00:00:00 Speaker 1: Quest Love Supreme is a production of iHeartRadio. This classic episode was produced by the team at Pandora. 00:00:10 Speaker 2: What up, y'all, it's unpaid bill for Quest Love Supreme. As you may have seen throughout June, we are celebrating black music a month by releasing an episode every day, so every day you will have to be here, especially picked QLs Classic, and on Wednesdays we are dropping new two part episodes with Wayne Brady and the legendary James Poyser, both of which were filmed in the studio. Black music is deeply important to me and has been an influence throughout my entire career. It's also something we celebrate here at QLs. Today, QLs revisits are Jeffrey Osborne Interview. This one is informative, but my co host Shoogy Steve also drops a few comedic gems in this special twenty eighteen episode. 00:00:48 Speaker 3: Supremo Suprema Roll Call, Suprema Suh Suh, Supremo roll Call, Suprema suck s, Suprema roll Call, Suprema sun So. 00:01:02 Speaker 1: Suprema Rolly. It's alright with me, Yeah, no matter what you want to believe. Yeah. Half of Supreme teams here or for me and Steve. Roll call Supremo built Supremo. 00:01:14 Speaker 4: Roll call, Suprema suck Son Suprema roll call. 00:01:19 Speaker 5: My name is Sugar. Yeah, what's it all about? 00:01:23 Speaker 6: Yeah? 00:01:23 Speaker 5: Roll call yeah or roll out. I'll explain later. 00:01:30 Speaker 4: Suprema roll call, Suprema su Suprema roll called. 00:01:35 Speaker 7: My shoelaces Yeah, have slowly loosened. Yeah, please forgive me. Yeah, I'm only human. 00:01:43 Speaker 4: Call Supreme Supprema roll call, Suprema Sun, Suprema roll call. 00:01:51 Speaker 1: My name is Joy. 00:01:53 Speaker 6: Some call me Jeffrey, Yeah, some call me Osborne. Hey, what's that for me? 00:01:58 Speaker 4: Bro Suprema soun Sun Supremo roll call, Suprema soun Sun Suprema roll call Supreme Son Son Supreme My roll call Suprema Son Son Suppreme my roll call. 00:02:16 Speaker 1: Wait before I do anything, Yes, I'm breaking tradition. Okay, I'm asking a question first. Then I'll introduce our guests. Okay, Jeffrey Osborne, you just introduced our guests. Is that you drumming for Smokey Robinson on Soul Trade in nineteen seventy four. 00:02:37 Speaker 6: With the part down the middle of my head. A, Ladies and gentlemen, welcome. 00:02:44 Speaker 1: I knew it. 00:02:44 Speaker 6: I knew it. 00:02:45 Speaker 1: Ladies and gentlemen, Welcome to Quest Love Supreme. I am Quest Love and our Supreme team consisting. 00:02:53 Speaker 5: Of this team today Supreme. 00:02:55 Speaker 6: Yeah. 00:02:56 Speaker 1: Yeah, Sugars thief who's very excited. I think more than anyone wanted this episode to go down, Sugar Steve. Uh and of course, uh boss Bill with us, not with us. Fantakolo is still waiting on his titles for his for his basement house furnishing. Uh, like you somewhere getting our house together in U Los Angeles. 00:03:17 Speaker 7: Did you know that they did an audiobook recently? No, I didn't know that. Apparently he narrated a children's book. It's called The title is great. The title is called we used to have money, Now we have you. 00:03:28 Speaker 1: You have some explains to do, Fonte Uh and unpaid Bill somewhere on Sesame Street, Sesame Street land. Uh, Ladies and gentlemen, I'm so excited about our guest today that I did absolutely no prep work whatsoever because I think I can just go off the top of the dome one of my personal in my my top five soul singers ever. And uh, you know, I haven't been this happy for Steve I mean, he means much more, even more than me than Steve is mad at me already for putting on this spot. No, no, well. 00:04:12 Speaker 5: Don't I mean, I know. 00:04:14 Speaker 1: Okay, okay, okay, ladies and gentlemen, please welcome Jeffrey Osborne, quest of supre Won. Alright, all right, all right, we've been trying to make this happen for a second. Thank you for coming on the show. 00:04:26 Speaker 6: Oh it's great, man, I'm enjoying it and I even got started and I'm joining it trusting. 00:04:31 Speaker 1: This is this is Black Music, Nerd Paradise and Steve when the NERD came in. Yeah, so okay, where My first question is always where were you born? 00:04:49 Speaker 6: In Providence, Rhode Island? Really Providence, Rhode Island? Yeah, youngest of twelve, really really yeah. 00:04:57 Speaker 1: I don't think I ever had a situation where someon wasn't born down South or in the Midwest. You're probably our first Northeast oh really yeah? 00:05:06 Speaker 6: Yeah, And it was interesting growing up there not a lot of black people. I think my family probably represented the most black people in Pute Island. Really no, but that's not a lot. So it was kind of shocking when I met LTD because they told me it was a ten piece black band playing downtown. I'm like, and it wasn't black musicians together in a while Providence, so that was kind of interesting. 00:05:29 Speaker 1: They started in Providence. 00:05:30 Speaker 6: No, they were actually Sam and Dave's backup band back when Sam and Dave were rolling during the Hold on Them Coming Days, soul Man Days. They were called sol Men Ltd. Sole Men Limited. And they left them in the early well actually around sixty nine, and they were based in North Carolina. So they started coming up the East coast playing in the clubs. And I met him in a little nightclub in my hometown in Province. But I don't believe it or not. 00:06:00 Speaker 1: So was it a musical family my family, Yeah, yeah, quite a bit. 00:06:05 Speaker 6: I say eight of eight of the twelve of us were into music. Either played instruments, saying. My father was a great trumpet player, and you know, he was one of those guys that never went after his dream. But you know, anytime and then the big bands came through town, like Ellington and Base, he would run down and play trumpet with them, and he was pretty amazing trumpet player. But he had twelve kids. That's what you get if I having twelve damn kids, Like, I don't even know you have twelve kids. You couldn't do it today. Back then it was you know, it was a lot of big families back then. Okay, so he just worked a few jobs, you know, during the day, and played at night in the clubs. 00:06:42 Speaker 1: And what was the mean well known what was the main industry in Rhode Island? 00:06:47 Speaker 6: Costume jewelry still is, you know really especially in Patucket, Rhode Island, huge costume jewelry place. Yeah. 00:06:55 Speaker 1: So similar to people moving to Detroit for cars or threes in the Midwest, costume joy. 00:07:03 Speaker 6: Like the yeah, it was in Pentucket, Rhode Island, right. 00:07:08 Speaker 1: The more you know, wow, that's crazy. So uh well, leading back to my original question, can I assume that drums was your weapon of choice first or how did you? 00:07:22 Speaker 6: Well, I've always singing. I was winding up at a choice first. I started singing in nightclubs when I was thirteen. My mother used to chaperon me and I would go start at My first job was in New London, Connecticut, a little club called Ebony Lounge. Was pretty I was thirteen, you know, I thought I was doing big shit back then. I was making ten dollars a night, but you know that was that was way back then. And I started playing drums when I was about fifteen. My brother Billy, who was a drummer, left a set in the basement, you know, and so I kind of was a self taught drummer. But everything that's happened for me has happened through drumming. Like when I met LTD, their drummer had gotten locked up that night I went to see him for smoking weed. In nineteen seventy. That was like a major offense. Now everybody got a marijuana card, you know, it don't mean nothing today. But they locked him up and I sat in, played drums with him, sang a couple of songs, and they asked me to join the group. 00:08:23 Speaker 1: So you winged your first gig with LTD. 00:08:26 Speaker 6: Not know, Yeah, but they were doing Top forty and I used to work part time in the record store, so I kind of knew everything that was out there, so it was kind of easy. And I was playing locally in my band, So so I sat in with them and you know, sang a couple of songs and I don't know that guy was in jail for a while. So and then's the funny thing. When I was fifteen, I met the OJ's and a club in Province. So I went to see them perform and they had a drummer. 00:08:56 Speaker 1: And back then, you know, the. 00:08:58 Speaker 6: Drum of passion was heroin. You know, That's what a lot of our black musicians got hung up into back in the day. And so he was nodding out in between songs and I'm watching him and I'm like, damn, this dude was falling asleep in between songs. So club owner let me meet them. I talked to Eddie. I was like, you need a drummer. They said, okay, well if you can find us one, because you're too young. I'm like, no, I can play now, I said, okay. So I brought about three drummers up and auditioned and I got the job. So I played with them for two weeks while they were in Providence. And so I kind of old my career. 00:09:29 Speaker 1: To drugs, drug drums. 00:09:33 Speaker 6: But again, drumming is you know what opened the door for all that I'd see. 00:09:39 Speaker 1: Yeah, drumming opens the door. There you go to an industry. Wait, what year was the was it before? 00:09:46 Speaker 6: It was nineteen seventy, all right, So before. 00:09:48 Speaker 1: They made their in Philadelphia record a year l Yeah. 00:09:51 Speaker 6: Yeah, they actually they had five people in the group. It was five singers. OK, yeah that lineup. 