Raphael Saadiq

31:04How'd you pick the dude for the recent Tony's tour?

31:10um how did i i seen him play i think i found him on instagram really i seen him play josh wow yeah josh he's a bad boy too and um and he used to play with mpg but i didn't know that at the time you just found him and just i found him at the time and um it's i knew he was solid you know you just need somebody solid is they they got some they got they they got chops but they also know how to play, you know, be solid, you know. Did you consider doing the tour, like bass on the tour or nah? Oh, no, I never even, because I've never played bass on a Tony tour. Never. I've never even played guitar. But you're on the records.

31:52I played all the records. Yeah. Yeah. How can you, and you just, same reason, you just didn't want, you wanted to be, because you're leading, yeah. I didn't think I could do it, honestly, to be honest, I didn't think I could do it. I didn't think that, you know, syllables and rhythms, you know, sometimes when you sing a word in a syllable, sometimes your fingers go with it. So you have to separate. Like a drummer, you have to separate that pop. I could do it. I've done it. I've done a tour with me, Rob Bacon. Rob was on guitar. I was on bass. I forgot the drummer. And Kelvin Wooten played keys.

32:30And it was fun. It was, you know, less people, more money for me. Right, yeah. That was fun. One less player you gotta pay. That was fun. How do you separate, I mean, you've like, man, you've been on a hell of a run lately with composing and writing and producing. These days, like, how are you spending your time, like, musically? Like, are you writing a lot for your, like... I spend my time right there on that piano. This piano? Yeah, I spend most of my time on the piano. I haven't recorded anything in maybe close to six months. I said I just want to practice and just play and not just loop everything.

33:18Because when you're recording now and you're in Ableton, you just loop everything and you never get any practice time on any instrument. so I'm just doing a lot of listening to you know a lot of Donnie, a lot of Earthwind a lot of going to shows going to concerts and figuring out when I'm going to tour again in 25 and just figuring out a lot of keyboard stuff listening to songs that I really love and learning how to play them and just knowing learning what I'm playing I'm taking piano lessons. I take piano lessons three days a week. I take classical pianos. I haven't played now one full classical piece yet, but because I'm starting from the very, very...

34:05And are you reading or are you reading? Reading, everything, yeah. So I played first bone in school. I played trombone in high school. So you bad school? We was cheating in school. That's why. We was writing down the positions. It was fun, two, four. We knew I could read bass cleft pretty good then. But, you know, you don't use it, you lose it. Yeah, that's true. So it's from the beginning now. Wow. What made you want to, like, woodshed right now? Like, what was the impetus for that? Like, was there a moment where you're like, ah, man, like. I got bored. I mean, I just, I love piano. I love chords.

34:42I love voicings. And I just want to have so much artillery to write, to grab from. Like, I can hear everything. I can hear it. but I just want to be able to go to it in like two seconds. So my nephew, he plays piano, Dylan, and he's from another world. Yeah, he can pick up anything, learn anything. And I always tell him to not, don't stop because he's doing pretty good. He's done a lot of records. He worked with a lot of people. And because he's so talented that, you know you could you could stop playing your main instrument his main instrument is piano but he plays guitar drums his his little brother jayden he plays bass he's funky as hell he he been playing like larry graham song since he was like nine years old what and talking like larry acting like him the whole issue yeah the whole thing so you know when you're in the industry you just don't want to fall off the instrument that you love and so i always tell him like are you practicing you know are you practicing don't stop because you got a record out with this person this person keep playing so I took some of my own advice and jumped on the piano looked on google found this this piano teacher um Kristen is the Tujunga Pianos I found it I thought she was in Tujunga no sorry no Topanga Canyon Pianos and um she was actually in Seattle so I like have a screen here i mean a camera here the camera here camera here with my upright piano in the back oh okay you're zooming on that i'm zooming yeah and it's it's been really cool so i haven't written any music but when i start writing music i think it's gonna be a little different you have a whole new like bag to pull from yeah yeah because now i'm playing like stylistic songs I'm going over all the songs that I used to play.

36:45I used to discuss, yeah. Some of the best writers were, you know, piano players. Yeah, so what are the songs that stand out for you? The songs that you loved growing up that are also incredible piano songs? It's going to sound redundant, but that's why I started listening to the Hawkins family, because I felt like all those records, if I learned those records, just almost everything I wanted to know. But then I would say like, you know, Tom Bell and the Creed, you know, very good piano songs. And it falls right in place with all like the spinners and the Delphonics, the Stylics, all those people.

37:23And then Earth, Wind & Fire, I was definitely all over the Gratitudes albums, the live album. Did you ever see them in the day? I didn't see the Gratitude tour, no. Okay. But I saw Funk on the Green. I saw Parliament. I saw Bernie Burrell. Damn. play live I saw Tower of Power live I saw Bob Marley and the Wailers you did the Berklee Greek wow I don't think I've met anybody that saw that saw I met one person one time that had tickets and they didn't go for some reason I was like oh I didn't have tickets I was just on a bike riding a bike from East Oakland just to Berklee just being some bad kids is riding so far from home.

