Speaker 1: My name is Alex and I am a proud ally
Speaker 1: to the Black Lives Matter movement. No be alright, no alright,
Speaker 1: no be alright forever, No be alright, alright, no be
Speaker 1: alright forever. So I was planning on releasing my debut album,
Speaker 1: The Gospel Tree, the first week of June. I can't
Speaker 1: remember exactly what date it was, and I thought it
Speaker 1: was the right time. We were in the middle of
Speaker 1: a pandemic. Uh. It felt like the world could use
Speaker 1: some of the messages that I had wanted to share
Speaker 1: in my music, and I thought it was really kind
Speaker 1: of like the perfect time to drop the album. And
Speaker 1: then I saw it. I I saw the video of
Speaker 1: of George Floyd being murdered at the hands of police.
Speaker 1: I mean, I feel like, as an American, you see
Speaker 1: violence all the time. It's it's literally glamorized. It's it's
Speaker 1: sexy to see violence. We watch World Star fights, we
Speaker 1: watch you know, rated our movies, we watch war movies.
Speaker 1: We watch everything we can. But this one felt disgusting.
Speaker 1: This one felt hatred fueled. You know, it felt like
Speaker 1: I I was watching something that I shouldn't have to
Speaker 1: see as a human being, and it just brought forth
Speaker 1: feelings that I've always felt, of supporting somebody standing up
Speaker 1: to bullies, not letting somebody put another person down, not
Speaker 1: letting anybody think that they're more valuable than somebody else,
Speaker 1: And it just it lit this fire under me. I
Speaker 1: shut everything down. I told my team, we're not releasing
Speaker 1: the album. I stopped posting on social media, as if
Speaker 1: the world wasn't about to enter or wasn't in this
Speaker 1: disgusting place. And it's interesting because we were in a pandemic.
Speaker 1: People are dying every single day. But for some reason,
Speaker 1: watching this video uncovered a truth to me and really
Speaker 1: gave it this this blinding light. And I knew that
Speaker 1: me being silent wouldn't be an option this time around.
Speaker 1: So I shut everything down and uh, and I immediately
Speaker 1: started researching how I can help, you know, signing petitions, donating,
Speaker 1: calling mayor's offices and and and police departments in and
Speaker 1: reaching out for justice for UM for Brianna Taylor as
Speaker 1: her murder was was brought forth, and Elijah McClain and
Speaker 1: signing just so many petitions, And it was disgusting how
Speaker 1: many petitions there were, because it meant that this many
Speaker 1: murders have been just completely swept under the rug. And
Speaker 1: I fought as hard as I could every single day,
Speaker 1: and we started seeing progress. We started seeing arrests, we
Speaker 1: started seeing cases reopened, we started seeing um gatherings, and
Speaker 1: and and and so much love. And the hatred from
Speaker 1: the other people also rose up. The hatred from racist
Speaker 1: the hatred from white supremacists also rose up, but they
Speaker 1: kept getting fought back by so much love that we
Speaker 1: had been producing together. I also started prepping to release
Speaker 1: the album again because I felt like, Okay, now that
Speaker 1: we've now that we've been fighting for quite a bit,
Speaker 1: I do still feel like this album I can fit
Speaker 1: in today's time. And that's when I came across one
Speaker 1: of our guests, and I created an amazing friendship out
Speaker 1: of that. But we bonded so well in our unified
Speaker 1: goal to reach true racial equality and racial justice and
Speaker 1: justice for the lives that have been taken for years,
Speaker 1: hundreds of years. As I started finding out through podcasts
Speaker 1: like sixteen nineteen, as I started listening to more anecdotes
Speaker 1: from the Jim Crow era, and I started reading books
Speaker 1: by tnahsy Coats and and educating myself to really be
Speaker 1: the best ally that I can be uh, And now
Speaker 1: I'm here to discuss Black Lives Matter and the movement
Speaker 1: in music. And what I'm thinking is where do we
Speaker 1: go from here? YEO? What's up? This is alex Iono.
Speaker 1: This is my podcast. It's called Let's get into it.
Speaker 1: And to help me with that, I have again, like
Speaker 1: I said, one of my very very good friends. Now
Speaker 1: like it literally went from zero to a hundred and
Speaker 1: then one song. My brother d Wilson. He's a singer, songwriter,
Speaker 1: worship leader from Chicago. He's written songs including the number
Speaker 1: one gospel single not Lucky I'm Moved by Jonathan McReynolds.
Speaker 1: He wrote the song that still tears me apart to
Speaker 1: this day. It's called Rose Pedals with his band Common
Speaker 1: Hymnal and Uh and of course wrote the Medicine, which
Speaker 1: is one of the songs on my album The Gospel
Speaker 1: at D How are you, brother? I'm great, bro, I'm
Speaker 1: great man. Good to be here. Thanks for having me on.
Speaker 1: I'm happy you're here. And we both now get to
Speaker 1: make another new friend that we can release another new
Speaker 1: song with. It might not be as it might not be,
Speaker 1: it might not be as clean or reverence, but it's
Speaker 1: definitely gonna be fine. I could guarantee that he is
Speaker 1: a rapper, producer and the co host of the Waiting
Speaker 1: on Reparations podcast and Athens, Georgia. His friends call him Mac,
Speaker 1: but we call him Dope Knife. Dope Knife, How are you, bro? Hey?
Speaker 1: What's going on? Alice? How you doing? Thank you for
Speaker 1: having me? I'm so happy that you're here and and honestly,
Speaker 1: to me, I think, UM, being an ally means knowing
Speaker 1: when to shut up and listen. And that's really kind
Speaker 1: of what I wanted to do on this podcast is
Speaker 1: talk about music, talk about art and UH and really
Speaker 1: learn from both of you guys how I can continue
Speaker 1: being the best ally that I can be in anybody
Speaker 1: who's listening who wants to be the best ally they
Speaker 1: can be to this movement to fighting for racial justice
Speaker 1: and fighting for racially quality, UH can can do that
Speaker 1: as well. So before we get into all of that,
Speaker 1: I have a question that I ask all of my guests,
Speaker 1: what have you been doing this week to better your life?
Speaker 1: And and I'll start so that you guys got some
Speaker 1: time to think. Um, I've been house hunting, So I
Speaker 1: don't know if this is like a new thing. But
Speaker 1: the house that I was living in right now is
Speaker 1: getting so old, and I got to find a new
Speaker 1: house to live in, and it is I guess it's
Speaker 1: for the better. I don't know. It's not a really
Speaker 1: good answer. Usually I have a really good answer. But
Speaker 1: my whole life has been the virtual tour and finding
Speaker 1: a house. It's like my two biggest goals. So that's
Speaker 1: what I've been doing. What you got from me, Mac,
Speaker 1: I I freestyle a lot, and um it's it's actually
Speaker 1: one of my more notable things that I do in
Speaker 1: my live show. And it's usually the more that I've
Speaker 1: been making music that's kind of become The main practice
Speaker 1: that I get at freestyling is when I'm performing when
Speaker 1: I'm on tours, like incorporating the freestyling into my set.
Speaker 1: Before I started doing that, when I was like in
Speaker 1: high school and stuff, I used to like have myself
Speaker 1: go through like a regimented practice, like I practice freestyle
Speaker 1: wrapping every day and practice and practice until I could
Speaker 1: get good at it. And it's just been such a
Speaker 1: long time since I've been in a situation where I
Speaker 1: wasn't performing regularly, so I was I was kind of
Speaker 1: like man maybe I should take the time out to
Speaker 1: do like practice for a couple of hours for the
Speaker 1: first time in years. For the first seven years, I've
Speaker 1: practiced freestyling like I was in high school and it
Speaker 1: was it's pretty refreshing. Can you explain what practicing freestyle like?
Speaker 1: How do you practice freestyling? Well? For me, um, like,
Speaker 1: I'll put on YouTube videos or TV and just out
Speaker 1: loud rap what I'm seeing as it comes up, and
Speaker 1: that way you can you can mess up. You can
Speaker 1: still because okay, you have to understand how I incorporate
Speaker 1: freestyling into my live set where I have this song
Speaker 1: called who Got the Props? Where I'll just tell people
Speaker 1: to pull stuff out of their pockets and stuff and
Speaker 1: we'll make a song on the spot out all the
Speaker 1: stuff that people and stuff like that. So that game
Speaker 1: in particular, like just watching TV and everything that you
Speaker 1: see visually just wrapping it, wrapping in the shower. So
Speaker 1: I practiced freestyling and I feel like I'm better today
Speaker 1: than I was yesterday. Here we go. That's what that's
Speaker 1: what matter is most. What do you got from me?
Speaker 1: What you've been doing this week to make to make
Speaker 1: your life a little better? Well, so there's this big
Speaker 1: um conference every year uh that really couldn't happen in
Speaker 1: persons years that did on videos called the Global Leadership Summit.
