Confessions of a Writer ft. Rico Love

[00:00:05] Speaker A: Are we back at it? It's dj head. It's homegrown. I got a legend in the building hanging out with me today, and I've been meaning to get to this for a minute. Honestly, I don't spend a lot of time on the other side of the country. And, you know, this man flew in just to do the show with me today. Straight from Africa. Ladies and gentlemen, the legend himself, rico Love. [00:00:29] Speaker B: Turn the lights on. [00:00:30] Speaker A: Turn the lights on, man. First and foremost, I want to say this publicly, on record, documented. I've been wanting to do this for a long time. You are somebody who I look at, like, I don't want to say. It's kind of like one of them cliche things where they say, oh, you don't get your flowers or you don't get your. Just do. But I feel like a lot of people have benefited off the back of Rico love, right? And countless, and countless people, because you got to figure even the artists that you've worked with, that you coach, that you mentor, that you wrote for, that you produce for, that you have featured on your shit, have ecosystems among themselves. They have assistants, they have drivers. So if you think about that, from the tree of Rico Love, a lot of people have benefited off the back. So I want to give you that salute. [00:01:16] Speaker B: Thank you so much. [00:01:17] Speaker A: First and foremost, and then also, I mean, we don't get into the records and the music and all that stuff, but how is Rico love feeling? Because we was just talking, and you've been everywhere you was in Africa. What was you in Africa for? [00:01:30] Speaker B: If you. I was visiting Africa with Afrozone, celebrating the addition of the african performance category to the Grammys. [00:01:38] Speaker A: Right. [00:01:38] Speaker B: And then we just kind of spent a few days out there just running around. I hung out with Mama Berna and just Sheila o Emmanuel Linus. Like, tons of elected officials in the government just had a great time and just building, really figuring out what the future is going to look like for not only just the BMC, but also the we love music conference and everything I got going on. [00:02:03] Speaker A: Shout out to the BMC, too. We were at the event, and everybody's here for Grammy week, but we was at the BMC event, and Rico walked up in this gigantic, like, I don't know what animal it was. I don't know what animal it was, but it was white, and it was beautiful. And you look like. I forgot which Marvel character it is, but you look like a full marvel character. And I was like, at first when it caught my eye and I was like, oh, yeah, that's Rico. You know, your luxury. I look at Rico love like a luxury brand. [00:02:44] Speaker B: Oh, that's what's up. [00:02:45] Speaker A: You know what saying, like, apple. [00:02:46] Speaker B: I like that. I like that. [00:02:48] Speaker A: Is that intentional? Because I also want to. For the artists that's going to watch this and hear this, is that part of being an artist? Is that part of being a creative? [00:02:57] Speaker B: It's absolutely intentional. It's a part of how. It's what makes me feel good. It's what makes me feel like myself. So I don't feel like I need all of these things, but it makes me feel like wealth. And I feel like in order to gain wealth, you got to look like wealth. You got to speak wealth. You got to walk in it. You got to live in it. So it's something that's a part of who I am in my dna. And believe it or not, I haven't shopped in years. And people look at my wardrobe, and they assume that. [00:03:28] Speaker A: Wait, when you say you haven't shopped in you, somebody does the shopping for you? [00:03:32] Speaker B: No. Meaning I haven't even had to go shopping yet. [00:03:35] Speaker A: Oh, you just got. [00:03:35] Speaker B: I have so many things that I accumulated over time, and I've selected great pieces. So when you look at my pieces, it looks like I just got it. But I've collected the right types of pieces over the years, over time. And also, I was in the space for many years where I was overweight. I had gained a lot of weight, so I was 65 pounds heavier than I am right now. So for a long time, I couldn't wear a lot of my stuff. So I'm pulling out things now, and people are like, what's that? Yeah, I couldn't wear this for a while, but, yeah, people assume that I shop every single day. Know what I mean? [00:04:10] Speaker A: I would assume that, yeah, when they. [00:04:12] Speaker B: Look at my wardrobe and they look, know, I like to get dressed, and that's someone that's a part of who I am. I came up under puff and usher. You know what I mean? Those are my big brothers and mentors in the business. So that's what I saw. That's all. Yeah. So that was reflection of what I wanted to be, how I wanted to look and feel. I grew up in that era of looking at that, idolizing that opulence. But believe it or not, I've just accumulated an incredible collection that I feel like my closet is, like, curated so I don't have to. It was a time in my life where I was spending ridiculous amounts of money on clothes. [00:04:53] Speaker A: What's that look like a ridiculous amount? [00:04:58] Speaker B: Probably like 150,000. A month. [00:05:00] Speaker A: A month? [00:05:01] Speaker B: Yeah. I'm not even exaggerating. And I'm not saying it to brag. No, I'm saying it like, I don't feel like that was a part of my life that I don't feel like I need to repeat. But also, it was a part of my life that I was like, why? You don't really have to do this. You know? What happened was one day, a good friend of mine, Mr. Ruggs, actually, Ruggs said to me, he was like, you know, these guys are still in these clothes, bro. You really are buying clothes. And every people in here is boosting. Or they buy it and bring it back. Or he said, you're the only person that's really buying this stuff. Like, you want to chill? Yeah. And I looked at it and I'm like, yeah. Because everything about me, I'm not a poser. So everything I represent is, like, always authentic. So that was a wake up call for me. You know what I mean? So I was just like, damn, why am I doing this? And then I went through some very difficult times, and I wasn't able to shop that way. So when I wasn't able to for a long time, I thought to myself, I'm okay. Like, I don't have to do this. So then when I was back in a position where I was able to, I didn't need to. I didn't feel the desire to. But I do love nice clothes and nice brands. So I can get small pieces and I can do little things to put things together, but I don't have to shop the way that I used to. I have an incredible collection of timeless pieces. [00:06:21] Speaker A: That's insane. First of all, 150 a month is. Why did you do that for, like, twelve months or you did that for, like, more than twelve years? [00:06:29] Speaker B: Years, yeah, a couple of years. Like, I was really going crazy. [00:06:34] Speaker A: I'm not good at math. [00:06:37] Speaker B: I'm very serious. And again, I'm not saying it to say that. I advise it, because I know a lot of people talk about money they spent and they try to be like, yeah, I want to do it as a precautionary tale to tell people like. [00:06:51] Speaker A: Yo, you don't have to do that. [00:06:52] Speaker B: You don't have to do that. And the thing about it is, I have accumulated a great amount, and I've given away millions of dollars worth of clothes I've given away to friends and people around me. Now, I have a son who's 13 and he's almost my height, so I don't ever have to give anything away outside of my son. But I've given away so much to people, and I love to give and I love to do that, so that's not a big deal. But I would say if anybody's looking at this, you don't really need that. You don't have to do that because. [00:07:22] Speaker A: You know, that's the perception. That's what's fed, is that you have to have this or you have to have that. [00:07:30] Speaker B: Yeah. And I think that it's because we're competing with each other. And if everybody is poor, then whoever looks the richest amongst the poor is the coolest in the room. So I just don't want us to get caught up in that because we're all in this fight together. We shouldn't be trying to shine on each other. We should be trying to shine with each other. [00:07:49] Speaker A: Shout to my big brother, glasses G. Malone. He always told me that. He said, why would you go to the hood and try to outshine on your people? [00:07:57] Speaker B: And it just showed the consistency of what the conversation is out here. It's the fact that we are all living in tough situations, and in order for us to feel better about our condition, that's why a lot of kids in the project will have Jordans on. You're like, this don't make sense. [00:08:12] Speaker A: It don't make sense because it's like. [00:08:13] Speaker B: My baby got the Jordans. It was really the mom, and then it was teaching that to the Children. So then the kids grow up and be like, I got these and you don't got this. We're making fun of you. And why? Because this is how we feel society is treating us. And if you're being abused from this perspective, then whoever's below you, that's who you abuse. Who's below them? This who they abuse. And the cycle repeats and repeats and repeats. So I think that the idea of having to make sure I got this, and a lot of people, I remember somebody saying, like, oh, man, you wore that already. I know. You can't wear that again. I'm like, try me running this back. [00:08:45] Speaker A: When's the last time you repeated an outfit? [00:08:48] Speaker B: Do you know I repeat outfits? [00:08:51] Speaker A: No, I'm talking about, like, did you wear anything, like, to the Grammys or to an awards ceremony? [00:08:56] Speaker B: This jacket I got on, I wore to the Grammys. Last year? No, two years ago. [00:08:59] Speaker A: See, that's on the red carpet. [00:09:01] Speaker B: It's a Virgil. This is one of the last pieces that Virgil made. Word and I wore this at the Grammys, so now I just kind of wear it. I