38:10And we were just riding around and I heard this reggae music and my friends kept going on the bike and I stopped and I'm looking through the fence and I'm like, what is that? And I could see Bob Marley and I just stayed there. I never left. Did you know Bob Marley at the time? Yeah, I knew who he was. I didn't know much about, I knew who he was, but I didn't leave. I just stayed there by the fence. I watched through the fence. That's incredible. Yeah. So I'm a huge Wailers, you know, I mean, the bass playing from Family Man is the naughtiest. I like rhythm sections like Brothers, like the rhythm section with him and Family Man and his brother on drums.

38:52It's the tightest drum section. I would say I would put them neck and neck with James Brown rhythm section. Wow. It's different, but it's tight. That's a hell of a... I know. I'm gonna have to go back and listen for that specific. Oh, man. It's just crazy. Then I'll go to Verdine and Freddie. Yeah. You know, those are my rhythm sections. Yeah. The Bob rhythm section, Earth, Wind & Fire's rhythm section, and James. Wow. And, of course, James Jameson. Yeah, right. Motown. Motown. Yeah. You worked with Earth, Wind & Fire. and with like when Maurice was still I did I had a chance to work with Maurice Maurice White talked to Maurice White a lot what was that like cause he's that was scary man that was scary working with Maurice I mean they all walked in the room three of them Phillip Phillip Bailey Phillip Bailey Maurice White and Ralph Johnson dope yeah they walked in the room and I was super nervous but they're really nice and so much history.

40:04You could feel the history when they walk in the room. You could just feel that. Like, like we just, we bad. We bad boys. Like, we, we, we bring it. Yeah. You know, he was a band leader. You know, he was a band leader guy. And then. Yeah. What was the dynamic? How was, how was Maurice's dynamic in the room with the rest of it? He produced me. He produced me to produce a record. To produce. Yeah. Yeah. That's crazy. Like when I was singing, I was singing the falsetto part on Show Me The Way and he told me to tell him to just kick the reverb a little bit higher. It's a producing tip. Damn. Yeah, from the best.

40:44Definitely from the best, especially if it's a producing tip on a falsetto vocal. Yeah. Come on. You know, that's solid advice.

40:56Did you, you didn't play, You never played live with them, did you? I've never played live with Earth, Wind & Fire, no. I mean, I would still love to do that now. But, I mean, it's still neat. Verdine's just playing. Yeah. You can't. I mean, that's the backbone of Earth, Wind & Fire. Jumping on guitar, though. If you're not moving, nah. They just let me clap my hands. Maybe I could sing a part with Phillip, but I'm definitely not going to jump on a guitar at base. Man. Maybe a soundcheck. Soundcheck. A couple of sound checks I would like to play with. With Earth, Wind & Fire. And I got a chance to play with Nile Rodgers and Sheik.

41:38Wow. For something at Apple. When was that? Maybe a year ago. A year ago. Something for some type of new headphones or something. Yeah. You know, I was like, oh yeah, definitely doing that. But it wasn't a live audience. How was it though? It was amazing. Because you know, Bernard Edwards is. Right. This is my guy, too. Were you playing his parts? Yes. Oh, shit. Dressed like him. I did the whole thing. You did? I had schoolboy glasses on, the tweed jagged. I did the whole thing. Now I was looking at me and saying, wow, man, this dude went all the way in. I'm like, of course. Of course I did. Damn.

42:15That must have been Bernard Edwards. It's ridiculous. Yeah. Of all the bass players we talked about today, I feel like he might be the most underappreciated, you know? Yeah, he's celebrated. it though people do celebrate bernard um i feel i even feel like queen that took a piece of another one bites the dust it's from good times yeah for sure boom boom boom another one bites the dust boom boom don't don't do that was smart that's a nice bite that's a nice little give me that can't be mad at it i love queen i was like oh that's a nice bite yeah yeah it is ridiculous it stands out in their catalog though it was like that's a that's yeah um how was uh tell me about the beyonce sessions man or how the the work on that came to be because um i was you know the singles were were great 16 carriages was particularly my favorite of the early singles and I know you worked on both of those, but then when the album came out, I was kind of an American, what was the top?

43:28American Requiem came on. I was like, I got to really listen. Well, they did a great job of having the right people in the room.

43:42I always tell people about Beyonce's her ear and her like, you know, decision making is the most important thing you could be as an artist, somebody that tours, somebody that makes records, somebody who knows their audience. So if you know your audience, it's easy to have musicians in the room that you think can push forward what you're trying to do. And so for, for me, you know, dream was in the room. Yeah. A lot of great musicians. So we took songs and I changed some songs around, you know, but then it was great things on the record already. So I just had a great, it was almost like, it was almost like the all star team, you know, with people that I didn't know, like the, the, uh, the banjo playing, you know, with, you know, yeah.

44:35Rhiannon Giddens. Rhiannon Giddens who like that record wouldn't be that record without her doing that. That banjo part's amazing. Right. So I think that's, I just, I just think they ain't already great. they had a great team they had great people was that banjo part on there but when you first heard the song no no but she knew like she wanted to have it on the record and you always want to always i love working with people who know what they want yeah it makes producing fun you know or being a part of something fun yeah what was the what was the ask of you like what was like What did you feel like you were brought in?