Speaker 1: And it's, um, it's this this sort of megachurch in
Speaker 1: Chicago invites leaders from based literally all across, from all
Speaker 1: over the world and from like sort of all walks
Speaker 1: of life, the business world, of the church world, social
Speaker 1: media world, like all of it. Like it's all it's
Speaker 1: almost like a you name it of leadership. Um. And
Speaker 1: so so for literally uh two days, you just hear
Speaker 1: about all sorts of uh leadership principles. UM. You know,
Speaker 1: not everybody that comes is you know, is a Christian
Speaker 1: or or even like you know, practices of faith at all. Um,
Speaker 1: you know, not even all the speakers or even but
Speaker 1: it's just this is an amazing intersection of people just
Speaker 1: exchanging leadership ideas and it's and then you get so
Speaker 1: much good just um quality talks. UM. I want to
Speaker 1: stay preaching because I live in the church, bro, But UM,
Speaker 1: you get you get such a good quality talk, such
Speaker 1: good quality principles. So literally since yesterday eight am until
Speaker 1: I came here to do this, UM, I've been in
Speaker 1: that in that summit. Oh man, Yeah, she's pretty it's
Speaker 1: pretty intense that you definitely you definitely win for the
Speaker 1: like I mean freestyling, like that's like that's major, major major.
Speaker 1: But you're like you're talking about going to like you're
Speaker 1: at the u N. You're at the u N of
Speaker 1: the leadership, except like, yeah, way more efficient. Damn. Well listen, guys,
Speaker 1: we we got we got three topics we're gonna be
Speaker 1: talking about. First up, D and I are going to
Speaker 1: go one on one and we're gonna talk through the Medicine,
Speaker 1: which is the song that we we sing together on
Speaker 1: my album and on your upcoming album. Am I allowed
Speaker 1: to talk about your upcoming album? Um? Uh? Nobody told me? Yeah,
Speaker 1: what's the streets saying no? Yeah, absolutely no, But nobody's
Speaker 1: told me no. So this is the debut we're talking
Speaker 1: about it right now. I'd rather ask for forgiveness and permission.
Speaker 1: So yeah, there you go. Uh And then uh, and
Speaker 1: then Mac, you and I are going to go one
Speaker 1: on one talking about politics and hip hop. And then lastly,
Speaker 1: the three of us are going to have like an
Speaker 1: all in, you know, go at it to talk about
Speaker 1: the Black Lives Matter movement in music Um, so, d
Speaker 1: let's get straight into it. Mac. We'll talk with you
Speaker 1: in a bit, all right, d Well, listen, we're friends now,
Speaker 1: you have no choice. You're my friend, and and I
Speaker 1: just want to I think if you watch my documentary
Speaker 1: that I put out of the whole album, you'll see
Speaker 1: at the very end there's the snippet that talks about
Speaker 1: the album. But I kind of wanted to just do
Speaker 1: like a twenty minute in depth discussion about how we
Speaker 1: became friends, how the song came about, Um, what the
Speaker 1: song means to you now compared to when you first
Speaker 1: wrote it. We're gonna talk about all that. So first,
Speaker 1: let's get straight into it. Um, I heard this song
Speaker 1: my dad like literally, this is like it's usually when
Speaker 1: your dad shows you something on social media, it's not
Speaker 1: cool historically actually really bad. My my dad posted a
Speaker 1: story that was you singing the first ever version of
Speaker 1: the medicine. It was just you live sitting at the keyboard,
Speaker 1: and uh, and I was like in tears, a full
Speaker 1: on was it was? It was? This was maybe? Days?
Speaker 1: Was it was like days after George Floyd was murdered? Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: I had to be Um, maybe it wasn't it certainly
Speaker 1: was not a week. Yeah, it might have been like
Speaker 1: four or five days. And uh, and I just I
Speaker 1: just remember hearing it and just weeping, just feeling it,
Speaker 1: like I mean, because the thing that the thing about
Speaker 1: the song to me was that I had heard so much,
Speaker 1: you know, and and not that it's the wrong thing,
Speaker 1: but after George Floyd's murder, it was all hatred in return,
Speaker 1: you know. It was it was fun twelve, It was
Speaker 1: a cab. It was all of those things which I'm
Speaker 1: not saying are the wrong reaction, but as somebody who
Speaker 1: always tries to lead with love, I searched for where
Speaker 1: the love was. I searched for where we're turning to
Speaker 1: love instead of just urnning directly back into violence and
Speaker 1: feeding into the cycle of war. And the song that
Speaker 1: you that you wrote was really one of the first
Speaker 1: places in which I felt like we were at a
Speaker 1: growing like it was. It was, it was written from
Speaker 1: a growing place. It wasn't just it wasn't just looting
Speaker 1: and fire and destruction, which is the deserving reaction to
Speaker 1: something like George Floyd's murder. But hearing hearing your song
Speaker 1: brought a whole new side of it to me, and
Speaker 1: so I've I've heard it many times and I love
Speaker 1: listening to it. But how did you write this song?
Speaker 1: Tell me about the creation of the medicine? Yeah, um,
Speaker 1: so yeah, just like you said, you know, it's a
Speaker 1: couple of days after um, George Floyd was murdered. Um.
Speaker 1: I've had a very interesting sort of journey when it
Speaker 1: comes to justice issues. Um, you know, like being sort
Speaker 1: of raised in uh you know, maybe middle class, um,
Speaker 1: you know, like sort of society, like a lot of
Speaker 1: diverse f It's like I've never really encountered a lot
Speaker 1: of racism, um, even growing up, not really until I
Speaker 1: became like sort of maybe a teena like once I
Speaker 1: started driving on my own, and it's always driving with
Speaker 1: young black men where you run into it, you know,
Speaker 1: And so like I remember being like so like I
Speaker 1: had to really sort of laid awaken and in my
Speaker 1: twenties around Traylon Martin's murder um and watching so many
Speaker 1: of the people that I knew as family turned into monsters.
Speaker 1: And so for me in a lot of ways, like
Speaker 1: writing songs like Rose Pedals, writing songs like the Medicine,
Speaker 1: it's sort of me sort of find a lot finally
Speaker 1: being able to articulate all the things that have been
Speaker 1: turning into me, and I, like you, I was the
Speaker 1: same way. I was like, man, you know, like it
Speaker 1: was so hard to see because it happened in Chicago
Speaker 1: to like and actually happened, a lot of looting happened
Speaker 1: like just five minutes or so from where we live.
Speaker 1: And at the same time being so heartbroken that you know,
Speaker 1: there are so on the people that are that are angry,
Speaker 1: that are hurt, that are under pressure, um, that are victims,
Speaker 1: that just that that feel a real thing and can't
Speaker 1: express it articulate a different way. I was really I
Speaker 1: was marked by two things. I was. I saw this
Speaker 1: one video of this young man and I don't know
Speaker 1: where he was, was a young um, young black kid
Speaker 1: basically saying like, this is what you get. This is
Speaker 1: what you get when you take a man away from
Speaker 1: his family, This is what you get when you impose
Speaker 1: all these ills on this community and don't give us
Speaker 1: any way out or any resources. We don't want to
Speaker 1: destroy anything, We don't want to burn anything. But how
Speaker 1: else are we supposed to do this? If if everything
Speaker 1: that we want to change isn't happening. And I cried
Speaker 1: watching he couldn't have been older than sixteen. And I
Speaker 1: cried just watching this kid. You know, I'm thirty three,
Speaker 1: was watching this kid. He was so profound in what
Speaker 1: in in thought of saying, this is what you get,
Speaker 1: like this is what happens. You know. Ice Cube was
Speaker 1: around the same age when he wrote after Police. It's
Speaker 1: like he was sixteen being able to process information. So
Speaker 1: I'm driving home. I listened to one of my favorite pastors,
Speaker 1: name is Eric Mason and Philly. He's a black pastor
Speaker 1: UM and one day on Twitter. One day on and
Speaker 1: I don't even know why, it's like he's a boomer too.
Speaker 1: I guess he used. He still used a periscope, which
Speaker 1: is weird. But one day he was um. He was
Speaker 1: one day he was on periscope just like letting it
Speaker 1: loose man, and I'm screaming. I'm screaming at my phone
Speaker 1: like yes. And so that's where I first heard him
Speaker 1: say something like something to the effect of like there's
Speaker 1: like this is a sickness, like there's a sickness and
Speaker 1: a sickness. And I'm driving home, like just I just
Speaker 1: left the chiropractor and I'm driving home. All the windows
Speaker 1: are open and I just I like that that word
Speaker 1: like sickness just like hit me in the middle of
Speaker 1: my chest, and I probably in the car, probably at
Speaker 1: least wrote the very first line, like there's a sickness
Speaker 1: here that threatens to divide us, and we're all afraid
Speaker 1: to say its name out loud. Always trying to find
Speaker 1: a way to to express things, or to look at things,
Speaker 1: or to address things that is differently than the way
Speaker 1: everybody else is sort of addressing and getting talking about it.
Speaker 1: And um, I still could because I don't throw people away.
Speaker 1: I still have a lot of people that fall on
Speaker 1: the side of you know, that cop was just doing
Speaker 1: his job, or George Floyd was this, this and that,
Speaker 1: like they're still very much in my world and now
Speaker 1: and then I haven't, But now that I'm more awake,
Speaker 1: I have a lot more people on the on the
Speaker 1: on the side of saying. But whatever whatever it was
Speaker 1: that y'all thought he did, that was unwarranted. He did
Speaker 1: not deserve that. He like, you don't kill a man
Speaker 1: in the street for a twenty like, where are we like?
Speaker 1: What do we like? What kind of world are we
Speaker 1: living in? Where a twenty effake twenty if it even
Speaker 1: was that gets you killed in the street, you know.
