QLS Classic: The Family Stand Part 1

Questlove Supreme is a production of iHeartRadio.

Hey, what's up, y'all? This is Questlove with another QLS Classic. Back in April of 2020, Team Supreme and I had a two-part conversation with The Family Stand, the wildest episode we ever, ever taped. In that chat, we got Peter Lord, V. Jeffrey Smith, and the always, always entertaining Sandra St. Victor.

You know, we go back where the music found them, in Brooklyn, Dallas Living Room, and the Harlem House Party. They tell how three busy session players became one band, meeting through Will Downing, of all people, and the 1986 Luther Banjo show, and then pushing back on the stiff productions of the era. To keep their own energy intact.

They bring the receipts. Ghetto Heaven, of course. Producing Paula Abdul's sophomore album, Spellbound. That immortal sax solo on Billy Ocean's Caribbean Queen. That Jeff never actually played straight through. Surprise. Anyway, that was part one. And I hope you guys enjoyed this. It was a really crazy episode. Check, Jeff, Mike.

Check, one, two, three.

Check, Jeff, Mike.

Check, check. One, two.

Ladies and gentlemen, sometimes you just have to go with the flow. Steve's looking mad nervous right now because we're not following the rules of the show from an engineer standpoint. But I don't know. I just felt the need. We don't have to do roll call every time. I will say, yes, for starters, if you're tuning in late, this is Questlove Supreme on iHeartRadio And we're still here with three Supremas, because I have them locked in chains. See what I did there, guys? Locked in chains.

Yes, yes, yes.

Boss Bill, Laia, and Sugar Steve are with us.

Woo!

Apparently, unpaid Bill met a woman named Lady Sunshine.

Whoa!

And he left us a Dear John note that said he ain't never coming back.

Oh!

Fontagalo apparently is still smoking very strong cigarettes, and he said he'd be back for Visitation Sundays in a month.

Indica!

So.

What I will say is that when time has passed and the smoke has cleared, I really hope that the storytellers and the history makers and the history tellers will be kind to our next guest, whether as a collective or as individuals, as an artist, producer, songwriters, or just plain old session musicians, or just three really talented musicians.

Our guests today have made impact in history, and they march to the beat of their own drum, their own weird drum, whether we know it or not.

Sing it, Steve.

And I'll be honest.

I think Bill can agree with me. Boss Bill can agree that the gems of discovery for this episode alone.

Yeah.

Rates 10 on the OSHIP meter.

Yes, yes.

And we graciously thank them for doing us the honor of celebrating with them 30 years of truth, weirdness, cleverly hidden snark.

That's right. Hello, Vanna White. How you doing?

Zero compromises, as far as I know. Ladies and gentlemen, please welcome the one and only Peter Lord v.

Jeffrey Smith and Sandra St.

Victor, a special treat for all you music experts and nerds and connoisseurs out there, professionally known as The Family Stand.

Yes. Yes.

Wow. Now every intro has to be like that. I know, right?

Right? I think a new standard has been set.

And I really had a good roll call, but, you know.

Me too, but I didn't decide.

I had two of them, because I knew one of y'all was going to steal one of them.

Now, see, I wasn't even going to do the obvious one. I have to say that this is one that I didn't see coming.

Really? Why?

I didn't see it coming. I just, now I see it coming, I appreciate it. You know, I just wouldn't. When your name appeared on the wish list of, oh, Family Stand want to do Quest.

Love Supreme, we're like, thank you. What are you talking about?

Yeah.

I'm happy.

Yeah.

Boss Bill's happy. Everyone's happy.

I'm not worried about a thing.

You're not worried about a thing.

That's what's up.

So has this always been this way with you guys? Like you just.

Pretty much.

Yeah, no doubt.

Break out. Is that the bond that kept you together?

The music.

The music has always been the thing. I mean, we... We can hang out and have fun. We are compatible outside of music. But the thing that always brings us back is that music. Because we are like, I call them my musical soulmates. And I mean that sincerely. They literally are. I mean, I've never been connected or bonded with anyone the way I am with Peter and Jeff.

And I call them my powers, towers of powers.

Powers that beat.

The towers. When I'm between them, I'm the safest that I am in the world.

Okay.

Powers that beat. Well, this is a tradition on Quest Love Supreme because any guest that comes on the show, I always want to find out what brought them to where they are now. The first question I always have, well, there's three of you now, so this is going to be an extra long episode. This might tie Jimmy Jam's record.

Can I take my shoes off?

For six hours.

That's why we brought you to a reservoir. This is home.

Make yourself comfortable.

I'm like, wait a minute.

You got feet made for radio, so it's all right. I got radio feet.

I'm good.

Thank you.

Thank you, sweetheart.

Brothers.

Thank you. They know.

What I'll do is I'll go from my right to left. My first question for you, Pete, is first, where were you born?

I was born in Brooklyn, New York. Really? I'm from Brooklyn. Brooklyn.

Okay.

Same hospital as Michael Jordan. Nice. Off Atlantic Avenue.

Okay. Wait, what hospital is that?

What'd you say? What hospital is that? I think it was St. Joseph's or something like that.

Off Atlantic?

Yeah. Okay.

And Sandra, where were you?

Dallas, Texas. Yes, I know you were.

Big D.

Yeah. Yeah.

All right, so you're the Big D and then Detroit's the D.

Okay, the D. That's another thing.

Okay, so the big D.

Ride that D.

You know what I'm saying, Jeffrey?

HR.

Never saw him.

This is XM Radio or Triple X. Yeah, Triple X.

And V, Jeffrey.

I was born in Harlem, Harlem Hospital.

Really?

Yeah, the old one.

Oh, okay.

I'm a man of a certain.

Age, so. The old one as opposed to.

Yeah, the one that's here now. It was one on 135th and. Lennox.

Lennox.

No, it's not Lennox. I think it's a little further over.

Really?

Okay.

Yeah.

It's the old one. Like I said, I'm a man of a certain age. So I don't think people even know about that one.

An older, okay.

An older Harlem hospital.

Like Frederick Douglass was born there, right? Same time? here we go all right here we go.

Y'all in the right place.

So then so then i'll ask what year all the way for that sandra what year did you come to new york city 1982 Okay. Visiting a few times or you've officially just.

