Speaker 1: Quest Love Supreme is a production of iHeartRadio. We Are Ready,
Speaker 1: Here We Go.
Speaker 2: Supremo Supremo, Roll Call Supremo Supremo, Roll Call Supremo Supremo,
Speaker 2: Roll Call Suprema Supremo.
Speaker 1: Roll call My Yeah, Mama, Oh yeah, yeah, Mama.
Speaker 3: Ma Yeah, Supreme Supreme, Roll Supreme Supremo.
Speaker 1: Roll Call.
Speaker 4: My name is Sugar.
Speaker 5: Yeah.
Speaker 4: And it's such a thrill. Yeah to be in the
Speaker 4: same room as Boss Bill.
Speaker 6: Supreme Roll Supremo Supremo roll and this Boss Bill Yeah
Speaker 6: with the rhyme to say yeah, one of my favorite jams.
Speaker 1: Yeah, quiet time to play roll spret.
Speaker 2: So Supremeo, Roll Call Suprema Son Son Supremo, roll call
Speaker 2: like em.
Speaker 7: Yeah, and Johnny guilt to the end.
Speaker 5: Yeah.
Speaker 8: We vote from d C. Yeah, so he ain't my
Speaker 8: fair with a friend, ro call Suprema Yeah.
Speaker 3: Back up, Supreme, Supreme, Supreme A roll call.
Speaker 5: Name is Johnny.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 9: I'm so happy to say. Yeah, I'm in here with
Speaker 9: all of y'all. Yeah, I'm gonna rub you all all right.
Speaker 5: Well, Supreme So Supreme, Roll Call.
Speaker 3: Supremo Supremo, Roll Call Suprema Son Suppremo, Roll Call Suprema
Speaker 3: Son Supremo.
Speaker 7: Roll call all over my body.
Speaker 1: Wait a minute, Well, I'm curious, all right, ladies and gentlemen.
Speaker 1: Normally I don't do the I don't do the capped
Speaker 1: in the obvious roll call, but the look of darts
Speaker 1: thrown in my direction because you cheated. Man, I didn't cheat.
Speaker 10: I stayed far away from from my mind. I knew
Speaker 10: that somebody was gonna take that.
Speaker 1: I'm sorry. So wait, I'm actually curious you had a
Speaker 1: backup one just in case?
Speaker 7: No, that was it. That was it was a friend.
Speaker 7: I beat it.
Speaker 8: I had to ask Bill to look it up because
Speaker 8: I was sure. In the lyrics, I was like, he said,
Speaker 8: he want to be my Fairwether friends.
Speaker 1: He won't be. I won't be, Okay, I was just
Speaker 1: I was really impressed if you told me that I
Speaker 1: stole your roll call and that you had would a
Speaker 1: new one on standby.
Speaker 10: I had one almost ready for standby. Mine was a
Speaker 10: real deep cut.
Speaker 1: So I guess me going first. I don't have to
Speaker 1: worry about that, but you guys, I get it now.
Speaker 1: Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to another episode of Quest of
Speaker 1: Supreme on iHeartRadio. How are you? We got, Team Supreme
Speaker 1: in the house. What's up, guys?
Speaker 5: Anyway?
Speaker 1: We got Steve Hey MANU wait wait, can we just
Speaker 1: cut to the chase? Yeah?
Speaker 11: Uh did did?
Speaker 1: Uh?
Speaker 10: Unpaid Bill just ghost us? I think he did. I
Speaker 10: haven't heard. He hasn't even been on the group chat.
Speaker 4: I never left him.
Speaker 8: You see, Johnny, we have this you know co host
Speaker 8: who's mister Broadway.
Speaker 7: It ain't got no time for us, no more.
Speaker 1: But that shows over unless he's working on Max Martin
Speaker 1: right now.
Speaker 7: Broadway shows and I think a movie. I'm trying to
Speaker 7: tell his.
Speaker 1: Business like I got stuff going on.
Speaker 7: Yeah, but it's called Quest Love Supreme.
Speaker 10: You have to be here his name and into the title.
Speaker 1: All right, Well we could do Quest Love Supreme feature.
Speaker 7: That's what it is.
Speaker 1: He's gonna ask for more money for that, Okay, nevern
Speaker 1: I forget it. Good to know, and I hope Fante
Speaker 1: doesn't get yes.
Speaker 4: Can someone want to tell Fante that we have enough?
Speaker 4: We got a pack.
Speaker 8: You see, Johnny, we got another co host that went
Speaker 8: out for cigarettes and he has not come back, but
Speaker 8: he's been on two or five thousand.
Speaker 11: He said he go out for cigarettes.
Speaker 1: And you know it's good.
Speaker 4: It means they're successful. And they don't have time for us.
Speaker 1: Look right now, we're Marlon Jackie, Jermaine Tito. We're still
Speaker 1: touring as a unit, right and I know.
Speaker 7: We're working a minute.
Speaker 5: I'm here, gentleman, you guys.
Speaker 1: No, no, ladies and gentleman, no, I'm not even going
Speaker 1: to waste time. I'm not even gonna waste time, ladies
Speaker 1: and gentlemen. Our guest today is.
Speaker 11: I don't know.
Speaker 1: He's the last of a I can't say that word.
Speaker 1: I won't say dying breathe, but it's not a dangered species.
Speaker 11: But he's a singer, singer.
Speaker 1: That sounds like he went through puberty. Yes, yes, a
Speaker 1: singer singer like I'm sorry, this is hard to find
Speaker 1: a male singer these days.
Speaker 10: That sounds like he's you know, older than thirteen.
Speaker 1: So we're can sing more than one note? Yeah, ors
Speaker 1: verbrato or knows how the annunciator or you know.
Speaker 7: Just slip off my red dress.
Speaker 1: Let's out, hey, ladies and gentlemen. Uh, the master, the
Speaker 1: master himself, Johnny gil Is, thank you.
Speaker 5: That's damn.
Speaker 1: Call you Johnny Jackson right now. Uh j G. You
Speaker 1: know something I thought, all right, of of all the
Speaker 1: I'm speaking of the new addition of alumnus of all you guys,
Speaker 1: all of them have cool nicknames, but I felt they
Speaker 1: got lazy with you and just named you j G.
Speaker 9: Well, I have how come you don't have a I
Speaker 9: have two names. It's Jay Guil, I mean j j G.
Speaker 9: And then Skills is what they call me. And even
Speaker 9: though my company is called Jay Skills, they they called
Speaker 9: me skills because that's my nickname from them is because
Speaker 9: we walk in a room. I played the drums and
Speaker 9: they were going okay, So then I get on the
Speaker 9: keyboards and start playing that. Then I got on the guitar.
Speaker 9: I started playing the guitar, so I started playing because
Speaker 9: they kept going yo. It was like damn skills.
Speaker 1: So that that's.
Speaker 11: How I never knew that. I just heard him call
Speaker 11: you j G.
Speaker 7: All right, played instruments.
Speaker 11: I can't imagine.
Speaker 1: Well because of his high school education in d C.
Speaker 1: Where are you are you now? You're d C. I'm
Speaker 1: just saying, as opposed to.
Speaker 8: Philly, I went to I graduated high school. When wherever
Speaker 8: you graduate high school, that's where it is.
Speaker 1: Really Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 9: Really right, Johnny, Yes, I got back, I got your Yeah,
Speaker 9: she's right.
Speaker 7: Johnny left d C.
Speaker 5: At what age I left around I was about I
Speaker 5: want to say, maybe eighteen when I left and came
Speaker 5: to it went to l A.
Speaker 11: Yeah, but you clocked more years in LA than you
Speaker 11: have in d C.
Speaker 5: Actually pretty much?
Speaker 7: Are you a Washingtonian? What do you call yourself?
Speaker 5: Confused?
Speaker 1: When's the last time you lived in DC?
Speaker 5: I lived in d C.
Speaker 9: Oh, nineteen eighty five, maybe eighty six.
Speaker 5: I think in eighty seven I was in LA.
Speaker 1: So yeah, yeah, yeah, so right after chemistry then that
Speaker 1: was that was that?
Speaker 5: Yeah?
Speaker 1: I see? Yeah, well I always switch inside. So you know,
Speaker 1: now she's DC.
Speaker 7: Johnny gill is here.
Speaker 1: Hell yes, right, So let me say that you're you're
Speaker 1: one of our rare guests that I'll say that you
Speaker 1: came to my attention almost way before your music did,
Speaker 1: because I'll say that in my childhood, the Internet for
Speaker 1: black kids was right on magazine.
Speaker 11: So you have a friend.
Speaker 1: In Cynthia hornor yes, because she would do full blown
Speaker 1: like features on you and I heard narrow a note.
Speaker 1: Wow that was I knew your face, I knew your
Speaker 1: life story, I knew everything. I never heard a note.
Speaker 5: I don't know you guys, I mean he really really
Speaker 5: just very talented, and you're going to get to see
Speaker 5: and know.
Speaker 11: That's how.
Speaker 1: That's how she talks. No, and that's the thing, like,
Speaker 1: because I knew they kept comparing you to of course,
Speaker 1: either the rich your richness of Donnie Hathaway's voice, the
Speaker 1: rasp of Teddy Pendergrass, and I guess by association there
Speaker 1: is a deep cut from the Dells Marvin Jr. Who's
Speaker 1: Teddy's idol, but just saying that you look like me,
Speaker 1: you look young, And I was like, no way that
Speaker 1: this guy has that deep voice. But finally one of
Speaker 1: your videos came on like New York Contracts Like it
Speaker 1: was like a show that came on New York. Yes.
Speaker 1: So thus I finally said, oh, okay, that's what Johnny
Speaker 1: Gilt does so describe.
Speaker 5: To Mary Carol issue. I just couldn't get it right.
Speaker 11: So you were born in DC? What part of DC?
Speaker 5: Southeast southeast? What is that first place?
Speaker 8: I remember it is the last place to get gentrified
Speaker 8: in DC. I'll just put it that way.
Speaker 11: It's still the problem.
Speaker 7: It's actually called southeast.
Speaker 1: Southeast, Southeast southeast southeast, So every.
Speaker 5: Now and then it can come out, but it's buried
Speaker 5: in there.
Speaker 9: And not try to keep it under control and everything.
Speaker 5: I've got some help for it. Minute.
Speaker 1: I have a question for you though, because I know
Speaker 1: you're from DC, and I always wondered if how how
Speaker 1: deep does go go culture resonate with your art? Like
Speaker 1: have you ever thought of truly incorporating like any of
Speaker 1: those Like did you ever at all immerse yourself in
Speaker 1: go go culture or read just straight church?
Speaker 5: And I was straight church, but I did.
Speaker 9: I was absolutely familiar with it, and I used to
Speaker 9: play it, you know.
Speaker 5: I used to get my mom worked three jobs.
Speaker 9: When I would come home from school, I would get
Speaker 9: on my brother's drums, and before you know it, the
Speaker 9: whole neighborhood.
Speaker 5: Was coming around the house and they were all jamming.
Speaker 9: I was, you know, but it wasn't something that I
Speaker 9: put in my music, but I just that's how I
Speaker 9: used to practice.
Speaker 5: I used to practice go go stuff.
Speaker 1: Okay, So, with the exception of New Orleans, I'll say
Speaker 1: that d C has it's steeped in black music culture
Speaker 1: in a way that's not like any other place in
Speaker 1: the United States.
Speaker 11: How is that so?
Speaker 1: Like, why is it like the fact that your brother
Speaker 1: had a drum set in my household?
Speaker 11: Especially post seventies.
Speaker 5: Is well, my dad usual.
Speaker 9: My dad was a minister, and you know we used
Speaker 9: to sing and play in church, and uh, he bought
Speaker 9: all of us just different instruments. And I was one
Speaker 9: of those kids that was just intrigued by everybody's instruments.
Speaker 9: My brothers they couldn't figure out why I could play
Speaker 9: the bass, why I could plays drums, why I could
Speaker 9: play the bongos, And they wouldn't. You know, as a kid,
Speaker 9: when you grow up, your you know your siblings, you
Speaker 9: fight and it's like no, get off mind.
Speaker 5: You don't want to them play your toy. So I
Speaker 5: would play sick and wouldn't go to school sometimes.
Speaker 1: When when young to school.
Speaker 9: Yes I was a younger, Yeah yeah, okay, they never
Speaker 9: understood why I could play everybody instruments.
Speaker 1: But while he was gone, he was practicing.
Speaker 9: But I didn't know even as a kid that I was,
Speaker 9: I would have never been. I couldn't describe it until you.
Speaker 9: I was intrigued. I didn't know that's what it was.
Speaker 9: I was just a kid, but I wanted to play
Speaker 9: the instruments.
Speaker 5: And everybody would fighting, like no, get on drums, get
Speaker 5: on guitar, and so I was like, I'm gonna fix you.
Speaker 1: How old were you at the time when you started
Speaker 1: sneaking on your brother's.
Speaker 9: I was about eight seven eight years old, and we
Speaker 9: all had interesting But my dad was a miniatuer. Joe Jackson,
Speaker 9: I swear to you. My dad was the no nonsense
Speaker 9: guy and would make us rehearse. We would had to
Speaker 9: go to school the next day, but we couldn't go
Speaker 9: to bed until we got it right.
Speaker 5: So all my brothers all we all sang.
Speaker 1: And how many how many siblings?
Speaker 9: I have three older brothers, so it was four of
Speaker 9: us total, and my dad would make us put us
Speaker 9: in talent shows. But he used to make us rehearse,
Speaker 9: and we couldn't go to bed until we got it right.
Speaker 5: And when we got it right, we got a glass
Speaker 5: of Coke cola.