Speaker 1: So I'm hearing all these things and I'm just I'm
Speaker 1: just so grieved and heartbroken because as a as a Christian,
Speaker 1: it's tough watching the church miss it so freaking often.
Speaker 1: Like that's what happened that, That's part of what happened
Speaker 1: with Rose Pedals too. Was just like guys were missing it.
Speaker 1: We're missing it like this is a human life, like
Speaker 1: this is this is blood, this is breath, these are
Speaker 1: all the things that we say we're supposed to care about,
Speaker 1: but all of a sudden we have all these all
Speaker 1: these excuses and all these reasons not too Um. So
Speaker 1: I came home, Um, my daughter and my wife are
Speaker 1: about the head to the store, and I was like, great,
Speaker 1: y'all leave. I have to get to the piano, like
Speaker 1: when I find those moments, you know, as a songwriter,
Speaker 1: like when you have those moments of inspiration, you have
Speaker 1: to hold onto them as long as you can because
Speaker 1: once they're gone, they're gone. Right, And so, um, I
Speaker 1: got I probably got back home at like five thirty
Speaker 1: or six. I went right to my my keyboard, um,
Speaker 1: and I just immediately started like hammering out these world
Speaker 1: and it was weird how quickly they came and how
Speaker 1: good they were. Um. And then literally as as soon
Speaker 1: as soon as I felt like the song was done
Speaker 1: being written, I started doing takes on a video and like, um,
Speaker 1: I just started like going, you know, like playing it,
Speaker 1: playing it. I would mess up, start everything over again,
Speaker 1: like and once I finally got one that I mean, honestly,
Speaker 1: that was the first one that I was able to
Speaker 1: even sing all the way through between messing up and
Speaker 1: crying and writing, and it's like and I just put
Speaker 1: it up. Man. It was just like, um, you know,
Speaker 1: I don't have a huge following, I'm not a very
Speaker 1: influential person. Like I just put it up as a
Speaker 1: way too. I don't even know why, Like I don't
Speaker 1: know what possessed me to do it. It was more
Speaker 1: just like I have to put this up, Like I
Speaker 1: just have to. I have to put this out into
Speaker 1: the world like this. It's it's unprotected, it's all the
Speaker 1: wrong things, but like this, this is I have to
Speaker 1: just say this right now, that this like this like
Speaker 1: we are and more importantly, you know, to those to
Speaker 1: those folks that I and in community with, you know,
Speaker 1: in the Christian space, we are missing it. Like that's
Speaker 1: what that second verse was about, you know, Like if
Speaker 1: I can sing, I can sing the words of ends
Speaker 1: of men and songs of angels, I can give all
Speaker 1: my possession to the poor. But if your love can
Speaker 1: move them out into my hatred, I missed it, like
Speaker 1: I missed everything. If if, if all these you know,
Speaker 1: platitudes that we throw out all the time is not
Speaker 1: causing me to love my brother, then I am missing
Speaker 1: the whole thing. Um. And then I just cried, and
Speaker 1: I just cried. Then I just cried. I if you
Speaker 1: listen to this song and you really have that pure
Speaker 1: hearted you know, drive and understanding of the weight of
Speaker 1: what's going on in the world right now, it's I
Speaker 1: think it's absolutely impossible to not cry listening to that song,
Speaker 1: or not at least feel like you want to. You
Speaker 1: mentioned the faith aspect of the song, you know, Uh,
Speaker 1: You're you're obviously a very devout Christian man. I do
Speaker 1: still absolutely claim Christianity. I still believe in God, I
Speaker 1: still believe in higher Power. I'm very monotheistic in mind,
Speaker 1: as somebody who writes so much gospel music and and
Speaker 1: and worship music. More than anything I in the gospel.
Speaker 1: In my album, I have some songs that directly address
Speaker 1: my relationship with with God. How difficult is it? Because
Speaker 1: I do definitely find it difficult um looking at Christian
Speaker 1: religions right now, and like you said, are just missing
Speaker 1: it so hard that we believe in a god that's
Speaker 1: that that that gave us scriptures that say to love
Speaker 1: your brother and love and and to be christ Like,
Speaker 1: and to to accept everybody and love everybody, and and
Speaker 1: leave no stone unturned when it comes to love. And
Speaker 1: yet we're here and among the hatred for the l
Speaker 1: g B t Q plus community, among the hatred for
Speaker 1: for anybody that doesn't believe in what the amount of
Speaker 1: wars that that have been started off of religion, And
Speaker 1: now we're here today as somebody who writes actively addressing faith,
Speaker 1: addressing worship. How difficult has it been in the wake
Speaker 1: of all of this. It doesn't change that the leaders
Speaker 1: of churches, that that pastors that churchgoers are still saying yeah,
Speaker 1: but blue lives matter, or saying but all lives matter,
Speaker 1: or trying to fight these these fight something that's so
Speaker 1: simple as yes, a man was murdered and that's not okay. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: you know it's been. It's been crazy difficult, I think, Um,
Speaker 1: you know, I think one one of the ways that
Speaker 1: you know, we as a church all like missing probably
Speaker 1: consistently is like we want to pick and choose. Um.
Speaker 1: And so for me, the difficult part actually hasn't been writing,
Speaker 1: because I've always written songs that have have pushed up
Speaker 1: against those boundaries and barriers. I've always done that. Um. Now,
Speaker 1: they haven't always been popular, which is why I'm not
Speaker 1: rich or famous. But but it's uh, but it hasn't been.
Speaker 1: I think the more difficult thing for me now is
Speaker 1: how much Sunday mornings have become in a journey into
Speaker 1: escapism for Western American Christians. Um, in that we can
Speaker 1: you know, as long as we can get the church
Speaker 1: on Sunday and have that hour, you know, the world
Speaker 1: be damned. Like it's like nothing. We don't address anything
Speaker 1: in here. We don't talk about any of that stuff
Speaker 1: in here. Um we had you know, we don't. We
Speaker 1: don't like none of that stuff matters. I just you know,
Speaker 1: I got my church. We're gonna sing our favorite songs,
Speaker 1: We're gonna do these things, and then we can go
Speaker 1: back to the real world. My my driving the last
Speaker 1: uh two or three years has been no, we have
Speaker 1: to bring that stuff here to Sunday. Um. So the
Speaker 1: most trouble I've gotten into, and I've gotten into trouble,
Speaker 1: the most trouble I've gotten into it is just it's
Speaker 1: just UM not allowing my church at least, you know,
Speaker 1: the folks that I lead and served, not allowing gus
Speaker 1: to come into church and be able to escape the
Speaker 1: real world. No if when when um, when there was
Speaker 1: I think it was the same. I think didn't like
Speaker 1: the Charlottesville thing happened in the Dallas thing happened in
Speaker 1: the same weekend or like in the same couple of
Speaker 1: days where it's like they had a riot, they had
Speaker 1: like pro two protests in Charlotsville class and then I
Speaker 1: think that same weekend there was a peaceful protests in
Speaker 1: Dallas and then somebody started shooting there. And I think
Speaker 1: for you're talking about a few years ago, you're not. No,
Speaker 1: it's not recently this last summer. It was last summer
Speaker 1: because I remember and I remember in our meetings going, hey, y'all,
Speaker 1: this thing just happened. We have to say something to
Speaker 1: our church about this, because because everybody's talking about it
Speaker 1: on Facebook. Everybody's arguing about it on Facebook. Everybody's being
Speaker 1: very hateful. We need to be the ones to come
Speaker 1: in and say this is wrong. Well, you know what
Speaker 1: I mean, like to address it. So that Sunday I
Speaker 1: addressed it. I talked about it, we pray like, we cried,
Speaker 1: we wet we I had people like yo sitting here
Speaker 1: for five minutes, and think about how you interact with
Speaker 1: with with people that don't look like you, think like you,
Speaker 1: believe like you. You might be doing it way wrong.
Speaker 1: There's a parable that Jesus tells a New Testament about
Speaker 1: the good Samaritan, about the man that was beaten on
Speaker 1: the side of the road. All the church folks passed
Speaker 1: him by, everybody that said, oh we love God, we
Speaker 1: believe in God, we hold all these things. A little
Speaker 1: lah saw this man that was beaten, bruce, robbed, destroyed, disenfranchise,
Speaker 1: and provished to press on the side of the road
Speaker 1: and pass him by. And the Jesus says, a despised Samaritan.
Speaker 1: Not that he was a bad person, not that he
Speaker 1: was sinful, none of these things, just that church folks
Speaker 1: hated him. And it was the one person that all
Speaker 1: the church people hated that ended up being the most
Speaker 1: kind and compassionate and showing God's heart to a person
Speaker 1: that was disenfranchised. So for me, it's like the hardest
Speaker 1: thing has been helping the people that I served in
Speaker 1: the context and then the community that I've been placed
Speaker 1: in understand that these just can't be good things that
Speaker 1: we talk about that we don't live about. If we're
Speaker 1: not living them, then we just stopped talking about them.
Speaker 1: If we start, if we're not living them, we just
Speaker 1: stopped singing about them. Um, if we're not living them,
Speaker 1: then we should stop trying to influence everybody to vote,
Speaker 1: you know, a certain way when if you don't care
Speaker 1: for me, if you don't care about all life, you
Speaker 1: can't be pro life. If you don't care about a
Speaker 1: life that is brown, that is gay, that is you
Speaker 1: name it. If you don't care about that life equally
Speaker 1: as much as you care about just a life just
Speaker 1: being born, then there's no way you could be pro life.
