Speaker 1: Of course, Love Supreme is a production of I Heart Radio.
Speaker 1: This classic episode was produced by the team at Pandora.
Speaker 1: What's up, y'all? This is QLs classic. My name is
Speaker 1: Quest Love. Uh. One of my favorite people ever Sheila Escobido.
Speaker 1: This is from two thousand seventeen December. Um, yeah, man,
Speaker 1: Sheila is you know, has killed the game for the
Speaker 1: last well, you know, four or five decades. Was one
Speaker 1: of the greatest drummers. And uh, this is modern music,
Speaker 1: and she's really really made a name for herself from
Speaker 1: her humble beginnings playing with her family, of course, her
Speaker 1: time with Prince, and her time after Prince as a
Speaker 1: percussionist and session musician and a solo artist in her
Speaker 1: own right. Um, it's definitely a fun time. She's a
Speaker 1: great storyteller. Let's get into it. This is Sheila e
Speaker 1: Quest Love Supreme LS Classic from two thousand seventeen. All right, okay,
Speaker 1: here you go, you're already. Yeah, what to suprema road
Speaker 1: called suprema subprema road, called suprema subprema role, Call suprema
Speaker 1: subprema role. Some call me eyeball with nineteen jobs. Everybody
Speaker 1: stop on the one. Yeah, I knew I was going
Speaker 1: to find docs. How you doing a Sheila good? God
Speaker 1: see you still I didn't know, but that's what we
Speaker 1: would do. Damn it. God call some good Call my
Speaker 1: name is Sugar, yeah with Sheila eye. If we got married,
Speaker 1: I'd be sugary Boss Buller wanted to be a percussionist. Yeah,
Speaker 1: went at the age of six. Are Sheila bounced some sticks?
Speaker 1: Yea with Queen Sheila. Yeah. This ain't gonna be quick
Speaker 1: because I want to talk about dookie stick role called
Speaker 1: sma role call. My name is Sheila, Yeah, I am
Speaker 1: the queener. Yeah, percussion Yeah, no discussing Wow. I actually
Speaker 1: I wanted to say that I don't think there's any
Speaker 1: word in the English language that rhymes with Sheila. I
Speaker 1: thought you're gonna say dookie, okay, vestable peeler, No, there's
Speaker 1: there's there's no word that Sheila might be the most
Speaker 1: unique name Matamela. No, I'm serious, like, I literally for
Speaker 1: at least two hours last night. Yeah, there's nothing, ad
Speaker 1: it took you two hours. Then I just said I'm
Speaker 1: real gentle Fela. Okay, so the next episode I'll rhyme
Speaker 1: it with Fila. Anyway, Ladies and gentlemen, um I will
Speaker 1: say that. Yeah, I'm gonna keep my composion. Um, if
Speaker 1: you were probably to compile and gather uh probably the
Speaker 1: modern rock top three list for drummers or percussionists, I
Speaker 1: guarantee you that our next guest, uh well, no doubt
Speaker 1: always be placed on that list. Um. Her name and
Speaker 1: her legacy, I believe is synonymous with uh, drumming excellent,
Speaker 1: band leader excellent and truth be told as many times
Speaker 1: as I've ever name dropped as influences either Tony Williams
Speaker 1: or Clyde Stubblefield or John Stark's or whoever truth be told.
Speaker 1: Probably you know, Sheila E is my drumming hero like
Speaker 1: I've I've done many hours practicing and studying and practicing
Speaker 1: and practicing, and you know she never ever gets her props.
Speaker 1: I mean as a as a session uh, as a
Speaker 1: session musician. The rosters endless, from from George Duke to
Speaker 1: Marvin Gay, the lioneld Richie Dina Ross to Kenny Loggins
Speaker 1: to Phil Collins to Jennifer Love Hewitt, Quincy Jones, Boon
Speaker 1: Um homework. Yeah, the list is endless, and um, you know,
Speaker 1: even in the arts as an artist in her own right,
Speaker 1: I mean. She has an amazing uh diverse discography lasting
Speaker 1: of the last four decades, from albums with her father
Speaker 1: Pio Scavito of course, to the Grace of All Time
Speaker 1: with Prince and again it's it's absolutely endless. Uh. Your
Speaker 1: new project, which I believe is iconic, formerly called Boy
Speaker 1: versus Girl or that was I thought it was initially
Speaker 1: called No No No, that was that. That was another
Speaker 1: record that was after Prince pass. So girl means boy.
Speaker 1: I'm sorry, um, but your new howm iconic is in
Speaker 1: stories now and everyone from Freddy Stone to to Collins
Speaker 1: and everybody's on this record, Um, even Ringo Starr, Ladies
Speaker 1: and gentlemen, please welcome Sheila the Quest left Supreme. Thank you.
Speaker 1: Shout out to Fonte, who's kicking himself right now. He's
Speaker 1: like me when the shock episode that has Sorry everyone
Speaker 1: has to and yes, I'm paid Bill, He's always kicking himself.
Speaker 1: Both of you guys, How are you today show? I
Speaker 1: appreciate you doing this for me on know that you've
Speaker 1: been up since zero o'clock in the morning. That's true,
Speaker 1: two hours. Hey, anything for you, you know, But I
Speaker 1: also I was telling them that, you know, I'm not
Speaker 1: saying that the sleepless streak has to But you're you're
Speaker 1: the queen of this. You've done many me. I learned
Speaker 1: it from y'all. Like you know, who needs sleep? Yeah,
Speaker 1: I know, I'm just saying, but I appreciate you for
Speaker 1: thank you for having me. I appreciate it. That's awesome. Okay,
Speaker 1: I'm looking at the clock and realizing that my intro
Speaker 1: took seven minutes. It's only right though, like what you talking,
Speaker 1: It's right. Okay, Well, let's let's start right into it. Um.
Speaker 1: For those that don't know about your history, could you
Speaker 1: tell our audience where you were born? Oakland, California, Oaktown, California,
Speaker 1: Bay Area born and raised. Uh, my dad Pete Escovedo,
Speaker 1: still playing, still alive. My mom Janita Marie gard dear
Speaker 1: Escovie though still crazy. Uh. They had their sixty one
Speaker 1: anniversary yesterday, sixty one years being married. That's a miracle
Speaker 1: right there. Sixty one years. Yeah, and Pops are still
Speaker 1: playing percussion and playing with his band, and so it's
Speaker 1: a it's awesome. I have two brothers, one of Peter Michael,
Speaker 1: and his sister Zena, and and about five billion family members.
Speaker 1: And I'm not exaggerating cousins and nephew for cousins forever.
Speaker 1: Every week you meet, somebody's like, yeah, I'm your cousin.
Speaker 1: That is true, and you just got to believe him. No,
Speaker 1: it's mostly true. We five. I'm not even joking. It's
Speaker 1: most right, bread, It's mostly true every time. I mean, seriously,
Speaker 1: I go somewhere. Okay, you gotta prove it. Okay, Well,
Speaker 1: my mom da da da da, So I'm your third cousin.
Speaker 1: I'm like, wow, you do look like that is okay,
Speaker 1: You're right. It's both sides been so lucky. All my
Speaker 1: cousin situations have not you know. Well, plus you have
Speaker 1: all kinds of funky mixes in your family, which is yeah,
Speaker 1: we have everything and everybody. Yeah. Um Mexican, Creole, Puerto Rican, Cuban, Filipino, Japanese, German, French.
Speaker 1: Literally are the world. We are the So okay, you
Speaker 1: said that you're Oakland born and raised, so I gotta
Speaker 1: ask you, um, you know, because I go out to
Speaker 1: Oakland a lot. Well, I guess we ever missed if
Speaker 1: I didn't say that Pandora or our parent company is
Speaker 1: located in Oakland, which which is why I'm out there often,
Speaker 1: um And I'm often told by people that, you know,
Speaker 1: the Oakland of two thousand seventeen is definitely not what
Speaker 1: Oakland was or the Bay Area in general. So what
Speaker 1: are you what are your feelings of the current metamorphosis
Speaker 1: of what Oakland and has become from what it was
Speaker 1: to what it is now? Well, I mean, right now,
Speaker 1: it's pretty pretty challenging because all of the tech, uh
Speaker 1: you know, in companies like Pandora and different things like that,
Speaker 1: and Apple and everything else. A lot of the people
Speaker 1: who are building all of these things have moved the people,
Speaker 1: some of the people out of the way in places
Speaker 1: where they used to live that they can't afford it anymore. So,
Speaker 1: I mean there's some places in the hood I can't
Speaker 1: believe that are a million dollars and they're not even
Speaker 1: worth thirty five thousand dollars. So that the money has
Speaker 1: gone up as far as pricing housing. UM. So, a
Speaker 1: lot of people are having to move out of the Bay,
Speaker 1: you know, further out into like Valeo, UM or even
Speaker 1: pass Richman, but Valeo, Sacramento, UM, different places like that
Speaker 1: Fremont Mill, Petis because they can't afford it. And then
Speaker 1: at the same time, like my foundation, we're partnering. We've
Speaker 1: partnered with five in Oakland. We started Elevate Oakland with
Speaker 1: Elevate Hope. So there's like three of us together just
Speaker 1: trying to keep music and arts in the schools in
Speaker 1: the Bay because the we just don't have enough help,
Speaker 1: especially in the hood in the community where they really
Speaker 1: need us, UM, and they're ending up dividing the schools.
Speaker 1: Instead of it being one school, they're dividing it to
Speaker 1: two and sometimes three schools because there's too many kids
Speaker 1: and not enough teachers. So a lot of the teachers, UM,
Speaker 1: they're really good teachers, don't want to go in the
Speaker 1: community and we get small pickings from choosing a great
Speaker 1: teacher who would like to come and help our students.
Speaker 1: So UM, i've been you know, it's changed a lot
Speaker 1: even for us, like what we've been doing to help
Speaker 1: UM some of the schools and stuff and try to
Speaker 1: keep the kids and and get them involved in music
Speaker 1: and arts because the music and arts have been take
Speaker 1: and a lot of schools. We hire a lot of
Speaker 1: the Bay Area musicians, you know, and if they're in town,
Speaker 1: we hire them to do artists and residents so they
Speaker 1: come you know, to the four to six times in
Speaker 1: a month for like a couple of months if they're available,
Speaker 1: and we pay them to help assist the teacher and
Speaker 1: teaching classes and and Afro Cuban hip hop whatever it
Speaker 1: may be. Um, so that change we we were we
Speaker 1: didn't do that early on. Um there was music in
Speaker 1: school when I was growing up, you know, and now
Speaker 1: there's there's that need. There are a few, um charter
Speaker 1: schools and stuff, but a lot of the kids there
Speaker 1: there's nowhere for them to go. So we need to
Speaker 1: fix what's happened. So to me, that's changed tremendously. So
Speaker 1: you're saying that during your time period in school, it
Speaker 1: was typical for music appreciation class and lessons like you
Speaker 1: didn't go to a performing arn't schools now or we
Speaker 1: couldn't afford it either. No, Now we just we we
Speaker 1: learned in school. We have music in arts in school,
Speaker 1: but I mean most of my learning music was in
Speaker 1: the house watching pop play. So yeah, so I mean
Speaker 1: describe that because you know, there's rarely artis that are
Speaker 1: here that come from that environment. What is it at least?
Speaker 1: Why is it important for music in the school systems?
Speaker 1: Like how m when did they remove that pro like
Speaker 1: like the idea of taking the arts away? Was it
Speaker 1: like the mid eighties the lead. Wow, I don't even
Speaker 1: really know, because it if it seemed like it was
Speaker 1: about the eighties, I don't I don't know for sure.
Speaker 1: I just noticed that, Um, there was a whole generation
Speaker 1: of kids that wanted to learn, and we found out
Speaker 1: that they weren't learning, and they were asking where could
Speaker 1: they go get classes or be taught? Can I get
Speaker 1: a trumpet? And we that's when we started raising money,
Speaker 1: like in the nineties, or let's just raise some money
Speaker 1: so we can get the kids the instruments. Well, then
Speaker 1: we got the instruments, well, who's going to teach them?
Speaker 1: You know, well there weren't there not enough teachers to teach.
Speaker 1: So then again going back to well let's get some
Speaker 1: of the local musicians, maybe we can have classes with them.
Speaker 1: We we went beyond not We didn't go to the
Speaker 1: superintendent of schools and things like that or the the district.
Speaker 1: We ended up at that point, Um, even in two thousand,
Speaker 1: we ended up uh going to the schools personally and
Speaker 1: talking to the principles. Hey, we just want to help.
Speaker 1: Can we help you if you guys say, yes, we'll
Speaker 1: just come in. You know, I don't we were gonna
Speaker 1: go to Sacramento and deal with the whole Supreme Court
Speaker 1: thing and all. It's like, well, no, if if you
Speaker 1: just allow us to come in, will help. So I
Speaker 1: think it was around eighties or so, and then we
Speaker 1: started helping in the nineties. And and again growing up
Speaker 1: with my parents, Pops always had percussion around the house,
Speaker 1: and you know, and we'd go to facilities since I
Speaker 1: was young and play the foster cure facilities, the juviy facilities,
Speaker 1: anything where there were kids where they didn't have a
Speaker 1: lot of help, or they would live somewhere, you know,
Speaker 1: periodic periodically after at these facilities and then go home
Speaker 1: on the weekends or whatever. Uh, some of the kids
Speaker 1: have been abused. So, you know, Pops, even though we
Speaker 1: didn't have much, we would go there when I was young,
Speaker 1: like eight nine years old, and we were doing that
Speaker 1: most of our last That's how we grew up giving
Speaker 1: back to the community back then. It sounds like the
Speaker 1: organization that you have is a great model for a
Speaker 1: lot of other major cities, because I was thinking when
Speaker 1: you were speaking, the nineties was a period when it's
Speaker 1: happened in most major cities, like music was let out
Speaker 1: of schools. That's why the Grammys started their their organization
Speaker 1: and whatnot. But do you ever think about like expanding
Speaker 1: that because there are a lot of I just thought it.
Speaker 1: But that's a great idea to have people who I've
Speaker 1: already succeeded from the area start an organization for you know,
Speaker 1: music for children. Yeah, we're trying to build a curriculum
Speaker 1: now so that it works wherever we go. And instead
Speaker 1: of saying we're gonna elevate Oakland, we want to elevate
Speaker 1: San Francisco, elevate l A, Eleve B, Comped, and elevate
Speaker 1: whatever is. Just elevate whatever city. But we have to
Speaker 1: raise the money. So we took a break and trying
Speaker 1: to raise the money so that we can start all
Speaker 1: over again and and get a good board of people
Speaker 1: and and begin at the beginning. So this is the beginning.
Speaker 1: So and it's funny because Philly, I'm ready. I'm ready.
Speaker 1: I wasn't in the thank you you didn't know that.
Speaker 1: In a way, there's always more us, Philly, It's always
Speaker 1: more you can do, right, There's always more. Yeah, because
Speaker 1: I'm coming out of a pocket with that, so it's
Speaker 1: kind of hard to do it without. It's kind of
Speaker 1: hard to deal without a sponsor. I'm just pulling the board.
Speaker 1: I'm just adding to the idea. She listening. You know
Speaker 1: a board, Yeah, a board? Yeah, absolutely, we started board
Speaker 1: and I will. You need to do more. I will.
Speaker 1: I just don't have the fund, but I definitely have
Speaker 1: the energy. You got the energy and didn't mean to
Speaker 1: cut you off. You did what? Uh? What's your What
Speaker 1: was your first musical memory? H five years old? Playing
Speaker 1: with my dad. Um. Actually I don't remember playing with
Speaker 1: him as much as I remember getting dressed to go play.
Speaker 1: I was five years old at my grandmother's house and
Speaker 1: my cousins were mad because they couldn't go to the club.
Speaker 1: They're like, well, she was five, how come she gets
Speaker 1: to go. My mom was explaining, well, she's gonna play,
Speaker 1: So I'm getting dressed. I had on this white dress
Speaker 1: with the little white uh socks and then the black
Speaker 1: pantent leather patent leather shoes, and um, I remember my
Speaker 1: mom combing my hair. We got in the car. We
Speaker 1: went to the gig, which is still there at the places.
Speaker 1: It was called Sund's ballroom right on gig gig for real,
Speaker 1: Like my first gig was five and I remember it
Speaker 1: like it was yesterday. But anyway, yeah, Sam's ball Room.
Speaker 1: So we go there. My mom would get out of
Speaker 1: the car and and I could hear my dad playing there.
Speaker 1: There were these windows up at the tops. You can
Speaker 1: hear the music coming from the place, and as she
Speaker 1: was walking me up the stairs, I can hear the
Speaker 1: music getting louder and louder and louder. And then they
Speaker 1: opened the door. We stood at the door and my
Speaker 1: dad saw us, and uh, they ended the song, and
Speaker 1: then he said, lady and Jenny, I want to bring
Speaker 1: up my daughter, Sheila Escovedo. She's gonna come and play
Speaker 1: with us. And then I just remember all the people parting,
Speaker 1: like the Red Sea was so weird. It's like wow,
Speaker 1: and I'm just looking at everyone. Wow, this is amazing.
