Speaker 1: Pushkin. Krin Bailey Ray independently released one of my favorite
Speaker 1: albums of twenty twenty three, Black Rainbows. We had a
Speaker 1: chat over Zoom at the end of the year about
Speaker 1: the place that inspired the album, the Stony Island Arts
Speaker 1: Bank in Chicago, and then when she came to LA
Speaker 1: around Grammy time, we decided to meet up and continue
Speaker 1: our conversation, not only about the new album and what
Speaker 1: it meant to find her own artistic voice again, but
Speaker 1: also to discuss reflections Refractions at the Stony Island Arts Bank,
Speaker 1: a beautiful book Krin's put together, cataloging the items that
Speaker 1: inspired her new music and her creative awakening. The conversation
Speaker 1: takes us from Krinn recording her third album, The Heart
Speaker 1: Speaks and Whispers at Capitol in Hollywood, to finding a
Speaker 1: spiritual home in Chicago, to discovering a mid century New
Speaker 1: York subway pageant that led to one of my favorite
Speaker 1: songs on her new album, The rackus New York Transit Queen.
Speaker 1: This is broken record. I don't notes for the digital age.
Speaker 1: I'm justin Richmond. Here's my conversation with Corinne Bailey Ray.
Speaker 1: Have you recorded here much?
Speaker 2: Yes, I have I did my third album, Capitol, so
Speaker 2: I loved being there. I mean, that's amazing. We came
Speaker 2: for seven weeks and we ended up saying for seven months,
Speaker 2: I mean, not all in studio A because it would
Speaker 2: have you know, bankrupted.
Speaker 1: How much did you spend on?
Speaker 2: Yes, it was a lot. It was a lot, but
Speaker 2: it was worth it because it was James Godson, you know,
Speaker 2: who's such a brilliant drummer. And it was just nice
Speaker 2: we all to be in that space and anything you
Speaker 2: played in there you just played G on acoustic guitar thing. Yeah,
Speaker 2: that's right, a song with just G. Everything sounded good.
Speaker 2: I really liked it. I'd like to go again when
Speaker 2: I was a bit more together, because we didn't quite
Speaker 2: know what we're doing. I'd like to go when it
Speaker 2: was like, we know what the songs are, let's work
Speaker 2: on the arrangements, you know, rehearse and then you can
Speaker 2: just be ready to go.
Speaker 1: Yeah, a little room, I mean, I imagine there's some
Speaker 1: inspiration in that building. It's at room for.
Speaker 2: Just the actual sound, you know, space and then the
Speaker 2: echo chamber. Yeah, it's really good. And we went into
Speaker 2: the echo chamber and it still smells of paint. Wow,
Speaker 2: from when it was painted.
Speaker 1: That can't be good, can it. Yeah?
Speaker 2: I guess that's probably lead paint or something. But where
Speaker 2: the air didn't go anywhere, you know, just let you
Speaker 2: just close the door. So yeah, amazing place.
Speaker 1: I've only been there a few times, but it's so yeah.
Speaker 1: I still you know, I've lived here my whole life,
Speaker 1: but every time I passed that building, isn't it? And
Speaker 1: I always worry about now nowadays too, I worry about
Speaker 1: it when I passed, like I feel some sort of
Speaker 1: like hop you know, I doubt they're going to take
Speaker 1: it down, but I hope, Yeah, I know that.
Speaker 2: Do you universal still own it or is it owned
Speaker 2: by someone else? And when I was working there, there
Speaker 2: was a big fuss because they were making big condos nearby,
Speaker 2: but it was disturbing all the underground stuff and that's
Speaker 2: where the echo chambers are. They were like, what's it
Speaker 2: going to do to like acoustics? But I think it's
Speaker 2: probably fine.
Speaker 1: How's it been in town? It's so I forgot it
Speaker 1: was Grammy.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, I mean it's fun. I just won this
Speaker 2: award at the Resonator Awards, which is for women who
Speaker 2: produce an engineer. It's that organization called Move the Needle.
Speaker 2: I don't know if you've heard of it, but it's
Speaker 2: set up by Emily Lazarre. And so the main thing
Speaker 2: they've done is sort of analyzed music. So they made
Speaker 2: this analysis of everything that came out last year, and
Speaker 2: of all the songs that came out last year and
Speaker 2: all the records, there was only six just over six
Speaker 2: percent that either had a woman producer or engineer. So
Speaker 2: they're just looking at how they can kind of bring
Speaker 2: equity to these organizations, including mentorships for young women. And
Speaker 2: it's mostly coming out of school and you know, being
Speaker 2: the person who trains with a mixed engineer, because that's
Speaker 2: the seat you really want.
Speaker 1: To be in, right, That's how you get there.
Speaker 2: That's how you get experienced. You can learn all you
Speaker 2: want to college, but when you're actually working on records
Speaker 2: every single day and sitting in rooms and working with artists,
Speaker 2: that's when you really become a master. So I think
Speaker 2: they set up quite a few internships and there's camps,
Speaker 2: and then there were loads of big writers there, like
Speaker 2: Linda Perry was there. She's really good and she's really honest.
Speaker 2: And then alanis Morrissette was winning an award, a kind
Speaker 2: of trailblazer award, and she's such a big writer. Her
Speaker 2: record Jagged Little Pill is the second biggest selling record
Speaker 2: of all time?
Speaker 1: Is that true?
Speaker 2: Which I didn't see. It's like thriller then Jagged Little Pill.
Speaker 2: Whoa yeah, So when it was eighty eighty five million recorder,
Speaker 2: I could move for that record, and obviously all over
Speaker 2: the world eighty five million.
Speaker 1: Records, five million thriller like below, just below thriller rilla.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I was thinking, is it a Beatles record or
Speaker 2: but yeah, it's thriller, my yeah, I guess it's like
Speaker 2: it's also with how which chart you're looking at and
Speaker 2: all that sort of stuff. But yeah, that's a massive.
Speaker 2: But then they were just highlighting all these different engineers
Speaker 2: and producers that I'd never heard of that were doing
Speaker 2: big things. They're all sort of Grammy nominated this year.
Speaker 2: And this woman who's kind of Jack Antonof's right hand
Speaker 2: woman who does everything you know, yeah, exactly, Yeah, she's
Speaker 2: the mixed engineer and he just won't work with anyone
Speaker 2: Else's amazing.
Speaker 1: Would you ever produce it? Would you ever work in
Speaker 1: that capacity? Like help another artist?
Speaker 2: I mean, I just don't feel myself to be prolific
Speaker 2: enough to kind of be a producer for other people.
Speaker 2: But obviously I love producing my own music. I mean,
Speaker 2: maybe in the.
Speaker 1: Future I could do that.
Speaker 2: I just feel like it's not like, oh, I've got
Speaker 2: ten records out and then I've got, you know, two
Speaker 2: spare months to produce someone else. I feel like I'm
Speaker 2: always just trying to like get it right for myself.
Speaker 2: I did get asked recently to work with someone, and
Speaker 2: you know, maybe at a different point in my career
Speaker 2: I could do it. Or if I saw someone who thought, oh,
Speaker 2: they're really brilliant and they you know, they need a
Speaker 2: bit of help with the direction, and they were up
Speaker 2: for it. I think it's hard sometimes an artist producer.
Speaker 2: I've worked with artist producers before where they have a
Speaker 2: really strong opinion of how it should be. Whereas I
Speaker 2: feel like the best producers like we could do it
Speaker 2: like this or this or this or this, I've got
Speaker 2: all the different angles, Whereas I won't have loads of ideas.
Speaker 2: It's just with my own music, I just think it
Speaker 2: has to be this, you know direction.
Speaker 1: You know. It's funny. I re listened again to like
Speaker 1: every record in chronological way. Every record is different. Yeah. Yeah,
Speaker 1: so you at least got four different you know angles.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, No, I do really love it. I just
Speaker 2: think it takes it takes me a long time, you know,
Speaker 2: with Hero and the Tortoise or something.
Speaker 1: Do you feel like you're always like writing.
Speaker 2: I feel like I'm always in phases. So I think
Speaker 2: with this record, I'm still very much in the phase
Speaker 2: of tell the stories, communicate the stories. It feels much
Speaker 2: bigger than me. It's really different from talking about your
Speaker 2: own life compared to talking about these stories in this place,
Speaker 2: and I feel like I'm in the business of connecting people.
Speaker 1: You know.
Speaker 2: I spoke to a radio presenter who's just over at
Speaker 2: Tavis Smiley's radio station. But I remember specifically the interview
Speaker 2: what we talked about. You know, we talked about Aretha
Speaker 2: Franklin's Amazing Grace.