Speaker 1: Because God cares about human life. God cares about human blood,
Speaker 1: God cares about human breath, and if we don't, we
Speaker 1: can't say we care about the same things God cares about. Absolutely,
Speaker 1: bro I couldn't agree more. I want to talk about
Speaker 1: something that actually you told me d which is uh.
Speaker 1: It was a quote when I was afraid because you
Speaker 1: are one of the first churchgoers, um and devout you know,
Speaker 1: worship leaders and musicians, who writes church music. So I
Speaker 1: was definitely nervous to show you my album. That was
Speaker 1: definitely uh, my album was very irreverent is the word
Speaker 1: I like to use. You know. I have a song
Speaker 1: called old a f I have. You know, I talk
Speaker 1: about hooking up with girls, I talk about smoking weed,
Speaker 1: I talked about all of this stuff. Um. I was
Speaker 1: definitely nervous to show you it, and you actually came
Speaker 1: back with one of my favorite quotes that I think
Speaker 1: is what I want to end with on this on
Speaker 1: this faith talk, which is when you were known. That's
Speaker 1: the other quote you told me. When you follow God,
Speaker 1: you flow in life. But God would this is the
Speaker 1: quote hold on. The quote is God would rather me
Speaker 1: be real than right. And when you told me that,
Speaker 1: it made me have all the confidence in the world
Speaker 1: that it doesn't matter if if if the music can't
Speaker 1: be played during a church service. It's it's that I'm
Speaker 1: telling my truth and I'm saying my piece as I
Speaker 1: see it, and I'm saying it with the words that
Speaker 1: I need to say it with, and so I think
Speaker 1: I absolutely agree with you. There's there's so much to
Speaker 1: be said about the oncept of like Sunday. You know,
Speaker 1: a Sunday Christian who is who on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday,
Speaker 1: Friday will post about is the devil angel on Sunday?
Speaker 1: Get out of here exactly and then come come into
Speaker 1: church and pretend that that it's the you know, the
Speaker 1: walls are sealed off from from the rest of the world.
Speaker 1: So my last question that I have for you before
Speaker 1: we take a quick break is about the next steps
Speaker 1: um as a musician, um as a worship leader, as
Speaker 1: somebody who writes worship music and and you know, uh
Speaker 1: other type other genres of music. What are the next
Speaker 1: steps that you see for yourself as a musician, and
Speaker 1: then what are the what are the next steps that
Speaker 1: you would see for an ally, for somebody who wants
Speaker 1: to keep this fight up until we really get the
Speaker 1: change that we want. Yeah, I would say I would
Speaker 1: say for me, you know, I'm called to the places
Speaker 1: that I'm called until God moves me elsewhere. So for
Speaker 1: the church that I that me and my family are
Speaker 1: a part of. You know, my my wife was the first, uh,
Speaker 1: but the first black woman on that staff. This has
Speaker 1: been a largely upper class, upper middle class white church
Speaker 1: for the last sixty or fifty years. So there's so
Speaker 1: much that they just don't know that they don't know.
Speaker 1: I would say for allies, um, you know, there's shortly
Speaker 1: at shortly or shortly in In this whole wake of
Speaker 1: people waking up to injustices, there were a lot of
Speaker 1: people that were suddenly asking black folks a lot of
Speaker 1: questions and sort of like reaching for their closest black
Speaker 1: associate to like say, well, teach me um. And I'm
Speaker 1: not sure if that's the way to go. I think
Speaker 1: the way to go would be a true partnership where
Speaker 1: you're not just drilling them for questions. You can have
Speaker 1: the right answers when the time comes, but they actually
Speaker 1: get to drill you, um and get to and get
Speaker 1: to uh sort of um, hold you accountable. And it's
Speaker 1: not it's more than just help me, Mr black man.
Speaker 1: It's you know or or give me all the right answers.
Speaker 1: It's like how can like how can can I hold you?
Speaker 1: Kind can I ask you the tough questions. Can I
Speaker 1: ask you how how have you how have you been
Speaker 1: trying to I appreciate you reading books and listening to
Speaker 1: the podcast, like doing all these things, and so many
Speaker 1: people I think that, oh, I'm gonna learn something, going
Speaker 1: to grab some black people and answer accent in questions,
Speaker 1: and I won't be racist at the end of it. No,
Speaker 1: you need to do You need to study this stuff
Speaker 1: to see how deeply ingrained it is so for every
Speaker 1: ally before you just jump out and do the wrong
Speaker 1: thing with the right intentions, do the appropriate study. That's
Speaker 1: absolutely I mean like it made me feel like, uh,
Speaker 1: it made me feel like, um uh if you were
Speaker 1: going to church and instead of actually reading the Bible,
Speaker 1: you just ask people like, hey, so what did Jesus
Speaker 1: do next? What do Yeah, that's what it feels it
Speaker 1: and and it's really the information is all there if
Speaker 1: you want to look it up. There's books on books
Speaker 1: on books, this podcast. I heard of a cool podcast
Speaker 1: with this dope host named Dope Knife. But I really
Speaker 1: appreciate you, bro, I really appreciate you for coming on here.
Speaker 1: Um and and I appreciate you for blessing the album. Uh.
Speaker 1: The album was absolutely made complete with with the addition
Speaker 1: of the Medicine. And I still don't know. I don't
Speaker 1: even know the miracle that was at the end of
Speaker 1: the song. Um D says we need a miracle like
Speaker 1: you did for my mother. I don't even know the
Speaker 1: miracle that that God did for you, mother, But I
Speaker 1: cry every time I hear that part because I know
Speaker 1: the passion in which you spoke with So I appreciate
Speaker 1: you immensely. I'm gonna talk with you in a little bit.
Speaker 1: We're gonna take a quick break, and when we come back,
Speaker 1: I'll be talking with Mac about politics and hip hop. Alright,
Speaker 1: we are back. This is let's get into it. I'm
Speaker 1: Alex Ciono, and we are talking about Black Lives Matter
Speaker 1: and music combining together. I just had a beautiful conversation
Speaker 1: with my friend d Wilson Um, who is featured on
Speaker 1: my album The Gospel of twenty three and his song
Speaker 1: The Medicine, which I actually just did. I call it
Speaker 1: a cover of um and Uh. And we've had a
Speaker 1: great friendship that's come out of that. So we're just
Speaker 1: talking about that. And now we are talking about politics
Speaker 1: and hip hop with somebody who has a bit of
Speaker 1: knowledge about both UH Dope underground rapper, producer and a
Speaker 1: host of the new podcast Waiting on Reparations. His name
Speaker 1: is Mac, but we call him Dope Knife, or maybe
Speaker 1: it's Dope Knife, but I call him Mac. I have
Speaker 1: not figured that out yet. What's up, by the how
Speaker 1: are you having I thank you for having me, um.
Speaker 1: But our subject that we're talking about is politics and
Speaker 1: hip hop, and politics and music have had a history
Speaker 1: that go way way back together from the Jim Crow
Speaker 1: era where they use music to actually oppress um black
Speaker 1: people too. Nowadays, like you have Pink with Dear Mr
Speaker 1: President and Kana Laday's UH remake of that that addresses
Speaker 1: this current president, you have the Dixie Chicks writing songs
Speaker 1: about this, uh, especially in hip hop. Let's go back
Speaker 1: to hip hop. What what songs do you identify as
Speaker 1: like some of your top politically saturated songs that were
Speaker 1: real like staple pieces. Well, Um, I'm kind of like
Speaker 1: a you know, third generation hip hopper, So I'm not
Speaker 1: really like I grew up in the eighties or anything.
Speaker 1: I grew up in the nineties and early two thousand's.
Speaker 1: So even with that, the most resonating hip hop song
Speaker 1: on a political end would probably be Grandmaster Flash and
Speaker 1: the Furious Fives The message You don't push me because
Speaker 1: close too. But yeah, I mean that that's widely recognized
Speaker 1: as being probably the first successful, you know, political or
Speaker 1: social commentary like rap song, So that one always stands
Speaker 1: out to me, like, whenever I'm writing something that has
Speaker 1: any sort of like political bent to it, I kind
Speaker 1: of think about that song and reference that because it's
Speaker 1: just the way that the I mean, the song is
Speaker 1: called the Message, but it really doesn't have a preachy
Speaker 1: vibe to it at all. It really sounds like somebody
Speaker 1: just speaking in their truth. I feel like some of
Speaker 1: the best, some of the best songs I have those
Speaker 1: like those hidden messages where you're like happening and then
Speaker 1: all of a sudden you're like, oh shit, I'm I
Speaker 1: was just just debunking, you know, this philosophy exactly. I
Speaker 1: have um a song called Dynasty that's really just a
Speaker 1: battle rap song, but there's like three or four lines
Speaker 1: in there that have you know, like one of the
Speaker 1: lines is, um, I would still love my son if
Speaker 1: he's gay, but I'll kick him out the house if
Speaker 1: he wraps whack And for whatever reason, Like people just
Speaker 1: resonate to that line like a lot, like on that level, Like, man,
Speaker 1: you know, I never really thought about it like that,
Speaker 1: but that's that's like, that's that's you really say something there.
