Speaker 1: The Quest Left Show is a production of iHeart Radios. Up.
Speaker 2: Y'all, welcome back to another mini episode of The Quest
Speaker 2: Left Show. So this month we dropped a banger, if
Speaker 2: you will, a two parter with James Alexander of the Barcays.
Speaker 2: You can listen wherever you get your podcasts, or watch
Speaker 2: the full in studio conversation on the QLs YouTube channel.
Speaker 2: It's nearly two and a half hours, not exactly Jimmy
Speaker 2: Jam length, but you know, not seven hours, but two
Speaker 2: and a half hours is a lot. And trust me,
Speaker 2: he brought the stories. James actually flew in from Memphis
Speaker 2: to hang with us at iHeart Studios in New York.
Speaker 2: And one thing you won't hear in the episode happen
Speaker 2: when we were talking about that faithful moment in December
Speaker 2: of nineteen sixty seven. Of course, I'm talking about the
Speaker 2: tragic plane crash where James law four of his bandmates
Speaker 2: and his dear friend and leader Otis Redding. So at
Speaker 2: one point he got sidetracked talking about the Ojs and
Speaker 2: the Temptations, who had played a show the night before
Speaker 2: in Cleveland.
Speaker 3: You know, I wanted to know what the.
Speaker 2: Last twenty four hours were like before the crash happened.
Speaker 2: And he told this really compelling story about just having
Speaker 2: a night off seeing the Ojs beform, seeing the Temptations beform.
Speaker 2: They had, you know, hung with each other, had some fun,
Speaker 2: went to see a concert, and then they were going
Speaker 2: to head up to Wisconsin to do a show, but
Speaker 2: they went to Cleveland, and that led to a whole
Speaker 2: conversation about bands battling each other on stage the old
Speaker 2: fashioned way with music, ego and pure showmanship. And he
Speaker 2: even mentioned a similar rivalry between the Barkays and Cameo. Sometimes,
Speaker 2: like really good stories wind up on the editing floor,
Speaker 2: and we definitely didn't want this to be a part
Speaker 2: of that, so we wanted to share that moment here.
Speaker 2: He walked me through the December ninth, like the day before,
Speaker 2: just whatever that.
Speaker 3: Time period was.
Speaker 4: Like December the ninth, we had a show in Nashville,
Speaker 4: Tennessee at Vanderbilt University. Vanderbilt was like the Harbor of
Speaker 4: the South. We had to show barcades and otis reading
Speaker 4: at Vanderbilt University. We played Nashville Deep some of the
Speaker 4: eighth then were supposed to play Cleveland, Ohio December the
Speaker 4: night so rather than spend the night in Nashville because
Speaker 4: he had his own plane. Hey man, the o Jason
Speaker 4: the Temptations in Cleveland. When we get through it our show,
Speaker 4: let's take the plane and fly to Cleveland and catch
Speaker 4: their last show because they was doing two shows or
Speaker 4: early show in the late show. So we left and
Speaker 4: went to the place which we were going to be
Speaker 4: playing there on December the ninth. The Temptations of Ojas
Speaker 4: were there on the some of the eighth OJ's were
Speaker 4: opening act, and I mean the Temptations were on fire
Speaker 4: at that point. And the OJ's this was back when
Speaker 4: they had five members. The o Jays turned it out.
Speaker 4: They had one song. They had a song called I'll
Speaker 4: be Sweeter Tomorrow than I Was Yesterday.
Speaker 3: Okay.
Speaker 4: When they got through doing that song, I mean people
Speaker 4: just stood up. I mean kind of like about a
Speaker 4: ten minute standing ovation. The Temps didn't want to come out.
Speaker 4: Now the temps, man, you they had all these hits,
Speaker 4: and you know the Temps.
Speaker 3: They were there, tall, well dressed, they were the shit.
Speaker 2: Eddie Livett don't play fair. Yeah, I've seen him many
Speaker 2: times in concert. He does not play fair.
Speaker 4: They came out there and they ripped it right, So
Speaker 4: being around a lot of that kind of stuff like that,
Speaker 4: you know, So we came to an era where we're gonna.
Speaker 4: Don't know if you know anything about this, you ever
Speaker 4: heard of people saying we're gonna We're gonna cut your head. Yeah, ah,
Speaker 4: you know our head cutting.
Speaker 3: I mean, I'm in a band, you're the band. I'm
Speaker 3: in the band.
Speaker 4: So we had we know it's time we did some
Speaker 4: balance with Cameo. We that was one of our main
Speaker 4: battlet groups. But anyway, I'm gonna get to that they
Speaker 4: kicked our as we were playing the Reunion Arena and
Speaker 4: I never will forget it. In Dallas Reunion hosts twenty thousand,
Speaker 4: the venue sold out, right, So we actually had Larry
Speaker 4: Blackman's Cameo to be do a two day run with us.