00:09:58 Speaker 1: So so you're singing that before your nightclub hopping. You didn't have like a high school band experience or any. 00:10:05 Speaker 6: Not a high school band experience. But I played with a lot of the you know, the musicians that I played with were all from the same high school. We played together, but I was the only black one. But yeah, but I did play with a lot of musicians that were working their way through Berkeley School of Music in Boston. So that was nice because I got a chance to play with some really good musicians back then. 00:10:27 Speaker 1: Oh so you even had to learn rapertoire for rock music. And yeah, I was playing nightclubs, but it was actually the funny thing. It was in the ghetto. It was a hood. 00:10:36 Speaker 6: There was a hood in Providence. So I was basically doing mostly R and B, mostly R and B music, you know. But I you know, I grew up listening to jazz because my whole family was in the jazz. I'm the youngest of twelve and I'm seventy years old, so so everybody was listening to Sarah Vaughn and Ela Fitzgerald and Billy Eckstein and Joe Williams. And my dad was in the Miles Day but his favorite trumpet players he was Clifford Brown. So I got a chance to listen to everything, you know. So, you know, back in when I started, I was singing a couple of jazz songs, you know, in R and B. You know, I kind of mixed it up, but I didn not a lot of rock. Wasn't in the rock. 00:11:16 Speaker 1: Who were your influences as far as vocal back then? 00:11:21 Speaker 6: You know, my biggest influence, which everybody finds strange, was a singer named Gloria Lynn. Gloria Lynn was actually my biggest influence. I didn't realize that too down the line, and I went back and started listening to the Gloria Linn records, and I'm like, damn, I phrased a lot of things like her. I guess subconsciously I was kind of really into her. But you know, Sarah was my favorite. I love Sarah Vaughan. I loved, you know, I loved all the jazz singers. And then of course coming up there was the Tip you know, the regulars, the Donnie Hathaway's the Marvin Gays. 00:11:55 Speaker 1: You know those people I loved, and. 00:11:59 Speaker 6: You know Stevie. Stevie was singing back then. You know, at thirteen years old, I was still trying to sing fingertips and my voice was that high back then. And my voice dropped from male soprano to bass from junior high school to high school one semester. It's crazy. 00:12:19 Speaker 1: So when did LTD officially start or as a group, or even at that time you're freelancing as a drummer and right in the group at the same time. 00:12:30 Speaker 6: Well, we took a trip to LA and they were actually from Rhode Island. We drove to LA with a big U haul trailer on the back of the car and that broke off and snapped the bumper and rolled down the mountain in Flagstaff, Arizona. Wait wait, wait what, yeah, I mean we were driving through flag Staff. People don't realize it's nose in Flagstaff, Arizona. So it was going up a little hill and it was icy and cars just started skidding and trailer snapped off roll down the hill. So we had to get someone to go down and pull it back up. And we were there for a couple of days trying to get the bumper repaired. And so we drove out to LA in nineteen seventy and we played in every nightclub in LA for no money. It was the price of admission. It was ten of us living in a one bedroom house and we played for the admission and with fee was back then it was two dollars ahead to get in. So you know, if we got forty people in the night club, we had eighty dollars to split ten ways. I was sending home for money, my pig, my baby. My ho was like, h don't you think it might be time to come back home. My older brother was like, I was like, dude, just send me the money. I don't want to lecture right now. 00:13:57 Speaker 1: I well, I do want to ask how is it or was it feasible? Because you know, the seventies had supergroups. Yeah, and in my mind, I mean I was in the nineties in a band of four members. We were struggling. Oh yeah, And so I you know, I used to wonder, like, well, what was the system like for bands in the seventies that were ten, eleven, twelve, thirteen strong. You all had costumes, you all had all these elements. Was per diem a thing back then in the day. 00:14:34 Speaker 6: Oh, I didn't even know what padem was until I became a solo artist, and then you had to pay it, right, That's when I had to pay it to other musicians. That's when I realized, oh, this is I got to pay this. But no, yeah, there was no padem back then. I mean, we were struggling just to get by and paid the rent. You know, it was I mean, what you got to look at it for what it is. I mean, even when we became a hit group in the seventy two was our first record, so it took us a couple of years to get rolling, you know. And then even when we were popular, you split anything ten ways, that ain't nothing. You think a million dollars split it ten ways, it ain't. So yeah, it gets it's rough for those groups back then, a lot of them. You don't realize the struggle that they went through. And then again then you got you know, people's personalities clashing and this one wants to do this and that one wants to do that, and there's always a struggle. It's it's tough. So I admired the groups that came out of that era. 00:15:33 Speaker 1: You know, so even before you were scheduled to do this show, I found a record on Sunday. I didn't realize that there was a I guess your first record on an M And there was a woman in the group as well. 00:15:47 Speaker 6: Oh yeah, Celeste. Her name was Celestia. 00:15:50 Speaker 1: Yeah, so was she always in the group in the beginning or no? 00:15:54 Speaker 6: There was a girl named Tammy Starr in the group when I joined the group, and you know, there was you know a lot of people that went through that group. We had a baritone sacks player, yeah, a percussionists and times got hard and they dropped out before we even got the record going. You know, yeah, it upset now, but you know it happens like that. You know, it's hard to make that struggle and give up everything. So she was with us for one record. 00:16:24 Speaker 1: What was the audition process like? And how many other labels were you guys gunning for or how did you even game the well? 00:16:30 Speaker 6: We we actually got our first deal through a production deal that Jerry Butler had on In and Records. 00:16:38 Speaker 1: Very funny really yeah, yeah, Leon Silver, Like everyone has a Jerry. 00:16:45 Speaker 6: So we had a production company, production company, so we signed his production company and after our first record. The label then came over and signed us directly to the label, even though we didn't do any sales on the first record. I couldn't figure that out, but they they signed us directly to the label after the first record. 00:17:02 Speaker 1: What do you think it was that? 00:17:04 Speaker 6: I think back then it was so different than it is today because they had artists development departments, so they could look, they could see us live. They watched the potential and they said, three years down the line, we know what you could be. 00:17:19 Speaker 1: That don't happen anymore. 00:17:20 Speaker 6: Today, and so they invested in developing us and you know, they went out, they found producers, and that's why music is so different today today. I mean, we used to get a piano vocal and we'd be able to hear what this song could be, and record companies could Today. You got to give them a fully produced product and they still can't hear what it's supposed to be. It's crazy. 00:17:48 Speaker 1: So when you nap that record deal, was there suddenly dreams and hopes of like okay, we made it big time and where were those early struggle days? 00:18:00 Speaker 6: Like well it was you know what we did first? Was it with the NM? Was we played behind a couple of their artists. So we played behind Mary Clayton and we did all her live shows and we had this one show was at the Monterey Folk Festival. I guess it was nineteen seventy one and the nineteen seventy one and somebody fell out, so they asked us to do a twenty minute set and we did a twenty minute set. It was like eighty thousand people and they went crazy. That's when the record company said, okay, we see what you can be now. So it was you know, it was a grind, but we were doing all original material and it was a lot of it was social protest material back then, so we were kind of turning people on and turning people off. 00:18:49 Speaker 1: If that seemed like so was it? Albert? Did you guys have a relationship with Albert or Moss at the time? 00:18:55 Speaker 6: When not really? Now the first year we didn't. We were trying to form a relationship. But but but Jerry was our guy, Jerry Moss, I mean herb Albert was the music guy, you know, because he was off doing his thing. But Jerry Moss is the one that really believed in us, and and uh, you know, he put the support behind us. 00:19:16 Speaker 1: See. Yeah, at the time I thought that the Getting Down album, I thought that was the first album. 00:19:21 Speaker 6: I didn't realize that there was one before that. Yeah, it's just called LTD. Really a real forgettable record. You know Getting Down is kind of forgettable too, But you know it was the struggle was it was everybody wanted to sing. So if you listen to those early albums, there was about four different lead singers on. 00:19:43 Speaker 1: The record, and so I thought you were just the drummer of the group. And then figure out. 00:19:48 Speaker 6: So this is where the company came in and you know, the third record, they said, okay, you know this is our third your third record we're invested in. We now have to zero in on a voice. There's too many lead singers, and we think he should do the majority of the vocals. 00:20:06 Speaker 1: How was that. 00:20:08 Speaker 6: I don't think that still sits well with them wait to this day, to this day, Yeah, because they feel that if if everybody had a chance to sing when I left, they would still be viable. So I get that. You know, if it wasn't for the producer giving you all the damn songs and you know when you left, we'd have been straight white. 00:20:28 Speaker 1: Well should have had a hit with some of the I wasn't mad at cutting it up. No, that became you know, that became a hip hop staple. It was different because all this time I thought it was P Funk related. I didn't realize it was ALTD. But well, who was managing you guys at the time? Back then? 00:20:51 Speaker 6: It was a guy named ron Nadell. Okay, he was one of my first managers. 00:20:55 Speaker 1: And so in a situation like that, at least with ten people, like who's the Who's the alpha? 00:21:04 Speaker 6: The alpha figure that there was, It was an alpha figure when I first joined the group. His name was Onion. He had a ball ball headed Onion. 00:21:14 Speaker 1: Onion. Onion was the guy. 00:21:16 Speaker 6: He was the leader. And after I was in the group for about a year and a half, my brother Billy came into group. Okay, and he's an alpha. 00:21:25 Speaker 1: So they clashed. 