Nah, that was it. I just rolled up and it was a crazy roll up.

But yeah, I rolled up in 1982. Really?

It was crazy.

Kind of the opening to a song that wasn't written yet, Welcome to the Jungle, like you got off the bus.

It was freaking nuts. You know, it was a Roy Ayers roll up. So he's had a setup and it was, there's a whole thing there, but yes. I got it.

Okay.

We got time. Now, no, no, I'm going to get to that.

Okay.

So then I'm just, my first four questions are always just the basic foundations of who you are as individuals before we get in the collective.

All right.

So what is, Peter, what is your first musical memory?

Very first musical memory. This is going to give away age.

We're all mature here.

Yeah, we're all mature.

That's right.

The first song I remember hearing was Hit the Road Jack.

Okay.

Hit the road, Jack.

And don't you come back no more.

What you say?

Hit the road, Jack. And that's my first musical memory, Hit the Road Jack.

Okay.

And then I remember my sister having a party at around... I think it was 1968 or 9, and she played that Sly album, and my life was never the same after that, though I didn't realize it yet. But the really reason I got into the music industry was because of Satan. And that was because... And he follows you till this day. Yeah, and I'll tell you why. A lot of us, people of a certain hue would like to say that Jesus got into music, but Satan got me into music because of the movie The Exorcist. And I'll tell you why. Because the movie came out and I was so afraid to go to sleep, I started playing the radio every night. And then, ah, I went tangential.

I went tangential.

Yo, we went tangential. All right. So every shadow was like, you know, Linda Blair turned her head around. So I started playing the radio every night. So I wake in the morning, I got this new song. I'm so tired of being alone. I thought about that all myself.

Really?

Yeah. Oh, that was Al Green? Oh, you know, but then I kept hearing Stevie and those people doing the radio during that. I'm like, oh, I think I like music because I'm hearing songs in my head. Wait, no.

To say something. I don't think I've ever shared this story before, but now that makes sense because when you think of the boogeyman or whatever, the first thing you want to do is distract yourself from whatever you think is under the bed or in the closet, so you put music on to be an invisible roommate. Frank Zappa had.

Did a film, a short film with Bill Plimpton, 1973, whatever, and it came on Midnight Special, but this thing, like, he turned into a demon. I mean, if you know Frank Zappa's music, it's like four fingers turned into 75 billion fingers, and I had nightmares of Frank Zappa forever.

And so, thus, my mom, I.

Totally forgot, that's how music really, I had her on 24-7, because I was scared of Frank Zappa.

Get me.

Yeah.

That was it, see? We connected, bro.

Sondra, what was your first musical memory, in addition to the first music that you purchased or owned, and the moment that changed your life and brought you to music?

Okay, well, so the first and the last question are probably about the same. And that's the first musical memory, I... parents and my aunts tell me about stuff that i did when i was two like playing the piano and they said i was fiddling around playing skate and i figured out that the scale was joy to the world.

So they said but.

You know i was they said i was two i'm okay i don't remember this but they tell me said you were two and you said.

And i said.

George to the world the lord has come so when it was george to the world i don't recall that but my first musical memory is um I had chores, and I had to clean, dust these coffin-looking bedazzled lamps in the living room. And as I was consoling myself while I was cleaning, I started singing. And as I was singing, I said, I'm a singer. I was like eight.

I said, I am. I didn't say I want to sing. I said, I am a singer. And it's new, and it's never changed from that moment. Never anything else. And so yeah, that was the first, that's like the first real solid memory. And that also is the last question. That's the thing that changed my life as far as, it was no question at that point who I was in my own, you know, in my own, you know, skin.

I knew from that point. I forgot your second question though.

The first record you purchased.

Ah, okay. So yeah, ah. The first thing I probably purchased was Songs in the Key of Life or Larry Graham's Mirror. That's the first thing I probably purchased.

Nice.

Yeah.

Damn. Yeah, because I was young, but I had a little allowance, and that was about that time, and those were the first albums I had. Songs in the Key of Life and Mirror.

And Mirror.

Yeah.

I love that record. Jeff, what was your first musical memory?

Around my house, there was a lot of music because my mother, she sang, and she used to have these parties. Well, I don't know exactly what to call them now.

Uh-oh.

Was there a card game? Was there a knife?

There was a lot of stuff going on.

And gin?

There was a lot of stuff going on. A blue light or a red light. Me and my sister was under a chair watching them play music all night. But at the same time, the music that we would listen to was things like Brooke Benton and the first... The song that I remember is Booker T and the MGs. What's the song?

Green Onions?

Green Onions, right?

Right.

Until this day, I say Stevie probably copped that with.

Oh, for Higher Ground?

Higher Ground. Because when I first heard Higher Ground, I said, Stevie jacked that song. I mean, he added his little twist, but that's probably the first memories of... And also, I Was Made to Love Her. But the music that really changed my life was music of my mind.

Really?

There's another observation I'm making right now that's rare for our guests. It sounds like that at a very early age, music isn't an obstacle in your households. Usually with our guests on the show, There's like Charlie Wilson, like people have to sneak to listen to records. Like the only secular record they're allowed to listen to is What's Going On or that sort of thing. So you're saying even at an early age and discovering music, your parents were more than okay?

What type of parents did you guys have that were so open to? Well, I had a parent. That's a can of worms. Well, my mother was a nurse and my father was a communist. So that creates an artist. So he was open-minded to begin with, a little bit too open-minded. And my oldest sister was into music, and my father sang. So we weren't, and I was baptized Catholic, so we weren't like a religious Baptist, you know, music is evil type of family, you know.

So you had an alternative family.

Semi-alternative. Different from what most black people at the time.

Yeah, absolutely.

Because my father was actually, he graduated from Harvard. He was a lawyer. He was a columnist of a major paper and a professor. But he was seriously a communist and got caught up in the 1950s scandal. So his whole career ended up being a teacher in Jersey City. So my parents got divorced around 1963. This is when the violins come in.

Well, explain to me the repercussions of that. If the government was trying to vent out who was a communist based on... Yeah, exactly.

So even though he had a Harvard Law degree and was a doctor of philosophy and wrote books about history, the fact that he was a communist, he got outed and he was taught at a school in Albany and was forced to leave there.