Speaker 1: I'm like, oh, just absolutely kind of sounded funny. Man,
Speaker 1: I love that line. What what What do you think
Speaker 1: is so important about using music as a tool? What
Speaker 1: makes music such an incredible tool in times like this,
Speaker 1: with movements like this, well, just as a communications device
Speaker 1: for people who do want to like spread a message,
Speaker 1: who have any sort of musical talent. I think that
Speaker 1: a musician using their mus to get a point across
Speaker 1: is probably more powerful than any interview that they're gonna do.
Speaker 1: You know, like your your listeners are gonna hear your
Speaker 1: new track, are gonna hear your album before they're gonna
Speaker 1: hear oh you you really dropped some science in like
Speaker 1: a three hour interview with BBC or something like that.
Speaker 1: You know they're going to hear a jewel that you
Speaker 1: you put it in a in a line or in
Speaker 1: a verse. First, No, I mean, I think you're absolutely right.
Speaker 1: I've I've from however early I can remember, have used
Speaker 1: music to express myself, to speak my piece or to
Speaker 1: say whatever I need to say. And so whether it's
Speaker 1: talking about girls and trying to get a girl to
Speaker 1: like me. Back to now, like releasing songs like like
Speaker 1: the cover of these the Medicine where you're talking about
Speaker 1: some real heavy ship. I think it's just a powerful way.
Speaker 1: And I think even like we were talking about before,
Speaker 1: sometimes it's so catchy that you sing something before you
Speaker 1: even know what you're singing. You know, sometimes you're singing
Speaker 1: along and then you're like, oh, wow, that's crazy. I
Speaker 1: didn't even think about it like that when I was
Speaker 1: thirteen listening to a Most Deaf and Tilips Black Star album.
Speaker 1: It's like, you know, you listen to that Third Team
Speaker 1: and you're taking in stuff and you're like, oh, man, yeah,
Speaker 1: that's really deep. But then you get older and you
Speaker 1: go back and revisit it and it's like, oh they
Speaker 1: were They were talking about stuff on a level that
Speaker 1: I was hearing but wasn't necessarily retaining. But it was
Speaker 1: important that I heard it that earlier, because like, those
Speaker 1: ideas stuck with me, even if I wasn't aware that
Speaker 1: those like, you know what I mean, that they were
Speaker 1: like giving ideas and stuff like that. Now, of course,
Speaker 1: life with anything, it can be used for good, it
Speaker 1: can be used for bad, you know, like people can
Speaker 1: use music to spread messages that aren't necessarily aren't necessarily
Speaker 1: constructive to hear over and over and over and over
Speaker 1: and over and over again. Oh man, I mean, I
Speaker 1: think it's it's a device that can be used on
Speaker 1: both sides. Our current president right now has been mentioned
Speaker 1: in so many rap songs even before he was the president,
Speaker 1: and he brags about it as if it's like a
Speaker 1: powerful thing and and and uses it. We did an
Speaker 1: episode on that um about a week or two ago,
Speaker 1: like strictly strictly about hip hop's relationship with Donald Trump president.
Speaker 1: But um, we're pretty much going back and talking about
Speaker 1: why Donald Trump was referenced so much in hip hop
Speaker 1: before his presidency and kind of what we came to
Speaker 1: the conclusion because from what we found, Trump has been
Speaker 1: mentioned over two hundred times in rap songs from like
Speaker 1: nineteen eighty four to two thousand and fifteen, Like two
Speaker 1: hundred and fifty times. I don't know for a fact,
Speaker 1: but I'm pretty sure that's more than any one living
Speaker 1: figure has been mentioned, you know, I mean exactly, like,
Speaker 1: for I mean, you're you're talking like Trump and Tony
Speaker 1: Montana like men like that much in rap songs, so
Speaker 1: you know, it's it's it very much kind of seems
Speaker 1: like hip hop or just kind of looked at Trump
Speaker 1: as like a symbol of success, you know, in the
Speaker 1: in this capitalistic dog eat dog sort of society that
Speaker 1: we live in the States. They kind of looked at
Speaker 1: him as that sort of thing. It's just like, hey,
Speaker 1: I got money like Trump. I mean, I mean the
Speaker 1: Trump Plaza, Yo, We're getting paper like Trump. I'm the
Speaker 1: black Trump is all that that sort of thing. And
Speaker 1: then the switch as soon as he came down that
Speaker 1: escalator like happens super hard, all of a sudden, f
Speaker 1: Donald Trump. Yeah, it's literally that all across the board.
Speaker 1: Let's switch gears really quick, because I do want to
Speaker 1: talk about your new podcast, Waiting on Reparations. Reparations. It's
Speaker 1: a very Reparations is definitely a hot button. And by
Speaker 1: the way, I should probably define it for anybody who
Speaker 1: is curious about what reparations are. It isn't the form
Speaker 1: of actually paying, like like giving the value of the
Speaker 1: wrongs that you have done back to the person who
Speaker 1: you did the wrongs too, So reparations is not just
Speaker 1: like people saying sorry that reparations fail action most of
Speaker 1: the time by money. That is a way to physically
Speaker 1: try and make a situation. Right. That being said, tell
Speaker 1: us about waiting on reparations, well, waiting on reparations. The
Speaker 1: podcast um Our podcast is pretty much dedicated to bridging
Speaker 1: the intersections between hip hop and politics and where those connect,
Speaker 1: and we kind of used that as a vehicle for
Speaker 1: both of us. My co host is um the Athens, Georgia,
Speaker 1: Clark County Commissioner Mariah Parker, who's also dope rapper and
Speaker 1: singer herself by the name of Lingua Franca. And you know,
Speaker 1: we we make music together and we we were always
Speaker 1: talking politics and stuff. So, for example, last week, we
Speaker 1: were having a discussion about the police, right, so we
Speaker 1: started talking about how the cliche of like, oh, the
Speaker 1: police are the biggest gang in America, which led us
Speaker 1: to getting in contact with uh m C who does
Speaker 1: a podcast called Hood Politics and Behind the Police, and
Speaker 1: we just had a whole discussion about police policing and
Speaker 1: their connection to gang culture. And then we listened to
Speaker 1: a bunch of rap songs that are about police and
Speaker 1: gangs and then discussed it. So that's so just just
Speaker 1: extrapolate that with any sort of political topic that you want,
Speaker 1: and that's kind of the format for our show. So
Speaker 1: you know, um, if we want to talk about the
Speaker 1: history of the N word and its relations to hip hop,
Speaker 1: if we want to talk about, um, the labor movement
Speaker 1: and its relations to hip hop. It's been a new experience,
Speaker 1: the whole podcast thing. And that's I mean, it sounds sick.
Speaker 1: You know. I was raised in my community was like,
Speaker 1: let's not talk about politics, Let's let politicians talk about politics,
Speaker 1: and now knowing that that is a terrible concoction for
Speaker 1: for just kind of falling into a blind sheep mindset. Um.
Speaker 1: I think it's incredible that you're doing something that bridges
Speaker 1: that gap because I feel like a lot of people
Speaker 1: want to get into pol ticks but are so intimidated
Speaker 1: because they feel like, you know, if they're in their
Speaker 1: twenties and they're just starting to learn about politics when
Speaker 1: you have like a little baby Obama that's been studying
Speaker 1: politics since like kindergarten, and they feel like they're just
Speaker 1: not equipped for it. And so I'm excited to listen
Speaker 1: to it if you're listening to this podcast, makes you
Speaker 1: go and listen to this afterwards. Um, but I would
Speaker 1: like to I'm very interested because of the name of
Speaker 1: your podcast, what do reparations look like to you this year?
Speaker 1: In a lot of people, and especially you know, people
Speaker 1: on the right, like to use sort of the specter
Speaker 1: of oh, they want they want you to repay, and
Speaker 1: they want you to give give them money, you know
Speaker 1: what I mean, Like, it's not necessarily about here's some cash. Sorry.
Speaker 1: You know if that doesn't feel real, you know, that
Speaker 1: doesn't feel like, hey, it's not realistic, and it's just
Speaker 1: like stupid, Like that doesn't that doesn't accomplish anything, you know. Um,
Speaker 1: it's kind of like, uh, it's it's reparations. The you know,
Speaker 1: repair is part of the name is to like put
Speaker 1: right what was wrong, you know. So to me, a
Speaker 1: realistic look at what reparations would be is if you
Speaker 1: put government dollars into the black community, you know, I
Speaker 1: mean into education, into historical black colleges, into black owned businesses,
Speaker 1: into changing the infrastructure so that some of the things
Speaker 1: that were done systemically fifty forty years ago that is
Speaker 1: like still a roadblock in impairing people's like upward movement, mobility,
Speaker 1: get you know, getting rid of that stuff. But I mean,
Speaker 1: all of these things are stuff that we haven't even
Speaker 1: addressed yet that if they were addressed to the people
Speaker 1: who are so staunchly, you know, opposed to even the
Speaker 1: concept of reparations, you can't be against that and then
Speaker 1: also be against just stopping the factory, you know what
Speaker 1: I mean. You gotta choose what you can't be like, oh, well, y'all,
Speaker 1: don't we don't need to pay reparations because everything's fine,
Speaker 1: but everything's not fine. But everything's not fine from so
Speaker 1: many double standards. There's so many double standards going on. Um.