00:21:27 Speaker 6: Oh you know. It was like, okay, I want to run it this way. I want run it this way. And so I'm sitting in the middle because I was doing most of the work and the lead singing. So it's like, who am I going to side with? So that got old with me. I had to side with somebody, you know. But there were two. There were two that really wanted to control the group, and a group was just set up wrong, you know, and you know you which is good, and you see the way groups are set up today, it's a lot better for the individuals to actually evolve. Back then, you know, we had this songwriters agreement that for some stupid reason, I signed, and so when I was ready to leave the group, I was still signed it as songwriters agreement. And then they didn't want to give me a solo record because A and M came to me and said, we want to give you a solo project. They're like, no, he can't do the solo project. He's exclusive with us. People that wanted me to write songs, no exclusive songwriter agreement with us. So it got stifling to the point where I really couldn't evolve if I wanted to. And you know, so I in nineteen seventy nine, I told him I wanted to leave the group, and then I stayed down another year just to make it easier for them to find someone. And then I did the next tour, and that was in seventy nine. That was the tour we did with the Jacksons, and that was so that was the last tour and then I think I did one more tour. But then when I got ready to leave the group in nineteen eighty, it got they got kind of ugly. That's so that's why there's never been a reunion. 00:23:05 Speaker 1: You know. 00:23:05 Speaker 6: Everybody said, how come there's no LTD reunion? Well, even it's just the way that we split up. It wasn't It wasn't an It wasn't an amicable split, right. 00:23:18 Speaker 1: What was it like working with the Miselle brothers, who. 00:23:22 Speaker 6: Was interesting They produced the Blackbirds. Yeah, they produced Love to the World Record. They were interesting. Uh. They were good because they had you know, they they brought in some very good people as far as uh, you know, orchestrating things. You know, I think Love Ballot was orchestrated so well back then. And uh, but you know, we we did well with the with them. The funny story with them is that I think I sang the lead vocal on Love Ballot at five o'clock in the morning, after I sat and waited for them to show up, and I was so pissed off. I did one take and left and that was it. It was like, I mean, you know, well I'm there at like nine o'clock. I'm all pump rady to sing no Show, No Show. I think they showed up about two thirty three o'clock in the morning, and so we had this big round table discussion. I'm like, I'm out of here. I'm gone just sing this song one time, just try it, all right. So I sang it one take. 00:24:24 Speaker 1: That's the alpha. 00:24:26 Speaker 6: That was it. 00:24:26 Speaker 1: That's the infamous Quincy Jones Alpha state. Quincy Jones has a theory that well, for a lot of the music he would choose to record when he was making a dude, choose to record his musicians at those ungotly hours because he says that if you're fully aware, you'll tend to overthink your performance in the studio, whereas if you're just tired, uh, you just do the matter at hand without putting a second thought into it. 00:25:02 Speaker 6: And that might work for musicians, but if you're tired as a singer, no, but you can't. 00:25:07 Speaker 1: So you're saying when you listen to Love Ballot like, you're like I was pitching on the port or no it. 00:25:14 Speaker 6: Was I was, you know, but you know, for me, for the most part of my career, my first takes always my best take. Always, you know, and I would always go back and do another take, and it was like I was trying to sing like myself now I'm trying to you know, but the first impression was always the right impression. So I'm a I'm a big believer in that. 00:25:37 Speaker 1: You know, so rarely if you worked with the producers, it's like, oh yeah, one time, George. 00:25:44 Speaker 6: Duke, No, I love George Duke, he was George Duke was Oh man. I was so close with George Richard Perry, Richard Perry who had all these hits with the Point of Sisters, and he approves the emotional album with the wu Wu song. 00:26:00 Speaker 1: Okay okay and swato right, and yeah, that was my joy. 00:26:04 Speaker 6: But I pulled it from him after a certain point and took it. So we went on friends to this day. But about he uh yeah, I mean, I mean, I you know, I was like take twenty four and I'm like, dude, I'm not sang this song twenty times. 00:26:20 Speaker 1: You have it. But he never knew what he had. 00:26:24 Speaker 6: He had to sit up and listen to this, taking this take and then piece all this together and I'm like, man, that ain't even real. So we you know, after a while I was like, I got to get away. So and that was a A and M Records decision because that was the first record I did without George. He did my first three solo records, and then here comes Richard Perry and it was like, you know, George was a dream that he was to me, the best producer I've ever worked with as far as knowing how to work with a vocalist, because most of the other producers were kind of intimidate and didn't know what to tell me to do. But George was I mean, dude, dude, he's scary. He had like perfect pitch. He always said, he says he's on that perfect, but he had the perfect pitch. 00:27:11 Speaker 1: And uh. 00:27:12 Speaker 6: He would just make suggestions that were so right on, you know, and I'm like, yeah, George, that's pretty cool. That works, you know. So I had a great relationship with George. But Richard was a different guy. 00:27:22 Speaker 1: You know. 00:27:23 Speaker 6: It was back in the day when people were doing things that they shouldn't be doing in the booth and he never knew when he had it. And it was like that with the musicians. Also. He just was takeoff to take off, the take off to take so he was the one guy that I've never had that experience with any other. 00:27:42 Speaker 1: Who chose How did you guys even get a love ballot? Would Skip? Skip? Scarborough wrote it? 00:27:47 Speaker 6: Skip? 00:27:48 Speaker 1: Scarboro wrote it? And did he have a relationship with you guys? That was just like a song. 00:27:52 Speaker 6: I think Mizelle's knew him and Maurice passed on it. Maurice White passed on it. He gave him first. 00:28:01 Speaker 1: Oops, I'm trying to mat I'm trying to imagine that. Yeah, I probably just didn't work for him, you know, I can kind of hear we would have the earth wind fire right, Yeah, okay, it would be like a love solid day. Yeah, yeah, I can see that now. 00:28:26 Speaker 6: Skip was great, though, Script was brilliant. Cat I used to wait play drums with Skip around town. It used to play behind artists all the time. Yeah, me and Skip. So Skip was cool guy, great songwriter. 00:28:37 Speaker 1: Wait, there was I have a question about like we had a cheap echosystem or like a reverb ecosystem and the mics thing, and like how that came out in seventy. 00:28:53 Speaker 6: Probably seven Love seventy seven okay, six, so the first. 00:28:58 Speaker 1: Song I even't heard it since I was a kid. It but I remember the first song, someone's yelling the words showdown on the fade. Yeah, right, And so in my father's speaker system, like all you have to do is test test one two one two one two, and something told me, Okay, go over there and turn on the ecosystem. But it's nightclub and I was permanently taken off of I never told y'all that I got fired from sound and he was like, no, you just work lights. Now you're not. You're not working mind, just sounds. That's funny. Yeah, but uh, with you guys' presentation, which watching a lot of bands, I will say that maybe heat Wave is probably the only other band I knew that really put a lot of emphasis on their choreography and their acrobatics. I mean heat Wave were. 00:29:56 Speaker 6: They were literally flips and back flips. 00:29:59 Speaker 1: You ever see heat Wave clips seen like a couple of clips you ever see like bring it On? Or like those cheerleading uh ESPN cheerleading squad where they're standing on shoulders and they're doing that. Heat Wave was damn near doing like human pyramids like but playing at the same time, but still like Johnny Wilder's like on someone's shoulders and someone's on his shoulders and crazy. 00:30:24 Speaker 6: But you guys were like, well horn section was flashy. They did all kind of steps. 00:30:29 Speaker 1: Yeah, y'all, y'all were so together with Yeah, so what was in that period when when when the wheels were turning the hits were coming, where you guys like, okay, we gotta have a presentation better than this group and that group like oh yeah. 00:30:45 Speaker 6: It was very competitive back then. The interesting thing was though, that there was one guy that made all the damn uniforms because. 00:30:53 Speaker 1: People don't know guy the ain't Bill Whitten. 00:30:55 Speaker 6: Bill Whitten made the Commodoa's uniforms Ltd's uniforms winning five. We all had those big tubes. 00:31:01 Speaker 1: And stuff and the mirrors on the I was wondering. 00:31:07 Speaker 6: Yeah it was a guy named Bill Whitten, and uh, you know, but yeah, it was you know, it was it was competitive back then, but it was a it was a fun kind of competitiveness. You know. 00:31:19 Speaker 1: We we would challenge each other. You know, did you ever think like, okay, well Parliament's cheating because they're using theatrics and we need to do that. We need to levitate, oh god, earth wind and fires using duty Duck Henning and all that stuff. So was there any discussion of because I know that in the opening for the Jacksons and their affinity for explosive explosives and all those things, Like, was there the thought process like we now have to add on top of these songs, add these theatrical elements to our shows. 