BONUS: From woke to MAGA to A.I.: Erykah Badu’s entire Ari Melber interview

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1:13Welcome to Mavericks with Ari Melber today we are joined by a celebrated singer DJ and really cultural icon, four-time Grammy winner, Erykah Badu. Thanks for being here. Thanks for having me. I'm excited. Is there any energy or intention we should set for our conversation? I think we are in alignment. We're surrounded by everything that matters. As long as we're getting this oxygen, I think we're good. Good. Oxygen's good. I like being outside. Usually they have us inside. For you, we're outside. Thank you. You got a lot going on that we're going to get into. Yeah. But just big picture, how are you feeling at this point in your life and your art and all this other business you're doing?

1:57I feel exquisite. I feel excited, you know. Yeah. Exquisite's good. Looking forward to the possibilities of things. Do you feel like you're building off everything and I got some stuff I'm going to show you? Okay. it's all future you got everything ahead of you i got everything ahead of me yeah yeah yeah i like that so we talked to people who we call mavericks okay labels can get in the way we could call them anything perfect but you from the start that we got to meet you at least in society in the culture yeah uh really saw this independent spirit yeah so we kind of want to start from there uh and look at that.

2:55My name is Erykah Badu, also known as Badula Oblingara. The winner is Baduism by Erykah Badu. Erykah Badu!

3:13She can't use my heart.

3:20How did you work out being you? Work out being me? Yeah, how'd you figure out how to be you? Hmm. I don't think I have too many choices. Um, I follow my heart. Uh, sometimes I'm afraid and nervous, but I'm confident. so it makes me brave. My thoughts are unorthodox a lot and I do not have the most popular opinion as I've learned over the years. But the only thing I can be is me. And as a mutable person, I've learned to be the best me but still be able to mutate within different circles so that I don't disrupt it too much. Yeah. It's funny you say that some of the opinions may be unpopular. Yeah.

4:15Popularity changes over time. Yeah. Your work was very popular from the jump. Yeah. Baddowism, triple platinum, and kind of immediately this excitement. Yeah. One question I've been curious about now I get to meet you is, did that embrace, which really only endured over time, did that make it harder or easier to do your next work? How did that affect your approach? It didn't affect my approach. It affects the people around you and their opinions and what they think. And if you're not careful, that will influence you or deter you from doing what you want. You know? So I was very careful. I took my time because I don't feel it's a race.

5:03My best work is still in me. So I'll just pace myself. Well, you know why life ain't a race. Why? because then we'd be trying to die first. That's right. That's how you know. That don't make no sense. They lie. Somebody lying. I always find that funny. They say, oh, someone did this by this age. And you're sort of like, so? Right. Because if it's something worth doing, then you do it when you get to it. Get to it. Yeah. But the racing of it means, okay, now you did it by that age. So what? You kind of get to it when you become it because I'm finding out that the universe really doesn't give you what you ask for.

5:40It gives you what you are. And you attract the things that you are. So, yeah, you can't really race to be something you're not. Do you remember how old you were when you had that thought? Or was that always with you? It was always with me, but not in those words. Yeah. Yeah. I always felt it. So let's look at Erykah Badu around that early time. Uh-huh. on Regis and Kathie Lee. Oh. And Baduism. Is there... Can you define that for us? The Baduism experience is supposed to get you high, make you feel really good naturally. I just have one big question about your career now. You have one of the most extraordinarily beautiful faces.

6:25Why in the world would you hide your face on the cover of this? You really are exquisitely beautiful. Well, thanks. I don't know. I just don't think it's really all about Erykah Badu. It's about the way that you're supposed to feel when you hear the music. It took a lot of people and a lot of energy from the creator to bring this all together. How do you feel looking at her, looking at you? She's so green. I think she's very special, very gifted, and very, very talented. Very giving. Very naive. How do you see her as naive? She just didn't know a lot of things. and was influenced easily by other people's feelings and thoughts.

7:11So I had to be really careful, like I just said, to pace myself so that I wouldn't go down the wrong, if there's a wrong path. Well, we got another. We'll see if you remember this. Okay. I want to be another example of what positivity can bring. I'm an artist. Because the creator has blessed me in every aspect of the word. Artists, I'm a dancer, singer, actress, poetess. Anything that has to do with art. You know, I live art, dress art. I guess you could say art is my religion. And to use my gifts is my gift back to the creators. Same person? I still feel like that. And I mean, it's interesting looking at that.