wear it. It's like a casual jacket. You know what I mean? This is like some fun, something to put on. But, yeah, I take pieces that seem extremely luxurious, and I'll dress them down like, I wear this with a hoodie. That white fur I had on last night, it would be nothing for me to be out with that, with some jeans and a hoodie on with that. You know what I mean? I feel you, like, just kind of like, you go to the big event with it and you shine. But then after that, this becomes a part of your wardrobe, and you can pull it out anytime you want. [00:09:36] Speaker A: I love that, bro. You brought up, you said early in your career, I do want to go back a little bit, because I never had a chance to talk to you about it. But I remember you telling the story about how you got your first record deal. I think it was 20 years old. [00:09:50] Speaker B: Yeah. I was like, around. Well, I got signed. I was like, 1819. [00:09:54] Speaker A: Okay, so when you first got signed at 1819, I feel like a lot of artists feel like that's how it's supposed to happen. Right? I get signed as I'm young. The label gives me a million dollars. [00:10:04] Speaker B: I remember I thought that the label. [00:10:07] Speaker A: Gives me a million dollars, and then I'm just famous, and now I go get $100,000 a show. I think in people's mind, a lot of artists, especially the ones that I talk to, all of them think that that's how it goes. And your story is a little different. Like, you have to earn your key. Like you said, you go up, and then you come down, and then you. [00:10:26] Speaker B: Climb back, and it keeps going up and down, up and down, up and down, until you find something that establishes certain types of wealth for you. You know what I mean? And that's the difference. But, yeah, there was an idea that you're supposed to get signed. [00:10:42] Speaker A: Did you believe that? [00:10:43] Speaker B: Yes. Okay, so you thought, I remember getting signed, and when I put out a single, I put out a single called settle down. Right. And it was on a soundtrack called in the mix, a movie that Usher did, because I did the soundtrack, and we shot a video for it. I remember after the video, I flew everybody, all my friends, out to the video, and I was thinking to myself, this song is going to be just telling. I remember telling a banker, I think his name is Hernandez, at Suntrust bank, I remember telling him, yes, I need to know, because I'm about to probably be on the road a lot. I'm probably going to begin like 20, 30,000 a night. I need to know how to do I deposit it and how do I get it to you? And I'm just talking again. He's like, oh, yeah, what you could do? And I'm just thinking like, oh, this? Nah, it didn't work out. [00:11:30] Speaker A: It'll work like that. [00:11:32] Speaker B: Yeah, you have these expectations. I think now it's different because social media has erased the mystique of the music business facts. So I don't think that people kind of know. They know that it's difficult. It's not the same, obviously, those rare occurrences where artists just take off, where you got honchos and skiller babies and artists that just kind of have create these buzzes. And that time they took rob for nine, the time it took for these guys to develop with some real time. But I think guys look at that and they believe it's overnight and they believe it's going to happen for them overnight. [00:12:08] Speaker A: I believe that. Do you think that? Okay, so also, I'll skip something. You got your deal. 18, 1920 ish around that time. [00:12:17] Speaker B: Right. [00:12:18] Speaker A: But then you signed an artist like a year later. [00:12:21] Speaker B: Yeah, immediately. Takara Hamilton. [00:12:24] Speaker A: Okay, I'm going to tell you what I was doing at 19. I lost my virginity at 19. Like, right before I went to college, I lost my virginity like, 18, transition to 19. And I was skateboarding every day. I was not trying to be a record executive at 19. Did you already have that mind? [00:12:44] Speaker B: Exactly what I was going to be. I named my company division one. It was a guy named BJ who was in Atlanta as well. He moved down to Atlanta. We kind of came up together and I told him, yo, we both play basketball. We both love basketball. Let's name our company division one and let's sign artists. And he was like, bro, you haven't even got a deal yet. And I'll just tell him. So I said, cool. I just started it myself. So I started the label. [00:13:10] Speaker A: Not to cut you up. When you say you started a label, like you filed for a business? [00:13:13] Speaker B: Yes. [00:13:14] Speaker A: Are you serious? [00:13:15] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:13:16] Speaker A: Damn. Okay, continue, sir. [00:13:18] Speaker B: Yeah. One of my mentors who passed away, Bishop Long, he gave me the money to start my business. [00:13:25] Speaker A: What was his initial investment? [00:13:26] Speaker B: It was just $700 to pay for the business. LLC. LLC. So I remember starting division one LLC in Redan, Georgia, because I was going back and forth and I had lived in Atlanta just trying to make it so I remember being down there. I started the company. And when I got signed to usher I was like, yo, I was on the road with him, and I was telling Takara, because she's super talented still to this day. And I was like, yo, I'm assigned. You're going to be my first artist. And brought it to Atlanta. Moved too fast, and the loyalty wasn't there. And I can't blame her. She was young. Everybody in her face. You were young, but she was even more young. Yeah, that was my. Was my mentality was, I want to be like puff. I want to be like Russell. I want to be like the guys I look up to, and I want to be an executive. So my whole idea of who I want to be was as an artist, was a brand, was with Jay Z, and Rockefeller was Dmy with rough Riders, was diddy and bad boy. That was my mindset. So I thought, yeah, you put out a record, you get popping. You sign something, they get popping. I saw 50 do it with g unit. You know what I mean? I saw j do it with Rockefeller. So it was like one of those things. It was. My mentality was just, bill, Bill, be an executive. [00:14:49] Speaker A: That's crazy, first of all. Second of all, that's dope, because you got to have some balls on you to think, to not even be where you are and be like, yeah, I'm a sign an artist. I'm going to get a label. And then also Bishop, what's his name? [00:15:03] Speaker B: Bishop Long. Yeah. [00:15:04] Speaker A: Shout to Bishop long for even pouring into you in that way. Because a lot of elder statesmen or ogs, they'd be like, man, if you. [00:15:12] Speaker B: Don'T get out my day one. Right. [00:15:15] Speaker A: I want to talk about, from a perspective of a songwriter, because you're famous and people know who you are. But I also think that from a songwriter's perspective, that's not something that's respected like it used to be. I don't want to sound like I don't want to put a date on date. The ideology of it, right. But I think that songwriting has gotten diluted because people feel like it's a badge of honor that I write my own shit. Yeah, but you can write your own trash. Shot to dj clue, he just had this whole rant about how songs are trash and nobody's, like, writing songs anymore, and there's a structure to it, and it's an art form to write and craft a song, not just for you as an artist, but also putting yourself in somebody else's space and being able to write for them. Right. What was the first song you wrote for somebody else that blew up. [00:16:14] Speaker B: The first song I ever wrote was throwback for usher on confessions. [00:16:17] Speaker A: Wow. [00:16:18] Speaker B: Yeah. Before that was just rapping. That was the first song I said, this is a song. I'm going to write a song for somebody. That was. [00:16:25] Speaker A: So you wrote it with the intention, like, this is for Usher? [00:16:27] Speaker B: Yeah. He gave me the track. I went to his office, and I was like, I need money. And he was like, all right. I was signed to him as a rap. So when I went to his office. [00:16:37] Speaker A: If you're signing somebody, they did your deal, you have your deal. But you went to him and just. [00:16:41] Speaker B: Was like, I need some money. I didn't get paid when I did my deal, okay. It was a shopping agreement. So we were going to do, we were in the midst of him closing, finalizing his deal with Jay records, which took about almost like a year after I was signed, a year and a half after I got signed. [00:16:54] Speaker A: Gotcha. [00:16:55] Speaker B: So I didn't have, um. So the thing about me and Usher's relationship was as soon as I got signed, we spent a lot of time together as brothers. So you would think he had an r b group called one chance. You would think that he would spend more time with the r b group. But he and I were, like, kendra spirits. So we were, like, always together. He would call me, like, come to the house. Let's hang out. Yo, I'm going here. Hang out. One time he called me and said, get on the plane, come to LA. Bring an empty bag. Empty. And he just took me shopping. He was my friend. He is my friend, like my brother. So we hung around each other so much so that I was on diary, MTV diary with them. Or he did bet how I'm living, you know, remember that show, how I'm living? I was on cribs, all of that, all that. So I was there, invisible. And then they took me on tour. So when people saw me, family members, cousins, all these people friends, they were like, oh, you on? No, I need this. I need this. So I went to him, like, I need money. My people need money, I think. And he said, I can give you money and you'll just blow it. How about I give you an opportunity to make your own money? So write this song for me. And he gave me this track, and I was going to write a rap to it. And my manager, Cersei, he came to me and was like, first of all, he was my first manager, and he's still to this day, one of my best friends and my mentor. And he said to me, I was sitting in the car. He