00:31:52 Speaker 6: I don't think we ever felt that. I think we were just happy to finally be getting a paycheck and put it all into production. But you're right, was that that uh that Jackson tool was eye opening for me? 00:32:08 Speaker 4: Uh? 00:32:09 Speaker 6: You know that was actually the year Michael came out with Off the Wall, that was his first solo record. So we used to open for them and then they would come out and do theirs, and then he would go back and come back as a solo artist. Right, And uh, it was a fascinating show. It was amazing. Uh, just that whole just traveling with that. I've never seen anybody that the fans went so crazy over as Michael. I mean it was, it was. It was scary to watch it. 00:32:39 Speaker 1: How did for that particular tour, how did product I'm thinking in terms of production, like as far as backline is concerned, Like normally, if. 00:32:48 Speaker 6: We carried all of it back then, most of it really Yeah. 00:32:52 Speaker 1: Got set up and did your loading and all that stuff. Yeah, well no we didn't. 00:32:55 Speaker 6: We had roadies, but I mean we you know, we weren't renting back line back then. 00:32:59 Speaker 1: You know. Well just even the point of like using an established act, wouldn't want an opening act that had you know, I would just think like LTD, damn all those microphones and then they got sound check, use their soundboard and then I got to wipe the board. There was no digital stuff back then, so it was like as big as their production was, then what space that leave you guys, all ten of you to set up your instruments and your equipment and you're well, you. 00:33:31 Speaker 6: Know, the biggest thing was them setting up. Because we won. We went on first, so it was kind of easy for us. I mean, you know, once we finished, then they had to set that whole stage up for them. But the thing but they made it tough for us. They did make it tough for us because I mean we had to. You know, I always tell people, they're like I do shows with people. They're like, well, you got this banner, take this band it down. I'm like, dude, I sang shows with the Jackson sign literally hanging on top of you, I'm ducking right. 00:34:01 Speaker 1: And these things. 00:34:02 Speaker 6: So yeah, so it was challenging because you know, they were the headline and act and so you know, they could leave their most of their stuff up, so we had to play around it. So a lot of times we didn't have that much room on stage. But we were incredible live band. I mean, uh, And they kicked us off that tour. Oh, they kicked us up before they went to LA. They was like, you will not be opening for us in LA. They kicked us off the tour. We did a handful of Dans, We did Madison Square, gotten here, and but we used to light them groups up, commodoors. Who's to light them up? Telling you there was nobody wanted us in front of them. We're a great live group and uh, you know, so that's that's how it was back in the day. Man. 00:34:47 Speaker 1: You know, you had to bring it. You had to bring it. You said that a competition was was really big back then. Who were some of the bands that you guys were afraid of? Were you afraid of it? 00:34:56 Speaker 4: You know? 00:34:56 Speaker 6: We I mean everybody was good back then. So you know we want shows with you know, with the Commodoors mainly, and the big tour back then was LTD Commodoors. We did maybe two three years of that tour and then we'll be on packages. So we were the Old Jays a lot comfunction. Uh you know, we did some days whining Fire, so it was it was competition. But you know, for most of the parts we were we were never headlining. Uh most of those shows, we were somewhere in the middle. We opened for the Commodoors, it was just us and the Commodore's and uh Jackson was just us in the Jackson's. But then we did a lot of those big places like the Dome and Atlanta and we had you know, the Old Jay's confunction LTD Commodoores and we'd be somewhere in the middle, and we used to always talk shit. And my favorite one of my. 00:35:46 Speaker 1: Friend yeah, because you know, my favorite, one of my favorite guys of all time is a LeVert. 00:35:53 Speaker 6: I just I thought he was probably one of the best entertainers I've ever seen because that dude brought it every single night. I knew there was not going to be one night that went by where he was not going to bring it. So we used to talk ship to each other and I'm a single love ballot the night saying I'll be sweeter than But it was always it was friendly. It was friendly. You know, it didn't start getting ugly until god like the nineties and them group started going crazy. It was shooting, going on checks. 00:36:31 Speaker 1: My era. 00:36:33 Speaker 6: Was all kind of wild. 00:36:36 Speaker 7: I wonder how friendly it got because you know, you listen to what was it Ankadelics, Let's take the stage and it's like slicking the family brick, and you know, yeah, they used to talk a lot. So I was just wondering, you know, did anybody ever get offended? You know it was anybody? 00:36:48 Speaker 6: I thought it was funny. Actually it didn't offend me. You know, I thought it was funny. They had names for us. They said, we had a two on our phone. Wait what O? T D had a two on the bunk, like we cut it twice. That's been funny. 00:37:09 Speaker 1: So with with I think the first time that we sort of communicated was when the new edition biopic came on. Were you were you surprised at all that they covered holding on in that or did they ever tell you like that was our. 00:37:28 Speaker 6: Johnny kept hitting to me, you know what they were doing. He said, man, you're gonna like this. You're gonna like this. I said, really, He said, oh yeah, man, we did it right. He said, you did it right. You're gonna You're gonna see. But I remember meeting them when they had first come out, and uh, you know, they brooke their manager, the choreographer brooke did everything. 00:37:49 Speaker 1: Yeah, you know. 00:37:50 Speaker 6: He they did a show and they opened up for me and he came to He said, man, I need you to come in the dressing room and talk to these kids. That's so wow, man, he said. 00:38:00 Speaker 5: They need and they love you. 00:38:01 Speaker 3: Man. 00:38:01 Speaker 6: They love you. They love holding On, they love all your songs. So if you come and speak with a man, it would mean a lot. So I went to the dress room and talk to him and they was wild. 00:38:09 Speaker 1: Like you said, they was just kids. 00:38:11 Speaker 6: Man. They was having fun. But you know they that was the song they got their deal with, you know, holding On. 00:38:19 Speaker 1: So yeah, when I was watching it, I was just like yo, and I was I was more happy because, uh, normally in cases like that, they'll try to dumb down to the you know, the lowest common denominator. And normally, like work in a movie music placement, usually the producers like, well, why don't we pick a song that's more popular? Da da da da whatever? Right, And so I knew that movie was serious when they I was like, yo, they actually And I called the Barry, I called the music supervisors, like how did that even happen? He's like, yep, we wanted to keep authentic and meal and that's the song they always that was the song, always rehearsed. 00:39:00 Speaker 6: They slicked up a little bit with Jimmy and uh, Jimmy and Terry put a little put a little hardcore groove on it. 00:39:08 Speaker 1: It was funky. 00:39:08 Speaker 6: I was like, but yeah, no, they and then you know, I ran into Bobby at some functions. He was like, man, they gave you my play and they gave me in that movie. 00:39:26 Speaker 1: Were you shocked at all at the at the the reception of how Stranger got embraced in the dance tall community at all, or Stranger in the song Stranger? Uh? 00:39:44 Speaker 6: Yeah, I mean I didn't expect it to be that kind of a song, you know, but. 00:39:50 Speaker 1: It's And I hate to ask this because I want to I want to ask a sampling question. 00:39:56 Speaker 6: And then opened the door like it's been sampled a million times. Oh, Okay, you know about a million that lit if I got paid for every time someone's saying that no no, no, no, no, no no no, I'd be going. 00:40:09 Speaker 1: Through the bank. Yeah. 00:40:10 Speaker 6: I was gonna everybody ripped that. 00:40:12 Speaker 1: That is he that is held down dance all music for so long that I was like, yo, I really kind of hope. 00:40:18 Speaker 6: Uh you know that's what that. You know, that copyright thing comes in. You know, you get four bars, you got to change it on the fourth bar and you're safe. 00:40:29 Speaker 1: Who did a I'm trying to figure out who initially did it? Oh no, no, no, no, no no no, no kill he was the biggest, really but he but no, it's the dance all guy. 00:40:43 Speaker 6: Uh oh, I know you talked about it. I can't remember. 00:40:49 Speaker 5: I can't remember the. 00:40:49 Speaker 1: Name because my very first gold record came from him as well. Well he he sampled, Uh who am I? 00:41:00 Speaker 6: Uh? 00:41:03 Speaker 1: Who are you guys have music college? I know, but we're I'm failing today now we have to look it up now. I was saying that my my very first gold record for the longest was the only gold record I can claim, not my own. For your eventual exit uh from the group, going into your solo career. You said that it wasn't amicable, so you gave yourself like at least a year to. 00:41:44 Speaker 6: Well, I had to sit out a year before I could even sign with the and because of this songwriters agreement, because they really wanted to sign me as a writer on the publishing side and as an artist, so they wanted to deal the run concurrently. And uh so I was tied up with them and they wouldn't give me a release. And they told me that if I gave them a piece of my contract, they give me a release. So there's been some ugly stuff going on. So I said, I'll set this year out. 00:42:12 Speaker 1: Wait you were, you were signed, you had you had to sign the LTD and within him Like, no, I had. 00:42:18 Speaker 6: I had a songwriters agreement signed with LTD and it was another year on it. Okay, and so and M wackets wanted to sign me concurrently with a publishing deal and as an artist. And so they came to an M and said, well, we'll make a deal. If he gives us a piece of this and a piece of that, we'll give it. And I'm like, I'm not giving up a piece of nothing no more. So I just sat a year out. 00:42:42 Speaker 1: So, so is that why the Devotion and the Shine On record was so released in proximity because in my head, and you can't even find the Devotion album anymore on streaming services or anything. 