8:02because if I got like a little snatch, I could look like that again. You know that, right? I know that, yeah. I mean, I don't even think you need an adjustment. It's you. I'm good. Yeah. So when you look at that and you see what you're doing now, you charted your own path. Yeah. Then in COVID, you stood up your own concert streaming. Yeah. You've got this cannabis accessory line, and now new, you have your own cannabis with cookies. Yeah. So how does that work for you? Have you tried it? What are the results? I'm super excited about that. That's a long time coming. A friend, Kumail, gave me the energy to do it, you know, and I waited for a little while.

8:53And when I was ready, I told Berner, I'm ready now because I wanted to do a little research because I wanted some purpose in the whole thing. Yeah, Berner's a businessman and artist rapper who's involved. That's correct. Berner is the owner of the Cookies franchise, the biggest growing franchise for legalized cannabis in the world right now. So, yeah, he's a perfect person to meet and be influenced by because he was a good teacher. He's a good friend. He was the plug. He gave me all of the information I needed. And I found my space, my place, my interest is women's studies in cannabis because I use it in my work.

9:38What does purpose mean in this line? Purpose in this line for me is to continue that conversation about women's health in the cannabinoid world. to break some of the taboos and to start a new dialogue about what cannabis means in our world and in our bodies and our lives. I use cannabis a lot in my work as a doula. And as a doula, I help babies come into the world and I also sit at the bed, the rest bed where people pass on. And cannabis is a really big plant medicine that we use in there. And I serve it as tea a lot. So when I thought about the packaging for that Badoo with cookies, I thought about this Persian oriental look of porcelain and blue flowers.

10:38So the packaging looks like that. and I just collect things that look like that now. It's like my new thing. You know, I collect pieces, broken pieces of art. There's a story there and there's beauty in it. And we've all lived through this sort of shift in part of the war on drugs where you still got people in prisons for marijuana-related offenses, et cetera, while we're shifting out to actually do some of this business. and it's all in flux. What does it mean to you to have people from communities that traditionally have been targeted and over-incarcerated as compared to, like, white users of the same drug back when it was more criminalized?

11:23Yeah, I mean, I think it should be legalized. And, you know, I don't like to give a lot of political opinions. I've learned my lesson with that. But what we do know is that there are a lot of people in jail who are very intelligent alchemists who can change chemicals into other things and properties. I believe that legalizing marijuana would be one of the best things to happen for our community because we're not the people bringing it into the community in the first place. But we're taking the rap for it. And yeah. In Texas, specifically, I would like to spearhead the campaign to legalize marijuana For many reasons.

12:07Yeah. One is the mass incarceration. The other reason is because I want, it's over, marijuana is overshadowed or the use of marijuana is overshadowed by the commercial use and the medicinal use of the herb is kind of being, you know, covered over by the commercial use. Yeah. You said you learned your lesson on politics. Maybe we'll come back to that. but on hip-hop it's like you are so hip-hop you are too respect you're you're also this immaculate singer people have made we look people made all these comparisons we can get to that you all these singers but you did start as a rapper you've worked with so many rappers what does hip-hop mean to your creativity right now?

13:01Hip-hop is a culture, and in that culture, there is a process in which we do things. You know, first there is the music or the beat, and then the lyrics come afterwards. The other way around, it's poetry, if you're writing lyrics. So it's very braggadocious. It's very confident, you know, and that's where I got a lot of my confidence from, being an emcee. in that arena it's okay to boast and brag and be a part-time narcissist you know so that gave me a lot of uh inspiration and confidence yeah it's been said some don't need no part-time lover but a part-time narcissist maybe maybe maybe yeah do you remember your first bar yeah it's it's well my name is apples and i rock your world i'm also known as the gucci girl well i'm super cute and plenty bad 30, 26, 36 and a half.

13:58Hey, okay. You remember your first bar? Who said I had a first bar? You got to have a bar in you somewhere, all right. In high school, I had this line. I only remember like a part of it, but I thought it was really great when I was a kid. Okay. But it was like, I'm the one who's deaf, but you ain't even heard. Ooh. Yeah, I was really excited. That's a bar. If you say so. It is. So this is my question for you, given that you do those different things, are they just distinct creative talents and you happen to have them? Which is great for you, right? Because you could DJ and you have this hip hop part of you and then the singing voice, everybody know.

14:39Yes. Or do you think they reinforce each other? Does being one of those things help you be a better DJ, help you be a better singer? Probably, yeah, because they all go together in hip hop. The culture of hip-hop is graffiti, it's break dancing, you know these things. It's the spoken word, it's rap. It's, did I say DJing? It's the way we dress. It's a language that we have. It's a full culture. And hip-hop is the people. So hip-hop changes with the people. As we progress and change and grow, so does it. So I think it's all something, it's all in the same pot, you know, kind of. And being creative is the nucleus of that.