Speaker 4: I think they were supposed to do Dallas with us
Speaker 4: and Houston played the Reunion Arena and the Summit, which,
Speaker 4: by the way, the Summit now is Joel Old Things.
Speaker 3: Church, gotcha.
Speaker 4: Anyway, I think we paid them, you know, forty grand
Speaker 4: for the two shows. So the deal was Cameo is
Speaker 4: supposed to go on a nine to thirty, so it's
Speaker 4: nine thirty and you.
Speaker 3: Know, we're still in the dress room, but we don't
Speaker 3: hit on music.
Speaker 4: How come cameos not on? So I said, my ropeanch
Speaker 4: around and see what Camerao's not on. Well, you know,
Speaker 4: Larry Blackman don't feel too good right now, so man,
Speaker 4: he need to be on stage right now. Dude, we
Speaker 4: done paid him this money. So as it turned out,
Speaker 4: he'd have looked out at the audience and saw the
Speaker 4: place is sold out and said come back, and the
Speaker 4: message got back to me, He's not going on unless
Speaker 4: you get five more thousand dollars.
Speaker 3: So I'm the band leader.
Speaker 4: And back in those days we had what you call
Speaker 4: a democratic band, you know, the majority rules.
Speaker 3: All of that.
Speaker 4: So I said, man, I said, I went back and
Speaker 4: tell my band, said, man, we got an issue. Larry
Speaker 4: Blackman does not want to go on unless you get
Speaker 4: five more thousand dollars. And fuck but I know if
Speaker 4: the MC go out there and say, Cameo would not
Speaker 4: be performing tonight.
Speaker 3: And they was hot. I think they had out keep
Speaker 3: it hot.
Speaker 4: I mean they had out shake your pants all that
Speaker 4: stuff like that. So I had to make I had
Speaker 4: to make a leader decision. So I told my guy
Speaker 4: to go around to the box office and uh, you know,
Speaker 4: I mean we had maybe one hundred grand in the
Speaker 4: box office.
Speaker 3: Go around there and get them five thousand dollars so
Speaker 3: they can go on mission. And so a guy that'd be,
Speaker 3: oh man, you're weak.
Speaker 4: But if if the MC had went out there and
Speaker 4: announced the Cameo is not gonna perform, they would have
Speaker 4: told that place up. We would really have a problem then.
Speaker 4: So we gave them five thousand dollars. They go out onstage.
Speaker 4: They kicked our ass bad. So with the cycle logical
Speaker 4: and all of that, and you know, getting the five grand,
Speaker 4: so our guys, you know, was feeling some kind of way.
Speaker 4: But we went out there and did the you know,
Speaker 4: just an okay show. Cameo show was right here, Our
Speaker 4: show was right here. So I said, oh, hell no,
Speaker 4: so we won't do you know, we're supposed to spend
Speaker 4: the night in Dallas, you know, I said.
Speaker 3: Look, everybody, we pack it up, we leave it tonight.
Speaker 4: We going to Houston rental room, I mean, get one
Speaker 4: of the rooms inside of the venue and set us
Speaker 4: up there. We'd yes, you know this, this can't happen
Speaker 4: like this no more, never again.
Speaker 3: We had to come back at him, and you said,
Speaker 3: the old Jay's kicked the times ass.
Speaker 4: The same one kick the ass smoked them and they
Speaker 4: only had one hit.
Speaker 3: Tims had multiple hits. That's all it takes.
Speaker 4: This is when David Ruffing was in the group. Got you,
Speaker 4: David Ruffin, Eddie Kendricks, Paul Williams, Oldis Williams, and.
Speaker 3: Who am I missing? Melvin Melvin Melvin freend Yes, oh
Speaker 3: I can I forget? Yeah?
Speaker 4: Yeah, so Lara was still playing.
Speaker 3: Yeahlara was still playing drums. Oh got you? Yeah? Oh yeah, okay,
Speaker 3: I know that area of pre pre red Cup.
Speaker 4: Yeah yeah, but it was about nine to ten people
Speaker 4: on stage.
Speaker 2: We had actually had Larry Blackman, founder of Cameo, on
Speaker 2: the show a few years ago.
Speaker 3: Classic episode. If you haven't checked it out, check it out.
Speaker 2: And I kind of love seeing how both of those
Speaker 2: guys are still carrying with their bands to this day,
Speaker 2: still entertaining audience, still making art. But stay tuned for
Speaker 2: more bonus content from the Quest Left show. We've been
Speaker 2: getting your mailbag, questions and comments, and uh I've even
Speaker 2: been jumping in and responding online here and there.
Speaker 3: You can always drop us a note.
Speaker 2: Find tons of info at questlove Supreme dot com, or
Speaker 2: if that's too much, just dm us give us feedback.
Speaker 2: We read it, we love it all right, enjoya