing with that.
Speaker 5: You do what you're supposed to do, man, you know,
Speaker 5: and kind of keep me away from So was.
Speaker 1: It gang culture in the MIDI?
Speaker 8: You know, I had the whole pimp thing and you know,
Speaker 8: drugs and that, that whole thing you know in my
Speaker 8: house was right, it's one of those spaces where you
Speaker 8: go two blocks up, you know, you could get into something.
Speaker 1: So they knew to leave mister Williams kid alone.
Speaker 5: And something like that.
Speaker 8: Yeah, yeah, it was a kind of vibe. So, but
Speaker 8: it was a small community of you know, African Americans.
Speaker 8: They're really into the culture. And this is too when
Speaker 8: you know, everything was everybody's trying to find the identity,
Speaker 8: so you know, father his name, and my mother and
Speaker 8: all that kind of thing, just trying to feel closer
Speaker 8: to the culture, that kind of thing. So that was
Speaker 8: my that was surrounded by that. And then I would
Speaker 8: go out into the world and you know, you turn
Speaker 8: on the radio and you hear all these you know,
Speaker 8: different things. I'm in the Midwest, and then it was
Speaker 8: fly over country, right, So.
Speaker 5: That's what it was.
Speaker 8: So I'm hearing all this uh pop radio. You know,
Speaker 8: you know Crosby Steels and Nash and you know everything
Speaker 8: about Dylan, you know, you know all that.
Speaker 1: So can I can I assume that your your name
Speaker 1: came from Stokely Carmengle. That's why they Stokely Mandela, So
Speaker 1: he wanted yeah. Now yeah, So were any of your
Speaker 1: parents musicians?
Speaker 8: Like how did play nothing but the radio? You know,
Speaker 8: my mom like to dance and sing every probably getting
Speaker 8: my energy from both of them. They love music, you know.
Speaker 8: You know Dad loved to play me big jazz heads.
Speaker 8: So you know, if he wasn't listening to Malcolm X
Speaker 8: or you know, Martin Luther King records, you know, he'd
Speaker 8: have some Richard Prior records too, just a little bit
Speaker 8: of everything jazz records.
Speaker 3: So you were playing like the speech records.
Speaker 5: Oh, yeah, I'd be hearing him in the house that
Speaker 5: come in. It's like playing that thing, you know, and.
Speaker 1: Damn so y'all could have been a tripal quest like.
Speaker 3: Exclan that sort of thing, glorious.
Speaker 8: Do you have siblings, Yeah, older brother, youngest sister. Yeah,
Speaker 8: and yeah, so that was uh, he was playing a
Speaker 8: lot of stuff in the house.
Speaker 5: It was. It was a musical house. There was always
Speaker 5: music going all the time.
Speaker 1: Do your siblings pay play anything or no?
Speaker 5: My sister played flute. She tried singing in church.
Speaker 1: But yeah, it was were you always like when did
Speaker 1: you first start singing? You know?
Speaker 8: It was one of those things where singing happened for me. Yeah,
Speaker 8: drums was first, yeah, so, but then the singing thing.
Speaker 8: I would always you know, you know, any kid as
Speaker 8: a family, you put on your little plays for your
Speaker 8: family and that kind of thing. So I was into
Speaker 8: mocking any and everything, you know, anything I would hear,
Speaker 8: you know, my parents, you know, Uncle jam is out
Speaker 8: here coming in with his you know, a little flask
Speaker 8: you know, and so be the same with music. But
Speaker 8: the time I heard al Green, That's did it for me.
Speaker 8: It was like fifteen people in one I was like,
Speaker 8: I mean, all these different voices, I'm like.
Speaker 5: Wow, who was this dude?
Speaker 1: So you took on his his inflections all.
Speaker 5: Yeah, it was just amazing to hear that.
Speaker 1: So even as a youngster.
Speaker 5: Yeah, but I didn't know what I was doing. I
Speaker 5: just like doing it.
Speaker 8: I just thought it was fun and you know, but
Speaker 8: singing was one of those things. Actually when I got
Speaker 8: to high school, basically we had kind of like a
Speaker 8: uh it was a performing arts school and it was
Speaker 8: called a Magnet Arts program. But we had like, uh,
Speaker 8: we had there was a recording studio there. I Sweller
Speaker 8: and steel Pain had an acting class in there and
Speaker 8: different things like that, so I was involved in that.
Speaker 5: But taking the recording class, I was. There was two classes.
Speaker 8: One where they paired you with other musicians and be like, okay,
Speaker 8: you play funk and you're gonna we're gonna pair you
Speaker 8: with somebody plays rock and roll something like that, so
Speaker 8: just to get it. Yeah, yeah, you know that whole thing.
Speaker 8: And then there was the technical aspect where you actually
Speaker 8: learn how to record. I wanted to take that class
Speaker 8: so I can learn how to press nop and learn
Speaker 8: the technical aspect so I could do my own stuff.
Speaker 8: And so when I did that. It was a little task,
Speaker 8: you know, forty four whatever. It was four track and
Speaker 8: a little eight O eight and a little uh j
Speaker 8: X three P. And I go in there and make
Speaker 8: up little songs. And at this time and here all
Speaker 8: the Prince inspired stuff, and so I wasn't.
Speaker 1: Uh, just go for you. It was like eighty two
Speaker 1: eighty three, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 3: And so.
Speaker 8: I'll go and make these little songs up. And I
Speaker 8: was shy of saying I wouldn't wouldn't want anybody to
Speaker 8: hear me. So I was singing in my false subtle
Speaker 8: Prince esque kind of you know. And the door was
Speaker 8: right there, so anytime i'd be like stop stop everything.
Speaker 1: Called yeah video door look out.
Speaker 8: In that, you know, and I would play them at
Speaker 8: the person who really heard the stuff. I would play
Speaker 8: for Homer Rodell, the guitar player for men. Oh, people like, man,
Speaker 8: it sounds really good, you know, just the way you're
Speaker 8: putting the songs to get the arrangements and stuff, you know,
Speaker 8: and it'd be like ten minutes long, of course, you know.
Speaker 8: But I think that's what helped me to develop just here,
Speaker 8: because I felt like I was meeting.
Speaker 5: Myself for the first time. You know, stacking vocals and
Speaker 5: that kind of thing.
Speaker 1: Now, before the Orange Slaughter of the first wave of
Speaker 1: Black Minneapolis, say seventy eight to eighty four, was there
Speaker 1: any presence of any of those guys in your life
Speaker 1: pre then? Like was Grand Central playing like the local
Speaker 1: church down the block? And okay, did you know any
Speaker 1: of the All Stars of Minnesota? Yeah?
Speaker 8: Now, so there was some stuff told me because I'd
Speaker 8: forgotten it and I was younger, and there are a
Speaker 8: lot of people who filled in the blanks for me
Speaker 8: because I was so young. The second group was called
Speaker 8: Black Arts Midwest Trummers. It was like, like I said,
Speaker 8: we did African Chance and that kind of thing. And
Speaker 8: so I remember there was this place in Minneapolis, I
Speaker 8: think it was Sabbathany and they used to throw like
Speaker 8: local dances and things like that. And I remember we
Speaker 8: were either on before Grand Central, either opening or we
Speaker 8: were rehearsing there and they were getting ready to play.
Speaker 5: Either way.
Speaker 8: And this was told to me not too long ago actually,
Speaker 8: and by a couple of people. So I was like
Speaker 8: the first one I didn't believe. I was like, all right, okay,
Speaker 8: but I do remember a couple of things. One was
Speaker 8: I remember Prince was there.
Speaker 5: It was a group.
Speaker 8: I remember just Afro happening and so and I remember
Speaker 8: somebody screaming out, you know, I was playing Congress and
Speaker 8: you know, a couple of people filled in that story.
Speaker 5: It was like it was Prince saying, oh little brother
Speaker 5: God play.
Speaker 1: I was like, oh wow, wow.
Speaker 5: Really, so that's funny.
Speaker 3: How old were you at the time.
Speaker 5: I was about nine nine ten? Yeah, oh yeah.
Speaker 1: The Minnesota music scene, I know that it's it's you know,
Speaker 1: it's heavily populated. So I mean in high school, were
Speaker 1: any of like the Peterson family clan or like, was
Speaker 1: anyone uh in high school at the time when you
Speaker 1: were in school?
Speaker 5: I didn't.
Speaker 8: I wasn't aware the Peterson's in only when I got older,
Speaker 8: but I'm sure they were around, you know, doing the
Speaker 8: thing developing too.
Speaker 5: So I didn't know.
Speaker 8: A lot of people. I just knew my own little circle.
Speaker 8: And then the people that were local, like Grand Central
Speaker 8: and Enterprise and you know, Mike Brown's man and you know.
Speaker 1: So did any of their albums make an impression on
Speaker 1: you at the time, Like, yeah, when you saw the time,
Speaker 1: was it like yeah, we got it?
Speaker 8: I Mean that's been how Purple Ranglent. It was pretty
Speaker 8: much like that becausehen we were coming through even with Mint,
Speaker 8: we would have you know, it was kind of like
Speaker 8: the competition.
Speaker 3: You know.
Speaker 8: It was a good I think it was called Peach
Speaker 8: Tree And there's a bunch of different bands around that time.
Speaker 8: And I remember we would always borrow equipment and we
Speaker 8: had this one show. It was always a futures one show.
Speaker 5: In particular.
Speaker 8: I remember we had like like some real Barron equipment,
Speaker 8: like each Jeff had one keyboards, Bard, Larry had one keyboards,
Speaker 8: Barn and yeah, it was it's They would be like,
Speaker 8: oh man, what what's your Midian? This was like when
Speaker 8: MIDI was like a big you know it's coming out,
Speaker 8: so it's been out a few years, but.
Speaker 5: But y'all stacking up on it.
Speaker 8: No, we only got this one keyboard, Like, uh, okay,
Speaker 8: you don't really give up your secret nothing like, No,
Speaker 8: we only got one keyboard.
Speaker 5: That's all we got.
Speaker 8: Now what we did do was going in, you know
Speaker 8: and just work it as best we can. We would
Speaker 8: know every looking cranny about that keyboard or whatever. You know,
Speaker 8: that's all we had. But they thought we was just
Speaker 8: you know, but it was really what were y'all using
Speaker 8: like Oberheim's or we had a it was a rolling
Speaker 8: Juno one was one of them.
Speaker 5: June. Yeah, still use that, you know, absolutely, and uh
Speaker 5: it was X three P and a D X seven Yeah,
Speaker 5: what was it?
Speaker 3: Cheesy DX seven?
Speaker 1: Yeah?
Speaker 5: You know what with that Seinfield bass.
Speaker 1: Face?
Speaker 5: He was that on so much.
Speaker 1: Yeah, So how did the other guys enter your life?
Speaker 1: Were you all in high school together?
Speaker 5: High school?
Speaker 8: So yeah, Saint Paul Central was a high school there,
Speaker 8: and we all went there at different times. Larry's first
Speaker 8: to come out, and then it was me and O'Dell
Speaker 8: and then Jeff and then Carrie Rick came up. He's
Speaker 8: from Chicago bass player, and he came up about was
Speaker 8: it nineteen eighty three or something like that, but we
Speaker 8: didn't I didn't meet him till like eighty six, eighty
Speaker 8: six something, you know, I think about eighty six, and
Speaker 8: you've seen him in bands. We had all this little
Speaker 8: leather pants and you know, leopard and whatnot. Teacher look, yeah, yeah,
Speaker 8: you know, okay.
Speaker 1: So Masariety once told the story of how, like, you know,
Speaker 1: how competition was was just Steve amongst black bands back then,
Speaker 1: who was going to out do each other? Or out
Speaker 1: shock somebody or whatever. But I mean, was that almost
Speaker 1: expected at the time, because I would assume that, you know,
Speaker 1: nineteen twenty whatever. I mean, it was eighty seven, so
Speaker 1: Prince was really Prince by the Yeah, so was there
Speaker 1: a need to feel like, Okay, we have to follow that,
Speaker 1: like what Jesse Johnson and those guys look like, and
Speaker 1: would Masariety and those guys look like.
Speaker 8: And I think the whole country at that point was
Speaker 8: just like, you know, that was the phase. You just
Speaker 8: had to make an impression, make an impact, and that
Speaker 8: was that. But you know, also not only that, we
Speaker 8: were just trying to be really heavy on the music
Speaker 8: and have substance at the same time. You know, you know,
Speaker 8: we were a group that we didn't really do covers,
Speaker 8: so our shows were limited to certain you know, like
Speaker 8: events we didn't really do.
Speaker 1: How long were your shows if you didn't do covers.
Speaker 8: Damn, we probably only doing thirty minutes. We were doing showcases, well,
Speaker 8: unless we were doing less somebody with you know, somebody's mom,
Speaker 8: so well we can play down after such and such.
Speaker 3: You know, they minutes y'all own material.
Speaker 8: It was not you know, we weren't interested in anything else.
Speaker 8: It was you know, that's rare, but yeah, I know
Speaker 8: because I noticed that. Yeah, and we would try to
Speaker 8: do you know, had segues and everything, and I was like,
Speaker 8: you know, let's do it, like you know, JB or.
Speaker 8: We would see all the groups that were there at
Speaker 8: that time. It was like that they would play you know,
Speaker 8: original music. It's like why yeah, why not? And then
Speaker 8: you know, so, I mean it was like the nerve
Speaker 8: they to who are these dudes, the nerve of you
Speaker 8: to you know, be trying to hit segues and but
Speaker 8: you know it worked because we had We would do
Speaker 8: these showcases and that's how it got discovered.