15:28You know, anybody can say they're a rapper or a dancer or something. But the creative part of it is what's special about it. You know, the more creative you are in a cypher, the better you are as a freestyler or a DJ or someone who could put a playlist together. or a graffiti artist, you know, the more creative you are, you know, in this thing, the further you'll go. Yeah. Yeah. It's funny because in talking, conversations, they start and they end. Yeah. With most people, I mean, maybe your closest friends, it feels continuous. But with most people, that's talking, right? And humans do a lot of talking.

16:06Yeah, we talk. But we start and we end. Mm-hmm. It seems to me culture, the conversation's always ongoing. And I'm curious about that with you because you're in this conversation with hip-hop to this day. Does that inform you and you say, oh, I want to be doing that or that's just sort of organic and it just keeps happening? Yeah, I'll answer it like this. I really appreciate artists that I can feel. It doesn't matter what they're talking about. They can be talking about shaking their ass. so they can be talking about saving the world or God or healing. But if I believe it, that's when it's potent to me.

16:49And what hip-hop or music or art, period, is all about is the real girth and personal energy that you're sharing. You're almost supposed to feel like you're not supposed to be seeing it when you're watching someone when they're really honest about something. You know what I mean? Yeah, because, well, that's the thing. We love society. I think most people, even introverts, don't want to be alone their whole lives. That's right. So we need society as human people, as social animals. Yeah. But what you just said is deep, right? When you see someone really bare their soul, you think, oh, that's so raw and true and private.

17:29It's almost like I shouldn't see it. And yet with art, it feels like art can connect us to our humanity more than just being out with people. Sure. You know? I agree with that. Let me play you your interaction. We just have back and forth. Okay. We got you covering a song people might know in the rap game. Okay. And then we got black rapper, artist, singer covering you. Oh. Oh.

18:09I remember that, yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

18:20Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. How do you feel about that interaction? I love it. You know, I love that. You know, you don't like everybody doing your stuff. Mm. You know. Who should not do bad doing? I don't know yet. You know, I'll let you know. I don't know exactly who should not, but I feel it. I appreciate Black's version of that. Yeah. Yeah. And Drake was cool with mine. So I was happy about that. A lot of younger artists, particularly like coming up now in this digital era. Yeah, it is faster. It is more about the vibe, the energy, the mood. Yeah. Although there are still plenty of conscious artists and there's plenty of paragraphs you can find.

19:04Right. I read that you said, well, you love the Flintstones. Oh, yeah. But the pacing doesn't work for kids today. Uh-uh. So how do you deal with today's pacing? Because you seem really unthreatened by it. So a lot of people go, oh, this is new. Why can't we just love my old kids? It's like you seem really open to the new pace. You know what? I'm probably the opposite of that last statement you made. I appreciate being in the moment and growing with the time. And, you know, I think that's the key to reinvention and reinvention is the key to survival in this business. And I'm able to I don't know.

19:45They just made me like this, whoever they are. You know, they made me like this. I'm just really interested in what's what's next. You know, I'm a very futuristic thinking human and I don't get stuck in the past. Once I do something, it doesn't belong to me anymore. so yeah i like that it's like snoop said he can't watch his highlights at halftime nah he's got live i'm curious about your aesthetic image visual artistic sense you mentioned earlier hip-hop has this and other other genres have it too where we see i mean he's just is there anything you can tell me about what we're looking at right now because it seems like a whole story Wherever you want to start with the...

20:32I slept in this. This is not nothing. These gold rings, these are my talismans and amulets and things. You know, these are things that just make me feel good. And they're designed, they're all custom, the things that I wear, from the hat to everything else. And what's the hat made out of? This hat is made out of resin, actually. You want to feel it? For real? Oh, okay, yeah. Yeah, so it looked to me almost like something that would be inside a cartoon or like soft. Yeah, it is. As a softness. Yeah, it's hard though. It's made by a friend of mine, Bonacapelo. So, and the jacket, Juana, a subsidiary of Comdigger Song.

21:13That's one of my favorite designers, you know? So I mix and match things. These pants were given to me by one of the elders in my community, because I just loved them, because he wore them so much. um yeah i just mix and match things you know they're like i said talismans and amulets things that make me feel good yeah i love shape and color and things like that yeah yeah and that's like so we saw you pop up on the cover of vogue i popped up popped up yeah pulled up hey vogue and and also sort of showing that this idea that you have to choose that you would have to choose what they used to or sometimes still call street wear versus couture or high fashion.