Speaker 1: But we we chose the name for the show. First
Speaker 1: of all, we we originally were coming up with the
Speaker 1: rap group for a rap duo, and we were like, hey,
Speaker 1: we're Waiting our Reparations. We had like for the story
Speaker 1: of sort of style like our our music both has
Speaker 1: a sort of political tint tours. We're like, yeah, Waiting
Speaker 1: our Reparations would be a dope ass name for that.
Speaker 1: And then we got Approach from the podcast and we
Speaker 1: were like, yo, I think it would be a Domnat
Speaker 1: from the podcast too, So now it's a great name.
Speaker 1: It's a great name. UM. Well, I mean, we're here.
Speaker 1: And that's why I think the podcast is so UM
Speaker 1: prevalent right now, is that we're we're here living in
Speaker 1: this newest wave of civil rights movements of fighting for
Speaker 1: racially quality and racial justice, UM, dating back to the
Speaker 1: forties into the sixties with Dr Martin Luther King and
Speaker 1: and uh in the last let's say, maybe four years,
Speaker 1: five years, UM, since you know, Black Lives Matter was
Speaker 1: really kind of coined as this new civil rights movement. UM.
Speaker 1: In that last five years, there's also been so much
Speaker 1: progress that we've made from um, you know, starting the
Speaker 1: movement of of reforming the police and figuring out a
Speaker 1: new way to to enforce law here in America. For
Speaker 1: the next five years, what would you like to see
Speaker 1: for the Black Lives Matter movement and for the civil
Speaker 1: rights movement in general? I think that, um, just like
Speaker 1: the civil rights movement of the past, I think what
Speaker 1: this current moment in time is going to need. And
Speaker 1: I'm not I don't even I feel kind of hesitant
Speaker 1: to even say what it's going to need or what
Speaker 1: I think it needs, because for all I know, there's
Speaker 1: people out there who are doing the work right now,
Speaker 1: you know what I mean, Like I'm on a podcast
Speaker 1: when I live in him. So, but I do think
Speaker 1: that tangible policy change needs to be attached to all
Speaker 1: of this emotion right now, and if you know, from
Speaker 1: my understanding, that seems to be what's going on. But
Speaker 1: it goes way deeper than reforming the police, you know,
Speaker 1: And I can kind of already see it happening that
Speaker 1: the gate keepers, as they were, are kind of looking
Speaker 1: at this as a reason to do a bunch of
Speaker 1: ship that no one asked for and that no one
Speaker 1: really cares about, thinking that that's going to pacify anyone,
Speaker 1: Like I don't know how like a character from family
Speaker 1: got to be invoiced by a black person who's going
Speaker 1: to stop a cop from shooting me, you know what
Speaker 1: I mean. So it's like, let's handle that stuff first,
Speaker 1: like let's handle these deep seated systemic racist issues first,
Speaker 1: and then I think through that policy change, it will
Speaker 1: filter into the culture, society. And then it almost feels
Speaker 1: like if you start with the bigger things, the smaller
Speaker 1: things are gonna obviously come out as like okay, we
Speaker 1: can't do that. That's not okay exactly but it's American though,
Speaker 1: for us to like try to solve problems that way,
Speaker 1: you know what I mean. It's like, hey, we have
Speaker 1: a drug problem. Should we look at the reason why
Speaker 1: people are doing drugs? No, let's just the rest the
Speaker 1: people that are doing you know. It's like yeah, right right,
Speaker 1: it's just like I mean, it's it is like that,
Speaker 1: Like you said, it's the American way right now. And
Speaker 1: I think that the American way needs to change before
Speaker 1: anything else changes, because if the American way changes and
Speaker 1: we lead in a certain direction, then most of the
Speaker 1: things we're trying to fight off will naturally fall apart.
Speaker 1: The thing with the thing with like politics is that
Speaker 1: a lot of cats that are in my like circle,
Speaker 1: like the hip hop scene, you know, they definitely have
Speaker 1: strong like political leanings and political ideals, but they kind
Speaker 1: of turn a nose towards actual electoral politics and stuff
Speaker 1: like that and kind of think it doesn't matter. All
Speaker 1: politicians are the same. The game's rigged, and they don't
Speaker 1: understand how important this stuff is. And it's like it's
Speaker 1: it's just people. It's just made up of people, and
Speaker 1: those people could be us, you know. Now, I'm not
Speaker 1: an elected politician. I have way too many tracks that
Speaker 1: would prevent me from like that to anything, but I
Speaker 1: mean it is. It is important, especially for like young
Speaker 1: people to know that. It's like, yo, if you want
Speaker 1: to change the world, you actually can go out and
Speaker 1: change the world right now. It's you know what I'm saying.
Speaker 1: Absolutely all right, Well listen, we're gonna take a quick break.
Speaker 1: When we come back, we're gonna pick up right where
Speaker 1: we are, which is music in in in the Black
Speaker 1: Lives Matter movement and how we can best use our
Speaker 1: art to to continue making change. We'll be right back,
Speaker 1: all right, y'all, we are back. This is let's get
Speaker 1: into it. I'm alex Iono. I got my man mac
Speaker 1: a k a Dope knife, and my brother d Wilson here,
Speaker 1: and we're talking about Black Lives Matter movement and uh
Speaker 1: in the new civil rights movement and how it's affected
Speaker 1: and influences music today. All three of us are musicians.
Speaker 1: All three of us produce and write and speak from
Speaker 1: our hearts, and especially in a time like this, what's
Speaker 1: going on in our hearts is turmoil. What's going on
Speaker 1: in our hearts is fighting for real change, fighting for
Speaker 1: a better world, and sometimes it really feels like, uh,
Speaker 1: like it's impossible, and some days it feels like we can.
Speaker 1: We're on the brink of glory. So we're here talking
Speaker 1: about it. We had some great conversations so far, UM,
Speaker 1: but I wanted to ask some more questions about kind
Speaker 1: of language. UM. And and language in music is one
Speaker 1: of our most effective tools. I mean we're talking about
Speaker 1: I think for the last like five weeks on Spotify's
Speaker 1: New Music Friday, the the out of the first five songs,
Speaker 1: you'll have a song that is directly speaking to this
Speaker 1: civil rights movent, this Black Lives Matter movement. UM, why
Speaker 1: is it important do you guys think as musicians? And
Speaker 1: I kind of talked on this a little bit with
Speaker 1: you Mac already, But to use that language and how
Speaker 1: important it is to pay attention to the language not
Speaker 1: only that we use, but that we listened to as well.
Speaker 1: When you know better, do better. What's why I say
Speaker 1: to myself, and that's what I'm say to my daughter
Speaker 1: now too. Is like once you once you know better,
Speaker 1: you have you have um, not just an opportunity, but
Speaker 1: an obligation to do and say better. There are things
Speaker 1: I said when I was a middle schooler that I
Speaker 1: don't say now because I'm thirty three years old and
Speaker 1: I would sound crazy, right like, um, you know, like
Speaker 1: and that's that's both socially and that's you know, professionally,
Speaker 1: Like there's there's things I had to learn how to talk,
Speaker 1: you know, when I'm in offices versus when I'm talking
Speaker 1: to my homies, you know what I mean. It's like,
Speaker 1: so the language like what you fill yourself with, um,
Speaker 1: is what you're gonna regarditate. I'm like a hip hop
Speaker 1: hip hop cat, right, so like I'm on some like
Speaker 1: elemental hip hop stuff where it's like you know, break dancing,
Speaker 1: DJ's graffiti, m seeing and what is commonly you know,
Speaker 1: overlooked element is you know knowledge. You know, knowledge is
Speaker 1: knowledge yourself, knowledge of of of the world around you
Speaker 1: is one of those elements. So I try to make
Speaker 1: sure that I'm always putting in something like that in
Speaker 1: my music when I'm making it. Not necessarily in a
Speaker 1: way to preach, but I just I just try to
Speaker 1: make sure that all of my music means something to me,
Speaker 1: you know, And it's not necessarily like a standard that
Speaker 1: I hold for other musicians to have, Like, oh, musicians
Speaker 1: have to address what's going on in the world around him.
Speaker 1: But I think that if everyone that you talked to
Speaker 1: is thinking about what's going on in the world right now,
Speaker 1: and it's like this whole black lives Matter, George Floyd, COVID, quarantine, lockdown,
Speaker 1: all these things are like the most prevalent things in
Speaker 1: people's lives when you're talking to them in just actual conversation.