Speaker 1: And I remember him picking me up and I was
Speaker 1: gonna play congo, so congas were pretty big, and so
Speaker 1: he stood me on a stool and then I don't
Speaker 1: remember anything else, and he said I was killing it,
Speaker 1: but I don't remember. You'll got five year old hairds
Speaker 1: on congas Like I'm just making a loud sound. Remember
Speaker 1: my father was a drumming too, and I remember trying
Speaker 1: and but it didn't come out loud as I wanted
Speaker 1: it to because my hands were too small. That's crazy. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I was going to say as a drummer, I mean
Speaker 1: I started off from bongos, but really it's well, yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean, it wasn't like there was a drum set
Speaker 1: in the house, but there was like one bongo in
Speaker 1: the house. And I mean I played it a lot.
Speaker 1: But the wear and tear in your hands especially, no,
Speaker 1: bongos are horrible to play. Why did you choose that?
Speaker 1: I chose Conga's not bongles. They're different. The difference bongos,
Speaker 1: I don't know, shut up, no, but okay, so why
Speaker 1: I didn't know that there is a wear and tear
Speaker 1: difference on your hands between my god, yes, okay, so
Speaker 1: explain the difference. Then. The difference of the bongles are
Speaker 1: really small, um, and because of the drumheads, I'm gonna
Speaker 1: put this down, the drumheads, they're smaller playing bongos. You're
Speaker 1: gonna play with half of your finger where your finger, uh,
Speaker 1: your knuckle, you know, so that first part of that finger,
Speaker 1: that's how you get that really high snapping sound on
Speaker 1: the bongles, so you're playing everything just you're just playing
Speaker 1: this and it hurts after a while. Your finger is swollen.
Speaker 1: I mean my brother's hands used to be so swollen
Speaker 1: from plane, so I would play him too, but they hurt.
Speaker 1: And Conga's you end up using more of your hands.
Speaker 1: I mean you can do that on the bongles, but
Speaker 1: the sound of what you want to get from bongles
Speaker 1: is really the tips of your fingers, and that hurts.
Speaker 1: You have beautiful hands with somebody who does that? Look
Speaker 1: at your palms, like, look at that, no marks, no scars,
Speaker 1: that's let me is tech nooks, just tech nook. You
Speaker 1: get treatments on your hands, like to keep them softer,
Speaker 1: anything along those lines. No, I do use lotion, but
Speaker 1: in hood and every house now, uh no. You know
Speaker 1: when I was playing every single day, like with George
Speaker 1: Duke and with my dad playing Congress, just mainly playing
Speaker 1: that as my instrument, my hands were bleeding. I have
Speaker 1: to use ragor blade to cut the callouses and it
Speaker 1: was painful. Yeah. I remember, like this wall right here,
Speaker 1: this is like a concrete wall, and before this shows
Speaker 1: with my dad and with George Duke because we would
Speaker 1: play every night. I'd have to bang on the wall
Speaker 1: before we went on stage until my hands got numb
Speaker 1: so I could get through the first like two songs,
Speaker 1: and then he'd do a ballad and I have to
Speaker 1: start all over again. It's like so painful, but I
Speaker 1: loved it, not the pain but the you know, the
Speaker 1: satisfaction of being able to play percussion is just when
Speaker 1: when did you hear of the existence of these things
Speaker 1: called sticks in your hands? It's not any better see
Speaker 1: everything without without going to see the unspoken situation with
Speaker 1: the roots right now. Yeah, but what I'm saying is that, um,
Speaker 1: you know, is it is it? Is it taboo or
Speaker 1: unspoken or cheating? I think it's taboo and cheating. Those
Speaker 1: things are meant to be played with your hands. Why
Speaker 1: are you answering the question the no? No, No, I'm
Speaker 1: asking because I want to know do you play We've
Speaker 1: all used bongos. No, she doesn't know your background, like
Speaker 1: you're a superstar engineers, that's what she's asking. But I mean,
Speaker 1: I know the answer is no. But um, I've seen
Speaker 1: and recorded. I've seen him recorded both types. People use
Speaker 1: sticks and don't use sticks, and it's just my I
Speaker 1: guess my opinion that bongos and congress are supposed to
Speaker 1: be playing with the hands and sticks are for other
Speaker 1: percussive things like drums. But but well, what my question was.
Speaker 1: I always wanted sticks because this is a certain loud
Speaker 1: dynamic that I like when sticks hit bongles, just for it,
Speaker 1: for it. And I think it's mostly because of whenever
Speaker 1: Prince programmed the rim shot to be that conga sound,
Speaker 1: that's the sound always was going for in my head.
Speaker 1: So thus I was like, well, I can't get that
Speaker 1: with the hand, but you get that with the stick.
Speaker 1: So that's always been my default move. Of course, to
Speaker 1: the dismay of every percussionist watching us, or why you're cheating,
Speaker 1: why your man's cheating, not not, you know that sort
Speaker 1: of thing. So is it really? Is it? Truly? Because
Speaker 1: even when you're you're you're at your you're set up
Speaker 1: with with some bodies and whatnot, and your and your
Speaker 1: your cow thows, it's not like you're gonna put them down.
Speaker 1: And then yes I would. So you're saying it's absolutely cheating, Yes,
Speaker 1: but I agree with him as well. But let me
Speaker 1: tell you why, because in traditional music, like traditional meaning
Speaker 1: Latin jazz, SA also things like you're gonna play bongles
Speaker 1: with your hands. They would kill you if you soda plays. Yeah,
Speaker 1: there's no sensitivity to the instrument. Is just going to
Speaker 1: be one tone. You can't get the different tones and
Speaker 1: the field with sticks. Now, However, when disco music came
Speaker 1: out and more pop music, you would end up using sticks,
Speaker 1: you know, for a different sound. I've done it on recordings,
Speaker 1: but it depends on but I've done it too, but
Speaker 1: it depends on you know what music you're gonna play
Speaker 1: with it. But definitely they were made to play with
Speaker 1: your hands and not sticks. Final answer, final answer. That
Speaker 1: is my final answer, the real answer to your question,
Speaker 1: which was why did I chime in? It's because on
Speaker 1: this day right there talking the most talking Steve I want,
Speaker 1: I already said I was right, as it turns out,
Speaker 1: thank you. I'm a purist. You know you can sticks
Speaker 1: on on those things. But you're more famous actually in
Speaker 1: my head for using sticks. You just do me. You've
Speaker 1: been my engineer and you're just telling me this now.
Speaker 1: But you're I mean, you're more of a drummer, you know,
Speaker 1: than a percussion than a conga bungo player like I
Speaker 1: was about to do you play the lad over thirty? Um,
Speaker 1: you know what I have the ability to, but until
Speaker 1: I master the sound of I cannot claim that, and
Speaker 1: I do not know how to. What is that? It's
Speaker 1: like when you rub your finger. When you rub, this
Speaker 1: a vibration thing. I've never been able to do anything.
Speaker 1: It's like learning the whistle, or like when you wolf whistle.
Speaker 1: When the actually on the drum, you can g it's
Speaker 1: a vibration with your fingers. That what was what was
Speaker 1: the song? Doo doo dunk dunk DoD scorpio. Don't you practice?
Speaker 1: Of course? Of course? Okay, so how long did you?
Speaker 1: Because we're big on just the one thing I want
Speaker 1: to convey to my listeners is the amount of practice, yeah,
Speaker 1: that you have to put it into to master your craft.
Speaker 1: So in general, were you just always jamming in the
Speaker 1: house or like how much time would you personally practice,
Speaker 1: just isolated and that sort of thing, or was it
Speaker 1: like you had to go and practice Oh no, no no. Um. Actually,
Speaker 1: like when I played that beat, it was if you know,
Speaker 1: my dad's congos were there. The song came out, we
Speaker 1: got the forty five and I was like, oh, that's dope,
Speaker 1: let me try that. You know, we would just do it,
Speaker 1: or we'd play it, you know, jamming, jamming with bands
Speaker 1: or out in the park, you know, um when out
Speaker 1: of the street drummers, we'd all get together and just
Speaker 1: play outside. Um. I hate to say that I've never
Speaker 1: practiced to day in my life, and I'm sorry for
Speaker 1: those who I believe. I believe that you've jammed a
Speaker 1: lot of hours, like and that was your practice, yeah
Speaker 1: kind of yeah, just like The Roots before Fallon. The
Speaker 1: Roots never practiced as a band like we just you
Speaker 1: do three hours shows for six five days out the year.
Speaker 1: Then it's right. So you just jam with your family
Speaker 1: and now yeah, just jamming and stuff. Yeah. But to
Speaker 1: sit down and say I'm going to learn a rhythm
Speaker 1: and apart so i can get better, I'm sorry. No,
Speaker 1: my parents made me practice to keep me from going
Speaker 1: out on the streets and they did the right thing, right.
Speaker 1: But I'm saying, like, but you grew up in the
Speaker 1: household with other musicians, so I'm certain that it was
Speaker 1: more like a jamming thing. It was. Well, yes, that
Speaker 1: weird though, I mean is it also? I I'm not
Speaker 1: not that I'm big on jamming, but there's something very
Speaker 1: vulnerable about a jam session that makes it very hard
Speaker 1: for me to do in front of people I know. Okay,
Speaker 1: so the first the first day of of taking the
Speaker 1: Tonight Show gig, and it's just the eight of us
Speaker 1: facing each other. So like the circle we're in now,
Speaker 1: it was the hardest thing in the world to do. Like,
Speaker 1: I stopped the session after five minutes and called my
Speaker 1: manager like, I don't know what to do, Like what
Speaker 1: do you just just start playing a song? Like, because
Speaker 1: I think it's it's a it's a vulnerable, intimate thing
Speaker 1: almost I hate to be creepy with the metaphorical thing,
Speaker 1: but I mean it's like intimacy, and you know, the
Speaker 1: thing is that you have to be on I mean,
Speaker 1: we're or in good terms with each other as a band,
Speaker 1: but it's it's sort of like I think that you
Speaker 1: also socially have to be in tune with the person
Speaker 1: that you are playing with in order to get that
Speaker 1: the desired results. And so it's I think that's it's hard.
Speaker 1: So it means that you were able to jam or
Speaker 1: borderline envious that you're able to play with your family,
Speaker 1: Like yeah, and we grew up like that, so I mean,
Speaker 1: anytime the opportunity, if they were sitting out, let's go play.
Speaker 1: All right, We started getting into this whole thing and
Speaker 1: then taking solos and going into different rhythms and like
Speaker 1: just jamming in the backyard outside absolutely in the house,
Speaker 1: in the backyard at the parks down at Berkeley College
Speaker 1: and on telegraph all the time. We were at out
Speaker 1: on the streets, just jamming in the mission in San Francisco. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: for real? Where are you in the scheme of your brother,
Speaker 1: your brothers and sister like oldest young yars? How does Yeah?
Speaker 1: So I'm the oldest, My brother Lauan, my brother Peter Michael,
Speaker 1: my sister Zina. Because I was wondering why you got
Speaker 1: I was like, how does she get picked out of
Speaker 1: everybody to go jam with dad? And do the rest
Speaker 1: play too? They played, But it seems like you guys
Speaker 1: had a special relationship or your dad. Yeah, I was first.
Speaker 1: So how unusual in your childhood was it? For um?
Speaker 1: I know that drums are normally associated as a more
Speaker 1: masculine music, uh instrument to play, So how unusual was it? Like?
Speaker 1: Did you get any ribbing whatsoever? T's like you played
Speaker 1: with drums, or like why don't you play piano? Or
Speaker 1: why don't you play guitar? Like from or people. Well,
Speaker 1: I'm just saying, was there anyone who discourage you, like, well,
Speaker 1: that's not a young ladies shouldn't be playing? Like do
Speaker 1: you have a grandmother that said like she shouldn't be
Speaker 1: playing the drum, can't wear a dress and played drums?
Speaker 1: Oh no, And my family, no one in the family
Speaker 1: ever said anything. So it's a supernatural to supernatural. No
Speaker 1: one ever said my parents, my uncle's cousins, they all play.
Speaker 1: No one ever said you can't play because you're a girl,
Speaker 1: because everyone would pick up something and just play. My
Speaker 1: mom plays guido, she plays a little bit of conga's,
Speaker 1: she tap dances, she's things. You know, it's just an
Speaker 1: entertaining family. And every time we go to a party,
Speaker 1: even with the family, we put on Jackson five, Tempted, whatever,
Speaker 1: James Brown, and we just start imitating people. So um,
Speaker 1: we grew up like let's let's who's going first, and
Speaker 1: the and the way to get to the party. Well,
Speaker 1: in the party, as soon as my mom would start
Speaker 1: saying that that that that that that, everyone start running
Speaker 1: to the living rooms like time for that's the intro,
Speaker 1: so time, oh yeah, oh yeah, and then my mom
Speaker 1: would break right into tap dance and then we'll see
Speaker 1: who's gonna play what record and start dances. So I
Speaker 1: was never told. Never ever, until I left the house
Speaker 1: and started performing with other artists did people say things.
Speaker 1: But even in school, no one really said, oh, you know,
Speaker 1: you can't play because you're a girl. I don't. I mean,
Speaker 1: it was always cool. It's like, you know, everyone was
Speaker 1: in school was like stope. Well, I mean on the
Speaker 1: other side of the coin, like did they make a
Speaker 1: big deal of it because you were dope or you know,
Speaker 1: it was like every time you play, like go like
Speaker 1: it's a novelty thing that we're watching or whatever. Because
Speaker 1: I think with the exception with the exception of what's
Speaker 1: her name, I think her name was Cookie. There was
Speaker 1: there was a Jersey based group in the seventies called Ecstasy,
Speaker 1: Passion and Pain, Uh, the Mob, Deep Sample, the Realist
Speaker 1: Do doo doo doo doo doo doo doo doo. I'll
Speaker 1: play it later, but yeah, there's they were I mean,
Speaker 1: they had a they had a run from like seventy
Speaker 1: three to seventy six, but they did like three appearances
Speaker 1: on Soul Train. So that's the first time I saw
Speaker 1: like a woman playing drums, but he was actually playing drums. Yeah,
Speaker 1: oh yeah, I gotta check it out. So yeah, I
Speaker 1: was gonna say, did you have anyone that you looked
Speaker 1: up to that was in the car? Cook? Yeah? Did
Speaker 1: you have anyone that you looked up to that was
Speaker 1: a woman that was playing drums when you were coming
Speaker 1: up at all? Um? The only woman that I saw
Speaker 1: play ever, especially drums, was Karen Carpenter when her and
Speaker 1: her brother had their variety show. Yeah, and she was
Speaker 1: killing it, you know. Um. And as soon as I
Speaker 1: saw her on television, I turned to Pops and said,
Speaker 1: how come I don't have a TV show like nine
Speaker 1: or something? What do you mean? As I said, I
Speaker 1: played drums. I played just like her. What how come
Speaker 1: can't we just get a TV show and goes, sure
Speaker 1: you can. I mean, it was never like, no, you
Speaker 1: can't play because you're a girl that no one else
Speaker 1: Nothing that was never said. But in your formative years,
Speaker 1: did anyone think like, yo, there's no one that we
Speaker 1: know of that can feel in the slot and you'll
Speaker 1: be the first to at that time would have been revolutionary,
Speaker 1: something like anyone thinking like dollar signs, like no, we didn't. Actually,
Speaker 1: as a matter of fact, when I first started playing
Speaker 1: and sitting in with other bands and they wanted to
Speaker 1: pay me, I thought it was disrespectful to pay me
Speaker 1: because I know it's kind of weird. Yeah, I thought
Speaker 1: it was disrespectful because I loved it so much. It's like,
Speaker 1: don't pay me for something I really love. I'm just
Speaker 1: I just want to do it, like this is my passion.
Speaker 1: I don't And then Pop was like, come here. He
Speaker 1: took me in the kitchen. Yeah, he took me in
Speaker 1: the kitchen, open the kitchen refrigerators, like we need some food.
Speaker 1: You gotta. It's okay to get paid, it's okay. And
Speaker 1: I'm like, okay, alright, cool were you at that moment?
Speaker 1: So I was gonna ask at what age were you
Speaker 1: when you were like a total Jedi master, as in
Speaker 1: like I could close my eyes and know I haven't
Speaker 1: got you, I haven't gotten there yet. Good answer, Good answer?
Speaker 1: Now manna ask you again? This time just dropped. No,
Speaker 1: I'm so serious, I'm being honest. At what age were
Speaker 1: you when other musicians took you totally serious, as in,
Speaker 1: I want her for at what age were you when
Speaker 1: you started? You know? They still sometimes don't take music. Sister,
Speaker 1: can't get a call for a gig nowhere me, I'm
Speaker 1: telling because you're me on. They're like, I can't afford that.
Speaker 1: Whatever you think. I was like, oh, I could have
Speaker 1: called you. See that's what happened. That's not nothing to
Speaker 1: do with that's that's because we're afraid of you. You're
Speaker 1: on a mountain top and now it's about a climate.
Speaker 1: It's like, yeah, no, I mean, I know you're not
Speaker 1: owning the superhero thing, and I know that artists hate
Speaker 1: the fan worship thing, but your your existence is kind
Speaker 1: of a big deal. So no, thank you. I mean,
Speaker 1: I understand it now. But seriously, when when growing up,
Speaker 1: I mean, I didn't get it, and I don't think
Speaker 1: we realized it even Pops until later on. It's like, okay,
Speaker 1: wait a minute. You know, Um, that wasn't ignoring you.