Speaker 5: You know, when we were at.
Speaker 8: First Avenue, we invited Jam and Lewis. I think at
Speaker 8: the time there was a rep from m c A there,
Speaker 8: Prince had Levi come down. He said I'd rather see
Speaker 8: them than hear them, and so he sent him down.
Speaker 8: He's a videotape and so he did. And then after
Speaker 8: that show, I think it was just Jam and Lewis
Speaker 8: would always say, man, we just you know, signed you
Speaker 8: off for your live performance. You know, that was the strongest.
Speaker 8: That's what we really really worked on. We had demos
Speaker 8: and everything, so it does as well. But that's the
Speaker 8: thing that really did it.
Speaker 1: What was the practice regiment?
Speaker 5: Like we got it in it was like, you know,
Speaker 5: after school, it'd be pretty much all day.
Speaker 1: And at that time, I was where would you practice?
Speaker 8: Like, yeah, it was like warehouses, you know, all those
Speaker 8: warehouses you see in purple and stuff like that.
Speaker 5: Yeah, exactly that how.
Speaker 2: You balancing the studying on the weekends and school.
Speaker 5: Well let's see, so your parents.
Speaker 8: Okay, let me back up. So a lot every group
Speaker 8: I've ever been in is like been at my parents'
Speaker 8: house in the basement.
Speaker 5: There's a lot of group. So that was first.
Speaker 8: So after I actually after I graduated, then we started
Speaker 8: I was working jobs, odd jobs, that kind of thing.
Speaker 8: Then we did the warehouse thing and it got more
Speaker 8: serious there, and then from there, if we weren't working,
Speaker 8: we was like be like all weekend, be like twelve
Speaker 8: hours if you get in there.
Speaker 5: And just hit it.
Speaker 2: And your parents were supportive because I don't know if
Speaker 2: that's what.
Speaker 5: They saw for you.
Speaker 8: Yeah, well they wanted they wanted school, of course. You know,
Speaker 8: Like I decided that I don't know, there's something, there's
Speaker 8: something in me. I just I'm gonna take a break
Speaker 8: on that, you know, and I just felt something and
Speaker 8: you know that was always like, man, my worst nightmares
Speaker 8: like you being in around fifty dollars, you know, a
Speaker 8: night making musician.
Speaker 5: You know, it's like, no, I don't see that, you know.
Speaker 8: So I just kind of went from I just said,
Speaker 8: I'm gonna try as hard as I can to really
Speaker 8: do what I can do, you know. So you know,
Speaker 8: I think the practice thing, that's why we just kind
Speaker 8: of work so hard, you know, And a lot of
Speaker 8: us do that have that drive whatever it is that
Speaker 8: drives us. You know, I know you always here work hard,
Speaker 8: just trying to get our ten thousand hours plus in,
Speaker 8: you know, right.
Speaker 1: You know, So how did you get over your shyness
Speaker 1: into really developing your voice?
Speaker 5: Is?
Speaker 1: I mean, I know everyone's like, oh, yeah, that's my
Speaker 1: natural voice, but do you have a fucking spot on
Speaker 1: skill dass voice? So how do you? You had to
Speaker 1: do some you had to get out of that shine
Speaker 1: it's eventually.
Speaker 8: I think part of it was theater. There's a small
Speaker 8: theater company. We're not so small. There's a small big
Speaker 8: coming up a number. I was in a production there,
Speaker 8: and I think that experience opened me up to go
Speaker 8: to open me up, you know, just kind of not
Speaker 8: to get beyond that, you know. I think also performing
Speaker 8: too is one thing because there's a lot of shine
Speaker 8: musicians and you know what I mean.
Speaker 1: You there's one thing you didn't mention. Did you not
Speaker 1: have a church experience at all? Yeah, because most black
Speaker 1: musicians have to.
Speaker 8: I didn't sing in church pay okay, like the midnight
Speaker 8: musicals and stuff. So I was always Now, church definitely
Speaker 8: has a big effect because I just knew every time
Speaker 8: I went there, I felt like crying, you.
Speaker 5: Know, brings all that emotion. I was like, why am
Speaker 5: I crying? But it was always crying in church. That's
Speaker 5: what it is.
Speaker 8: Spiritual is something gets in you and I just all
Speaker 8: the the bending of the notes and all that kind
Speaker 8: of thing, and you know, just it's just an amazing experience.
Speaker 8: So I was playing percussion, you know, some drums and
Speaker 8: but just really listening and taking it all in, I think.
Speaker 5: But I didn't sing in any choir.
Speaker 1: When did you get your first drum set? Was it
Speaker 1: a Christmas experience?
Speaker 5: Like how Sears and Roebuck.
Speaker 3: And uh it was.
Speaker 5: I was nine and I heard them stumbling. I was
Speaker 5: sleep trying to my dad and my brother try to
Speaker 5: set it up, trying and I heard I'm like, this
Speaker 5: might be it, you know, I heard them.
Speaker 1: So you don't have to interview me because this month drumming.
Speaker 1: Their first drum.
Speaker 8: Set you mad, like everything, I can't sparkle, but they
Speaker 8: had some of the wrong pieces so they had to
Speaker 8: take it back and silver sparkles, so I still got yeah,
Speaker 8: you still I.
Speaker 5: Still got yeah. Yeah, Yeah, it's that feeling, man.
Speaker 1: I know, you'll never there's never a feeling of coming
Speaker 1: downstairs Christmas morning seeing your brand new drums.
Speaker 5: Yeah, that's everything.
Speaker 1: Yours came from Serious and Rob Mine. Mine came from
Speaker 1: my dad's drummer's bad drug Habiteah, it's yours now. Who
Speaker 1: were your drumming idols.
Speaker 8: At the time, uh An art Laking, Max Roach, So
Speaker 8: you were in the jazz drumming Yeah, absolutely, yeah, those
Speaker 8: two were for it, you know, just because at the
Speaker 8: time I had a couple of I was both formally
Speaker 8: and informally taught, so a lot of ear training, but
Speaker 8: I had some you know, piano, little piano and uh
Speaker 8: drum training and they were like, look, man, if you
Speaker 8: can hit jazz, you got everything you learn how to
Speaker 8: read a little bit. But really, if you've got all
Speaker 8: those skills of four wad coordination, all those books, you know,
Speaker 8: stick control, you know all that stuff.
Speaker 1: Stick control. I still have those books. Yeah. So if
Speaker 1: you when you were young, are you imagining yourself as
Speaker 1: more like, were you trying to pursue jazz or his
Speaker 1: R and B looked down upon? Because I know a
Speaker 1: lot of serious jazz musicians that, like, you know, every
Speaker 1: jazz musician looks down on pop music.
Speaker 5: Yeah, you know I was.
Speaker 8: I think I was right in between it. I could,
Speaker 8: I could at the time. I could definitely respect you know,
Speaker 8: whole pop music. I liked a lot of it, you
Speaker 8: know what I mean, So I can see where all
Speaker 8: that stuff fit in. There's a lot of fusion stuff
Speaker 8: that I started listening to us like, man, this is
Speaker 8: you know, I've turned it forever and all that stuff.
Speaker 8: I was like, all that stuff was in there. I
Speaker 8: was like, wow, this is crazy, you know they're actually
Speaker 8: fitting it in there. But yeah, so I liked it,
Speaker 8: you know, I was just kind of I felt like it,
Speaker 8: I feel like a hybrid.
Speaker 1: Who will put you on to that stuff? Though? Like
Speaker 1: was it an older cousin or.
Speaker 8: That like just people around you know, you know, because
Speaker 8: I was always the youngest musician in any group I
Speaker 8: was playing in, and you know, it's like, you know,
Speaker 8: it's returned to forever. It is a you know, Mike
Speaker 8: Stern or whatever. As a you know, it was just
Speaker 8: people put me on you know, certain things like that you.
Speaker 1: Study it and yeah, you know, I mean yeah, so, uh,
Speaker 1: what year is it around the time you guys were
Speaker 1: serious about pursuing a record deal like a demo or
Speaker 1: it was signing to Paisley Park or whatever, like.
Speaker 5: Eighty eight eighty nine is what happened?
Speaker 8: Was you know, after high school, I was like, okay,
Speaker 8: I m work and I'm going, you know, try to
Speaker 8: do this thing as hard as I came at the time. Uh.
Speaker 8: It was probably one time where I was in I
Speaker 8: don't know, like twelve bands one time. It's just so
Speaker 8: we just working gig in you know.
Speaker 1: You know.
Speaker 8: Michael Bland was actually he was actually in met He's
Speaker 8: on the first draft of the contract. Michael Bland drummer,
Speaker 8: used to play with Prince. He It was right at
Speaker 8: the time Prince was was breaking and we were right
Speaker 8: at the time we were about to sign, you know,
Speaker 8: so he obviously would Prince and that kind of thing.
Speaker 8: But between me and Mike, we had like it seemed
Speaker 8: like we had all the gigs in time. We was like, man,
Speaker 8: we just need to call ourself the drum hos. How
Speaker 8: did we go?
Speaker 1: Because I know that a lot of the initial MPG
Speaker 1: musicians were local Minneapolis, like the coach what was Yeah,
Speaker 1: So I mean, could there have been a chance that
Speaker 1: you could have had that gig or like a word
Speaker 1: of audition?
Speaker 5: Probably he would just go down there in Jam and
Speaker 5: you know, and it'd be killing it, you know.
Speaker 1: Of course, So what's the nightclub that the central nightclub
Speaker 1: that all the bad musicians would be?
Speaker 5: That was it Bunkers? Yep, that was it at the time.
Speaker 5: Everybody would go down there.
Speaker 8: They'd hit their seventies and eighties reviewed kind of thing,
Speaker 8: and everybody would come down, you know, and they would,
Speaker 8: you know, after their gig whatever they're playing, you know,
Speaker 8: whether it be Excel Center or you know, Target Center,
Speaker 8: they'd come down.
Speaker 1: You know, they would stay over later than normal.
Speaker 8: Yeah, like one sometimes I think it'd be two o'clock
Speaker 8: at at some point. But yeah, it would come down
Speaker 8: there in Jam. But he found out about it and
Speaker 8: it's like this group down there and Margaret Cox and
Speaker 8: all these great you know people from Twin Cities.
Speaker 5: Amazing, amazing.
Speaker 8: So yeah, he just kind of come down there and
Speaker 8: you know jam and of course he'll be packed within
Speaker 8: ten minutes of people knowing.
Speaker 1: That he's there.
Speaker 5: Yeah, that whole thing.
Speaker 1: So it wasn't like he was trying to well that
Speaker 1: he could blend it with I mean people, he.
Speaker 5: Was still friends, like yeah, I mean, yeah, absolutely.
Speaker 8: I mean if the people knew who he was, it's like,
Speaker 8: I think you'd like coming there too, just because he'd
Speaker 8: have a little corner. Nobody really bother them. They would
Speaker 8: want to, but they can't get them. You know, they're
Speaker 8: not say anything. Somebody might say something crazy and he'd
Speaker 8: be like.
Speaker 7: You know.
Speaker 1: What keeps when? Okay? So I know that in most
Speaker 1: cases that I've seen, I can tell when musicians are
Speaker 1: showing off when someone else is there like, okay, this
Speaker 1: might be my my big chance to flex and what
Speaker 1: what keeps? I would imagine in that environment if he's
Speaker 1: there a lot that everyone's just trying to go for
Speaker 1: broken and show with chops they have and forget that
Speaker 1: you're a unit and.
Speaker 8: Right it depends people who don't know how to be cohesive.
Speaker 8: When you got those people in this like of course
Speaker 8: he's next, you know, and then you have people like look,
Speaker 8: stay in the fold, stay in.
Speaker 5: Your lane, and make all this shit sound good. You
Speaker 5: know what I mean.
Speaker 8: That's that's everything you know when you're playing with it ensomer.
Speaker 8: So some people would be aware of that, and other
Speaker 8: musicians would be like, you know, and just go for it.
Speaker 5: And then you know, he would be like.
Speaker 1: Because there's a jam session here in a village underground
Speaker 1: village ground Actually yeah, I mean like Princeton. Larry would
Speaker 1: go there a lot, and it's almost like the same thing.
Speaker 1: It's like these mode of musicians that were like just
Speaker 1: everybody's over playing, like from one one hundred, they're all
Speaker 1: on five hundred. And that used to always just turn
Speaker 1: me off about jam sessions because it's like they're not
Speaker 1: you know, jamming with each other. They're trying to like
Speaker 1: make an impression on whoever the celebrity is like in
Speaker 1: the audience. So yeah, that's crazy.
Speaker 8: Yeah, he was more about you know, staying in pocket,
Speaker 8: you know, and that kind of thing he would want
Speaker 8: to say about keyboard players, like I'm more interested in
Speaker 8: their timing, you know, and probably passing cords and that
Speaker 8: kind of thing.
Speaker 1: So so how many labels uh offered you guys deals
Speaker 1: before you chose a perspective?
Speaker 8: Maybe three or four I think MC it was in there.
Speaker 8: Of course a M was in there, might have been
Speaker 8: some silly offered Columbia.
Speaker 1: And you guys were always be in conditioned.