21:55You seem to be like, nah, we could do it all together, yeah? Yeah. And then when we look at some of your work here, what does this mean to you visually? This album cover, we're looking at New America Part One, Fourth World War. And I wrote that album off of the heels of watching a documentary called Fourth World War, which was about occupation all over the planet. Occupation is when the government comes in and takes some land for one reason or another that does not belong to them or to anyone. But it's land that indigenous people built and lived on. So in this piece of art done by a good friend of mine, Emek, whose father is from Israel, was a political cartoonist, his father.

22:45He became a rock poster artist. He does posters for the Grateful Dead, BC Boys, different people. And I met Emick and I talked to him about my album, New America Part One, because it was a social political kind of thing. And this is what he came up with. And inside of the Afro are so many different things. You know, there are signs of the time. Money, capitalism, needles. But then they're in her hair. Like, it's like, are they part of her or they're in her mind? They're in my mind. because New America Part 1 was me standing on an apex or standing at the top of something observing everything. There are no solutions in this album.

23:28It's just what I've observed. Well, I would push you on that. May I push you on that? You can push me. Thomas Dewey said a problem well stated is a problem half solved. I understand that. Could be. But we did start a lot of stuff on there. There's a song on this particular album called Master Teacher. And in that song, Master Teacher, the chorus is I Stay Woke. So Stay Woke was introduced to the world by way of this album, New America Part One. And I tweeted it once. Georgia Ann Muldrow actually wrote the song. She's singing with me. And I tweeted it about this group that was detained, Pussy Riot.

24:17They're this group of activists who are artists. And in my tweet, I said, free Pussy Riot and hashtag stay woke. After that, woke took off and became many things. Let's talk about it. You bring up that fact, which is your art took this concept. Ideas and words can evolve, but it really put this out, this idea we should wake up to these problems and stay woke. Sure. We made something for you, Eric. This is just like a minute. Okay. But we track how you started it and how it spread, and then how some on the right are sort of hijacking or attacking it or giving it a different definition. Sure. So I want to play this for you since you bring it up, and then we can talk about it.

25:03All right. Even though you go through struggle and strive to keep a healthy life, stay woke. And everybody knows the black or white, there's pieces in every shape and style. Stay woke. Stay woke. Yeah. It's just urging folks to pay attention, to be alert. Stay woke. Wow. I want my culture to stay woke, but I want the other cultures that's supporting us to stay woke. Woke fascism that will destroy our nation. We will never ever surrender to the woke mob. Florida is where woke goes to die. I think they mean black. Yeah. It's just another way to say thug or something else, right? So you've got the opponents of this kind of using the word woke as their stand-in.

25:58Their dog whistle they used to call it. Yeah. Yeah. And how do you feel about that? It is what it is. Like we said, it doesn't belong to us anymore. And, you know, once something goes out in the world, it takes a life of its own. It's an energy of its own. I can tell you what woke means. It just means being aware, being in alignment with nature. because if you're in alignment with that, you're aware of everything that's going on. And it's not only in the political arena. That means with your health. That means in your relationships. That means in your home. That means in your car. It means in your sleep.

26:39I like that. I haven't heard it put quite like that, but you're sort of reminding us, I mean, a big part of politics is just psychology. Are people angry? Do they need to blame? A big part of psychology is denial. Right. Right. You could be awake to it or you could be asleep to it because to be awake to it might hurt or it might mean you have to do something to feel ethical and people would rather not do anything. That's right. That's like that's a lack of love in there because I believe denial is the opposite of love. You sound like you have equanimity or peace about people misusing it. Like, well, you can't control it.

27:18Right. That guy we showed, Ron DeSantis or Trump or anybody's going to use it for their purposes. You say, well, let him try. And that's that. Yeah. And then that's a good push for us to document our own history, you know, instead of having it documented for us. You know, we have to document what we are doing and who we are if we care about that. You know, if we care about our children knowing the story. and it's not about right and wrong, it's just about the story. Well, you know, I think about that with what they sometimes call traditionally masculine energy. Yeah. Which can sometimes use anger as a way to fake a feeling of power in a bad situation.

28:04In America and around the world, the political potency of just keeping people angry is how some people corruptly hold onto power and they're not helping the people at all. Yeah, I think, yeah, they bank on our ignorance. You know, it's a big business. Our ignorance is their business. Yeah. So. Yeah. So I got one more clip for you that was just interesting to see what almost was people just trying to like, how do you even reference bad dude? How do you put it? How do you, you know, because we think in categories and we talked about briefly why you've always transcended. But we'll show you this.