Speaker 1: That was more like we're not worthy. There was one
Speaker 1: time I think I was going to call you for
Speaker 1: a thing, and it's only because I saw that you did.
Speaker 1: Um was it loving you? Loving you? Right? And I
Speaker 1: saw your credit. And then I was like, oh, oh,
Speaker 1: she would, she would come down the earth. And at
Speaker 1: what point in your life were you thinking like this?
Speaker 1: Because you said, you know now you understand now why
Speaker 1: people weren't calling, But like, at what point? Because until
Speaker 1: I started speaking with people, it's like, you know, how
Speaker 1: how you doing? Oh? You know? Like and then I
Speaker 1: was like, wait a minute, you know I'll come and
Speaker 1: do a session. You would Yeah? Why I mean, Steve,
Speaker 1: you wanted to play the piano and yourself. No, listen,
Speaker 1: this guy, this dude, this producer called me. I could
Speaker 1: have slapped him through the phone. He called me and
Speaker 1: he said, hey, Sheila, I just want to know something,
Speaker 1: all right, okay, yeah what you need? Um I'm doing.
Speaker 1: I'm producing this record on this girl. I want to
Speaker 1: know how to get the Sheila. So, do you know
Speaker 1: anybody but cheap? You're on the phone with it right now.
Speaker 1: I did. I said, wait a minute, how can you
Speaker 1: my sound? You want to you want me to refer
Speaker 1: you to somebody else? Dude, Okay, here's another thing we're skipping.
Speaker 1: We're skipping the line here. But I believe that the
Speaker 1: the number one weapon of the Purple Cloud period, or
Speaker 1: just that period with Prince, the number one weapon was
Speaker 1: mystery and anybody associated any at least in my eyes,
Speaker 1: Like you know, when I was ten, eleven twelve, like
Speaker 1: seeing you guys, it was like it was some untouchable.
Speaker 1: We're too I don't mean arrogant, like we're too good
Speaker 1: for that, but you know, a different world even yea,
Speaker 1: even like that, we are the world perception like, oh
Speaker 1: we never do that, like in our minds, we're just
Speaker 1: like you guys, would only do your music and you're
Speaker 1: laughing at us mere mortals like kind like that, But
Speaker 1: we weren't going to say no, no, no, no no,
Speaker 1: we you know what the it's weird, like it's like
Speaker 1: being in this room, all of us sitting here, we
Speaker 1: just start playing and jaming and next you know, four
Speaker 1: days later you might have cut another record. I mean,
Speaker 1: it was just like we love being in the studio,
Speaker 1: and after being with everyone, you know all the time,
Speaker 1: you kind of forget that there's a world happening, there's
Speaker 1: something's going something that's going on. At one point, Prince
Speaker 1: and I just we felt like we're in a bubble
Speaker 1: and and until we woke up at in the Purple Rain,
Speaker 1: It's like wait, what just happened? We didn't even we
Speaker 1: didn't understand it at all. Okay, so now I know
Speaker 1: that you're available for session war, which is the important thing. Yes,
Speaker 1: I am. So what was your very first gig as
Speaker 1: a professional for customers? Pops playing his percussion player, got sick.
Speaker 1: He had a band called as tech Has signed to
Speaker 1: Clive Davis. They were out touring out with Temptations, Steven Wonder,
Speaker 1: Earth winning fire. Pops as percussion other percussion player got
Speaker 1: sick and I said, I'm fifteen, Pops, I knew all
Speaker 1: the music, you know. Let me play this show. And
Speaker 1: I was like yeah. He was like, no, you can't
Speaker 1: do it. And I was like, Pops, come on. He said,
Speaker 1: you're only fifteen. You can't. You know they're out on
Speaker 1: tour with all these bands. Now, you can't do it.
Speaker 1: You're only fifteen years old. And I said, Moms, Pops
Speaker 1: won't let me play in the band, thank you. So
Speaker 1: I got my way, and um, so I played that
Speaker 1: show in San Francisco um for I think it was
Speaker 1: then Mayor Masconi, I'm I think, and it was for
Speaker 1: three thousand people and the band was killing, you know,
Speaker 1: fifteen years old like I've been playing with these a
Speaker 1: couple of other bands and they were like knockoffs of
Speaker 1: Santana music, So we knew all that stuff. Um, and
Speaker 1: my dad was in Santana right before having the band
Speaker 1: as Teca, and that band as Teca was formed with
Speaker 1: when Santana's band broke up, Carlos broke up his band
Speaker 1: half the band with my dad Neil Sean, Lenny White
Speaker 1: on drums. All those people were huh yea. So they
Speaker 1: were playing with my dad in Azteca, and so you
Speaker 1: got this caliber of musicians in in these people playing
Speaker 1: with the eighteen piece, you know, five six horns, three singers,
Speaker 1: three percussion players, to keyboard players, two guitar players. I mean,
Speaker 1: it was insane and all this music and it's like
Speaker 1: I wanted to play in that band. So I got
Speaker 1: to play in the band. And it just brings you
Speaker 1: if you're set in a place where it's going to
Speaker 1: force you to go somewhere you've never been before. You know,
Speaker 1: I wanted to make sure that I was there representing,
Speaker 1: and I mean I went for it. Well, you know,
Speaker 1: my dad turned to me at one point and he said,
Speaker 1: you know, I want you to take a solo, you know,
Speaker 1: like he's gesturing to me, you know, play from your heart.
Speaker 1: I'm like, I'm so scared. I closed my eyes and
Speaker 1: I started playing a solo and I black. I felt
Speaker 1: like I blacked out. I just left the planet. And
Speaker 1: next thing I know, I remember looking up in the sky.
Speaker 1: I was up in the sky, like floating, looking at myself,
Speaker 1: playing with in the looking at the entire room with
Speaker 1: my dad looking at me. I'm looking at him, and
Speaker 1: the crowd is just starting to roar it and I
Speaker 1: saw it like from above. It was so weird, and
Speaker 1: I when I finally all my eyes did, I realized,
Speaker 1: like all of a sudden, you know, like in a
Speaker 1: movie and you hear the music like coming back in
Speaker 1: out of nowhere. That's how I felt. And then I
Speaker 1: started shaking because I got scared, like wait, did I
Speaker 1: just what happened? You know? And I felt like it
Speaker 1: was an out of body experience, and my hands were shaking,
Speaker 1: and in the at the end of my soul, I
Speaker 1: looked at Pops and I was I just started crying
Speaker 1: while I'm still playing, And then I heard the roar
Speaker 1: of the crowd and just like and it just got
Speaker 1: loud and it was a standing ovation and I was like,
Speaker 1: I don't even know what that. I was just looking.
Speaker 1: I was just crying like crazy. And we ended the song,
Speaker 1: the show stopped, went backstage, and I was like, Pops, Daddy, daddy,
Speaker 1: I'm going out on tour with you. This is what
Speaker 1: I want to do. What I want to do. I
Speaker 1: know what, I know what I know this is. It
Speaker 1: was that the first and the last time you had
Speaker 1: that that feeling, like that moment, No, that was the
Speaker 1: beginning of my purpose. That was the beginning. And Pops
Speaker 1: looked at me and then we hugged and we just
Speaker 1: started crying. He's like, I don't even know. How do
Speaker 1: you know all this? I was like, I don't know.
Speaker 1: I think I was watching you. I'm like a sponge.
Speaker 1: I don't know. We we had no idea, like all
Speaker 1: of a sudden, just kind of jamming with a local
Speaker 1: band for six months, and then I went from that
Speaker 1: local band to professionalism. I don't know. So, okay, this
Speaker 1: is definitely the I gotta get a nastecha record, bro man,
Speaker 1: there's two of them. You have to hear it. It's amazing.
Speaker 1: Seventy six five or something like that is only five four. Okay,
Speaker 1: so you as a drummer and as a musician. I
Speaker 1: was gonna say that the the one thing that I
Speaker 1: think that you won't ever able to be, that you'll
Speaker 1: never be able to avoid is the solo. Now, that's
Speaker 1: the dividing line between you and I because think I've
Speaker 1: made a life in a career on the most minimalist
Speaker 1: kind of approach to drumming. That's a huge gift to have.
Speaker 1: It's a it's a dangerous and a big responsibility. It's
Speaker 1: a dangerous gift. But the thing is is that in
Speaker 1: my age and as I get older, like okay, so
Speaker 1: when I was in my twenties and my thirties or whatever,
Speaker 1: especially uh, the way that my arms are now with
Speaker 1: um uh your carpal tunnel on everything. Yeah, it's so
Speaker 1: painful now to take solos. So it's like I'm taking
Speaker 1: them less and less. How are you, especially when most
Speaker 1: of your solos have to have this you know this,
Speaker 1: this climatic uh, climatic applause from the audience. How are
Speaker 1: you able? Like do you not? Do you have a
Speaker 1: fear of soloing or just but it's always expected of you? Yeah,
Speaker 1: I see in the music stops go ahead you and
Speaker 1: yours has to be extra acrobatic, like it's always, yeah,
Speaker 1: you have to be you're not even zero to ten.
Speaker 1: You have to go through zero the auto bond zero
Speaker 1: autobond in like five minutes. And I'm just saying not
Speaker 1: not even physicality or with with with with age, whatever,
Speaker 1: but maybe there's just some nights you don't feel like
Speaker 1: turning it on and like, but that's pressure because you
Speaker 1: have to go from zero to a gazillion. It's expected
Speaker 1: of you two minutes. Yeah, it's interesting because I don't
Speaker 1: I don't think of it as an I've got to
Speaker 1: be on on and off or I don't feel like it.
Speaker 1: I've never put myself in that position to feel like that.
Speaker 1: So I'm I love doing what I do and if
Speaker 1: people ask me, I would love to do it. But
Speaker 1: I wouldn't walk into a room to say I'm not
Speaker 1: gonna walk in there because I don't feel like it.
Speaker 1: Then I should have not showed up. I never want
Speaker 1: to put myself in that positions say okay, I gotta
Speaker 1: turn it on. No, I'm excited. If someone asked me
Speaker 1: to play, I would love to. So there's no on
Speaker 1: and off switch you asked me, it's always on. Can
Speaker 1: I just I'm not fast forwarding, But I just have
Speaker 1: a quick question on that note, because I just watched
Speaker 1: you do the view and in my mind I said,
Speaker 1: she wouldn't not do this performance unless you have full,
Speaker 1: like comfortable they would say yes and you could do
Speaker 1: everything that you wanted to do. Is that like an
Speaker 1: example of that moment, because it was kind of amazing
Speaker 1: and groundbreaking some of the things that you did within it.
Speaker 1: Thank you. Um, it was it was a It's interesting.
Speaker 1: It was a fight. It was a fight to get
Speaker 1: what we had. It was a fight I and I'm
Speaker 1: grateful it ended up turning out good. But um, I
Speaker 1: always tell everyone you know, no doesn't mean you can't
Speaker 1: do it. No, it doesn't mean you shouldn't a lot
Speaker 1: of time, no one means opportunity. And I was like,
Speaker 1: this has just been insane, the things that we had
Speaker 1: to do and change, and I mean it was, you know,
Speaker 1: from one thing to another, and I just kept saying,
Speaker 1: but no, this is the message. We have to send
Speaker 1: a message. I have to stand for. This is what
Speaker 1: we're trying to send, this message, and we need the
Speaker 1: flag and it needs to be upside down, you know.
Speaker 1: And I need to put the images in the backs
Speaker 1: where people can see what we're talking about. I need
Speaker 1: Dr King's speech, I need Kennedy's speech, you know, I
Speaker 1: need Obama speech. You know. So it was a definite fight.
Speaker 1: But you know again how things turned around. We were
Speaker 1: only supposed to just play the music, and then it
Speaker 1: turned into uh, two questions and then there's something. Then
Speaker 1: once they understood what we were trying to do, they
Speaker 1: were then they were behind us, understand, and we're glad
Speaker 1: that they they understood what we wanted to do. And
Speaker 1: then it turned into let's move you to segment five
Speaker 1: and six, and it's like, oh, now I get to
Speaker 1: explain what happened. But never give up, you know, never
Speaker 1: give up, and know means the opportunity. Man, I wasn't
Speaker 1: coming through that front door, but I came through that
Speaker 1: side door, you know, and I wasn't gonna give up.
Speaker 1: And I still got there and it was better than
Speaker 1: it was going to be initially. Sorry for those of
Speaker 1: us who don't watch the view, you have to move
Speaker 1: your neck like that when you say the word okay,
Speaker 1: I just I don't I don't watch most of the time. Um,
Speaker 1: so what can you just tell us what the performance was. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and you could go shela YouTube channel to watch it
Speaker 1: too on my Facebook. Yeah, she lea jum or she
Speaker 1: lea um No. Uh. The beginning of it is I
Speaker 1: did the funky national anthem I colleague, so the national
Speaker 1: anthem with um some things, and I had speeches in
Speaker 1: in the song as well. She kneeled while she played.
Speaker 1: Were the speeches samples of the actual speeches or was
Speaker 1: somebody else? Okay, No, it was the actual Like I
Speaker 1: got the okay from Dr King's estate and family to
Speaker 1: use his images and his speeches on my record. That
Speaker 1: was huge because they just don't do that for anybody,
Speaker 1: for anybody. It was super political. It was funky national anthem.
Speaker 1: I got it. You gotta have me a funky. When
Speaker 1: I reposted it, I was like, it was nice that
Speaker 1: they allowed you to show your love and your frustration
Speaker 1: for this country. Yeah. Yeah, absolutely, Okay. So in in performing, um,
Speaker 1: I know that today, especially with it being the call
Speaker 1: to personality and based on celebrity that gets people approval.
Speaker 1: I know that. Uh, in the seventies, you actually had
Speaker 1: to be good and great and you had to entertain
Speaker 1: not just perform, but you had to entertain. So what
Speaker 1: was this the level of preparation, especially with Azteca and
Speaker 1: then eventually went to George Duke and stuff. What was
Speaker 1: the level of preparation that you guys put into doing shows?
Speaker 1: Like were you guys looking at other acts that were
Speaker 1: on the bill and like, yeah, we gotta blow them
Speaker 1: off the stage or you know, we're their headline acts?
Speaker 1: That were like okay, can you guys not you know,
Speaker 1: I just you know, do something normal And right now,
Speaker 1: I don't know that. I don't remember. Um with once
Speaker 1: I I said I was going to become a professional musician,
Speaker 1: did was there a competition? Um? I think that there
Speaker 1: was competition early on with the other bands, the local bands,
Speaker 1: We're gonna be better than them kind of thing. But once, um,
Speaker 1: once I became a professional musician and wasn't about we
Speaker 1: have to be better. The preparation was like, as Pops
Speaker 1: told me all the time, in order for you to
Speaker 1: feel good about what you're doing and what you're playing
Speaker 1: and walk out there with confidence, the only way to
Speaker 1: do that is know what you're supposed to do, and
Speaker 1: if you prepare and listen to the music, learn you
Speaker 1: know all the breaks, and you walk in, you play,
Speaker 1: uh the show. Um, you're gonna enjoy yourself and you're
Speaker 1: gonna play and not have to worry or be afraid.
Speaker 1: So I was always prepared. I always listened to the
Speaker 1: music whatever I needed to listen too, to make sure,
Speaker 1: especially if I had it ahead of time, I would
Speaker 1: learn the music so I'd walk in. And that was
Speaker 1: part of the issues with some of the other male
Speaker 1: drummers was I'd walk in prepared and they wouldn't know anything,
Speaker 1: and they're just like, piste off of me. Really because
Speaker 1: you're because she did the job. I did the job
Speaker 1: with a smile. I'm so glad we didn't come up
Speaker 1: and see I would have been like, okay, actual proof.
Speaker 1: We're we're the cuts in the Hope song. So how
Speaker 1: I know that, Um, because George Duke came from the
Speaker 1: school of uh Frank Zappa. UM. But I also know
Speaker 1: that in the mid seventies he was trying to get
Speaker 1: more into his funk thing. I mean, we're his shows.
Speaker 1: I've never seen like any of the tapes of his
Speaker 1: seventies shows on YouTube. I mean, there will be like
Speaker 1: a clipper too, but it'll just be you know again
Speaker 1: like Dukie stick or you know, just like one of
Speaker 1: his his groove based songs. But how much of his
Speaker 1: fusion stuff that he uh incorporate in in his seventies
Speaker 1: shows by the time that he joined his band, Oh
Speaker 1: a lot of it. Um. The dupe thing about George
Speaker 1: was he played so many different genres of music because
Speaker 1: he played the fusion a lot. He did play jazz,
Speaker 1: We played a lot of Brazilian music, we played the
Speaker 1: funk music. Um. I mean he played everything in the show.
Speaker 1: So he allowed me to He never told me what
Speaker 1: I needed to play or what even what he wanted
Speaker 1: me to play. He's just always said, Okay, you got
Speaker 1: your house full of stuff, whatever you feel like fits
Speaker 1: in that song, just play it. So he allowed me
Speaker 1: to grow as a musician. That doesn't really happen with people.