Is your dad Paul Robeson?

No. He hung with Paul Robeson. There's a picture of him and Paul Robeson and Joe Lewis in this big, you know, party, uh, back in the, like, late 40s. He had me, like, late, later in his life.

Yeah, I remember. I mean, were his beliefs that he was just anti-capitalist.

Or just... Um, he was, he, uh, he was an atheist, in fact, but my mother wasn't, uh, even though she wasn't necessarily religious, but she went just, and my grandmother, um, Jamaican and very religious. Wanted to make sure I didn't... How did that work?

It's a lot of conflict.

I was about to say, most Jamaicans.

I know are like that close to God. That's why he's a genius.

Crazy.

Are you Gemini?

I was just about to ask.

I'm a Leo.

Leo. Yeah, he's a Gemini.

You better be a Gemini because I think your album is.

Yeah, so they were open-minded in terms of that, in terms of music. So they love music and she actually wanted me to I think she wanted me to get into music, but my sister actually went to music and art, and I didn't go. I went to Erasmus High School in Brooklyn. Oh, actually, no, I didn't. I went to Walt Whitman Junior High School in Brooklyn, and to make sure I didn't have to fight the same people I did in Walt Whitman when I went to Erasmus, I made sure I passed that test to go to Stuyvesant High School. So that's what I ended up doing.

Isn't that Tip's story as well? It sounds familiar. That's crazy.

Yeah, so I ended up going, but I wasn't in music, but music wasn't such a, there wasn't a block to music in my house, so that was fortunate.

So was there a, most, the sort of hip-hop narrative is basically with gang activity in New York in the 70s, and sort of waning out in the 80s, but was that an everyday thing in your teenhood? I hear it a lot on the West Coast, but you rarely hear it before.

Well, the thing is, let's say I was a different type of kid. Yes, you were.

Yeah, I want to know how you survived and navigated this.

Actually, I kind of ignored a lot of stuff. Okay. And not a conscious thing. I mean, I just wasn't into it, you know what I mean? So I just wasn't definitely into it. Gangs are fighting and all that stuff. How do you avoid it? Because normally they choose you. I guess they thought I was so weird. They didn't know what to do with me. And I just didn't, you know. Ah, the Amir route.

Yeah, the Amir.

I was just so kind of out. And I had like a weird kind of childhood like in Brooklyn. And so there was a lot of fights and stuff. But I was, as opposed to getting to the fights, I was kind of a stupid kid in a way because I was scared of people I should have been scared of because they had a bunch of brothers and I had no brothers. But one day, I found out later was the biggest bully in the neighborhood took my, we used to play this game, people don't play anymore, called punch ball. It's kind of like baseball, you throw in a punch ball. So this guy took my ball and I said, give me my ball. He said, no. And I punched him in the face. And then everybody said, do you know he just punched you in the face?

Rob Markman, Jr.: You hit the biggest prisoner. Nice. Rob Markman, Jr.: I punched him in the face, but then it was like, do you know he just hit him? And then after I realized who I hit, then I was scared.

Rob Markman, Jr.

But then the guy became friends with me and looked out for me. Rob Markman, Jr.: He didn't mess with you no more, right?

Rob Markman, Jr.

But he looked out for me for a bunch of other kids who were really tougher than even worse he was.

Well, I'm glad you had that because I can't imagine a childhood growing up where you don't have that one person that's like.

I'm going to get the fuck you up. Oh, no.

Yeah.

I never had that, so I just ran home with the quickness. So, Sandra, in Dallas, okay, is... What was Dallas at the time in your childhood? Because I think of Austin as a blue city in a red state. Or at least they would like.

To paint that.

Or now it is.

Yeah, for sure.

Or we don't even know now.

Texas trying to go blue, right?

But I'll say that the times that I went there, at least with my gracious host, El Head Rappo.

Is that me?

Yeah, you.

Oh, oh, oh, Erica, I'm done. Oh my God.

Head rapper.

L head rapper. We all will. She showed me sides of Dallas that I didn't even know existed, and I've been there plenty of times, and I was like, oh, there are people like me down here. What was it like for you growing down there?

Yeah, it was like the two sides of the tracks, you know? And my dad, who came from, like him and his brothers, Him and his brothers, I mean, the first gun I saw was my dad's. My dad was like a pimp back in the day, right? And I stumbled upon those pictures. But so Dallas, when I was growing up, was very divided. So he had decided at some point that he was going to leave the gang life behind a little bit, at least on the front.

I wanted to use this.

You can, you can, you can, because trust me. Because let me tell you something, my daddy didn't really leave that shit behind. So what I'm telling you is, what I'm telling you, so he kind of like, you know, so we got a great job, you know, moved up first, black supervisor at the phone company, all that kind of crap.

But my mother's family lived on the other side of the track. So when we had to go visit them, we said, oh, snap, this is the real, the real, right? So they lived in West Allis and south dallas and you know in little trailers and like 12 people in one house and you know we went to visit our country cousins they didn't have shoes so like you know we was like oh damn we're middle class i mean i didn't know the term for it then but i will now look back on it you know i grew up middle class well you know i would say lower to middle middle class yeah close you know upper middle middle class life but working class but dad um Dad's, like, you know, sort of gangster side never left. I mean, for example, I remember I was with this dude.

Oh, no.

Uh-oh. Here we go. With this dude.

I know where this is going.

The story begins.

Feel it, Sandra. Let's go.

I mean, just tell us cute little. I mean, so, and, you know, he wasn't treating me right. And he actually, like, he actually slapped the shit out of me one day.

And I, like, And I was so stunned.

So I got on a flight and I was in New York. So I got on a flight and I just went back home. My dad always picked me up at the airport. And he picked me up at the airport and I was just quiet. And he was like, what's wrong with you? I'm like, nothing. And he was quiet. It was a 40 minute ride. We almost home. He said, did he lay his hands on you? He just guessed it.

And I was like, wah!

Ba-da-bing, ba-da-boom.

Son, so we got home.

I never saw him get that red.

He was like.

He got home, he picked up the phone. He called dude. He didn't say shit to me. He just picked up the phone. He brought my suitcases in, picked up the phone.

He said, I'm on my way.

He said... He said, he said, Clark, this is Mr.