had a green Acura. I was sitting in Acura outside of Red Zone Studios, and he said I was, like, writing raps. He said, no, bro, write a song. He told you to write a song. Don't write raps. Write a real song. So I sang you never miss a good thing. To the leisure, in the song, in the voice notes. And JQ Smith demoed it for me. He referenced it for me and changed my whole life. [00:18:40] Speaker A: Wow. [00:18:40] Speaker B: That was the first song I ever wrote. [00:18:42] Speaker A: Do you think? Now, okay, so first of all, that's dope, but I think that confessions is one of those albums. I've gotten to a real heated debate about this before. Right? Like, it's a real thing. I don't know if it's that serious at this point in time, but when you start to revisit classics and you start to deem things as classics, right. [00:19:07] Speaker B: Confessional is an instant classic, immediate. [00:19:10] Speaker A: It wasn't like there was no discussion because, again, I won't say her name. She's a radio personality. I love her. There's a heated debate about this on the radio and it's like, well, 87 one. And I'm like, it's confessions. This is like one of those transcending albums that I feel like changed the climate. It wasn't just, oh, this is a dope usher project. This changed climate, you know what I'm saying? Between you and shout to JD, and I want to get your. [00:19:41] Speaker B: Sonically. [00:19:42] Speaker A: Sonically. [00:19:43] Speaker B: And first of all, I think 87 one is one of my favorite ushers albums. My way is one of my favorites. I love those albums. But even though 87 one was not a perfect album, you know what I mean? Agree. [00:19:56] Speaker A: There was shinks in the armor. [00:19:58] Speaker B: Yeah. Uturn wasn't one of my favorite songs on there. It was a few on there that I feel like good old, good old, good old. I didn't like that record. It was like two or three on there that I didn't like. There was not one song on confessions that I don't absolutely love. You know what I mean? Even take my hand, you know what I mean? That's what it's made for the records. That was like, deep cuts. It's just a perfect album, in my opinion. It's just a perfectly crafted album. [00:20:25] Speaker A: And also, full disclosure, I want to say this because the purists that watch my show and know who I am out here on the west, I'm not an r and B fan by any sense of the word, really. I do not like r and b. Wow. It's just because I think we've more so got into the blues and forgot the rhythm at this point. It's all melodic. It's all 60 bpm. I'm a dj by trade, too. You got to think I came up in the little John era. [00:20:51] Speaker B: Oh, yeah. [00:20:52] Speaker A: I came up watching, looking at. I came up looking at Rick Rock and battle cat. So I'm a party dj where the dance floor was bigger than the sections. [00:21:01] Speaker B: Yeah, exactly. [00:21:02] Speaker A: Okay. [00:21:03] Speaker B: What a time. [00:21:04] Speaker A: And women accuse me of not being emotionally available. [00:21:10] Speaker B: Right. For lack of better words. [00:21:17] Speaker A: So me being emotionally constipated, r and B doesn't speak to me the same way. Okay, bitch, I'm underrated. Switch. Yeah, it's different. Right. [00:21:26] Speaker B: Okay. [00:21:27] Speaker A: So since we talk about confessions, though, I agree with you. I love that album. [00:21:33] Speaker B: Perfect album. [00:21:34] Speaker A: I love confessions. I didn't love 87 one my way and stuff was a little young. It was a little before me, but. [00:21:40] Speaker B: I love 87 one. Okay. So that's why my argument for confessions is different. [00:21:45] Speaker A: Strong. [00:21:46] Speaker B: I love 87 one. I used to catch the bus to Atlanta every weekend trying to make it in the music business from Tallahassee. I went to college at FAMU. I would catch the bus every weekend, and I would listen to 87 and one. My man Chad Roper used to drive me some weekends when I didn't catch the bus. Sometimes he was available. He would drive me to Atlanta on the weekends, and we would play 87 one. That's the album we would play. My man Brandon would drive me to. He was from Pensacola, Florida. He would drive me to Atlanta some weekends, and we would play 87 one nonstop. So me meeting usher and being him becoming one of my close friends, my brothers, the godfather, and my children, that is insane for me because I grew up with that man. Just call me the Mac. You make me want to. I remember those moments. I remember where I was when those songs came out. I remember hearing nice low for the first time and sitting down and thinking to myself, what is this? I don't know what to do listening to this. This isn't that incredible. So for me to say that confessions is a perfect album, and I think 87 one is not a perfect album, in my opinion, it means a lot because I think 87 one is a high. But I could see the flaws, right? There are songs on there that I'm like, we could have did without that record, right? There's not one song on confessions that I could say I could have did without that. [00:23:05] Speaker A: And my personal opinion, I don't think we needed a deluxe. I don't think we needed. [00:23:09] Speaker B: You had to. When it's coming gets so big, it's like Netflix. Netflix has to figure out how to charge you more because it's like, where do we go from here? [00:23:17] Speaker A: Where do we go? [00:23:18] Speaker B: Okay. That's the business of music. That's when it comes in. [00:23:22] Speaker A: But it would have been perfect without it. There's three. [00:23:25] Speaker B: What happens is, when an album is so perfect, usually, and this is why I want to explain deluxes for people. When an album is so perfect and people are full off this album, the record company has to come away, because usually it's two singles. You work them over time. You start off, you do 200,000 the first week. In six months, you're at gold. In another year, you're at platinum. All right, cool. Now we're going to release the next single, and that's going to help sell it. No. Every song on the album was a single. So what we have to do is we did 1.4 million the first week. We did 600, 800,000 the first day. So in order for us to take this record to the next level. All right, we got to do a delivery. [00:24:06] Speaker A: You have to. It's the business of music. Yeah, that's just part of it. Were you around for the construction of the entire confessions album? [00:24:13] Speaker B: I was a part for remnants of it. [00:24:14] Speaker A: Okay. [00:24:15] Speaker B: I was there. I was signed to him. [00:24:17] Speaker A: I'm not talking about being involved, like, musically. [00:24:19] Speaker B: No, I was there. I witnessed a lot of it, but I wasn't in the room for a lot of those songs. But I was in that space. I was signed to him, and I was a part of his infrastructure when he was making that record. [00:24:31] Speaker A: There's three urban legends that surround. Well, no, there's two urban legends that surround the confessions album. And then I also want to talk about the JD thing, because I got a lot of heat for my love for. He's like, he's my number one. And I know I'm from the west coast, and I know it's blasphemous. JD's number one. [00:24:46] Speaker B: For me. He's the Goat. [00:24:49] Speaker A: And I told him that. [00:24:52] Speaker B: I don't understand why you couldn't. Somebody could. Well, I can see if somebody's saying he's not my goat. No, but to say that, that's a. [00:24:58] Speaker A: Well, because there was a conversation that happened online that I partaked in, and it went viral about the whole versus thing when Puff JD was puffing JD, and I was like, it's JD by landslide. And they're like, well, you from LA. There's other producers that are from here that you should be riding for. And I'm like, JD has always been and always will be my number one hip hop and R B. Like Tim is right there know and everybody else. But it's JD. [00:25:24] Speaker B: Like JD Pioneer, unstoppable. I love JD, by the way. I've been in studio with JD many times. He's one of my mentors and a dear friend. I've seen it. He's doing it. [00:25:34] Speaker A: He's making the beats himself. He got the NPC and he's banging. [00:25:38] Speaker B: The drums, his drum patterns, and then he's writing the raps and he's singing the song. He can't sing to save his life, but he in there singing. You know what? No, no. He's different. [00:25:51] Speaker A: Okay. So there's two urban legends that surround the Confessions album that I'm asked JD about it too. But from your knowledge is burn was initially the first single but they switched to. Yeah, because they needed something different. [00:26:04] Speaker B: No, what happened was burn was always slated to be the first record. [00:26:07] Speaker A: Okay. [00:26:07] Speaker B: When Sean Garrett wrote, yeah, it was like it shook up the whole Atlanta. Everybody was talking about this song. Gotcha. And La Reid had Sean Garrett. I think Sean Garrett was signed to Hicko or he would work at Hicco all the time. And no, he wasn't because I don't think Sean did a pub deal till later. But he was at Hicko all the time, which is owned by La Reid. So he heard this song and he's put out an APB and told usher, you got to cut this song. And usher's like, I'm not singing this song. I'm not singing. [00:26:36] Speaker A: Usher didn't want it. [00:26:37] Speaker B: No, I remember being in the room and they played and I was there when he played it for usher and I fell on the floor laughing. I thought it was terrible. [00:26:46] Speaker A: You thought it was terrible? [00:26:47] Speaker B: By the way, sean garrett is one of the greatest. [00:26:49] Speaker A: And you thought, yeah, it was terrible. [00:26:52] Speaker B: I'm in the club with the homies trying to kick a little vi and put it down. I'm listening to the words and I'm like, and then you hearing Sean voice singing, it was like, what does that even mean? Right? Yeah. So I was like, nah, I laughed because I thought it was hilarious. Usher was like, I'm never singing