45:12Why was I in the room? Yeah, yeah, yeah. I think I was in the room because I take,

45:21I'm coachable and I take instructions and I can do what you ask me to do. And I actually love what I do. And I love actually knowing that somebody is gonna, you dish them a dime, they about to go dunk it. That's my inspiration. I think they know like, you know, I could be in a room and work with people. And it's more about the camaraderie of working with others, you know, and not being like, I'm a producer. Instead of like, no, we're in a room, like we have instruments, and it's time to get it done. And I think that's why I was in the room, because I can play in many genres. Yeah. But you can also play a lot of parts.

46:08So it's like, were you in there with your set, like your musician hat on or producer, like the dreams already, like how do you balance that? There's so many people, man. I'm only, well, sometimes I'm in a room by myself and some of the stuff I did here. Like they sent you stuff. I would send stuff too. There was already, like Bodyguard was pretty much a song that I did, you know. You wrote that? I wrote that. Alone. Because you do the, is that you doing the count off on Bodyguard? Yeah. Yeah, she kept it counting. Yeah, but I wasn't even going to play that song. I was going through another song, and she heard it, and she said, what's that?

46:45She got an ear like that. And that's why I said not many artists could take a song like Bodyguard and say, I like this song, and I want to make it a record. They changed some lyrics and did different things, but it's only maybe two people I know that takes some of the stuff that nobody would take from me. That's Beyonce, now, and D 'Angelo. Wow. And Solange. Right. Yeah, right. Solange, too, man. Right. That'll take some, like... I wouldn't even play some things for people because I know they might be like, oh, that's just way too, like, you know... But you know the great ones, the great ones, they want to dive in.

47:29Yeah. We'll be right back with more from Rafael Sadiq after the break. In today's super competitive business environment, the edge goes to those who push harder, move faster, and level up every tool in their arsenal. T-Mobile knows all about that. They're now the best network, according to the experts at an Oocla speed test, and they're using that network to launch Supermobile, the first and only business plan to combine intelligent performance, built-in security, and seamless satellite coverage. With Supermobile, your performance, security, and coverage are supercharged. With a network that adapts in real time, your business stays operating at peak capacity, even in times of high demand.

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50:55The music was. And I was really singing something. What you do is what you do. It's a certain thing you always do. That's what I was doing, something crazy like that. and when I met Solange we were both doing these 60s records at first and then we were gonna hook up and I wanted her to write for me with me for that song for me for your album right so she had a copy of it but I think it had my vocal on it but then she wrote something for herself and it was years later maybe a few years later but it was already 8 years old and some water. I didn't have a copy of it. I didn't have a clean copy. You gave her the actual, like the only.

51:44She didn't have it either. We never had a copy. Wow. So when she was calling me, asking me for a clean version with no lyrics, I didn't have it. So a good friend of mine, Conrad, who lived up in Portland is a videographer and he sometimes takes my songs and sort of make short films. And so I was talking to him about, he said, you know, I have a copy of it on a CD, on a disc. So that's the only thing we had. Because you had sent it to him just to... That was it. Just so we could make a film with it? I like a little short film shooting some friends and like, you know, just some stuff on the street.

52:30How the hell did he get on that list? yeah yeah conrad montgomery he he's a he's a track and field coach he's a um good friend and now rogers and he we run together we we we run together he taught me really how to how to run he's a track and field guy and he had it and i said i only only one i have is it's on it's on a disc. And so we, that record's nothing separated. That's the record that came out. Wow. So you ripped it from that. She just sang over the, just put that in Pro Tools and sang over, over top, on the top of it. Wow. Yeah. That's, that's, that's wild. Yeah. So when it works, it works.

53:17Sometimes you don't even, I mean, we, I think they compressed it and mixed it that way, like with compression to make it, you know, but pretty much it was, you know the bass was there the drums is already there um melatron is is that melatron right there wow and this is it has worked so it kind of cracks and does some weird shit so no melatron sounds like that melatron because of that so i never get it fixed because of that and but it was all on that record it was not anything recorded only thing that was recorded over was my nephew dylan played he played another uh he played an acoustic uh an upright piano or he played a grand piano on top of it then solange added some like crazy like bell was just like boom she added that but everything else was pretty much already multi-tracked and we could we couldn't separate anything did she record that here with you or did she do it on her on her own did she i think she recorded crane too yeah yeah that's that's that's wild that that's the origins of that song man yeah you know what i mean like that's a that's a that's a grammy winning project man that you just was like discarded and with some track coach yeah sometimes you just have to make music and to make music because I don't make music to give to anyone.

54:45I make music to sort of entertain myself because I love music that much that I just want to hear it. If I come in the studio, I want to hear music. Sometimes I come to the studio and I don't even play any music. I might play Madden or something. Like the arcade, the old one, like when McNabb was the quarterback. Okay, all right. Yeah. Going back. Yeah. So you play with, okay, yeah, McNabb. I play with McNabb and then Terrell Owens is the receiver. He catches everything right out there. You don't play with the Raiders? Every Blue Moon, I play with the Raiders. The Raiders wasn't that good that year.

55:29Okay. But sometimes, you know, sometimes I play with the Raiders. I am definitely a Raiders fan. I mean, come on, that's tough, man. I'm a Raiders fan, though. No, don't get it twisted. But if I'm playing arcade, I don't do it. Okay, all right. You got to go with the Eagles on that. I got to go with the Eagles or I have to go with the best defense on that game, I would say. Somebody like Rick Ross would probably say, no, that's not true because I heard he's really good on arcade. Oh, really? I would say Green Bay. I like to play with Green Bay. Kansas City because they had Priest Holmes as the running back at the time.