Speaker 9: And then you gotta and go to bed, and then
Speaker 9: you gotta get up early for school. But he was like,
Speaker 9: you know, I didn't realize what he was. I don't
Speaker 9: know what he was preparing me for.
Speaker 1: I mean, not to put you on the spot. Are
Speaker 1: your brothers as good as singing as you are?
Speaker 5: Or I have one that kind of mimics me. He
Speaker 5: can do what I do Randy.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 9: Yeah, he's in the group to the extreme. Yeah yeah yeah,
Speaker 9: So I mean, you know, he'll go at me. As
Speaker 9: a matter of fact, if you go on YouTube on
Speaker 9: our Seniors show, you'll see one of me and him
Speaker 9: going at it with each other on our Senio really
Speaker 9: yeah yeah yeah yeah, he kind of out yeah yeah,
Speaker 9: he was going at me, and I was like, okay,
Speaker 9: you a little bama.
Speaker 1: Yeah so all right, so what did the other ones
Speaker 1: were just musicians.
Speaker 5: My oldest brother hated the whole music thing. He was
Speaker 5: the oldest.
Speaker 9: We He used to get weapons when we would come
Speaker 9: home from church because he would sing with his back turn.
Speaker 5: So my aunt and my dad used to get him.
Speaker 5: He said when he turned eighteen he would never sing again.
Speaker 5: He turned eighteen, you know, a sorry again. Really was
Speaker 5: like I'm done. He just didn't like it, but he
Speaker 5: had to because when you know, my dad used to
Speaker 5: make us all sing and.
Speaker 1: Play with his family business. Yeah was he good or yeah?
Speaker 5: He could sing.
Speaker 1: He could sing, he just didn't want it.
Speaker 5: He didn't like it. Wow, he didn't like it.
Speaker 9: And my dad and they used to stay on him
Speaker 9: about because he used to sing with his back turn
Speaker 9: like he didn't want to face the audience and he
Speaker 9: would get in trouble for because they knew he was
Speaker 9: doing it intentionally, but he just didn't like it.
Speaker 5: But he could sing.
Speaker 1: Wow yeah and no regrets on his part, like I
Speaker 1: could have been a contingent.
Speaker 9: Ever looked back, never looked Okay, I see.
Speaker 1: So what was your your period at Duke Ellington. I
Speaker 1: know many of the student well you know that that
Speaker 1: I have gone there and excelled or whatever. But during
Speaker 1: your period, what was it like in your environment? Like
Speaker 1: did you have talent not talent shows? Were you other
Speaker 1: groups or no? You know.
Speaker 9: I went and honestly, I visited Duke Keleton. Stacey went
Speaker 9: and I went there with her maybe a couple of
Speaker 9: few days or.
Speaker 5: So, and at that point I kind of like.
Speaker 9: We was having actually we were sitting there talking about
Speaker 9: the future of my career at that time, and I
Speaker 9: just went there.
Speaker 5: I really went there a couple of like.
Speaker 9: Maybe a couple of days at the most, and everybody
Speaker 9: was saying, well, he's he went to Dukeleton and that.
Speaker 1: Was yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 5: I went with.
Speaker 7: Where'd you really go?
Speaker 1: So?
Speaker 7: Where did you really go?
Speaker 9: I went to Kimball Elementary Susan junior high. And after that,
Speaker 9: Stacey and I both got We were tutored the way time.
Speaker 9: When did you get your record deal?
Speaker 5: I was fifteen and I recorded the album and after
Speaker 5: the album came out, the Johnny Gill album, the first
Speaker 5: one was when shortly after that.
Speaker 1: Wait, I'm sorry, wait wait, wait all right, I'm cheating
Speaker 1: a little bit. Uh, Jam Jam is texting me right now.
Speaker 1: I hit him earlier this morning, Johnny Today, he says,
Speaker 1: he says he has terrible tastes in his own stuff.
Speaker 11: He hated my ma mind.
Speaker 1: Wait, he said, he's sending me in paragraph right now. Boy,
Speaker 1: we'll get to that.
Speaker 7: You hated it from the jump.
Speaker 5: You just, I just.
Speaker 1: We'll get to that. We're jumping ahead. We're jumping ahead,
Speaker 1: We're jumping ahead.
Speaker 7: I get it. I guess.
Speaker 1: We're on the first alf anyway. So yeah, you So,
Speaker 1: why is it that they claimed you for just three days?
Speaker 5: And because I became famous?
Speaker 9: I see, I see, And man they always kept I mean,
Speaker 9: I would hear it all the time.
Speaker 5: It's like, yeah, you went to do Galleton. I said, yeah,
Speaker 5: a couple of days.
Speaker 8: Yeah, because y'all were the first you think about it,
Speaker 8: Johnny Guild, Stacey Latta saw.
Speaker 7: After that, that's.
Speaker 8: When more famous people came from ke Allington. But really
Speaker 8: they were the first, like well famous.
Speaker 5: Yeah, but you know, d it's a very special place.
Speaker 9: I mean it was Marvin Gay, I mean, there was
Speaker 9: Freddy Parent I think was from there as Freddy I
Speaker 9: mean you, Tony Braxton.
Speaker 5: It was quite a few. I mean people that.
Speaker 1: The DC connection was.
Speaker 10: How Freddy ended up producing your first album?
Speaker 9: You know, I don't know, but he I know that
Speaker 9: when I signed with Atlantic Records. Well, Indy Allen was
Speaker 9: the one that actually that was his idea to to.
Speaker 5: Link up with Freddy Parent for some reason.
Speaker 1: So so it was the story true, like how did
Speaker 1: you get your deal? Was it? Okay? So that was real.
Speaker 1: I didn't know that was just like a label thing
Speaker 1: like Stas Flas, Diana Ross discovering the Jackson but like
Speaker 1: that sort of It.
Speaker 9: Was crazy because you know Stacey and I we you know,
Speaker 9: we all grew up in to see neighborhoo. We Stacy's house
Speaker 9: was like the that was the playground for everybody. I mean,
Speaker 9: you come, you go to school, you come home, change
Speaker 9: your clothes and everybody meets up with Stacy's.
Speaker 5: We know something was going on where we were gonna
Speaker 5: be playing. Uh, it was gonna be going to the
Speaker 5: movies or going roller skating, or it was like everybody
Speaker 5: would meet up at her house.
Speaker 1: She used to organizing.
Speaker 5: And I tell you what happened whenever we were in
Speaker 5: the glee club together in in uh elementary and even
Speaker 5: back then we didn't we weren't very good friends. I
Speaker 5: mean we just you know, it was an acquaintance.
Speaker 9: And then one night, one day we were it was
Speaker 9: raining and everybody had to go downstairs into a basement
Speaker 9: and she said, Okay, we're gonna have a talent show.
Speaker 9: She was like, everybody has to do something. All you
Speaker 9: got to get out. And mind you, I wore suits
Speaker 9: to school, so I was.
Speaker 5: Like, you always I used to wear double rusted suits.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, yeah, George Jefferson.
Speaker 11: I was no, I was.
Speaker 1: I listen.
Speaker 9: My dad was a minister, and I think I didn't
Speaker 9: realize it at the time, but I believe that I
Speaker 9: was really influenced by him and didn't realize that because
Speaker 9: they used to, let you know, my nickname, my brothers
Speaker 9: and my godbrothers that was next door.
Speaker 5: They used to call me. My nickname was Reverdike. I
Speaker 5: used to go here come reverendnight. But I used to
Speaker 5: wear suits and and I just felt comfortable.
Speaker 7: In suits, and nobody made suit when I.
Speaker 9: Had three older brothers and three god brothers and next
Speaker 9: door the ones that the next door they would come
Speaker 9: home for lunch and you see them with blood on
Speaker 9: the shirt is what happened, and beat up the teachers.
Speaker 5: At one point, I thought.
Speaker 9: People didn't want to talk to even say hi to me.
Speaker 9: That was kind of like you.
Speaker 5: I had a pretty deep homy. I mean, so I
Speaker 5: could wear whatever I want.
Speaker 1: I see.
Speaker 11: Okay, So what was it?
Speaker 1: How much?
Speaker 11: How much time did she have before?
Speaker 1: Uh?
Speaker 11: How many years did she have on you? At least
Speaker 11: jump start?
Speaker 5: Uh, Stacy, Let's see, she had about at least three years.
Speaker 5: I would say she came right, yeah, yeah, eighty one
Speaker 5: because she had that album with Van Van McCoy. McCoy,
Speaker 5: I think that was the very first one, and right
Speaker 5: that one.
Speaker 11: Let Me Be In that was the first one, and
Speaker 11: let Me Be In?
Speaker 5: Was that young in love? Maybe?
Speaker 1: Then there was the.
Speaker 9: One that she did with with Narda. Yeah, I think
Speaker 9: then she wound up doing another one with Narda. But yeah,
Speaker 9: she had about three years on me before that, and
Speaker 9: you know, back then, you.
Speaker 11: Know, I was just lived on the same blot.
Speaker 9: No, I lived, uh maybe about ten minutes from them,
Speaker 9: but I used to ride my bike over there because
Speaker 9: that was the stomping grounds. Everybody would hang out over there,
Speaker 9: So I would go home and I used to ride
Speaker 9: my bike with my suit on.
Speaker 1: So wait, I'm curious waiting tips. So when she got established,
Speaker 1: did she still maintain these friendships or was it?
Speaker 5: Yeah, yeah, that's she is.
Speaker 11: For the Jackson's and all and stuff.
Speaker 9: Yeah, we were all during that time. Everybody, we was
Speaker 9: hanging out back then, and of course, you know.
Speaker 5: Being the plan that I you know, uh, this was
Speaker 5: before I was even in the game.
Speaker 9: And you know, you understand me, the man was still
Speaker 9: I was just standing up on the pimp, you know
Speaker 9: what I'm saying, Reverend.
Speaker 1: So with your first album, with your first record, I
Speaker 1: always wanted to know, how did you manage to pull
Speaker 1: all of these heavyweights were even aware at that young age,
Speaker 1: at the level of heavyweights that you've come in contact with.
Speaker 12: I mean, you, for which one the very first first
Speaker 12: of all them saying hindsight because they weren't none of
Speaker 12: them were household names at all you're working with them,
Speaker 12: but eventually in.
Speaker 1: Time it's like like your first record, like freaking Elliott Wolf.
Speaker 5: Yeah.
Speaker 11: Well, first of all, Freddie Parent alone, who.
Speaker 7: Give us some Freddy Parent, how did you know?
Speaker 1: How did you was it like working with them?
Speaker 9: I used to call them Pops and Freddy and his
Speaker 9: wife Chris Parent. They took me under their wings, and
Speaker 9: I swear to you it was like, uh, Freddie told
Speaker 9: me and really prepared me for what was to come ahead.
Speaker 5: I used to stay with them, and Chris used to Uh.
Speaker 5: They treated me like I was their their their their son.
Speaker 9: So but Freddy used to tell me all these stories
Speaker 9: about working with Michael Jackson.
Speaker 1: I was going to say, for listeners out there, forget
Speaker 1: Freddie Parent was part of what we know is the
Speaker 1: corporation like the kind of the last of the you
Speaker 1: know Motown as a factory where teams that people are
Speaker 1: working together. So the corporation was Freddy parron U, the
Speaker 1: Manes brothers, jam Master Jay's uncles, Ah and and so
Speaker 1: basically they wrote like I want you back and like
Speaker 1: all the Jackson five early young hits. Then he wrote
Speaker 1: like he worked with the Silvers, did Boogiey Fevers, Uh
Speaker 1: Glory Gayner, I Will Survive, a little song called it
Speaker 1: So Hard to Say Goodbye.
Speaker 11: The tars all the to bar, stuff.
Speaker 5: Like more than a Woman, And one of the big
Speaker 5: ones was that Saturday Night.
Speaker 1: Yeah, Saturday Night, If I Can't Have You was so yeah, yeah, Reunited,
Speaker 1: Baked Groove Things. Yeah, he wrote a few good songs.
Speaker 11: Yeah, yeah, so never heard of anywhere.
Speaker 9: And I remember recording when they came in and said
Speaker 9: we were in the middle of recording when he said,
Speaker 9: came in and bought Freddy Pearron a song, and.
Speaker 5: He says, man, listen to these little kids. This little
Speaker 5: kid sounds just like Michael Jackson. And guess what it was,
Speaker 5: Candy Girl sitting in there and listening to it.
Speaker 1: He I think he produced under the Blue Bloom. Yeah,
Speaker 1: he sure did that.
Speaker 7: I had that on vinyl after, but we sat there.
Speaker 5: We listened to it. He was like, oh, this cat
Speaker 5: is pretty cool.
Speaker 1: Little did he know? Yeah, little did you know? Little
Speaker 1: did you know?
Speaker 9: I was the recording my first album when that that single?
Speaker 1: Yeah, but even okay, so there's one name on the
Speaker 1: credit of your very first record that is killing me.
Speaker 1: How the hell did Lawrence Hilton. Yea, why theboards boom boom, Yes, yeah,
Speaker 1: he was a writer. Or Joe Jackson.
Speaker 5: He was a writer scream.
Speaker 1: Please give Me. Yeah, I know he had an album.
Speaker 5: Yeah, he was a writer, and he wrote the song
Speaker 5: I'm Sorry and uh yeah yeah, and I was in.
Speaker 1: Oh he submitted the song to you and that's how.
Speaker 9: Yeah, and he worked well, he was submitted to uh
Speaker 9: to a pretty parents and that's how it came about.
Speaker 9: And I was like when he walked in, I was like, Yo,
Speaker 9: that's Freddy boom boom Washington. I knew when I when
Speaker 9: I came to Los Angeles that that was going to
Speaker 9: be my home.
Speaker 5: And I knew it. I was like, listen, I'm coming
Speaker 5: back here. This is where I'm going to live. And
Speaker 5: I was just a kid.