that. I remember hearing, I don't know if it was Mark Pitts or KP was on the phone. And I remember hearing la reid on the phone saying, I don't give a fuck what you got to do, he better sing that fucking song. Hung up. And I just remember leaving and like, I'm thinking, usher not singing, he's not. [00:27:23] Speaker A: Going to do it. [00:27:24] Speaker B: I left, man. I had a girlfriend at the time. She was from west palm beach. She and I were driving to west Palm beach to meet her family. And on the way, they said, we're going to premiere new usher. We're going to be playing every hour on an hour new usher. We're driving through cities, bro, nonstop, bro. I said, I don't know nothing about. [00:27:47] Speaker A: Music your whole life. [00:27:50] Speaker B: Because when I heard usher sing it, I understood. It became different. I'm like, this is the illest shit in the world. So what happens is the gift of a r artisan repertoire. The understanding of how to hear a hit is a gift. And some people don't understand how to hear a hit. It's something I had to learn. Hearing a hit means I don't care who sings it. Hearing a hit means it could be a guy. Just like, I'm in the club, I'm home, and you try to kick a little bit and you're like, it's something to that. Let's speed that up. Let's put 808 behind. Like, that's hearing a hit. La reed's ability, KP's ability, mark pitt's ability to hear a hit, Brion Prescott's ability to hear a hit. These are guys are true a and r men. I know their ability to hear a record, no matter the condition. The know, when people were like, oh, the mix wasn't good, so I ain't get it. You don't know how to hear a hit because these guys can hear through everything. [00:28:48] Speaker A: Hear it through everything. You know, I what mean, there's no, yeah. [00:28:50] Speaker B: So when he did that record and it came out, that's what changed because, yeah, was supposed to be that b side, right? [00:29:00] Speaker A: To burn. [00:29:00] Speaker B: To burn. Because burn was the ticket. Everybody knew Burn is going to be the you got it bad for this project. [00:29:06] Speaker A: It's the ballad that took everything. [00:29:07] Speaker B: Come on. Yeah. [00:29:10] Speaker A: I egregiously hate ballads, and Burn is one of my favorite songs. [00:29:15] Speaker B: Do you like children? [00:29:18] Speaker A: I don't know. I've been in therapy. [00:29:20] Speaker B: You got to pray for me. [00:29:22] Speaker A: I don't like ballads. [00:29:23] Speaker B: Do you know who you're talking like? [00:29:24] Speaker A: You know, I know this is crazy. [00:29:27] Speaker B: I know, I get it. But what I'm saying is what happened was it bought them so much time because, yeah. Became such an explosive record that it bought them time to say, oh, shit, we don't even have to rush. Burn. [00:29:41] Speaker A: No. [00:29:42] Speaker B: Oh, my God. They got a massive smash. We can roll this album out. The album was already exceptional, and I believe that with Burn, confessions would have probably sold three to 4 million albums. Right. What year did it? Made it a phenomenon. So then when confessions came out and then the whole breakup with Chili, and then Chili got on the radio and said he did the unthinkable, and then the whole story about the baby without, yeah. Setting everything up. He's a global phenomenon, a mega superstar with. Yeah. Then you got the story of confessions, and then you got burn as the song. It changes everything. So now your first weekend, you're doing 1.4. You're breaking records that still haven't been broken today in r and B music. Physical to this day. Physical to this day. That's why I have to apologize to Sean Garrett as a young 17 year old. [00:30:42] Speaker A: All that to say. [00:30:43] Speaker B: Yeah. To say, I didn't hear it, bro. And now I'm wrong. [00:30:46] Speaker A: Yeah, I was wrong. [00:30:47] Speaker B: And that's why he's one of the greatest ever. [00:30:50] Speaker A: Okay, so that's funny as hell that you didn't like. [00:30:53] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:30:53] Speaker A: Because instantly, coming from a dj's perspective. [00:30:57] Speaker B: No. But again, I had to learn. I didn't know how to hear a hit. [00:31:01] Speaker A: I feel you. [00:31:02] Speaker B: So you heard it after it was made. Right. So in fairness, you and I, I. [00:31:06] Speaker A: Heard the finished product. [00:31:07] Speaker B: Yeah. You may have felt the way I felt. [00:31:09] Speaker A: Who knows? Okay. [00:31:10] Speaker B: You know what I mean? That's fair. [00:31:11] Speaker A: That's fair. [00:31:12] Speaker B: Because when I heard it, when Usher sang it, I knew it. [00:31:15] Speaker A: Well. See, also instantly, because I'm a tactician, I'm a scientist, I'm a real geek in real life, I just do cool shit right in media, but I'm actually a nerd. So when I look at songs like, yeah, to me, it's just, like, supposed to be, and I know they're not the same. Like, yeah is number one. It's the number one record in the country. [00:31:34] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:31:34] Speaker A: Took the world by storm. But to me, I look at it, like, from a formulaic standpoint, right? Even the way I produce music, I look at it very formulaic. There's no emotion attached to it. I'm like a MacBook. Right? So when I look at. Yeah, it's not only sonically amazing and not sonically a hit record, but on paper, it's a hit record, right? It's 105 bpm. It has a great 808. It has a great high. And even when I'm producing records and I'm telling people like, oh, yeah, you need muddy drums and high highs. Like, you always win. Because this is not scientifically proven. I don't have any science to back this up, but I believe that white people can't hear low frequencies like we can. So they hear the highs and we hear the lows differently because of whatever. That's just my belief. So when you combine those two with amazing melodies and dope runs and stuff like that, I think instantly you have a formula for a hit record. Right? Same thing. When I looked at poster be on paper, it's a muster bees. Janae. It's Chris. It's Omarion. Amazing melody. It's easy to learn after you hear it one time, you know, familiar, you know, stuff, like, at it. I look at it very scientific as opposed to the feeling part about it. The second urban legend you mentioned was the chili thing, because there's a story attached to confessions. I feel like confessions as an album is always attached to that story. And I know that they said that that didn't have anything. Usher was like, no, JD said, we were just being creative. It had nothing to do with their situation and stuff like that. But it's like, I think in the black community, nobody ever believed that. [00:33:07] Speaker B: Yeah, but that wasn't the truth. That was a real thing. [00:33:09] Speaker A: That was a real thing. [00:33:10] Speaker B: JD. That was JD's situation. [00:33:12] Speaker A: That was JD's situation. [00:33:14] Speaker B: Confessions was JD's real. Was. And then he came up with the lyrics being creative, because he just told me this in Vegas, maybe a couple months, six, seven months ago. And he said when he was in, just he stepped out and he was looking at the. He was walking around and he saw the Beverly center hand in hand. The Beverly center. Like, man, he was really writing it as he was there, but that was his life. The confessions thing about having a girl. Yeah, that was his life. That was real. [00:33:44] Speaker A: That was real. [00:33:44] Speaker B: It's just that chili made it so incredible because we were in New York during release week, and Chili was in Atlanta on Ryan Cameron morning show, and she did an interview with Ryan Cameron, and she said. He said, why did you and Usher break up? And she said, because he did the unthinkable. [00:34:05] Speaker A: That was it. [00:34:06] Speaker B: He did something I can't even. Ladies, it's the worst thing you could ever do. But she didn't say what it was, right? So when confession comes out and he says that it set it up, but that's not what even. You know what I mean? And her unthinkable was different than what everybody else's unthinkable. Because I think in fairness, and I think if she would have just said he cheated, the women would be like. [00:34:28] Speaker A: Oh, okay, men cheat. [00:34:30] Speaker B: You'd be. But the fact that she said the unthinkable is set it up in a way. And I remember because you have to understand, we didn't have social media, so somebody had to send us a clip to a computer. I'm not exaggerating. Somebody had to send us a clip. And then what happened was somebody took the sound bite from the interview, and since we were in New York, hot 97 was running it. Chili just did interview, and she had this to say about usher. Boom. Coming back from commercial break, blah, blah, blah. And that's how it went. Crazy, right? And people were like, oh, my God, usher really had a baby on her. Blah, blah, blah. How did you do that? How could you do that while I purchased your. [00:35:13] Speaker A: Okay, rico love from a grammy standpoint. So I'm sitting there last night and I saw your speech, right? And I'm listening to you speak, and I was like, I know what it's about. Right? I know what the organization is about, and I've been a part of different. I joined the grammy board, like, three years ago, and I did that because I actually wanted to speak to you about this too. I joined the grammy board because I hate these people. Not hate. That's a strong word. I strongly dislike these individuals who are keyboard tough, right? They're twitter fingers, right? Every single year. Every single year. And I was a hypocrite at one time, just like everybody else. When macklemore beat kendrick for the grammy, good kid, mad city, and macklemore black, twitter black, the whole black community, we all were in outrage, right? There's outrage for everything. I was part of that community. Like, what the fuck? [00:36:13] Speaker B: How could. [00:36:14] Speaker A: This don't make sense. And nobody