00:42:55 Speaker 6: Yeah, it's it's hard to find it. 00:42:56 Speaker 1: Just like, okay, let's get this out with it. 00:42:59 Speaker 6: Then that's it. 00:43:01 Speaker 1: No, I don't think so. 00:43:01 Speaker 6: They they you know, they they put a little time into the record. It didn't affect that record. It affected their next record though, because you know, the company wasn't happy about what happened. So because they had their their last record on A and M was after I left the song, but they had a pull love on that song. And yeah, but that kind of affected their deal, you know, because they basically h went back and said it was another it was a whole is a whole other thing. Now they went over budget with that record. So the record company said, oh okay. They called me. They said, okay, we got a wedge. Now they're over budget, so maybe I can work a deal with them and we'll give them the rest of the money if they give you the release. So said cool. So they worked the deal and no, but they didn't hold up to their end of the deal. LTD, which is why there was only one record left that they have. 00:43:59 Speaker 1: They so. 00:44:02 Speaker 6: It could have been could have been great group, though, I mean, yeah, it's a great group. 00:44:08 Speaker 1: So with your solo record, I mean, was it a feeling of relief finally like or was it fear like, Okay, I'm here alone, Yeah, I'm responsible for everything? 00:44:19 Speaker 6: And well it was a little bit of both because I couldn't I didn't have you know, now I'm out front. It's like I got it now because my name was never out front of the group. It was always just LTD. But you know, you're on stage and you always feel the comfort of having ten of the nine other people behind you. So now it's just me and not in not ever having my name out there, I didn't know if people people didn't know my name, they knew my voice, they didn't know my name. So the biggest, uh, the biggest thing we had, the obstacle we had was to associate the name with the voice, which is why my first record was just called Jeffrey Osborne because back then radio used to backline everything, in front lock everything, so it'd be okay, this is really don't need No Light by Jeffery Osborne. From the album Jeffery Osborne, so they have to keep saying your name, so it kind of yeah, it's so it happened kind of quick. But George. You know, working with George was great too. It helped to have I just felt solid. You know, when you have like a guy that is that musically incredibly solid doing your project. You I felt good about that. I'm like, well, I know it's gonna be musically right. 00:45:30 Speaker 1: You personally chose him, yeah, or were there any other options? 00:45:34 Speaker 6: Like did you well, you know, they the record company was really cool. They said, you know, do we want to We want to find the right person for you, you know, so I talked to a few other people, but when I met George, I was like sold on George, you know, just you know, and I had we had done shows with George, so I had met George before. But he was what a guy talent. 00:45:57 Speaker 1: Okay, I'm dying right now because I just wikipedia his first solo record. I didn't realize that Steve Farni was the drummer on that album and. 00:46:09 Speaker 6: Steve Farroni And now this is what's funny. George didn't even know Steve Froni. But I had done gigs with No. He didn't know Steve Rooniy because George was into more than do go chancellors. You know, the those kind of fusion kind of drummer. It's more so so. And I had been doing shows with AWB you know, a lot of shows, and he was my favorite drummer. I used to sit there and he was I just was fascinated. He had the most incredible press role I ever heard drummer too. I'm like, how do you do that? So I was like, I told George, I said, man, I would love to have this drummer, Steve Froni. He said, I don't know, Man, I don't know Steve. I said, man, I'm telling you. He said, well, he's in New York. We gotta fly him in, we gotta put him up. I said, it's gonna be worthy, George, It's gonna be worthy. He said, I'm gonna trust you on this. 00:46:58 Speaker 1: Wait a minute, now, I have to listen to this entire record because God even the double hit at the end of one of the wings of Love right, wait till I tell my family that's the step is my idol. The reason why I drummed that he's one of my idols man. Yeah, it was my boys, his black and white kit that he used on the AWB tour, like his only drum kit. He gave me that snare drum my first day of the Tonight Show. 00:47:27 Speaker 6: Are you serious? 00:47:28 Speaker 1: Yeah? Like I was raised on a w B. When I saw him on Soul Train, I was like, that's what I want to do for a living. So he gave me that on my first day at the Tonight Show. Yo. Incredible dude drumming on the wings love. 00:47:43 Speaker 5: Yeah, speaking of which we have now we have that in common. 00:47:47 Speaker 1: Yes, now for the next ninety minutes, Sugar, Steve, I mean, are we at that? Yes, We're We're there. I set you up for the alue. 00:47:57 Speaker 8: This is it feels ridiculous this guy's telling us an Actually, I mean no, don't be a shame. 00:48:02 Speaker 1: Listen, Steve has I've been waiting for you to tell this story to our listeners. We've been, we've been throughout the history of the show. Right, They've known that on the Wings of Love means something to Steve, but we never thoroughly explained really why. 00:48:21 Speaker 8: First of all, you're going to feel silly telling me no, I just got I'm a Jewish person. I have ten disclaimers I want to put first. 00:48:29 Speaker 1: Jeff have you ever had someone just nerd out on you and it's been a little awkward. 00:48:37 Speaker 5: No, it's not awkward. 00:48:39 Speaker 8: I've told the story literally one hundred times, one hundred times in my life, so it's not awkward. 00:48:43 Speaker 5: It's awkward telling it to you, but. 00:48:46 Speaker 1: Just pretending he's not here. Yeah, no, but you tell us about on the wings. I'm just talking to me and Bill. I'm about to Okay, thanks. 00:48:52 Speaker 8: I'm gonna tell it to Jeffrey that Actually, if you don't mind, all right, I'm gonna eat my oatmeal. 00:48:56 Speaker 6: Okay. 00:48:59 Speaker 8: But and I'm sure you've heard a thousand and one stories about this song and people's experiences with this song weddings, I'm sure, and this, that and the other thing. 00:49:10 Speaker 1: But for me, what what? What is it? 00:49:13 Speaker 8: Nineteen eighty two now is Yes? So I was eleven or twelve or something like that in seventh or eighth grade and and so junior high and we have music. It was a music class and one of the assignments mister Gallo was the teacher, and the assignment was called a roll out, which was basically, you take you choose a song, and you do illustrations based on the lyrics, and then you go in front of the class, you play the song, and as the song plays, you roll out the scroll of illustrations as the lyrics go by. So that was my favorite song at the time. It was on the top ten or whatever, and I was completely digging it. And so I chose that song, and I worked for weeks on this rollout, and I had the markers and the crayons, and I went to town. I mean it's you know, as the first verse starts and all the sunshine, you know, everything was sun and love and wings and hearts. 00:50:16 Speaker 1: And I'm having a hard time seeing this coming from you. And you didn't and you didn't say there was this junior high. I thought this was elementary. 00:50:26 Speaker 8: No, there's like seventh grade or something like that. Okay, junior high right out of elementary school. But whatever, whatever grade you're in when you're eleven or twelve. So so I did this, I mean I really, I have to say, I did a great job on this thing, real proud of it, and went into school the day that we were presenting it, and so sitting in the class and mister Gallows says, all right, the boys going to go first, And so the first boy went up and put He says, all right, you know, my song is Black Sabbath war Pigs and proceeds to play warp Pigs and rolls out this this rollout, and next next boy comes up and he says, yeah, this is a my song is van Halen running with the Devil? You know, does his thing? Next kid comes up, deep purple smoke on the water. You see where this is going. So next next up Stephen Mandel, you know, come to the front of the class. By this point, I know, I know that things are have gone horribly right from me already and are about to go much more horribly awry, of course, with all due respect to the greatness of your song. 00:51:50 Speaker 5: So I go up to the front of the class, hearts. 00:51:52 Speaker 8: Beating, everybody looking at me, put my cassette in, you know, in the boom box. Piano starts and uh and uh, you know, the intro, and then the first first starts. I start rolling out my scroll. Here comes the sun, Here comes the hearts, Here comes the wings. And I see all the girls looking at me like falling in love. And I see all the dudes pointing and laughing and screaming sorry, and uh it was you know, it was clearly at that moment when I realized, you know that. 00:52:39 Speaker 5: I wasn't cool. I guess according to SO, I was essentially. 00:52:45 Speaker 8: Excommunicated for the next I don't know, six years from the from the social scene of my junior high and then high school. 00:52:55 Speaker 5: I was. I was beat up, mocking laughed at, of course, m beat up and whooped. 00:53:02 Speaker 8: But here's here's the the end, or the punchline rather, which is, uh, the joke was on them because I got an A plus and uh. And it took it took a few years to recover from that socially, but never I never turned my back on the song, though I never said, I never said that. 00:53:20 Speaker 6: Song every time you heard it the opposite. 00:53:24 Speaker 1: He went deep into what's which actually leads me to my next question, because the song got so much traction on m R, which is, what is it? Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, so uh leased in eighty two there's there's there's a pattern that I noticed of seventies X uh, seventy soul X that go solo or sort of go to a promised land, like I never thought it was a thing of okay, what do I have to do to survive or justify my record deal? And I never you know, I've read some of that stuff in Jet magazine like Go and Pop or whatever or crossing Over. But you know between Coolna Gang, the Pornous Sisters, Lionel, Michael Jackson, whatever, I mean there there's there's this migration into a new, unchartered, black, smooth, black pop territory that you're kind of planting your flag and not occupying. I mean, at the time with On the Wings of Love, did you feel as though, okay, this is this might have the potential to be something more than it was, or to you it was just like, got another ballot here, this is it now? 00:55:05 Speaker 6: I think, you know, under Wings of Love to me was a chance to showcase another side of myself that I hadn't really had that opportunity with LTD because LTD most of the ballots were straight up R and B ballots. So this was the first chance I got it because I always felt, you know, I mean, I want to be able to sing everything, no matter what it is. I want to be able to sing that, and I never really got. The closest thing we came to it was the year before was shine On, which was again written with Richard Kerr, who was one of those you know, big songwriters back then, and that didn't do as well as the R and B records. On that record, I mean, the R and B songs like where did We Go Wrong? Those were bigger than shine On, But I just felt like it was a nice departure and still trying to keep the record so that it was you know, it had an R and B flavor to it because I didn't want to leave the R and B roots, but I did want something that might go across. 