Speaker 1: Did you, I mean, did you feel as though, well,
Speaker 1: I mean back then, I don't like Cotillion?
Speaker 11: How do you pronounce it?
Speaker 1: Ye?
Speaker 11: Then? Manaid what were they?
Speaker 1: What was it like as a label to be on Cotillion?
Speaker 1: Because it wasn't straight up Atlantic?
Speaker 5: But I mean I didn't know the difference. I was
Speaker 5: a kid that was walking into blind or like no.
Speaker 5: I had a young man by the name of Bill Underwood.
Speaker 5: Mister willis him Underwood?
Speaker 1: Very well?
Speaker 5: He was, uh, you know, like I said, and a
Speaker 5: lot in my life, I've had a pretty deep army
Speaker 5: and you know, he he just you know, he was
Speaker 5: like a brother and a father figure to me, and
Speaker 5: he really really really just protected me and taught me
Speaker 5: the game. And it was funny because Atlantic, you.
Speaker 9: Know, even when I recorded my first album and they
Speaker 9: put it out, nobody didn't tell me that, you know,
Speaker 9: your record and sell are two copies, right, I didn't know.
Speaker 9: I'm like, I had no idea that what I did
Speaker 9: was a failure or success.
Speaker 5: I didn't know nothing about anything.
Speaker 9: All I know is you go in, you record, and
Speaker 9: back then to get a record deal that was something huge,
Speaker 9: and I just I always.
Speaker 5: Assume that means you're gonna be a start. Like it
Speaker 5: never dawned on me like, oh wow, the first one
Speaker 5: didn't work. I had no idea.
Speaker 11: I was just throwing was what was promotion like?
Speaker 1: Because again I knew of you. I didn't hear your music.
Speaker 1: I didn't hear it on the radio in Philadelphia until
Speaker 1: I saw hot tracks. But like, what was promotion like?
Speaker 1: Back then?
Speaker 5: We had to go to radio stations, we was going
Speaker 5: from station to station, and God bless Frankie cock Crockery
Speaker 5: at the time. Frank and I became great friends later,
Speaker 5: and I'll never forget him and Bill going at it
Speaker 5: was they used to they were, I mean, but they
Speaker 5: were really tight.
Speaker 9: But you know, I Katillion was a label and I
Speaker 9: everybody kept saying, I don't know what happened?
Speaker 5: What did you do to?
Speaker 8: Uh?
Speaker 5: To to Henry Allen, who was the president of Atlantic
Speaker 5: Conillion Records at the time, because he was a tough, tough,
Speaker 5: tough guy and some reason he took a liking to me,
Speaker 5: and it was like listening, He's like, Eh, Johnny, Johnny
Speaker 5: ain't gonna be a big star.
Speaker 1: Yep, and ride, We're.
Speaker 9: Gonna move you back to DC because we hadn't moved
Speaker 9: to Columbus, Georgia, right, And he says.
Speaker 11: Wait, why why?
Speaker 9: Because my mom was getting back with my dad and
Speaker 9: so my dad bought this house. And I'll never forget
Speaker 9: he bought this house and we didn't like it, and
Speaker 9: I'll never forget.
Speaker 5: We were all talking and asking him about maybe finding
Speaker 5: something else for us, and we actually I remember walking
Speaker 5: in the front yard of this particular house and I
Speaker 5: had my hands in my pockets, and I was looking
Speaker 5: up and I was like, man, what I wouldn't do
Speaker 5: to be in Stacy's shoes right about now? And why
Speaker 5: did I get a call a few days later from
Speaker 5: Stacy saying, Hey, I talked to the president of the
Speaker 5: of the label about you, and he wants you to
Speaker 5: make a tape. He wants to hear your voice.
Speaker 9: I mean, you know, my demo was a twenty nine
Speaker 9: dollars take recorder where you put on the corner and
Speaker 9: that was it.
Speaker 1: The radio shack joins, Yeah, yeah, what did you sing
Speaker 1: on it?
Speaker 5: I sang, uh, the greatest Love of All and people
Speaker 5: bryceon is field of fire.
Speaker 1: Wow.
Speaker 9: And I remember him calling me and asking me to
Speaker 9: sing on the phone, and I sing the man had
Speaker 9: a dollar shining star, right, And so he had me
Speaker 9: to sing that for everybody on the phone. Then he
Speaker 9: went upstairs to the next thing and put me on
Speaker 9: again and asking yank, yep, yep, sing sing it again? Yeah, yeah, Johnny,
Speaker 9: have you ever been on the plane before? I said no, sir,
Speaker 9: He goes, yeah, we're gonna fly you up here. We're
Speaker 9: gonna put you on a plane and we're gonna fly
Speaker 9: you up. You know you're gonna be big star.
Speaker 1: Wait, I gotta ask you all right, So your voice
Speaker 1: is it's very unusual. I mean, no, even tell me
Speaker 1: now what you think. Well, it's just that it's very
Speaker 1: I think it's for people to use that much power
Speaker 1: in their bar Are you naturally a baritone? Like what
Speaker 1: are you? Yeah? Like, I don't strong baritones to me.
Speaker 1: Usually like even even in well Barry White is based.
Speaker 1: But I'm saying, usually baritones are more soft. Right, But
Speaker 1: you're like mac truck going one hundred miles per hour?
Speaker 11: How do you like?
Speaker 1: How do you train your voice? Are you the type
Speaker 1: of that just sings all day in the house?
Speaker 9: And like, well, my mom used to tell me that
Speaker 9: all the time. And I used to She used to go, Okay,
Speaker 9: John R. We still I asked my mom just recently,
Speaker 9: I said, Mom, what does the R stand for?
Speaker 5: She goes, I don't know. She's always called me John R.
Speaker 9: So she used to go, John, can you shut the door?
Speaker 9: And I would be in the room and playing the
Speaker 9: piano and singing and uh and you.
Speaker 5: Know I told her later, I was like, yeah, mom,
Speaker 5: uh so what you got to say now?
Speaker 7: Yeah?
Speaker 1: But I meant like, do you traditionally like seth Riggs train?
Speaker 5: No, no, no, you know it's crazy.
Speaker 7: Is this room too cold for your voice?
Speaker 5: Right now? Okay, I can sing.
Speaker 11: None of those things.
Speaker 5: Yeah, this actually can sing him asleep. I've been knowing
Speaker 5: to do that.
Speaker 1: Wait, is Johnny the first singer singing we ever had?
Speaker 1: And yeah, so I have so many questions about you know,
Speaker 1: and God bless you here and everything you've heard, everything
Speaker 1: like oh the air got to be off, my throat closes?
Speaker 1: Is he real or is that just psychosmatic?
Speaker 5: Absolutely?
Speaker 1: Is it real?
Speaker 5: Absolutely?
Speaker 9: Because if I'm around cigarette smoke, I can still sing.
Speaker 9: But you it makes it tough. It makes it tough
Speaker 9: to be able to do the things that you want
Speaker 9: to do vocally. But I can still get through it.
Speaker 5: But I've had places where saying where there the cigarette
Speaker 5: smoke is going, and it's like, hey, this is not good.
Speaker 1: So for a vocal session, how long can you go
Speaker 1: Bosston the wall hard before you're you're wearing out and
Speaker 1: you have to.
Speaker 9: Back In the day, I could go non stop these days,
Speaker 9: give me about a good guy hour maybe so, and
Speaker 9: then I'm gonna do like a rethix.
Speaker 5: She comes in and sing them down two or three
Speaker 5: times ago. Okay, that's it.
Speaker 1: The baby they tell me that he's also one take
Speaker 1: show you you did one song? Was just like, all right,
Speaker 1: that's it, that's it. I did it, and I can
Speaker 1: go about an hour.
Speaker 9: And it's funny because I was sitting list and go no, no, no,
Speaker 9: I think I can do that better.
Speaker 5: No, no no. So I'm one of those kinds. But after
Speaker 5: a while, I you know, when it wears down, and
Speaker 5: then I'll sit rested for a minute and if it
Speaker 5: feels like I can still go again, I'll go, come on,
Speaker 5: let's rock, let's go.
Speaker 10: It's part of that you just don't want to overthink it.
Speaker 9: I think part of it is just that you know
Speaker 9: you're the voice. It's it's a muscle, and it's like,
Speaker 9: no matter how much you know you do to vocalize
Speaker 9: and exercise and make it strong, it's like anything else,
Speaker 9: it gives out at some point where it's just like
Speaker 9: I ain't got it. There there's been many a nice
Speaker 9: I didn't have a voice, and then you go into
Speaker 9: Shulman shulman uh mode where it's just I'm like okay.
Speaker 7: Like now y'all that now you're.
Speaker 5: Saying, and then I can go from the Brown method.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 5: Yeah, you just find ways to get around it.
Speaker 9: And I've always been able to just figure it out,
Speaker 9: even though you know, it's like I'm not where I
Speaker 9: need to be and I know I can't get there,
Speaker 9: but it's like I'll figure out a way to get it,
Speaker 9: make it work, and make it happen. Okay, the other day,
Speaker 9: matter of fact, last what was a couple of days.
Speaker 5: Ago I was playing. I just played it. That's why
Speaker 5: you know when you're traveling so much. I just played
Speaker 5: somewhere just a couple of days ago.
Speaker 9: And the the track gave out.
Speaker 4: Ooh.
Speaker 9: And this was for the event that I was doing,
Speaker 9: so I only had to do a couple of numbers
Speaker 9: and I wasn't gonna leave there. They did not want to,
Speaker 9: but not let me leave without singing my mind. So
Speaker 9: I'm sitting there and I'm thinking, I'm going, okay, now,
Speaker 9: what the hell are we gonna do here? Because my
Speaker 9: my engineer, the sound guy, he was going, it just
Speaker 9: got bros.
Speaker 5: I don't know. I can't. I can't. It's not even
Speaker 5: in here. I can't get it.
Speaker 4: Shout great engine.
Speaker 9: So you know what I did, because there was a
Speaker 9: band that was playing that was gonna play even after
Speaker 9: I finished. So I told them, I said, you know,
Speaker 9: I said, when I came in, you guys was in
Speaker 9: here jamming. And I said, I was truly inspired, and
Speaker 9: you guys sound really good. And I said, why don't
Speaker 9: you guys come on up here with me and let's
Speaker 9: just jam a little bit. And that's how I started
Speaker 9: my mind. And we rocked it into that and just
Speaker 9: kind of swooveing into that to have everybody else to
Speaker 9: sing along with me because I didn't have the backgrounds
Speaker 9: all the other stuff, and.
Speaker 5: It was like everybody was just in there.
Speaker 1: Rocket and one of my buddies, they knew the bridge
Speaker 1: and everything they knew, and.
Speaker 5: He said, oh my god, he said, bro, did you
Speaker 5: just yo what you did? Do you know what you
Speaker 5: just did? And I said, yeah, I had to think
Speaker 5: on my feet.
Speaker 11: The best do the best do that? All right?
Speaker 1: So all right, I'm trying to rush the entire history and.
Speaker 8: Uestion.
Speaker 11: We're about to go back to that.
Speaker 1: But okay, so of course, the the the Walden Jackson
Speaker 1: Glass team produced the Stacey Lasso album with You Perfect
Speaker 1: Combination Album.
Speaker 11: Okay, is.
Speaker 1: Narda is one of my drumming idols. And every time
Speaker 1: I see him I think he's trying to hypnotize me
Speaker 1: because he has a very little really lately love me.
Speaker 5: You know, yeah, well you know how how's your spirit?
Speaker 1: Is he that cosmic?
Speaker 5: Are you happy?
Speaker 1: Is he that cosmic?
Speaker 11: Twenty four seven?
Speaker 5: Twenty four seven where sometimes you start rubbing, you go, hey, listen,
Speaker 5: I don't even Besides, I'm cool, right, he.
Speaker 1: Is like, you know, like the brothers in the airport
Speaker 1: that like do the Harry Christener thing like walk up.
Speaker 11: He just came out of nowhere or me in lax
Speaker 11: one time.
Speaker 1: Like, brother, I just want to say, I said, norder
Speaker 1: Michael Walton.
Speaker 11: He said, yes, brother, I just want to say, it's
Speaker 11: such a blessing to see you on l.
Speaker 1: And he just whispered me to sleep. I thought he
Speaker 1: was hit those of me, like literally, he.
Speaker 9: Just tell you the university tell you, man, it's very
Speaker 9: few special musicians like you coming along.
Speaker 1: You know, got it? No, but he's gonna hypnotize this.
Speaker 7: Sign sounds nice? Could be nice?
Speaker 1: Rest he wrote enough he wrote and produce enough of
Speaker 1: my favorite songs.
Speaker 5: Oh yeah, he wrote, I mean he's not Yeah from
Speaker 5: Angelo Boatfield.
Speaker 1: Goes on, I was gonna say, literally, you're for your
Speaker 1: first three records, including the duo album, you literally worked
Speaker 1: with everyone that would normally be on Clive Davis's uh
Speaker 1: speed Out without ever having to be on ariston record,
Speaker 1: which is kind of weird to So basically you just
Speaker 1: didn't have the muscle at at whatever to to push
Speaker 1: you through. Was it hard for them to try to
Speaker 1: figure out how to market you because like by that point,
Speaker 1: hip hop had settled in, and it's sort of like
Speaker 1: you weren't teeny bopper at all, so how is it?
Speaker 1: How is it to see h But now minutia or
Speaker 1: kids kids music sort of just pass you by while
Speaker 1: you're like, hello, what are my chop Livery like, well
Speaker 1: that's back then and now.
Speaker 5: That's when the universe aligned everything up and I became
Speaker 5: a part of a group called New Audition. Remember New
Speaker 5: Adition was the kids.