56:01So I just like to play with the players that do special things. I didn't know you were a video game guy. yeah yeah i have a video game company you do yeah we make games it's called ill phonic wow ill phonic we did uh friday the 13th friday's 13th uh state ghostbusters um so my engineer who who recorded the way i see it and um and jimmy lee he mixed it and stone rolling his name is chuck brungart so we started a video game company almost 12 13 years ago because we were in the business we were trying to make records and we couldn't fit the system of you know we work on a record they'd have somebody else mix it and it was just getting kind of weird so I came up with this idea to start a video game company because it was a joke about what's the Dev Jam game it's a death jam game it's a fight game yeah it was the rush the rush uh anyway a friend worked for the coming it was all these rappers and it was a fight game and i was like like slick ricks in it or whatever i'm like you got to put me in the game and my friend's like we don't put r &b people in the game and i was like i'm gonna make my own game and i'm called a ghetto golf and and we just laugh and so when she left my partner chuck goes you know if you really want to start a game company you know that's what i do for i went to school for programming i'm saying let's do it let's call it ill phonic because illmatic is my favorite hip-hop album one of them so i called it ill phonic and then maybe like the next month we had like this test game of ghetto golf and from there we started taking the publishers for about a year or two and the next thing we were you know i was at all the conference game conferences and i just kept it on the low because i felt like um gamers don't really care about musicians having you know having a game company yeah it's about the gamers it's on the strength of the game itself yeah it's about them it's not about me it's not about chuck and so then we kept going um then we moved the company to Denver, Colorado.

58:22And now it's in Colorado and it's in Tacoma. Wow. And it's still, it's active. It's active right now. Wow. What games are you developing?

58:33Wow. I always, I always blow this title and they will kill me if I say this. So I'm just not going to say it. Okay. Because one time I spoke on a game and I wasn't supposed to and it was like I just blew up the world or something. Okay. We don't, we don't, we don't. But yeah, you can look and, we don't got to go there then. Yeah, yeah. You should revive the Def Jam game. That sounds incredible. I don't know how I missed that. Yeah. It was a good game. Eminem was in it? Really? Yeah. Was it on Def Jam? I don't know why I can't think of the name of the game. I love games. But I play more sports games than I do first-person shooter games, which I really want to start playing more first-person shooter games.

59:13You just got to put a lot of time into that. I'm still like Call of Duty. I'm still getting blown up on the first stage. I'm like, you got to keep going. I can't follow the... I can't look at it and follow it. So I think I should just get better on piano instead of... I think that's a better move, man. Yeah, that's what I'm going to do. That's about the time I got out of games. I was like, well, I got to spend, like, you know, I got to train for the game. I'm like, man, I can't really be involved with this. Yeah, I can't catch any passes on, like, Madden and New. Like, it's just... It's like just...

59:45It just bounced off my fingers. I'm like, is there a button? I'm always asking kids. Is there a button that the fingers do like this to catch the ball? Because I can't, I could throw a short pass, a screen. But if I'm going for a bomb, it's like, psh, pop. You gotta go to training camp, man. I gotta go to training camp. It's too much time on that. Yeah, it's too much time. You know, I want to ask you, speaking of rap, you brought up O-Matic, made me think of The Chronic, because I always think of those two albums in my mind for some reason, different years, but just incredible debut rap albums.

1:00:13Right. but Chronic 2 still DRE and you did still Ray on Instant Vintage speaking of like a good that was a great bite yeah of course I mean I'm a huge Dre fan you know his name is Dre and mine is Ray and I was like hmm and you know Dre always have those lyrics and this is the motherfucking thanks I get I kind of feel like Dre sometimes that's how you feel No, not really, but I love that lyric. Do some motherfucking things out good? But when that was like, I was like, let's turn that into a lullaby, like a pretty song, the hardest song that everybody's...

1:00:59I'm like, let's turn that to... I'm coming home to you. I'll keep it going. Hold on, that's too nice. I'm like, let's flip it. Let's put it on his head. Let's change it. I'm coming home to you where something's see-through you know it happened just really fast yeah but that was definitely inspired by did you hear from Dre on that? nah I bet he appreciates it though oh no definitely Dre is a music guy and y 'all both worked with Don Robinson we both did we both have stories okay i'm working with good stories good stories can you share can you can it's the one you can did you know in vogue from oakland i did they are i feel like bad girls i mean beautiful um some of the nicest people and we sort of came from the same camp with um denzel foster and and Tommy, Tommy, Thomas McElroy.

1:02:06Right. Which did, they did the, I got five on it. They did, I got five on it. They did, um, lean on me with club, um, club Nouveau. Right. They did, um, I mean, situation, situation number nine for club Nouveau. And, that's, that's five on it, but they did, engine number nine. They just, they, and they signed us. We came, the Tonys went through, tough enough production. They found us. They signed us. I didn't know that. They're responsible for, they're the reason why I'm sitting here talking to you. Wow. Yeah. I still talk to them. I mean, I talk to them pretty much, you know, a couple times a month.