Speaker 1: Grace read it for you, didn't.
Speaker 2: He He was like, do you know about this record?
Speaker 2: And I said, yes, I love that record, and we
Speaker 2: got to talk about that. You know, remember, so this
Speaker 2: what's sacred, what spiritual, how people come out of the
Speaker 2: church and they kind of punished for it to a
Speaker 2: certain extent, or you know, you're really on your own,
Speaker 2: But how can you ever separate music from spirituality and
Speaker 2: all this?
Speaker 1: That's blowing my mind because that's actually the conversation. I
Speaker 1: completely forgot about it. You said, that's how I discovered
Speaker 1: that record.
Speaker 2: Really from that conversation. Really, yeah, you guys talking about Wow.
Speaker 2: So he was, yeah, that works then, right, he was
Speaker 2: recommending it to me. But whoever was watching it, Yeah,
Speaker 2: that's such a good album. And it's just a community
Speaker 2: choir who were.
Speaker 1: Excellent, insanely good.
Speaker 2: Yeah, but you know they just live nearby and they
Speaker 2: go to that church. Yeah, you know, it's not the
Speaker 2: all star gospel choir of you know, it's just not
Speaker 2: local people.
Speaker 1: Speaking of like spiritual homes. Got to look through the book.
Speaker 1: It's wild how Chicago became this kind of spiritual home.
Speaker 1: It's a second home for either way you're I.
Speaker 2: Mean, Chicago just became and still is for me. It's
Speaker 2: kind of the center of the world for black stuff
Speaker 2: for me. You know, in terms of thinking about the
Speaker 2: huge migration that happened after the Civil War and after abolition,
Speaker 2: where did the majority of people from the South want
Speaker 2: to go? The enslaved people Obviously a lot of people
Speaker 2: stayed in the South and really identified with those states
Speaker 2: and being in the land and being farmers and being
Speaker 2: close to nature. But so many people wanted to go
Speaker 2: to Chicago, you know, the big city. So many people came,
Speaker 2: and so you think of all those the mixture of
Speaker 2: all those different cultures. I mean, I sort of think
Speaker 2: it's all those different Africans that have lived in America
Speaker 2: for generations, and all the cultures of the various states,
Speaker 2: and even the cultures of the various plantations, you know,
Speaker 2: impacting to what extent people were allowed freedom to move
Speaker 2: around because of course some enslaved people were hired out,
Speaker 2: you know, on different jobs. They drove the masses around,
Speaker 2: you know, Dave the Potter who made pots for people
Speaker 2: around around the plantation delivered them and so just what
Speaker 2: that was like. And then coming to Chicago and then
Speaker 2: what they brought with them, their traditions, their culture, their food.
Speaker 2: But yeah, Chicago, I mean I feel like I knew
Speaker 2: of Chicago as a you know, being a British person,
Speaker 2: a European person, as like the mab the Mafia, Yeah,
Speaker 2: the Windy City, you know, the musical Chicago. I didn't
Speaker 2: think of it as being this center of Black thought
Speaker 2: and space. You know, I certainly wouldn't have thought, oh,
Speaker 2: Ebony Magazine was Chicago, and then was it? Yeah? Yeah,
Speaker 2: So the headquarters of Ebony Magazine were in Chicago, and
Speaker 2: John Johnson had this building that he bought and sort
Speaker 2: of decked it out. You know. He became a really
Speaker 2: wealthy man. The whole family were wealthy because they had
Speaker 2: Jet and Ebony, Negro Digest and they would send them
Speaker 2: all over the world. So he would go to all
Speaker 2: these fancy places and all these bands, and they would
Speaker 2: have all this European art on the walls. And he thought,
Speaker 2: when I get my own place, I want it to
Speaker 2: be contemporary Black artists and African pieces. So when you
Speaker 2: see photographs of that building, the Johnson Publishing Building, every
Speaker 2: floor had its own character. There was like swirly carpets
Speaker 2: that had commissioned, the furniture was specially made. There was
Speaker 2: the glass ash trays, and the art on the wall,
Speaker 2: and the dog One statues and the Marlean statues. It
Speaker 2: was like being in an art installation. And the photos
Speaker 2: it also looked like something from two thousand and one,
Speaker 2: a Space Odyssey, you know, just really like futuristic sixties.
Speaker 2: They really heavily documented it. And it also was a
Speaker 2: center for black Chicago. So when Muhammad Ali was in town,
Speaker 2: he would go to the Johnson Building or when you
Speaker 2: know sha Ka Khan or whoever was passing through, those
Speaker 2: people were always the building was always fizzing with these entertainers.
Speaker 2: So I really liked the idea of that. And then
Speaker 2: just to know the library from that building had gone
Speaker 2: to the Arts Bank, Wow, you know, and that's what
Speaker 2: the library was. It had been people who had sent
Speaker 2: their books to try and hope that Ebonie would review it,
Speaker 2: the magazine would review it. So I just couldn't believe
Speaker 2: the amount of literature in this library. It was a
Speaker 2: new another look at Chicago for me.
Speaker 1: How much time have you spent there? Now?
Speaker 2: I spent loads of time though, because we you know,
Speaker 2: obviously I went on that first visit and then I
Speaker 2: came back and did a two week residency, which really
Speaker 2: was immersive. It was freezing cold. It snowed on the
Speaker 2: first day, and the snow didn't melt all the time
Speaker 2: we were there. It never snowed again, but it was
Speaker 2: banked up, you know, it was weak solid. It was
Speaker 2: frozen in England, if you drive into a bank of snow,
Speaker 2: you kind of you know, the car crushes the snow.
Speaker 2: But in Chicago it was so frozen the car would
Speaker 2: just kind of ramp up, like a four wheel drive
Speaker 2: would just kind of ramp up on these huge snow drifts,
Speaker 2: and it was freezing. You know, your eyes would freeze.
Speaker 2: It was November or December when we went. But just
Speaker 2: to be in that building and see people who'd come
Speaker 2: out out and the cold to come to this building
Speaker 2: because there was a dance event happening, because there was
Speaker 2: a music event happening. Carolinia had put this tea party
Speaker 2: and that had it had dance, she was singing, It
Speaker 2: had a contemporary dance performance. It had this tea ceremony
Speaker 2: that everyone engaged in. There was just always so much
Speaker 2: going on. You know. There was this artist who was
Speaker 2: commissioned once a week. He would just do these pop
Speaker 2: ups in various parts of the building and you would
Speaker 2: go and you wouldn't sure whether it's going to be
Speaker 2: in the library or it's going to be in this
Speaker 2: room or that room. You'd just be able to hear
Speaker 2: the singing and kind of follow.
Speaker 1: Hopefully.
Speaker 2: I just followed to where it was, and it felt
Speaker 2: so special that all this was happening in this really
Speaker 2: beautiful space.
Speaker 1: You mentioned in the book too by car Laney that
Speaker 1: there was some like singing exercise.
Speaker 2: Yeah, she is a I guess she's an artist, but
Speaker 2: she also teaches vocals and they have this choir that
Speaker 2: would meet every every week, and they were doing this
Speaker 2: exercise where you moved around the building. We moved around
Speaker 2: this one room and he had to make a single sound.
Speaker 2: I can't remember if she gave you the sound or
Speaker 2: that you just chose it. Maybe you just chose it,
Speaker 2: but it was just, you know, one syllable, and you
Speaker 2: had to have an object that you interacted with as
Speaker 2: you walked around the space. So it might have been
Speaker 2: that rocking chair, you know. That might have been my object.
Speaker 2: So I had to make the sound as I went around,
Speaker 2: and then each time I came to the object had
Speaker 2: to interact with it. Maybe I sat in it, maybe
Speaker 2: I climbed over it, maybe I crawled under it, maybe
Speaker 2: I turned it upside down. But each time it was something.
Speaker 2: And because you were so focused on this object and
Speaker 2: doing your thing each time, the part of your brain
Speaker 2: that was concentrating on the singing just became really loosened,
Speaker 2: and so I found the things I was doing when
Speaker 2: I eventually kind of checked back in with it, it
Speaker 2: was really free and really loose, And of course everyone
Speaker 2: else was making their sound as well, so we were
Speaker 2: all kind of singing together as a choir, but not
Speaker 2: really paying attention to each other consciously but unconsciously in
Speaker 2: our music world, we were so just to hear, like
Speaker 2: all these harmonies and sounds and rhythms and textures, and
Speaker 2: you know, you'd be challenged, like the more weird someone
Speaker 2: else's sound was, the more permission it gave you to
Speaker 2: do your weird growl or screech or bark or whatever
Speaker 2: it was, because it was all about what am I
Speaker 2: going to do with this chair? Kind of fit my
Speaker 2: body through that side. So it was really mind opening.