Speaker 1: You know, everyone's a lot of times you need to
Speaker 1: play this and you need to play that, and be
Speaker 1: specific on what you're playing. But he just allowed me
Speaker 1: to express myself freely like always and that was huge
Speaker 1: for these early gigs where you also your own tech
Speaker 1: and your own rody. Like I know that times have
Speaker 1: changed down it's like I have a writer and those things,
Speaker 1: but those uh. Um, I had a tech later, but no,
Speaker 1: I was when I was playing the clubs in the
Speaker 1: Bay Area with the different bands. I put my drum set,
Speaker 1: Timbali's and Conga's in a vovo myself, load and unload
Speaker 1: and set everything up and then do the same thing
Speaker 1: every night. So you transport in in a car. In
Speaker 1: a car, those are hills where you live? Like, how
Speaker 1: did you get those? Like? How did you transport? Yeah?
Speaker 1: They were here, they were hills, but no, we I
Speaker 1: I had a vogel and so I put all my
Speaker 1: gear in a vovo, not unless I use At one point,
Speaker 1: Mom's got a van, but that was I never hardly
Speaker 1: used a van. So I was my own tech. Absolutely,
Speaker 1: sometimes I get help. And then later on with George,
Speaker 1: he did have a tech. Uh so he did do
Speaker 1: a lot of the works as well. Yeah. Um, after
Speaker 1: George Schuke, it was did you do a stand up?
Speaker 1: I don't know if you did a stand with Algero
Speaker 1: or not, or I don't know if he was just
Speaker 1: opening or we well we played on the same bill. Yeah,
Speaker 1: so we all jumped together. Yeah, we did shows together.
Speaker 1: I wasn't officially in this band when we played together, damn. Okay,
Speaker 1: because I thought that you would have been on that
Speaker 1: the Live in Europe Looks at the Rainbow. It's one
Speaker 1: of my favorite albums of and I had someone else
Speaker 1: asked me that, And I'm not sure. I have to
Speaker 1: listen to it because it could be me. We were
Speaker 1: in Europe doing those shows a lot together on the
Speaker 1: same bill, so I don't know. It's it's it's all
Speaker 1: a blur. I'd have to listen to see. Oh, it
Speaker 1: could be No, I don't know. I was gonna say
Speaker 1: it could be Pauline though, Okay, I don't know. Were
Speaker 1: you on a lot of George Duke albums or just
Speaker 1: part of his how you were? Yeah? And uh the
Speaker 1: game Master of the Game follow the Rainbow and about
Speaker 1: fourth after that. I just don't remember the names of Yeah. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I'm on the verge of going headlong into him. I've
Speaker 1: been pretty He's amazing, incredible. Yeah, oh you love it
Speaker 1: because yeah, I'm coming in through the jazz way actually,
Speaker 1: like no, have a dealer's stuff is based on like
Speaker 1: George stuff, so you you you love it instantly? So, uh,
Speaker 1: I know that you did stints with You're Diana Ross period?
Speaker 1: Was that in the seventies or yes, it was in
Speaker 1: the seven early seventies. Do you know if that are
Speaker 1: you part of the I know that she had two
Speaker 1: live albums out in the seventies. One was Ah, there
Speaker 1: was one in the seventies seven, which I know. There's
Speaker 1: multiple percussionists when you're doing these shows. Are you the
Speaker 1: loan percussionists on a majority of these shows? Are you
Speaker 1: sharing with Yeah? Most you and your brother in a
Speaker 1: package or no? U those showed well with Diana Ross,
Speaker 1: that's a different story. I didn't even make the record
Speaker 1: because I quit after the second gig. Okay, I was
Speaker 1: gonna say, client wise, pre pre your your solo career.
Speaker 1: Who who was a client that it was easy to
Speaker 1: work with? I mean, I don't mean the complexity of
Speaker 1: the music, but just a comfortable environment that you enjoyed,
Speaker 1: that you like the music versus high end Yeah, versus
Speaker 1: high end. Uh. You know, politics of of either a
Speaker 1: band a band leader not being cordial or being hard
Speaker 1: on you or whatever, or just because a lot of times,
Speaker 1: you know, I know that with the artists, like even
Speaker 1: if the artist is is wrong, they're right. Yeah. Wait,
Speaker 1: that's s throwing me off, That's not the one and
Speaker 1: you know, blaming you easy to point you out. So well,
Speaker 1: that was dying to Ross. That's why I quit. Um.
Speaker 1: She came to play Circle Star Theater, which was one
Speaker 1: of the the dopest places to playing in San Francisco
Speaker 1: at the time, and everyone played there. Shaka Rufus played there.
Speaker 1: I mean everyone, Oh, Jayson didn't matter. So all the
Speaker 1: artists would come and play that play. So they hired
Speaker 1: me to play. And it's in the round, so it
Speaker 1: turns in. The stage turns throughout the show, so half
Speaker 1: of the stage was pit for the orchestra. And then
Speaker 1: she's on top of the main floor and so you know,
Speaker 1: I told everyone in the Bay areas, shoot, I'm playing
Speaker 1: with Diana Ross, and all my people came. Well, she
Speaker 1: didn't like people screaming at me. You can get a
Speaker 1: one off, like, okay, I won't do it a second time. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it was you know, I mean, and they announced the
Speaker 1: people in the band and everything and then uh, but
Speaker 1: you know, she was very angry, and so then she said, well,
Speaker 1: I'm getting too much What she didn't tell me that.
Speaker 1: She told the musical director she's getting too much attention.
Speaker 1: She needs to cover up from her neck all the
Speaker 1: way down. But but they told me to wear black.
Speaker 1: I mean, I just I had like a sleeveless blouse
Speaker 1: on its black. Everyone should wear black. And I was like, okay.
Speaker 1: He said, well, she wants you to cover up your arms.
Speaker 1: I said I can't because I'm playing and you know,
Speaker 1: like this is gonna get in a way that pretty face.
Speaker 1: I didn't say that. It's okay. Oh yeah, so only
Speaker 1: two shows. Yeah, um, I played the one night and
Speaker 1: U then this, he said, um ms Ross wants to
Speaker 1: talk to you and um for tomorrow's show, but she
Speaker 1: wants you to cover up. And I was like, well,
Speaker 1: you hired me form my musicianship, right, and he said yeah.
Speaker 1: I said, well I'm doing what you need to do,
Speaker 1: right he said yeah. I said I can't play with
Speaker 1: the sleep It's gonna be too hard. He said, okay,
Speaker 1: Well she would like to speak with you. Okay. So
Speaker 1: I stood out the side of stood at the door
Speaker 1: of her dressing room and she could see me in
Speaker 1: the mirror. She was just staring at me, but she
Speaker 1: was talking to her friend. Yeah. Uh huh, So I'm
Speaker 1: standing and she's just talking. I'm standing. She could she
Speaker 1: could see me and five minutes, ten fifteen, then twenty,
Speaker 1: then almost going on thirty, and I said, oh, I'm leaving.
Speaker 1: So I turned around and her friends saw her, because
Speaker 1: Diana kind of you know, looked to the side, and
Speaker 1: her friend turned around. She said, oh my god, you
Speaker 1: were amazing. I loved you. You were so amazing and
Speaker 1: and and oh yeah that's a percussionist, blah blah. So
Speaker 1: I walked out of the room and the guy said, well,
Speaker 1: you know, I just want to make sure when you
Speaker 1: come tomorrow that you're gonna be covered. I said, no,
Speaker 1: that's not gonna happen because I quit. He's like, not,
Speaker 1: we in the two shows that night. So there was
Speaker 1: the two shows, but the next night I didn't even show.
Speaker 1: I said, no, I'm not coming. He goes, no, no, no,
Speaker 1: wait what you're quitting and said that, oh absolutely. I
Speaker 1: said that's just wrong. I know what she's doing and
Speaker 1: she and then I got really angry. She made me
Speaker 1: wait there in the dressing room right that she looked
Speaker 1: at me and purposely and like dog me and like hit.
Speaker 1: So you weren't afraid of no, no, no, not commit
Speaker 1: you for that, But at that time in your early career,
Speaker 1: you weren't afraid of burn a bridge. No, she was wrong. Hey,
Speaker 1: so that makes the we Are the World sessions super
Speaker 1: in between. Wait, what's the time between we Are the World?
Speaker 1: That's a lot offerent. And it was different. There was
Speaker 1: never a breakup after the makeups to breakups. No, it
Speaker 1: was I was she left Covido when I played with her,
Speaker 1: and then I was talons, you my favorite league. But
Speaker 1: did she know it was? Yes? And I bet you
Speaker 1: were playing with sleeves about it, like I speared some
Speaker 1: of them southed it with some sleeves. It was some sleeves, Sheila. No,
Speaker 1: it was all good after that. I laughed. We kind
Speaker 1: of we didn't say that, but we let it like
Speaker 1: you comes it over here, you know, Hey, it's all good. Okay,
Speaker 1: that's my girl. I loved me some Diana Ross. So
Speaker 1: I gotta know. I know that you were on the
Speaker 1: mid like Midnight Love Tour, okay, just to make sure. Okay,
Speaker 1: So the the eight um the documentary, No no, no,
Speaker 1: the eight uh Mancho Jazz Festival. That is not Chila playing, uh,
Speaker 1: but I thought it was he has a no, no no,
Speaker 1: this I'm talking to Marvin Yaane now man I'm sorry
Speaker 1: you never seen it. Okay, I thought this whole time,
Speaker 1: I thought it was you, and I looked this morning,
Speaker 1: I'm like, that's not Sheila. When did you? When did you?
Speaker 1: You've only joined for the Men Like Night Love Tour two,
Speaker 1: the very his very last tour I saw. It's not
Speaker 1: much footage is online, but I know of a promoter
Speaker 1: that had a really good Uh at least there was
Speaker 1: a radio City of Music Hall show that he did,
Speaker 1: and it's it's there, and I'll say that all the
Speaker 1: Marvin shows that I saw it was a little weird.
Speaker 1: I don't know if it's based on the the newer
Speaker 1: material or whatever, but I mean there's a point where
Speaker 1: like even when he does sexual healing, like he does
Speaker 1: a striptease thing down to his underwear and he just
Speaker 1: for this particular performance, he he didn't look comfortable. And
Speaker 1: then when the promoter told me like, yeah, this is
Speaker 1: like one of his I think he's like, yeah, there's
Speaker 1: like his his he would only have eleven more performances
Speaker 1: left in there's like his last ten performances of his life.
Speaker 1: What was it you did the whole duration of that tour? Yeah,
Speaker 1: the whole tour and my brother and one of our friends.
Speaker 1: So there was three of us playing percussion, three of you,
Speaker 1: and we had duplicates of each, uh, three pairs of
Speaker 1: Timbali's three pair of congress through a pair of bongles chimes. Yeah,
Speaker 1: what what what was it like to to do that tour?
Speaker 1: Just know what you know of what happened to his
Speaker 1: life and stuff, and I mean not get personal in
Speaker 1: his life, but what what was it like? Because even
Speaker 1: when I watched it, it just it's weird because I
Speaker 1: thought we started at Radio City. That was the first gig,
Speaker 1: wasn't it. Well maybe I don't know when he does,
Speaker 1: but he said like this, this is the last eleven
Speaker 1: and something. Maybe it was eleven months or whatever, but
Speaker 1: I know that because that was his last tour. I
Speaker 1: definitely know that it was the last tour, definitely, because
Speaker 1: after we got home was when he passed away. He
Speaker 1: started in New York. I think we started a radio sitty.
Speaker 1: It's crazy. I could swear no, No, I mean, I
Speaker 1: don't know he could. But I'm just saying that usually
Speaker 1: like agents like to start you off in Kansas or
Speaker 1: somewhere where you can. I don't know, And maybe we
Speaker 1: did I just remember because some stuff went down at
Speaker 1: that gig, so um, yeah, it was pretty interesting. Um
Speaker 1: he was amazing. I mean it was weird. I mean,
Speaker 1: of course the women loved, you know, him dropping his
Speaker 1: pants into some boxers with some designs on it. Um.
Speaker 1: But man, there were times when he was singing. I
Speaker 1: almost missed my cute because I was a fan going,
Speaker 1: oh my god, look at him. I mean I was tripping.
Speaker 1: He's at the piano, like really when he got into it,
Speaker 1: he got his rhythm going as far as knowing what
Speaker 1: songs were coming up, and it was amazing. He just
Speaker 1: blew us away. She How often did those moments happen?
Speaker 1: And that's that's interesting? Did you get this because you
Speaker 1: worked with like so many great people exactly? Now, this
Speaker 1: was at the kind of at the very beginning because
Speaker 1: it you know, I mean I grew up listening to
Speaker 1: Marvin Gaye and all of a sudden, I'm in the
Speaker 1: band and that was one of the dopest congo drumbeats
Speaker 1: everyone wanted to play. Dodd got could do that the
Speaker 1: mother right, So playing that congo be just like I'm
Speaker 1: playing it with Marvin Gaye. Like this story, I don't
Speaker 1: know if I told you this before, But the story
Speaker 1: when we were in rehearsals, like my brother didn't have
Speaker 1: the gig, Peter Michael. So I'm playing UM and I
Speaker 1: kept telling him come to rehearsal, um, you know, I
Speaker 1: think I can get you the gig. So he kept
Speaker 1: showing up. So Marvin thought he was in the band
Speaker 1: for real, like during rehearsals, no one. He didn't even
Speaker 1: know UM. And so he's playing thinking that there's three
Speaker 1: of us playing. So I'm playing at We're all playing
Speaker 1: at rehearsal, and everyone's kind of just sitting down playing,
Speaker 1: you know, chilling. So the three of us we start
Speaker 1: doing like the Michael Jackson, the Jackson five dance. We started,
Speaker 1: oh yeah, the two steps. We started doing that, and
Speaker 1: we start getting into it. So then the hard players
Speaker 1: look like, oh, we can dance too, so they started
Speaker 1: throwing down. Then the singers are like, well, we can
Speaker 1: do something. So all of a sudden, that's how everyone
Speaker 1: just started dancing, because we started dancing first, and especially
Speaker 1: playing what's going on? I mean, you can't help but
Speaker 1: not dance. So I'm playing that beat and it's really
Speaker 1: it only consists of that boom boom fid dum dudoom
Speaker 1: got well it got good to me and I hit
Speaker 1: that low jump. I went dum dumack d got dune.
Speaker 1: You know I hit that low jump. He's a very
Speaker 1: soft spoken man. How are you telling she like? He
Speaker 1: whispers when he talks. His back was to us. He's
Speaker 1: singing that song. I hit that extra drum beat. There
Speaker 1: were twenty four at least six people in the band.
Speaker 1: He put his hand up and yelled with his back
Speaker 1: to us and like, hold on stop. And it was
Speaker 1: a trip because I don't think anyone had hurt him,
Speaker 1: yell like yeah, and all you hear is, you know,
Speaker 1: he sticks falling and you know, like what the heck
Speaker 1: does happen? And it's like, you know, right? And then
Speaker 1: he turned around and he's and he has his mic
Speaker 1: in his hand. He said, somebody played an extra beat.
Speaker 1: And I'm like, oh my, you could hear my heart pounded.
Speaker 1: I was so scared. I was like, my heart is
Speaker 1: gonna pop out of my chest. I'm frightened. And all
Speaker 1: I could think it was to blame it on Peter Michael.
Speaker 1: So so I just went like this. I was like,
Speaker 1: I better say something before no one said okay, uh sorry,
Speaker 1: Mr Gay. Um, that was my brother Peter Michael. So, yeah,
Speaker 1: I had raised my hand, excuse me, I'm sorry. I'll
Speaker 1: make sure that he doesn't do that again. And then
Speaker 1: Peter Michael put his hand in and he goes, yeah,
Speaker 1: I'm sorry, I'm sorry. So he took it and he's
Speaker 1: like okay. So at the end of all of this, um,
Speaker 1: Peter Michaels rehearsing with us for a couple of weeks
Speaker 1: or whatever. We get ready to leave and Peter Michaels
Speaker 1: walking to go home and he says, I'm gonna drive
Speaker 1: back to because we're rehearsing here in l A. I'll
Speaker 1: drive back to Oakland and the road. Magic Wilber says, hey, man,
Speaker 1: go get your suit, your tuxedo, get fitted for your tuxedo.
Speaker 1: And he's like for what. He goes, you're going on
Speaker 1: to He goes, I know I'm not in the band,
Speaker 1: and then he said yes you are. He said, yes
Speaker 1: you are, and Marvin said, uh, yeah, you go get
Speaker 1: your suit, and he didn't know that Peter Michael wasn't
Speaker 1: in a band. He's like, make sure you get your
Speaker 1: suit and you look nice. And so he got hired
Speaker 1: as he was leaving, because Marvin thought he was in
Speaker 1: the band the whole time. And who's do you know
Speaker 1: who the d was at the time. It was his
Speaker 1: cousin nephew. What was his name? If you told me
Speaker 1: his name, might say, okay, yeah, he wasn't. Like wait
Speaker 1: a minute, nobody said in the first place that many musicians. Okay,
Speaker 1: you brought up. You brought up a point. Even when
Speaker 1: you said with an Azteca, you mentioned at least seventeen
Speaker 1: nineteen people, Um, how did y'all get paid? We did?
Speaker 1: We got paid well. I mean Azteca was opening for
Speaker 1: Earth Winning Fire and Stevie and Temptations, so they were
Speaker 1: making money. Um, and that back in that day, Um,
Speaker 1: you know they were getting paid, so you could, you
Speaker 1: could still make a good living actually as a as
Speaker 1: a side person. And at no point during this part
Speaker 1: of your journey are you thinking, Hey, I gotta be
Speaker 1: out on the front, I gotta be my own artist,
Speaker 1: and I gotta you were just fine with being a
Speaker 1: team member, and absolutely I love being a team member.