1:02:48You know, Denny, Denny's a golfer. He plays golf, so he tries to get me out there and playing golf. I'm not good though but I'm trying and Tommy is just Tommy started he started fighting he became a fighter he always had he was always a martial arts guy and then I think he became a what do you call he was a martial arts fighter he was a fighter yeah he started doing that he said he got hit really hard and then he stopped that's a good reason to stop that's why I never started with that and yeah but yeah those guys I'm really responsible for you know so that's how you got on mercury that's how we got to mercury wow that's how we got there through those guys and um i'm i'm lucky to have them in my in my you know my career because i learned a lot by just by listening to them that's amazing man um how how was the tour with the tonys the tour with the tonys was amazing it was a definitely a bucket list um we you know we took the phones i took the phones you took the phones away from from the audience and i because i wanted the audience to have a good time the way that i've seen like the ojs i didn't have a phone when i was a kid and that's where i learned i feel like not having a phone and you know and you you actually sitting with your friend or your mate and you you're singing and dancing with each other and you know you're giving people a moment of freedom that they don't that they don't they don't know that they actually lost yeah right you know nobody knows you know we attach to our phones no one remembers life before a phone man yeah you know and you you're not actually doing anything with the videos anyway like you just want to show your friends that you were at the show but it's better that you watch the show in its entirety like yeah like we rehearsed it you know so i it was it was it was amazing though the songs were fun the singer it was great to be around my brother and tim and and you know introduced some new musicians like sharky who play guitar for us who who helped me out tremendously to put the show together um it was it was amazing it it was having an out of body like an out of body experience like more of like i feel like i felt my ancestors um talking to me um especially in memphis memphis was this we played at this um in this venue that just felt it was packed like it was like it was like black people from the front to the back and we haven't played i haven't played audience with all black people in a long time really because my audience is very diverse you know over the years as a solo artist you feel as a solo artist it's just got very diverse but this this audience was black from the front to the back man in the south was everywhere it was a few different people in different places but it just felt like this whole um because nobody had the phone you could you could look at me and i could look at you so it's probably different for artists really doesn't don't know how that feels anymore to having a phone to have a you know 5 000 people looking right at you and not a phone and you're the main you're the main entertainment main thing so i think we we share something that we both haven't had in a long time so it brought out this energy of um these spirits and energies that i felt like most of the time i was i felt like it i felt like it didn't even happen and so you know every moment we could take our time you could walk off we had an intermission people were very patient you know it felt like it was like a house party like we were all together in this yeah in this house party and and everybody had a good time.

1:06:52They were talking, they were hugging, they was kissing. And sometimes the audience wasn't even looking at me. They was talking to their girl, and she was talking to her man. They was just enjoying it, thinking about the times when they heard this music for the first time. And everybody was sort of reflecting on, they may have lost people in the family. And it had this real deep feeling that I just never felt. And so it was funny when there was anybody of any other, you know, if there was somebody whiter, some at the shows, it almost felt like a Malcolm X rally. It felt like it was the CIA. It felt like a movie.

1:07:27I'm like, this is CIA. Get that out of my pocket. But then as we got closer to San Francisco, it got more diverse. You were, okay. People came out. You went at the Paramount in Oakland? We played the Paramount and then we played, I forgot we played in San Francisco at some hall. Warfield? Did y 'all play the Warfield? We didn't play the Warfield. We played inside. It was raining hard outside. But I've never played the Paramount ever. That was my first time playing the Paramount. And it was really good to bring it home. We brought it home. It's a beautiful theater in Oakland. It's beautiful. Yeah, it was.

1:08:02So the experience was, it was amazing. I just felt like we needed to give people, you know, give it back to them one more time. Something that they gave to us. They gave us the gift to like our music and to like what we were doing. because we didn't know we were doing this you know just kids making music with a record deal and um we were able to put out some some tests some tests of the time music that people still listen to i mean how did it feel for you guys to to do it because because i mean i feel like and i guess there's two ways of thinking about it when you guys broke up if that's what y 'all want to call it after house of music i feel like you guys kind of went out on top like house of like i love all the records but house of music's like of course far and away from me my favorite record of y 'all's um and it's like damn there's probably so much more y 'all could have done or or maybe it was the right time i don't so i don't know but y 'all left like on top for sure yeah we did i mean so to get together like you know 20 years later like how did that feel for you guys it felt because we rehearsed right in this room we rehearsed here and um it felt good to see everybody in the room and you know like and playing those songs live no no back tracks just it felt really good and it was more for me for like the nieces and nephews family members to you know and and for my father who was not living anymore he would have wanted us to do that and i really wanted to he he said something to me before about you know how to look at things no matter what you think they are, how you look at them and how you want to be perceived.

1:09:48And I wanted to be perceived as, I wanted to give people what they wanted. Because when we were younger, we blew it. We broke up. We didn't run it. I left. I left the group. But it was the perfect time for me to leave the group. I mean, I didn't want to be a member. I always have these stories about Eddie Kendricks. one of my favorite people who you know he it was hard for him to leave the temptations i'm guessing right yes yeah such a big group such big staple stable songs or and like you know london richie leaving the commodores you know he had big huge compositions and i didn't want to get stuck being a just a a group guy i felt like i had more to offer and i had ideas of how i wanted to do things yeah and and i wasn't like the band leader guy who could tell people you know this is how it's gonna go just do what i say yeah so that was better for me to step off and just and just try and you know and see what i was gonna do i wanted to work with other people i just wanted to play music yeah you know and to see if i could copy these these legends that i love it didn't feel like you could do both like you didn't feel like that was uh nah nah no i just i just came home one day and was like i'm just buy some season tickets to sacramento kings and i did and i met brian grant who became one of my best friends to this day and i didn't want to you know he was i had a detail shop out there and so i switched the king's cars will come there different cars would come there people will come there wait so you got the season tickets just as like a i can't I can't book nothing because I got to go to the...