Speaker 8: Okay, yeah, yeah, we uh as I was saying before,
Speaker 8: so after I'd say about we formed in nineteen eighty
Speaker 8: six and yeah that was that was had the first
Speaker 8: anybody's been to the Mall of America yea America lost.
Speaker 1: Yes.
Speaker 5: Uh.
Speaker 8: There was a place called the Carlton's Celebrity Room there
Speaker 8: and they used to have this thing called Black Arts,
Speaker 8: the Black Minnesota Black Music Wars, and it's kind of
Speaker 8: Pete and Kim Roha to run it, and they would
Speaker 8: have that would be the spot you have the Minnesota
Speaker 8: Music Awards, more of the pop stuff, but then you'd
Speaker 8: have Black Music warges and the Jesse Mobs variety everybody,
Speaker 8: all the.
Speaker 5: Acts and everything.
Speaker 8: So that's where we first kind of uh cut our
Speaker 8: teeth right there, and that's right. Carton Selebrity Room was
Speaker 8: right where the Marlve America is now and so that's
Speaker 8: that's where it happened.
Speaker 5: Nineteen eighty six.
Speaker 8: We had these crazy ass outfits on with one leg
Speaker 8: mashed out and leather where backwards turned to the audience
Speaker 8: is when the curtain came up, like what yeah, we
Speaker 8: turned around. It was just yeah great, we had fringes
Speaker 8: flying and yeah, we didn't wear no draws and it
Speaker 8: was just crazy.
Speaker 5: Like we look back it now, like, what do you.
Speaker 1: Guys have a recording of the stuff that you guys
Speaker 1: did back then? Yeah?
Speaker 5: Yeah it looks would cal.
Speaker 3: Oh yeah, some of it's in the the unsung some of.
Speaker 5: It yeah, yeah it is yeah, yeah it is yeah.
Speaker 2: Curious yeah, because how much time in between eighty six
Speaker 2: and the song that Bill hates five years?
Speaker 5: Five years? Yeah, and then from there, I guess what happened.
Speaker 3: Was why do you have to say it like that?
Speaker 2: I just needed a reference.
Speaker 5: From there.
Speaker 8: So from eighty six, you know, I was still playing
Speaker 8: around the drums and everything, and I got offered this
Speaker 8: sum this guy named George Pettis.
Speaker 5: It was he was doing this choice much.
Speaker 1: Yeah this is yeah, okay, wait he's from Minnesota.
Speaker 8: No, but he moved there again. Everybody was flocking trying
Speaker 8: to you know, and he had to deal with m
Speaker 8: c A. And he was gone on tour opening for
Speaker 8: Whitney and uh opportunity to go out with him and
Speaker 8: we were That's how I met her in Europe for
Speaker 8: like three months.
Speaker 5: This was like eighty seven eighty.
Speaker 1: Eight, her second moment for the for the second album.
Speaker 8: Then it was the second I believe its second, Yeah,
Speaker 8: and so I kind of had to put the mint
Speaker 8: thing on on the whole.
Speaker 5: That's what we whenever we're doing.
Speaker 8: And but that was a great experience because you know,
Speaker 8: all those people I met and I just kind of
Speaker 8: got to see it, you know, up close for about
Speaker 8: three something months, you know, over in Europe doing that
Speaker 8: and came back and you know, we.
Speaker 5: Just started grinding.
Speaker 1: Man.
Speaker 7: Yeah, what was it that made y'all sign the Perspective
Speaker 7: rather than the other labels that was out on the
Speaker 7: yoab'll were the first act on the label?
Speaker 1: Correct?
Speaker 8: No, some blacks are are Loky, you're the one, yeah,
Speaker 8: are Lucky also from the Twin City. They're from Kansas City, Okay,
Speaker 8: but they moved up again. Everybody's moving up there and
Speaker 8: we used to have same rehearsal spot that was like
Speaker 8: what that?
Speaker 2: What was their hit?
Speaker 1: Yeah?
Speaker 5: Yeah, yeah, yeah yeah, Sorry.
Speaker 1: Stokes.
Speaker 2: I just wanted to ask you have you had your
Speaker 2: Your journey is kind of parallel in some ways with
Speaker 2: Sheila Ease, So I was just curious if you guys
Speaker 2: have ever talked about that, especially in the drummers since
Speaker 2: turned into the artists and the African roots and whatnot,
Speaker 2: we haven't talking.
Speaker 5: Much about me played together a little bit.
Speaker 3: You know, she's African, know, but.
Speaker 2: Her African most Latin.
Speaker 3: Started you want to East eastaff.
Speaker 7: Yes, I do as y'alluys, y'all signed perspective.
Speaker 5: Yeah, it was because of jam and Lewis.
Speaker 1: You know that.
Speaker 8: I think we felt some kinship just because of them
Speaker 8: being from the time and you know, after the first
Speaker 8: Avenue showcase, I remember walking to my car and I've
Speaker 8: seen both of them.
Speaker 5: It's like, ain't so great job, man, we'll talk.
Speaker 8: At that time, I had seen enough and you know,
Speaker 8: artists around town they were like, you know, we're gonna
Speaker 8: do this and nothing happened.
Speaker 5: So I was kind of like grain of salt. If
Speaker 5: it happens, great, I was like, yeah, great, sounds great.
Speaker 8: Thanks man for coming really showing, you know, because I
Speaker 8: definitely appreciated it came out. So that was a big deal,
Speaker 8: but I didn't really know if anything.
Speaker 5: Was really gonna happen. You know, this is Jam and Lewis,
Speaker 5: you know, Jackson, all these people.
Speaker 1: You know.
Speaker 8: So two weeks later, we were sitting up in the
Speaker 8: flight Time office, you know, They're like, what do you
Speaker 8: all want to do. We're like, we want to make
Speaker 8: a record, but we want to produce our own ship,
Speaker 8: you know what I mean.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I was gonna say, but they were so red
Speaker 1: hot at the moment.
Speaker 8: Yeah, and they're like, well you can. We said we
Speaker 8: wanted to do at least half the album. He was like,
Speaker 8: well y'all can do the whole thing. We were like okay, okay, wow.
Speaker 5: So I mean that was you know, I don't think
Speaker 5: we would have gotten that, you know, any other label,
Speaker 5: you know what I mean?
Speaker 3: Yes, Like yeah, and then if they would have douced,
Speaker 3: y'all would have just sounded just like an R and B.
Speaker 5: Yeah yeah right basically. Yeah, So yeah, that was that's
Speaker 5: pretty nice. Yeah, gotcha.
Speaker 7: When y'all went into recording the first record, because we
Speaker 7: talked about are you free?
Speaker 3: I like, you, I like, are you free? I just
Speaker 3: didn't forget it. It was just one of those records.
Speaker 3: It came out, and then it was then when I heard,
Speaker 3: you know, the ballance stuff on the record. Why did
Speaker 3: they come with that first? What was the what was
Speaker 3: the thought?
Speaker 5: I guess here's the thing about you know, it just
Speaker 5: happened like this.
Speaker 8: We weren't really uh we became I guess, really good
Speaker 8: at doing ballads after we came out, but we didn't.
Speaker 8: All this stuff was all up temple. We like to
Speaker 8: dance and you know, all that kind of stuff, and
Speaker 8: you know, I used to be boying ourselves that. I
Speaker 8: was always energetic. So I was like, I was like,
Speaker 8: why are we going slow like that?
Speaker 5: What?
Speaker 1: You know, I was gonna say, for a band with
Speaker 1: such skilled musicianship or whatever, it was it frustrating that
Speaker 1: the songs that were really hitting bullseye with with the
Speaker 1: audience were the slow songs where you guys really couldn't it's.
Speaker 3: Flex that much on the fast joints.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean it was.
Speaker 8: It was at first it was like, man, this is
Speaker 8: you know, we didn't really understand why we couldn't. We
Speaker 8: just learned in the industry. It was like and say, look, man,
Speaker 8: you better take you know, if it's hidden, you got
Speaker 8: to flow with it, you know. But we hadn't learned
Speaker 8: that a little bit later, so that's find a live show,
Speaker 8: you said, Okay, we just still we do. But yeah,
Speaker 8: it was a little a little frustrating at first because
Speaker 8: it's like we tried, you know, people would want to
Speaker 8: hear what they want to hear year yeah, and be like, man,
Speaker 8: we can't even you know, we can't get what we
Speaker 8: want to do. So it was kind of it was
Speaker 8: a little weird at first. We had to learn where
Speaker 8: how to fit inside of that.
Speaker 2: You know, how did you guys learn to like agree?
Speaker 2: Like was there like a mint like voting system on
Speaker 2: all things?
Speaker 1: Like how did y'all what six people? Is anything? Ever? Democratic? Yeah?
Speaker 8: Like like from songs to like like I don't it's yeah,
Speaker 8: it's it's democratic. Is yeah, definitely democratic? And that's that
Speaker 8: can be frustrating too, you know, Yeah, being as.
Speaker 1: Though I used to have a relationship with them, I'm
Speaker 1: just saying, like, what is I mean? I can safely
Speaker 1: say that even in the root situation, it's like there's one, three, four, right,
Speaker 1: that seems really good I'm no, really, I've forgotten toak. Damn.
Speaker 3: That's bad.
Speaker 1: No, you know what, because to just get the final say,
Speaker 1: he gets a final say in the way that I don't.
Speaker 1: His final say is I can't write to about to say.
Speaker 1: He can't If he can't write to this, you know,
Speaker 1: it doesn't make sense. Only my only power is like, well,
Speaker 1: I can't come in the studio, so I'm working on
Speaker 1: this project. So but I'm just saying that there's clicks
Speaker 1: and so is it.
Speaker 2: But yours is a more uneven balanced than Stokelydell, Like.
Speaker 1: What's the.
Speaker 3: Balance of power?
Speaker 1: What's slithering Griffin?
Speaker 2: Did y'all have us because you know the roots? Do
Speaker 2: they have different buses?
Speaker 5: Slythering?
Speaker 3: No, I'm on the same bus, and you'll stay together
Speaker 3: this whole time.
Speaker 5: Yeah, we've we've had some healthy debates.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yo, you got ship.
Speaker 5: Yeah, I mean we used to go.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, I know, I know what For those who
Speaker 1: didn't see that, Yeah, there was some in the beginning,
Speaker 1: Like in the beginning, how do you But you've known
Speaker 1: each other since high school, so you should already know
Speaker 1: the personalities. You know who's going to be on CP time,
Speaker 1: you know whose girls saying that you should be rude
Speaker 1: and you know, fighting over this girl and that girl.
Speaker 1: Why are you cock blocking? Whatever? Like how do you.
Speaker 2: Who are you?
Speaker 1: Are you guys friends? Yeah?
Speaker 8: I mean I'm I'm I'm kind of like the cleanup
Speaker 8: clean up guy, utility a little bit whatever the holes
Speaker 8: need feeling, you know, Yeah, which is great for me
Speaker 8: because it's it's been like a university truth for me.
Speaker 8: I mean, it's just, you know, I think I can
Speaker 8: write in the spirit of everybody, because you know, everybody's
Speaker 8: a writer and producer and their own right. So a
Speaker 8: lot of these songs, they were like, Okay, we're going
Speaker 8: to produce a vocal this way.
Speaker 5: So I've been that vessel for them, you know what
Speaker 5: I mean.
Speaker 8: And so I feel like that's an added advantage I have,
Speaker 8: so I can, you know, kind of whatever they were thinking,
Speaker 8: I want this. It's not something I would do, you know,
Speaker 8: but I was like, okay, wow. So I had to
Speaker 8: learn that and be patient and so the other patients
Speaker 8: for me had to come in kick in hard.
Speaker 1: But so what's the division of labor amongst the band members?
Speaker 1: His glass rehearsals. Who organizes?
Speaker 8: I would say that everybody comes with grooves first of all,
Speaker 8: like oh Dell, he's like the top of the funk master,
Speaker 8: you know, p funk rock and roll.
Speaker 5: Rick is like the.
Speaker 8: Kind of saying funk rock and roll with really good
Speaker 8: rock and roll edge. It writes from a lot of
Speaker 8: narrative standpoint, you know, stuff that happens to him, that
Speaker 8: kind of thing.
Speaker 5: Larry's more related, you know.
Speaker 8: His thing is he's perfectionist, incredible keyboard player, and great songwriter.
Speaker 8: So he's kind of all over in that area. Jeff
Speaker 8: is kind of like he's got a lot of bridge
Speaker 8: It's really interesting chor changes and things like that.
Speaker 5: It's interesting thoughts, you know. As far as songwriting as well.
Speaker 5: I'm kind of like I like to arrange beats.
Speaker 8: Is my funny thing is like my I love like
Speaker 8: rhythm beats, you know, say like that's just first before
Speaker 8: the singing.
Speaker 1: And all that.
Speaker 8: So it's I'm just kind of like, you know, whatever
Speaker 8: holes need feeling, you know. That's that's way I can
Speaker 8: explain it, I guess.
Speaker 1: And how do you know when a song is done
Speaker 1: and going to make it to the album, are you
Speaker 1: guys A let's do thirty songs and have a vote
Speaker 1: on the best yeah, and then how do you campaign
Speaker 1: your song that's with the problem? Yeah? Yeah, okay, so
Speaker 1: what's it?
Speaker 3: Unpopular?