Matthews.

He said, if you ever lay your hands on my daughter again, New York won't.

Be big enough.

Oh.

I was like, ding.

Why are you all like, that's so romantic.

I just want to know if we ever heard from Clark again. No, actually.

I didn't think we did.

We did not.

All right, that'll be enough.

For you, Sandra.

No, I mean, like, is he alive?

I really could not answer that question, honestly.

I do not know. I just know I did.

Not hear from Clark anymore. He shut him down. So, I mean, he's done that kind of thing. That's the kind of thing he does.

I mean, you know.

He got cute when he got older, when he would just meet ladies. All my girlfriends, who I introduced, he would flirt with and tell them, I'm not a dirty old man. I'm just a sexy senior citizen.

Oh, even now. Embarrassed the shit out of me.

You're going to use that line?

Pull that one out.

That was my dad and his brother.

Did you learn how to handle a pistol?

Oh, I did, actually.

Okay.

Well, she from Texas. Yeah, I mean, I assumed, but I was like, I don't want you to. I can handle mine.

I don't want to make any assumptions about Texas whatsoever, but can I assume that that's as simple as breathing the air or water? At least we're taught to think.

Yeah.

I would say, I would say 70%. I'm not going to say everybody, you know what I mean? Because everybody, most people don't know how to count. But I knew how to shoot, or the parents definitely had guns.

Right.

So you come across it, you know what I mean? So I came across the gun in my house. My dad used to keep it on top of the refrigerator.

I'm like, why is it on top of the refrigerator? That's where the gun was. Yikes.

So when he saw me, like, find it, he was like, okay, well, if you don't do the gun, you don't, you know. Let me show you how.

Were you the only sibling?

No, I had three. We were all adopted, by the way. Three siblings, yeah.

You were chosen.

Yeah. Nice.

Three chosen kids.

I almost shot my sister.

Wait, what?

No, no, no, no. Let me tell you what happened.

We were kids, right?

And me and my sister were in my stepdad's, I mean, I wasn't like familiar with my biological, so my mother had remarried, right? Oh, yeah. And me and my sister was playing in their room.

Found a gun.

And so we was reaching, you know, trying to look for things and We see this gun and I'm thinking it's a toy gun. So I pointed at my sister and clicked. And then I pointed at the ceiling and it went off. They came in and they said, I didn't know what was happening. So they was wondering if something had happened upstairs. I was wondering why they were tripping.

So I didn't know it was a real gun. You know, I was like, that's one of my earliest memories because I don't remember much before I was nine.

Well, that's Questlove Supreme, ladies and gentlemen.

Good night.

Steve is sober now. Yeah.

Ain't nobody carrying, right?

You know what the family's saying.

You got an ass now.

That's scary.

Yeah, that's scary. I mean, I remember that's like kind of a weird kind of thing. It's a blessing.

Like, you're blessed.

No, seriously.

Your life would have went differently.

Well, I don't, you know, I don't believe in luck or anything like that, but That's what's up.

Yeah, I mean.

Somebody's looking out.

Bring you guys to New York now. What year did you guys meet? Not even as a, but like.

Okay, you talking about all of us?

The three of us.

Okay, let me take this one. Go ahead, break it down. Peter and I met through a mutual friend, Will Downing.

Yes.

Me and Will Downing, we used to do a lot of work together. We were writing sessions, all that stuff. And, you know, Will used to come over my house and, you know, we used to write. And so he, one day he told me that he knew that this guy needed a flute player on a song that he was writing.

Right.

And I never forget the song was in the thick of it. Right. That's the name of it. I never forgot the name of that song. So, He let me hear the song. I said, man, I got to meet this guy. So he said, I'll bring him over. So Pete came over my house. You know, I said, that's Pete.

He's weird.

He looked like he had this like Larry Dunn, he's 6'5. So we started working together. And at the time you were. You had a group, you were with Rene and Angela?

Rene and Angela, right?

Oh, I can't wait for the stories. We're not even going to get to Family Stand yet. Just your collective experience. Oh, she's shaking her head no already. Every Rene story is terrible. I'm ready for this.

I'm ready for the team. So it was Rene and Angela, right? They were producing the group. So somehow I convinced Pete. I said, Pete, man, you know, we could do this ourselves because I was always into... You know, being in control of our own music. So, you know, we started working together, doing a lot of productions and stuff. And so we had a bunch of singers come in and doing demos for us. Because at the time, we were doing stuff for Silver Yaron, Merlin Bob.

Mickey Howard.

Mickey Howard. You know, we did Mickey Howard.

It's all the weird stuff the mac yeah yeah yeah.

Mac band we did we did productions on them and we had different singers singing our demos so um lisa fisher was one of the one of our singers now i knew lisa from i met lisa in 1980 83 on a session that i was doing for billy ocean all right So she was in the studio. She was in the.

That's him.

You said that so casual. We'll get to that one. That's his saxophone. We'll get to that one. We know this. We're going to get to this.

So, you know, I met Lisa then. So we kind of established a relationship over the years. And then she did some demos for us too. And so did we get a... Offer the deal, or we just started.

No, first we met before you guys got the offer for the producer's deal. Because Lisa had to go do Luther.

She had to go Luther.

Right, and so then she... pulled me in because I met Lisa when she was doing The Crystals and I still lived in Texas and I was doing Lazy Affair and so we hooked up before I moved to New York and The Crystals? The Crystals. She was in The Crystals.

Like the doo-wop?

Yeah, yeah.

She was doing The Crystals back in the day.

Wait a minute.

Just traveling, not as the original.

No, no, I know this but that's my era.

Yeah, no doubt.

So it was like one original Crystal and the other two and Lisa was one of the other two.

Shit, I did shows with Lisa Fisher and I never knew it. Yes. Oh, when you were a kid with your dad, you're talking about.

Dude, we did mad shows with the Christmas.

Really?

My dad was like a doo-wop legend. Oh, that's crazy.

Shit.

Wow.

So anyway, we were using Lisa and a bunch of other singers and we told Lisa that we needed a singer. And she said, oh, my girl, Sandra lives in Dallas, and I could hook you up with them. And at the time, we were producing this group called the Mac Band.

Who was out of Dallas, yeah.