1:11:38No, I just... When I decided I was leaving the group, I just decided... I just moved to Sacramento. It was new in Sacramento. Bought this house there. Was nothing to do. And I was like, it's not shit to do in Sacramento. But go to a strip bar or go to a game. So I did both. Season tickets to both. No, not season tickets. but not season tickets but i mean that's where i was like you just hear a lot of metallica in sacramento strip bars oh man that's it dude that's always i love metallica and i was like oh yeah this is cool metallica like nicky's coming up right now guys and metallica and truck drivers and it was a sacramento kings and then um and so people was asking brian for tickets all the time you know he had a family i said i'm gonna get my own tickets right and that's what i did i I ended up watching more basketball, watching more sports.

1:12:38And then I only worked on two artists at that time because of D 'Angelo was Lady and Total, Kissing You, Puffy's Group. Other than that, I didn't do much work for a few years. You know, it's interesting too, you compare yourself to Eddie Kendrick's too, because there are some times listening to Tony, Tony, Tony, when you and your brother trade vocals, it's almost like a Ruffin Kendrick kind of like, just the way y 'all sound sometimes. You know what I mean? Yeah, because I always felt like, you know, sometimes when I'm watching sports shows, sometimes people scream too much. Like if I'm watching, if I'm watching - Stephen A.

1:13:18If I'm watching First Take, I call First Take First Baptist because it sounds like church. It sounds like preachers. They all sound like preachers. Yeah, yeah. But I love their show. I love the show. And then I listen to, I'll go to like, what's it called? It's called First Things or something. First Things. First Things First. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Their voices are too high. It's just like, and it just irritates the hell out of me. And then. Skip Bayless. Can't take Skip at all. But who was up? Shannon? No, who was on the show? I like Skip's show. Wayne? Lil Wayne's on there. The right receiver.

1:13:58oh you're talking about USC yeah yeah yeah I'm just blanking out on his name that's terrible because he's my favorite guy yeah he just joined the last year I can't it's great great commentator I can't yeah so he makes Skip show good but I'm really a Colin Herb guy you're a Colin Herb guy I know I can't deal with I feel about Colin the way I feel about Skip I like Skip actually he kind of reminds me of like wrestling no Colin is like no Colin is right because you know why because Colin got it right because Colin is no debating he'll ask a question he debates himself no but yeah but when he brings he brings on great guests yeah okay and he doesn't if i ask you a question yeah and then when you answer the question he goes to the next subject he don't debate you i like that he doesn't move along he doesn't debate you right so that's so fun back to me and duane yes i think my voice is irritating sometimes right so it was great to have me and duane going back and forth and that's the way i see those talk shows, those game shows, you need different people with different voices because some voice might irritate you.

1:15:00My voice is high and sometimes people, it could be irritating. It's too high. It's too... But when Dwayne comes in, it just levels me off and gives me the confidence. You know, it's like, I don't want to say this, but like, Michael and Jermaine, it worked, right? Yeah. So, those talk shows, yeah, I think Colin is the man, bro. Come on, man. I can't, man. You like Skip over Colin? Skip's funny to me. Skip just cracked. It's like, it's so ridiculous. It's insane. He's like Trump almost. Yeah, but, okay. Sorry. Okay, listen. Listen, you're not wrong. He just said shit. But here's the thing. Okay, I might regret putting this on wax, but Trump is actually kind of funny.

1:15:48He is funny. It's just that he's funny. George Bush is funnier. Come on. they're both pretty funny no he's just no trump is just ridiculous trump well you know what's ridiculous i mean this really ain't funny it's kind of fun it's in a dark way that you think about george bush started the iraq war all those veterans people dead man it's terrible and now he's just sitting there at home painting them and he's good bro like what if you sent them to fucking lose an army because now he's painting like look at this motherfucker you guys got now yeah like what like whatever choice do you have like i mean the most people i know like are voting and who want to vote trump who you wouldn't think and everybody want to save money on taxes but i'm i want to save money on taxes too but i'm like if that's gonna be it i don't want to do it that much lose the money yeah i would rather lose money than do yeah yeah yeah yeah but skip is definitely trump he is but he's not trying to run the country that's what i appreciate about it you know what i mean he's just trying to push in with a ready package like you say something he's gonna to combat it.

1:16:47I feel like they have the, you could, I guess I can see their daily meetings. I'm going to take this position. You're going to take that one. That's why I don't like it. With Colin, you know there's a meeting but it's only one person so Colin just reminds me of the guy in the classroom that's doing too much. You know what I mean? He's just ruining everything for you. It's like, you know. But you know what I like about Colin? I don't know how we got on this sports thing but the funny thing about Colin, I want to find out why does he hate Aaron Rogers so much? that's a great question it's funny though he'll give him a break but then he'll be like you know he just kills him I think I watch him just to watch him kill people but he has like really I will say this he has really good tips for for being professional if you listen to him oh yeah definitely like he definitely I'm okay you gotta I'm gonna move to Manhattan Beach try to link up with him he may see he can mentor me on how to you know what I mean I mean because look at this I'm gonna leave Long Beach behind look at this podcast That's his company.