Speaker 1: And and the crazy thing about it, even being a
Speaker 1: team member with Marvin, he would still say she want
Speaker 1: you to go take a solo. I'm like, okay, So
Speaker 1: he'd go change and then the three of us would
Speaker 1: do this dump thing that we made up, and I
Speaker 1: take a TIMBALI solo, We throw the sticks up and
Speaker 1: do this whole thing until he come back in a
Speaker 1: new outfit. Okay. And I'm always going to refer to
Speaker 1: the solo because it's very important. When you bounced the
Speaker 1: stick on the floor, you throw up in the air
Speaker 1: and you turn around do the pure wet and you
Speaker 1: catch it behind your back. Has it ever dropped? And
Speaker 1: I still, yes, it has dropped. But here's the thing.
Speaker 1: Is when I was you play it off well or something,
Speaker 1: I like, what I know? I don't see. Here's the thing.
Speaker 1: I'm gonna give away some of my secrets. Please thank
Speaker 1: you the ball. Yeah. So here's the thing. It's I
Speaker 1: when I realized every time I wanted to make sure,
Speaker 1: it's like she you know, you can't freak out. I
Speaker 1: don't want to drop the stick. And I was like,
Speaker 1: you know, I don't want to drop the stay every
Speaker 1: time I throw it up, so um, most of the
Speaker 1: time I caught it. Once in a while, like missing
Speaker 1: you hear the audience go, ah, well, you're playing in
Speaker 1: front of twenty thou people and I threw the stick
Speaker 1: up one time and I missed him, like shoot, you know,
Speaker 1: and you hear ah, And then I threw it up again.
Speaker 1: I said, I'm catching sec. When I missed it, I
Speaker 1: was like, seriously, But the all got louder. Oh. And
Speaker 1: then the third one they're like, oh, she look come on,
Speaker 1: and then I looked all they want me to win.
Speaker 1: So the fourth one, I picked it up, and I mean,
Speaker 1: I threw it up and I caught it, and they're like,
Speaker 1: the roar was louder than the first roar because they
Speaker 1: wanted to be with me and cheer me on. I
Speaker 1: was like, I get it. I get it. See, you're
Speaker 1: making me feel bad for not taking more risks. I
Speaker 1: did that once once. Once I did so, and I
Speaker 1: was watching you did the thing when you bounced the
Speaker 1: stick off the floor or whatever, and the ship hit
Speaker 1: me in the face. Never again that that hurts. And
Speaker 1: this happened before. I used to try it in band
Speaker 1: class in school and you just stay on the floor
Speaker 1: like I never knew how you science to the bat.
Speaker 1: Between watching her and Jerome Bent and do it, Yeah,
Speaker 1: I wanted to know how to do it. With ease
Speaker 1: and they bounce off the floor spin like it was nothing. Uh. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I practiced that thing for at least thirty seven minutes
Speaker 1: back backstage. I was then, because backstage is marble floors,
Speaker 1: your drum sets on a rug. Somebod didn't think about
Speaker 1: your own move, that Sheila move. Alright, So I know
Speaker 1: that you moved to line Richie right after marr. I
Speaker 1: was actually uh, touring with Marvin playing Chills at night
Speaker 1: and flying back to l A during the day to
Speaker 1: rehearse with Lionel for that next tour. Wow, did the
Speaker 1: line of the first line of album tour? Not? Uh? Technically, well,
Speaker 1: it's yeah, cancel because you're I forgot. You're in a
Speaker 1: Running with the Night video. She's the leading video. You're
Speaker 1: not here right now. I finally know something important. Wow, Yes,
Speaker 1: she is the lead and Running with the Night video.
Speaker 1: And so you did the cancel down tour. Yes, yes, cancel, Yeah, yes,
Speaker 1: she did. That's okay a throw and everything. I'm sorry.
Speaker 1: I'm just amazed that I knew something that wasn't here
Speaker 1: to steal my shine on my own show than you
Speaker 1: were you on the album too? I don't remember. I
Speaker 1: don't know if I came in before, yes, before I did.
Speaker 1: Speaking speaking of are you there or were you not there?
Speaker 1: Can you settle the debate of if you are or
Speaker 1: if you're not on? Don't stop to you get enough?
Speaker 1: Good question. I've heard that you confirmed that you are,
Speaker 1: and I heard you. I heard it was a rumor.
Speaker 1: I don't Is that a rumor? No, uh, that's not
Speaker 1: a rumor. No it is no, it's no, it's is
Speaker 1: it fake news? Okay, Look what happened was Quincy called
Speaker 1: me and said he wanted me to play something on
Speaker 1: this song that Michael had written with some kind of
Speaker 1: he didn't know what percussion thing was going to be. Um,
Speaker 1: so I forgot. I don't know. I want to say
Speaker 1: it's Westlake. I can't remember this to he was in
Speaker 1: l A Westlake. Yeah, I think it's Westlake. So I
Speaker 1: go there and I'm one known for not using normal percussionists.
Speaker 1: I makeup stuff. I use different things, spatula's hair brushes, um, chopsticks,
Speaker 1: you know, just whatever bite of an apple up they
Speaker 1: put on the snare. I'm telling my secrets. Um yeah,
Speaker 1: uh huh. I know you're gonna rewind that one. Yeah yeah,
Speaker 1: But so I go in the studio and it's like
Speaker 1: trying to figure out, Okay, what what works here? What
Speaker 1: he's what? They're trying to tell me he need he
Speaker 1: needs something. So I took water bottles and what real bottles,
Speaker 1: not plastic? We didn't happen, but water bottle and I
Speaker 1: tuned it to the song and I used my that
Speaker 1: that metal piece for the triangle that I played the
Speaker 1: triangle with, I used that for the sides and went
Speaker 1: to Gang D Gang. So I tuned it to the
Speaker 1: to the song and that's it. But whatso So what
Speaker 1: happened was they kept changing Who's gonna play on? What?
Speaker 1: You know? They that thing went on forever, trying to
Speaker 1: get it done, and they forgot I played on it,
Speaker 1: and they're like, no, I think it was Paulino, and
Speaker 1: maybe it was what what you're not? You're not the
Speaker 1: first person to get gagged on this, right? I was
Speaker 1: just gonna say feeling games too. So I'm waiting for
Speaker 1: the record to come out, and the record comes, I
Speaker 1: was telling me what I played on Michael's first record,
Speaker 1: blah blah blah blah. So I go to Leopolse in
Speaker 1: Berkeley and and Michael's doing a signing. So he says,
Speaker 1: I'm gonna be there at leopold I want you guys come. Okay.
Speaker 1: We go to Leopoles. We meet him there and I
Speaker 1: get the record and I was like, my name is
Speaker 1: not on the record. He's like, huh, my name is
Speaker 1: not on the record, man, So I just have to
Speaker 1: tell the story. Damn Michael, who did the credits for that?
Speaker 1: I did because I always forget people. That's funny because
Speaker 1: he did it in store at Leopold's. Because I believe
Speaker 1: there's there's footage of him the same day that he
Speaker 1: did that in store at Leopold's. There's footage of him
Speaker 1: visiting in Oakland club that very night and the DJ
Speaker 1: plays don't stop, t get enough, and he gets on
Speaker 1: and like he grabs the microphone and dances a little
Speaker 1: bit in front of it, like it's it's that night
Speaker 1: in Oakland that that same that same period. Wait a minute,
Speaker 1: he let you guys know, I know this is weird
Speaker 1: because you played with everyone, but I'm kind of freaked
Speaker 1: out that, like you were even on speaking terms with
Speaker 1: Michael Jackson. It was just me, but I thought it
Speaker 1: was maybe that's like there's something to people because that's
Speaker 1: kind of un comma. Wait, so did y'all talk about
Speaker 1: each other? And did he say did he? And did
Speaker 1: he asked you? What he and why are you talking
Speaker 1: to him? And when he wasn't he wasn't Michael Jackson,
Speaker 1: I mean, was Michael Jackson he was still Michael Jackson.
Speaker 1: But yeah, but I met them when they were I
Speaker 1: met them with George Duke in the seventies, so I
Speaker 1: met the whole family when they were playing in Europe,
Speaker 1: so they were still approachable. Yes, okay, absolutely, And they
Speaker 1: wanted me to teach Randy how to play percussion. So
Speaker 1: I went to the house to try and and then
Speaker 1: the parents were like, we don't want no Mexican. No,
Speaker 1: I'm just kidding, but I'll let it go. But I
Speaker 1: don't been the kidding, just kidding. I really know they
Speaker 1: wanted me to come and, uh, you know, teach them
Speaker 1: how to play. So, yeah, can you teach the one
Speaker 1: how to play? Because people asked me all the time, no, yes,
Speaker 1: I say, I say yes, man, I've seen every one
Speaker 1: of their mom asked me, and the most I'll do,
Speaker 1: I'll do a play. I do not know how to
Speaker 1: or I don't know if I have the patients do.
Speaker 1: But there's another secret. What's the last time you gave
Speaker 1: a lesson? She look, can you teach something how to play? Okay, yeah,
Speaker 1: I've done some. I don't mean like when you're going
Speaker 1: to a school and whatever. You're like, okay, you hold
Speaker 1: the sticks and it's like, I mean, like a real okay.
Speaker 1: I'll be there at four o'clock and then I sit
Speaker 1: down and you're the Randy Jackson paid only need to death.
Speaker 1: And I don't know any paradis, so I don't um. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I don't know a lot of that stuff. Anyway, you know.
Speaker 1: I I taught um like people at some of the
Speaker 1: women conferences and stuff, and we talked about my book
Speaker 1: or whatever. Then I'll say, but I can also teach
Speaker 1: you how to play drums. Very simple. It's really simple.
Speaker 1: And everyone's going no, no, no, I want to play,
Speaker 1: and I don't know how to play like so I
Speaker 1: have a drum set in the room for these conferences,
Speaker 1: and all I do is this is this is the
Speaker 1: trick right here. And because it's mind over matter, you
Speaker 1: can sit down. You're going my feet and my hands
Speaker 1: are gonna How am I gonna separate my brain to
Speaker 1: do well. If you're walking, you're walking opposite like this,
Speaker 1: your your your hand and your feet are walking opposite
Speaker 1: of each other. So if you walk like that on
Speaker 1: the drums, high hat kick, high hat kick, I can
Speaker 1: do like this and every if you just walk on
Speaker 1: the drums, immediately everyone plays done, got done, got dune.
Speaker 1: Got it happens in three seconds. I'm going through some
Speaker 1: emotional things in the corner because my dad is a drummer,
Speaker 1: and for all my first teen years of my life,
Speaker 1: I wanted to be a drummer and he just never
Speaker 1: taught me. And I had to look at you on TV,
Speaker 1: and then I had to look at our two, look
Speaker 1: at Terry, and now that was He could have at
Speaker 1: least just shown me that you know the way to
Speaker 1: hold the sticks and it's still hard. Yeah, we've known
Speaker 1: each other. You ain't teaching what you say. He did
Speaker 1: you hear what he said? He don't teach you never asked. Yeah,
Speaker 1: at least give me the honor to reject you. You
Speaker 1: teach me how to play the drums. But I just
Speaker 1: had an epiphany and I'm dead serious. You are going
Speaker 1: to be my percussion teacher. Okay. I do not feel
Speaker 1: like I'm a complete drummer until all right, so you
Speaker 1: take your bottle of water. We're here. You get your
Speaker 1: bottle of water. Build water. You just build a sum
Speaker 1: about the wizard. Wait, not all you grabbing bottles. I'm thirsty.
Speaker 1: I'm not thirsty, but I gotta get rid of this.
Speaker 1: I don't want to destroy let your lady studios right now,
Speaker 1: but you have to drink some of it because it's
Speaker 1: too full to make a sound. There you go. You're
Speaker 1: not supposed to do that. This is gonna be the
Speaker 1: next route I've watched, watched you. For those who are
Speaker 1: listening at home, they're breathing, or they're do we say breathing.
Speaker 1: This is a vast water commercial right now is based
Speaker 1: on using bottles of water. But she didn't do that.
Speaker 1: But she didn't. You encourage me, woman, you're doing good.
Speaker 1: I just mean that this is failing away from the mic.
Speaker 1: First of all, it away from the mic. Yeah, because
Speaker 1: it's why I can't whistle in the mic when i'm yeah,
Speaker 1: because you're gonna hear nothing but error. You're right, No, no, no, no,
Speaker 1: you do it like the shut up, get away from
Speaker 1: the mic. They're just mad at you. You just this
Speaker 1: is pressure. It's not we're not looking go ahead. You
Speaker 1: said you're liking when other people looking at No, don't
Speaker 1: make a sound first, just make a sound with the bottle.
Speaker 1: Did Yeah you did? Bill? Okay, you want there you
Speaker 1: stop trying to do headhunters and just can we please
Speaker 1: no we have you have to hit a different note
Speaker 1: than the note in the bottom. There you go, There
Speaker 1: you go like some fair and tight there you go. Yes,
Speaker 1: I am now that we've edited half of that out.
Speaker 1: I'm kidding. I'm kidding. It's okay, thank you. Yeah, I
Speaker 1: do feel that's your first lesson how to get high.
Speaker 1: That's interest in Sheilia, because you talked like a mere
Speaker 1: already talked about carpal tunnel and stuff, and you seem
Speaker 1: to have very healthy hands and wrists. Talked me about
Speaker 1: the rice trick. I did that. She told me to
Speaker 1: go to trade of Joe's or to a place that
Speaker 1: has like just one of the big gas industrial size
Speaker 1: rice bags. Uh put it in my freezer and then
Speaker 1: put my entire arm in it, and uh, exercise, exercise, mold,
Speaker 1: do you warm it before you I do a little bit. Now.
Speaker 1: Fifteen minutes, just just back and forth with the sticks
Speaker 1: on a pillow or couture chair something and that helps. Yes,
Speaker 1: absolutely see. I thought, in tune with with our James
Speaker 1: and too many Miles Davis stories that that would kind
Speaker 1: of be like eating before you get to the restaurant.
Speaker 1: Or well, I learned the hard way, like maybe you have.
Speaker 1: I mean I never warmed up before I played. So
Speaker 1: I've got injury after injury and it's like, okay, you
Speaker 1: need to stop and you need to warm up. So yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean, my my wrist was messed up. I couldn't
Speaker 1: pick up a toothbrush and brush my teeth, my elbow.
Speaker 1: So I had a PRP done. Which does that work? Look,
Speaker 1: I'm doing a p RP in like a month? Does
Speaker 1: it work? I'll tell you who? Wait, who's well? We
Speaker 1: can talk out. I'll give you my yeah. But I'll
Speaker 1: tell you no, I have the dopest doctor here. He
Speaker 1: moved here New York. Yes, he did. Mind and everybody
Speaker 1: I think, So, what's his name? You know what? I think?
Speaker 1: We see this? We see okay, uh, there there's a
Speaker 1: doctor in Brooklyn. I see your photos up in there
Speaker 1: Stevie Wonders photo. Like then it would be him. He's
Speaker 1: amazing African. Is he African? Is he's not African. I
Speaker 1: think he's like the opposite. The look like it's Caucasian.
Speaker 1: I mean, this is a doctor's office, so many doctors
Speaker 1: are but um PRP is I guess in a way
Speaker 1: to describe it is when um they take your blood
Speaker 1: out of you and then feed it back like they
Speaker 1: have to spend it first again. No, no, they spin
Speaker 1: it and clean it and then they get the good
Speaker 1: blood as it spits out in like three or four,
Speaker 1: four or five different bags automatically in this machine. And
Speaker 1: then they take the good blood and then they mix
Speaker 1: it and they shoot it back in the area and
Speaker 1: you end up growing new tissue. That's what it does.
Speaker 1: So I grew new tissue in my elbow and my wrist.
Speaker 1: I did have it twice, because sometimes you do. I
Speaker 1: just want to tell you take a pain pill before
Speaker 1: you do this, because I'm I'm no, I'm not scared,
Speaker 1: and I'm not scaring. That's fine, I am okay, that's
Speaker 1: the simple part. No, the pain is that your blood
Speaker 1: going back into that area is it hurts. Like I
Speaker 1: can't even explain. I filmed my whole thing. I haven't
Speaker 1: all the film yet. You can't. Well, I only know
Speaker 1: about it because at the tonight show, Um, allot of
Speaker 1: those camera guys there that a lot, so at least
Speaker 1: four or five of them have gotten But how are
Speaker 1: you going to do this when you need at least
Speaker 1: three weeks off? That's I'm waiting for Christmas? Yeah, Christmas
Speaker 1: break to do it and you literally you can't do it.
Speaker 1: Where are you having it done where I'm doing it
Speaker 1: in or no? No? No, I mean is it your risk?
Speaker 1: I'm doing it on my knee. Oh yeah, that's good.
Speaker 1: My mom had it done on the need to same
Speaker 1: for our same guys talking and everything. But it's important
Speaker 1: because really, in order to sustain what we do for real,
Speaker 1: we get I have. I had a torn uh in
Speaker 1: my shoulder all this stuff. My back went out in
Speaker 1: from wearing heels. I wanted you to talk wearing heels
Speaker 1: and it's shortened my calf muscle wearing heels playing for
Speaker 1: years and years and years, my back gave out. Uh.