Speaker 9: Was this this boy band that was they considered call
Speaker 9: them bubblegum, a bubble gum group. So when I joined them,
Speaker 9: the thing about their fans, the only thing that they
Speaker 9: knew of me, and they would say because I was
Speaker 9: just you know, to talk of being a new guy,
Speaker 9: was have you guys heard that new guy that can sing.
Speaker 1: And I mean they weren't singing.
Speaker 9: I don't think they were singing, but that's was the
Speaker 9: way they described me. And it was like almost like, okay,
Speaker 9: so singing is cool. Oh that's it's in because I
Speaker 9: mean they loved the group, so it was always and
Speaker 9: they and they had their.
Speaker 1: Following singing to novelty now so.
Speaker 5: You know, let me think about it from us. And
Speaker 5: then there was the Joe Disses and the boys, the
Speaker 5: Man and the list.
Speaker 1: So the whole being.
Speaker 5: Singing thing was like, oh, that's the in thing. And
Speaker 5: then you start hearing people going oh they can't sing,
Speaker 5: they can sing, he can't sing, and it was like
Speaker 5: you're going, wow, okay, but that's it was just perfect time.
Speaker 5: And I often say I think with that and with
Speaker 5: them the way that happened, that was really what gave
Speaker 5: me the exposure that I needed. And I think for
Speaker 5: even a younger generation to appreciate just me being a vocalist.
Speaker 5: I wasn't the greatest dancer. I was just the vocalist.
Speaker 1: Where did you meet them and what did it mean
Speaker 1: for you to just kind of not take a back
Speaker 1: seat but to be a team member or be one
Speaker 1: fifth of a situation and just have patience until having
Speaker 1: your own thing your turn. So one, when did you
Speaker 1: meet them? And then how did your nuanced a relationship
Speaker 1: with first?
Speaker 5: We actually crossed paths many times.
Speaker 7: Make show that on the movie that y'all knew each other.
Speaker 9: Yeah before it even became Yeah, we were just on
Speaker 9: a couple of shows, several shows and we're talking, Yo,
Speaker 9: what was happening and all that kind of stuff.
Speaker 5: But I, you know, we we hung out briefly. And then.
Speaker 9: I want to say Michael was probably the one business
Speaker 9: that you know that that I was at a show
Speaker 9: at a concert, a Whispers concert in La.
Speaker 5: He was the one that said, Yo, let me holler
Speaker 5: at you for a minute.
Speaker 1: One man, are you do you prank call people? You
Speaker 1: know you do?
Speaker 5: And he goes, do you so, let me ask you
Speaker 5: a question like like like do you feel like you
Speaker 5: got your just due? Like as a singer? And I
Speaker 5: looked and I did this and I went m so
Speaker 5: and he asked me and invited me to come to
Speaker 5: lunch the next day with them, and I was like, yure,
Speaker 5: because I was in La it wasn't doing anything. And
Speaker 5: went to lunch and I'm thinking nothing about it. Then
Speaker 5: he asked me, say you want to come check our
Speaker 5: show out because we were playing they were doing the
Speaker 5: ice capage or something, so I said, yeah, not problemage.
Speaker 7: That doesn't exist anymore.
Speaker 5: Is that not a thing? Just and ice capades they
Speaker 5: have to performed at the help somewhere and there. Yeah,
Speaker 5: half time.
Speaker 1: I know I'm not guys, don't kill me.
Speaker 5: So then they asked me, invited me to lunch again
Speaker 5: the next day, and I'm going. I said, yeah, I'll come,
Speaker 5: And that's when we sat around and started talking, and
Speaker 5: then they asked me about being a part of the group.
Speaker 5: They were talking about they wanted to go back to
Speaker 5: having a five a fifth member so that they can
Speaker 5: the choreography even look more effective and more A little
Speaker 5: did I know it was far from what that was.
Speaker 9: I had no idea that there was the kind of
Speaker 9: turmoil that was going on inside of that group, but.
Speaker 5: It was just something that just happened. But you know,
Speaker 5: ultimately I believe that it was just fate and destiny
Speaker 5: that this is where it was supposed to be.
Speaker 8: It was always so interesting that they went with a
Speaker 8: voice that was so different than the one kid or
Speaker 8: and for Bobby's like the one that was gone that was.
Speaker 9: Well, that's where you gotta get my credit, Mike said.
Speaker 9: Mike said, you know, our audience is growing up and
Speaker 9: they get tired of like he kept saying, y'all it's
Speaker 9: the bombacum sound that people connecting us with, Like, you know.
Speaker 5: We gotta grow up with our audience.
Speaker 9: So his whole thing was like, y'all your voice.
Speaker 1: Okay, so explain to me in hindsight, of course, and
Speaker 1: I you know, I said, of course we all see
Speaker 1: in the biopic Steve yes, you said, even me. Okay, okay, so.
Speaker 11: Just explain to me what.
Speaker 1: Not even the division of labor, but what is truly
Speaker 1: when you're in a five man group, like who is
Speaker 1: sort of the captain of it that makes decisions or
Speaker 1: is everything totally just diplomatic and we all get.
Speaker 9: Is always constantly just a bunch of madness. War I
Speaker 9: havn't say tug of war, tug of war for for for.
Speaker 5: For power, struggle for power, who wants to be the leader.
Speaker 8: And when you feel empowered to be able to use
Speaker 8: your voice, because I mean you the late.
Speaker 11: One on us.
Speaker 9: I came in immediately and said, I was watching two
Speaker 9: guys that were the security guys, and they were running
Speaker 9: picking up girls from the airport, going to the store,
Speaker 9: taking people's I mean, it was non stop, non stop, NonStop.
Speaker 9: And they're looking at me and I'm looking at them
Speaker 9: and I'm going yo. And they were like, we haven't
Speaker 9: slept in days. It's like it's non stop, but non stop.
Speaker 5: Trying to handle four or five guys. I said, you
Speaker 5: know what I called a meeting. I'm the new guy.
Speaker 9: I called a meeting and I said, you know, these
Speaker 9: guys out here and they're supposed to be protecting us,
Speaker 9: and they got our lives in their hands. And I said,
Speaker 9: the last thing that I want is some disgruntled worker
Speaker 9: here who's claiming that they're working hard and they're saying
Speaker 9: they're really totally underpaid.
Speaker 5: I think that at the end of the day that
Speaker 5: we're going to have to figure out a system that
Speaker 5: allows them to feel good. I know their job is
Speaker 5: to protect us, but they'll go the extra mile when
Speaker 5: you got great hard workers and you appreciation. And I said,
Speaker 5: so we need to sit down and figure this out.
Speaker 5: And so we came out of the room and successfully
Speaker 5: got them a raise and they thought Johnny for president.
Speaker 1: You knew, you knew doing it, you knew you you
Speaker 1: know it.
Speaker 9: I was standing and I was outsider. So I'm standing
Speaker 9: there looking at all this stuff that's going on, you know.
Speaker 9: And for me, when I joined the group, the thing is.
Speaker 5: I always had still had obligations to Motown well actually
Speaker 5: mc A.
Speaker 9: But when Gerrol Buzby moved over to Motowner, Busby questions.
Speaker 9: So when I vent that, I knew I still had
Speaker 9: an opportunity as an artist to be able to express
Speaker 9: myself artistically. So it didn't matter to me about being
Speaker 9: a part of the group. As a matter of fact,
Speaker 9: I often said that it was about teaching me and
Speaker 9: giving me balance to be able to be a team
Speaker 9: player and play It's like being on the basketball team
Speaker 9: and knowing what your role is and then actually being
Speaker 9: able to go out at some point and do what
Speaker 9: I needed to do as an artist. I always knew that,
Speaker 9: so I was always comfortable with whatever role that they
Speaker 9: had to play. Jimmy Listen. Terry Lewis told me when
Speaker 9: we got there and sat at the table to start recording.
Speaker 9: When I first when I came there with him, he said,
Speaker 9: you're probably not gonna sing on this album? I said, okay,
Speaker 9: I said, no, no problem, just whatever you guys need
Speaker 9: me to do.
Speaker 11: Heart breaking.
Speaker 5: I can tell you what I did do though.
Speaker 9: I became a demo singer because I was singing most
Speaker 9: of the stuff that they would say.
Speaker 5: And then they would come back and Ricka sing the
Speaker 5: stuff that I was doing. I was like, oh, I'm
Speaker 5: a demo singer here, huh.
Speaker 1: But he sang on five parts Somewhere somewhere exist version
Speaker 1: of the I was going to say. I was going
Speaker 1: to say that how intense were non Brooke payne uh
Speaker 1: tasks in this period of New Edition? As in, do
Speaker 1: you guys do vocal rehearsals? Do you guys decide harmonies?
Speaker 1: Like is?
Speaker 5: Oh? We left that all up to Jimmy and Terry.
Speaker 5: Brooke handled all of the choreography stuff. I'll never forget
Speaker 5: the day that they asked me but joined the group
Speaker 5: and we went over to Ronnie's house and they had
Speaker 5: Brooke the meters over there, and so Brooke goes, okay.
Speaker 9: So well, let me see what it is. Can he
Speaker 9: do the cross step? And it was like, yo, can
Speaker 9: you Jake, can you just do the cross steps? And
Speaker 9: it was that, so and then Brooke, Brooke looked.
Speaker 5: And just went.
Speaker 1: Really like the video do I look.
Speaker 11: Like God, you had two left feet like that?
Speaker 5: Oh? Yeah, man, not even two step?
Speaker 1: That was church boy, what they make that.
Speaker 11: There was no dan, no secular stuff at all.
Speaker 8: No.
Speaker 9: I mean the only second step that we would get
Speaker 9: is doing family cookouts when you would hear Marvin Gaye
Speaker 9: and some of the other ones.
Speaker 5: But other than that, there was a nothing but church
Speaker 5: music and ours.
Speaker 1: Or just the holytance and that was it. Heartbreak.
Speaker 5: Yeah.
Speaker 11: Yeah, Well so he had to work all right, so hard.
Speaker 8: How long did it take choreography?
Speaker 11: How long did it take for you to finally catch on?
Speaker 1: Wow?
Speaker 5: We did? God, that's ah, it was a while.
Speaker 9: It was a while because what Brooke would do he
Speaker 9: makes you rehearse and in front of the mirror.
Speaker 5: Well, when you learn dancers in front of a mirror.
Speaker 5: For me, because I'm not a dancer, I'm like, you
Speaker 5: learn these routines in front of a mirror. Then he
Speaker 5: removes the mirror. Now you have to.
Speaker 9: Learn it and you have to have remember memorize it
Speaker 9: and the form and all that stuff. So it was
Speaker 9: almost like fuck it, just let me start right now
Speaker 9: just remember it from here without the mirror, so I
Speaker 9: can just have it down firstance. It was like, no,
Speaker 9: you got to learn and see what the form is,
Speaker 9: what you're doing with the hands where everybody's hands are.
Speaker 5: So it was a freaking nightmare.
Speaker 1: What was the logic of all right? So when I
Speaker 1: first seen uh, your first tour with him, you got
Speaker 1: used the Temptation microphone set up? Yeah, yep, what was
Speaker 1: the logic? And also anytime you guys performed you never
Speaker 1: did the traditional format right of Mars. You always had
Speaker 1: the diagonal thing. What was the logic behind that?
Speaker 9: Well, because it would work for the for the choreography
Speaker 9: because of the different stuff that we was doing that
Speaker 9: was intricate. So it was like we were switching mics
Speaker 9: and switching positions, and so he would sit them that
Speaker 9: the mics in positions where their best work for everybody
Speaker 9: because at the end, somebody was gonna be over here
Speaker 9: on this side, somebody's gonna be on this side, just
Speaker 9: based on the routines. So and the that the five
Speaker 9: mic thing was really that our whole Temptations kind.
Speaker 1: Of tribut thing, okay, trivy thing.
Speaker 9: But it was like we did a little Medley there
Speaker 9: on those on the mics. But everything had like Brooke
Speaker 9: just had an eye and of that was just out
Speaker 9: of this world.
Speaker 5: And he what have you doing? Stuff? Where you go?
Speaker 5: It doesn't make sense to me until it all comes
Speaker 5: together and you go, oh damn.
Speaker 1: So all the staging and the creativity that usually is
Speaker 1: like Brooks.
Speaker 5: Range Child and yeah, and then you would think, oh, man,
Speaker 5: he's just picking on me.
Speaker 9: He goes, and he would make us go through each
Speaker 9: we would have to go through the whole show, from
Speaker 9: the beginning to the end altogether. Then you go one
Speaker 9: by one to go.
Speaker 5: Through the whole show.
Speaker 11: Wait what and if you mess up?
Speaker 1: I start all over again, start back at the test.
Speaker 5: True? Can you imagine what I had to do? I
Speaker 5: don't think you understand.
Speaker 8: But you got it now, right, because y'all still do
Speaker 8: shows every once and again, you're not You're not the
Speaker 8: one that fall short anymore.
Speaker 9: Like no, no, no, Mike is always the one that would
Speaker 9: go left and then we go, Mike, Mike, that's the
Speaker 9: wrong one.
Speaker 1: Y'all wrong, man, This is the right way.
Speaker 5: Stop. This is the right one, isn't it. Everybody's going
Speaker 5: this way?
Speaker 1: All right? So since we're here jam just hit me
Speaker 1: down and says, ask him why did he hate singing
Speaker 1: Boys to Men?
Speaker 7: That's the song?
Speaker 5: Yeah, dang, John.
Speaker 11: You know.