Speaker 8: Some stuff is just unanimous. You're like, okay, this is
Speaker 8: definitely gonna you got some stuff that because it's like, okay,
Speaker 8: we got to let other people besides us listen the
Speaker 8: feel and so that's good and bad sometimes because then
Speaker 8: you know, depending on who who's people you know see
Speaker 8: But isn't it.
Speaker 1: Good to have a producer for that because I see
Speaker 1: a producer more as a referee.
Speaker 8: Yeah, yeah, I hear you. Yeah and mhm for that reason, Yeah,
Speaker 8: definitely would it would be good. But we were our
Speaker 8: own referee sometimes, so not.
Speaker 1: Yeah, do you recommend that for future practice? I mean
Speaker 1: twenty years later, like do you?
Speaker 5: It depends?
Speaker 8: I mean, I think if you have an outside ear afterward.
Speaker 8: You know, we started getting that a little bit more
Speaker 8: than not so because we knew that we needed that.
Speaker 8: It's like, okay, we can't just be insulated like that.
Speaker 8: It's got to be other people that realize, you know,
Speaker 8: it's get some you know people. I would always say,
Speaker 8: you know people some friends and friends who I don't know,
Speaker 8: so they're out of it. They don't have any Yeah,
Speaker 8: you know what I mean, can you.
Speaker 1: Name a Mint classic that either you felt indifferent about
Speaker 1: or didn't like that wound up winning verses or like
Speaker 1: them saying they didn't like I don't like pretty brown lines.
Speaker 8: I think all of the hits were pretty unanimous. Where
Speaker 8: where it was really jacked up. It's like the people
Speaker 8: at the company like stuff like so fine, like pretty
Speaker 8: much all of its. So like when we first got
Speaker 8: the deal, it's like when you know, when MC I
Speaker 8: heard its like now that would have been on the
Speaker 8: demo it was, you know, swing, and it's like it's okay,
Speaker 8: really okay, a lot of these you know, So, I
Speaker 8: mean it was it was kind of like that people
Speaker 8: that at the label that would hear's like you know,
Speaker 8: I mean we did Turning so fine.
Speaker 5: You're like when if you're the guitarre so nobody does
Speaker 5: guitar solos.
Speaker 1: Like wow, there's all the more reason for us to
Speaker 1: do it. Yeah.
Speaker 8: So, I mean you're Ernie Eisley and you know, these
Speaker 8: great people. So yeah, it was more so the people
Speaker 8: at the labels. I think, like as far as the hits,
Speaker 8: we we knew, you know, Jam and Lewis, we definitely
Speaker 8: they would be like, okay, you talk about outside ear.
Speaker 8: They would definitely be like, Okay, look, you all need
Speaker 8: to think about this one, or you know, or not
Speaker 8: do so many chords on this you that kind of thing, so,
Speaker 8: you know, which was definitely we learned a lot from them.
Speaker 8: I mean absolutely they knew exactly they had that magic.
Speaker 1: First album was meant to be meant Yeah. So the
Speaker 1: beginning of it, what were your were you guys personal goals?
Speaker 1: I mean, I know everyone's like world domination.
Speaker 5: But.
Speaker 1: For you, was it just like, yo, we want to
Speaker 1: be like the best black plan ever. Or was it
Speaker 1: like yo, we want to be on that pop level shit?
Speaker 8: Or I think it was you know, we just had
Speaker 8: Join and craft Man just creating. I think part of
Speaker 8: our thing was just we didn't really care about anything
Speaker 8: else but the music. You just wanted to be tight
Speaker 8: and funky and just have an impact. And I think
Speaker 8: that's partly why, like the show was what it was.
Speaker 8: We worked so hard on that, and then we learned
Speaker 8: as we went in the studio, I was discovering my voice.
Speaker 8: Like if you listening to the first album, like to
Speaker 8: the last Couple, you can list all the vocals are
Speaker 8: very tight, and arranging everything is saying, you know, the
Speaker 8: way formally really really tightened is that I got I'm like,
Speaker 8: you know, you got to lett some life in here
Speaker 8: and you breathe. I think that's just that first time,
Speaker 8: you know, doing the ceedy, You're excited and everything. Everybody's
Speaker 8: on edge because you want to be perfect.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Well, I'm just asking because the early nineties also,
Speaker 1: you know, there's a lot of black artists that had
Speaker 1: like breakout records and suddenly they're selling in the five
Speaker 1: and six and seven millions. So I know that's hard
Speaker 1: to ignore. But were you guys say we're gonna stay
Speaker 1: in our lane and we know that like a cat
Speaker 1: like Prince rejected Soul Train four times because I don't
Speaker 1: want to be pegged as a soul artist. I want
Speaker 1: bandstand in solid Like, So, were you guys fine with like,
Speaker 1: okay being BT Staples and not? I mean, eventually you
Speaker 1: guys made it on like MTV jams and that sort
Speaker 1: of thing.
Speaker 5: But yeah, I mean got to understand though too.
Speaker 8: I mean, you know, it was being a band, some
Speaker 8: of our exposure was limited just because it's hard to
Speaker 8: move a band, you know, and we got to we
Speaker 8: even had a thing Exam Lewis at one point because
Speaker 8: it's like, you know, the first few gigs, you're like, look,
Speaker 8: we got to get you all out here, you know,
Speaker 8: because at one point they were doing out of their
Speaker 8: pocket because A and M they had a joint venture
Speaker 8: with them. They don't believe, they don't get they don't know, right,
Speaker 8: So we got to get you all out here because
Speaker 8: you know, are you free?
Speaker 5: Wasn't free? You say, you know, you know it was
Speaker 5: going on. Sorry, So we got to get y'all out
Speaker 5: here so they would have us doing these track shows.
Speaker 8: You know, how do you and so what we did, okay,
Speaker 8: we got to do that. We're gonna go back and
Speaker 8: remix everything. And that's when the whole you know, Teddy Riley,
Speaker 8: the whole now his whole sound was really prominentent and
Speaker 8: so everybody was dancing and you know, we had a
Speaker 8: lot of choreography back then, and so the pretty yeah,
Speaker 8: pretty much but with the instruments and uh. We were
Speaker 8: doing that until we got to Houston and after the
Speaker 8: show we were getting into the van, heard some do
Speaker 8: that fucking computers.
Speaker 5: This ain't even playing.
Speaker 8: I was like, oh, ship, that's it, that's that's it
Speaker 8: like we gotta we just defeats our whole purpose was
Speaker 8: supposed to be a band like na man, damn. So
Speaker 8: that one Heckler, Yeah, that one. Yeah, thank you Heckler,
Speaker 8: thank you truth. Yeah, it was real real And then
Speaker 8: it hit me. I was like, man, that's he's right.
Speaker 1: You know.
Speaker 5: He just felt like I was. You know, I wouldn't
Speaker 5: my mic would be on, but it was just like
Speaker 5: it did. It wasn't real. Life is live, man. You
Speaker 5: couldn't extend nothing. It's like the track is the track
Speaker 5: and that's it, you know.
Speaker 1: Speaking of Houston, hmm, the world's crazy as human being
Speaker 1: lives in Houston.
Speaker 3: How does he wind up?
Speaker 2: Uh?
Speaker 1: In the in in the Mint family. Speaking of Chris
Speaker 1: Daddy Dave, Chris Dadlin Dave.
Speaker 8: He met him at Howard University and while we were
Speaker 8: while was going down to charts, we put down put
Speaker 8: out uh Breaking my Heart Pretty Brown Eyes, which was
Speaker 8: going down.
Speaker 5: To charts as well. So yeah, until when we get out.
Speaker 8: In a winter bagel and we went to all the
Speaker 8: HBCUs in the country. Yeah, And so we got to
Speaker 8: Howard University and this was around the time too, where
Speaker 8: you know that I'm telling you about Michael Blant. So
Speaker 8: we had a uh drummer, A couple of drummers filling
Speaker 8: in correct down Friols.
Speaker 5: What's up?
Speaker 1: So you weren't going to fill Collins this ship?
Speaker 8: No, because at that time I felt like, I know,
Speaker 8: way I can I can't. I felt I started to
Speaker 8: feel differently perform. I started to come into it a
Speaker 8: little bit more, you know. I was still I loved
Speaker 8: the state I couldn't. I could express myself definitely. I
Speaker 8: was learning all about how to perform and.
Speaker 5: That kind of thing.
Speaker 8: So I was like, I couldn't you know, I couldn't
Speaker 8: do it. I feel I would feel confined, you know.
Speaker 1: Plus none of the girls go for the drummer.
Speaker 5: Put the drums in front, man come to the front,
Speaker 5: to the side.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 8: So yeah, it it was at Howard University and jelly
Speaker 8: Beans Johnson was out with us.
Speaker 1: Yeah he was.
Speaker 3: He was playing with y'all.
Speaker 5: Yeah, playing with us. Yeah, yeah, it was. It was real.
Speaker 5: And he he went into one of the practice room
Speaker 5: He's like, yeah, man, it's something, dude. Man. He sounded
Speaker 5: like Michael Blad you got.
Speaker 8: I was like really a little dude, And I was like, okay,
Speaker 8: but I don't I think I don't know if I
Speaker 8: met him. Then we were on the road and we
Speaker 8: got to Uh. I remember speaking to him. I called
Speaker 8: him when we got to l A and we were
Speaker 8: doing the Disneyland Grad Nights and the Crazy Story too.
Speaker 5: I think I'm like, this is just off.
Speaker 1: Anything with Chris Dave is definitely crazy.
Speaker 5: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 8: Now I was thinking about the Grad Knights. I remember
Speaker 8: Leila Hathaway to, yeah, did you play my grad Knights?
Speaker 1: Like what? Oh wow? That was crazy?
Speaker 5: Yeah crazy.
Speaker 8: So yeah, Disney that grad Nights and I ended up color.
Speaker 8: I was like, you know, man, yeah, I have heard
Speaker 8: about you, and if you can just send me, you know,
Speaker 8: just send me something slow, something made, something fast.
Speaker 5: And you know he's like, okay, yeah man, yeah here's
Speaker 5: a voice. Yes yeah, And so it was like okay, cool.
Speaker 8: But it wasn't until you know, I really audition up
Speaker 8: in a flight time and yeahs, cred ahead, chops and everything.
Speaker 8: At that point, I'm just like, Okay, all I need
Speaker 8: you to do right now is I want to feel
Speaker 8: this rise and move like play harder, you know, play harder,
Speaker 8: because I think it was more jazz reinly t killing,
Speaker 8: you know, I like play hard and we're gonna play long.
Speaker 8: And we had these super thick arrangements at the time,
Speaker 8: some of them recorded.
Speaker 5: But he's like, you know, he could handle it.
Speaker 1: Was he that abstract even back, and I didn't even
Speaker 1: start seeing him droning until like maybe like two thousand
Speaker 1: and four, two thousand and five. Okay, I had heard
Speaker 1: about we did one gig with you guys in like Seattle,
Speaker 1: or at least all you guys were there, like we
Speaker 1: that's the first time I met you guys in Seattle,
Speaker 1: but you guys had even y'all there the night before
Speaker 1: or something or whatever. That's the first time my man.
Speaker 1: I was like, oh, I've heard of you, Chris Dave.
Speaker 8: But yeah, well he was, you know, we've playing R
Speaker 8: and B stuff, So I mean, that's the gig, is
Speaker 8: what it is. It's kind of somewhat theatrical, but it was,
Speaker 8: you know, we need you to hit that.
Speaker 1: I know he's known for he's an awesome pocket, but
Speaker 1: his calling card and his reputation is based on coloring
Speaker 1: outside of the lines.
Speaker 5: For sure.
Speaker 1: How in a group so uh disciplined and it's in
Speaker 1: it in its songs, it's how did that?
Speaker 8: How it was it fits because I call it like
Speaker 8: pocket aggressive, where it's like, okay, there's parameters because sometimes
Speaker 8: we've auditioned drummers in the past they just think it's
Speaker 8: like you go wow, because you know, it's like no,
Speaker 8: there's certain stop signs, you know, from between.
Speaker 1: Here and here.
Speaker 8: This is just here's where you start out, and there's
Speaker 8: a couple of things and then you have to know
Speaker 8: here you can kind of do what you want, but
Speaker 8: make it tasteful, you know. But sometimes there's certain drummers
Speaker 8: of the song like oh, they're just going off like no,
Speaker 8: it's it's not you got to play the music. It's
Speaker 8: like you know, solo and is like with five percent,
Speaker 8: but I'm just really interested and you know, you got
Speaker 8: to most of the times playing trying to play with
Speaker 8: the ensemble make your head brought, you know, And yeah
Speaker 8: he did that.
Speaker 5: It was just like, you know, we'd have.
Speaker 8: Our part where we do a little little drum battle
Speaker 8: and all that kind of stuff, so which was cool,
Speaker 8: but a lot of it too. We spent a lot
Speaker 8: of time because he lived with me for off and
Speaker 8: on for a couple of years, and we would just
Speaker 8: shed you know, and just kind of exchange ideas. And
Speaker 8: it's so funny because a lot of ideas I hear
Speaker 8: now is just kind of like, you know, just kind
Speaker 8: of the color and I like, I say, coloring outside
Speaker 8: of the line. As far as the tempo changes, you know,
Speaker 8: with inside four four time and all that kind of
Speaker 8: stuff is it's become like a thing ye hear drummer's
Speaker 8: doing now.
Speaker 5: But that was just was just kind of messing around.
Speaker 5: I was like, Wow, that's cool.
Speaker 3: Whose idea was it? One of your most probably iconic moments.