00:56:05 Speaker 1: It was. 00:56:06 Speaker 6: It was weird back in the seventies. I mean, it was a time we couldn't put our faces on the record covers. Yeah you know you remember that, you know, the rack jobs. They wouldn't rack it, and so it was weird. And we didn't even get a chance to have the pop department work our records at M Records. They never even worked our records. Back in Love just crossed over on its own. Really, they didn't know what happened. They looked up and it was on pop shots like okay, so then they want to take credit for it, right, like yeah, right, you did nothing, So yeah, so I kind of made you know, it's one of those songs. When I heard it, I was like, I wrote it with this guy piano player, and when he played it for me, I was like, I like that, that's kind of showcases another side. 00:56:48 Speaker 1: So well, now I'm realizing that, uh, you had every monster on this album. People there and yeah, Ernie Watson and Lark Graham and. 00:57:01 Speaker 6: Bark Graham did yeah, Michael. 00:57:05 Speaker 1: Lewis, Lewis Johnson, Louis. 00:57:06 Speaker 6: Johnson, Yeah, Mike so Bellow, it was Hawk Withlensky, I wrote a couple of yeah, yeah, yeah. 00:57:14 Speaker 1: So he had some people on that record. So at the time, were you just like a kid in the candy store, like I want the best of the best to work on this record, And well I was. 00:57:23 Speaker 6: I mean, but you know, it wasn't just me. It was George. You know, George was. 00:57:28 Speaker 1: Like getting George has the connections to get. 00:57:31 Speaker 6: Exactly and a lot of those people had worked with George before, with the exception of Ferroni, you know, and I don't know if Mike and Bello had worked with him before, but Mike was incredible, dude, man, Michael play play and mikel singing too. Mike was talented. 00:57:48 Speaker 1: You know, this is blew in my mind that I didn't realize that he's on all all these records, Peter Schles. 00:57:56 Speaker 6: Peter Schlesh, Yeah, he's He wrote the song with Peter Schless and when it's funny, I played played it for George and he was playing it real fast. You know, damn no, no, no, don't, don't don't. Joyce said, nah, I ain't hearing that, Like jeege, I'm gonna slow it down, you know, get this melody's gonna be right. I'm gonna write these incredible lyrics. You're gonna You're gonna have to. You're gonna really have to turn my head on this one. So I finally brought it into him. He said, oh, okay, yeah, I like that. 00:58:26 Speaker 1: I like that. 00:58:27 Speaker 5: And that was the first single on this rend. 00:58:28 Speaker 1: I Really Don't Need No Light. 00:58:29 Speaker 6: Really, don was the first single. 00:58:32 Speaker 1: I even when queuing up his singles for it for some reason. I Really Don't Need No Light and don't you get so mad? In my head they're the same song, the same song, and then I realized, like, oh wait a minute, they are two different songs. 00:58:47 Speaker 6: They're two different songs, but yeah, they got that same vibe and they were written by totally different people, which is interesting. 00:58:54 Speaker 1: You know, how did another barried Man in Cynthia? 00:58:58 Speaker 6: Uh what, yeah? 00:59:03 Speaker 1: Did Okay? So in the songwriters period of the eighties, and was it just that you go to a publishing house and they give you a slower cassettes to listen to and you. 00:59:15 Speaker 6: Yeah, that's basic, do you Yeah? Generally back then, you know, all these publishing companies they kind of put the word out, you know, on an artist is getting ready to do a record, you put the word out and then you start getting stuff submitted, you know, from all the other different publishing companies. And that's basically how it worked. And but with Barry Man Cynthia, while, they actually came to me and said they had a song that they thought would be good for me. And I mean, you know, there's a duo that had probably number one hit records going as far back as you know, the leader of the pack that stuff. I mean, you know every year they had a number one record. Who I was like, I'm sure not going to turn this down. So yeah, so it was it was it was great getting a song from them. And that's an intricate kind of a song. I mean, so they tailor made it just for you. I don't know if they tailor made it tailor made it for me. I think that they had written this song and they thought that it would be good for me, not like I went to him in front to write me a song. 01:00:14 Speaker 1: You know. 01:00:15 Speaker 6: They came in with the song and I was like, yeah, this is this is a nice piece of work. 01:00:20 Speaker 1: I could tell that an M was really behind the baby stayed with me tonight because the commercials. 01:00:29 Speaker 6: That's funny though, because they and them told me I should take go back and sing that song again. I sang it too low. What I'll tell you this is just stories when you think, yeah, they told me, Nah, you didn't. This ain't right. You got to go back and sing it's too low. Your voice is too low. I'm like, too low, that's my voice. Who was your A and R on this project back then? I'm trying to think, well, Charlie Mino was to pop in our guy. I think it was this guy named Barry. I can't think of his last name. It was so long ago. Really yeah, but they basically told me, uh, I think you missed it and you should go back and re sing it. And I'm like, I'm not gonna go back and re sing this. This is how it's supposed to be. That's weird because we want me to do now taking any other octave and false that up. 01:01:17 Speaker 1: The commercial spots that they had for the album almost made it almost like James Bondish, like Osborne Osborn, like the and the logo on like it showed a lot during like Soul Train and Solid Gold. 01:01:32 Speaker 6: So that was Raymond Jones who actually wrote that song, and uh, it was kind of all of his vision. 01:01:41 Speaker 1: You know, he came in. 01:01:42 Speaker 6: He wanted Alfonso Johnson play bass. I mean he kind of had it. Oh you played bass, Okay, yeah, Alfonso Johnson and uh, you know Raymond had Raymond was a talented guy. You know he was with Chica all those years and uh, real talented guy. There was a different song for that period because I asked, funny because I hear that song now on the radio and it kind of almost sounds like what's going on today. It's it's actually sounds fresher than anything else I've done, and still it's an eighties song. 01:02:15 Speaker 1: Yeah, it's the test of time. 01:02:17 Speaker 6: Yeah, it had all the gimmicks and that was you know Hawkwlinsky was the gimmick guy too. Really, oh that guy was coming. He was the first person I ever seen coming with that Len drum machine. And uh sequence Plain Love was completely sequenced, and George was freaking out. George was like, yeah, he wrote. 01:02:37 Speaker 1: It, that'sh Yeah he was. George was like, George was not into that. 01:02:44 Speaker 6: He was like, I don't know, man, this is I don't know about this sequence stuff. 01:02:47 Speaker 5: Man. 01:02:48 Speaker 1: Yeah, he wasn't. 01:02:49 Speaker 6: He wasn't crazy about just the way it was laid out. But I mean as we got into it, he was like, Okay, I see who he's going after. But you know, there was like Sinn drums on there, some weird and even the twelve inch mix of it, Like the twelve inch was that's the only twelve inch mix that I liked of any song that was ever mixed of mine. I hate all the mixes. That's the only one I like. 01:03:10 Speaker 1: Even to this day. I dja the twelve inch mix of it. 01:03:13 Speaker 6: No, it works like that was the number one dance song in New York when it was out. 01:03:18 Speaker 1: Yes, it was. That was like that was a bee Boy classic, had a break in the middle and all that stuff. 01:03:23 Speaker 6: When I come to New York to do shows, I have to do plain love and I don't do it most of the time, but I have to do it here. 01:03:29 Speaker 1: I was gonna Okay, so eventually one of these days, uh, you know, we're gonna have you sit in on the tonight show. 01:03:36 Speaker 6: Right. 01:03:37 Speaker 1: We've been waiting for this moment forever. And we were kind of on our group chatter and like, okay, what are the six? What do we make them do? What do we make it? Time? 01:03:45 Speaker 5: And you know, one slots filled right here? 01:03:50 Speaker 1: Yes, we know, we know. 01:03:53 Speaker 6: But this morning I was the east of a song to play. 01:03:56 Speaker 1: It's funny you say. 01:03:58 Speaker 6: Keyboard nightmare, but in my head I. 01:04:01 Speaker 1: Was like, yo, well he because in my head like even a deep cuts like so wato right? Uh? Playing love like all? I was just like he probably don't do that no more. He'll just I do it. I do it. 01:04:13 Speaker 6: It just depends. But I've been doing it a lot lately, actually playing love. Yeah, I've been doing it a lot lately. Hmm. 01:04:21 Speaker 7: Okay, I have a question about a song real quick. Yeah, was I Just Want to Be Your Friend? Ever released on an album? 01:04:27 Speaker 6: Was on that soundtrack? There was a soundtracks that sound. 01:04:30 Speaker 1: Okay, I can't find that soundtrack anyway. 01:04:32 Speaker 6: The Toy, The Toy with Richard. 01:04:36 Speaker 1: It was it was the theme song. 01:04:38 Speaker 7: Know that songboy that The Toy is one of my favorite movies ever. 01:04:44 Speaker 1: So of course I've seen the intro like a billion times and it opens the movie. So it does. It's so funny. 