Speaker 9: When Terry told me, he said, you're probably not gonna
Speaker 9: sing any songs on the album. And then I wind
Speaker 9: up start singing these songs like Cane standing the Rain
Speaker 9: and doing ad libs all that stuff. I'm going, shoot,
Speaker 9: I'm thinking, why can't just sing that song? So and after,
Speaker 9: out of all those great songs, the very last song
Speaker 9: that they decided they was gonna let me do a
Speaker 9: lead full lead on was Boys of Men.
Speaker 5: So I'm going, oh, this is some political bullshit. I
Speaker 5: was like, oh, I think they just messing with me now,
Speaker 5: because they just and I said, oh, okay, so they're
Speaker 5: gonna give me this piece of bull to sing as
Speaker 5: a whole full song.
Speaker 7: And so I like, what mess the song?
Speaker 1: Wait time out? Wait?
Speaker 11: Wait time out?
Speaker 1: Though? All right?
Speaker 5: And I was I was really mad, like.
Speaker 7: He trying to tell you to grow up.
Speaker 1: Well, wait a minute, listen, it's nineteen eight, all right.
Speaker 11: They done came out in eighty seven.
Speaker 1: Eighty eight, it's eighty so I'm assuming you've recorded in
Speaker 1: eighty seven. H Okay, So Jim and Lewis are at
Speaker 1: the height of their powers at this point. Yeah, you
Speaker 1: had an opinion on a Jam and Lewis song, Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: in eighty seven.
Speaker 9: Yeah, because you kind of remember I had already sang
Speaker 9: on can You Stand the Rain and uh, You're not
Speaker 9: my kind of girl, and any Heartbreak, any heartbreak, and
Speaker 9: I'm they're letting me unleash. And then it was like, Okay,
Speaker 9: now we're gonna give you a song for yourself, and
Speaker 9: I'm going the hell like really, And so I'm.
Speaker 5: Listening to the track before there was even because there
Speaker 5: was no vocals on there.
Speaker 1: I was gonna say, how do you get a song?
Speaker 1: Who demo? Were you demoed all the songs on Heartbreak?
Speaker 5: First? I didn't demo all of them. I dim I
Speaker 5: just would on most of them.
Speaker 9: Some I would do ad libs, come in, do something
Speaker 9: the verse, somebody else come in. He'll let somebody have
Speaker 9: somebody else do mimic or whatever I did, and then
Speaker 9: they would just kind of blend whatever they would do.
Speaker 1: But but this is what I'm trying to get out
Speaker 1: of Jam and Lewis, which they never answer, is when
Speaker 1: they're creating songs together, huh, who's creating that song that
Speaker 1: that they eventually played an artist.
Speaker 5: Like you never heard?
Speaker 9: No god, I never heard Jimmy Jam sing, never heard
Speaker 9: Oh my god, I gotta find I'm gonna send you
Speaker 9: a couple of jam Is singing.
Speaker 5: And when he sings and all sound my god, it's like,
Speaker 5: you know, I'm typing right now to you.
Speaker 1: He's telling me what your voice sounds like?
Speaker 11: One of them?
Speaker 7: Come on, John Ammy voice, what's the Jimmy Jam on record?
Speaker 7: What that sounds like?
Speaker 5: No? No, no no no no no no no no.
Speaker 1: No no, James roon, how do you want me to do?
Speaker 5: What's you know? Do you? Johnny?
Speaker 2: Do you?
Speaker 1: I always thought it was Terry Terry words.
Speaker 9: Jerry Terry would do the lyrics and stuff, but Jam
Speaker 9: would sing the melodies for you.
Speaker 5: And I used to go, oh, I want to keep these.
Speaker 5: I'm gonna keep these.
Speaker 1: Got them?
Speaker 9: So I was mad and I kept saying, okay, So
Speaker 9: so now y'all just playing bullshit games. Now this is
Speaker 9: some political bulls.
Speaker 5: Wow.
Speaker 11: So did you say can I get a better song
Speaker 11: or like.
Speaker 1: Ask that?
Speaker 5: No?
Speaker 9: I just said, okay, so you want to play with me?
Speaker 9: I said, I'm a sing the shit out of this song.
Speaker 9: I'm gonna show y'all.
Speaker 5: And that's why I went in there. I was mad
Speaker 5: and I sing mad as hell. I was like, okay, yeah,
Speaker 5: you want to play with me?
Speaker 1: That was you mad?
Speaker 5: That was me mad.
Speaker 1: Wow. I don't know if I kept.
Speaker 5: Thinking, man, this is bullshit, that all these good songs,
Speaker 5: they're gonna give me this one.
Speaker 1: Did anybody see the Drew Hill unsung.
Speaker 5: A thing.
Speaker 11: Yeah, it's brand.
Speaker 10: New Francisco has the same story pretty much about sleeping
Speaker 10: somebody sleeping in my bed. He did not want to
Speaker 10: sing that song, and so the performance he gave was
Speaker 10: he was just mad. He said like, I'm gonna sing
Speaker 10: the funk out of this song.
Speaker 1: That's what I did with well. And then I was
Speaker 1: I would naturally think that you want to sing the
Speaker 1: every song let me sleep through my mind now, my
Speaker 1: my my. I recorded that song and I hate that too.
Speaker 1: I didn't.
Speaker 5: It's not that I hated it. I wasn't sure about
Speaker 5: that one. And I kept saying, I don't know about
Speaker 5: this because because they were talking about if we recorded it,
Speaker 5: uh and and Joel Buzzley was like, yeah, I think
Speaker 5: this might be your your your next single. This is
Speaker 5: probably gonna be your signal to your song, and I
Speaker 5: was like, really, and I kept saying, I mean it's cool,
Speaker 5: but would you like, would you I don't know about
Speaker 5: that one?
Speaker 7: What was your single? Would you thought? What do you
Speaker 7: think it should be?
Speaker 5: Off of that album? Feel so Much Better was one
Speaker 5: of those songs, and I was just like, oh, so.
Speaker 10: Much Yeah, my favorite song right there, Karen Whit's background,
Speaker 10: Karen when I'm done, I'm done. I was on that
Speaker 10: vibe where I.
Speaker 9: Needed and I remember telling Terry we were still We're
Speaker 9: just pretty much beenised.
Speaker 1: I did.
Speaker 9: My very last song I recorded was Lady de Jour,
Speaker 9: and I remember telling telling Terry. I said, I looked
Speaker 9: at him and I said, do you think we got enough?
Speaker 9: And Terry looked at me and said, we got way
Speaker 9: more than enough. Negro, goodbye, get out of here, You're gone.
Speaker 1: You trying to pull more songs than them?
Speaker 5: I just didn't. I was so feeling like, do I
Speaker 5: have enough? Is this album gonna be enough of what
Speaker 5: people was expect?
Speaker 1: Wait, let me let me ask you, because again, you
Speaker 1: are a Maverick singer, So let me ask you. Do
Speaker 1: you respect the art of simplicity?
Speaker 5: Absolutely?
Speaker 1: But I can you can you embrace the song that
Speaker 1: won't allow you to do your default gymnastics?
Speaker 9: Absolutely absolutely in hindsight back then, could you see it
Speaker 9: back then?
Speaker 1: No?
Speaker 10: No.
Speaker 5: Terry used to be like, you got to prove list
Speaker 5: We don't have nothing to prove. It was like at
Speaker 5: that point there was a point where you're just going.
Speaker 1: You would just go.
Speaker 9: Every time I would go, I would go all in.
Speaker 9: It was like I'm showing you something because if you
Speaker 9: doubt me, I'm gonna show you. So I always thought
Speaker 9: it was that.
Speaker 1: So you get a hear it one hundred and three
Speaker 1: seconds and they stopped the tape and be like, no,
Speaker 1: just sing the melodies.
Speaker 5: Melody, and then they go, okay, now now do your Johnny.
Speaker 5: Now do Johnny.
Speaker 11: So so you have an arrangement with him like okay,
Speaker 11: I'll sing the song here.
Speaker 1: But then you're okay, give me your.
Speaker 5: Johnny Yill.
Speaker 9: And let me tell you it was crazy because the
Speaker 9: first person that told me and taught me, or at
Speaker 9: least at that point, I still wasn't there, uh and.
Speaker 5: Mature enough to understand that.
Speaker 9: But Luther told me one day, he said, you know
Speaker 9: my favorite all time Johnny Gill's song and I said
Speaker 9: what he said?
Speaker 5: Wait, wait, Luther was nice to Yeah, I was wanted
Speaker 5: the only people let me tell you what it happened.
Speaker 1: Wait, like Yo's I've never tell you a nice louting
Speaker 1: story ever.
Speaker 9: People, the whole crew used to be happy when I
Speaker 9: would walk in or come to one of the shows
Speaker 9: and they go, yo, Johnny's here because men him used
Speaker 9: to go at it, just joning on each other, like
Speaker 9: going none stops. And he used to be and all
Speaker 9: you can hear in there is are screaming.
Speaker 5: He used to call me and would call and go listen.
Speaker 9: He said, look, this is the song I'm getting ready
Speaker 9: to lease as a single, and tell me what you think.
Speaker 9: So you play it and I go, I think that
Speaker 9: shit sucks, and you can say I go, and I go,
Speaker 9: you should probably get it to me. So one year
Speaker 9: he beats me out of the Grammy with here Now,
Speaker 9: and that was going to my mind, right. So he
Speaker 9: used to have these movie nights over his house where
Speaker 9: I mean we everybody who's who used to come. So
Speaker 9: every time I would go over there, he had this
Speaker 9: little case where the Grammys.
Speaker 5: And I would go over there and I start hitting
Speaker 5: the case.
Speaker 1: Go give me my grammy, give me my grammy security.
Speaker 7: That's our first Luther story.
Speaker 9: Then, man, I'm telling you if you if you knew Luther,
Speaker 9: he missed his calling. You're talking about somebody was funny
Speaker 9: as hell and.
Speaker 5: Was quick on his feet. Yo, he was freaking pure genius.
Speaker 7: Like, oh, you know you gotta stay away from him.
Speaker 8: No.
Speaker 9: No, We used to talk about his jerky co He
Speaker 9: was like, yo, you know you only got half of it,
Speaker 9: only took.
Speaker 5: Up here right he goes, He goes, I got curly hair,
Speaker 5: and I said no, no, no, no, no, no, you
Speaker 5: got a half curly hair.
Speaker 9: I said, this, don't even take up in here. So
Speaker 9: but I never had to work with him like that,
Speaker 9: so it was always just fun like when we would talk.
Speaker 9: He came one year, I got so plaster that my
Speaker 9: New Year's uh party.
Speaker 5: I never made it past twelve o'clock. I was drinking
Speaker 5: drinking champagne, I mean drinking wine, and Luther came.
Speaker 9: It was we had this band, everybody's planning and he
Speaker 9: was hanging out and that I passed out before twelve o'clock.
Speaker 5: Luke called me the next day and said, man, man,
Speaker 5: that was a hell of a party. He said, you
Speaker 5: should have been there. Excuse you, man, Wait a minute.
Speaker 1: It just hit me. It just hit me right now.
Speaker 1: One question that we never asked him, what how do
Speaker 1: we how do they ever orchestrate a Luther Vanders velvet devote? Yeah,
Speaker 1: Janet Jackson song idea which I know was recorded Minnesota,
Speaker 1: so I know you have to be around in proximity.
Speaker 1: Were you nowhere around when this happened? Is Luther velvet
Speaker 1: Devoteet Jackson for the more money?
Speaker 11: Sounds right right?
Speaker 5: For the more money? Because I did my own.
Speaker 1: Yeah, you had Let's Just run Away?
Speaker 5: I had Let's just run Away.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that is my ship all the time.
Speaker 5: That was a simple, simplistic kind of a joint that
Speaker 5: we just had.
Speaker 1: George sample, that was yeah.
Speaker 10: Yeah, we gotta talk about the soundtrack run too.
Speaker 7: Got to talk about lrgs. I just I mean not
Speaker 7: larg I mean.
Speaker 1: Yes, yeah, yeah, yeah, it was.
Speaker 5: Yeah. I did my own that one. I remember. I'll
Speaker 5: never forget that.
Speaker 1: Okay, So when you are all right, so you and
Speaker 1: Luthor never had a professional relationship, so you could be
Speaker 1: cordial with.
Speaker 11: Each other, Yeah, we were.
Speaker 5: It was always fun but fun.
Speaker 1: Okay, give us an example of like, Okay, so when
Speaker 1: you're doing like Black Men United or something. I mean,
Speaker 1: when it's time for Gladiator Sport, how do you now
Speaker 1: seeing someone night speaking of LSG Okay, So we were
Speaker 1: doing this is so weird to say, the Roots and
Speaker 1: Chico the barge. We're doing a show together at like
Speaker 1: uh LA, what's the outdoor Hollywood Ball or something like that.
Speaker 1: This must have been pre d Angelo. No, it was
Speaker 1: actually phrenology period, right. But the thing the thing was
Speaker 1: is that so Joe and Chic are doing uh No Guarantees.
Speaker 1: I think that was their join together. And so by
Speaker 1: this point we had just got friendly with uh Gerald, yeah,
Speaker 1: because he was part of he was part of a
Speaker 1: break you off, right, Yeah, so you know he's hanging
Speaker 1: with us backstage, and so he's he's backstage and he's
Speaker 1: watching uh Chico and and and Joe like trying to
Speaker 1: get the women all roused up and all that stuff
Speaker 1: and everything, and he's looking at it. He's like, man,
Speaker 1: he said, yeah, I should be good.
Speaker 5: And I was like, wait, what do you mean.
Speaker 11: He's like, man, I should just go out there and.
Speaker 1: Listen get him literally yeah, And he was like, oh,
Speaker 1: I can't help myself, and he ran on stage and
Speaker 1: then like it was like the flat in the balloon,
Speaker 1: she goes microphone and just started sh.
Speaker 7: And none of them muscles mind it anymore.