Speaker 3: I remember whose idea was it?
Speaker 1: To have half the go to knew the video?
Speaker 2: Please remember the audition of how.
Speaker 3: Like he was like a newscaster or he was like
Speaker 3: a broadcaster.
Speaker 2: He was a broadcast.
Speaker 7: Yeah, he was singing in front of the TVs and
Speaker 7: then came under knows.
Speaker 2: Yes, I'm sorry, I know.
Speaker 1: It wasn't.
Speaker 8: Who was this dude just trying to find a ledge man? No,
Speaker 8: that was that was my version of Ilande. I wasn't
Speaker 8: gonna dolines half a bid, you know, shaven man.
Speaker 2: You know, but that video was a whole raror because
Speaker 2: I was just thinking about how I remember the call
Speaker 2: the model call in d C at Howard y'all had
Speaker 2: a whole relationship with Howard in that way where that
Speaker 2: y'all did.
Speaker 5: The The girl was from d C.
Speaker 1: That's right.
Speaker 5: Yeah, we did a the video contest.
Speaker 1: We won it. Yeah. Yeah.
Speaker 2: So it was that senior year. I remember because I
Speaker 2: slow grind across the street at the A k. A
Speaker 2: House to Pretty Eyes the first time I ever got
Speaker 2: felt us. It was really and everybody else was in
Speaker 2: the coat line because it was the end of the
Speaker 2: party or whatever, but he wanted dance with me one
Speaker 2: more time before the door closing. Pretty Brown Eyes came
Speaker 2: on Forever Your Eyes.
Speaker 8: I just had.
Speaker 1: That.
Speaker 2: It meant like, I'm sorry, all right, okay, what kind
Speaker 2: of man we're gonna get that you don't slow ground
Speaker 2: to that?
Speaker 1: Yeah?
Speaker 2: Right?
Speaker 1: If people could get married to pretty wings, why can't
Speaker 1: you slow ground? What kind of man?
Speaker 2: Was just awkward lyrics as we listen to those, though
Speaker 2: we listened to the condition lyrics. I feel like it's
Speaker 2: the hole at least the hook, you know.
Speaker 1: The Earth on fire reason story. Yeah, we gave up
Speaker 1: two million dollars once the couple found out what it meant,
Speaker 1: like what a couple wanted the earth winding fire Rich
Speaker 1: couple comes singing reasons at their wedding and really opened
Speaker 1: his mouth, was like you sure, and they're like why,
Speaker 1: It's like just about cheating and that's it. It was
Speaker 1: lost two million dollars. Yeah wow, I mean we loved
Speaker 1: every every song is about for you, all the sweet.
Speaker 2: Except for pretty Brown hold on just breaking his heart?
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 7: Fuck the condition to the Sie sage one as we
Speaker 7: lay this morning putting on a playlist called songs for
Speaker 7: February fifty.
Speaker 1: The week the weekend before the seventh February. Oh, we
Speaker 1: told her.
Speaker 3: I wouldn't know that about that.
Speaker 1: Yeah, February thirtieth. Baby, I'm sorry.
Speaker 2: Man.
Speaker 1: Wait is there a black love song that pledges black
Speaker 1: love and commitment without being the side piece or music?
Speaker 3: I celebrate my love, yeah, spending my life?
Speaker 1: Yeah, but your hair ship is it? Just do me baby?
Speaker 1: That's it?
Speaker 2: And sat.
Speaker 1: Was that well.
Speaker 3: I don't think somebody.
Speaker 1: Second verse the HR though.
Speaker 9: If he shows you, I feel like you're in the
Speaker 9: office and you don't go to HRY.
Speaker 1: Do you ever think you have HR conversation at NBC?
Speaker 1: I know you do now, but like before, every day
Speaker 1: in my life, no, every day in my life is
Speaker 1: how not to go to HR the principals off with.
Speaker 3: The second record, I thought that that was where.
Speaker 7: That was the first record that I listened to like
Speaker 7: all the way down, like complete, and that was probably
Speaker 7: the one that I just played because I felt like
Speaker 7: y'all got your up tempo game right and it was
Speaker 7: really good songs and just everything was dope. What was
Speaker 7: the process between the first record to the second record?
Speaker 8: Well, I guess we'd heard about this sophomore Jenks thing
Speaker 8: with that. Didn't know what it was, what does that mean?
Speaker 8: Just you know, we just said, look, we all come
Speaker 8: with the best songs we can come with.
Speaker 1: You know.
Speaker 5: We were just really.
Speaker 8: Really focused, you know, and having that and we went
Speaker 8: through that process of like, Okay, no, this doesn't sound good.
Speaker 8: And I think at that point, at that point, each
Speaker 8: one of us knew what you know, we were bringing.
Speaker 5: It had to be good.
Speaker 8: And I think we'd learned so much from you know,
Speaker 8: touring from the first album and then first somehow that
Speaker 8: didn't what was really resonating with everybody and it's like, Okay,
Speaker 8: we we really gotta get.
Speaker 5: That, get that up so our tone game.
Speaker 8: I'm a tone dudes, like like drum sounds, keyboard sounds,
Speaker 8: all that kind of stuff had to be on points.
Speaker 5: So I think that was all, you know, part of
Speaker 5: that it was, that was the sum of it.
Speaker 1: You know, what's how's your engineer? Steve Hodges, Jimmy James,
Speaker 1: did you work with you guys at all?
Speaker 8: He would kind of oversee because I was, always, like
Speaker 8: I said, interested and it sounds like, for instance, like
Speaker 8: the remember like the drum tones on what kind of man.
Speaker 8: We worked a little bit on that, and I'm just
Speaker 8: kind of watching what he did. But yet amazing, amazing technician.
Speaker 2: Man.
Speaker 1: Just what studio did you guys record on flight Time? Yeah?
Speaker 8: Yeah, not oh yeah. It was a four studios up
Speaker 8: in there. It was jamming them had their studio. There
Speaker 8: were Studio A was a smaller studio, which I love
Speaker 8: them in their studio, you know, studio scene in the
Speaker 8: studio was a bigger studio. Steve Hodge had his own
Speaker 8: studio and that he mixed primarily in there. But it's
Speaker 8: four of them.
Speaker 1: Is that still in operating in Minnesota?
Speaker 5: It's up there.
Speaker 8: It's uh, Paul Peterson is over there now, Saint Paul
Speaker 8: in the family. But some of the boys they used
Speaker 8: to have Harrison Boys, and so there was all gone
Speaker 8: now and they have different you know, because you don't
Speaker 8: need those big boys.
Speaker 2: And more so during that time, what were some of
Speaker 2: the other projects that were being worked on while you
Speaker 2: guys are in the studio.
Speaker 1: Because you're playing on my Ship? Yeah?
Speaker 5: Yeah, what did I do?
Speaker 1: Yeah?
Speaker 3: Ye, he's on the Body that Loves You to.
Speaker 5: Some of that stuff. Man, I would I would do
Speaker 5: those sessions and not know where the song was going.
Speaker 1: Were you guys the band for what Will I Do?
Speaker 5: No?
Speaker 1: No, not that one. You just dreamed on it.
Speaker 8: But I need a remix and I can't remember. Yeah,
Speaker 8: I ended up on it was a giant thing, for sure,
Speaker 8: that must be what. There was so much stuff I
Speaker 8: don't know, some of it don't even know.
Speaker 3: On that album, man, talk about ten million strong. Like
Speaker 3: that song.
Speaker 1: I used to put that when I would make my
Speaker 1: slow jam tapes Midnight.
Speaker 3: I loved doing like my Cake, my cake tapes. I
Speaker 3: kept that tape.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that was like.
Speaker 3: My cake tape was what you made, you know what
Speaker 3: I'm saying. When you it was your music for when
Speaker 3: you was on the phone.
Speaker 1: Cake that cake.
Speaker 5: Cake, So that was what it was.
Speaker 3: So I kept that song on like that made several iterations,
Speaker 3: you know what I'm.
Speaker 1: Saying, talk about that multivo Where were you? What was yall? Only?
Speaker 1: I did that? I love that record.
Speaker 8: That one was influenced. I was listening to this this composer,
Speaker 8: Japanese composer I'll reach yeah, and he had all these
Speaker 8: you know, black rain.
Speaker 1: He did that.
Speaker 5: That that score just amazing.
Speaker 8: I just love his the way he used textures and
Speaker 8: sounds and that kind of thing, and that is where
Speaker 8: that came from. It's just that's that whole thing, and
Speaker 8: then the whole ten million strong kind of thing. Just
Speaker 8: you know, just certain songs coming I can do in
Speaker 8: five minutes. Other times it might be, you know, a
Speaker 8: couple of hours, it might be a week. I'man just
Speaker 8: set it down, the hook is done. I want to
Speaker 8: spend some time with That was just kind of like
Speaker 8: maybe ten minutes on that one, you know, but yeah,
Speaker 8: it was just one of those.
Speaker 5: It was just kind of a vibe. That's exactly for that,
Speaker 5: I mean, just to kind of chill the vibe.
Speaker 7: I certainly feel that purpose going back, I forgot my
Speaker 7: dear on the More Money soundtrack.
Speaker 8: No, it's funny about that, you know, it's the spearheaded
Speaker 8: by Homer Owe Dell guitar player man and that we
Speaker 8: really originally did that for Calling Me Back in a
Speaker 8: group called And but it was produced differently to have
Speaker 8: more of kind of pop sensibility, and they something happened
Speaker 8: when they didn't take the song they were going and
Speaker 8: they didn't, and it's like, okay, we're gonna make it
Speaker 8: for us. So we went in, rehearsed it, you know,
Speaker 8: did the music, and then me and Odell pended. You know,
Speaker 8: we just wanted to make it kind of an extravaganza.
Speaker 1: You know, used to run that joint. Thanks man.
Speaker 3: We talked about soundtrack joints. Jason's lyric trouble was Money Money.
Speaker 1: That one.
Speaker 5: Yeah, that was.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 8: They wanted they wanted the songs, but they wanted to it.
Speaker 8: So Carrie Lewis was brilliant at doing that. He had
Speaker 8: Carrie had like a he's like a really great pop sensibility,
Speaker 8: you know, knows the textures to use and everything.
Speaker 3: So he was.
Speaker 8: Really instrumental the group for that. So you pen swinging
Speaker 8: as well me swinging. So yeah, he's just amazing. Still
Speaker 8: to this day, it's just crazy with it.
Speaker 2: Do you really still enjoy singing like your classics, like
Speaker 2: are there's some that you like still enjoy always wanted.
Speaker 5: Because I appreciate the catalog as I appreciate it.
Speaker 8: Yeah, you know, as you get older and doing this thing,
Speaker 8: it's like you know what you know, doing music man,
Speaker 8: you know, changing hearts and minds and actually changing you know,
Speaker 8: the vibration is actually going through people and helping. You know,
Speaker 8: it's like feeling different, you know. So it's uh, I
Speaker 8: learned later on life like this really about healing.
Speaker 1: It really is.
Speaker 5: You know, if we didn't have music, I mean, what
Speaker 5: would that feel like?
Speaker 1: You know what I mean? What is your vocal regimen?
Speaker 7: Because I've I mean I've seen you like a couple
Speaker 7: of times, and you guys are still, you know, twenty
Speaker 7: years later, still singing these songs in the same key
Speaker 7: like you still.
Speaker 3: I shouldn't be, you know, I mean, it's just like
Speaker 3: that's amazing.
Speaker 5: Man, that's you know.
Speaker 8: I definitely try to baby it as much like I'm
Speaker 8: not one of these dudes who have these Some dudes
Speaker 8: can just sing all night and you know the next
Speaker 8: you just got these still lungs.
Speaker 5: I'm like, I gotta do my garlic.
Speaker 8: And my ginger and all that honey, you know, warm up,
Speaker 8: you know, it's a big thing, and really it's just
Speaker 8: about it's just about endurance, really and trying to sing differently.
Speaker 8: You know, your voice changes as you get older, it
Speaker 8: drops a little bit, and but I like where it's
Speaker 8: at now because it kind of rounds it out because.
Speaker 5: I listen back and I'm like, man, I sound like
Speaker 5: many a.
Speaker 1: Mouse pete those y'all guys. That the way that you're
Speaker 1: speaking now, that your baritone game is on point when
Speaker 1: your voice resource but you saying and your low register.
Speaker 1: I was like, yo, do the low register? Yeah, and
Speaker 1: you killed it. Like have you ever thought of of
Speaker 1: doing a project where you just use your your your
Speaker 1: low register.
Speaker 5: And then that day like I already started it.
Speaker 2: It's like a song on a new record, Like at
Speaker 2: least one song, I feel like you use it.
Speaker 3: Even on the Soulfine remix, you kind of went a
Speaker 3: little lower than normal.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 5: I think people are so focused on the.
Speaker 8: Natural high registered and on your life, you know, and
Speaker 8: if they see it live, you know, or they'll ask
Speaker 8: me that, they assume it's somebody else that's singing.
Speaker 5: That's that's me saying yeah, but.
Speaker 8: Yeah, I enjoy that. I missed that baritone. I missed
Speaker 8: that whole very white out the price sock.
Speaker 5: You know, you know I'm that right. Nobody sings, yeah,
Speaker 5: there's there's there's a lane.
Speaker 2: It's funny you say that about your voice, because last
Speaker 2: night and I were trying to figure out, like, who
Speaker 2: is in your your try vocally right, because you are
Speaker 2: just in an elite situation where there's not a lot
Speaker 2: of people that, oh, he sounds like stuff.