Speaker 2: And I also remember saying I wish this was my life,
Speaker 2: and then saying to myself, wait, this is my life.
Speaker 2: So I felt like there was this huge contrast between
Speaker 2: maybe the way I had thought about my music making practice,
Speaker 2: which at that time had really become try and write
Speaker 2: those hits, you know, sit down and really concentrate and
Speaker 2: really make it happen, and really put this pressure on
Speaker 2: yourself and.
Speaker 1: Was that pressure coming from you?
Speaker 2: It didn't start off coming from me, but it was
Speaker 2: very much absorbed by me. When I was making my
Speaker 2: third record, when we came over to Capital in Los Angeles,
Speaker 2: you know, bless a record label, I think they had
Speaker 2: seen that I had been successful and they really wanted
Speaker 2: it for me and for themselves again. So definitely with
Speaker 2: that third record, I was kind of how can we
Speaker 2: make this work? And you know, I'd had lots of
Speaker 2: times of either playing people music had recorded, or sitting
Speaker 2: there with my guitar in a room full of important
Speaker 2: dudes who were all sort of older than me and
Speaker 2: more powerful, who would just sort of say at the
Speaker 2: end of a song they'd say, I just don't think
Speaker 2: it's the first single. That's what I'd get all the time,
Speaker 2: and so I would definitely be in that position of thinking, well,
Speaker 2: what is this elusive song that's kind of kind of
Speaker 2: smashed the doors in, and of course for me on
Speaker 2: my first record that had been put your records on?
Speaker 1: And did you know when you wrote that, like, were
Speaker 1: you like, oh, this is a single or no, no all?
Speaker 2: I mean, I guess I was definitely thinking the album
Speaker 2: that I had written because everything else was done, I
Speaker 2: was definitely thinking we need another kind of up tempo song,
Speaker 2: so that's all we were thinking. Really was kind of
Speaker 2: the pace. But it came about really easily and it
Speaker 2: was really fun. It was really conversational and I liked it.
Speaker 2: So it wasn't labored, whereas I think with my third
Speaker 2: record it was just every try it just felt there
Speaker 2: was so much pressure on it and bless the label again.
Speaker 2: You know, the more time and money you sort of
Speaker 2: spend on the thing really wanting to it's like gambling, right,
Speaker 2: You just like keep putting the chips down.
Speaker 1: But at a certain point you're so for you have
Speaker 1: so many chips in it's like.
Speaker 2: Whoa, yeah, it going exactly. It got in a sort
Speaker 2: of too big to Veil's situation for me where it's
Speaker 2: just I just it just can't it just can't not
Speaker 2: have an international megasmash on because it's taken so long
Speaker 2: and it's got so much money, and you know, I'm
Speaker 2: a people person. People would lose their jobs if you
Speaker 2: don't do well at a certain point in a label.
Speaker 2: You know, if someone's your guid at the label and
Speaker 2: they've kept saying no She'll do it, you know, just
Speaker 2: keep we just need another one hundred thousand dollars.
Speaker 1: You know.
Speaker 2: It's like the heads will roll, and head did roll.
Speaker 2: So I just was always, you know, like lying in
Speaker 2: bed with that kind of weight of responsibility, like I
Speaker 2: am my failing pop star and my friends are losing
Speaker 2: their jobs because of my inability to produce this thing.
Speaker 2: They pull this thing out of the bag. So then yeah,
Speaker 2: walking around with Kiara just singing these crazy bits of
Speaker 2: music and being with other artists who I thought were brilliant,
Speaker 2: I just thought, yeah, I really remember this thing of
Speaker 2: music being freeing and playful and creative and pressureless and fun,
Speaker 2: and I really want to get into that. I want
Speaker 2: that to be my life. And then of course being
Speaker 2: that was my life in Chicago and that building was
Speaker 2: my life, and that led to a whole creative, free
Speaker 2: project in Black Rainbows where I didn't feel the same
Speaker 2: pressures as I did when I was making The Heart
Speaker 2: Speaks and Whispers.
Speaker 1: So so that was the thought, like that I wish
Speaker 1: that music making was fun.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I wish I could sort of get back to
Speaker 2: my first love without thinking this is really important, because
Speaker 2: this is it's for your career and it's for the people,
Speaker 2: you know's livelihood.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's scary. Yeah. I read a book on Moe
Speaker 1: Austin or maybe it's about one the Warner Brothers label
Speaker 1: and but had a lot to do about Mo Austin,
Speaker 1: And there was a story about when they were starting
Speaker 1: some A and R guy did a produced a Van
Speaker 1: Dyke Parks record. I think it was like Van Dyke
Speaker 1: Park's first record, and it's very experimental and very cool.
Speaker 1: I think it was like the most most money they'd
Speaker 1: ever spent on like a record too, and it didn't
Speaker 1: sell at all, but it was very cool, and so
Speaker 1: he kind of sheepishly went to like Mo and was like, hey, like,
Speaker 1: you know, god of I fucked up, Like you know,
Speaker 1: this was really expensive and it didn't sell, and apparently
Speaker 1: Mo said, well, this is the album good and then
Speaker 1: he was like yeah, it's amazing. He's like, that's all
Speaker 1: we can do it? Yes, where's that kind of an
Speaker 1: executive these days?
Speaker 2: You know, It's just it's an important thing to say,
Speaker 2: I think to be fair to music executives. The way
Speaker 2: that people buy music means that there is and the
Speaker 2: money stream coming in in the same way, you know,
Speaker 2: I always say to people with my first record, if
Speaker 2: you wanted to hear, for example, like a star, you
Speaker 2: could sit by the radio and hope it came one,
Speaker 2: or you could go to the shop and buy the
Speaker 2: CD or vinyl or in India tape. But now if
Speaker 2: you want to hear a song, you can just stream it.
Speaker 2: But of course the streaming the record doesn't bring that
Speaker 2: much money to the artist. Yeah, there's a big gap
Speaker 2: now between I love that song, I have to hear
Speaker 2: it right now, or you could listen to it on YouTube,
Speaker 2: which is completely free and none of the money goes
Speaker 2: to artist.
Speaker 1: But is the money going to the label though?
Speaker 2: Now the money is going to label. Yeah, but it's
Speaker 2: the same amount of money going Maybe maybe it is,
Speaker 2: and maybe they're sort of all good, but the artists aren't.
Speaker 2: Like I would love to know more about it. I
Speaker 2: feel like someone like Taylor Swift would know the breakdown.
Speaker 1: What she knows she's thinking account of everything that's going on.
Speaker 2: Yeah, she's like, let me just rerecord all my records,
Speaker 2: you know. But yeah, I think there is money somewhere,
Speaker 2: but it's definitely not with the artist. I mean, I
Speaker 2: feel really lucky because I got to have that phase.
Speaker 2: But I think for new artists it can sometimes feel
Speaker 2: for them that the making of the music is just
Speaker 2: the start, and that if they can then spin their
Speaker 2: good music into kind of making themselves a cool brand,
Speaker 2: then maybe they can get the sponsorship that they need
Speaker 2: to go on tour to Yeah. You know, so it's
Speaker 2: really hard for artists. They're like, Okay, I've made a
Speaker 2: great record, but now I need to I don't know,
Speaker 2: get my Instagram figures up so that I can where
Speaker 2: these trainers to pay to go on the road. I
Speaker 2: don't know.
Speaker 1: I have a friend who I didn't really know to
Speaker 1: be a music person, but all of a sudden they
Speaker 1: have a job now as an A and R person,
Speaker 1: And they were on Instagram on their little story complaining
Speaker 1: the video themselves, saying, you know, I'm spending all day
Speaker 1: long going through music, and I'm founding artists and I
Speaker 1: really like their music, and then I'm going to their
Speaker 1: page and they're not promoting themselves. So why would I
Speaker 1: invest in you if you really Oh.
Speaker 2: Wait wait wait wait wait wait, yeah, that's the whole deal.
Speaker 2: I'm going to a page and they're not. It's almost
Speaker 2: as though they're spending all the time recording music, you know,
Speaker 2: all the time sitting in front of a camera telling
Speaker 2: us what shoes they're like, or like what products are
Speaker 2: using there. Yeah, I think that's really crazy. And also
Speaker 2: being a self publicist is in I feel it's kind
Speaker 2: of counter to the feeling of being an artist, right.