Speaker 1: And literally the art like there's a crazy shit ever seen.
Speaker 1: So with that type of gladiators port with singing, not now,
Speaker 1: because again it's like singers are a novelty today. Yeah,
Speaker 1: but back then, how how did you nuance it so
Speaker 1: that you wouldn't hurt people's feelings? Then?
Speaker 5: Jerrold used to I swear to you, Geryl would call
Speaker 5: me and go, hey, I'm getting ready to do the
Speaker 5: show in Chicago. Blah blah blahs on there, blah blah
Speaker 5: Bla's on there, blah blah blah, I'm gonna tear the
Speaker 5: asses up where you at. I'm like, I'm on my way.
Speaker 5: So and we would actually we would double tea. I
Speaker 5: swear to God, I would call him.
Speaker 9: Sometimes they go, Yo, I'm doing the show and Vegas.
Speaker 9: I got blah blah blah's on that, blah blah blah.
Speaker 9: Let's going like the ass up. He goes, I'm coming.
Speaker 5: I'm on my way.
Speaker 1: Us.
Speaker 5: The double team all right.
Speaker 1: Is there is there without you know, because we're not
Speaker 1: gotcha journalism who would you say who did you have
Speaker 1: a friendly rivalry with at least like in terms of
Speaker 1: like that you wanted to go at, but not not
Speaker 1: level for sports, because again I know that your level
Speaker 1: of singing is is out of this world, but es
Speaker 1: are you know, like.
Speaker 5: You won't to be honest you and now I'm gonna
Speaker 5: be really honest.
Speaker 9: And it's not even like it was a rivalry or
Speaker 9: friendly ribery because I just never particularly care for for
Speaker 9: Brian Knight, and so every time every time I would
Speaker 9: get on the show or go on to show with him,
Speaker 9: you best believe you're gonna see Johnny tearing that house
Speaker 9: inside out.
Speaker 5: And it was all always been personal.
Speaker 1: Wow, I just never wait, you know, like I'm trying
Speaker 1: to be politically correct on the show, make the artists.
Speaker 5: Feel safe, and yeah, and he knows it.
Speaker 9: I mean, it's not what happened with him, It's just
Speaker 9: something happened in the past that was just like, what's
Speaker 9: this guy always just kind of made it like her name,
Speaker 9: he was cool, and then he was just one of
Speaker 9: those guys sometimes he guys like I don't I can't
Speaker 9: deal with sometime people one minute they cool with you,
Speaker 9: the next minute you see him the right like, I'm
Speaker 9: from DC and I'm just someone I'm consistent.
Speaker 5: The guy that you see today, you'll see next week,
Speaker 5: next year, in the following.
Speaker 1: And so I was like, yo, sometimes, yeah, So I've
Speaker 1: seen him on well, we don't talk.
Speaker 5: We see each other, We've been in the same building.
Speaker 5: He can tell you what the smokes feel like and
Speaker 5: smell like. But I'm just saying, but we don't wow
Speaker 5: my mind mind. And you know, that's the only thing
Speaker 5: I had. My issue was with him was just I
Speaker 5: don't like people that are inconsistent.
Speaker 9: And when I've seen him when he first started and
Speaker 9: how much he and he was influenced by me and
Speaker 9: all the other things. And then you watch this guy
Speaker 9: overtime and then you see him and it was like, hey,
Speaker 9: what's happening to act like you know you did next
Speaker 9: time you see him.
Speaker 5: He would turn and act like he's you go to yo,
Speaker 5: what's up man? And he's kind of like the give
Speaker 5: me that, and it was like, hey, yo, for real.
Speaker 9: So one night we're playing and he was opening no,
Speaker 9: he was the headliner for the New Edition show.
Speaker 1: He wanted to close.
Speaker 5: He wanted to close, and we was like, he want
Speaker 5: to close for real.
Speaker 1: We was like, people want to clothes.
Speaker 5: So I was like, okay.
Speaker 9: We was like, guess we had an issue where and
Speaker 9: I think it was in uh Westbury and Mike and
Speaker 9: I think Ron they was in the car and their
Speaker 9: car got was in traffic something.
Speaker 5: So the show needed to get started and the show
Speaker 5: was running really really far behind. So we had asked
Speaker 5: him if he would go on first and then we
Speaker 5: just closed, and he was like no. So I was
Speaker 5: like wow, I'm going, Wow, how disrespectful is that?
Speaker 9: And I mean, you know it was he realized it
Speaker 9: was a tough think about trying to follow after noon.
Speaker 9: They all ballots exactly, so you imagine trying to follow
Speaker 9: us what that was like when you could hear an
Speaker 9: echo by the time we finish in the house. And
Speaker 9: I'm not saying it's a talented guy and I like
Speaker 9: his music. I'm just saying, but he so when he
Speaker 9: said no, I was the only one that was pissing.
Speaker 9: I'm from DC. You know, I know how to be
Speaker 9: politically correct. And then I also can turn to this
Speaker 9: other guy with Southeast coming out.
Speaker 5: So I got on the mic because I told him, hey, listen,
Speaker 5: we're getting ready to we can only give y'all what
Speaker 5: we can because we asked we wanted to make sure
Speaker 5: you guys got your money worth, and we asked Brian
Speaker 5: to go on before you guys, before us, so that
Speaker 5: we could make sure you guys will get the full show.
Speaker 5: And he says no. I said, so, we only can
Speaker 5: do what we can do. And I think we might
Speaker 5: have did maybe fifteen minutes at the most, fifty twenty
Speaker 5: minutes at the most. So then I was, you know,
Speaker 5: I mean, looking back out in the hindsight, maybe it
Speaker 5: wasn't the right thing to do, but I just said,
Speaker 5: ladies and gentlemen, get ready for Brian McKnight. Get your
Speaker 5: pillows and blankets.
Speaker 1: And so.
Speaker 5: So. So Mick was like, yo, man, He's like, yo,
Speaker 5: what's up? Like y'all you know, man, I was like, listen, man,
Speaker 5: how disrespectful.
Speaker 9: I mean, the reality is that we want to give
Speaker 9: these people there, you know, their money's worth. And I'm
Speaker 9: going this is not like it's on every night thing.
Speaker 9: It was like, you can go on and we'll closed.
Speaker 9: This is not like it's going to make or break
Speaker 9: your career. So it was just one of those things
Speaker 9: that I always felt like, yo, man, you really feel
Speaker 9: like you're like that, like that's you know, it's not
Speaker 9: that serious. We all artists and we all need to understand. Listen,
Speaker 9: there's a number of people I'm not going on dying.
Speaker 9: I understand what my catalog is. I know where I
Speaker 9: belong and figure out how you make the show elevate
Speaker 9: and make sure people leave ultimately going the whole show
Speaker 9: was incredible, not I. Somebody brings them here and then
Speaker 9: I'm coming here knowing my catalog does not fit there
Speaker 9: and have and bring people down.
Speaker 5: It's like, figure out where you belong. It ain't gonna make.
Speaker 9: Or break your career to figure out how to be
Speaker 9: a part of a great show, make people leave thinking
Speaker 9: and feeling like I got my money's worth. So that's
Speaker 9: just my way of thinking. And then that's the only
Speaker 9: thing that became an issue for me with him.
Speaker 7: How damn I dropped my Yeah would take six though, right, brother?
Speaker 5: Yeah? Yeah, I like that body so yeah, but no,
Speaker 5: really we still don't to this day. We walk, we'll
Speaker 5: see each other in the same room. We don't speak,
Speaker 5: we don't see anything.
Speaker 1: We just cool, man, We got it.
Speaker 7: We brothers got everybody can't be we canna just be.
Speaker 1: With silent brothers. So I said aside, Well, besides that,
Speaker 1: like what what artists like? Do you truly respect? And
Speaker 1: you you bowed down to like who are your favorites?
Speaker 5: Of course Luther, of course, Teddy, I love Jeffrey Osborne,
Speaker 5: Stevie my ultimate you know, that's that's my that's my
Speaker 5: heart there.
Speaker 7: And period?
Speaker 1: Did I say down?
Speaker 5: You have the way? Who can I say in this?
Speaker 5: I love what Neil does. I like Neo, I like
Speaker 5: Jahim okay ex Millennial, Yeah, I like Joe okay, I
Speaker 5: like Joe.
Speaker 1: Uh where do you where do you feel that soul
Speaker 1: music is is?
Speaker 5: Oh?
Speaker 1: God? Now I'm asking questions that I hate, like here,
Speaker 1: what do you think about our young rappers?
Speaker 8: Now? No?
Speaker 1: But it's.
Speaker 11: How how disheartening is it to you.
Speaker 1: To see? Well, this is like a two.
Speaker 11: Prong question. One is just like singing is not what
Speaker 11: it was when you were.
Speaker 1: Coming up, especially with now with technology and how it is,
Speaker 1: whereas now you know, like well s anybody with he's
Speaker 1: still who's still alive?
Speaker 5: Now?
Speaker 1: Yeah, I'm just saying like.
Speaker 11: Where you're you're where.
Speaker 1: Your auto tune rapper is mostly singing? Now?
Speaker 8: Well?
Speaker 1: You know I don't have a problem. And but with that,
Speaker 1: but then on top of that, uh I I guess
Speaker 1: right now, it seems as though, like most when you
Speaker 1: think of soul singers, it's people that don't look like you.
Speaker 1: And I'm in the one hand, I'm like, okay, well, yeah,
Speaker 1: I can see that you've been influenced by this and
Speaker 1: you listen to this artist, so you know, what, are
Speaker 1: you more just me that more black people aren't carrying
Speaker 1: the baton, or or that maybe we just don't know
Speaker 1: about them. I still think that there's singers out there.
Speaker 5: There's a lot of singers that are still out there.
Speaker 5: There are still singers that are making R and B music.
Speaker 5: It's not the artist, it's the industry. It's the industry,
Speaker 5: it's the you know, everybody. You know.
Speaker 9: Music is just totally segregated now, there's no I mean,
Speaker 9: everything is based on research.
Speaker 5: The kids and I stream like, it's just that we
Speaker 5: have to look and understand.
Speaker 9: That the one thing about a hit record is when
Speaker 9: you say a hit, it has something that's magical that
Speaker 9: resonates with people.
Speaker 5: That's why it becomes unique. That's why it becomes special.
Speaker 5: That's why it becomes a hit because it can connect
Speaker 5: with people. And I think the problem is that we're
Speaker 5: allowing the industry's just gotten to a point where everything
Speaker 5: is a category and it's so it doesn't even allow
Speaker 5: even out the new generation and these kids to really
Speaker 5: really grow up and be educated to understand what music
Speaker 5: really is or what's you know, what's a great song,
Speaker 5: because they're like, if you've never had soul food, how
Speaker 5: are you gonna appreciate all everyone or even have a.
Speaker 1: Desire for soul food.
Speaker 9: And I believe that it's just gotten to a point
Speaker 9: where it's not so much of the artists that are
Speaker 9: still out there, they're just not getting a shot. It's
Speaker 9: tough to take even though there's something a lot that
Speaker 9: I'm making music, but they're not able to not get
Speaker 9: an opportunity to be heard. And that's only due to
Speaker 9: because of the way this industry is now. Everything has
Speaker 9: been diluted. It's like, if it's got to be if this.
Speaker 5: Person's not on it, if this is the artist, you
Speaker 5: belong over here, not because of the song, it's just
Speaker 5: based on from here in the ac over here, because
Speaker 5: that's your name, that's where you are, that's how old
Speaker 5: you are, and it's just gotten so crazy that it's
Speaker 5: just hurt the industry and it's still hurting us. And
Speaker 5: I don't think it's gonna get any better until we
Speaker 5: can get or people begin to understand and recognize and
Speaker 5: identify when you just got great music, great songs, and
Speaker 5: you see that it's reacting. People are gravitating to allow
Speaker 5: everybody to be able to have and enjoy it and
Speaker 5: stop trying to control and trying to put everything in
Speaker 5: a category. Everything though it is necessarily belong in a category.
Speaker 5: If it's just great, it's great. If it works and
Speaker 5: it feels good, it feels good. And I just think
Speaker 5: that it's just gotten so bad now that it's we're
Speaker 5: choking and the killing ourselves.
Speaker 8: But at the same time, what does it feel like
Speaker 8: for you to still be making new music and be embraced,
Speaker 8: like still be playing on the radio, like do get
Speaker 8: that number one?
Speaker 5: I'm so grateful. I am grateful, and I'm just doing
Speaker 5: my part. When you listen to the.
Speaker 9: Songs that I recorded on this new album, Game Changer two,
Speaker 9: I'm doing as a musician, stretching out being able to
Speaker 9: do music that I enjoy doing. But I never compromise
Speaker 9: who Johnny gill Is, and I understand that it's important
Speaker 9: to do that, make sure you stay and be who
Speaker 9: you are, and making sure that my audience can appreciate
Speaker 9: what I'm doing here. But at the same time, I'm
Speaker 9: also allowing myself, from an artistic standpoint, to be.
Speaker 5: Able to do and try the things that I enjoy.
Speaker 5: The music that I enjoy. When you listen to me
Speaker 5: myself would call Santana and sheili E.
Speaker 9: I love that type of music, and I was able
Speaker 9: to be able to enjoy it and bring them on
Speaker 9: and collaborate with them to do something that I've always
Speaker 9: wanted to do, but I don't.
Speaker 5: When you hear me singing, you still hear Johnny Uh
Speaker 5: And I think that it's just for me.
Speaker 9: I'm grateful that people I can see because when I
Speaker 9: go to work there's sold out shows, which tells you
Speaker 9: it's a blessing first and.
Speaker 5: Foremost that they still want to hear from you. More importantly,
Speaker 5: and I believe that there's just still a number of
Speaker 5: people that really appreciate what we do and uh And
Speaker 5: I believe everything comes full circle. I think it's cycles.