Speaker 3: You y'all need to do a jam together. Yeah, I know,
Speaker 3: y'all like, who's who.
Speaker 6: Together?
Speaker 1: Phrase that because the argument was three between Ray and
Speaker 1: Son and him.
Speaker 2: Okayan and Stokely is like cousins in this game.
Speaker 1: Get me beat up.
Speaker 2: A great producer.
Speaker 3: But yeah, it's yeah, it is y'all are similar.
Speaker 8: Yeah, yeah, I mean we seen we talk about this,
Speaker 8: like what is that? I guess he just comes out
Speaker 8: and it comes out, man, you know for the first
Speaker 8: I guess you know a little while that breaking my
Speaker 8: Heart was out. Nobody really there. We had no video,
Speaker 8: so they didn't a baby face. It kind of sounded like, Stevie,
Speaker 8: who's what you know? We had gotten?
Speaker 5: I had gotten a few different you know, artists.
Speaker 7: And people thought it was, you know, on the cover
Speaker 7: of the uh definition of a band album. I'd always
Speaker 7: want to ask you about what was it that made
Speaker 7: y'all not be on the cover and just fos the instruments.
Speaker 3: I thought it was a statement behind it, But I
Speaker 3: want to hear your definition of a band?
Speaker 5: Yeah, yeah, for sure.
Speaker 8: It's like, okay, this is let's be what we are, like, man,
Speaker 8: enough of this trying to look pretty on the cover
Speaker 8: and that kind of thing.
Speaker 5: Let's just more rugged, be what it is.
Speaker 8: It's like, we're musicians, let's letting we always say that
Speaker 8: the music is king over everything that speaks, you know,
Speaker 8: So put the instruments on there, you know, the old
Speaker 8: warehouse looking thing, you know, and that represents us, you know. Definitely.
Speaker 8: I think it was perfect, you know, definition of man.
Speaker 8: Put instruments boom, that's it, and I think it resonated.
Speaker 1: Why did it take you guys three years between on
Speaker 1: that one? And is it risky to well I know
Speaker 1: that well, yeah, for the next three records. It's that
Speaker 1: was ninety six.
Speaker 5: Y between that one and what was one after that?
Speaker 1: Was that aquarium? Well okay eight yeah, man, factory to
Speaker 1: Definition band was three years.
Speaker 8: And then just just toring, you know, a ment factory
Speaker 8: to definite Yeah, touring and h I think to from
Speaker 8: definition band to Life's Aquarium. There was a couple of
Speaker 8: things that happened, so, uh, Carrie had found love, got married,
Speaker 8: you know, all the things.
Speaker 5: We're trying to figure out our sound, you know, and how.
Speaker 3: Did he handle that?
Speaker 1: Did he like give your heads up or was it? Yeah?
Speaker 1: And did you guys handle that? And we did?
Speaker 5: We we were on tour with.
Speaker 1: I didn't watch the Lifetime.
Speaker 3: It was the Lifetime movie? Was it accurate?
Speaker 6: Was it?
Speaker 1: What?
Speaker 2: Was it the Whitney's movie, because I mean, we're not
Speaker 2: Whitney I'm sorry Tony movie.
Speaker 5: Sorry, No, they mentioned in the movie kind of remember that.
Speaker 5: I only watched half of it, so I'm not I
Speaker 5: don't even know if it was in it.
Speaker 1: But was it good? After the Whitney John and Leah Jorn.
Speaker 1: I didn't do it.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I saw the TC one that wasn't Lifetime, that
Speaker 3: was one life Time. Oh you're thinking about it? Oh
Speaker 3: yet no, little Mama she killed the TLC version, the
Speaker 3: t G. She did good in that one. I wasn't
Speaker 3: met at that one at all.
Speaker 1: So how did they depicted just just for my ignorance, like,
Speaker 1: how did they depict.
Speaker 2: The It's been depicted that the band was not happy.
Speaker 2: That's what it's been depicted at all.
Speaker 3: I can imagine that.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean yeah, I mean with someone for your
Speaker 1: life and then they're like, I'm out in love.
Speaker 8: And then y'all were on tour together to so there
Speaker 8: was a whole thing, right, so that it developed with
Speaker 8: them on tour. So I mean we've seen it kind
Speaker 8: of was like okay, all right, all right, see what's
Speaker 8: going on? And uh so announced getting parried and that
Speaker 8: whole thing.
Speaker 1: Say, Bryce was, I'm sorry, this is a long story.
Speaker 3: He was anyway, good.
Speaker 8: Yeah, so they did that, and so we were, yeah,
Speaker 8: I mean everybody in the band wasn't you know, It's like, man,
Speaker 8: what's going to happen? I guess all he was asking
Speaker 8: for is like, look, he's give me some time to work,
Speaker 8: Steff hars gonna happen? Like noah, we got we got
Speaker 8: it roll out man. I guess it was like an ultimatum.
Speaker 8: You know, it's like any out kind of thing. But
Speaker 8: you know, to me, I just thought it was business
Speaker 8: and you know, let you know, short life loves love man,
Speaker 8: let him do this thing. So I went to wedding.
Speaker 8: Some people were supposed to make it and had some
Speaker 8: technical difficulties as well. So in somewhere up bet yeah
Speaker 8: what it was. But I understand that, you know, that's
Speaker 8: just human nature. It's going to be that, you know,
Speaker 8: and it's uh this, you know, I've been married to
Speaker 8: these dudes longer than you know.
Speaker 2: It's very faithful. Like I wonder how many times somebody
Speaker 2: says so stokedly when you're going on solo, like how
Speaker 2: is it like thirty fifty hundred?
Speaker 3: What do you think was there a chance of you
Speaker 3: actually going solo in the late nineties because you did it.
Speaker 3: There was a couple of soundtrack records that was you
Speaker 3: album every.
Speaker 2: Yeah oh in the press and the rate in the
Speaker 2: interview like oh.
Speaker 8: Man, I mean if there was to deal with pretty
Speaker 8: much album's done, it was pretty much every every time.
Speaker 8: So but I just think there was a ment was
Speaker 8: you know, necessary, like at that time, there's so many
Speaker 8: solo artists galory, you know, so I'm like, you know,
Speaker 8: I think it needs to be you know what I.
Speaker 5: Mean, it needed to be a making there's nothing like that,
Speaker 5: you know, there's not a roots.
Speaker 1: Am I the only artist that believes that in the
Speaker 1: open marriage like Amie Davis and the Ship. It's no, no, no,
Speaker 1: you can have this, dude, go to common.
Speaker 7: Yeah, but you have to kind of watch that because
Speaker 7: the while you kind of end up cutting your package.
Speaker 7: You know what I'm saying, you have to you kind
Speaker 7: of dilute yourself too much. And it's like you saying
Speaker 7: I don't need to cut it.
Speaker 2: Metaphor.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's like you, like you, you're diluting you know yourself.
Speaker 7: So it's like, Okay, if I'm here and then I
Speaker 7: start going here and here, here, here, here, here, I
Speaker 7: think it's different yourself.
Speaker 3: I think it's different for musicians versus singers.
Speaker 2: Okay, okay, with drumming, it's hard at all.
Speaker 3: Like was anybody talking, Steve Gett, you're playing on too
Speaker 3: many records, Pinos, gonna have to chill.
Speaker 1: Right, right, yeah, let get these tell you. But I
Speaker 1: think that you know, you would want to, like I
Speaker 1: want to start aside jazz combo with blah blah blah,
Speaker 1: do a supergroup.
Speaker 8: And what the thing it's even like right when I'm
Speaker 8: doing now is all this stuff. It's there's a few
Speaker 8: ways and you can do that, and I've been doing that.
Speaker 8: Actually there's a couple of groups that I played with,
Speaker 8: you know. Still that's been last fifteen probably the whole
Speaker 8: time through. You know, I've always been active, you know before,
Speaker 8: meant you know, during, and now it's just like I
Speaker 8: feel like, you know, I give him so much time,
Speaker 8: attention and care to that. You know, as a musician
Speaker 8: and artist, you have to figure out you know, I
Speaker 8: put When I do something, I'm like really focused in
Speaker 8: on it. So at this time now I'm just like, Okay,
Speaker 8: it's time for another facet.
Speaker 1: You know, I have.
Speaker 8: I got a couple more gears, I think, you know,
Speaker 8: while I'm still healthy and you know I can do it.
Speaker 8: I want to give it it's full attention, you know.
Speaker 8: So there's different ways to do that. I have done
Speaker 8: what you talking about as far as you know, being
Speaker 8: in a group and doing all the other things outside
Speaker 8: of it, you know, making that the mother.
Speaker 1: Do those guys have side options as well or just
Speaker 1: doing different things everything? I'm sorry, you know what I'm saying.
Speaker 1: Do they have side options as well?
Speaker 3: Or is this group there.
Speaker 8: Everything everybody's got different things. And that's the thing that's like,
Speaker 8: once they decide to do that, you know, if they
Speaker 8: want to, then you know what they've got. Definitely, it's
Speaker 8: it's they're amazing dudes, you know in so many different ways.
Speaker 8: They just you just know about me because I'm lead singer,
Speaker 8: you know, and that's usually the way it happens. It's
Speaker 8: a focal point. And yeah, there's there's a lot of
Speaker 8: magic within and beyond me.
Speaker 2: I mean, because there's a moment in reading the title
Speaker 2: introducing Stokely as a fan where you're like, well, that's nice,
Speaker 2: but what you mean introduced like like.
Speaker 3: When you're starting over. Its introducing.
Speaker 5: Decades of music.
Speaker 1: It don't matter.
Speaker 3: Black people don't read.
Speaker 2: It.
Speaker 7: It's like people like people know you too, they don't
Speaker 7: know necessarily or yeah, you know what I mean.
Speaker 2: So it's like, let me ask you just why we're
Speaker 2: on this subject, because I told you one of my
Speaker 2: favorite songs that is yours. Yours was meant something something.
Speaker 2: So the other day we were talking to Fonte and
Speaker 2: he was saying how he's real selective with his features. However,
Speaker 2: he was on the condition song you know it's you
Speaker 2: know something something, because that's mean conditions.
Speaker 3: My mama, she Mama, I wouldn't. She didn't validate me
Speaker 3: until that ship was cool. I talk until I got
Speaker 3: a gentleman condition.
Speaker 2: She was like, oh, ship talking, ship like the ship
Speaker 2: talking is just my favorite.
Speaker 6: Yeah.
Speaker 3: I couldn't believe. I can't even remember.
Speaker 7: I think like my manager hit me, but yeah, Like
Speaker 7: me and Rick were talking and he was like, yo,
Speaker 7: we got a joint we want you on and I
Speaker 7: was like all right. I was like, man, crazy.
Speaker 3: So he sent it to me and so I do it.
Speaker 1: I just do my verse.
Speaker 7: I'm like, all right, my rap, bam, nick, I'm good,
Speaker 7: sixteen a miuth And so I sent it and so
Speaker 7: then Rick hits me.
Speaker 3: And he's like, yo, man, we love the verse. Stokely
Speaker 3: wants you to sing on it.
Speaker 5: I was like, nigga, what.
Speaker 3: No, He's like, no, Stokely won't what like, what do
Speaker 3: you want me?
Speaker 5: No?
Speaker 1: For real?
Speaker 3: That's like yeah, that's like you know, that's crazy.
Speaker 7: So I was like I and so I just went
Speaker 7: back and added like some Marvin harmonies on or whatever,
Speaker 7: and then he hit me back. I was like, Rick,
Speaker 7: I sent you some vocals and I said, but dude,
Speaker 7: I really would rather stokely do these.
Speaker 3: Oh he was like, he was like, let me hear you.
Speaker 1: I sent it to him.
Speaker 3: He was like, dude, we love it, we love it.
Speaker 3: And so that was the time like that record.
Speaker 7: And then it was another record we just did on
Speaker 7: Chris's album, the record I the Destiny and Stereo record.
Speaker 3: I sing the hook on that, but I sung it
Speaker 3: as a reference for you to sing it. But Chris
Speaker 3: kept my reference.
Speaker 1: Of course. He was you the man. But I heard it.
Speaker 1: I heard like an alien aliens.
Speaker 3: Man, I'm trying to we did. Oh, it was on thing. Okay,
Speaker 3: it was another record. We didn't.
Speaker 1: Look so where was the record we did?
Speaker 5: Uh?
Speaker 7: It was a brother I leave record and that was
Speaker 7: a joint. I just again, I did the hook on
Speaker 7: and then I leave. He like, put you in some
Speaker 7: harmonies under me. That ship was stupid. It was called
Speaker 7: I'll be around. It was man, this had to be
Speaker 7: like two thousand and nine.
Speaker 1: And heard again, nice, you don't remember none of the teachers.
Speaker 5: Man, you were just singing.
Speaker 3: You were singing on it because I mean, because you
Speaker 3: were like lead like y'all. He was all over, oh.
Speaker 5: Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, I need
Speaker 5: to hear that again.
Speaker 3: I'll send it to yes. Yeah, yeah, so yeah, man,
Speaker 3: my mother she when I told I did the record
Speaker 3: with y'all. I made it congratulations.
Speaker 1: That is funny.
Speaker 2: Didn't get to touch any of introducers, like was there
Speaker 2: any memory?