Speaker 1: And when it gave out, I was partially paralyzed for
Speaker 1: like two months, sorry, two weeks. And it took four
Speaker 1: months and three doctors, three or four doctors to get
Speaker 1: me to walk an entire block, like I had to start,
Speaker 1: learned how to walk all of I had. I had
Speaker 1: a cane. I was in pain, pain, pain, and I
Speaker 1: didn't want to take out. You were a trailblazer in
Speaker 1: pain because there was nobody else that you could probably
Speaker 1: vibe with because nobody else is wearing heels, goes and eggs. Actly. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that's what I was freaking out on some women's Yeah. No,
Speaker 1: it messed me up. Yeah, right, but he didn't. His
Speaker 1: surgery was after yours, right like you had George before
Speaker 1: he did. Well, I didn't have surgery. You didn't know.
Speaker 1: They wanted me to have surgery in my back and
Speaker 1: I said, no, I think let me try to walk
Speaker 1: on and do this health wise, you know, by myself
Speaker 1: and with the doctors, and and it worked. Yeah. So
Speaker 1: it took a long time now with those, I'm sorry.
Speaker 1: I started with Line and then we got off. I
Speaker 1: don't know what happened. Information were were those? Was that
Speaker 1: a good tour for you or did you Marvin? No? No?
Speaker 1: After after? Was it night and day? Or I mean,
Speaker 1: was it a good tour with Line? Oh? Amazing? For me?
Speaker 1: It was the first time, uh, realizing when someone makes
Speaker 1: that much money, what that really means? And so then
Speaker 1: you start touring on a private plane, hot cookies when
Speaker 1: you get on the plane, blankets, dranks, chicken, and you
Speaker 1: were worried. I was worried. I wasn't gonna. I was
Speaker 1: scared to eat chicken in front of you. I didn't
Speaker 1: first impressions. By the way, can I get adding this
Speaker 1: this this video with the line Ritchie video? Just a
Speaker 1: quick question question left Supreme Michael Peters who grandfather? Yeah,
Speaker 1: Michael Peters, Yeah, I was going to say how long
Speaker 1: did it take for you guys? Told the story about
Speaker 1: Disneyland and used taking to disney Land the rapper prodigy
Speaker 1: from Mob Deep, that's his grandfather. He was this year. No, Yeah,
Speaker 1: I was gonna say how long did it take for
Speaker 1: you guys to I mean, were you throwing off about
Speaker 1: being the lead lady or I didn't want to do
Speaker 1: it because Line is like my brother and he and
Speaker 1: he says okay, and Michael Peters not there, like okay,
Speaker 1: Sheley have to learn this dance step and I'm like, okay,
Speaker 1: what are we gonna do? And the dance steps that
Speaker 1: Michael Peter, I'm like, who does that? Like yeah, Like
Speaker 1: how am I going to extend the arm with the
Speaker 1: leg and then look at Line like we're in love?
Speaker 1: That's my brother. Like so we kept laughing in between takes.
Speaker 1: We couldn't even get it together. And Line was like,
Speaker 1: don't look at me like that, like it's your fault.
Speaker 1: Don't look at me like that video. Yes he did,
Speaker 1: Yes he did. It was dope. You must have been
Speaker 1: in the All Night Long video too. They were like five,
Speaker 1: we all look alike and that I'm gonna mess with you.
Speaker 1: You know. Actually I thought initially I thought who was
Speaker 1: the leading Hello videos? She was all my children? Oh yeah,
Speaker 1: I forgot a name that wasn't the same Chip from Thriller.
Speaker 1: I thought that was oh no, no, no, okay, why
Speaker 1: don't I know this? Her name is Laura Carrington. Why
Speaker 1: do you know that? Because because those names, they were
Speaker 1: the original video joints. You know what I'm saying. Uh No,
Speaker 1: But I thought when I saw the Running with the
Speaker 1: Night video, I was like, yeah, she grew hair out
Speaker 1: a lot, like I thought it was a continuation like
Speaker 1: they were dating now off the college campus and now
Speaker 1: she got her sight back? What right? Exactly exactly? But
Speaker 1: that album, that album was very Latin leaning. Yeah, the
Speaker 1: Cancelo Down, Cancelo Down. There was some. There was a
Speaker 1: lot of percussion on the album. Yeah, there was some.
Speaker 1: I played percussion on one or two of Lionel's records,
Speaker 1: and I don't remember if it was that one or not,
Speaker 1: but which I do have to look and see um.
Speaker 1: But he did. He loved having percussion in the show.
Speaker 1: And the cool thing about Liono again that it was
Speaker 1: so different from the Marvin Gate tour but musically and
Speaker 1: then what they were doing, I mean they had, uh,
Speaker 1: all these people putting together the show. It's like a
Speaker 1: big major thing, you know, and you know, private planes
Speaker 1: and chicken chicken and uh, you know, you've got clothes
Speaker 1: made for you and everyone's you know, everything is coordinating.
Speaker 1: You're going, wow, this is yeah, it's the big times.
Speaker 1: My first time ever experienced in that. And I was like, oh,
Speaker 1: this is what it is. Okay, I think I want this, Yeah, Okay,
Speaker 1: I think I may roll with you for a while
Speaker 1: instead of this guy one cookie Okay, Okay, it was
Speaker 1: threw me under the bus, so sorry being his name,
Speaker 1: his name is Sugar, all right, so Steve, basically we're
Speaker 1: here an electric lady student because a good story to tell.
Speaker 1: This is where, you know, and I'm trying to make
Speaker 1: it distinct and fast. Um, watch watch watch Okay, Uh
Speaker 1: are wasted twelve minutes right there? Okay, So we're in
Speaker 1: an Electric Lady studios because for five years, this is
Speaker 1: where we recorded D'angelo's Voodoo, which Steve was one of
Speaker 1: the intellect Yeah, trust me, we spent a lifetime with de' angelo.
Speaker 1: So um after the Voodoo record, and I guess you
Speaker 1: know you started, Yeah, you worked on Black Beside, which
Speaker 1: took fourteen years to make. Um. But by that point,
Speaker 1: you know, everything fell off the rails. And he became
Speaker 1: my full time engineer. And I think Steve is probably
Speaker 1: the first white person in history or to have diabetes.
Speaker 1: He basically because of my soul food diet. It. Oh lord,
Speaker 1: I moved to Philly. He moved to Philly basically just
Speaker 1: eating every meal with him. Yeah, and I got diabetes.
Speaker 1: And there was a church. What was the name of
Speaker 1: the churchyer version of it? Yeah, it's the House of Diabetes. Definitely.
Speaker 1: Oh my goodness, do not feed your white person too much?
Speaker 1: Is that what happened to you? After midnight? Okay? So
Speaker 1: I know You're asked this a billion times, so I
Speaker 1: want to take a different approach. Can you tell me
Speaker 1: a random, normal print story, like a very normal story,
Speaker 1: like what is normal that time that our volkswagon broke
Speaker 1: down in the middle of the four oh five and
Speaker 1: we had to trip to the supermarket when he ran
Speaker 1: out of toilet paper. Let me get this sorry. Wow,
Speaker 1: So I'm pretty sure that the world have your fans
Speaker 1: know how you met Prince at backstage at his show
Speaker 1: in the seventies, the same place where I played with
Speaker 1: Diana Ross. Okay, the same theater, yes, the same show. Okay, wait,
Speaker 1: what was he doing going to see al Well? We
Speaker 1: were both at the Algebro show Great Theater in Oakland, Berkeley.
Speaker 1: I'm impressed. That's when we first saw pick at each
Speaker 1: other and went ding ding ding. So you were there
Speaker 1: to see you were there playing? We're both no, we
Speaker 1: were both there to see Aldro but I think I
Speaker 1: was playing with George then. But but we were both
Speaker 1: there watching Aldrow on stage, see okay from each other,
Speaker 1: and we locked eyes and it was over. Prince didn't
Speaker 1: strike me as a cat. That was like, yo, I
Speaker 1: gotta see Algebro. He loved he loved all that music.
Speaker 1: It's weird to me because at least from what I know, Like,
Speaker 1: I feel like if from people I know that you're
Speaker 1: either a total student or a total leader, and oftentimes
Speaker 1: leaders aren't too they're more a loof or not aware.
Speaker 1: I totally disagree. Let me tell you why you now,
Speaker 1: because you can be both and that's what makes it awesome.
Speaker 1: I'm going to continue to be a student lift life
Speaker 1: forever because I'm never gonna learn everything, and if every
Speaker 1: single day I learned something, so I'm always a student.
Speaker 1: Prince is the same way, and I'm a leader. Prince
Speaker 1: is the same way. He was a student. He wouldn't
Speaker 1: say it, but he's a student because every time we
Speaker 1: came in with something different, he's learning stuff he had
Speaker 1: never even heard before, you know. So, I mean he
Speaker 1: he became a student if he's in a situation with
Speaker 1: other people that he's not played with, or you know, um,
Speaker 1: we bring in music that he's never I mean when
Speaker 1: he first met my family's like, what kind of music
Speaker 1: is this? Latin jazz? Dang, this is dope. You know
Speaker 1: that's the first time you heard it? Okay, Yeah, So
Speaker 1: he was always a student in a way. I never
Speaker 1: had to really say it. But he was always learning,
Speaker 1: which is why he every time you you can tell
Speaker 1: if he was hanging with this group of people or
Speaker 1: that group of people, his music change the influence from
Speaker 1: being a student. I think he was always a student
Speaker 1: and he was also a leader. And I think you
Speaker 1: can do boom. That's my take on it. I never
Speaker 1: thought of that. Who can do both? It sounds like
Speaker 1: we all should be both. Yes, we we yes. All
Speaker 1: of people just checking Okay, I love alwe after roll
Speaker 1: really okay, yeah this love get a lave dad last ever? Yeah?
Speaker 1: Okay with Aldo? And then what happened that Steve so
Speaker 1: um in in meeting? How long did it take for
Speaker 1: him to really convince you that you should be your
Speaker 1: own artist? And for him to convince me? Oh? It
Speaker 1: was assuming that he was the one that told you
Speaker 1: you need to be your own artist. Um well, he
Speaker 1: wasn't the only one. But I had been writing a
Speaker 1: lot of my own music. Um when I was a teenager,
Speaker 1: and whatever money that I made at clubs or whatever,
Speaker 1: I would take that money and go buy a piece
Speaker 1: of gear. And I said, I'm gonna learn how to record.
Speaker 1: I'm gonna be an engineer. I'm gonna learn how to produce.
Speaker 1: I'm gonn learn how to write songs. So I started
Speaker 1: with a two track. Then I started with a poor track,
Speaker 1: you know, and you keep duplicating like then you hear
Speaker 1: more hissing and more, you know, TI to that point,
Speaker 1: what is what am I listening to? Um? So I
Speaker 1: kept buying gear and so I had tons of tapes
Speaker 1: of songs that I've written. Um. When I was with
Speaker 1: Marvin Gay, Prince um prince was I forgot what record
Speaker 1: he was doing? Then nine? Right? Yeah? Um so Uh
Speaker 1: during the Marvin Gay tour he was sending me flowers
Speaker 1: and then you know, coming to some of the shows, uh, Lionel,
Speaker 1: Richie and eighty three. Then he started coming hanging out.
Speaker 1: He's like, man, you're always backing everyone the same thing.
Speaker 1: You get a solo with everybody. Every time I see
Speaker 1: you're playing with you know, don't you want to do something?
Speaker 1: I said, yeah, I do, but I'm you know, when
Speaker 1: when the time is right. And so during me playing
Speaker 1: percussion with Line eight three. Then towards the end of
Speaker 1: Lionel's tour, he said, you want to do a record?
Speaker 1: I said sure, he said, okay, let's do When I said, okay,
Speaker 1: that was it, just like that, and we went into
Speaker 1: the studio and a week later we were finished with
Speaker 1: Glamorous Life record. Wow, you've recorded it in that in
Speaker 1: less than two weeks. You it's only like six songs.
Speaker 1: I get it. Well, yeah, but you also have to
Speaker 1: be focused. Um, we didn't. We didn't sleep again. Remember
Speaker 1: Prince was doing the song to day, So you've got
Speaker 1: six songs on the record. That's six days and we
Speaker 1: had two studios going at the same time, so we
Speaker 1: had sense it sound. Um. Yeah, I admire his especially
Speaker 1: in hearing that the output between two and eighty seven,
Speaker 1: his kind of bull's eye like ability to I mean,
Speaker 1: you know when you again, when I'm you're younger, you
Speaker 1: just think that, oh, this magically happens. But it's like
Speaker 1: the rareness of someone to write something effective. I mean,
Speaker 1: I gotta go through thirty songs before I think like
Speaker 1: one's half decent to use this is some women's just
Speaker 1: like well, he really believed that every single song, every
Speaker 1: single song that he wrote, he believed was a hit.
Speaker 1: What it wasn't, but he believed that, so he just
Speaker 1: kept writing, so it didn't stop him to go, well,
Speaker 1: this is not a great song, so you know, but
Speaker 1: again you're you're writing songs, and it just kept going
Speaker 1: in the archives. I mean, I think even if they
Speaker 1: weren't singles, I mean they were still correct, correct, just
Speaker 1: the ideas. And some of them weren't all great. I
Speaker 1: know some people are not gonna be having me saying it,
Speaker 1: but it's the truth. They weren't all great. Uh No,
Speaker 1: some of the ones him and I recorded, just him
Speaker 1: and I that are in the about that I don't
Speaker 1: really like. I'm sorry, I'm one friend. No, no, I'm
Speaker 1: just like one. She looked record. I wanted to get
Speaker 1: to that later though, Okay, no, but I mean he
Speaker 1: but that was so this is the incredible This man
Speaker 1: was an incredible songwriter, and he never wanted it. Sometimes
Speaker 1: he would, but like he never wanted to use the
Speaker 1: same sound all the time. He would just experiment. There
Speaker 1: were no rules. And that's the thing is musicians tend
Speaker 1: to we put ourselves in the box, you know, and say, well,
Speaker 1: we need to mike the drum set this way. No,
Speaker 1: we don't, we need to use this mike because I
Speaker 1: heard that this is the snare mike. Well, you really
Speaker 1: don't you know? Well, let me, I used the kick
Speaker 1: drum mike, and I'm gonna sing a lead vocal on
Speaker 1: it because it sounds different. You know. Go ahead, Can
Speaker 1: I ask uh for the Sunset sound sessions doing that tenure?
Speaker 1: Do you remember what brand the drums were there? If
Speaker 1: I could get the answer to that, my life would
Speaker 1: be super complete drum machine. No, no, no, no, I
Speaker 1: don't mean the Lynd drum. I'm talking about, you know,
Speaker 1: the occasional songs that you did cut that that had
Speaker 1: live drums on them. Everything I used there was Yamaha okay, alright,
Speaker 1: the maple custom maple okay, and pisty symbols right there,
Speaker 1: and pins stripe hands jump hands really yeah, pin stripes
Speaker 1: not coated white? Why did you put for a pin stripes?
Speaker 1: I mean didn't matter to you. Was it just like,
Speaker 1: oh it's there? Or was it like I changed I
Speaker 1: changed them out sometimes, but most of the time was
Speaker 1: because it had a funk thing, you know, with the
Speaker 1: pins stripe and then sometimes putting a pillow inside the
Speaker 1: kid jump and then putting a little bit of tape
Speaker 1: or something on the snare is just tight. Even on
Speaker 1: the snare. It never occurred to me once you use
Speaker 1: the pin stripes. Now do you remember how they mike
Speaker 1: the Lyne drum you were For those that are scratching
Speaker 1: your heads at home, you can't really mike. Actually that's
Speaker 1: not even fair to a lot of people. Put things
Speaker 1: like that through an amp. And then that's what I
Speaker 1: want to get to to get I know that the
Speaker 1: dryness of the lyndrum, the dryness of the lyndrum naked
Speaker 1: sounds very dry. How many do you know? What was
Speaker 1: the effects process of getting Yeah, just the the sound
Speaker 1: like those patches you got the closest. This is the closest,
Speaker 1: remember is just the please like what what? What reverb stuff?
Speaker 1: Did Prince huset like? That's the other engineers as well,
Speaker 1: and they told you, I mean for me, yes, Susan,
Speaker 1: you talk to you. You have to talk to Susan.
Speaker 1: I'm certain that she'll reveal it. But but you've got
Speaker 1: just for the sake of that sound being preserved. And
Speaker 1: here's the other thing with the drum, the lyndrum machine,
Speaker 1: because we have both of them, the big I call
Speaker 1: it the mothership, the big one, and then the smaller one.
Speaker 1: But we had um are the lyn drum machines modified,
Speaker 1: so we had A and B switches to do different
Speaker 1: stuff on the LI machines, which I still have. What
Speaker 1: customized modified? Uh huh? Do those have effects on them?
Speaker 1: Remember we got her must be in the Okay, so
Speaker 1: those claps, it's those those claps are dopey. Yeah, how
Speaker 1: did you build those claps? Slowly? SIPs water? Christ You
Speaker 1: know I'm a student, man, I'm just I'm just kidding.
Speaker 1: I'm kidding, waiting for let me off the hook. She'll
Speaker 1: tell you offline maybe, yeah, I'll tell you offline. Seriously. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that's cool. That's just the claps. That's the only thing
Speaker 1: I'll ask about. The drums. That is the key to yes,
Speaker 1: it is you want to give this secret out everybody.