Speaker 2: The feeling of being an artist is like here I
Speaker 2: am with my cup full. I humbly bring it to
Speaker 2: the world as an offering. You know, it's being a promoter.
Speaker 2: It's like I am the ship. You need to listen
Speaker 2: to me. This is the best thing you've ever you know,
Speaker 2: some aret takes out, like certain certain wedges of hip
Speaker 2: hop like that have that.
Speaker 1: Like you know that might have been a reserve space
Speaker 1: for like the superstar at some point, like the Bruce Springsteen.
Speaker 1: I can kind of be both the little.
Speaker 2: Bit here I am the boss, yeah or whatever, or
Speaker 2: like a Kanye is you know where he was at
Speaker 2: one point with just like people love that kind of swagger.
Speaker 2: But if you're just sitting in your room playing a
Speaker 2: song on your acoustic guitar or you on your sampler
Speaker 2: or whatever, you've got to just hope that someone's into it.
Speaker 2: And I don't know, are we getting. Are we only
Speaker 2: getting artists who have got a kind of a weird
Speaker 2: distance between what they who they are and they making
Speaker 2: and then who they are looking at themselves from the
Speaker 2: outside thinking what are my marketable traits? Yeah, I just
Speaker 2: feel like there's something really ill at ease with that
Speaker 2: for me. But yeah, I know that that's how a
Speaker 2: in our works. It's like they look at the numbers
Speaker 2: and they say, well, if you haven't got enough followers,
Speaker 2: then there must be something wrong. Instead of thinking we
Speaker 2: can help you get followers, we can invest your platform. Yeah. Yeah,
Speaker 2: so I think it's hard for new artists. But I mean,
Speaker 2: obviously there are lots of great artists coming through, but
Speaker 2: it's generally people who know how to get that ring
Speaker 2: light on and get that content done, and that maybe
Speaker 2: be prohibitive to other kinds of artists.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Yeah, after the break, we'll be back with more
Speaker 1: of my conversation with Karen Bailey Ray. We're back with
Speaker 1: Karen Bailey Ray in the book too. You say it's
Speaker 1: been a real journey for me in music in terms
Speaker 1: of what I've wanted to say and how much space
Speaker 1: there is for it. Yeah, just struck me.
Speaker 2: What did you mean by that, I feel like, now
Speaker 2: it's a revelation. There's as much space as you imagine
Speaker 2: there to be if you can uncouple from the idea
Speaker 2: that you're trying to make massive hit music, Like I
Speaker 2: love this Andre three thousand record, which is just like
Speaker 2: I really tried to make a hip hop record, but
Speaker 2: I actually wanted to just sit cross legged and play
Speaker 2: my bass clarinet.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: Why shouldn't a music maker have that phase in their career,
Speaker 2: especially someone who's already packed the dance floors and there's
Speaker 2: already been the music you have to play your wedding
Speaker 2: and your party and you're getting ready to go out.
Speaker 2: It's like, why should we expect artists anything else of
Speaker 2: artists except kind of evolution. The artists are meant to
Speaker 2: be the weirdos, the strange ones, the ones who are
Speaker 2: kind of like listening to the muse, the ones who
Speaker 2: are a bit out there. And so I think there
Speaker 2: is as much space as you imagine, and you can
Speaker 2: say anything you imagine. You just have to not think
Speaker 2: that people a large amount of people are going to
Speaker 2: actually care, you know, but some people will care and
Speaker 2: that will make a deep connection and that's really valuable.
Speaker 1: So how have you experienced, then, the reception of your
Speaker 1: new album, Black Rainbow.
Speaker 2: I mean, I've experienced it in a really profound and
Speaker 2: rewarding way. I mean I think I've experienced it in
Speaker 2: two ways, maybe three. One is actually live, you know,
Speaker 2: going to a room, like traveling somewhere on a tour bus,
Speaker 2: getting out of the bus, getting our stuff ready, getting
Speaker 2: my clothes on, getting my makeup done, and then working
Speaker 2: on to that stage and just being there and saying
Speaker 2: I stories for you, I've got some things I want
Speaker 2: to say, and seeing people react. You know, when we
Speaker 2: first started our tour, our last US tour, it was
Speaker 2: before the record had even come out, and I knew
Speaker 2: I was playing the whole thing, so it was just
Speaker 2: you know, you may have heard two songs off this
Speaker 2: whole album, but here we are just bringing it to
Speaker 2: you and this.
Speaker 1: We recorded it and everything.
Speaker 2: But yeah, I mean the album wasn't out yet, so
Speaker 2: the tour went just ahead of when the album was out,
Speaker 2: So I think maybe people would have heard if they
Speaker 2: were really looking for it, they would have heard New
Speaker 2: York Transit Queen and maybe Peach Velvet Sky, but nothing else.
Speaker 2: And just to be able to play the songs and
Speaker 2: see people's reaction and feel like you're in it with
Speaker 2: people you know. To be able to play, he will
Speaker 2: folly with his eyes and go from this kind of
Speaker 2: dreamy section into the more disjointed music at the end
Speaker 2: where I'm singing abby hit with my plum red lipstick,
Speaker 2: my black hair kinking, my black skin gleaming, And just
Speaker 2: to say that over and over again and to hear
Speaker 2: people like start clapping and cheering and like standing up,
Speaker 2: and just to feel that in real time that gave
Speaker 2: me so much, you know, maybe think this is striking
Speaker 2: a chord. That's all I want. All I want is
Speaker 2: to connect with people. And I get that feeling in
Speaker 2: a room of five hundred people, eight hundred people, one
Speaker 2: thousand people, twelve hundred people, just small intimate rooms that
Speaker 2: meant the world to me. Doing those places, or being
Speaker 2: able to hear a song and you can hear a
Speaker 2: pin drop, no one's talking, no one's at the bar,
Speaker 2: you know, just a song they've never heard that meant
Speaker 2: a lot. So that's one way I've received it. I
Speaker 2: think another way is getting to talk to people like
Speaker 2: yourself or been requested to talk with people like yourself,
Speaker 2: that's meant a lot to me that the phone has
Speaker 2: kept ringing, or that you know, say can you come
Speaker 2: on this? Can you come on this? Can you come
Speaker 2: in this? Can you can you talk? Can you talk?
Speaker 2: That's been amazing just to say like, oh, it has
Speaker 2: connected in certain places. That means a world. And then yeah,
Speaker 2: the same getting to be on radio and play the
Speaker 2: music and then have like the feedback come through, or
Speaker 2: you know, we just did a session for Joe Wiley
Speaker 2: and she's on Radio two in the UK and I
Speaker 2: had played for her in two thousand and five. I mean,
Speaker 2: I've been back since, but just to think, gosh, I've
Speaker 2: been in this space many times, but this is doing
Speaker 2: a really different thing. And to have people, you know,
Speaker 2: phoning in.
Speaker 1: Does it feel like a first record again for you
Speaker 1: in a way like does it feel it does.
Speaker 2: Feel like a first record? Yeah? And it also feels
Speaker 2: I think because it's different to what people might have expected.
Speaker 2: It feels like not cheeky but risky. You know, it
Speaker 2: feels like a risky thing to do good.
Speaker 1: Even in a meta way as a listener of your
Speaker 1: music beyond like just really liking the set of music.
Speaker 1: What's exciting about it? For me is seeing someone that's
Speaker 1: been in your life for as long as you've been
Speaker 1: in our lives take that risk. It's thrilling and it
Speaker 1: makes you know myself. I'm sure other people too who
Speaker 1: listen like, yeah, fuck it, I want to try something
Speaker 1: different because it's really out there and it's really fucking good.
Speaker 2: Thank you, Yeah, thanks, It's just been good for me.
Speaker 2: I just feel like, what do I want to do
Speaker 2: with my time here? I don't want to forensically pour
Speaker 2: over what I've done before and try and make it
Speaker 2: enough the same that it's going to catch those people.
Speaker 2: And that's why I tried to always talk to the
Speaker 2: label people about the people who bought my first record.
Speaker 2: They're not even the same now, Like who a listener
Speaker 2: was in two thousand and six, it's not the same
Speaker 2: as who they are in twenty twenty four. So it's
Speaker 2: like even your audience has changed in terms of who
Speaker 2: they are.
Speaker 1: Way so I would have been like sixteen whenever came out.
Speaker 1: I loved it. Now I'm an almost thirty five year
Speaker 1: old dad of two girls whatever, but like listening to
Speaker 1: it makes me feel sixteen again because it makes me excited.