Who, I think, Babyface, they produced.

Roses are Red.

Roses are Red, right? Roses are Red. So we were producing some songs on that record, so we had to go to Dallas to produce them. And that's where we hooked up with Sandra at.

The Luther Vandals show.

I'll never forget it. Yeah, Lisa invited us to a Luther Vandals show.

What year was this?

1986? You don't tell us that.

Like, 86? It had to be in 86. It had to be 85, 86.

87.

No, it was 86 because I met Pete in 85.

Was there air conditioning on in the stadium when you went?

Yo, wait.

Cassandra said, I'll never forget. When did you ever forget Cassandra?

He was shady.

I was minding my own business. We said hello, and maybe because she was used to men melting over her, rightfully so. but she just said hello, and I said, oh, how you doing? And she thought I was being cold, but I think I just had some indigestion that day. So I didn't feel... It's like me and my auntie's story.

I think my stomach was hurting, like, oh, who's he think he is? I'm sorry to say, Victor.

Yeah, that sounds familiar.

It's good to see another dynamic.

I'm sorry to say, Victor. Who's this little Peter Law? Six five.

She's giving you commands and everything.

Come on, he looked down his nose at me. Jeff was like, hey, how you doing? He's like six foot billion.

Exactly, exactly.

But you know, he could look at me, but not look.

I was looking at the rest of you, baby. What's going on? Nice shoes. Good one, good one. HR, but good one, good one. It was the 80s.

Say that kind of shit.

Okay, this is the thing.

I'm really excited that you guys are on the show simply because the one story that I've, not story, but just the one narrative that that I never ever got to wrap my head around was what was the environment like.

For, I.

Guess the black musicians in, trying to navigate through the mid 80s, like the Marcus Millers, the Bernard Wrights, the Tawatha Gs, like what is the stratosphere of you guys.

Well, see, you know, all those people you mentioned. So basically all those people came out of the session scene, right?

Right.

So the session scene was thick. It's not anymore, right? But back then, you had your West Coast session folks and you had your East Coast session folks and all the people you mentioned. Marcus was more West. No, Marcus was East. But he ended up going back, yeah. But so, I mean, those people are mostly East Coast people and they came out of sessions and record labels... were looking to push people to the front, like M2 May and Tawatha out of M2 May from that session scene. So that's why you got the McMurphys and the Bernard Wrights and those folks that came from that scene. And also Pete and Jeff, you know what I mean? They were offered this producer's deal because they were doing all these sessions.

Was there a collective where like, I mean, I'm talking even deeper, like with Chaka's brother, like Mark Stevens and all these monsters, Lenny White and all those cats.

Yeah, we used to hook each other up, man.

Oh, yeah.

I mean, definitely.

Yeah.

There was a real camaraderie with folks. I mean, like Lisa and Brenda White King put me on, you know, because Lisa knew me before I moved here. And she introduced me to Brenda and- They all sort of took me under their wing, and they put you into the situations you need to be put into.

So what was your apprentice situation? Like, if you say that Lisa was a Luther disciple, who was your apprentice situation?

That would probably be Roy Ayers then, because, you know, that was how I first got up there, up here. Where am I now?

New York, yes? Yeah, yeah.

So, yeah, so it was Roy Ayers. You started to tell that story a little bit. Yeah, I got a lot of Roy stories.

But you said something like when you came to New York and you were with Roy, like that's when you knew things were different.

Like the way you entered New York was different than just. Oh, it was wild as fuck.

No, it was wild as fuck.

Let it out.

No FCC here.

Okay, okay, cool, cool.

Yeah, no, it was definitely a.

Put your clothes back on.

Oh, clothes? We have to keep clothes on?

We have to keep clothes on.

Darn.

I was trying to let the girls free.

I don't know.

I've got a love of that song.

Another Me Too moment. Or to me moment. To me.

I like that.

To me. New song.

That's how songs come up right there.

We'll get to.

That too. So Roy, I met him when I was playing with a group with Zachary Burrow. I don't know if you know who he is. We had to use his equipment so he came to our show and stuff. After the show, He was like, I want you to come to New York.

You want to be in my band?

I was like, uh, dirty old man. That's kind of what I thought. I was like, ew.

I was like, ew.

But yeah, I thought he was just pushing up, really. So I went and told the band. I'm like, Roy Ayers asked me to come to New York. They were like, yo, let's go. So I was like, wait. I wasn't really planning on accepting. They were like, no, you gotta just all go. So then I Reached out to Roy, and I said, Roy, so the whole band wants to come.

He says, I don't need the whole band.

So.

I want you.

Wow. I want you.

That's going to be.

I love you, too.

I was like, that's going to be awkward. Because they got the van. They got the transportation to get me there.

Sounds like someone else we know.

I'll give you a ride home.

That is also the D'Angelo story.

Oh, my God.

Oh, OK.

So.

So I went, the whole band decided to come. I said, but he said he doesn't really need. So we got there and he took me and Zachary, bro. But when we got there, he had set us up to stay at William Allen's house. William Allen is an arranger, string arranger for all of those beautiful ubiquity arranged songs. He did all those string arrangements. And we were staying at, I was, no, Zach and I was staying at William Allen's apartment in Harlem. And it was February 21st, 1982.

And it was like, you know, 47 inches of snow on the ground. And the cab like picked it.

Is that a gift of yours to recall dates?

I remember this definitely.

Oh, just this story.

I remember a lot of things like that, that like, you're like, well, things that terrify you, you have a tendency to.

Okay.

Yeah. Because we, we, we passed, I mean, I'm from Dallas. Okay. We have nice large streets and stop signs and lights. Everybody follows the rules. So we got here, we passed by like two blocks. I'm like, so I think we passed it. I think it was back there. He just said, okay, put it in reverse. And just like sped backwards, you know, like two and a half blocks in the snow and, you know, on a one-way street. And I was just scared shitless. And we got there and we stayed at Williams. And, you know, he didn't have a bed for us. He could barely walk to his house because he was a hoarder.

He had no food.

And we were like, what can we eat? He said, whatever you find in the pantry. opened a pantry, roaches dropped out. It was like, this is mine.

I was like, oh, fuck.

That was like my introduction.

To New York.

Back off.

I imagine a much freakier story.