Speaker 1: She's gonna tell you. Have you heard music? Yes, So
Speaker 1: she's gonna tell you claps right now on my show,
Speaker 1: I should hope. So, like those are very iconic, but
Speaker 1: louder than hell claps, they can be achieved. Okay, I'm
Speaker 1: gonna get this from another I'm gonna get this from
Speaker 1: another angle. So when you're doing this live, which I
Speaker 1: know this is a a a nightmare. At least two
Speaker 1: duplicate to to duplicate. How many drum machines are you
Speaker 1: guys taking on the it with you in case one
Speaker 1: breaks down or in case a buttons right now or
Speaker 1: before before. I'm talking pre pro tools free. Oh you guys,
Speaker 1: in my mind, we did um for real, we did.
Speaker 1: So what I did was I had a Yamaha drum
Speaker 1: set um. I had eight ten twelve fourteen sixt eighteen
Speaker 1: tom and I had to kick drums. I had a
Speaker 1: piccolo snare of fourteen inch, and then I had a
Speaker 1: eight ten twelve fourteen sixteen eighteen crashes with a couple
Speaker 1: of splashes, a sixteen and a fourteen inch paying and
Speaker 1: a twenty inch ride and a sixty in that real
Speaker 1: big one. I don't even know what size that thing is. Um.
Speaker 1: And with each which each time that I had, I
Speaker 1: put triggers in the in each tom, so which so
Speaker 1: that I could trigger any sound that I wanted, not
Speaker 1: just on the snare, but on all the tom's. Then
Speaker 1: I had switched is put on each tom that had
Speaker 1: a switch, and a B switch, so in case a
Speaker 1: trigger went out, I just click it and I'm not
Speaker 1: gonna lose anything. So I got my B plan. Always
Speaker 1: got to happen plan the way that triggers are sensitive
Speaker 1: and the way that monitors are Your monitors really can't
Speaker 1: be that loud or have that much vibration because it
Speaker 1: might offset the triggers. Correct, yes, and no we that
Speaker 1: we didn't have that problem. Would they modify that for me?
Speaker 1: And how loud were your monitors were using in ears
Speaker 1: or happens? Then we have monitors. I tried triggering once again,
Speaker 1: do something and then you give up too easy? Well, no,
Speaker 1: it's just a nightmare because you know at the time
Speaker 1: when I was using monitors before any ears, anytime I
Speaker 1: have my kick drum, it would set off the entire
Speaker 1: It was just a nightmare. And I know, like even
Speaker 1: with the way that Rob had those those lights going
Speaker 1: oh yeah, surely like if like you must be bulls
Speaker 1: eye and know to press, like what if you miss press? Uh? Right? No, no, no,
Speaker 1: I had I had triggers on each drum and then
Speaker 1: I had pads. Uh it might have been a roll
Speaker 1: and I don't know, it might have been yamaha, um.
Speaker 1: But I had modules in a rack. Then I had
Speaker 1: a different trigger on my snare and with the trigger
Speaker 1: there was an on, on and off switch for the
Speaker 1: handclaps that I triggered all my snare, those claps around
Speaker 1: my snare, so I triggered. There's an on and off
Speaker 1: switch with that. Then there's an on and off switch
Speaker 1: for the LEN machine and everything that I just told
Speaker 1: you that I built. That my text built, but this
Speaker 1: is what I needed to make this happen. We built
Speaker 1: a duplicate one just in case that one went down.
Speaker 1: So then I had another switch that would then switch
Speaker 1: all the programs. Every time I went to the next song.
Speaker 1: They weren't switching, I was switching it. So I had
Speaker 1: like temped was on the floor. One was off and
Speaker 1: on switch just for the snare to have handclaps or not.
Speaker 1: One was a switch to to change all the UM programs.
Speaker 1: One is to turn the entire Lend drum machine off.
Speaker 1: And then I've got two double pedals because they didn't
Speaker 1: make a double pedal then, so I had two separate
Speaker 1: pedals um that I had a high hat. Yeah, there
Speaker 1: were so many pedals down there, and that was it
Speaker 1: was like me playing in bas organ. Yeah, it was
Speaker 1: so assuming that everything was perfect. I mean, what's your
Speaker 1: panic level if something gives out like okay, it's time
Speaker 1: to do high thing and you press the button and
Speaker 1: it doesn't start, well, you would naturally play it on drums.
Speaker 1: I'm behind right. Well, that was the that was why
Speaker 1: we had to be planned. So if that machine didn't
Speaker 1: work or didn't trigger, they just automatically switched to the
Speaker 1: secondary entire rack of everything. For those that are listening
Speaker 1: right now, Um, this might be right now. I had
Speaker 1: a question follow I've already forgotten. Some people might not understand.
Speaker 1: I'm just saying that what she's described to me right now,
Speaker 1: like I'm I'm not breathing right now because just sound
Speaker 1: like a lot of just just the level of I
Speaker 1: don't know if I can handle that. No, it was
Speaker 1: it definitely was a lot. But that was what I
Speaker 1: came up with to do because I was his m D.
Speaker 1: And it's like I was there most of the time,
Speaker 1: just him and I as he recorded a lot of stuff.
Speaker 1: And it's not like we have pro tools. We had
Speaker 1: a hundred and fifty tracks, so we had twenty tracks
Speaker 1: and if we slaved another one we'd have forty eight maybe.
Speaker 1: But you know, so whereas says bass and he's playing bass,
Speaker 1: he just put another sound in the middle of something
Speaker 1: and I'd have to grab that little sound for one
Speaker 1: or two bars or a phrase and take it and
Speaker 1: sample that so I can play it on the drums
Speaker 1: because it was on the bass track. But no one
Speaker 1: would know that because they weren't sitting there with him.
Speaker 1: So I was punching him in like stuff that he
Speaker 1: couldn't punch himself in as far as playing guitar sols
Speaker 1: or lines or whatever. If he couldn't do it. I
Speaker 1: was his engineer for a lot of this stuff. You
Speaker 1: would sample stuff from tape that he had played and
Speaker 1: then and then assign it to a drum and then
Speaker 1: play some other Wait a minute, Even in overdubbing, he
Speaker 1: would play on top of prexisting tracks because because we
Speaker 1: didn't have I'm spitting out what you just told me.
Speaker 1: So even if like there's a keyboard part that says
Speaker 1: keyboards left and right, but at the same time, he
Speaker 1: would just punch in some other weird sound instead of
Speaker 1: going to another track, He just punch it in the middle.
Speaker 1: And there were tons of that throughout a song. So
Speaker 1: when you hear stuff coming in and out, it's because
Speaker 1: he punched it in there, and it's only to happen
Speaker 1: at that place at that sound and you'll never hear
Speaker 1: it again, because it's my life stream just to sit
Speaker 1: and analyze one of those tracks in the ball, just
Speaker 1: to see how things are mixed, or just to you.
Speaker 1: I mean, that's like Rubik's cube level of confusing, because
Speaker 1: I mean, again, now we have technology in our computers
Speaker 1: that you can have a gazillion tracks. But yeah, I
Speaker 1: think what what she's saying he was doing was like
Speaker 1: when you run out of tracks, you have to go
Speaker 1: to a track that already has something on and find
Speaker 1: a space where that thing isn't playing like the pianos.
Speaker 1: That's what I'm saying. That's what I'm saying. He didn't
Speaker 1: have to not even go with a Sympty track lets.
Speaker 1: We didn't. We didn't believe in all right, if you
Speaker 1: got if you're locking up the machine and I'm sorry
Speaker 1: if we're getting too technical shows for this shows for
Speaker 1: nerds me coming and up coming. Oh my god. Okay,
Speaker 1: So I have a question. So you were talking about
Speaker 1: the all the pedals and stuff and the triggers and
Speaker 1: all that. How forgiving was prince of technical um screw ups?
Speaker 1: You know, if something went wrong, like did he get
Speaker 1: mad at you or um who did he get mad
Speaker 1: if something I didn't get Yeah, we're impatient, absolutely, Like
Speaker 1: but um like, did you see did you see that
Speaker 1: as your fault? Uh? Like if it was, if it
Speaker 1: was if there's a short and yeah, like if it
Speaker 1: was a bona fide technical like if something was wrong
Speaker 1: with the mission he was Sometimes he would just say,
Speaker 1: whatever is going off, somebody fix it, walk out of
Speaker 1: the room and come back and hopefully it was fixed. Yea,
Speaker 1: I see that we're still not breathing. Yeah it was.
Speaker 1: I'm telling you. It was a lot for me. And
Speaker 1: then at the same time, not just you know, some
Speaker 1: of the times I had to press either the limb
Speaker 1: machine to stop on the end of before the down
Speaker 1: so I could hit the down with the kicked I mean,
Speaker 1: I was I know, you got to hear in all
Speaker 1: of this, but but at the same time, taking this,
Speaker 1: uh you know, the claps soft where they needed to
Speaker 1: be in the middle of a phrase sometimes and it
Speaker 1: was always on the up while I'm still playing and
Speaker 1: singing and doing choreography. And You're like, okay, Superwoman, that's
Speaker 1: what's that. Okay she was as a superwoman. Um, so
Speaker 1: this is where I don't know if you're aware of this. So,
Speaker 1: so there's a term speaking of black Messiah that um
Speaker 1: that D and I always used, and well the term
Speaker 1: was Michael Angelo. Oh okay. So I don't know if
Speaker 1: I ever told you the story. So basically there was
Speaker 1: there was a law period in our relationship where you know,
Speaker 1: we didn't wrap with each other for like a couple
Speaker 1: of years, and he was still working on this record.
Speaker 1: So we mended our relationship and I came back to
Speaker 1: the studio and he's like playing me cuts of what
Speaker 1: he's been working on so far, like all three of them,
Speaker 1: and by this no I'm playing by this time, like
Speaker 1: he had gotten James Gatson to uh to to drum
Speaker 1: on these joints. And I was saying, you know, part
Speaker 1: of me was like trying to be like encouraging, like,
Speaker 1: oh man, it's really fun, you know, because again it
Speaker 1: was incredible ask Funk I was listening to. But in
Speaker 1: my mind I was on this. Yeah, in my mind
Speaker 1: I was set, even with rage like damn, I'm not
Speaker 1: on the ship. And for me, in my head, I
Speaker 1: was like, Damn, the only songs I'll I'll be able
Speaker 1: to play on are the Michael Angelo songs. Which and
Speaker 1: de'angelo speak, because the way that Romance six hundred is sequenced,
Speaker 1: that would be Sheila's second solo for those that are listening.
Speaker 1: Um A Love Bizarre is such a monstrous song the
Speaker 1: way that is positioned on the album that there's really
Speaker 1: no way for me to separate and make Dear Michael
Speaker 1: Angelo its own song without thinking that Dear Michael Angelo
Speaker 1: is just a three minute movie preview to what's about
Speaker 1: to come around the corner, kind of like the first
Speaker 1: half of Sliding the Family Stone stand like, okay, this,
Speaker 1: we know this part of song, but we know the
Speaker 1: part we're really waiting for is the last minute of
Speaker 1: the song where they start like funking out. And but
Speaker 1: whenever I sequenced the record, I always used Michael Angelo
Speaker 1: the Love bizart like it's almost like an alley set
Speaker 1: up shot to the Slam Dunk, And I thought, well, damn,
Speaker 1: I can't get Jimmy gets In off this record, but
Speaker 1: at least I can try to work on all the
Speaker 1: Michael Angelo's the setup songs. And so that's where the
Speaker 1: charade song on one Uh Black Messiah comes into plate,
Speaker 1: Like that was our tribute to Dear Michael Angelo because
Speaker 1: you know, I was not on Sugar Daddy, and I'm
Speaker 1: still salty about that. But yeah, so that no, that
Speaker 1: that song means a lot to us. I don't know
Speaker 1: if you hear that often never no, thank you, that's awesome.
Speaker 1: It's also hard to figure out where the one is
Speaker 1: um um. I gotta ask for toy box because I
Speaker 1: know that humor is is a big part of the presentation.
Speaker 1: But how how how easy or hard is it to
Speaker 1: do skit sort of that that sort of thing like
Speaker 1: in front of like as you're recording it. I mean,
Speaker 1: it's one thing to hear and like, okay, by that
Speaker 1: point used to the comedy skit or the comedy section
Speaker 1: of a certain songs, But how hard is it to
Speaker 1: do like and and map and plan because it's like
Speaker 1: you have to take a sixty four bar break too
Speaker 1: to insert this in the song, Like are you guys
Speaker 1: mapping it out one by one? Like all the lines
Speaker 1: that you're just we're just going for it, okay, yeah,
Speaker 1: just going for it. So a lot of times it
Speaker 1: wasn't planned. We're just playing in whatever ended up happening,
Speaker 1: is what it was, and then you built it around there.
Speaker 1: Yeah yeah, okay, all right, and for for songs like
Speaker 1: Mercy for the for the speed of Mad Clown in
Speaker 1: the summertime? How many is that a band effort? Like
Speaker 1: who's playing on that? The whole band that was recorded
Speaker 1: live like Love Bizarre was And yeah, I'm trying to
Speaker 1: get everything else. So I want to get the Crush
Speaker 1: Group right now. You better hurry because I gotta go.
Speaker 1: Can you tell where the pink jacket is over in
Speaker 1: my closet? Okay? Thanks Crushed Group? Ye Bill? You oh,
Speaker 1: I thought, you know, helping you move along the Cress Group. Okay,
Speaker 1: Cresh Group, crush Man. So yeah, Michael, how did how
Speaker 1: did Michael Schultz choose you? Like where you? I was
Speaker 1: out on tour on Purple Rain. I have no idea.
Speaker 1: Management said um. At the end of Purple Rain, we
Speaker 1: had been out for a year or something. That's like,
Speaker 1: we want you to go to New York and audition
Speaker 1: for a part in the movie. Uh, And I'm like
Speaker 1: what Okay? So they said, we just want to see
Speaker 1: if you have chemistry with this up and coming actor Blair. Okay.
Speaker 1: So of course I was exhausted. I had just cut
Speaker 1: my hair because we had been on tour. I was like,
Speaker 1: I'm so tired, but I'm gonna come here and do
Speaker 1: try it. I came here. I was stressed and it's
Speaker 1: so dumb because I've seen it somewhere. I don't know.
Speaker 1: I think it was on YouTube or maybe it was
Speaker 1: in my archives of stuff that I have. But we
Speaker 1: did a uh, um, what do you call it? I
Speaker 1: think I saw it there. If it's not, I have it.
Speaker 1: If not, I have it, but I thought it was
Speaker 1: on there. But if you see it in my profile
Speaker 1: because I was stressed out, this big pimple it was.
Speaker 1: It was a thumb growing out of my nose. It
Speaker 1: looked like I was so nervous that bothered me more
Speaker 1: trying to act like please don't look at my nose
Speaker 1: or we're auditioning here. But anyway, we did the audition.
Speaker 1: It was fine, and they said we want you to
Speaker 1: come back, and uh so we kind of worked it
Speaker 1: out and um. It was interesting still because in the
Speaker 1: middle of the um filming of this, I quit, uh
Speaker 1: And I usually don't quit, but I quit. You quit
Speaker 1: the movie. I quit the movie in the middle of filming. Yes, sir,
Speaker 1: we were sleeves, sleeves too much, too little sleeves have haunted.
Speaker 1: How long did it take the film? Um? I don't.
Speaker 1: I don't know. Four months, three months, I don't. It
Speaker 1: didn't seem like it was that long. Um was it
Speaker 1: a is it? Find memories of it like the good old?
Speaker 1: Or was it just like whatever? Oh? No, it was
Speaker 1: messed up. It was totally messed up. Um Now, Um,
Speaker 1: what happened was while we were filming it, I guess
Speaker 1: there was an East coast West coast thing happening. I
Speaker 1: didn't know anything about it, you know, because Wow, I
Speaker 1: had been on I had been on tour, and I
Speaker 1: came in and it's just like, who's this West coast
Speaker 1: wanna be rapper? Coming in as what I was? Because
Speaker 1: you okay, because I'm just saying that's how it went down.
Speaker 1: It's like, wait, what do you And I'm saying, what
Speaker 1: are you talking about? I don't even know what you're
Speaker 1: talking about. Well, we're here in New York and you're
Speaker 1: just want to be rapper and I'm like, no, I'm
Speaker 1: a musician, you know, So a lot of them hadn't
Speaker 1: heard kind of like and then plus being out on tour,
Speaker 1: I came in with and again you would call it entourage.
Speaker 1: Now but I mean I had road manager and the
Speaker 1: wardrobe people and we were just on tour, so everyone
Speaker 1: came with me making sure everything was cool. And you know,
Speaker 1: I'm used to being on tour and wherever we go,
Speaker 1: it's like wherever I laid my head is my home.
Speaker 1: So you know, like we're sitting in this room, you
Speaker 1: gotta have vibe, you know, lamps and you know, UM
Speaker 1: pictures of my family. They've never seen that before. It
Speaker 1: very I mean, you know, the fat boys were in
Speaker 1: other other room with some um cafeteria chairs in the table,
Speaker 1: and I came in with the rug. I mean again,
Speaker 1: you talked about the writer. I mean, it's like I
Speaker 1: want a popcorn machine and I wanted for real, and
Speaker 1: they're like wait, and they peeked in my room, like
Speaker 1: what's that. They were cool, but some of the other
Speaker 1: rappers were so mean to me. And and then not
Speaker 1: only that, the fans, not even the fans, because they
Speaker 1: weren't my fans. The people the extras in the movie.