1:17:46It's Draymond Green. Yeah. Wait, no. Is that his? That's his. Oh, I didn't know that. Yeah. Dude comes on and be like, you know. He gave Draymond the platform? I didn't know that. Yeah. He's a beast, man. He's a beast. I know. But Skip, you got Stephen A., Shannon, Wayne, our boy who we can't think of right now. He's put people on, too. I'm just saying. I try. Like, I try. I skip my stations and I go on Skip. I'm like, nah. Skip's like Skip's just like Making people mad Yeah Yeah I love it I love that about It's a different stroke For different folks That's right That's it That's it I feel like I'm bouncing Everywhere but it's just Like so much That's cool To ask you One more thing about Skip Please One more thing His name is perfect You should just Skip his show Exactly

1:18:42That's the tagline You can just go And skip me Skip this Skip Skip that. Just skip this Bayless, man. Yeah. Y 'all went down to record House of Music. Y 'all went down to, was it Trinidad? Yeah. So House of Music? It was the Sons of Soul. Was it Sons of Soul y 'all did that? I think it was Sons of Soul. Okay. Yeah. Pre-internet, like, how did you know about this studio down in Trinidad? How did y 'all know to get, like... We found out from some of our Trini brothers, Trent Gumbs and Desmond Gumbs, some guys that was in a... Trent Gumbs, I was in a high school band with him. and he's Trini and he told us about this studio they needed people to come down there and record it they gave us a good they gave us a good price to come record the music and we stayed there for three months wow stayed there for three months I think that's the first time I had roti this is the sad part that's the first time I ever tasted a mango really?

1:19:36yeah I was in Trinidad that probably was a good mango too the best mango I ever had in my life wow and it was beautiful it's a beautiful place beautiful music beautiful food and we had almost five or six rooms to record in huge orchestra room it was a great time was it like that was that how many people so it was you guys who else did you guys go down with we brought we might have brought like ten people when we left we left it was only maybe three people we left everybody wanted to leave except us. Wow. Yeah. It seems like an incredible... Do you guys have any footage of that time? I don't think we filmed anything.

1:20:19We're the worst. We weren't the Beatles. We didn't doc how, you know... You see, the Beatles have a documentary that came out, and they filmed it like 40 years ago. Yeah. Yeah, and it's like literally... All the footage. It's like, yeah, they're never off camera. No. Yeah. I mean, I just, yeah, it's pretty... I guess it makes sense that it was Sons of Soul because it feels like that's like really... There's an energy on that album. You know? Yeah. The Sons of Soul was like, yeah. It was definitely a Trini energy. Right. It had slow wine. Slow wine. That makes sense. Yep. Slow wine. It's beautiful.

1:20:54I mean, like the rainforest, it would be like just in the daytime, just eating dinner and just hard rain is just coming down, you know, because the windows are open. Yeah. They love the good life out there. Other thing I wanted to ask you, just going back to Beyonce, your brother. Dwayne brought Destiny's Child to Oakland before they blew up, right? So it's like, can you tell that story if you know it? And then did you know Beyonce at that time? No, I didn't know Beyonce at that time. I actually was in LA at the time. Or I was in Sacramento and then I moved to LA. So I missed that whole thing.

1:21:31I wasn't around it at all. Wow. Yeah. I know he had him through another guy named Alonzo Jackson. Lonzo Jackson is a guy I was in a band with too and Dwayne was in a band with Lonzo Jackson's uncle so we were sort of like the kids band to that band and so but there's also another lady who Lonzo met so he he met Destiny's Child through this lady she ended up passing away and then Lonzo brought the girls to Dwayne did you hear from him about it like yo i got these i mean he was working with a lot of people at the time he's working with alicia keys um after that um he had his own label he was working a lot of people but like i said i wasn't around for any of it i didn't know any of the artists do you guys get along or is that not like no we get along no we get along we just different yeah we just different and you know um i mean growing up he was my you know my child my idol i wanted to be them all the time was a sort of age gap there and once you get in once you get a record deal everybody's to start having their own set of friends you know so and i was still enamored with the the trick that i was i was in the business i was making records you know it was like something that was a really a surprise to me you know because i'm pretty much one to be like an assignment to play for people so I was too busy figuring this out and how not to be a failure in what we said we were doing.

1:23:11So I pretty much was trying to talk to as many people as I could to learn a little bit more. There was like a five-year, maybe six-year gap between House of Music and Instant Vintage. yeah I wouldn't know because there's no gaps for me because I'm always playing music right I'm always making records but they're just not coming out okay but so there wasn't like when you left like this feel of urgency of like I got to get something out establish myself as no you did the song for like you know yeah for different people it should have been some urgency but I didn't it's all worked out I was just curious no no it should have been some urgency but I didn't I wasn't I wasn't there like that I was like you know if like I said it was football basketball, music, video games, the new guitars, watching this person do that, nieces and nephews.