Speaker 1: It's like something new you know.
Speaker 2: So I think it's sort of patronizing to kind of
Speaker 2: imagine that your listeners, you know, everyone's kind of in
Speaker 2: a Belgia, are like just waiting for the same thing again.
Speaker 2: I mean, who even wants the same to buy a
Speaker 2: same record even if I made it carbon copy? You know,
Speaker 2: like the Disney films that they do where it's like
Speaker 2: it's The Little Mermaid but it's live action, but it's
Speaker 2: exactly the same, but it's different, but it's you know,
Speaker 2: I wouldn't. So it's like, how can you ever compete
Speaker 2: with the really you know, the thing that you already
Speaker 2: did and it's just Better's like, make a new movie.
Speaker 2: See what that's like? Yeah, the Little Moment will still exist.
Speaker 2: I mean I did actually like the Little Moment, but
Speaker 2: as an example of the whole way that things are
Speaker 2: being kind of remade, you know, why not just do
Speaker 2: something new? Well, the reason is because it's more of
Speaker 2: a risk, But what the benefit is that it's new
Speaker 2: art in the world, which is good for everybody.
Speaker 1: Yeah, you do take your time, and you alluded to
Speaker 1: that a bit earlier. Do you feel that like you've
Speaker 1: found a rhythm in a way that will allow things
Speaker 1: to come a little easier.
Speaker 2: Yes, I definitely feel that. And I think part of
Speaker 2: the reason the third album took so long is because
Speaker 2: it was actually a combination of songs that weren't rejected
Speaker 2: by either myself or a team, you know, So I
Speaker 2: could have written three records in that space. You know,
Speaker 2: there were definitely songs that were just like a wounded
Speaker 2: bird that you just kind of lay by the side
Speaker 2: of the road and throw out something else. So I
Speaker 2: think I will never go back to that place. However,
Speaker 2: I make my records now, even whether it's with a
Speaker 2: major label or not. I like the thing of making
Speaker 2: the record without anyone. I really enjoyed that this time,
Speaker 2: so you may and that's how did my first record.
Speaker 2: So you make it and then you sort of take
Speaker 2: it around like you're a traveling salesperson, you know, you
Speaker 2: say it's this, it's weird, it's different, is it good?
Speaker 2: Is it bad? And some people say no, and then
Speaker 2: some people say yes. And then when you find someone
Speaker 2: who says yes and you can work from there. I
Speaker 2: think that's a way that I want to carry on
Speaker 2: doing it. And you know, having you know, made a
Speaker 2: studio and invest made those kind of investments I think
Speaker 2: that it's possible. So yeah, I'm just trying to work
Speaker 2: out what to do next.
Speaker 1: Have you heard from labels, either your old.
Speaker 2: Well, I've heard from different people who are at the
Speaker 2: different labels, and it's been really positive. I mean I
Speaker 2: haven't heard from any sort of like the giants of
Speaker 2: any of the labels, and you know, you think, I
Speaker 2: wonder if they have you even heard it or not?
Speaker 2: But or even like my old manager, my first manager
Speaker 2: is like, I'm so happy you made this. It really
Speaker 2: sounds like you and it sounds like you're having a
Speaker 2: good time and that means a lot to me that
Speaker 2: it's come from historic me as well, that's not like
Speaker 2: a reinventor. Yea.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I read in the book that you felt like
Speaker 1: even the way you wrote the songs was different, I
Speaker 1: mean basing this rather than the songs coming from some
Speaker 1: internal sense of how you're feeling or something that's happened
Speaker 1: in your life, You're you're pulling the inspiration for the
Speaker 1: songs from outside sources, from these items you discovered at
Speaker 1: the archive in Chicago. Did you enjoy writing that way
Speaker 1: and is that something you keep doing as well?
Speaker 2: I really enjoyed writing that way, because I really didn't
Speaker 2: try to write that way. And I think I hear
Speaker 2: about people who I don't know write books or write films,
Speaker 2: or they say I was on the tube and I
Speaker 2: overheard so and so, and a lot of songwriters work
Speaker 2: like that as well. Right, So, I think because I
Speaker 2: wasn't trying to write songs when I was looking at
Speaker 2: that stuff, you know, that first day, I was just
Speaker 2: curious or nose even just pulling open drawers and like that,
Speaker 2: like certain things would interest me, certain things wouldn't. And
Speaker 2: I guess I was drawn to my own things that
Speaker 2: fascinate me.
Speaker 1: You know.
Speaker 2: I looked at a lot of women. I looked at children,
Speaker 2: I looked at particular eras of America. I looked for beauty,
Speaker 2: you know. I was really interested in the glamour and
Speaker 2: fashion of ebony from the forties and fifties. You know,
Speaker 2: I hadn't seen imagery of like black women in elegance
Speaker 2: and gloves and pillbox hats, and I hadn't seen enough
Speaker 2: pictures like that.
Speaker 1: Seen more of that, because every time it's flashed back
Speaker 1: to the fifties with black America, it's the black and
Speaker 1: white dogs.
Speaker 2: I mean, that's what I mean, so I think I
Speaker 2: had seen so much, Yeah, vintage blackness that was really
Speaker 2: framed around civil rights struggle or violent oppression. They were
Speaker 2: the images that went all over the world for all
Speaker 2: the reasons. But I think what that does is it
Speaker 2: makes blackness into a kind of perpetual struggle, you know,
Speaker 2: like the work of being black in the fifties is
Speaker 2: to struggle. And I remember talking to Miss Audrey Smaltz,
Speaker 2: who was Miss New York Transit Queen nineteen fifty three.
Speaker 1: That's a real thing.
Speaker 2: Yeah, there was a competition and it was Miss New
Speaker 2: York Transit. So that's what was the competition that she won,
Speaker 2: and that's how I found her. It was the black
Speaker 2: equivalent of Miss Subways. When I left the Arts Bank,
Speaker 2: I was googling like Mistransit, Mistransit. All I could have
Speaker 2: found was these two articles that were in Ebony magazine,
Speaker 2: so it was the only source on the entire Internet.
Speaker 2: But I would keep coming across Miss Subways, which was
Speaker 2: all of these kind of Doris Day types, you know,
Speaker 2: sort of posing and their photos will be plastered all
Speaker 2: over the tube, and so you could vote for who
Speaker 2: you thought was Miss Subway of any particular year, and
Speaker 2: I think the prize was, you know, free ride on
Speaker 2: the subway or whatever for the years. So a lot
Speaker 2: of these women, you know there were secretary, they were teachers,
Speaker 2: they were you know, they were going to their work,
Speaker 2: and they you know, beautiful women and immaculately dressed. But
Speaker 2: the competition, even if though it was in New York,
Speaker 2: the competition wasn't open to black women in the fifties
Speaker 2: in New York. So the black transit workers of New
Speaker 2: York got together and made Miss Transit. And that's why
Speaker 2: we see Audrey Smaltz. I think she's a fourth winner
Speaker 2: ever of Miss Transit. But yeah, because of that and
Speaker 2: because of ebony, and because someone put it on the internet,
Speaker 2: I was able to find out about it and actually
Speaker 2: find Audrey Smaltz, you know, because she became a very
Speaker 2: famous woman in fashion and media.
Speaker 1: Was that the impetus four or I mean imagine she
Speaker 1: was probably glamorous before, if that's how that's how she won.
Speaker 2: Yeah, she wasn't. She was seventeen and she was an
Speaker 2: art student and she had entered this beauty competition because
Speaker 2: it lists her as being I mean, I don't know
Speaker 2: feet and inches because we're metric in England. It's five
Speaker 2: eleven one one in shorter of six foot. Yeah, okay,
Speaker 2: but she is actually six foot but they thought it
Speaker 2: wasn't feminine enough. Sa, So it's like she's five to
Speaker 2: eleven but she was. Yeah, it didn't be intimidated fellas.
Speaker 2: But yeah, she's she was the six foots of Amazonian beauty.
Speaker 2: But she won the competition. I mean obviously because of
Speaker 2: her looks, but also she had this fold. She was
Speaker 2: an art student, so she drew and so that was her.
Speaker 2: You know, you had to show your kind of studies
Speaker 2: or special interests. And really I liked the idea of that.
Speaker 2: But yeah, going back to when you think, you close
Speaker 2: your eyes and think of black American in the fifties
Speaker 2: and the sixties, it is kind of a police dog.
Speaker 2: So seeing all this glamor and seeing all this beauty.