Back off.

No, I got a freaky story for Roy, but that's later.

We'll tell you.

Oh, that's why I thought you.

I got a Roach story.

I got another freaky story.

That's what I thought you.

Roach's freak.

Freaky Dinky goes.

That's a whole other freaky Roy story.

He's crazy.

Roy was.

I don't think I can tell this story we had him on the show oh you heard the story we should have mentioned it yeah yeah go ahead tell it no that's okay.

No Roy is nuts but yeah that was.

Okay alright I mean that was.

Just my introduction to New York story.

That's what I thought alright so you I mean this was obviously just a conversation between the three of you and you're saying that you met at this Luther Vandross.

Show Met Sandra at two. Me and Pete met a few years before that.

Well, we were going to try out different singers, but I mean, I want to back track. Actually, because you didn't answer, the person who was kind of really my mentor in a way was Jeff, because he didn't know that, but he was kind of my... No, I didn't. He's finding out right now.

He's finding out right now.

In a way.

How many interviews have y'all done together?

Well, in a way, can you talk about that? Well, the thing is, because I had just come out with the Howard University... You know. You know. With the Howard U. So I was there around the same time as Wayne Lindsey and some other people.

We're here.

We're here. I graduated in 82.

Was Leroy Hudson a... Yes. Was he a teacher there as well?

He was a teacher there.

Leroy Hudson?

That guy? I think that's who you're talking about. I wasn't even in the jazz band, but I had been... how the Renee and Angela thing, I think right after I graduated or something like that, I was working with a friend who was a singer named Raymond Reader, a great singer.

Yeah, yeah, I remember.

That was your group, right? Right, yeah. You had a female too, right?

Right.

They were going to turn us into another Shalimar, okay? With Norma Jean. Yeah, so that's who we were going to be, another Shalimar, right?

Okay.

All right, as you can see, it didn't quite work.

Y'all can't pop lock him?

Yeah, couldn't pop. Yeah, six, five popping don't really, you know, look like Pinocchio or whatever trying to pop lock. But anyway, so I was in that band, but that situation didn't work out. I won't get into the gory details of it, but it didn't work out, and I went back to New York. But I wasn't really necessarily in the New York scene like Jeff was. You know, sometimes I would hang with Jeff, and he was working with Kashif, and I went with him up there, and a lot of people who were there We're like, who's.

The guy over there?

The weird guy. Who's the weird guy? No, Jeff said, no, he's cool. That was the question. I don't even remember you going up there. You went up there with me? They only let me up there once. Okay, okay. But when I was up there once, there was a whole bunch of songwriters. And they were like, we're going to say, we can come up with these ideas. And they said, well, you write songs, right? I said, yeah, I know. I ran a little bit. So, right now, we were kind of jamming the idea, and I was like, oh yeah, and I came, I started singing stuff, and they were like, that's all right, that's cool. And then I left. I think about maybe a year later, I kind of heard what I was singing that day. But, and I'm not

lying either. But, so there was a, so I knew some of the people from Howard University, but in terms of the New York crew and hanging all the singers and stuff, I didn't kind of really know as much as Sondra and Jeff. But as we got a chance to produce the records like Jeff was saying, we got to do some stuff with Merlin Bob. And so we were on the Atlantic and they said, why don't you guys do a producer album? And that's how it came about finding this singer. But the thing is, since I was the outsider and the most fucked up one of the group, they didn't know people. The interesting thing, you're talking about the times and how people... It was a click. Yeah, it was kind of a click. I was never in

any clicks. I'd be like, Jeff, can I go with you? He'd say, yeah, no, he's cool. The tall guy's cool. But it affected kind of our sound and music because the 80s was a very unique time. A unique time was like the kind of bridge, as you know, between- Transition. Transition.

It was definitely transition.

Transition. And all I know is whatever the fuck was going on in the 80s for me personally, I wasn't fucking digging. But I hadn't really realized what that was yet. So these singers were really great, but there was a certain sound. So we started to make our album, Why Saja Fit In. All these singers, they were like, and it came from a little bit from the Kashif school.

He made some real dope records. It was like, it was a type of singing back then with background singers. Love come down. You know what that kind of, hmm, hey, hmm, hmm. and their shit was tight.

This is my favorite episode of my podcast ever.

This is my dream.

This is like talking to three mirrors, like all this random information. I don't have to say shit.

She was like, hi, whoo, hi, hee. But, you know, but Sandra, when she sang, she was like, ah, ah, ah, ah. She was a siren. She was that fucking Tina Turner kind of like, my shit is unbridled. I'm trying to be hee-hoo-hoo, but I wasn't really into that. So you didn't like the sheen and the professionalism. Yeah, I didn't know what that thing was. And we were doing back runs of the album. I'd be like, could you guys not make it so clean? And they'd be like, what's wrong?

That was a Jackie Gleason double take for those on radio who didn't see what I just did. I see, I see. Dad, who's Jackie Gleason? But anyway. So in terms of. Sandra just fit into an energy that we had and we knew naturally. And even with our first album, Chapters, we hadn't really locked in quite to what that thing was, but all I knew was I didn't want to hear the shit I had been hearing. Rob Markman Yeah, yeah.

Rob Markman Okay, well let's get to that.

I think.

We could safely assume that the most defined sound of what the 80s was, at least for the beginning of the 80s to the mid-80s, I mean, was the kind of sound that Prince crafted that Minnesota... Well, not for us. But there was Boogie, I know, with the work that Kashif did and everything, and Leroy Burgess. Any Leroy Burgess... Well, VJ, you work with everyone. Did you.

My life is a blur in terms of that. I mean, yeah, I have worked with a lot of people.

I mean.

The 80s to me, I mean, I think the 70s to me was like the best time for music.

Of course. But the 80s.