Speaker 8: Was I wanted to make it, you know, because I
Speaker 8: feel like we've done that, you know what I mean?
Speaker 8: Think about it, you know, introducing it's like you know this,
Speaker 8: You're getting me from the rude to the tutor, you know,
Speaker 8: so to speak.
Speaker 2: So playing still drums? Is that somebody?
Speaker 3: Okayment Records.
Speaker 7: Yeah, that was my favorite interviews Ash and Rio the
Speaker 7: Querros Revenge.
Speaker 6: I used to I used to have that ship time
Speaker 6: so perfectly where I could loop it on my CD player,
Speaker 6: like because it was only like forty three seconds and
Speaker 6: it wasn't long enough.
Speaker 3: If I hit it just right, it would look perfectly.
Speaker 7: That I want to ask you about sometimes on uh
Speaker 7: that record I got that brought the r A to
Speaker 7: my dormime.
Speaker 3: That was my front.
Speaker 7: No.
Speaker 3: That was like my freshman year of college, and I
Speaker 3: just I was beyond the too loud.
Speaker 1: I think this one is getting mean.
Speaker 7: Yeah, that joint so I would like just that drum
Speaker 7: solo man and just a wonderful song.
Speaker 3: And so I just would have that ship like playing loud.
Speaker 1: How did that?
Speaker 5: That's brother Rick, you know he like on the rock
Speaker 5: and roll Tippy's definitely master at that man.
Speaker 3: That one in fidelity, Yeah yeah.
Speaker 5: Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 8: The drum soul was amazing, just I think I like
Speaker 8: the tones and just how raw it is, you know
Speaker 8: what I mean. But as part of his personality, we
Speaker 8: just kind of wonder h push his vision forward. And
Speaker 8: again I feel just really fortunate to be a part
Speaker 8: of all that. I mean, just creating all those those sonics. Man,
Speaker 8: just amazing magical.
Speaker 5: So Glad resonated with.
Speaker 7: Somebody record what was the change or what prompted all
Speaker 7: to change from perspective to electure for Life of Warrior?
Speaker 8: Better deal it was, Yeah, so what kind of man?
Speaker 8: We just felt like at the you know, we'd given
Speaker 8: them a gift and uh uh.
Speaker 3: Was dropped.
Speaker 8: Yeah yeah, I mean it was already it was a
Speaker 8: gift in you know, the regime that came into a
Speaker 8: and M didn't really pick up the ball and really
Speaker 8: you could have did a lot.
Speaker 3: More, you know, And so that record was considered was
Speaker 3: like just like a moderate hit.
Speaker 5: It was it It was definitely, but it could.
Speaker 1: Have been a hipoppet. Oh yeah, it was just it
Speaker 1: felt like it could have been in a lank star
Speaker 1: move right, it could have been.
Speaker 8: You know what I mean, it was right there, you know,
Speaker 8: so they had to do with just pick it up
Speaker 8: and do what they need to do. So that didn't happen,
Speaker 8: and just what they were offering at the time just
Speaker 8: didn't feel right. You know, a lot of times put
Speaker 8: their own people in and you know, just a lot
Speaker 8: of people are fighting. She's like, you keep people are gone.
Speaker 1: Did you guys have any relationship with and improper like
Speaker 1: guilt Freeeson.
Speaker 3: Or whoever was?
Speaker 5: Yeah, they had.
Speaker 1: Yeah, So it was just basically your ceiling was jam
Speaker 1: and Lewis and the perspective people.
Speaker 3: But never right the higher up set.
Speaker 8: No, I would have been you know, after have we
Speaker 8: had we stayed on there because that's what we you know,
Speaker 8: at that time, I think it was McClain had came
Speaker 8: back on, you know at A and M and that
Speaker 8: kind of thing. So they were in the meeting with
Speaker 8: him trying to figure out the future and I'm like,
Speaker 8: well I'd rather get off, and I'm like, okay, we
Speaker 8: just we thought it was gonna be a big deal,
Speaker 8: so you just give us two songs.
Speaker 5: Out, you know.
Speaker 8: So then we started talking to a Silver rown over
Speaker 8: at Electra and did that deal pretty quick and she
Speaker 8: was pretty excited. So and that one was just like,
Speaker 8: I don't he dropped the ball on again. Just the
Speaker 8: tour support, you know, because I think that was one
Speaker 8: of one of the reasons why.
Speaker 7: Now I would say Life of Query that was one
Speaker 7: that I like, you know, like Bossville you talked about
Speaker 7: the are You Free? Life of Querim was the one
Speaker 7: record where I was kind of like, Okay, what's happening because.
Speaker 3: That's probably my second favorite minelbum. It's so here's the
Speaker 3: other part of it.
Speaker 7: So when I first kind of went through it, and like,
Speaker 7: because the first single, god, what was the first single?
Speaker 3: It just didn't sound like y'all. It sounded, you know,
Speaker 3: very like programming.
Speaker 7: No, it wasn't if You Love Me that was the ballad,
Speaker 7: but it was the it was a faster I can't
Speaker 7: remember what the Charlie that was pretty Lady, that was
Speaker 7: pleasure touched that body of.
Speaker 1: You know what I mean.
Speaker 7: But so that that threw me off. But like the
Speaker 7: ballads on that record, you know, what I'm saying like
Speaker 7: that just the Man for you and this day, this
Speaker 7: minute and God just uh tonight, like those are some
Speaker 7: of my favorite Mint songs of all time.
Speaker 5: So yeah, I mean, you just do what you feel
Speaker 5: in the moment. Man. It's one of those things where
Speaker 5: you you know.
Speaker 8: People get what they get from it, and it's you know,
Speaker 8: whatever your musical sensibility is, you take it or you
Speaker 8: leave it, and uh, you know, some stuff is hit miss.
Speaker 7: So when y'all went indy for Living in the Luxury Brown,
Speaker 7: how is that transition? What major decide to do that?
Speaker 8: So we would go in the independent stage at that point.
Speaker 8: So that was I felt like we all felt like,
Speaker 8: you know, people heard us, but they haven't seen a
Speaker 8: lot of us. So we wanted to do like a
Speaker 8: DVD component, you know with that, you know, living in
Speaker 8: a Luxury Brown and Life from nine thirty Club and
Speaker 8: you know, yeah DC. Yeah, so it felt like that's
Speaker 8: the perfect spot to do it. You know, these do
Speaker 8: always showed us love that part of the country and yeah, yeah, absolutely,
Speaker 8: so that's kind of what drove that, and we struck
Speaker 8: up a deal with Image Entertainment. Yeah yeah, Yeah, it
Speaker 8: was perfect there because they did. They dealt with DVDs
Speaker 8: and that kind of content, and yeah, that's pretty much
Speaker 8: where it came from. It just from us wanting to
Speaker 8: do something that was visual, you know. And yeah it
Speaker 8: came out great man, until we put all these songs
Speaker 8: on there. So remember that was not a target.
Speaker 7: My copy they had like an exclusive, so over here
Speaker 7: I bought it, bought my other target.
Speaker 1: So you have a new album, Stokely. I'm over here.
Speaker 3: Chatting with Sugar.
Speaker 1: Yes, Oh Steve, how you doing.
Speaker 2: Yeah, he's here.
Speaker 5: About the yes, sir.
Speaker 8: Yeah, we started introducing Stokely, So that's like I said,
Speaker 8: I felt that just you know, starting from the bottom.
Speaker 8: You know, we got some folks on there with me
Speaker 8: and some work with.
Speaker 5: Wild A on there.
Speaker 2: How do you after you waited all this time, how
Speaker 2: do you get the producers the people that you want
Speaker 2: to work with together, Because isn't everybody like yo, yeah
Speaker 2: pick me, pick me, pig me like.
Speaker 8: I did off of Spirit, you know, it's not so
Speaker 8: much off a popularity that kind of thing. Whatever fits
Speaker 8: what I'm doing, you know.
Speaker 1: So you've done a lot of stuff with Way though, Yeah.
Speaker 5: A little bit worked on with last couple of CDs.
Speaker 8: Yeah, yeah, Rob and yeah, So I mean it's just,
Speaker 8: you know, it's like this industry becomes very small. So
Speaker 8: you know, touring, you see people on and it's like
Speaker 8: always work together and when it happens, it happens. That
Speaker 8: kind of thing, if the time is free and they're interested,
Speaker 8: if it's something they want to get on, because you know,
Speaker 8: we're all sensitive. Think they think it's wacking. You know,
Speaker 8: it won't happen. So I mean, yeah, but we try to,
Speaker 8: you know, do our best and you know, hopefully make
Speaker 8: it something that's attractive to other artists. And you know,
Speaker 8: Carvin Haggins and Ivan Various. Yeah, yeah, absolutely so they amazing,
Speaker 8: definitely love what they do.
Speaker 1: You know, I gotta ask. Okay, so there's one project
Speaker 1: that I'm really interested in that you were part of.
Speaker 1: You became the facto lead singer of the Revolution for
Speaker 1: their you know, their a couple of their date tours
Speaker 1: or whatever. How did that come to be and how
Speaker 1: hard was that for you? Uh? Do you stay off?
Speaker 5: I don't want to do I've been saying weird, but
Speaker 5: it wasn't weird. It was just it was surreal. It
Speaker 5: was it was just a really interesting to me.
Speaker 1: It's it's uh, I enjoyed, Like I enjoyed it. Someone's
Speaker 1: got to sing those songs, and I'd rather someone that
Speaker 1: really knows how to sing to sing those songs.
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1: And I know for you it might be a thing
Speaker 1: like I don't want to get pegged in the weddings,
Speaker 1: the purple singer mode thing.
Speaker 5: But well, it wasn't that.
Speaker 8: It was just that I was trying to figure out
Speaker 8: my was like first, I just never thought in the
Speaker 8: main years that what I was like still sometimes like
Speaker 8: why am I here?
Speaker 5: You know, I feel like is he not here right now?
Speaker 5: I'm like, it's just weird.
Speaker 2: I know that.
Speaker 1: But to me, it's like, you know, I would I
Speaker 1: would talk to you know the one day you called
Speaker 1: me or whatever, and I would tell her like, because
Speaker 1: this was like the early stages of that. There's like
Speaker 1: maybe the second or third week where I saw something
Speaker 1: and I was like, look, I know, you guys are
Speaker 1: like really really protective of the brand, and you know
Speaker 1: want to make sure that no toes the stepped one
Speaker 1: as if Prince is going to come back to be like, hey,
Speaker 1: you're stepping on my toes. But I was like, I
Speaker 1: think she's like, what do you think we should? I said,
Speaker 1: I think the more that you guys just relax and
Speaker 1: have fun with it, then that's when the magic starts.
Speaker 1: And I felt that you were the perfect because of
Speaker 1: your your your energy that you bring with it. I'm
Speaker 1: not expecting you to show up with purple high hills
Speaker 1: and to do splits and start humping the speakers and
Speaker 1: none of that stuff. So I know that it's it's
Speaker 1: it's a very weird, vulnerable position to be put in,
Speaker 1: but I personally encourage it a lot, like I'd rather
Speaker 1: you than say the lead guy from Doctor Fink's Purple Experience.
Speaker 1: That cat. So how many days did you do with.
Speaker 5: Him last year? Still doing dates when I I'm not
Speaker 5: doing my own stuff. I don't know.
Speaker 1: It was a gang of them, and who sings when
Speaker 1: you're not there?
Speaker 5: Nobody they do. Yeah, So the Wendy and Mark had
Speaker 5: little duties, but it was kind of a weird things.
Speaker 5: I know that they knew.
Speaker 8: You know, Prince had a Prince and I had a relationship,
Speaker 8: and it was he got into a Princeton got to
Speaker 8: a place where you know, you could see him being
Speaker 8: kind of mentor to a lot of different artists. You know,
Speaker 8: he was like becoming that guy, you know, the yodas
Speaker 8: like you know in the industry, and the conversations which
Speaker 8: I missed so many conversations. The ones that I miss
Speaker 8: is like, look, man, we talked about life and everything,
Speaker 8: that kind of.
Speaker 1: Thing, and try to take you to kingdom on No,
Speaker 1: you got lucky.
Speaker 8: Yeah, I think you know when people get happen to
Speaker 8: lord sometimes like at the beginning, it's like, yeah, so
Speaker 8: he may.
Speaker 3: Still prepaid legal.
Speaker 7: Yeah, it's just you're selling it way too hard. I've
Speaker 7: kind of sold on the same way things. We're just
Speaker 7: going too far with it.
Speaker 1: Too much.
Speaker 3: Zeal Yeah, legal, what's the other?
Speaker 1: What the other? Scam?
Speaker 5: Yeah?
Speaker 1: I mean yeah that was those the college. Yeah, you
Speaker 1: just did you have an experience in all your life?
Speaker 3: Sure?
Speaker 7: Yeah, because they came back as uh, they came back
Speaker 7: as another company and I got recruited for that company,
Speaker 7: and that to.
Speaker 3: Telling me, no, wow, scam scam.
Speaker 1: Way.
Speaker 2: The first time you did these songs, these print songs,
Speaker 2: did you have any like unexpected emotional moments that you just.
Speaker 5: Wait, what is what is this?
Speaker 1: Yeah?