Speaker 2: But I said to Audrey Smult's, you know, what was
Speaker 2: it like growing up in Harlem in the in the
Speaker 2: forties the fifties, you know, was racism? I kind of
Speaker 2: was it an everyday you know struggle with me being
Speaker 2: this you know, black English girl. She's like, honey, no,
Speaker 2: She's like, I've lived in Harlem. We were fantastic we
Speaker 2: lived in that. I didn't know it was the projects.
Speaker 2: We thought we were muck aty Mac. She said, we
Speaker 2: had a live in the basement, we had black artists
Speaker 2: on the wall, and she was painting this segregated world
Speaker 2: of Harlem, saying our teachers were black, our doctors were black,
Speaker 2: our bankers were black, our lawyers were black. We lived
Speaker 2: in this relatively safe space where actually our every day
Speaker 2: was not thinking about the struggle. We were just getting
Speaker 2: on with our lives. And that really blew my mind
Speaker 2: to think about these some black spaces were safe to
Speaker 2: the extent that it wasn't the defining factor of a
Speaker 2: person's life. You know. They went to finishing school. She
Speaker 2: went to Miss Celia Devors finishing school. She just painted
Speaker 2: this picture which made me realize that we're always overlaying
Speaker 2: the kind of political struggle on top of the everyday
Speaker 2: lives of black people at that time. That's why I
Speaker 2: loved Ebony magazine because it's of course it's talking about politics,
Speaker 2: but it's also talking about the black families that are
Speaker 2: putting on an art expission in the house, and it's
Speaker 2: took about the Black doctrine Canada and it's talking about
Speaker 2: hem lengths and wigs and makeup and nail varnish and
Speaker 2: where you can buy the best powder deodron, just the
Speaker 2: real everyday things of black life. So I just, I
Speaker 2: mean ebony was just this amazing, glamorous, brilliant sauce for me,
Speaker 2: it's beautiful.
Speaker 1: I' have to go back and look at some of
Speaker 1: the sometimes I'm like Google books. I'll go back to
Speaker 1: some old stuff and look at those. But I should
Speaker 1: pick them up at like a store and look at them.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Yeah, there's still a few around because I got
Speaker 2: one last time I was in Chicago, which on that tour,
Speaker 2: you know, in November, I managed to pick one up
Speaker 2: and then now it's mine.
Speaker 1: You know.
Speaker 2: It's like nineteen sixty five and front covers gorgeous.
Speaker 1: That's great.
Speaker 2: That's really a real piece of history.
Speaker 1: Does every song on the album correspond to some thing
Speaker 1: or things in the archive?
Speaker 2: Yeah, So every song on the record is directly influenced
Speaker 2: by an object or a group of objects, or the
Speaker 2: events in that arts Bank. So that song put it
Speaker 2: down comes from those experiences like with Carolinia or this
Speaker 2: dance party that happened in Arts Bank where you had
Speaker 2: to write down your woes and put them in this
Speaker 2: big vessel on the way into the party. And I
Speaker 2: love the party because it was a proper mixture of
Speaker 2: the hip art crowd who liked the esta and admire
Speaker 2: his work. He's internationally collected, is represented by White Cube
Speaker 2: and so those people and then local community people who
Speaker 2: you know that is the South side of Chicago, so
Speaker 2: it's an underserved community, is the current title. And then
Speaker 2: just like black hip uptown people, people from the university.
Speaker 2: So it was a real mixture when you looked around
Speaker 2: the room and everyone was just dancing to this FRANKI
Speaker 2: Knuckles archive for like three four hours, sweating it out
Speaker 2: in this building, you know, like freezing outside of condensation
Speaker 2: on the walls on the inside, and then they set
Speaker 2: fire to all the woes at the end. And the
Speaker 2: thing that I had put in there, the burden that
Speaker 2: I had been carrying, I never experienced it the same
Speaker 2: after that event, you know, like the actual cathartic thing
Speaker 2: of dancing it out, being in that building, being around
Speaker 2: those people burning it. That was it, you know, done
Speaker 2: for me. So I'm a real believer in dancing out
Speaker 2: your woes, and that's what came into that song. You know,
Speaker 2: when I've gathered up all my woes, I put it down.
Speaker 2: I'm like a burden of all my woes and put
Speaker 2: it down, and then you know, too much inside. I
Speaker 2: got to dance it out and then into the end,
Speaker 2: you know, I feel so free.
Speaker 1: I put it down in hindsight. Was the work? Was
Speaker 1: it small in hindsight or was it something it was big?
Speaker 2: Definitely, Yeah, it was of getting in the way. It
Speaker 2: was blocking What then became all this new stuff, you know,
Speaker 2: just a perception of myself. And I just recently went
Speaker 2: to this meditation class as well, and they talked about
Speaker 2: a Hindu god whose work is to slice through the
Speaker 2: false narratives that you have of yourself. And I remember,
Speaker 2: I think she's called Shapti, and I'm thinking, yeah, I
Speaker 2: want that, you know, just just like burn away all
Speaker 2: the stuff that's not relevant.
Speaker 1: After this last break, we'll be back with the rest
Speaker 1: of my conversation with Krin Bailey Ray. Here's the rest
Speaker 1: of my conversation with Grinn Bailey Ray. What about the
Speaker 1: song Urthline? What would inspire that Earthlings?
Speaker 2: I really, I mean, there was a lot of stuff
Speaker 2: in the record of what's time and where are we?
Speaker 2: So are we here now but with the future for
Speaker 2: our ancestors, and we're sort of in communication with them.
Speaker 2: I think that, you know, you can reach backwards, you
Speaker 2: can kind of tell them where you are and how
Speaker 2: far we've come, and that we're safe. I don't know,
Speaker 2: I really feel that, and I've felt that a lot
Speaker 2: after I'd had my children as well, felt really connected
Speaker 2: to the kind of line going far, far back. But
Speaker 2: I think with the earth things, I thought a lot
Speaker 2: about utopias. You know, in the library, there's a big
Speaker 2: conversation going on over about two hundred and fifty years
Speaker 2: between black thinkers. You know, a classic example would be
Speaker 2: an early Malcolm X and Martin Luther King position versus separatism.
Speaker 2: You know, we find ourselves to be here. This similation
Speaker 2: argument says, here we are outside of West Africa, in America,
Speaker 2: in Europe, in South America, black people, but we find
Speaker 2: ourselves alongside our neighbor. We are human and they are human.
Speaker 2: Let's find a way to live together and move forward
Speaker 2: from this moment. The separatist argument says, we are here
Speaker 2: in this hostile environment, how can we possibly survive? The
Speaker 2: only way to survive is to turn inwards and separate
Speaker 2: ourselves from everyone else. Whether that's a geographical place like
Speaker 2: Marcus Garvey back to Africa, or whether that's a spiritual
Speaker 2: idea like the separatist communities that sprung up in the
Speaker 2: sixties and seventies, or whether it's economically when people talk
Speaker 2: about trading only withinside the community. All these different ideas
Speaker 2: and back and forth in the library. Before emancipation and
Speaker 2: then from there on, there were different Black thinkers, some
Speaker 2: saying we can make it work. We're all brothers and sisters,
Speaker 2: and some saying no, we have to be separate. And
Speaker 2: so Earthlings is looking at utopia and looking at all
Speaker 2: these different attempts at utopia, like the Black pioneers going
Speaker 2: west and making their own all black towns, some of
Speaker 2: which were really successful, some of which still exist, some
Speaker 2: of which were crushed and destroyed, like Greenwood, which was
Speaker 2: the first incident of fire bombing that happened.
Speaker 1: Is not what is Greenwood.
Speaker 2: Greenwood was an all black town that existed that was
Speaker 2: a very wealthy town, and there was an incident where
Speaker 2: a black man was accused of interacting with a white
Speaker 2: woman in a lift, a sexual aggression towards this white woman,
Speaker 2: and a lynch mob came for this man into Greenwood
Speaker 2: where he lived, and the Greenwood citizens defended him, said
Speaker 2: they were not going to hand him over to you
Speaker 2: false accusation, and the rumors grew and developed, and eventually
Speaker 2: the area of Greenwood was firebombed by the people who
Speaker 2: were outside of the community, and it's the first incident
Speaker 2: of fire bombing used in America, these agricultural planes. So
Speaker 2: I think there are some utopias which worked, some didn't.