1:24:06And I was, nephew was playing, you know, wanted to play basketball. So I would, you know, fly him to Dominguez from Sacramento to play in a league with the Pump Brothers. And I was sort of like helping my nieces and nephews get in good schools. And that was part of it too. You could have become like a sports agent or something. You could have like, you know, There's another path you could take. Yeah, I should tell my buddy, like I told Brian one time, he wasn't doing that good. Well, his points was low, and I just went to him one day. I was like, man, I said, tell me something. I said, if they come to you and say, no, they're going to fire you, I said, they're going to fire, the GM is going to be there for a long time.

1:24:53You probably get fired first. Like it's you, then it's the coach, then it's the GM. That's how I go, right? He like, yeah. He said, okay, I hear you. He went and he got like, he got about what? He had about 20. He had about 17 rebounds. And that night he called me. He's like, you see the game? I'm like, yeah. He said, yeah. He said, no, I want to hear some records. You're a clutch producer, man. You produce anything. Yeah. Charlie Ray, the song Charlie Ray. Yeah. Where did that guitar part come from? Well, it came from me trying to be in my funkadelic, you know.

1:25:44And it's like Charlie Ray's.

1:25:58It's like a funkadelic dream. It's such a ridiculous, it almost sounds like Grateful Dead-ish. Like it's so like, like it's just so, I don't know that anyone, like. I do have a lot of Grateful Dead type of music that I haven't put out. What? Just like instrumental stuff that I, yeah. For real? Yeah. Yeah, I did. Like, so my album, before I did Jimmy Lee, I had this whole other record. that felt like Charlie Ray. And then I started thinking about my brother and all this and some friends about drug addiction. And then I just jumped off and got on this whole other wave. But I did have these records that I'm going to put together.

1:26:41It's more instrumental stuff. Vocals happen, but maybe like after two minutes in the record. What? Yeah, that's the stuff I love. But, you know, I could do it now because I'm not really in the record. I don't think I've ever been in the record business. I think I've been a friend of the brand. That's my thing, a friend of the brand. A friend of, really? Yeah, the friend of the brand. I got that from like New Ballots. I did this thing with somebody and instead of having an ambassador, they have somebody in a commercial and it's like a friend of the brand. It's not an ambassador. When I heard that term, I was like, oh, that suits me just fine because that's what I felt like I've been.

1:27:25I'm a friend of the brand, which means I really, really love it. I can call myself a friend of the brand. Is that because you don't necessarily want to be fully in it? I'm sure you could be. No, I think I want to be fully in it, but I just want to dip off and do regular shit. I don't need to have 10 celebrity friends and hang out with them. You know, I don't need to be talking about celebrity friends all day. I need to just, you know, I'm walking. You know, I'm going to bike. I'm just doing things that, you know, my friends are, I'm still friends with my friends from third grade. Damn. You know?

1:28:07I still talk to them on the phone. Wow. You know, I took some of my friends' lyrics and put in a song. Really? A song that he used to always sing. And then I haven't seen them in 25 years. When he saw them, he's like, you sang my lyric in a song. what lyric what song um it's not called for the love of you i will see i will stand by you like a tree there anyone to try to move me but he had got it from marvin wow so that but i didn't know but we would be on the street hanging out he would be like i'll stand by you like a tree he always say that so our first record his name is Rodney. He called him We Got Rodney Smith.

1:28:50When he saw him, he was like, tell him, Ray. It was all our other friends. He said, tell him. He already knew. I said, tell him. I said, I took those lyrics. Stand by you like it. He already knew. Cold busted, man. Yeah, tell him that. Oh, man. I'm going to circle back because this is one thing we dropped, which was we started talking about the secret track. How did that, we got off on it because that Larry Graham one is my favorite. But how did that happen? When did that, like... I think I started doing it because I think Prince, when I heard Hello, how are you? It was at the end of the record.

1:29:32And I've heard maybe one other person do that. And I was like, I wonder if I just, like, let the record go off for, like, a minute or two, a minute and a half. would have scared a hell out of people if they're in the house. And the record pops. I didn't want to scare people, but I just thought, this would be a thing that I could start and I can continue to do it. I'm actually going to put out some vinyl pretty soon. Previous stuff? Previous stuff. I'm going to start a vinyl club. Start putting out vinyl. Put the Grateful Dead project down, man. I will. I'm definitely going to do that. I'll buy that on vinyl.

1:30:12The gatefold. Definitely. I'm a vinyl head you know man cool well Rafael thank you so much thank you man what an honor yeah thank you thanks so much to Rafael Sadiq for having us out to his beautiful Los Angeles studio to hear some of our favorite Rafael Sadiq songs check out a playlist at brokenrecordpodcast.com subscribe to our YouTube channel at youtube.com slash brokenrecordpodcast where you can find all of our new episodes you can follow us on Twitter at brokenrecord Broken Record is produced and edited by Leah Rose with marketing help from Eric Sandler and Jordan McMillan. Our engineer is Ben Tolley.

1:30:50Broken Record is a production of Pushkin Industries. If you love this show and others from Pushkin, consider subscribing to Pushkin Plus. Pushkin Plus is a podcast subscription that offers bonus content and ad-free listening for$4.99 a month. Look for Pushkin Plus on Apple Podcast subscriptions. And if you like this show, please remember to share, rate, and review us on your podcast app. Our theme music's by Kenny Beats. I'm Justin Richmond.

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