01:04:50 Speaker 6: I mean, my my wife, you know, every now and then she'll be that movie will come on and she Okay, I can't believe that you're singing this stuff. I used to love that song. 01:05:01 Speaker 1: Come on, you worked with with Rod Temperton. How did you get I know that he opened the. 01:05:16 Speaker 6: Yeah he did. 01:05:17 Speaker 1: I got to look up the emotional it wasn't it was we belong to Love? We Belonged to Love was the song? Yeah? Yeah, he I know that Rod Temperton did that one. Did you Did he collaborate with you directly or was it just like no, he wrote it. 01:05:28 Speaker 6: I was trying to collaborate with him. But you know, Rod's different kind of guy. Rod's like, okay, well well mate, will we'll well mate, we'll we'll. 01:05:36 Speaker 1: Try to make this work. 01:05:37 Speaker 6: He didn't pull and he calls me and says, well, I got the songs. 01:05:40 Speaker 1: Did he Pool's team as he did it. Yeah, no, he always right, that's right. Right, Wait a minute, I'm sorry. I hate the fact that I'm seeing as in real time Haymush Stewart. 01:05:56 Speaker 6: Yeah, I didn't know that. Yeah, I did not know that really has brought the song to me. I was like, I like this song really. Yeah, I know it's kind of weird, isn't it. Did you think about him that song? Yeah? Like so I believe it's something you don't know, because damn you know every day you know more about me than I do. 01:06:20 Speaker 4: No, I. 01:06:22 Speaker 1: I'm just saying that. 01:06:25 Speaker 6: You know what it is. 01:06:26 Speaker 1: I have most of your discography on cassette, right, A lot of those credits. 01:06:30 Speaker 6: Aren't it's so tiny, So yeah, I did. 01:06:33 Speaker 1: I didn't have it in no, if it was on record, if I have the records, actual. 01:06:39 Speaker 5: Writing is really small on here too. 01:06:41 Speaker 1: No. 01:06:41 Speaker 6: But I mean that's a lot bigger than anything you're gonna get today, though. 01:06:47 Speaker 1: If you get anything. 01:06:48 Speaker 5: I have a question. 01:06:51 Speaker 8: Whose decision or or request or desire was it to have Brian May from Queen on Stay with Me? 01:06:59 Speaker 6: That was was actually my manager, Jack Nelson, who used to manage Queen, and he did the guitar solo. He did the guitar solo on Yeah. Okay, so he said, you know, he said, well, maybe I can talk Brian into doing it. I said, really, that would be really good if Brian came in and did it. And he came in and did it. Great. Guy. 01:07:21 Speaker 5: We're a Queen fan, yeah, I was. 01:07:24 Speaker 1: Yeah. I knew a lot of their stuff. 01:07:25 Speaker 6: I wasn't like a big Queen fan, but I knew a lot of their material, and I was shocked at some of the songs that Brian May wrote. I mean, I didn't know he wrote we Will Rock You. It's like in every stadium across the country. Dude's incredible. 01:07:39 Speaker 5: I can't read who played bass on Stay with Me Tonight. 01:07:44 Speaker 6: I'll find so Johnson. 01:07:45 Speaker 5: Okay, sorry you said that. 01:07:46 Speaker 1: Okay, yeah, so with You should be mine, which, of course, the magic's in the woo woo woo ad libs. I mean, how does that presented to you in a way where you're like, Okay, this will work, or because the thing is is like hearing you sing and I'm like, oh yeah, hell I have that. But I can't imagine you hearing the demo and saying like, yeah, this is gonna work for me? Like how to? 01:08:19 Speaker 6: I didn't really know until I sang it. And once I sang it, I liked it. And I you know, back then, you know, you bring everything home and you bring it home and you put it on in the house, you know, and house tested. And my three year old daughter, she she's the one that confirmed it. I mean, she barely can talk and she's like, Daddy, what that woo song is so good? I'm like, what, I liked it? I said, it's not called the wool song. It's called you should be Mine. She said, no, that's the woo song. 01:08:49 Speaker 1: How bet you? Every black person ever met. 01:08:51 Speaker 6: Says everyone everyone. I mean, you know, they'll just somewhere. But yeah, that was that's a huge song man. I became the Woo Woo man all of a sudden. 01:09:02 Speaker 1: I was like, what they did? And why why did you and Duke stop working together after the the Emotional album. 01:09:11 Speaker 6: That was a record company kind of decision. They felt that we got there, but we didn't get where they thought I should be and they thought Richard they want Richard. Perry was the hardest thing out right then. So it was all for good reasons, but it kind of broke up a really good relationship that I had with George, and so I was kind of reluctant, and then it turned out so bad. I was like, wow, that was not good. But yeah, it was kind of them. They came to me and they said, well, you know, these guys are. 01:09:44 Speaker 1: Hot, man. 01:09:44 Speaker 6: They got all these hit records, and you know, Richard is great at finding good songs and this and that, and so you know, I gave it a shot. 01:09:52 Speaker 1: And in their mind, did they say like, okay, well you should be in Linel territory now, or like where where was their point of satisfaction? 01:10:04 Speaker 6: I think they felt that I should have been that I could reach another plateau in their mind, you know. 01:10:12 Speaker 1: Uh. 01:10:13 Speaker 6: And I have to credit them with by saying, you know, they were looking out, you know, trying to do the best that they thought was in my interest. And I was kind of curious about it because I'm like, wow, these guys do have this Richard Perry doesn't have a serious track record of hits. And he brought in the big people, the Diane Warrens and all them, and you know, the only thing that worked off that record was the. 01:10:36 Speaker 1: Wools, Right. 01:10:39 Speaker 6: I still dunk wayo yeah. I mean, you know else, the Wada was great too. It was a couple of good songs out there. But you know, for the most part, it didn't. The relationship didn't work out with me and Richard. 01:10:51 Speaker 1: And was it just like because I oft didn't wonder when you have mega a mega producer of that level, and I guess he did the breakout record with Porn and Sisters, right, So when you have a megaproducer that is probably often in demand, it's probably paint by numbers if he's an industry like, Okay, I got you this week and then I got there. So do you feel as the least with the chemistry between you and George was that you guys sat down and took time to socialize with each other and got to know and be. 01:11:28 Speaker 6: On top of that, we were really good friends, you know. So we had a really good, relaxed relationship, you know, and you come into Richard and it's more of a hyper kind of thing where you know, he's and he was never satisfied with anything. So that was confusing me. I'm like, someone have all this success and he's never satisfied. You know, he would have you know, back then, you had your master twenty fourth track and he would have like five slaves. I'm like, dude, when are you gonna put all these up? 01:12:02 Speaker 1: Right? 01:12:04 Speaker 6: So it was it was an interesting process working with Richard and we thought it would it would actually, you know, just lead to more and more success. Basically you made. 01:12:14 Speaker 1: A move to Arista for yeah, I did. 01:12:16 Speaker 6: That was an interesting move too. 01:12:18 Speaker 1: Was it Clive selling you the dream of I can make this happen? 01:12:21 Speaker 6: Exactly exactly because I actually was torn between Clive in Motown because Barry Gordy was made a big pitch for me. 01:12:32 Speaker 1: Wait in nineteen ninety yeah. 01:12:34 Speaker 6: But Motown wasn't really smoking hot then, it was. It was on the down side at that point. And Clive, you know, Clive did his number, he offered you know me the you know the right number right right. Yeah, but then we clashed, and Clive kind of clash because he doesn't like a strong personality. He likes somebody that's just gonna do whatever he says, and you know, I have a problem. Song was right, But then you know, this is a guy that wants a saxophone solo on every record. The couldn't be no other, no other, So it's gotta be saxophone record. Take that off, put the saxophone on it, exactly. 01:13:16 Speaker 1: Sorry, So we had a we had a that's the Arister, that's the Arista Sax. 01:13:20 Speaker 5: Like, sorry, Arista Sax. 01:13:28 Speaker 6: Think about it. It's the Kenny g thing for sure. Yeah, so we you know, the first record, I had a great time with the Barry Uh, Barry Eastman. He did basically the whole record. So I came back here to New York and worked with Barry, and I love Barry. He was a great guy to work with. But I don't think really Clyide went after that record. I mean, only Human was was a hit, and then he kind of like fell off after that by going after he thought if my Brothers in Trouble was a hit, and he kind of pushed that song on me. It wasn't a song that I selected. And that's another way you run into problems with Clyde. He's so involved and he wants to basically tell you what you should have on your record and pick your songs. So I had a hard time with that because you know, I never had anybody telling me, well, you need to do this song and take that off, put this song on, do that and so we kind of clashed heads, and I think my personality was a little too strong. He doesn't clive, he doesn't like confrontation, and he does he give. 01:14:34 Speaker 1: You at least the warning in the beginning, like, look like, just let me drive the car, and I swear we'll get you to I've heard there before exactly. 01:14:47 Speaker 6: He gave me that whole pitch and then he you know, he makes it sound right. You know, you don't realize you're going to go into a situation where like my second record, after Only Human, was three years before he could decide on what songs I was supposed to sing. So at that point it got crazy and so we worked on an agreement to to get it released. So I only did one record. 