has ever taken the initiative to get involved. [00:36:20] Speaker B: Yes. [00:36:20] Speaker A: And my number one issue with people, I'll speak for my city specifically. This is Los Angeles. I'm from LA, and I speak for us. In my city specifically. You can speak for yours, is that everyone has an opinion and no one does shit. Everybody sits on the Internet and complains, but nobody gets involved. [00:36:39] Speaker B: That's universal, by the way. [00:36:40] Speaker A: Okay, well, like I said, I don't represent. I have to speak for my people. [00:36:43] Speaker B: I feel you. [00:36:44] Speaker A: So the way I look at it is I didn't like how radio was. We created our own platform because I didn't like how back in the day, power 106 was only playing fist pump music. We did the first Kendrick interview ever I did the interview where he changed his name from K Dot to Kendrick. We did that on our platform. [00:37:03] Speaker B: Right. [00:37:04] Speaker A: So were the ones catering to the hip hop community from a west coast perspective. Right. Because I'm looking at the wake up show. I'm looking at sway and tech. I'm looking at what everybody else is doing. So that's what my mission was, right. I didn't like the way radio was going. I went and got in the radio state. I was at iheart for seven years. I worked on big boy show for three years. I learned under one of the goats. Then I got my own show. Right now we're here. I didn't like how things are in the community. I went and joined the boys and girls club. I had outrage about the Grammys passing over black people every year or people being snubbed not being nominated. I went and joined the Grammy board. [00:37:38] Speaker B: Became a voting member, and became a. [00:37:39] Speaker A: Member of the Grammy board because I want to understand these systems and how they work from the inside out, right? So that way I'm not just one of these people complaining on the Internet. Your involvement. When I was watching your speech, I say all that to say. When I was watching your speech last night, I was like, exactly. When you said this one piece, and I want you to talk about your involvement and where you are with that. But when you said this one piece, it stuck with me. And that's what I bugged. That's why I hit you this morning. I need you because when you had them kids come out, when you all had those kids come out, and it was after your speech, but when those kids came out and you said something, I thought about that. You were like, everybody in this room is in this room because we are community, to some, to that effect. But when we call on you, I need you to pick the same phone, the same email. I need you to respond to that email, too. That same phone call, I need you to respond to that phone call, too, because this is important, because we need to empower these people and we need to pour into our community so that way we can shift things and change the narrative. But you can speak on that from your perspective. [00:38:47] Speaker B: Basically, I'm the chair of the BMC, the black music collective. It's a DeI effort started by Riggs Morales, Harvey Mason, Jr. Jerry L. Johnson, and Valisha Butterfield. So what we do is we make sure that we hold the recording academy, hold ourselves accountable, and make sure that black people are getting their just due facts. They're getting opportunities that they need. We're doing outreach. We're making sure that they feel seen, they feel heard, they feel loved. It should feel like a home in the recording academy for all musicians and all writers and all artists, but sometimes for people of color, it doesn't feel that way. [00:39:18] Speaker A: Correct. [00:39:19] Speaker B: So we're going to do our part to change that. Now, as a person of color who's from the culture of the culture, no poser, really put in work, really put in time. Well respected, got a clean face, never stole from nobody, never robbed nobody, never did no underhanded business. [00:39:31] Speaker A: I've never heard anything negative about you. [00:39:33] Speaker B: So what I have to understand is, if I'm a person who is a clean face in the business, and I'm saying, listen, I know what y'all heard about the recording academy, but this is what we can do to change it. There's some things about the academy that at one point, I was ignorant to, and I got educated facts as I started putting my time in. Come on in, guys. Let's put in this time, and let's do the work. Let's become voting members. Let's make sure that we make a difference, because you can't be upset with a person voting for somebody that they're more familiar with. So why don't we become the people that are voting, and we can vote the things that we are familiar with, and that way people that look like us get an opportunity. Because of the way that music is so segregated in some times, in some senses, in some regions and markets and areas, I think that it's changing a little bit with streaming, which is a whole nother two hour interview that we have to get into. But I just think that there are opportunities to make sure that the things that we feel like deserve the shot and the credits get it. It's just about educating ourselves on how to do so. So with the BMC, I make sure that I do my part as the chair to lend my voice, lend my services, lend my visibility, and put in the work. Now, what we ask for is all year round, that we create initiatives to empower the youth, young black creatives, young women, people of color, people in the latin community, making sure that they feel seen and heard and respected and loved as well. And we do our, you know, we make sure we're out. We want to touch Haiti, we want to touch Jamaica. We want to know the Caribbean, all of it. It's about us showing them what is available to them and then creating a bridge for them to get there. It's one thing to say here is this water. You can have it. And you're like, well, how I'm going to reach it, right? You got to figure that out. It's yours. Wow. What we got to do is we got to say, here's the water, and here's this table, and this is how. And I'm going to slide it here. Now it's here. You're going to have to do something to get it. Now it's halfway there. [00:41:42] Speaker A: Halfway there. [00:41:43] Speaker B: Now you got to do the work. And that's all we want to do with the BMC, is make sure that not only are we doing the work to educate people, but we're creating opportunities for them to use the education that we've given them and giving them the best opportunities to utilize it. [00:41:58] Speaker A: I want you to speak on that because I have a real issue with that. I see a lot of people complain every year, every winter, but I always. [00:42:05] Speaker B: Ask the same question when they say, man, fuck the Grammys. And I'll be like, so how do Grammys work? [00:42:10] Speaker A: I love that. I'm going to start saying that. [00:42:11] Speaker B: What you mean? How does it work? Just show me how it work. So how are you going to say, you know what I mean? [00:42:18] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:42:18] Speaker B: That's like saying, fuck, we go love. All right, cool. Why? Yeah. What did he do? [00:42:23] Speaker A: Did he steal from you? [00:42:24] Speaker B: Well, I read one time on the Internet that somebody said that he did. What did he say about it? We don't educate ourselves enough generally. [00:42:34] Speaker A: Fact. [00:42:35] Speaker B: I just think that we look at situations and we form opinions based upon our own biases and based upon how we feel in life. And what I mean by that is this. If I don't feel seen, if I don't feel heard, if I don't feel respected, if I feel like I'm raging against the machine, if I feel like there's powers that be that are keeping me down, then every system that I can look at and I can point to, and if all it takes is one person to say, the Grammys did this to me, I don't need to educate myself on it. I'm mad already because somebody else did that to me. So fuck the Grammys. It's just like, if somebody get on tv right now and say, my baby daddy did this, and if somebody going through with their baby daddy, oh, he did it. You don't even know. You don't even have it. You don't know what's going on. But that's what we do as a community. We get angry at a system because there is another system that we feel is oppressing us. And by the way, we should be angry at certain systems. We should even be angry at the way the Grammys used to work and function. But we also should be angry enough to go and make a change and make a difference, educate ourselves on how it works. [00:43:36] Speaker A: Go do something. [00:43:37] Speaker B: Go do something about it. [00:43:37] Speaker A: And that's the key, man. [00:43:39] Speaker B: Or if you say, well, I don't feel like doing something about it, well, you should feel like complaining about it. [00:43:43] Speaker A: Facts. If you got the energy to complain, you got the energy to go do something. [00:43:46] Speaker B: And if you feel like, well, I don't give a fuck that much, then you shouldn't give a fuck that much to talk about it. Thank you, bro. [00:43:53] Speaker A: Oh, my God, bro. I deal with that so much about when it comes from radio. [00:43:57] Speaker B: Fuck radio. [00:43:58] Speaker A: I'm like, well, how does it work? Well, you there? Okay. Tell me how my job was. [00:44:02] Speaker B: Yeah, exactly. [00:44:03] Speaker A: Okay. Well, I left radio. So now you don't even have the. [00:44:08] Speaker B: Articulation or they say they play the same songs. All right. Why? Because these are the songs that are researching the best. These are songs that people want to hear. [00:44:16] Speaker A: That's it. [00:44:16] Speaker B: And just because you listen to the radio all day, you sit in the house or sit. There are some people that when they hear that song, the song you heard 50 times today, they've heard once because they get in the car to hear, oh, this is my song. They want to hear that song. If they don't hear that song, what's what they don't do? They're