Speaker 8: Oh for sure, I mean, like I said, doing them,
Speaker 8: you know, the first couple of shows, you know, definitely
Speaker 8: cost a little bit, costed a little bit emotionally. You know,
Speaker 8: I could even see, you know, the first couple of
Speaker 8: gimes I did, you know, when Manager was there too,
Speaker 8: and we were like, you know, I do a couple
Speaker 8: of songs and I go off, like come back on doing,
Speaker 8: you know, and every time I come off from a
Speaker 8: fan and I'm watching. In the first couple of times,
Speaker 8: was like I could see them becoming themselves, but I.
Speaker 5: Think they were trying to find themselves.
Speaker 1: You know.
Speaker 8: It's like we were all like, where is he? This
Speaker 8: is you know, this is a different experience, you know
Speaker 8: what I mean. And so I think they're trying to
Speaker 8: figure out where they fit and all this stuff. And
Speaker 8: then the fans were looking you know some of the time,
Speaker 8: you know, I they didn't a lot of fans unless
Speaker 8: you sing the Purple Rain tour because that was it.
Speaker 8: You didn't see the revolution, so a lot of people
Speaker 8: were seeing them for the first time. So it's really
Speaker 8: emotional for the fans, you know. And by the time
Speaker 8: you get to you know, sometimes snows in April, it
Speaker 8: was you know, it was just really never watch yeah,
Speaker 8: it was it was you know, so now it's more
Speaker 8: of a celebration. You know, we've you've done it a
Speaker 8: few times and there's still a lot of fans in
Speaker 8: the house are seeing it for the first time.
Speaker 5: It's really it's it's emotional, but you know, I just met.
Speaker 5: I was just concerned.
Speaker 8: Like I told mar It's like, well, what what am
Speaker 8: I going to sing? But you know I'm not in
Speaker 8: First of all, this dude is an island. Nobody saying
Speaker 8: we know that. That's that's it.
Speaker 1: It is what it is.
Speaker 8: It's a legacy and that kind of thing. So so
Speaker 8: I said, I have to pick what I think I
Speaker 8: sound good like. I just because I can do them
Speaker 8: doesn't mean I should, you know what I mean.
Speaker 1: So so some songs are sacrilegiously you too, Wow, I.
Speaker 5: Think yeah, I think, yes, I think I shouldn't be
Speaker 5: doing you.
Speaker 3: Know, I think the best way to handle that, uh.
Speaker 1: And I tell them this all the time that like
Speaker 1: Princess fan base, Prince has the luxury of having non
Speaker 1: hit songs just as popular as a hit song.
Speaker 3: Right, Stevie has that luxury.
Speaker 1: Go for the more obvious stuff, I mean, the less Yeah,
Speaker 1: like the filler, you know what I mean, Like his
Speaker 1: filler is just as amazing, you know what I mean,
Speaker 1: Like slow You Killing Slow Love would be amazing. You know,
Speaker 1: I know that's not a revolutionary song, but yeah, I
Speaker 1: get it. I'm just saying that, you know, it's I
Speaker 1: encourage that moves anyone gets a chance to see the revolution.
Speaker 2: So what's on the list, though, what don't you touch?
Speaker 2: Was like holy ground, I.
Speaker 1: Don't think they would do me baby or okay.
Speaker 2: Okay, so that's the prince list. That's princess list that
Speaker 2: he didn't do after a while, that's.
Speaker 1: What you mean basically, I guess, yeah anyway, So uh.
Speaker 5: But it's fun though.
Speaker 8: We have a good time and then I get to
Speaker 8: learn a lot about him and her old stories, and
Speaker 8: you know, it was really I just feel fortunate because
Speaker 8: it's like even with this project, it was a thing
Speaker 8: where he was, you know, really encouraging. It's like, okay, dude,
Speaker 8: well when the last conversation I had with him is
Speaker 8: about Paisley, and I didn't you know, he's just coming
Speaker 8: like what are you doing tonight? Actually just sitting home
Speaker 8: and come out that's all right? And they were rehearsed
Speaker 8: and I think it was.
Speaker 5: Andy Alo was out there and a bunch of the horns.
Speaker 5: You know, he had his his marching band out there with.
Speaker 1: The big Horns from North Carolina. I always wanted to
Speaker 1: know what the predemned situation was those guys.
Speaker 5: He's killing it out there, killing it.
Speaker 8: And he was like, just go up and you start
Speaker 8: talking just about whatever life and he's like, you know,
Speaker 8: what's it seemed like he was waiting for me to get.
Speaker 5: To a certain subject.
Speaker 8: As we start talking about music and everything, It's like, yeah,
Speaker 8: I'm working on some stuff. He said, you're working on something.
Speaker 8: I was like, yeah, I've been working for a minute.
Speaker 8: So he said, because I was wondering, why don't you
Speaker 8: why don't you do something? You know this is you know,
Speaker 8: it's time. And I said, I'm working on it now.
Speaker 8: It's like, can I be a part of it? I
Speaker 8: was like, whoa, No, you're beneath me.
Speaker 3: You know how I feel when I heard want you
Speaker 3: to sing on?
Speaker 1: How did you?
Speaker 3: How did you feel when you got the call to
Speaker 3: single and call my name?
Speaker 1: Oh?
Speaker 5: That was cool man.
Speaker 8: I was like, Okay, the same thing. It was like yeah,
Speaker 8: I think at that time it was yeah. Kirk Comedy
Speaker 8: was like yeah, yeah, pretty want you to come out
Speaker 8: that's something they're doing out here. So it's me, uh
Speaker 8: chance Howard and Kept blackshar Kept and his brother used
Speaker 8: to sing with Prince for a while too, and went
Speaker 8: out there, and you know, I taught us to harmony
Speaker 8: and everything.
Speaker 5: At one point we was like, it sounds too tight.
Speaker 8: Somebody needs to dirty it up, you know, you know,
Speaker 8: it's the harmony's too tight because we're trying to you know,
Speaker 8: sing it like you know, it's like we're.
Speaker 1: Like, okay, cool, and which one of you to sing flat?
Speaker 8: And so yeah, that came out great. And then we
Speaker 8: went out to the uh to l A to do
Speaker 8: the video. And it's around the same time that Ray
Speaker 8: was about to be released, the movie Ray. And I
Speaker 8: remember me said a great time, man, It was said,
Speaker 8: you want to go to this movie. It's like new
Speaker 8: Jamie Fox. He's portraying Ray Charles.
Speaker 5: Like okay.
Speaker 8: So we went to the Sony lot and you know,
Speaker 8: we you know, it's just like amazing. It's like then
Speaker 8: I knew it was like, oh, this is Oscar material
Speaker 8: right here, man.
Speaker 1: You know.
Speaker 8: Then the uh you know, doing the video and everything.
Speaker 8: I remember we jo kind of joking around about the
Speaker 8: Chappelle show, you know all that, you know, the basketball
Speaker 8: basketball scene and everything. We're like, yeah, that was funny,
Speaker 8: such and such and such. Yeah, he said he was
Speaker 8: balling everything and blouses and all that stuff. And he
Speaker 8: was like, and I hear him back of me, it's trill.
Speaker 7: Okay, talk about a super black question. Talk about your
Speaker 7: time on the set of the Academy Award winning film.
Speaker 3: Panther would say, I look like you were not finding
Speaker 3: the black of two minutes in this episode listen.
Speaker 7: Yeah, so that how did that come about? And we're
Speaker 7: talking about the Mario Van people. Panther talk about that
Speaker 7: Ryan Cooper not not not black paint. We're talking about
Speaker 7: Panther with Bobby Brown.
Speaker 2: He was on drugs, wasn't he?
Speaker 3: No he was, Yeah, he was on drugs.
Speaker 1: But then he was in the movie too.
Speaker 3: She's in the movie.
Speaker 7: That's what that was a better reference. Yes, matter, Yeah,
Speaker 7: I was talking about Yeah, he was about the movie.
Speaker 7: I was talking about the movie to I wasnt talking
Speaker 7: about it first. So yeah, dude, So Panther.
Speaker 1: Getting angry. I was just always are. So I think
Speaker 1: it was just the label.
Speaker 8: You know, we're trying to, you know, get more opportunities
Speaker 8: and seeing it that kind of thing, and you know,
Speaker 8: they said anybody wants to act? I was like, yeah,
Speaker 8: absolutely a little bit in my day and uh so
Speaker 8: that came up, Bob, I was like, yeah, were these weirds?
Speaker 5: You guys are the purple suited hipsters?
Speaker 1: Was there?
Speaker 5: You know on script? You know, and we just you know,
Speaker 5: you know, young I do just come on. But I
Speaker 5: think we had a couple of lines I can't remember.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I was out there when the when they're in
Speaker 3: the standoffs right there.
Speaker 5: Yeah, yeah, yeah, we're supposed to come out and kind
Speaker 5: of react to that what's going on?
Speaker 2: You know, your parents must have been proud, you know,
Speaker 2: now you somebody were.
Speaker 1: You or yeah?
Speaker 5: Yeah, yeah, yeah, that was crazy.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 5: I just remember the most amazing time I have with that.
Speaker 8: It's like we were actually doing the session and right
Speaker 8: before we actually taped everything, there's just there was another
Speaker 8: room that was happening, and D'Angelo was in there, and
Speaker 8: it's like everybody's playing this stuff and we heard ship
Speaker 8: that haven motherfucker he played that and every good body
Speaker 8: he was playing all of it was just like amazing.
Speaker 5: We all just went crazy, like what who is this?
Speaker 1: Arn't you what?
Speaker 5: Amazing? Yeah, just yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1: It was really dope. Yeah.
Speaker 3: I always forgured that that was like before d' angelo
Speaker 3: was d Angelo.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, yeah, it was like a couple of songs
Speaker 2: on the Samplo tape for a second.
Speaker 1: So what what what will the rest of twenty eighteen
Speaker 1: look like for you? And you're playing for twenty nineteen?
Speaker 8: Oh man, just yeah for all hey, yeah, you know,
Speaker 8: just really trying to push you on what I'm doing
Speaker 8: with this, introducing stokely just to my my journey, you know,
Speaker 8: everything I've lurted up into now, Like I said, I
Speaker 8: got a couple more gears. I want to talk about
Speaker 8: different projects you know, uh that I got in my mind.
Speaker 8: I would toast say it like a jazz project, something
Speaker 8: like that, something African inspired inspired, more of this kind
Speaker 8: of journey. More nati is you know pop, you know,
Speaker 8: R and B, sensible, whatever you want to call it.
Speaker 8: I don't want to get into the labels. And because
Speaker 8: HARVERD comes out, man, but definitely more of this. I
Speaker 8: think it's it's a lane that's missed. Like I said,
Speaker 8: I I see it as a hybrid because I'm like
Speaker 8: I feel like I'm I love analog and I love digital.
Speaker 8: I love you know, uh technology, but I'm rooted in
Speaker 8: you know, the past, So I think meshing both of
Speaker 8: those worlds together, that's what pretty much uh introducing stokel.
Speaker 8: I've got a lot of that energy in there, you know,
Speaker 8: so definitely, I mean more touring and just kind of
Speaker 8: creating awareness.
Speaker 3: So that just save a baritone joining for me, that's all.
Speaker 5: Yeah, and that too, Yeah, absolutely serious about that.
Speaker 1: We might be calling man, I know I spun that
Speaker 1: playing your game baby thing already. Yeah, it works.
Speaker 2: You not to be the ask the female questions here,
Speaker 2: but since it's not really asked too much, what's your situation?
Speaker 5: Situation?
Speaker 2: Yeah, like are you married? You got some babies?
Speaker 5: Oh, I take it off and play them.
Speaker 1: About carefully.
Speaker 5: Yeah.
Speaker 2: Yeah, you know the question that I don't have to ask.
Speaker 2: Is it a sister?
Speaker 5: Oh wow, yes, okay, I got some babies we need
Speaker 5: to see from d C. The Howard baby, Yeah, I am.
Speaker 1: Shut it down. Wait, why are you vicarious celebrated?
Speaker 2: Not she's like a sister, She's from d C. And
Speaker 2: she like y'all think I'm black, like she.
Speaker 3: Even matter yet?
Speaker 2: No, I don't need to meet her. He gave me
Speaker 2: facts she's married.
Speaker 1: And she's from d C.
Speaker 2: We were raised and she's of a certain age. We
Speaker 2: were raised. The march we made Martin King Holiday, we thought.
Speaker 3: Please just let people have their misagination in peace.
Speaker 8: Yes, and you're you're touring currently, Yes, yes, yes, doing
Speaker 8: a lot of that weekends. You know, we can worrying
Speaker 8: the chuf everything, the kids.
Speaker 1: Well, we thank you for coming on Request super Thank
Speaker 1: you for having me.
Speaker 5: It's a great show.
Speaker 8: By the way, man, congrats you listen to It's great
Speaker 8: to put the faces voices.
Speaker 3: Hopeful, go right in hope.
Speaker 1: Yeah for our listeners out there, both fante and and
Speaker 1: stokely and yeah and sort of me were we're dealing
Speaker 1: with domestic home situations with our countertops and bathrooms and
Speaker 1: when it's time to pick up in.
Speaker 5: The middle of America and St.
Speaker 1: Paul, ladies and gentlemen, we thank you very much. There
Speaker 1: is another episode of Quest Love Supreme on behalf of
Speaker 1: the Team Supreme and it's like on the next round.
Speaker 1: Quest Love Supreme is a production Heart Radio. This classic
Speaker 1: episode was produced by the team at Pandora. For more
Speaker 1: podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app Apple Podcasts or
Speaker 1: wherever you listen to your favorite shows,