Speaker 1: While we were shooting Love Bizarre at the at the
Speaker 1: at the club, yes, at the Favor Yeah, we're we're
Speaker 1: filming that part. And everyone's like, you know, yeah, kind
Speaker 1: of halfway moving. It was like whatever, and I'm singing
Speaker 1: Love Bazaar and then at the end they're supposed to go, yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: you know she's They just stood there like this, nobody
Speaker 1: clap and the extras nobody clapp New York is they were.
Speaker 1: It was so much, very protective and they're very caddy
Speaker 1: and and yeah, so they just they had the directors
Speaker 1: had to say, wait, cut, hold on, do you guys
Speaker 1: know where shoot in the movie? Like for real, you
Speaker 1: guys got a clap, We're shooting the movie. So anyway,
Speaker 1: it just got crazy scene too. That was a little
Speaker 1: bit weird too, um because actually I had prints come
Speaker 1: for that and so he was there. Yeah, he was
Speaker 1: there for that for a second. Yeah yeah, wow, I
Speaker 1: didn't know that it was. And then and then at
Speaker 1: the end when we were shooting the part where we
Speaker 1: were all dancing at the end of the movie. Yeah,
Speaker 1: at the end of the movie, it was kind of
Speaker 1: crazy because some of the other rappers were pushing us
Speaker 1: off the stage and everything and moving us out of
Speaker 1: the way and it was just dumb. I'm like, they
Speaker 1: were just hating on us. So I was like, but
Speaker 1: that boys were nice, right, boys were cool. The d D.
Speaker 1: I might feel bad for wearing this ll O sweater.
Speaker 1: Now was cool. That was cool. I'm in crush groove.
Speaker 1: But you know, in retrospect now, I'm sure the next
Speaker 1: project they did, they upgraded their writer because they was like, oh,
Speaker 1: we can get this. I had no idea. Yeah, yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: we don't. Damn. I'm kind of disappointed that that wasn't
Speaker 1: a good filming experience because that film meant everything to us. Yeah. No,
Speaker 1: I mean I came back and you know, it was cool, um,
Speaker 1: but it was weird. I mean, and the other ones
Speaker 1: that were really mean to me, who are well known
Speaker 1: people now and what they do and it is like, wow,
Speaker 1: that's their name. Ryan would fun PRB never No, I
Speaker 1: got that. Curtis go cold. Curtis is cool world now?
Speaker 1: He was. He was. He was really cool and he
Speaker 1: turned around to address everybody's like, come on, y'all, you
Speaker 1: know we're supposed to be shooting a movie. Come on,
Speaker 1: what you're doing now? He was really cool. Well, yeah,
Speaker 1: for the greater good, I appreciate you doing that movie.
Speaker 1: I had. I had a good time. I mean all
Speaker 1: I had a good time. Was that your first East
Speaker 1: coast West Coast situation because not for anohing, I was
Speaker 1: always curious about the West Coast Latin jazz scene versus
Speaker 1: the East Coast Latin right, and then now was a
Speaker 1: whole another issue. Yeah, the Latin jazz and and jazz
Speaker 1: and then salsa the East Coast against the West Coast,
Speaker 1: big huge thing happening. Absolutely that was also rival with
Speaker 1: the East Coast, said the West Coast US Latin jazz
Speaker 1: artists and musicians don't play as well as the East Coast.
Speaker 1: That's it's different countries. We're talking about two in situations
Speaker 1: and kind of but I mean it's really it all
Speaker 1: goes back to this rhythm called the clave and and
Speaker 1: in Layman's term is really like the two and the
Speaker 1: four where we clapping on the front, but this is
Speaker 1: called the clave and that's their their their clock, and
Speaker 1: so it's how you play it. So yeah, okay, I'm
Speaker 1: trying to move past the purple period too, your sex
Speaker 1: symbol post sex symbol, uh period of your career where
Speaker 1: you're totally out of the fold or left, Like, what
Speaker 1: was what was it like to make the decision to
Speaker 1: really leave and and explore music that you wanted to
Speaker 1: do without the tutelage of what you what you came
Speaker 1: into the world as, at least in our eyes, Like,
Speaker 1: what was that like for him to do Prince's Bid? Yeah? Well,
Speaker 1: I mean after a while, it's like I didn't like
Speaker 1: the direction he was going in and I didn't like
Speaker 1: all the cursing, and I just the music was getting
Speaker 1: crazy and I'm like, no, it does this, I'm not
Speaker 1: having fun. If I'm not having fun, you know, I
Speaker 1: need to leave. Do we forget to ask what we did?
Speaker 1: But actually I just wanted to ask, did you have
Speaker 1: any problems with seeing Scarlett Pussy No? Because I was
Speaker 1: wondering if that was if that might have been something that,
Speaker 1: you know, kind of no, no, no, when I did that,
Speaker 1: that was supposed to be on my record and it
Speaker 1: turned out that's right. That's actually I wanted to ask
Speaker 1: about the record that didn't come out. Um, can you
Speaker 1: tell me anything about the song three Nigs watching a
Speaker 1: Kunk Fu Movie? Because that title has just been stuck
Speaker 1: in my head for forever. Prince called me when I
Speaker 1: was in Oakland and Three Niggs united in West Yeah,
Speaker 1: that was on the Black album, but there was I
Speaker 1: guess a sequel that was Yeah, that was me. He
Speaker 1: called me, goes, I don't have a title for a song.
Speaker 1: I said, okay, three Nigs United in West Compton or
Speaker 1: whatever it was, and it goes, okay, that sounds good. Okay.
Speaker 1: It was so he literally made the black album just
Speaker 1: to have party music at your birthday celebration. That was yes,
Speaker 1: and no, I mean we were we were recording you know,
Speaker 1: that music mostly at his house in the studio, at
Speaker 1: his house, um, and then one day he's just like,
Speaker 1: we can't let this go. We can't release him, like
Speaker 1: it's the dopest record. You are you kidding me? He's
Speaker 1: just stopped the truck. No, we can't. And of course,
Speaker 1: you know one of them trucks got through or I
Speaker 1: don't know how many. Yeah, a lot of people got
Speaker 1: the record anyway, yes how many you have? But yeah, okay,
Speaker 1: but yeah, leaving it, I mean you felt more of
Speaker 1: a sense of independ and well again not no, it's
Speaker 1: not that, it was more of I felt something was
Speaker 1: missing musically, and so something missing musically for me means
Speaker 1: well why am I doing it? That passion was dwindling
Speaker 1: away because I wasn't excited about showing up, you know
Speaker 1: and playing it's like I don't like the direction. I
Speaker 1: don't like what's happening. So um, I said, I gotta leave.
Speaker 1: Well this led her to, uh, something that we do
Speaker 1: really have in common. You were a late night band
Speaker 1: leader for the Magic Hour? How how how was that
Speaker 1: experience at least as a late night band leader? Like,
Speaker 1: it was actually pretty dope. I mean I was ready
Speaker 1: to do it. I I to me again, You're gonna
Speaker 1: be a musical director for television. It's all about timing.
Speaker 1: So it's like it's to me as I thought it
Speaker 1: was a no brain and I just visualized what I
Speaker 1: needed to do. It's like, okay, what's common sense. It
Speaker 1: has to happen. Um, And I was cool with it.
Speaker 1: So um, your brother too, I enjoyed it. Yeah. I
Speaker 1: brought my brother and my band and now he's because right,
Speaker 1: your brother was a music wright the for a TV
Speaker 1: show as well, Martin Short and Wayne Brady. Yeah, wait
Speaker 1: a minute, Peter Mikey Martin Short show. No, no, no, no,
Speaker 1: not that one. You scared me. I was like, wait,
Speaker 1: a man, Peter Michael was under my no and I
Speaker 1: didn't know about it. What the hell? No? Okay, um, now,
Speaker 1: but I'm just gonna say the Magic Ourt thing. I
Speaker 1: mean it was, It's interesting, it didn't last that long.
Speaker 1: I mean Magic have problems with trying to, you know,
Speaker 1: figure out how to to be a host. That's a
Speaker 1: hard gig. That's not easy at all. Um, I have
Speaker 1: some problems with that show the first few episodes kind
Speaker 1: of yeah, the first few, probably the first fifty episodes.
Speaker 1: This is probably our rough This episode right now is not.
Speaker 1: Um Okay, So I have two more questions. I'll let
Speaker 1: it go. Um. The co Ed Project, Well, that happened
Speaker 1: in the future. You want to explain what is Chronicles
Speaker 1: of Every Dealer? Well, explain it to us. But what's
Speaker 1: the Coed cod Project? Well, let's let Sheila explain. Could
Speaker 1: you tell us what the Coed Project is? Well, wet there, okay,
Speaker 1: Chronicles of Every du Yeah, we were h me Cat
Speaker 1: Dot Dyson who plays guitar, Ronda Smith who plays bass in,
Speaker 1: Cassandra who plays keyboards, and uh Cassandra Neil and we
Speaker 1: would have different guests artists playing and performing with us.
Speaker 1: That was the idea. And let's just go out and
Speaker 1: play and put all girls band together, which is something
Speaker 1: I always wanted to do. Anyway, Um, so I don't
Speaker 1: know if we're going to do anything. Um I had
Speaker 1: to disband it because all the things that I didn't
Speaker 1: want it to be, and how women should be supportive
Speaker 1: of each other and we get along and you know,
Speaker 1: write some good music. It just kind of got funking.
Speaker 1: It was like, this is what we said we weren't
Speaker 1: going to be. So that is so. No, it's no,
Speaker 1: it wasn't a deva thing. It's just really uh, just
Speaker 1: not all on the same page of what we wanted
Speaker 1: to do musically. You know, we all we all have
Speaker 1: to be on the same page. Okay, two point five questions. No,
Speaker 1: because you are a band leader. How and I've heard
Speaker 1: maybe rears two were you leave, I maybe had some words.
Speaker 1: That's how nerdy we are here. Oh my god, have
Speaker 1: rehearsal tapes. We believe that. Yeah, so you heard it too. No,
Speaker 1: but the thing is is that I was I was
Speaker 1: impressed that you won the kind of the debate or whatever.
Speaker 1: But how hard is it for you to put your
Speaker 1: foot down, plant your flag and really make people respect
Speaker 1: your gangster as far as you know, this is our
Speaker 1: plan because this leads to what you organize for the
Speaker 1: for the BT Tribute. I know that must have been
Speaker 1: the hardest thing in the world for you to do.
Speaker 1: I'm just mostly underway, but just from a technical aspect
Speaker 1: for you to really take it there, I know that
Speaker 1: you had to draw the map, draw the blueprint and executed.
Speaker 1: How hard is it to band lead into to be
Speaker 1: the bad guy? To be a band leader? You got
Speaker 1: to be the bad guy, and I hate being the
Speaker 1: bad guy. I wouldn't be everyone's friend. So how how
Speaker 1: hard is it to do it? Um? Right now? It's
Speaker 1: not that hard. It wasn't that hard when we did
Speaker 1: the b ET to put that together. I have such
Speaker 1: an amazing group of musicians and people around me that, um,
Speaker 1: we love what we get to do. There's no drama anymore.
Speaker 1: And ma'am, what a great place to be. I have
Speaker 1: to say, there's no drama. There's no arguments and stuff
Speaker 1: like that. It just doesn't really happen anymore. If it does,
Speaker 1: it's once in a great while, but hardly at all.
Speaker 1: And putting together the b ET thing, you know, um,
Speaker 1: first trying to understand how I was going to do
Speaker 1: it and figure it out and then say, okay, then
Speaker 1: who can do this with me? I knew my band
Speaker 1: was going to do it, but who else was I
Speaker 1: going to bring into play? Well, some of the people
Speaker 1: I did ask were already booked for other things because
Speaker 1: it was the last minute. You know, this was unexpected
Speaker 1: first of all. And then um, you know, some people
Speaker 1: just said no, left me hanging like they didn't call
Speaker 1: me back, but you got I mean it's because it
Speaker 1: was the timing. No one knew you know what I mean,
Speaker 1: It was no. But it was a brave thing for
Speaker 1: you to to do. And I have to I don't
Speaker 1: know if I even texted you or after, but yeah,
Speaker 1: that was that was a great job. Thank you, Thank you. Okay,
Speaker 1: we're about to let it go. Do you have question?
Speaker 1: This is our last question. I swear you're gonna go. Um.
Speaker 1: You've accomplished quite a bit as a musician. UM. And
Speaker 1: I've been reading your book, The Beat of My Own Drum,
Speaker 1: which is in stores now. UM. And and you talk
Speaker 1: about how when you were a child you actually had
Speaker 1: some aspirations of being an astronaut and you were quite
Speaker 1: an athlete too. Um. Which of those two do you
Speaker 1: think you would have gone and like gone into um
Speaker 1: had music not worked out for you or oh, definitely athletes.
Speaker 1: Yeah were you I saw the Olympics and you had
Speaker 1: Olympic hopes. Oh yeah, absolutely. Mom's my mom is a tomboy,
Speaker 1: and and all her brothers and her sisters, they would,
Speaker 1: you know, compete all the time. So all of them
Speaker 1: doing that, they just you know, I learned all of
Speaker 1: that from from my mom competing and uh and being
Speaker 1: an athlete. She wanted to start her and her sisters
Speaker 1: wanted to start their own women's basketball team and baseball team.
Speaker 1: And so she's my mom is always like, you know,
Speaker 1: you can do whatever you want to do. And she's
Speaker 1: that person's like, don't tell me I can't do something
Speaker 1: kind of person. So, UM, I wanted to be UM.
Speaker 1: I was in track and field and I was breaking
Speaker 1: a lot of records in junior high in high school,
Speaker 1: UM running track, and then I also played on a
Speaker 1: a women's soccer league team for five years undefeated. We
Speaker 1: were undefeated and I uh trophies for the most goals
Speaker 1: and stuff like. So you couldn't even catch me. I
Speaker 1: just kuldn't care to me. Just that was just how
Speaker 1: it was. Running with the night, Huh. I love it. Yeah,
Speaker 1: That's what I would have I would have. I always
Speaker 1: tell him. It was like I wanted I wanted to
Speaker 1: be the first well girl on the moon and then
Speaker 1: asked her not. And the second thing was to win
Speaker 1: a gold medal in track and field and Olympics. But
Speaker 1: I got a gold record. I'm like, I'm cool with that,
Speaker 1: you know, and got something that Yeah, and been around
Speaker 1: the world. Yeah. You know, like when you're talking to
Speaker 1: someone and you're trying to keep the conversation going on,
Speaker 1: like you hang up, you hang up, Okay, it's time
Speaker 1: to hang up. It's not funny because yeah, trust me,
Speaker 1: there's like nine more hours of technical questions I have
Speaker 1: about drumming. I mean, but I know we can come
Speaker 1: I can come back. You can get talking about going countries.
Speaker 1: What are y'all doing? And then we got like a
Speaker 1: par of drunk behind us. I don't know what we're
Speaker 1: doing the night is you just you have no from
Speaker 1: us whatsoever you have get there before she was like
Speaker 1: sleeping you have Like I'm not passing the message of
Speaker 1: season in New York. Okay, my bad, I'm sorry. We
Speaker 1: are communicators. Yes, you're right exactly. Anyway, probably say goodbye, Sheila,
Speaker 1: thank you, thank you. Don't forget a little bye iconic. Yes, yes,
Speaker 1: it is available now. Okay, uh, sort of go off
Speaker 1: script with the show instead of playing our theme, Can
Speaker 1: we just have a thirty second dance on drama? That's
Speaker 1: all one? Thirty seconds dance thirty just shutting up? Can
Speaker 1: we shut our please for thirty seconds? Can we do this? Please?
Speaker 1: Do what? Yes? Can we have a dance on drum
Speaker 1: off for thirty seconds? What's a dance on drum off?
Speaker 1: You know? I love that you have such an illustrious
Speaker 1: history with drumming that you don't even remember your classic.
Speaker 1: The dance on it doesn't even have to be that.
Speaker 1: Just do that because the triggers the sound te Yes,
Speaker 1: I do. It's not gonna sound the same. We don't
Speaker 1: need the glass breaking and all that stuff. Just for
Speaker 1: thirty seconds, all right? Can we do this? Can you
Speaker 1: play it first? Sexual suicide? Can we do it? Can
Speaker 1: you play it first? Can you play it first? Yes?
Speaker 1: All right, let's go. Let's go, so everybody, a mirror
Speaker 1: is going to go behind the drum right now. Thank you,
Speaker 1: good night, thank you. This has been an amazing episode
Speaker 1: of Quest Love Supreme on behalf of the entire Supreme
Speaker 1: team I'll see you guys later, and I'm gonna go
Speaker 1: die now. Thank you until next time, good night of course.
Speaker 1: Love Supreme is a production of I Heart Radio. This
Speaker 1: classic episode was produced by the team at Pandora. For
Speaker 1: more podcasts from my heart Radio, visit the I Heart
Speaker 1: Radio app, Apple podcast, or wherever you listen to your
Speaker 1: favorite shows.