going to change the station. If they don't hear the rotation of songs, they want to year, which means the radio station is not making money. So there's the top 20 songs that they have to be played. Radio station have to play these songs at this time or else. We've seen research shows us that people are changing the station to our competitor who are playing these songs. So we have to go. It's a whole business, and we don't have time to educate ourselves. But we got all the time in the world to tell you. [00:44:57] Speaker A: Why complain? Yeah, research. TSL. That's time spent listening. Okay. Average TSL is under ten minutes. So if you want to do your due diligence on radio. All right, what's the first song you ever heard with auto tune on it? [00:45:12] Speaker B: There's a song. First song I ever heard was goodbye by Jagged Edge. [00:45:18] Speaker A: Well, no, auto tune or something like auto tune. [00:45:21] Speaker B: Like pitch correction, I think zap Rogers. Computer love. [00:45:27] Speaker A: Well, that's. I guess that would be considered. [00:45:30] Speaker B: I mean, that was the first time I heard anything, anybody, talkbox. [00:45:34] Speaker A: But talkbox is technically. [00:45:35] Speaker B: Yeah, talkbox is just the harder way of doing auto. Doing auto, because it took absolute skill and everything. You got to like him to put the talk box thing and then play exactly what he was singing, that was difficult. But that first time I ever heard something like that. So when I heard a song called Goodbye by Jagged Edge, they had put it on at the end of the song, and I think they did it because it was a great take, but the note was wrong, so they added. [00:46:04] Speaker A: The auto little pitch correction. [00:46:05] Speaker B: So if you listen to goodbye by Jagged Edge, it's an incredible song. But that was my first time hearing it. And then after that, it was t paint sprung. Oh, yeah. [00:46:20] Speaker A: Shout to t pain. Okay, so from your perspective, because like you said. Well, not you said, this is my accusation on Rico Love, right. Is that you're somewhat of a purist, which is why when you heard. Yeah, you rejected it. Right. It's that because you were listening to the lyrics from a sonic also, like. [00:46:35] Speaker B: I couldn't hear a hit at that time. Okay. [00:46:37] Speaker A: You were untrained in the jedi way of La Reid. Does that also apply to sonics? Right. Because the auto tune thing has been an ongoing debate in music in general. It seems like only black music, though. I don't never see white people arguing about auto tune ever. [00:46:57] Speaker B: Yeah, but. But the privilege. Let's make sure we understand whenever we talk about what white people do and what black people do understand the comfort and the privilege to be white means that I'm open to be wrong. I'm open to have this thing go, because the freedom of failure they have, the freedom of failure, we don't have it. So we beef about the most trivial thing, like the most ridiculous things, because. [00:47:24] Speaker A: We have to have it. Right? [00:47:26] Speaker B: Yeah. We don't feel comfort in our own skin. So whenever we talk about what black people do and what white people do, we always have to keep in mind and be sensitive to ourselves as black people to know that they can afford to not be upset about some things. You know what I mean? [00:47:42] Speaker A: It's a comfort because it's going to be okay. Right. Regardless, it ain't necessarily going to be okay all the time. [00:47:47] Speaker B: Exactly. [00:47:48] Speaker A: Okay, so do you feel like, from a sonic standpoint, that r and b helped or hurt rm? I mean, auto tune, do you feel like auto tune helped or hurt r and b? [00:47:57] Speaker B: Auto tune is a tool and some tools are going to be overused. And at the end of the day, the biggest songs and the biggest selling songs and the biggest selling artists and the most successful artists in the world still are very talented people. [00:48:15] Speaker A: Facts. [00:48:16] Speaker B: We can say what we want about fly by night, one hit wonders or artists that we think, but there's no way you're going to tell me that Travis Scott is not one of the most talented artists, producers, writers. You can't say because he used auto tune. No. You're not going to tell me that there's not something special about Uzi vert. You might not like his songs. I'm not a huge fan of every record I've heard of his. But you're not gonna tell me that it's not something special and appealing that the masses see in this kid. You can't do it. You're not gonna tell me that Don Tolliver is not masterful in the way that he places and arranges his vocal and the lyrics and decisions he makes as a writer. You're not going to tell me that Brent Fias is not come on the list can go on and on and on and on. And that's just me talking about the artists that's not even, with the exception of Travis Scott and Uzi, the artists that aren't even mainstream, ultra successful. Now, let's think about this. The artists that get us frustrated are the ones because it's so many of them, okay. But it's not much room at the top, baby. And there are only a few that are at the absolute top. When you talk about the biggest tours, you're talking about Drake in 21. You're talking about Taylor Swift, you're talking about Beyonce. That's the biggest. It's the biggest. I'm talking about this year. [00:49:32] Speaker A: Okay. [00:49:32] Speaker B: Yeah. When Kendrick want to come back, it's going to be another wave of that. So what we have to understand is that we get so upset because there's so much noise down here. But up here we look at the most successful acts. Usher was able to go to Vegas, reinvent himself, sell out 100 shows, three year run, nonstop, killing it because he's absolutely talented. [00:49:57] Speaker A: Facts. [00:49:58] Speaker B: We get upset because there's so much noise and we're like, music is dying and it's. No. The people who are Adele, absolutely talented. Mary J. Blige, absolutely talented. We honor Mariah Carey and Lenny Kravitz last night, absolutely talented. [00:50:15] Speaker A: Mariah is different, bro. I didn't realize she had that. I mean, I knew, but you don't know until you look at it. [00:50:21] Speaker B: No. She has so many heads, the accolades and the longest running everything she's ever sang. She wrote or co wrote everything. Everything. Every word, every song from Mariah Carey that was successful. She either wrote it or she co wrote it with somebody else, not co wrote it by taking credit for things that she didn't do, because a lot of artists do that as well. Really, I'm talking about. She actually is a writer, a legit writer. She actually comes in the sessions prepared and will sing you the melody and the concept and will construct the song she actually wrote. Her first album, in its entirety, is not a game with her. She is one of the best songwriters ever. It's just because she's such a big star, people try to discredit that. The same with Usher when, remember, Usher first came out, he was such an amazing dancer and a sex symbol that people would try to disrespect him as a singer. He's one of the greatest singers ever. It's just that he does other things exceptionally well that people so well that people try to disregard how great he is as a singer. The same with Mariah. I think because she's such an iconic superstar, people don't want to give her credit for that pin, but that pin is. [00:51:26] Speaker A: I didn't realize that she wrote a. Co wrote everything. [00:51:28] Speaker B: Everything. [00:51:29] Speaker A: That's insane. [00:51:30] Speaker B: She is insane. [00:51:31] Speaker A: That is insane. Salute to Mariah Carey, bro. [00:51:34] Speaker B: And she looked so beautiful last night. She did. [00:51:37] Speaker A: She did. [00:51:39] Speaker B: I was bugging out. [00:51:40] Speaker A: I'm like, you saw me when you were on. You was like, yo, I saw you turn into a nigga real quick. And he was like, almost staged. I'm at the grave. [00:51:51] Speaker B: Oh, shit. Oh. [00:51:54] Speaker A: I want to talk to you about groups. Right. So I came up. My mom is a huge music head. Boys to men, Joe to see Drew Hill, the whole nine. And then later on, actually, I forgot Sean. From boyz to men, Sean Stockman. Shout out to Sean Stockman. I remember talking to Sean one day. This is during COVID Everybody's in the house. So I remember talking to Sean Stockman, and he was saying that literally, I don't know who it was. I don't want to misquote him and putting nobody under the bus, but I remember him literally saying that there were people in the music business that conspired to invent the boys to men formula for the Caucasian. [00:52:38] Speaker B: Absolutely right. [00:52:39] Speaker A: And so they took the boys to men, the Jodeci, the drew heel formula, and then put it in sync. And Backstreet boys, the other what I forgot below something, Nick Lachey and them. So they basically 98 degrees. 