Speaker 2: But I think the song Earthlings is about how to
Speaker 2: make utopia, sort of knowing that it's impossible, but it's asking,
Speaker 2: you know, can we eat pineapples in the sun? Can
Speaker 2: we dig our gardens and live? Can we find work
Speaker 2: and time to dance? You know? How much do we
Speaker 2: need to work to survive? How much freedom is possible
Speaker 2: in the world? How much can we share our resources
Speaker 2: and all have enough? So I was kind of I
Speaker 2: am really interested in those.
Speaker 1: Questions, pragmatic view of utopia. It's like, you know, it
Speaker 1: would be nice.
Speaker 2: The basics, well it's the basis, but he asked us questions.
Speaker 2: So I'm the optimist who says, you know, I know
Speaker 2: it won't be long, like we can make this happen.
Speaker 2: And then I know other people who are close to
Speaker 2: the song who say when they imagine it, they kind
Speaker 2: of imagine it coming through the speakers on the sort
Speaker 2: of spaceship where you know, all the astronauts have died
Speaker 2: and they just kind of floating around and nothingness, you know,
Speaker 2: like we we didn't do it, We missed our chance.
Speaker 2: We're on the planet and the planet's destroyed, you know,
Speaker 2: by it essentially our own selfishness, however that comes out.
Speaker 2: You know, selfishness is manifesting in racism, doesn't it The
Speaker 2: separation of ourselves from other people, the imagination that they're
Speaker 2: not other people. Yeah, we can't because then when we
Speaker 2: don't have to imagine them as people, then we don't
Speaker 2: have to share anything with them, land, food, resources, love,
Speaker 2: and so yeah, that song. I'm an optimist. That's what
Speaker 2: I have to be that to get up in the morning.
Speaker 1: I like that. It's more and more of like a
Speaker 1: like a Curtis.
Speaker 2: Mayfield, Yeah exactly.
Speaker 1: Yeah, there is a train coming, you know.
Speaker 2: Yeah, exactly, we can get on board. We can all
Speaker 2: get in. The don't all he needs faith? You know,
Speaker 2: you don't need a ticket. Yeah, really, I like that.
Speaker 2: It's a kind of I don't know, I guess for
Speaker 2: Curtis Mayfield, it's a specifically you know, Christian gospel message.
Speaker 2: But I think it has the resonance, you know, so
Speaker 2: what's the train? The train is kind of psychological. It's
Speaker 2: a moment, it's consciousness. So I'm optimistic in that way.
Speaker 1: That's cool. I want to ask you about another song.
Speaker 1: But before that, they reminded him talking about Curtis reminded
Speaker 1: me that you did an song with Al Green. I
Speaker 1: don't know if you were actually with Al Green.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I was with that. I was with Al Green.
Speaker 2: It's terrifying, tell me, okay, it was. It was a questlove.
Speaker 2: It was a mer who asked me to do it.
Speaker 2: I can't remember if i'd even I think i'd met him.
Speaker 2: Then I had met him. We met a few things,
Speaker 2: and maybe a Music Cares thing and a Grammy thing,
Speaker 2: and obviously it's a mea and it's the roots and
Speaker 2: he was producing this al Green Records. So it came
Speaker 2: to me like, oh, they want you to write a
Speaker 2: song with Al Green, and I thought okay. So I
Speaker 2: had to fly to New York and walk into the
Speaker 2: room and there's al Green and he says like, yeah,
Speaker 2: you know, it's really softly spoken, and he's like, you know,
Speaker 2: don't you worry about anything? You know when al Gren
Speaker 2: is in the room. You know, when al Green is here,
Speaker 2: there's all everything's fine, and he talks about himself in
Speaker 2: the third person?
Speaker 1: Does have glasses? Aren't too? In the studio?
Speaker 2: I can't remember if you had glasses or it. I
Speaker 2: remember thinking, you know, I'd worked on some chords at
Speaker 2: home because I'm not the best guitarist, and also I thought,
Speaker 2: you know, I'm really actually going to be there with
Speaker 2: al Green. I don't want to be scratching my head.
Speaker 2: So we'd worked, you know, on these chords for Take
Speaker 2: Your Time.
Speaker 1: How did you present the chords to it?
Speaker 2: I was just played them. We know, I had a
Speaker 2: Spanish guitar, and I was like, you know, mister al Green,
Speaker 2: are you feeling these?
Speaker 1: Like?
Speaker 2: Do you like this? James Poiser was there. He obviously
Speaker 2: plays with the roots, and he's a brilliant organist and
Speaker 2: keep up player of all kinds and obviously questlove. So
Speaker 2: we were the band kind of jamming this song and
Speaker 2: I sang a few lines.
Speaker 1: He sang some lines and how did the words come thready?
Speaker 2: I didn't have the words already. No, So it ended
Speaker 2: up being a kind of I guess. You know, it's
Speaker 2: a duet, but there's this big age difference between us,
Speaker 2: so it wasn't like we were in love with each other.
Speaker 2: It's more that we were reflecting on you know, do
Speaker 2: you remember when we used to take our time, you know,
Speaker 2: I'd write you a letter and you'd or we'd stay
Speaker 2: up all night, or you know, now it seems everything's
Speaker 2: going too fast, and so it's kind of both of
Speaker 2: us reflecting on longing for a time when I guess
Speaker 2: love and communication could unravel in this real slow longing,
Speaker 2: which you know so much about Algreen's music, that that
Speaker 2: feeling of hot, damp southern air and love and waiting.
Speaker 2: You know, it's it's so amazing and it doesn't take
Speaker 2: much to kind of set it on fire. And so
Speaker 2: it's all about the anticipation with his music, and so, yeah,
Speaker 2: I can't believe that it came together, and I remember
Speaker 2: just sort of thinking, I believe this is really happening.
Speaker 2: It's really al Green and of couest Of was brilliant
Speaker 2: obviously on the session, he got the different people and
Speaker 2: I think John Legend was on that album as well,
Speaker 2: So there was all these kind of you felt like
Speaker 2: everybody in this room knows what they're doing, even if
Speaker 2: I don't, and I just have to you know. It's
Speaker 2: like a sink or swim.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: Yeah, was like you just don't worry about anything, you know,
Speaker 2: when Al Green is here, we can just relax. And
Speaker 2: you know he's a reverend, so his actual pastor. And
Speaker 2: then years later I went to his church. Did you
Speaker 2: that's my next I mean, you got, yeah, You've got
Speaker 2: to go because it's a real church in a real
Speaker 2: building and people are there with their baby, women are
Speaker 2: fanning themselves. I didn't know it's going to be there.
Speaker 2: I think he just that is his job. So he's there,
Speaker 2: you know, if he's not on tour, he's just in
Speaker 2: the church leading the service, you know, and he speaks.
Speaker 2: There's a you know when those organists who like plays
Speaker 2: behind the sermon and swells and the passionate partson and
Speaker 2: he holds it down. And then he said, Karin, would
Speaker 2: you like to come up and sing something? I was singing,
Speaker 2: Oh my gosh, you know, this is the real gospel church.
Speaker 2: My Christian background is not gospel music. It's like a
Speaker 2: white Baptist church. You know, someone with a guitar and
Speaker 2: a rainbow guitar strap and someone playing a tambourine. That
Speaker 2: is what I know, you know. So it's like my
Speaker 2: black church experience comes from listening to records, it doesn't
Speaker 2: come from singing pews. So I was like, oh, was
Speaker 2: it gonna ask me? But it was amazing grace, which
Speaker 2: I of course know, so yeah, and I remember thinking,
Speaker 2: don't try and don't try and make all these crazy runs.
Speaker 2: Just just sing this song. And I think they thought
Speaker 2: they maybe you couldn't do that. So it was really
Speaker 2: it was really simple how he made it. But I
Speaker 2: wasn't about to be like if you major, you know,
Speaker 2: I just I was happy I sang my song. You know,
Speaker 2: it was a church. I wasn't trying to dazzle. But yeah,
Speaker 2: I also didn't fall on my face, which is good.
Speaker 2: But yeah, out in the bag at this point, I'll
Speaker 2: just stick to it, I know.
Speaker 1: You know what's surprised me?
Speaker 2: I was.
Speaker 1: I think about this kind of often, and going back
Speaker 1: to Aretha was like Ariana Grande Atrea's funeral.
Speaker 2: Is that what happened. I didn't watch Aretha's funeral, but occasionally, okay,
Speaker 2: more than occasionally, just sort of here and Aretha Franklin vocal.
Speaker 2: I can't remember what it was the other day, and
Speaker 2: I was just like, holy ship, she's totally unparalleled, a
Speaker 2: total master in her own lane. And just the ability
Speaker 2: to control, you know, it's like it's delicate, is burbling.