Speaker 1: I'm not saying I'm trying to hear anybody's music filled
Speaker 1: with a bunch of that. But if your music is
Speaker 1: completely devoid of any sort of reference or mentioned of
Speaker 1: the world that we're all, you know, the shared human
Speaker 1: experience that we're all going through, then it's kind of
Speaker 1: just fluff, you know, And that's that's bad because that
Speaker 1: has its place too, But it's just it's not where
Speaker 1: I mean. I think it just carries its weight. It
Speaker 1: carries its weight, you know, it says I remember, I'm
Speaker 1: following a bunch of people that I used to and
Speaker 1: like that I used to really rock with. When George
Speaker 1: Floyd is murdered and they're busy promoting their brand new
Speaker 1: YouTube video and you're just like, there's there's a it's
Speaker 1: not I'm not saying that you have to go out
Speaker 1: and and you know, throw a Molotov cocktail at a
Speaker 1: cop car. Yeah, or even say there's a there's a
Speaker 1: middle ground. Even if it's doing you're at least just acknowledging, acknowledging,
Speaker 1: simple acknowledgement, even with the um you know, the explosion
Speaker 1: and by root and in Lebanon um the other day,
Speaker 1: I had tweeted something before I saw it and immediately
Speaker 1: saw it and took down the tweet because it's like
Speaker 1: there there's a level of tone deaf that is, it
Speaker 1: crosses over from not necessarily being political or not wanting
Speaker 1: to address things that don't bother you or don't that
Speaker 1: don't you know, affect you directly. There's a line between
Speaker 1: that and just being tone deaf to what's going on
Speaker 1: in the world. And and it comes off as your
Speaker 1: you know, I like the line, like your privilege is showing,
Speaker 1: Like that's really what it is when you're when you're
Speaker 1: posting about life, you know, in the Bahamas while there's
Speaker 1: there's a civil unrest going Yeah, I think go ahead, Yeah.
Speaker 1: I think the shift is happening to in in fan
Speaker 1: bases where I think folks will start to expect in
Speaker 1: demand that sort of well roundedness from the people that
Speaker 1: they follow, you know what I mean, Like yeah, I know,
Speaker 1: like like life for his little baby, you know, like
Speaker 1: a little baby the other like a month ago, Like
Speaker 1: we I love little babies music, you know what I mean.
Speaker 1: Like he makes great he makes great music, but he
Speaker 1: even took time him and the baby to address the world,
Speaker 1: right And it's like dude, like yeah, thank you know
Speaker 1: what I mean, Like thanks for that. Like we we
Speaker 1: want to know that the folks that we're giving our
Speaker 1: time and attention and our finances to that that they
Speaker 1: feel like they're part of our world and they at
Speaker 1: least make the attempt. Like I know, I know a
Speaker 1: little babies richer than me. I know, he has security,
Speaker 1: I know, but but he still understands where he comes from.
Speaker 1: He still understands that there is a world that he's
Speaker 1: connected to that he has to address. I think fans,
Speaker 1: I think if musicians don't start demanding that of themselves,
Speaker 1: fans are going to start demanding that of the folks
Speaker 1: that they're you know, of that their fans are. And
Speaker 1: particularly with hip hop, I mean there's never been there's
Speaker 1: never been more of a moment that was made for
Speaker 1: what for hip hop was birth out of than the
Speaker 1: moment that we're in right now out so and you know,
Speaker 1: there's the trust me, there's there's tons of hip hop
Speaker 1: out there that you're going to find where people are
Speaker 1: completely aware of the moment that we're living in and
Speaker 1: they're talking about it in their music and they're they're
Speaker 1: making it. They're making it fly, you know what I mean.
Speaker 1: It's it's not sounding like, it's not sounding like something
Speaker 1: that that's not, you know. But the thing is a
Speaker 1: lot of those cats are cats like me that are
Speaker 1: on the underground and stuff like that, and it's definitely
Speaker 1: stuff that people can go out and find, but it
Speaker 1: is very important that those mainstream voices part of my
Speaker 1: language get what the program, you know what I mean.
Speaker 1: It's just like it's like you're either sleep or you're not.
Speaker 1: You know. That's I loved when when Alex was talking
Speaker 1: to me when we when we when we talked about
Speaker 1: your album, when you let me hear it and you
Speaker 1: and you were you were nervous or trepidacious about you know,
Speaker 1: calling it the gospel and things like that, and I said, like, listen,
Speaker 1: inherent in the birth of gospel as some music is
Speaker 1: slave music. And what I had just learned about two
Speaker 1: months ago was that in those old Negro like slave
Speaker 1: songs and Negro spiritual songs, it wasn't just follow the
Speaker 1: dream gored like they were. They were giving each other
Speaker 1: game plans and road maps and secret messages and all
Speaker 1: these different things. So and even inherent in gospel music,
Speaker 1: it's folks dealing with the struggle of their day, right
Speaker 1: and so like there and so like if you say
Speaker 1: it's the perfect time for hip hop, which I completely
Speaker 1: when thousand agree with agree with, I think it's the
Speaker 1: perfect time for gospel music to that like real music
Speaker 1: that is that isn't that at the same time addresses
Speaker 1: um society and our issues, but also is um giving
Speaker 1: people hope and determination for a better tomorrow. That's gospel
Speaker 1: music in its essence. That's hip hop in its essence.
Speaker 1: Because black folks didn't have nothing else, Like all we
Speaker 1: could do was make dope music with with our own messages,
Speaker 1: with our own words, with our own culture, in order
Speaker 1: to communicate with each other to say, like, you're not crazy,
Speaker 1: I know what's going on, and YO to like tomorrow
Speaker 1: is gonna be better or the future is going to
Speaker 1: be better. It's at the perfect time for those two.
Speaker 1: From my from my opinion, the two the two greatest
Speaker 1: American art forms hip hop and gossap music. I'll fight
Speaker 1: anybody on this. Well, no, no, I agree with you.
Speaker 1: And it's like, like I was saying earlier, is you know,
Speaker 1: recognizing the power of music. Like imagine if that last
Speaker 1: like two minute thing that you just said was a
Speaker 1: verse you know what I'm saying, Like like like it
Speaker 1: would resonate so much more because it's music, and then
Speaker 1: that's what music was made for, so that we can Yeah, music,
Speaker 1: music carries its way absolutely. Uh. There's one last topic
Speaker 1: that I want to talk about, and it is a
Speaker 1: very very hot button right now, and it is cultural appropriation.
Speaker 1: I saw this funny as video when everything went down
Speaker 1: and it started talking about people were starting to bring
Speaker 1: up the concept of cultural appropriation and and people aren't
Speaker 1: fully getting it in terms of music because they're like, well,
Speaker 1: what about rock and roll? Rock and roll is just us?
Speaker 1: And somebody made a video as a producer who put
Speaker 1: in a video that said me making a beat with
Speaker 1: no Black music influence, and it was literally had ended
Speaker 1: up being like playing like random keys on a piano,
Speaker 1: because I don't think people fully understand how much of
Speaker 1: the Black culture is actually fully music. You know, all
Speaker 1: of my music, everything that I am is Black culture
Speaker 1: in terms of music, all of the R and B,
Speaker 1: everybody that I listened to from growing up, listening to
Speaker 1: Fred Hammond and Lauren Hill and Stevie Wonder and even
Speaker 1: to its deepest route is Black culture. And now there's
Speaker 1: a lot of brands, a lot of companies, a lot
Speaker 1: of artists who are taking fire for and and rightfully
Speaker 1: so for culturally appropriating and taking it as their own.
Speaker 1: Music is difficult because it's it is especially now we're
Speaker 1: blending everything we're throwing in rock and roll with country
Speaker 1: and throwing a little bit of hip hop in there,
Speaker 1: and everybody's dancing around. Where do you guys feel like
Speaker 1: that line is drawn between appropriation and collaboration in music specifically? Yeah,
Speaker 1: and music specifically, because I think in fashion, like I mean,
Speaker 1: we're I think they're in fashion, and in you know,
Speaker 1: sports teams from from the Washington UH football team is
Speaker 1: not what they're called. There's there. I think that there's
Speaker 1: a lot of movement going on, and as the three
Speaker 1: of us are you know musicians and quote unquote experts
Speaker 1: and music. I'd love to see your guys thoughts, because
Speaker 1: I think music is a little bit more complicated than
Speaker 1: calling a team something that's just really offensive musically, And
Speaker 1: I mean, I definitely can see how people disagree with
Speaker 1: what I'm gonna say, But musically, I'm personally not prepared
Speaker 1: two ask of somebody something that I'm personally not doing.
Speaker 1: So I know, I'm I'm a do sir, and I
Speaker 1: sample right, especially when I was younger, I used to
Speaker 1: sample a lot. So if I'm sitting down with like
Speaker 1: some old symphony composers stuff and I'm like sampling that
Speaker 1: into a beat that I'm making. If someone were to
Speaker 1: come to me and like say, well you sample that composer,
Speaker 1: can you name other songs that they composed? No, I can't,
Speaker 1: you know, I can't. I can't. So like, I just
Speaker 1: I just don't know how quick I am to like
Speaker 1: ask somebody, oh, well, you're a white kid, and that
Speaker 1: kind of sounds like a Motown song named another Motown artists.
Speaker 1: If they can't, I'm not prepared to be like, oh
Speaker 1: my god, you're culturally appropriating. What's wrong with you? But
Speaker 1: supplies have to say, I just the person whatever people
Speaker 1: are out there that are partaking in a music that
Speaker 1: isn't of their culture, that is like preaching I invented
Speaker 1: this and my culture really invented this, Like where giving
Speaker 1: anybody credit. Then yeah, obviously that person is wrong. But
Speaker 1: there's a lot of different things that we don't expect,
Speaker 1: like each new generation to fully be informed of, you
Speaker 1: know what I'm saying. In music, I think I just
Speaker 1: think music is probably going to be one of those
Speaker 1: things where it's just right now, it's so what's the word,
Speaker 1: it's so like like like incestuous and cross pollinating and
Speaker 1: everybody's doing everybody's doing you know, everyone's dipping their toes
Speaker 1: and everyone's music, you know in music culture that it's
Speaker 1: like I think the ideal situation would be ten fifteen
Speaker 1: years from now that we're just this genre lists. You know,
Speaker 1: just this this, this this genrest thing that can just
Speaker 1: morph into whatever whoever takes it on and whatever culture
Speaker 1: takes it on and they add their own spin to it.