98 degrees. Backstreet boys, 98 degrees in sync. They basically recrafted those. [00:53:00] Speaker B: Old Town was the first old town. [00:53:02] Speaker A: After boys to men. Jodeci, Drew Hill, did you have that experience or knowledge on that? [00:53:09] Speaker B: I knew that, yeah. [00:53:09] Speaker A: Okay. [00:53:10] Speaker B: Yeah. So that's true. It was the same as. I'm not even going to. [00:53:14] Speaker A: But was it a consorted effort? [00:53:15] Speaker B: It wasn't a consorted effort to get rid of Boyce men. I think it was just an effort to say, oh, shit, we're going to steal it. Like, all right, we white and we. [00:53:23] Speaker A: Just going to take things like an appropriation. [00:53:26] Speaker B: Like Elvis, like Jerry Lee Lewis, same thing. Like everybody. We're just going to take it. We like it. We're going to take it. [00:53:35] Speaker A: So that was a real thing as. [00:53:37] Speaker B: Far as like, yes, damn. It's the same as new edition comes out and they're like, oh, shit. All right, new kids on the block. [00:53:47] Speaker A: And that's the label doing that. [00:53:48] Speaker B: Or, by the way, the guys who discovered new addition when they made new kids on the block, it's just like, oh, it's bigger. If it's white, imagine how big we are and how still we got to struggle to get all this. So if they white, we cut through all that. [00:54:03] Speaker A: Wow. [00:54:04] Speaker B: More white kids. [00:54:05] Speaker A: Wow. [00:54:05] Speaker B: So it's just demographic, it's less threatening. [00:54:08] Speaker A: I feel that. [00:54:09] Speaker B: You know what I mean? [00:54:10] Speaker A: Beyonce, I remember you telling the story about when your mother was in town. I watched this, right? I watched this. You tell this story and your mother was in town and Beyonce wants you to go to the studio, and you're like, yo, my mom's in town. I kind of want to go take her to dinner. And Beyonce pauses and she's like, yeah. So I booked the. Like, is that one of those things where you don't say no or you can't no? [00:54:37] Speaker B: That was the thing where she was telling me, wake up, this is your shot. You about to blow it. Don't blow it. That wasn't her being rude or anything. That's her saying, we are in business, and it's time to do business. [00:54:47] Speaker A: Gotcha. [00:54:47] Speaker B: And from that point forward in my career, I missed funerals, I missed Thanksgiving and family unions and christmases and all type of things. I remember I was in London working on my first Father's Day, my first father's Day with my son. Before my son was one years old, I had to go to London working with Rihanna. I got out there. Rihanna didn't even show up. Yeah. No shade to Rihanna. [00:55:09] Speaker A: Where was she at? [00:55:10] Speaker B: I don't know. I went to London to work. We were writing songs, waiting to come. She never came. It's my first father's day. I would do it again today. You know why I'm with you. He was a baby. He don't know. It's my father's day. [00:55:22] Speaker A: I'm with you. [00:55:22] Speaker B: So what I had to understand is what that taught me wasn't like, oh, Beyonce didn't get no. It was her saying, bro, this is the game we in. Either you want to be great, or you want to be the greatest, and I want to be the greatest. So when you want to be the mom. I'm sorry. I know you just flew out here. I had my mom up at the Mandarin Oriental in Miami. She would have been fine, but by the way, Beyonce booked me the studio at the satay, so I go to work at the satay. My mom gets there. She like, this is. We ordered food and dinner at the satay, and Beyonce paid for that. So my mom is like, oh, we good? It was an opportunity for me to realize, what do you really want? Ask myself the question, what do you really want? [00:56:08] Speaker A: How bad do you want? [00:56:09] Speaker B: How bad do you want it? And from that point forward, my career changed because I was missing everything that people thought I had to be at cousins graduations. I've probably been to in my life, two or three graduations my whole life. Me too. Because guess what? I got to work that time of year. I got to get it. And a lot of people in my family was uncomfortable with it, but when they need that little extra, what's the name? They know who to call. [00:56:36] Speaker A: What is that like working with Beyonce? Is it very mysterious? [00:56:41] Speaker B: Yeah. No, she's incredible. But more than anything, she's the nicest person I've ever worked with. She's polite, she's on time. She's respectful. If she's late, she apologizes. [00:56:49] Speaker A: She apologized to you? [00:56:50] Speaker B: Yeah. For being late. [00:56:51] Speaker A: Wow. [00:56:52] Speaker B: She's a human being. [00:56:53] Speaker A: No, I'm not saying it like that kind. [00:56:56] Speaker B: I'm saying it to say she's a kind individual. And a lot of times, that concept of I can be nice and I can be successful is insane. To these small level, successful artists who walk in a studio and don't even know how to say hello and greet people and know how to be kind and courteous, the biggest artists I've ever experienced in my life are the nicest. The ones who was just in the middle, they were the ones always had. [00:57:20] Speaker A: A hard time, rude, stuff like that. What's the creative process like? While working with Beyonce, is that something like, do you come to her with stuff that you already came up with? Concepts, melodies, or is it collaborative? [00:57:31] Speaker B: I guess it's a person by person basis with her. She works very closely with certain groups of people, and I think they spend the time creating together, collaborating together. And she's very involved in sonics and everything. She's very involved. My situation, I wrote the actual songs that she and I did together, but she's such a force, and she has opinion and she has ideas, and she's just masterful the way she sees herself and sees her artistry. [00:57:58] Speaker A: I want to get into some of your songs, too, but also, the other thing is, since I'm talking about the beyonce thing, what about groups going solo? Right? Do you feel like that's something that artists should? [00:58:10] Speaker B: I think it's amazing. That's what groups are supposed to be. And then eventually, I would hope they would come back and do some stuff together. My heart is still believing that destiny, shao, will come back and do something together. [00:58:21] Speaker A: I think everybody wants that. [00:58:22] Speaker B: Yeah, that would be amazing. [00:58:24] Speaker A: I honestly thought we were going to get that on the renaissance. Like, I thought we were going to get that, the reunion type. [00:58:31] Speaker B: I would love that. I would love a tour. I would love all those things. But who knows? I think that the idea of groups and having a superstar. Some groups don't have superstars, right? But some know Steve Perry of journey was a superstar. So will you expect him not to put out a solo record? That would be insane. Peter Gabriel, when he was in Genesis, he left and did a solo album. And then when Phil Collins became the lead in Genesis, what did he do? He became a superstar. And then, guess what? He left and did solo projects. It's a natural progression, natural order of things, when you have superstars in your group. Lionel Ritchie was in the Commodores. Okay, cool. Now, when Lionel Richie left the Commodores, there wasn't a could. No, the Commodores could still work and tour, but nobody else could go and do a solo album out of that because he was the superstar. [00:59:28] Speaker A: Hey, daddy is one of them songs that I felt like, you know how men like, a lot of your songs are really good, really good records, but men that aren't secure can't sing them. You know what I'm saying? You give her a go already. But I'm like, I'm secure. And I feel like that was one of the records where I'm like, this shit is fire, bro. You know what I'm saying? When you come up with a song like that or you produced it, wrote, co produced it, right? [01:00:02] Speaker B: Yeah. With the runners. [01:00:04] Speaker A: Shout to the runners. When you do a song like, hey, daddy, is that like, okay, this is the single or does it work out that way? Just because it's a great record. [01:00:12] Speaker B: When I wrote it, I knew it should have been the single. And I don't make the decisions. [01:00:15] Speaker A: Right. [01:00:16] Speaker B: But what happened was I wrote daddy's home and then they put out there goes my baby and daddy's home at the same time. Top of the year. So during the Christmas break, I remember my man DJ O. [01:00:28] Speaker A: You had a good year. [01:00:29] Speaker B: Yeah, that was a great year. But I remember DJ O called me and was like, we just got this new record to say, turn the lights on. This you. I was like, what is like, it's usher records. God, daddy's home. We about to start running the top of the year. He said, oh, shit, we just got another one. It's called there goes my baby. I didn't even know. I said, oh, shit. What they doing? See, dropping two. Dropping two records and there goes my baby and daddy's home was going back and forth in number one spot. You know what I mean? Just swapping. [01:00:54] Speaker A: Had a great year. [01:00:55] Speaker B: Had a great run, man. Great time. And with that project we had, that raymond versus raymond album. Had a great run. [01:01:01] Speaker A: Usher, give me a worthy opponent in the verses. [01:01:05] Speaker B: Oh, man. Usher, beyonce is the verses that I would want to see. [01:01:10] Speaker A: Give me a realistic. Beyonce is not going to do the verses. [01:01:13] Speaker B: Usher. Not either. Okay, let's stop acting like, oh, no. [01:01:19] Speaker A: I'm not one of them people. [01:01:20] Speaker B: Okay. Because I'm not one of them guys. Ushers. That nigga. [01:01:22] Speaker A: No, I'm not one of those guys. [01:01:24] Speaker B: Okay? [01:01:24] Speaker A: I'm fully on the usher. [01:01:26] Speaker B: Okay. [01:01:27] Speaker A: It's always a common thread. [01:01:29] Speaker B: Yeah. Because when we talk about beyonce wouldn't do it, it's like, yeah, well, then just the same with usher. [01:01:33] Speaker A: No, I'm not one of those guys at all. [01:01:35] Speaker B: By the way, beyonce loves usher. [01:01:37] Speaker A: I'm not one of those guys at all. I'm 100% on the usher train. Right. I'm also on the brown train. But it's just that people want to see that. I don't know if we get the Vegas residency or not, by the way. [01:01:50] Speaker B: But if you ask me what would be the perfect. To me, I think that beyonce and usher is the, that's the one. Yeah. [01:01:58] Speaker A: By the way, I do want to say this on record. I went to the usher residency, one of the best concerts I've ever been to in my entire life, ever. And I do music for a living. Right. [01:02:09] Speaker B: It's easily flawless. Yes. Flawless. [01:02:12] Speaker A: Okay. [01:02:13] Speaker B: Flawless. And by the way, he has a whole club that comes out of the sky. [01:02:16] Speaker A: I'm aware, I'm aware. Last thing. And