Speaker 5: We go through these cycles, but I think at the
Speaker 5: end of the day, I think that it's like everything else,
Speaker 5: real music, true music, true artists, true musicians. It goes
Speaker 5: through a cycle. But you know, I don't think that
Speaker 5: you can keep us down forever. It always comes back.
Speaker 1: I have a question. Okay, so you and and Rizz
Speaker 1: did your do it together on on the album? Yeah,
Speaker 1: I'm sorry, Ralph. Uh It's is.
Speaker 5: To tell you how thank you.
Speaker 1: Is. Because the thing is, after the biopick came out,
Speaker 1: I feel like this new edition biopic is doing is
Speaker 1: doing better for you guys what the Temptations couldn't do
Speaker 1: with their biopick and even the Jackson's couldn't do with
Speaker 1: their biopick. And you know, I know that there's politics
Speaker 1: in the group, and there's six of y'all, and ya
Speaker 1: YadA yadao.
Speaker 11: We know the drama.
Speaker 1: But it's like if there ever was a time when
Speaker 1: y'all have millennials in the palm of your hands, Like
Speaker 1: it's now to the point that you know, i'd see
Speaker 1: I mean kids born like after two thousand and five,
Speaker 1: like that young.
Speaker 11: Yeah, quoting the movie.
Speaker 1: Yeah, And so they're mostly invested in you guys, and
Speaker 1: y'all have yet to really not cashing but really just
Speaker 1: that that's about yet to take that victory lap.
Speaker 7: But what does that look like? Because they y'all did
Speaker 7: do stuff like no, they did show the.
Speaker 1: New addition has yet to reunite and tour behind that
Speaker 1: BT movie.
Speaker 7: But they did. I thought you did.
Speaker 5: And no, I mean we did one show after that movie,
Speaker 5: and that was the Steve Harvey thing. I think we
Speaker 5: did after that.
Speaker 2: That was it.
Speaker 5: The internal issues that goes on with this group has
Speaker 5: been going on since for thirty some years. We find
Speaker 5: our way back, we go off, we forget you, we
Speaker 5: come right back. We're like a married couple.
Speaker 9: And what I kept telling everybody is that you know
Speaker 9: what happens when a married couple when they love each
Speaker 9: other and they keep breaking up, coming back, breaking up.
Speaker 1: The problem is.
Speaker 9: You have to deal with the core issue here because
Speaker 9: as much as you love each other, until you deal
Speaker 9: with the issue and that straightened out, what you're doing
Speaker 9: is you know you love each other, so you break away,
Speaker 9: come back, and you still got the same problem. So
Speaker 9: you end back up with the same outcome and something
Speaker 9: has to change. And so even with Kobe, just recently,
Speaker 9: we all started texting each other.
Speaker 5: I love you, man, I love you. I love you, man,
Speaker 5: this is crazy.
Speaker 1: We all six of you.
Speaker 11: It was I would love to see.
Speaker 5: W and we were we were.
Speaker 9: And what I said to everyone, which I think is important,
Speaker 9: is that what we learned was life just sent us
Speaker 9: all a message that it don't discriminate, don't.
Speaker 5: Give a fuck who you are. And at some point
Speaker 5: this call could have been and this could have been
Speaker 5: any one of us, so you realize that at some
Speaker 5: point we need to take heed.
Speaker 9: Then a few weeks ago, not even a few ago,
Speaker 9: by a week ago, Ronnie's brother Rob, who works with me,
Speaker 9: on his way from Atlanta.
Speaker 5: I was playing the Baton Rouge last weekend, he fell ill.
Speaker 5: They had to airlift him actually to a hospital in Atlanta. Now,
Speaker 5: Rob is Ronnie's brother, who's the biggest New Edition man,
Speaker 5: and he sits even though he works with me, he's
Speaker 5: always the guy that's sitting there going, man, y'all brothers
Speaker 5: a man, y'all need to stop this. Y'all need to
Speaker 5: come together man. And he's that guy. And I was
Speaker 5: like when I sat when I got that call, and
Speaker 5: I was like, I was like, okay, wait a minute,
Speaker 5: we just got a warning. And with Kobe and then
Speaker 5: who knows who knew a week later that it was
Speaker 5: going to step inside of our family and the one
Speaker 5: person that everybody loves Rob. It affected everybody and it
Speaker 5: was like, okay, well, so what are we doing here?
Speaker 5: Is this really? I mean when you put in a perspective,
Speaker 5: So I'm the oldest, so I've often said, and I
Speaker 5: told them, I was like, you know, forget who's right
Speaker 5: and who's wrong. We all just got to do better.
Speaker 5: We got to do better.
Speaker 1: We all do.
Speaker 5: And I said, and at some point that means that
Speaker 5: we have to look at ourselves, be honest and begin
Speaker 5: to try to figure out what we need to do
Speaker 5: if we never step foot on stage again in life.
Speaker 5: But how to get all these years and the things
Speaker 5: that we've done together, and the memories that we created,
Speaker 5: the impact that we've had, if we never stand on
Speaker 5: that stage again. There's no rhyme or reason for us
Speaker 5: as family members, as brothers to not have some level
Speaker 5: of a family of a relationship as brothers, as men.
Speaker 5: And so we've been you know, we've talked, we've had
Speaker 5: those conversations, and that's just where things are. And I
Speaker 5: think that you know, time, time heals wounds. And I
Speaker 5: think that who knows what's going to happen, what lies ahead,
Speaker 5: But I do know that my main goal, and like
Speaker 5: I've told them, and I feel that it's important, is
Speaker 5: that we all better take heed because as you began
Speaker 5: to believe or you saw what happened to Kobe, and
Speaker 5: then you see, it got even closer in our house,
Speaker 5: with our own family. So we gotta take us take
Speaker 5: a step back here and figure out what is it
Speaker 5: that the good lawd is trying to tell us.
Speaker 1: I suggest the Metallica, some kind of monstrous rales. I
Speaker 1: suggest therapy. I'm now I'm gonna say Lawrenxander on everyone,
Speaker 1: I'm sorry that yeah, Lawrenceander. She she is the no she.
Speaker 1: Lawrenxander is the group whisper. She keeps groups together.
Speaker 5: Let me tell you something. It's crazy.
Speaker 1: You know what I said to them this evening, We
Speaker 1: need a counselor.
Speaker 7: This is the first time that sentence has ever been
Speaker 7: that's crazy. This is the first time that sentence has
Speaker 7: ever been said amongst your group.
Speaker 8: Wow.
Speaker 1: But people don't think about that. People don't think about
Speaker 1: that very first time. Seriously, Like normally I'm really giving,
Speaker 1: I don't have to pay for no more therapy. After
Speaker 1: I give her this this endorsement. Know what what she
Speaker 1: what Lawrenceander does. She's like well known in the industry
Speaker 1: and and she fixes groups basically like managers will hire
Speaker 1: her to keep uh groups in tech and it will
Speaker 1: be over small ship.
Speaker 7: It don't have to be in your business. But that
Speaker 7: means that both of y'all are see her.
Speaker 1: I don't mean to no, no, no, I see I
Speaker 1: saw our individual like she's she saw. She's everyone's person like, well,
Speaker 1: I don't want to people out.
Speaker 7: Question right right right, No, no, no.
Speaker 1: She's not our group person. However, our good friend was
Speaker 1: her very well. She works with them and the Live
Speaker 1: Nation people like she'll come into companies and fix she fixed.
Speaker 1: She's the real fixture secret like Dan. It's kind of
Speaker 1: like the out She's the real.
Speaker 11: Fix your life person. Yes, but how funny did you
Speaker 11: say that I highly recommend that.
Speaker 7: No seriously, because you knew of her when I'm Saturday.
Speaker 5: No no, no, no, no, not just the fact of
Speaker 5: what I suggested that I thought would remit and then
Speaker 5: you know she's that person to.
Speaker 7: Everybody was open open shop, like six people on the line.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I need to see that. I want to see
Speaker 1: and you like, I don't want to wait till y'all
Speaker 1: like seventy doing.
Speaker 5: What not act when I'm singing and then I have
Speaker 5: to stop and go hold on all that thought.
Speaker 1: No, no, no, wait, I only wait. Were you with
Speaker 1: us when we got like were you with us in
Speaker 1: Philly when we got that uh plaque?
Speaker 5: And Philly?
Speaker 1: The what do you want? The diner? Which one?
Speaker 7: You know what I'm where?
Speaker 5: Came?
Speaker 8: Right?
Speaker 1: Yes? Yes, so you were there that night when the
Speaker 1: Tramps also performed. All right, I'm just saying, no, what
Speaker 1: happened during this The Tramps performed, you know because they
Speaker 1: got honored as well. But it was like you remember
Speaker 1: you remember the sketch on Living Color when they were
Speaker 1: doing the old train like oh no, like members like
Speaker 1: two and wheelchairs three with the walkers with the tennis
Speaker 1: balls at the bottom like one member it had like
Speaker 1: a good leg.
Speaker 7: I got up before that happened.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's no, I'm just no more power to the
Speaker 1: tramp even though they ate, they still going on. I'm
Speaker 1: just saying that there's this is valuable real estate time
Speaker 1: for a new addition to all come back.
Speaker 10: And and and you know, I'll just say I still
Speaker 10: have never seen the audition live, so I need I
Speaker 10: still need. I need y'all to come back and do
Speaker 10: at least one more tour.
Speaker 1: I'm lucky, people pieces my sisters went to see Heartbreak Tour.
Speaker 5: I was not to go. I was.
Speaker 1: I was too I was. I was like ten. I wasn't.
Speaker 1: I don't even think I was ten then, but like
Speaker 1: I was too young. Togo so and then, well, I've
Speaker 1: seen four shows, but I've not seen Super Group Status
Speaker 1: New Edition do it?
Speaker 11: So wow?
Speaker 1: Wow? Well you know, I listen, you're saying you're board,
Speaker 1: your bored, You're way for me.
Speaker 5: I think that. I mean, I'll often say this, and
Speaker 5: I'll say it again. I truly believe that.
Speaker 9: What we've done over the thirty something years plus, that
Speaker 9: we've had our differences and we always seem to find
Speaker 9: our way back. It always seemed to find its way
Speaker 9: and come back together. And I honestly believe that this
Speaker 9: is gonna be a different at some point. It's I
Speaker 9: believe good, he's got his hands in it, and uh,
Speaker 9: it's gonna come.
Speaker 5: I'm together.
Speaker 1: I'm not supposed to say this, because when you do
Speaker 1: these meetings at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame,
Speaker 1: what make it happen. It's kind of like what happens
Speaker 1: in this room with the thirty of us stays in
Speaker 1: this room. But I think I can at least say
Speaker 1: that No, in the last in the last two years,
Speaker 1: your names have been brought up as serious considerations.
Speaker 11: I'm part of the board that decides.
Speaker 7: The So that'll be the I see what you're doing here,
Speaker 7: You see what you're doing.
Speaker 1: No, dude, four years, four years, and you do it.
Speaker 1: You stand in front of a jewelry and you give
Speaker 1: your closing arguments, Da da da da, four years in
Speaker 1: a row.
Speaker 11: Finally with Janet, now like I need a new cause
Speaker 11: to yeah.
Speaker 7: No, but no, new edition is the new cause.
Speaker 1: New edition is yeah.
Speaker 5: And we're still making records.
Speaker 9: We're still doing because I've often said, whatever success that
Speaker 9: I have, it still reflects on this group. I mean,
Speaker 9: I've you know, read number one records, Ralph, the records
Speaker 9: that we have that's doing incredibly well. I don't care
Speaker 9: how you chopped up, you said, Johnny and Ralph, but
Speaker 9: we're all still the power of that tree.
Speaker 1: And so it still reflects on You're you're the voice,
Speaker 1: is like you're the crucial part of the tree. Intended
Speaker 1: you said crucial. Okay, but when is it?
Speaker 7: But my last question is, but when the last time
Speaker 7: you talked to Stacey though.
Speaker 5: She deep?
Speaker 7: That's an interesting sentence. Go ahead, tell me more.
Speaker 1: No, not now the DEVI DM something. No, she's a preacher.
Speaker 7: So she's still singing in her own way.
Speaker 5: Yeah, she's still and every once in the blue moon
Speaker 5: should hit me.
Speaker 1: You know, DM me on Twitter once like three years ago.
Speaker 1: I hope she's still on Twitter. What was you about
Speaker 1: to say, John, I was talking about my wisconcert. No,
Speaker 1: I know I was.
Speaker 8: He looked like he was holding something. I just thought
Speaker 8: he had something else.
Speaker 5: I'm just saying I.
Speaker 1: Jumped.
Speaker 5: I've been dmned, you know a few times on Twitter.
Speaker 5: I've been doing too, going.
Speaker 1: Somewhere else with all this comedy, John, what you're doing
Speaker 1: with all the issues.
Speaker 5: I got issues And think about most of my buddies,
Speaker 5: like Eddie and and all my crew.
Speaker 11: It's like inner circle. It's like you are a part
Speaker 11: of that circle.
Speaker 9: All we do is sit around and blast stuff, and
Speaker 9: it's like until Eddie goes yo. Yeah, looking around here,
Speaker 9: look at this house. I built this on jokes.
Speaker 5: Niggas don't want no part.
Speaker 8: Of me.
Speaker 1: Speaking of your buddies, and your golfing buddy is Sam Jackson, right.
Speaker 9: Yes, that's my road dog there, old Sam. He just
Speaker 9: he's recovering from back surgery. So I haven't had a
Speaker 9: pigeon in a while.
Speaker 5: So he's uh. Me and him fight every morning. Oh
Speaker 5: my god.