01:15:12 Speaker 1: Whatever, okay was, especially in the late eighties and the early nineties, was the onslaught of new jack swing and what was happening with traditional R and B. Was that troublesome for you at the time, Like, well, I'm not gonna have to do the running man now on these videos pull James ingram Y record, that's right, record, it's real? Yeah, what yeah, okay, okay. 01:15:46 Speaker 6: Well, you know I just never gave into that. I you know, it was all around me, and it was temptation maybe I should go this way, but I kind of said, you know, I'm not gonna. I'm not gonna. I'm just gonna try to stay doing what I do, you know. I mean, I think what happens with veteran artists is that, you know, you get to a point where there's there's always something new coming in, there's always a new flavor. Especially with R and B and black audiences, they're on to the next hip thing all the time. So if you don't keep up, you kind of just kind of get pushed back. And then radio does the same thing. Unfortunately, you know, if it doesn't fit this format, you're not going to get played and they can't appreciate, you know, what you have to offer. Although they play your old stuff, they won't play this stuff, you know, And so then there's the sellout point. Well you know, you know, do you do this and then they say you're selling out. So it's a kind of a catch twenty two. As you get longer and longer into your career, it becomes it becomes a challenge. It's a demographic battle. You know, you're fighting for the people that actually go out and buy the records, which are the younger crowd, the younger crowd, and it happens, and every entertained his life. I see people getting all My favorite singers got phased out when I was hot. You know, they were like still doing their thing, but radio wasn't embracing it, and they didn't want to flip over to do this, And so I guess it's a natural process of evolution. The only person I've seen whether the whole damn storm, is Damn Tony Bennett. I can't figure out. This guy is like nowhere, nowhere, He'll still be still singing. Yeah, thats what I'm saying. 01:17:35 Speaker 1: Touring wise, what are your favorite territories? 01:17:38 Speaker 6: Well, you know, I think here in the US, you know, there's always markets that you like to come to. You know, New York is one. There are tough markets. New York's a tough market, isn't it. Well you better you better be good in New York or they'll let you know it. Yeah. 01:17:58 Speaker 1: I think, Well, I'm not relevant to what you guys want to at least fourteen instant classics like back up, But. 01:18:04 Speaker 6: Yeah, but you still better be good when you go out there to do them. 01:18:08 Speaker 1: You can't phone it in from home. No, okay, you know you got you gotta do all at the end of love ballot or else like way, Mama, you missed one. 01:18:19 Speaker 6: That's funny. But yeah, I mean, you know these are to me New York, Philly, DC. Those are those are the markets that actually break you, you know, the West Coast market, so they kind of follow, kind of follow suit. But these are the tough market. So I like New York, I like Philly, I like DC. And then my favorite place is New Orleans because New Orleans is just crazy. 01:18:43 Speaker 4: Man. 01:18:43 Speaker 6: They just love everything down there. Yeah, they love it. 01:18:46 Speaker 1: They drink twenty four seven. So the party has already started. Yeah, but uh, what about what about outside of the United States? Like where is a market? 01:18:58 Speaker 6: You know, I like you, I love the Islands, you know, I just have a fun time now. 01:19:05 Speaker 1: I like the people. 01:19:05 Speaker 6: I feel like I'm right at home and they've supported me forever there. I mean, China is like the national anthem in Jamaica exactly. It's like what nowhere else in the world China national anthem. But it's interesting, you know, because I you know, I don't do a lot abroad. You know, I've done Europe, but not a lot of Europe, you know. And I'm just getting calls from Sweden like we want you over here. And I've never been to Sweden. So there's places, there's places I've never performed, a lot of places I've never performed. 01:19:39 Speaker 1: Oh yeah, absolutely, you got to do it. Wait where do you reside? Now? 01:19:44 Speaker 6: I live in La Okay, I've been in La since nineteen seventy, so you know I left with LTD back this nineteen. 01:19:52 Speaker 1: So since that, Wait, you never told us at the did you guys ever recover that trailer that women did? Mountainside? 01:20:00 Speaker 6: Did beat up some of our equipment, Uh, you know, but we recovered it and uh got it back up the mountain there and put it back on, hitched it and went on our way to La. 01:20:10 Speaker 1: I thought, you guys are just like, oh, there's that. That's that. 01:20:14 Speaker 6: No, we got it back, you know, we had to get it back. We were broke ass people just quick. 01:20:22 Speaker 1: So you just released worth it all? You did you work with on on on that record? 01:20:27 Speaker 6: I worked with me and that's it. I mean really I wrote everything and I produced everything on the record. So Good's probably the first record that I wrote everything on. It I have one song that I actually wrote with my son, and he's, uh, it's like it's it's interesting. He's he's a junior, never was into music, went to school, played basketball, came home from Collins and told me he raps. Now, I'm like, what really, I raised your ass and I never heard you rap once. Well, now you know, I've been in the dorm with my friends and uh, you know, we all started rapping, and so I'm into rap. So so he's doing his thing now, he's you know, rapping and writing. He's now writing music and he's a great engineer. He does my sound live sound. Now, my sound engineer took him under this wing and he taught him well because now when my engineer can't do it, he does my house and he's really good at it. So I figured, uh, he here is different than I do. I'm like, okay, so let me give me a track. 01:21:27 Speaker 1: Side note. That's also how I broke the news to my own dad that I was starting the Roots. Really, I was like, oh, by the way, it's on your second album though, right, well, yeah, he saw on the newspaper. 01:21:38 Speaker 5: What is this. 01:21:39 Speaker 1: I was like, hell, a little project with Yeah, it's like it took my second album to for me to break that news to my dad. He wanted me and Juilliard and whatever. Yeah, I just have to say that this is it's amazing. 01:21:58 Speaker 6: Now. 01:21:59 Speaker 1: I'm still salty that I'd let a Steve Frown project go on for so long that I never knew about. I just saw him too. Oh. Man. 01:22:08 Speaker 6: I did a show in La I was one of the wineries in Mecula and he was on the gig playing with Mindy A Bear. 01:22:16 Speaker 1: I'm like, what, oh, okay, at least he's still gigging, because after. 01:22:20 Speaker 6: He just let he had just left Tom Petty and so at the time. So yeah, well Steve always has the best gigs. Yeah, he always has the best gigs he does. But he's still my favorite drummer. 01:22:32 Speaker 1: Mane. 01:22:32 Speaker 6: And then I saw but Not Purtty at one of my shows and uh, really Houston and that that just lit me up. I love that dude. 01:22:41 Speaker 1: You still play I mean the. 01:22:42 Speaker 6: Rock Steady song that was it. But yeah, he's evolutionized all that. No, I don't play. I haven't played since nineteen seventy. I'm going to say when Love Ballot became a hit, I was seventy five they reck a company came to me and said, you have got to get up from behind the drums because I used to play and sing a long time. They said, you know, this song is a hit with the ladies. They can't see you with four horn players standing in front of you. You got to get out. I didn't even know what to do my hands. I was so used to singing and playing. So they got me this guy that was the president of a theater at the LA Community College, and he came in. He kind of worked with me and showed me how to kind of open up and you know, and from that point on, I played on the next couple of records, but I never got a chance to really sit down and play, and my career kind of took off. And it's it's one of those instruments that is really touch sensitive. I mean if you don't do it. I mean I could sit down and play a groove, but when I start trying to get around it. So never en concert. Were you like I used to do? I did at one point. I used to play in the show, but I don't needmore and my band is stepping on me. You need to get back. You need to play at the show man. 01:23:58 Speaker 1: You need to but I got to. 01:24:00 Speaker 6: Yeah, I mean I got to sit down and I have the ship. You got three months before I would even attempt. Man, it's like the bike. 01:24:06 Speaker 1: No, it ain't okay. 01:24:08 Speaker 6: I mean playing the groove, playing the groom was like riding the bike. But when you start getting around exactly I'm here so but you know, I might. 01:24:18 Speaker 1: Get back into it. 01:24:19 Speaker 6: I just need to take the time out to sit down and do it because it was it was kind of what got me into this business. 01:24:26 Speaker 1: Really open up the doors for me. Well, we thank you for it, Steve. Any other things you. 01:24:34 Speaker 6: Man, he kind of opened up a lot yea therapeutics. 01:24:41 Speaker 5: It was my wings. 01:24:43 Speaker 1: Feel good, mister Osborne. We thank you so much. Man, it's been a pleasure. Hopefully one day you'll come on the Tonight Show and sit in with the group. Maybe. Yeah, it's great man. 01:24:58 Speaker 6: Yes, I gotta get you guys to come down to my you know, I have a celebrity golf tournament trying to get you. It's in July this year, the twenty ninth, thirtieth and thirty. 01:25:07 Speaker 1: First Jeffrey Osborne Celebrity. 01:25:10 Speaker 6: It's an incredible tournament, man, and I have all the old school singers come, Smokey comes, OJ's come, Johnny Gill comes, Philip Bailey comes, and it's so it's more than just a tournament because we jam, you know, and then you know, Magic Johnson hosted for me every year. So I got Sugar Rayling, I got the most of the top athletes along with the best entertainers, and we just party. Man, it's a three day party. Man, it's it's incredible, said Foxwoods. Now I got at the casino, so it loves that, right. 01:25:42 Speaker 1: We thank you very much for coming on the show on behalf of Sugar Steve and Boss Bill and I'm Paybill and fan Tickeolo and who are not here? 01:25:51 Speaker 5: No no, no, no, no suckers. 01:25:52 Speaker 1: Yeahs. Anyway, this is Quest Love Quest Love Supreme. We will see you on the nextico. 01:26:00 Speaker 6: Thank a right. 01:26:11 Speaker 1: Course. Love Supreme is a production of iHeartRadio. This classic episode was produced by the team at Papandora. For more podcasts from iHeart Radio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.