Speaker 1: That's where my mind is with music. More than this
Speaker 1: music belongs to this culture forever about to touch it? Right? Uh? Yeah,
Speaker 1: I think I think, um, I think app Yeah, I
Speaker 1: think I think you can sort of unpack it in
Speaker 1: sort of three different ways. I try to be a
Speaker 1: geek about everything. Um, actually don't try to be. I
Speaker 1: just am sort of a geek about everything. But uh,
Speaker 1: I think, you know, I think I think you have to.
Speaker 1: I think in order to save yourself from the you know,
Speaker 1: appropch from appropriating a culture, especially when it comes to musically, UM,
Speaker 1: I think you should. I think there should be an
Speaker 1: appropriate love for the culture, um, a respect for the pioneers,
Speaker 1: and an advocacy for the community. Like I think that's
Speaker 1: where for me anyway, that's where I draw the line.
Speaker 1: So when I see, you know, an artist that has
Speaker 1: a clear love for the clear love and appreciation for
Speaker 1: the culture let's call it hip hop or R and
Speaker 1: B right like and but I don't see them paying
Speaker 1: homage to the pioneers, and I don't see them stepping
Speaker 1: up for the community should that community fall prey to
Speaker 1: whatever sort of injustice or whatever. That's when I look
Speaker 1: at that person differently, you know what I mean, Where
Speaker 1: I can even say like, yeah, you make you you
Speaker 1: make the music right or you know you like you
Speaker 1: uphold the standards musically, but in a in a sense,
Speaker 1: you are appropriating because you don't pay homage and you
Speaker 1: don't advocate, right, you know what I mean? And so
Speaker 1: like little Richard talked about it a couple months ago
Speaker 1: where he's like, I gave everybody their swag. I gave
Speaker 1: Elvis his swag, I gave the Beatles their swag. Like
Speaker 1: all these people ripped off of me and never brought
Speaker 1: me up in the conversation. So now we you know,
Speaker 1: now we all can look like we all now I
Speaker 1: look a little little richer differently. But before that, you know,
Speaker 1: I started saw him as like the goofy rock guy,
Speaker 1: you know what I mean. He's saying trudy, fruity and
Speaker 1: rudy and all these things, like clearly he was talented.
Speaker 1: Now I see him as, oh he was sonning all
Speaker 1: these dudes, like he was all these dudes dads, and
Speaker 1: they just never gave him gave him respect for it
Speaker 1: um And so like for you, you know, like when
Speaker 1: I you know, I call a little bit of what
Speaker 1: you're saying about your love for gossap music and things
Speaker 1: like that, like I see that in you, you know,
Speaker 1: I see the love for the culture. I see the
Speaker 1: homage you pay to the pioneers, and I see your
Speaker 1: advocacy for the community. So if every so, if anybody
Speaker 1: were to come for Alex and say Alex is appropriating,
Speaker 1: I say no, because I see all these things in
Speaker 1: him that tells me that he's not. You know, that
Speaker 1: tells me that he that he is actually a part
Speaker 1: of the community because of the way he treats the
Speaker 1: art form, the pioneers and the community itself, you know
Speaker 1: what I mean. So like for me, yeah, like that's
Speaker 1: that's where the line. That's where the line is for me.
Speaker 1: It may not be a perfect line, but I kind
Speaker 1: of feel like, um, the way we were talking before
Speaker 1: about how you know, things that happened politically filter into
Speaker 1: the culture, I kind of feel the same way about music,
Speaker 1: where it's like, if somebody does have a proper appreciation
Speaker 1: of the culture that they're protecting in you'll hear it
Speaker 1: in the music. You know what I'm saying. I just
Speaker 1: I don't know. I don't want to mention any names,
Speaker 1: but there's there's definitely stuff out there where it's like
Speaker 1: just aesthetically, it's checking off the marks, but there's there's
Speaker 1: something missing. But it's like act as. I think that
Speaker 1: the most important thing, like you would like you mentioned
Speaker 1: MAC is is and you mentioned it as well, The
Speaker 1: is making sure that you're paying that on is you're playing,
Speaker 1: you're paying that that respects back. Um. And you know,
Speaker 1: I'm not, by any means the person to to I'm
Speaker 1: not the appropriation judge. I don't. I don't choose what's
Speaker 1: appropriating and what's not. I just know, uh, you know,
Speaker 1: for me as myself, I was raised listening to a
Speaker 1: certain type of music. My parents loved listening to this music.
Speaker 1: It's what I drew a direct passion towards. And uh.
Speaker 1: And I made sure that when I stepped up to
Speaker 1: the plate, I knew what I was talking about, and
Speaker 1: I new what's even though you know, as musicians we
Speaker 1: are supposed to break the rules and we're supposed to
Speaker 1: bend and and try new things, it's also about respecting
Speaker 1: what's been done before and not you know, not trying
Speaker 1: to you know, shoot on what's been done before, or
Speaker 1: neglect what's been done before. Um. And that's something that
Speaker 1: I think, at least for me, I try and do.
Speaker 1: And I really appreciate your words d um about that
Speaker 1: art um. But we are actually out of time unfortunately. Um,
Speaker 1: but this conversation was so special. I know, right like
Speaker 1: I want, Um, but this conversation meant a lot to
Speaker 1: me honestly, um D, I always love talking with you.
Speaker 1: Uh it's it really is amazing to me how our
Speaker 1: friendship has bloomed in in the matter of months in
Speaker 1: one song. H and MATC. Hopefully the same goes. I'm excited.
Speaker 1: I'm really glad I met you guys. Thank you for
Speaker 1: having me on. Of course, my last bit of the
Speaker 1: podcast is called not So Shameless Promo, So I want
Speaker 1: to give you guys some time to just literally rap
Speaker 1: whatever you want to wrap and promote whatever you want
Speaker 1: to promote and plug. So Mac, I'll let you go first,
Speaker 1: all right. Yeah, Um, I'm Dope Knife. You can find
Speaker 1: me dope knife dot com. My Twitter is at Dope Knife,
Speaker 1: my Instagram is at Dope Underscore Knife, got a couple
Speaker 1: new EPs out, I've got a YouTube channel and um yeah,
Speaker 1: I don't want to sound to whatever whatever, but I'm
Speaker 1: I'm pretty I'm pretty dope. Like I mean, you know,
Speaker 1: it's it's it's it's definitely lyrical. So it's like if
Speaker 1: that's if that's the sort of thing that you're into.
Speaker 1: I definitely know it's a it's a niche. But if
Speaker 1: you're into hearing people wrapped very well, then if you
Speaker 1: if you're interested in good music, then you should probably
Speaker 1: listen to it. If people wrapping well is your thing, yes,
Speaker 1: people wrapping well over over pleasant beats. That's it. That's it,
Speaker 1: all right. D hit us with some not so shameless promo.
Speaker 1: Oh man, I'm de Wilson. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm
Speaker 1: so good waiting on reparations. Yeah, I was waiting on
Speaker 1: the promo. I was waiting on the promo. I just
Speaker 1: followed it. I just followed it. Um, I'm a subscriber.
Speaker 1: Now you got me. I haven't listened with a show yet. No, yeah,
Speaker 1: d Wilson, UM, don't follow me on Facebook. I'm gonna
Speaker 1: lead that soon. Um as as anyway, Um sorry, um.
Speaker 1: Ady Wilson live on Instagram Common him and no Gang
Speaker 1: Gang at Common him and on Instagram and I have
Speaker 1: a I have a couple of EPs coming out. Um
Speaker 1: checking me out on Alex's record. Arsna Medsin also play
Speaker 1: that record at Thalvan times from the beginning to end,
Speaker 1: but to repeat because it's flames. I think that's it. Oh,
Speaker 1: odds and in podcast that's my podcast, Odds and in
Speaker 1: podcast with Dan Sharona um love so check that out
Speaker 1: as well. I love that you guys know you can
Speaker 1: follow me at alex Iono everywhere. Ai O n oh.
Speaker 1: It's the best part about having a weird last name.
Speaker 1: And I'm so grateful for for you listening here. So please,
Speaker 1: if you have the time, make sure you rate our
Speaker 1: podcast and subscribe. That is how we grow and uh
Speaker 1: and we will talk with you very very soon talk
Speaker 1: to later Facebook. We really want you to get the
Speaker 1: help you need, so if you need help, please seek
Speaker 1: independent advice from a competent healthcare or mental health professional.
Speaker 1: The views and opinions expressed in this podcast are solely
Speaker 1: those of the podcast author or individuals participating in the podcast,
Speaker 1: and do not represent the opinions of I Heart Media
Speaker 1: or its employees. This podcast should not be used as
Speaker 1: medical advice, mental health advice, counseling, or therapy. Listening to
Speaker 1: the podcast does not established dr patient relationship with hosts
Speaker 1: or guests of alex Iono, Let's Get Into It or
Speaker 1: I Heart Media. No guarantee is given regarding the accuracy
Speaker 1: of any statements or opinions made on this podcast, well,
Speaker 1: if that's a doozy