Speaker 1: We we just go at it.
Speaker 9: And I swear to you, I haven't as much as
Speaker 9: I love golf, I just haven't had just the desire
Speaker 9: to want to play like I've been a moment we played.
Speaker 9: Since he's been off and he's healing, but he's he's
Speaker 9: doing much better.
Speaker 5: He's moving around walking.
Speaker 9: I'm just looking and watching and monitoring everything to make
Speaker 9: sure he's doing what he needs to do because I
Speaker 9: need some of the music that.
Speaker 1: That movie money, because you know, because he got he's
Speaker 1: convinced you.
Speaker 5: Yeah, he's the one that got in this movie that
Speaker 5: we we uh story, so yeah.
Speaker 1: Yeah, he's playing Clarence Burgh.
Speaker 5: Sam's idea. I'm just like, he was like, man, I
Speaker 5: think you ought to take a look at this character.
Speaker 7: I was like, what, Yeah, Yeah, you got some characters
Speaker 7: and you need to get come out.
Speaker 5: I don't know when they're gonna when it's gonna be released.
Speaker 1: Wow, okay, I can't wait for that. And Sam is
Speaker 1: playing George Clinton in the movie. Wow yeah really yeah.
Speaker 9: We're on a course playing and he's singing all those songs.
Speaker 9: I'm like, the hell are you doing, Sam Jackson, You're
Speaker 9: throwing off my game.
Speaker 11: Really, I cannot wait for this.
Speaker 1: Sam Jackson is playing George Clinton and the Neil Bourdgart story.
Speaker 1: That is crazy. I have to say that out loud
Speaker 1: just to He's playing Clarence Burger the five stairsteps.
Speaker 11: Yes, wow, yeah.
Speaker 1: Do you see more acting in your future?
Speaker 10: I mean it's not like this was your first because
Speaker 10: I remember those Family Matters episodes.
Speaker 5: I like, acting thing is fun, it's cool, but that
Speaker 5: hurry up wait yeah, I understand that you have no patience.
Speaker 5: Like I'm like, man.
Speaker 1: That's one of the things I hated about working in
Speaker 1: a record labels was a hurry up and wait.
Speaker 5: Yeah, hurry up and wait man. It's like man, Like
Speaker 5: I remember sometimes we would all hang out on the
Speaker 5: set and it's three o'clock, four o'clock in the morning,
Speaker 5: Eddie's getting ready to do another scene. Everybody in the
Speaker 5: trailer like this. We're like yeah, we were like yo, this,
Speaker 5: d you can't really gonna try to be funny.
Speaker 1: What he gets paid for.
Speaker 5: But I'm like, man, I don't feel bad. I don't
Speaker 5: feel sorry for you. Shoot, because man, we do all
Speaker 5: get to reap the benefits from your hard.
Speaker 7: Work nice, like like a male Oprah.
Speaker 1: I like that as.
Speaker 5: He's just you know, EDI's just a pure genius.
Speaker 7: I mean like he's just you can do it in
Speaker 7: his sleep, Dola Mike brought it back. It was like
Speaker 7: sleep all right?
Speaker 1: So Bill, do you have all year? Damn?
Speaker 5: You?
Speaker 1: All right, there's the thing before I always want to
Speaker 1: wrap the show. Then it's always like ten minutes when
Speaker 1: the show's over, and then we're.
Speaker 5: Like, damn, I forgot to ask did you have a
Speaker 5: saythem about L S G? Did you?
Speaker 7: And we didn't get.
Speaker 1: Yeah. I was gonna say the idea of Eddie Eddie
Speaker 1: replacing Ah was that what.
Speaker 5: Happened for and we're still gonna do that. That's what
Speaker 5: Keith and I was just talking about.
Speaker 9: Wow, we're gonna just bring bring pop in and uh
Speaker 9: and and and maybe a couple of other people.
Speaker 5: Just guess with us on another different Now that's something
Speaker 5: that's gonna happen.
Speaker 8: Absolutely was that the second time you've been about into
Speaker 8: a super group or was that just the one that
Speaker 8: you picked?
Speaker 7: Because I feel like I don't know.
Speaker 5: I look for the work and don't I was about
Speaker 5: to say anybody else got anything opportunity because I'm just
Speaker 5: trying to make a sure that is my life right now.
Speaker 1: I got some work.
Speaker 5: I look back at my journey and I'm like, man,
Speaker 5: what the heck? I mean from a soul artist do
Speaker 5: that stuff with Stacey to new addition to l s G.
Speaker 5: Then I had his stay with me, Bobby and Ralph.
Speaker 5: It's like, you know, we just go.
Speaker 9: I just I love just doing things and being put
Speaker 9: in the position that uh that doesn't allow me to
Speaker 9: dependenthole me and allow me to be able to just
Speaker 9: express myself in just different areas.
Speaker 5: So I enjoy it.
Speaker 1: The younger artists now call and ask you for advice,
Speaker 1: like you ever think like, okay, well maybe management or
Speaker 1: his management like too much of a logistical, non creative
Speaker 1: nightmare for you.
Speaker 9: Yeah, it's it's called babysitting, and I'm not a very
Speaker 9: good babysitter.
Speaker 1: I go to organizer. Well, yeah they do.
Speaker 5: As a matter of fact, you organized that met.
Speaker 1: You organized j Yeah. Yeah, he's an organizer.
Speaker 5: I'm the Yeah.
Speaker 7: Yeah, I was speaking secret talk.
Speaker 8: But that's okay. I think we figured out what you're saying.
Speaker 8: You're saying that sometimes he organizes parties and other things.
Speaker 5: Handling deal with so many Why I'm the go to
Speaker 5: guy with most of my friends that how to get everything.
Speaker 5: It's just I don't know.
Speaker 1: I don't understand it. Well, yeah, which no answers, which
Speaker 1: answers my question. Yes, you do know how the babysit, Yeah,
Speaker 1: and solve problems, problems, that's my m O.
Speaker 9: And then you would think that I'm doctor Phil. I
Speaker 9: have no idea, And I'm like, why does everybody listen
Speaker 9: to me?
Speaker 1: Because you're a preacher.
Speaker 5: Son it it's never ending with everybody, and I mean
Speaker 5: it's just from the who's who to it's always something
Speaker 5: and it's like everybody, I'm just going, why they listen
Speaker 5: to me? You got it right? See? But I love people,
Speaker 5: and I always understand.
Speaker 9: I knew and I truly understand that when you're listening
Speaker 9: to people, you have to learn how to listen, because
Speaker 9: there's there's that there's an art to that too as well,
Speaker 9: to learn how to listen and always understanding that I
Speaker 9: don't ever use that if I was you, because you're
Speaker 9: not me. Recognizing that there's always two sides or three
Speaker 9: sides to every story. So when someone's talking, you know
Speaker 9: you're gonna be dealing with them telling their story and
Speaker 9: they going to be the victim when it's.
Speaker 5: All said and done.
Speaker 9: So you have to learn how to read between the lines,
Speaker 9: deal with those things. Ask those questions, what hand did
Speaker 9: you have? They're not here to defend themselves. Let me
Speaker 9: ask you, what hand do you think you're had? And
Speaker 9: I go through It's a whole process that you go through.
Speaker 9: To me, it's, oh my god, let me tell you
Speaker 9: you have no idea.
Speaker 5: I've lost a few relationships because they're like, my god,
Speaker 5: can you just your phone. It's like, hey, listen, I'm
Speaker 5: just being obedient. I'm doing what God want me to do.
Speaker 1: I mean, it is what it is.
Speaker 5: So you have to at some point be patient. Good,
Speaker 5: I'll listen, I deal with it all.
Speaker 1: There you go, There you go. I do remember a question.
Speaker 10: Yes, one of my greatest regrets about this show is
Speaker 10: that we'll never get to have Roger Troutman on. You've
Speaker 10: worked with Roger? Yeah, can you give us a Roger
Speaker 10: story something about oh my god.
Speaker 9: Let me tell you my very first song I ever
Speaker 9: wrote and produced. Played all the instruments on a song
Speaker 9: called It's Your Body. So I I had a dummy
Speaker 9: bull corder on there and I was like, Yo, it
Speaker 9: would be cool. We can get rods on here.
Speaker 5: So I called him. He was in Hawaii and I
Speaker 5: asked him if he would be on the song with me.
Speaker 5: So he told me to send him this song. And
Speaker 5: before I sent it, I actually played it from the phone.
Speaker 5: And so he's quiet and he goes, you wrote that.
Speaker 5: I said yeah. He said you wrote that. I said, yeah,
Speaker 5: you wrote that. I said yeah. He said, I'm gonna
Speaker 5: come and I'll be honored to be on it. And
Speaker 5: I was like, whoa. He comes to LA. He brings
Speaker 5: this little uh his gear. He comes in a black
Speaker 5: suit with gold trimming around the lapels, and we're going.
Speaker 5: He walks in, goes into the other studio and he
Speaker 5: sets up. He comes back in, he says, play the track.
Speaker 5: Plays the track. Then he says, I'm going into the auditorium.
Speaker 5: The auditorium was the room the other room. He goes in,
Speaker 5: starts playing, and.
Speaker 9: My biggest regret to this day is not recording him
Speaker 9: each track. And when he was playing, he was like
Speaker 9: like there was no audience and we were just sitting
Speaker 9: there like this going as he was stat track and
Speaker 9: I'm just sitting there going and he came back out
Speaker 9: listen to it.
Speaker 5: He goes, uh, pressed me right here at this spot,
Speaker 5: going back into the auditorium.
Speaker 1: So he does he call it that. I'm said that was.
Speaker 5: Behind the like in the studio. So he tells the
Speaker 5: guy Joe after we finished. Uh, he finishes up all
Speaker 5: the parts and sounded really good. And he looked at
Speaker 5: Joe and Joe it's caucasion. He looked at him, he said,
Speaker 5: your credit to your race. Man was freaking amazing.
Speaker 7: Man.
Speaker 9: He was just that moment to watch him and he
Speaker 9: would be in there doing this recording and actual performing.
Speaker 5: We were just sitting there going yo, just performing like
Speaker 5: we was in there watching going wow. As he was
Speaker 5: stacked just.
Speaker 11: Doing full you and Roger like he does on the stage.
Speaker 5: Yeah.
Speaker 1: I was like, man, I was like guitar with his
Speaker 1: teeth and all that stuff.
Speaker 5: Mistake that just I wish we could have dis recorded
Speaker 5: that had that footage oh man, Yeah, Yeah, he's a
Speaker 5: unique guy.
Speaker 1: Regret. I wish he was on our show.
Speaker 5: J G.
Speaker 11: Man, I thank you so much, thanks for having I
Speaker 11: hope that you will because.
Speaker 1: The thirtieth University your record is like what uh yeah
Speaker 1: coming up mate, So yeah, I hope that after thirty
Speaker 1: years time you'll love your catalog. I'm like what Jam.
Speaker 7: Says in the meanwhile, get game changes to yeah.
Speaker 5: That change.
Speaker 9: I'm telling you, from the beginning to the end, I
Speaker 9: didn't put no wasted joints on that album.
Speaker 1: Proved yeah.
Speaker 5: Yeah, it's just a solid album.
Speaker 9: And I hope that people enjoy, want to listen to
Speaker 9: and want to hear good music because it's still there.
Speaker 5: It's still there and it's beautiful. Yeah. And you are
Speaker 5: to me our Quincy Jones man, who I've said it
Speaker 5: a million time and I'm just saying, man, this is
Speaker 5: just taking how much respect and how much uh uh
Speaker 5: love we have for you. Man.
Speaker 1: They love when I get uncomfortable. Thank you.
Speaker 5: That's generation he is that.
Speaker 7: But he loved black women.
Speaker 1: I got one more thing.
Speaker 5: I want to say.
Speaker 10: Thank you for side too of the nineteen ninety album
Speaker 10: because my niece when she was born, she would not
Speaker 10: go to bed, but as soon as we put on
Speaker 10: my mind, she would stop crying.
Speaker 1: She was just lay in the bed. And by the
Speaker 1: time by the time I'll give my all to you
Speaker 1: was over, she was knocked out. So thank you so much.
Speaker 1: You are so r and B.
Speaker 5: You saved this.
Speaker 1: You saved us.
Speaker 10: That child which just would not stop crying until you
Speaker 10: put on my mind.
Speaker 5: Yeah.
Speaker 9: Well, you know, I'm really a mess up man, because
Speaker 9: I remember the only time that I ever played my music,
Speaker 9: even for my own good was one night I was
Speaker 9: at an award show and I had this girl I
Speaker 9: was dating, and I was thinking, I've got to get there.
Speaker 9: I gotta figure this one out because so I left.
Speaker 5: Before I left home, I had I put the champagne
Speaker 5: on ice. I sat down and I said, when she
Speaker 5: comes back here, I'm gonna sit down and we're gonna
Speaker 5: sit down the piano. And we sat down at the piano.
Speaker 5: This was after the show.
Speaker 9: I went back and sat down at the piano and
Speaker 9: started playing. Matter of fact, it was right before my
Speaker 9: ma Min came out. I'm playing the song. And we
Speaker 9: went from the piano to the floor, from the floor
Speaker 9: to the bedroom.
Speaker 5: And I said, come, I don't do this more often
Speaker 5: because I didn't realize.
Speaker 1: Ladies, yeah, yeah, you will see. You have a team,
Speaker 1: Supreme man, did you learn anything?
Speaker 4: Good morning, good afternoon, and midnight.
Speaker 1: You will see one of the nights.
Speaker 5: Girl around.
Speaker 1: Ladies and gentlemen, this is I'm Supreme. Thank you. For
Speaker 1: more podcasts from iHeart Radio, visit the ie radio app,
Speaker 1: Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.