we could wrap up music when it comes to lyrics. Right? You started off rapping. [01:02:26] Speaker B: Yeah. [01:02:29] Speaker A: Why is it that rappers don't get the same grace when it comes to collaborating songwriting as r and b artists? [01:02:36] Speaker B: Because of the ignorance. Yeah. The ignorance of not knowing how the first songs were crafted. Eazy e didn't write one rap probably, in his life. Right. And he's one of the greatest voices in the history of hip hop. So are you going to be upset with the fact that Keenan Ivory Wayans, Robert Townsend were writing with Eddie Murphy? I bet if you knew that, you'd be like, what? [01:03:07] Speaker A: Right? [01:03:07] Speaker B: Yeah. [01:03:08] Speaker A: Or even Chris Spencer writes a lot of stuff behind the scenes. [01:03:11] Speaker B: Or the fact that Paul Mooney was writing for Richard Pryor. You know what? You know? Does it mean that these people are not talented? No. What it means is that his delivery is insane. So what it means for ice cube writing raps and ren writing raps for Dr. Dre is that Dre voice is dope. It's still Dre. He's still Dre, though. You know what I mean? [01:03:37] Speaker A: Or Jay Z writing still Dr. E. Exactly. [01:03:40] Speaker B: So the point is, there is an ignorance in which how Mc being this battle thing, and I'm coming up on my rhymes and this musical, lyrical, purist thing that people don't accept the fact that if I'm in a room and you're by right now, you think that if Jay Z is in a room right now with me, and he says a line and I say, and I say, yo, what about if you say. And he's like, oh, shit. You think he's not gonna say that line? You're crazy. And he's the greatest. You think he's gonna be like, no, I didn't write it, so I'm not gonna. He's going to be like, that's a dope line. I'm going to say that. And there's nothing wrong with that. And I think that, by the way, when you become so big, it's the only time that people care anyway. When you become such a big star, that's the only time that people give a fuck anyway. So it's really not that people have a problem with artists ghost writing. It's that people don't have a. They got to find something to have a problem with. [01:04:33] Speaker A: Everybody wants to be angry for whatever. [01:04:35] Speaker B: And I just always say this, man, my kid could come to me and say that they were anything in the world. My kid could come to me and say, I'm gay. My kid could come to me and say, I'm transgender. My kid could come to me and say, whatever. I love them forever. Unless they said that they were a troll on instagram, because these are the worst kind of people. Yeah, these people sit up and they just go under people's to talk crazy about everybody. Real shit, and then they say, the worst case scenario, everything. Somebody could get on television and say, I'm sorry, that thing I said about such and such wasn't true. I was wrong, and I was being hateful and spiteful in the comment section and be like, I don't believe it. No, they paid you to do it. It's just that there's a certain group of people who hate themselves so much, or they see themselves in every victim that there is, and they want to create that, and they rage against the machine so much, and they can't handle success, and they can't handle looking at success because they don't see success inside themselves. Those type of people are the reasons why anybody could feel uncomfortable about co writing and collaborating, because they got to worry about this individual who's never seen the world, who's never gotten them off their couch, who's never tried anything, who's never been comfortable with failure, who's never failed and got back up, who's never challenged themselves to be outside of the norm, outside of the community, outside of the city. Those people are the ones who make artists uncomfortable with acknowledging the fact that they collaborate. Hip hop space. [01:06:05] Speaker A: Listen, bro, I got to get you a thought before we go on royalty. The streaming thing is a whole nother conversation. That'd be ours, but the thing is, going on with TikTok and UMG is prevalent, but then also, you make money from the business of music. Like, you literally have made a fortune doing the business of music. Right. What are your thoughts, just briefly, on the streaming era, and are you directly affected by the way things are done now versus how they used to be? [01:06:36] Speaker B: Yeah. Streaming definitely changed the way that writers, the shares that we get, especially on the publishing side. It's not the same money, but some things being put in place. We just passed the music modernization act a few years ago to make it easier for us to kind of raise how much we're getting as songwriters. When it comes to that, I just think that it has to be a big change, and there's a lot of money being made. It's not being distributed, in my opinion, fairly and properly. And I want to make sure that I do my best to educate myself on why that is and educate myself on how to change that. I'm not going to get in here and say, fuck the labels, because that's ignorant. What I can say is that I don't know exactly how everything is functioning and that is a problem because there's nobody who can give me a clear answer. [01:07:21] Speaker A: There's no answers. [01:07:22] Speaker B: So what I would like to do is try my best to figure out the Rubik's cube of it all, and then I can start saying, this is why this isn't working and we need to change it. What I do know is there's a ton of money being made. There's a ton of money being distributed, and it's not coming in a way towards the direction of the writers and the producers as it should be. And I want to do more work to understand why. And that's the best way to look at it. But you can't go in these situations and saying, fuck these labels, and they doing this and expect for them to have their doors open and say, oh, rico, we heard you said fuck us. Come on, talk to us. Why you feel this? Nah. So you got to be mature about it and understand, like there's something going on and we got to figure out how to change it. [01:08:01] Speaker A: The king of r and B, does that exist? [01:08:03] Speaker B: Usher, say less. [01:08:05] Speaker A: I'm with you, man. [01:08:08] Speaker B: Thank you, bro. [01:08:09] Speaker A: I've been trying to get you in here forever. I got more stuff. We could talk forever, but I know you got to go, but I just appreciate you. One, for your contribution to the culture. Two, because you actually do things, you actually move on action, and it's not just lip service and thumbs and all of that Internet stuff. And then also, I also appreciate you because I've never really heard your name in no mess, you know what I'm saying? As far as, oh, Rico don't pay on time, or Rico hasn't sent this in or I've never heard that. And I know we know a lot of the same people, and I just feel like that's important too. I remember my brother Charlamagne told me, he said, protect your reputation with your life because it is your life when. [01:08:50] Speaker B: It comes to why, you know, there are a few people that had discrepancies with me, and you will see the consistencies in their character. So that doesn't bother me. So there's always going to be a group of people that have something to say, facts, and going to tell us different story, but you'll see the consistencies in each of those people's characters or inconsistency, but even the way they match each other. Right. But one thing I always say is if you don't have a relationship enough to ask me a question personally, then you shouldn't be comfortable enough to have an opinion about it. Right. And you've never heard me get on the Internet, ever respond about anything that was said negatively about me. Because the truth is I got to be a leader and I got to be a representative for my children, and I got to make sure that no matter what, they got to look at dad and say, dad always handled things in a way that was admirable, that was respectful, and that was honorable. Even in the face of ridicule, even in the face of kind of like people telling one size of stories. This business is funny like that and life is funny like that. So at the end of the day, I can't say that I haven't ever been accused of being a certain thing, but I do know that I know unequivocally who I am and what I represent, what I stand for, and a majority and a bulk of people who have dealt with me can be attested. And even the ones who say the bad things when they're alone time, they know the truth. They know what I am and know who I am and what I do. [01:10:18] Speaker A: No, I appreciate you, bro. For real. [01:10:20] Speaker B: Thank you so much. [01:10:21] Speaker A: Thank you for being here. Thank you for being a pillar, you for show a legend. [01:10:26] Speaker B: I appreciate. [01:10:28] Speaker A: Hopefully, hopefully we can fix this. We'll have another conversation when you come back to LA about the streaming thing and all of that stuff because we. [01:10:38] Speaker B: Should have a whole panel station with BMC and discuss that man. And have young artists and producers and writers, successful producers, artists and writers. And let's get us all on the panel. [01:10:48] Speaker A: I would like to moderate and we. [01:10:50] Speaker B: Can invite the streaming ceos, if they'll come. We can invite the people from Tidal, from Sony, and from Universal. We can invite the people from Spotify. We can invite apple music, Amazon music, and let's sit down and have a conversation. And we would extend our olive branch. We just want to hear them out. And hear and they want them to hear us out. That'd be amazing. [01:11:10] Speaker A: That'd be amazing conversation. [01:11:12] Speaker B: Yeah. [01:11:12] Speaker A: I don't know how that's in the card, but I'm with it. I'm with you. We can try to make that happen. [01:11:18] Speaker B: Let's make it happen. [01:11:18] Speaker A: All right. It's DJ head Rico love. It's homegrown. Catch you next time. [01:11:24] Speaker B: Turn the lights on.