Was transitional to me because the sound just changed and I thought people were just trying to figure things out in terms of the sound, sonically, everything kind of just sounded stiff and perfect. And we just kind of had to go through that. I mean, even today, as much as we can get to anything that we want sometimes sonically things just sound kind of over quantized to me hell yeah yeah everything just sounds kind of over quantized and it's too processed it's not bad it's not good it's not a bad thing or a good thing is but it's a thing so it's numbing yeah yeah it's it's numbing you know because the funny thing is i went to to visit my son over the Christmas holidays, you know what I mean? I don't really celebrate Christmas, but,

you know, I had to go see my son. So he was taking me back to the airport and we were listening to all this music, right? And I'm hearing one song and everything sounds perfect. Everything, you know, harmonies, big drums, everybody's into the loudness and the, you know, so this one song comes on by this girl, I forgot her name, but it sounded so soulful, harmonies, As soon as the song finished, me and my son started laughing at the same time. We started laughing at the same time. You know, he's my son, but he realized that everything sounded the same. And there's always like just kind of one song that will kind of stick out and you realize how fucked up things have kind of gotten and everybody's kind of just playing the, you know,

I got to sound like the last.

Thing, you know? Well, that's the thing though, but in the 80s, you have to choose a path.

For sure.

It's like there's Boogie, there's the Minneapolis Prince Sound. There's also hip-hop. How are you guys wrestling with what hip-hop has become and the fact that you're developing a craft, but yet you're people that just seem to.

Well, I think what the key transition was for us and then how it leads musically... is that there was this link with 60s and 70s children music. So, but then the music got electronic and slick. But what the bridge was, was hip-hop. So, hip-hop was feeding off of that rawness from the James Brown and the drums and all that kind of stuff. In the late 80s, though.

In the late, yeah.

In the mid-80s, have you guys dealt with Larry Smith?

I'm just throwing out New York names.

I know him.

Yeah, I don't know him personally.

I don't know him personally, but I know of him.

I know of him.

I think the thought was, what I was getting to is like, we did a session. I was following to Jeff, carrying Jeff's bags to a session one day. And I would just, a lot of times I would just sit there and be quiet and listen to people. They were doing a hip hop record. And I was listening to it and I was like, you know, at that particular time, I hadn't really heard yet somebody Bring the sensibilities of hip hop, the drums, what's happening underneath with a melodic song kind of at that particular time. So that concept of bringing that together. And plus, there was starting to be on East Coast certain rock records that I heard that I liked. And then listening to more soulful stuff.

And since we were called The Stand, we were going to become The Family Stand and change our name because Yvonne Jeffries and The Stand was too confusing. That story, we can get to it at a later time. But that's what led to Ghetto Heaven. That idea of, let me sing a song within the context of this hip-hop, raw-ish type of, beat.

I'm going to tell them how Ghetto Heaven came to be.

What is Ghetto Heaven? I love that we're going to break down the song before I even get to how you guys got your group name, but let's go.

You want me to tell you how the song came to be?

Yes.

You know Salaam Remy?

Yes, we do.

He was kind of the inspiration for that song because when we were on our first album, you know, we did the first album, the record company, you know, we were like that group that they didn't exactly know what to do with us. So they kind of fucked us around and, you know, so I said, I, I knew Saran.

Who's your A & R?

Merlin Bob.

Right.

Y'all were on Elektra?

That was Atlantic.

That was Atlantic at the time.

So Merlin Bob was at Atlantic first?

Yeah.

Okay. I remember his electric phase with Sylvia.

Sylvia.

They were.

They both went together.

Okay. I forgot.

I forgot. Yeah.

They were getting us all, me and Pete, all the production work. Okay. But anyway, after that first album, I knew Salaam Remy's father because him and I grew up together. We did the Chitlin Circuit. We did a lot of sessions together.

Mm-hmm.

So I said, Pete, we need to go talk to my friend Van, Van Gibbs, right? So Van was over there on 54th Street and 11th Avenue. I set up a meeting with him so we could kind of talk because we were getting kind of frustrated with what the record company was not doing for us. And we had our little talk, and then we heard this music coming from the basement. So I said, what's that? He said, that's my son. His name is... I knew, that's my son Salam. He's going to be a producer. He said, you want to go down and listen? So we went down and listened to the music. And then he listened to the music. He said, he came over and listened to me. He said, I got an idea. He said, I got an idea. So after we left Vans, we

went straight back to Ebbets Field and worked on Getter Heaven. Came up with a drum beat. Came up with a drum beat. Now, if you remember the original version of Red Velvet.

With funky drummer.

With funky drummer. Came up with a bass line.

That came from, because I was in love with Kool Moe D. And I said, Jeff, I was in love with Kool Moe D.

What's that?

He had us on the Wild Wild West. So then I, that's why I said Kool.

Oh, I didn't even know that. You remember? I said, I like that bass line.

Why get the feeling y'all just mean each other right now?

I know, but I didn't know that bass line.

Yeah, so then you said, ba-do-ba-doom-boom-ba-doom. Ba-do-ba-doom-boom-ba-doom-ba-doom. So he was like, ba-boom-boom-boom.

Yeah.

I was like, I love that. So then you like sort of fucked with, you twisted a little bit.

So the record company heard it.

Yeah, but see, here's the thing.

Here's the thing. See, this is the piece that I always remember about the inspiration of Ghetto Heaven. Because the Salam thing was part of that. But also, we had gone to the label. We had submitted the whole record.

Right, right.

We had submitted the whole album. And they were like, yo, this is dope.

This is dope.

We didn't hear no singles.

Yeah, yeah.

So we were like, son of a. And so we were like so excited about the album and disappointed. that they didn't hear, you know, because we felt like they were singles, you know?

It was change, right? It was change.

So we like, I remember, you know, eventually getting back to studio, it was like, you know, it was just like, they just want nursery rhymes. They just wanted nursery rhymes. Those people were like, I know I love my baby. I know I love my baby. I remember that.

He did the same thing with Rush Rush.

With Rush Rush. Rush Rush was a dare. Wait, wait, wait. Time out.

Was Rush Rush the last song done for Spellbound?

Rob Markman No, no, no.

Rob Markman The first one.

Rob Markman You just did the same formula. Rob Markman Exactly, right?

No, no.

Rob Markman Not really.

Rob Markman Nah, it wasn't, no.

Rob Markman Well, you want to hear the Rush Rush story?

Rob Markman I asked you to, I said, you can't play, you can't write a song with just two chords.

Rob Markman He said, bling, bling. Rob Markman No, no, that wasn't it. That was, that was big part of it. Rob Markman No, man. Rob Markman The other part was, no, at the time... What happened was, usually what happens is, at the time, Babyface was writing a lot of songs. We would go back, and Babyface is a great songwriter, of course.