Speaker 2: You know what it was? It was her and Smoking
Speaker 2: Robinson singing Babby duet version. It's a duet that they
Speaker 2: just did totally spontaneously, and you can tell it is
Speaker 2: because Smokey sort of waits for the first note before
Speaker 2: he was a harmony and it was on Soul Train.
Speaker 2: You've got to watch it. I'm going to yeah, and
Speaker 2: she sat seeing and he said, oh, we should have
Speaker 2: been a duo and he says, it's not too late, baby,
Speaker 2: and I hadn't quite got them right in time. So
Speaker 2: it's like Smokey's a bit older than her, and he
Speaker 2: kind of looks older. He's wearing a jumper and I
Speaker 2: don't know, he might be like forty, and she looks
Speaker 2: like she's I don't know, twenty nine or something, and
Speaker 2: she's just like her skin's all just like beautiful and chotchy,
Speaker 2: and she just it's amazing seeing like a woman and she's,
Speaker 2: you know, a serious statued woman. And then Smoky looks
Speaker 2: kind of small next to her, and she's the piano
Speaker 2: player and he's kind of perched on the end of
Speaker 2: the thing. It's just like something you maybe hadn't even
Speaker 2: seen in terms of gender.
Speaker 1: On TV reversal. Yeah, you're right, Oh, that version as like,
Speaker 1: holy shit, her piano playing.
Speaker 2: Just everything, and like just thinking of her being in church,
Speaker 2: you know, with a hair pulled back, playing behind her father,
Speaker 2: who was like a superstar Cel Franklin, wasn't he, which
Speaker 2: you sort of forget about that. She really came up
Speaker 2: through gospel music and kind of the business of gospel music, right,
Speaker 2: people travel far and white to see him. His daughter
Speaker 2: that could also sing was kind of the side side
Speaker 2: showed to him. He was the main artist. And just
Speaker 2: to think coming up under that training just you cannot
Speaker 2: go wrong from there. But yet I think Areatha is
Speaker 2: probably the absolute pinnacle, you know, the top, and you
Speaker 2: always feel like you feel like she's there, you know that, Oh,
Speaker 2: she's reached kind of the top of her range and
Speaker 2: then the show was just like seventeen more, you know,
Speaker 2: like hold tones from there, just like she just shifts
Speaker 2: a gear. Yeah, so maybe, yeah. I always worry wonder
Speaker 2: I shouldn't say I worried. I wonder about the later
Speaker 2: part of her career, And it sort of makes me
Speaker 2: feel sad for music that in a way, like in
Speaker 2: the eighties it was sort of less room for a singer.
Speaker 2: There was less room for I don't know, late phrasing
Speaker 2: or taking your time or space, like the arrangements became
Speaker 2: really dense, and the only type of voice that could
Speaker 2: sit on top of it would be like a sort
Speaker 2: of Michael Jackson's voice. You know, there's loads of air
Speaker 2: in there. It's really like course Michael stabs through important times.
Speaker 2: But I felt like in the eighties there wasn't really
Speaker 2: the room in production in hip music. I always feel
Speaker 2: sad when music kind of takes a turn and it
Speaker 2: means like an artist just gets sort of chucked away,
Speaker 2: like how it was for Bill Withers, kind of so
Speaker 2: are you going to do disco? Bill?
Speaker 1: No?
Speaker 2: Okay, Well, you know by and then you don't really
Speaker 2: hear his records, you know, into the nineties, and obviously
Speaker 2: then there's a cover of Lovely Day and he's sort
Speaker 2: of back out.
Speaker 1: You know.
Speaker 2: That's again another thing I think of as artist, you know,
Speaker 2: was Bill Withers' label saying, we'll look how well Stevie's doing,
Speaker 2: will look how well this person's doing, and you're I mean,
Speaker 2: Live from Carnegie Hall didn't have a good reception, and
Speaker 2: it's one of my favorite records of all time.
Speaker 1: That's an insane right, yeah, but it was.
Speaker 2: It wasn't well received because my dad's got these magazines
Speaker 2: and it wasn't sort of well reviewed, you know. Oh
Speaker 2: you know, it's old material and it didn't have the
Speaker 2: spot I was thinking it all.
Speaker 1: But it's elevating all the songs that if they get
Speaker 1: to all the songs, you know, but just I don't
Speaker 1: want to say better, but it's just.
Speaker 2: Another talking about grandma's hands for longer than the length
Speaker 2: of Grandma's hands. But that's the version I played to
Speaker 2: my kids, and they know that speaking part as well
Speaker 2: as they know the song, you know, and it's like
Speaker 2: I love that old lady, Love that old lady. Just
Speaker 2: his rap he's talking is it's as great as a song.
Speaker 2: What a good person, what a good human? So that's
Speaker 2: the other thing I think of as an artist is
Speaker 2: you can be in a moment and think, oh, well,
Speaker 2: my work is not as well known or as popular
Speaker 2: as X, Y Z, A, B, C, D and E.
Speaker 2: That's not why you're doing your thing. You're doing your
Speaker 2: thing because you're doing your And I think there's always time.
Speaker 2: You know, sometimes people might not get into a record
Speaker 2: till the person's died, but then it's it's made, it's there.
Speaker 1: Do you think of yourself as a singer.
Speaker 2: I think of myself as I guess I think of
Speaker 2: myself as a singer, and I think of myself as
Speaker 2: a music maker. You know, I like my voice. I
Speaker 2: don't know. I remember doing loads of award shows and
Speaker 2: stuff with my first record and thinking, oh, it's funny
Speaker 2: when you're divorced from like, it's not your song, it's
Speaker 2: not your arrangement, it's not your production. I'm not playing
Speaker 2: my guitar, it's not with my band, you know. I'd
Speaker 2: feel really like, well, what can I bring to this?
Speaker 2: They literally want me to sort of put a dress
Speaker 2: on and heels and just kind of go. But I
Speaker 2: did find that I had something to say, so yeah,
Speaker 2: I do see myself as a singer.
Speaker 1: What were the best versions of that in your mind?
Speaker 2: Oh gosh, I mean I got to sing in a
Speaker 2: Wreatha Franklin song. I got to say, I'm trying to
Speaker 2: think angel. It was a music Cares was honoring a
Speaker 2: reutha Franklin. So although I never got to meet her,
Speaker 2: I was kind of like I was next to her,
Speaker 2: you know, in the red carpet. So she had this
Speaker 2: white fur coat on this like it was kind of
Speaker 2: split low so you can see her, you know, a
Speaker 2: beautiful figure. And she played a few songs at the
Speaker 2: end of the night and that was amazing. But yeah,
Speaker 2: I remember singing I just played. It was Abe Laboreal
Speaker 2: Junior and La Boreal Senior and so yeah, he plays
Speaker 2: with mcartney and then I think his dad plays guitar,
Speaker 2: so that even just the band was ridiculous. And I
Speaker 2: think I had my guitar. I don't even know I did,
Speaker 2: but I just was playing the cruds really simply. But yeah,
Speaker 2: getting to do that and knowing she was there that
Speaker 2: that was really amazing.
Speaker 1: And it worked. Do you feel like it worked? Yeah?
Speaker 2: It worked. It worked, and I heard she liked it,
Speaker 2: you know, So that's all you can. I think a
Speaker 2: lot of people were really trying to like sang like
Speaker 2: out sing Aretha kind of thing, like in Aretha Franklin tribute.
Speaker 2: But I think everyone was just trying to shine. My
Speaker 2: way of shining was like trying not to do that.
Speaker 2: Don't try to do that thing, just trying you know,
Speaker 2: this is a good song I was sort of honoring
Speaker 2: as a songwriters.
Speaker 1: Yeah that's great. Yeah cool.
Speaker 2: Well, thanks so much, Thank you, Thank you.
Speaker 1: Thanks Bim Bailey Ray for meeting up in La to
Speaker 1: chat about her book Reflections Refractions at the Stony Allen
Speaker 1: Arts Bank with us. You can hear a playlist of
Speaker 1: our favorite songs from Krim Daily Ray at broken Record
Speaker 1: podcast dot com. Subscribe to our YouTube channel at YouTube
Speaker 1: dot com slash broken Record Podcast, where you can find
Speaker 1: all of our new episodes. You can follow us on
Speaker 1: Twitter at broken Record. Broken Record is produced and edited
Speaker 1: by Leah Rose, with marketing help from Eric Sandler and
Speaker 1: Jordan McMillan. Our engineer is Ben Tollinday. Broken Record is
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Speaker 1: I'm justin Richmond.