I love him.

But I would say to her, I can write those songs in my sleep. Wait, wait, time out.

So did you purposely use the DX7 patch just as a point of sarcasm?

No, it wasn't a point of sarcasm. I literally said... I knew what his thing was. The thing was, there was a way he hit the beat. So I was like, I jokingly went to the piano and I said, You're the whisper of a summer breeze. You're the kiss that puts my soul at ease. And I was like, oh, that sounds good. And that's the first two things I said.

But there was a way he would write songs that would kind of go, I want to run, I want to try. I'm going to take to you. Yeah. On my heart, on my soul. It's a pocket to a song. And every songwriter has their pocket. So once you figure out what the mofo's pocket is, you'll be like, oh, you want that type of song? You want that type of song? That's the pocket of that thing. So it's all of... There you go, baby.

Take that.

Oh, wow.

So that's it, my brother. Yo.

Who you texting here?

I got to do this.

Who you calling? Babyface, yo, this dude sent you. I got to do this.

Wait, I got to do this.

He had him on the show, though.

I got to do this.

Hang on. Please pick up.

What time is it on the... Oh, it's... Okay.

Just pick up, please.

I meant to tell him that when I met him, too, but he wasn't.

He didn't pay no mind.

It's not a butt down.

Okay.

Pick up. It's an odd time. It's six o'clock.

It's... You ready?

Damn it, damn it, damn it, damn it.

I'm officially calling Jimmy Jam to let him know that he's officially my second favorite Question of.

The Supreme episode. You should have left him a message. You should have left.

Him a message.

No, he's going to call back. I think he thinks that I'm butt-dolling him.

Oh, I got Jimmy Jam. Just bring him. Bring him. No, because it really was for Jimmy Jam, because the first song that I did, we kind of did... together, but I did this track with this song for this girl named Janice Christie. Okay. Heatstroke. Heatstroke. It's one of the worst songs I ever wrote, but it came a little bit of a hit.

It was a hit, though.

It was a hit.

What year was this? This was 1986 or 87, something like that. Okay.

Yeah.

So, the Janet Jackson's record had come out, so everybody was trying to do that, What Have You Done For Me Lately. And what was that song called?

By that group.

On that album? No, but it was another group. There's another song that came out, Alice Be My Girl. Full Force? Full Force. Full Force had a record, right, that was really dope. I want you just for me. Yeah, but so the bass line for Heatstroke was a, Kind of a combination of a ball for Jimmy. So it was like.

That sounds kind of funky. I don't know what you're talking about. Yeah, I know that.

You know, so it was that.

And the song was horrible, too. Stroke up, I'm burning up.

For the moment, it was kind of fly.

It was fly for the time. But usually my joke songs end up being hits. That's what happens. All the joke songs are the hits. I swear to God. Ghetto Heaven, Rush Rush, all the joke songs.

So he is like.

promise of.

A good day. Rob Markman, Jr.: He is. Even he is? Rob Markman, Jr.

No, no, no.

I was serious about that. Rob Markman, Jr.: No, I was serious about that.

Rob Markman, Jr.

But notice, he put that one out under another name.

Rob Markman, Jr.: No. You did an Alan Smithie? Rob Markman, Jr.: Yeah, that was really dumb too. Rob Markman, Jr.

Why?

Rob Markman, Jr.: Because at the time- Rob Markman, Jr.: Because I never knew until now. around 2004, I'm like, they're not checking for us anymore. I'm going to check my name to Joshua Nile, so they think I'm a new young hip hop cat, which was the dumbest shit I ever did in my fucking Oh, sorry. Rob Markman, Jr.: You don't know about that?

Stop editing yourself.

Rob Markman, Jr.

You don't know about Joshua Nile?

Rob Markman, Jr.

Joshua Nile? Rob Markman, Jr.: We did our research. Rob Markman, Jr.: He is, but the thing that inspired that was, again, going back to hip hop. there was this record that I loved, Broken Language, or Broken... Broken Language, by Smooth Dust. Yeah, yeah, that track, it was like, so, so, so, he was like, the mind, da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da- So when you... Motherfucker. Yo, when I hear her that song... You're right. Oh, God. So that's the connection between the soul and the hip hop.

That was your R & B broken language by Smooth the Hustler?

Yeah, basically.

Call Jimmy Jam back.

Call him back.

It's your number two now.

You know what? The interesting thing about that project that I remember too is that I remember them taking a long time to get back to us about doing the song because and we almost thought that they didn't want to do the song and we almost thought that Maybe they were trying to get somebody else to produce the song.

And it was just kind of a weird thing. And I think we almost gave the song away.

Yeah, well, the problem was they didn't intend for the first single to come from us.

Exactly. Exactly. They didn't intend for the first single to come from us. But they made the right choice.

They made the right choice.

Finally.

But the problem about that album, though, and go back to Jimmy and Terry, because we love, love, love them. Absolutely. But- that's their second single was, I wish I don't. Yeah. I think it was called I wish or something, but there's a song we had on there called four words from a heartbreak. There was a really dope song that actually, uh, should have been this next thing. It should have been the next thing, but it was, it was a tie.

So it was good, but we, but you know, there's a lot of times with music industry is politics and, you know, um, Most of the time. Yeah. And we get it though. And the name. And we actually had offered that. So I think we had tried to get it to Whitney Houston. And then I think Satan. I'm sorry.

Chris.

Clive Davis. Clive Davis.

Yeah.

I'm sorry.

Oh my God. Shots fired. You got to let that sip on you. Shots fired. That shit was great. Me so much. The way you dropped it, it.

Was just. Oh, yo. My mind is about to explode right now. Because we're all over the place. All right, so since we're... No, no, we're just being sporadic. This is what I want to know. Because when I got word that you guys were producing Spellbound... Paula Abdul's second album. Yes, her second album. Her follow-up to her.

I mean, her.

It was a massive record for you.

Yeah, I mean, Forever Your Girl was more like an industry. That built Virgin.

And.

Opportunities like that don't come... That story doesn't happen. When I heard you guys were producing it, and the line share of the record, I was like, yo!

How?

Yeah.

That's from him playing in our house, playing the piano. How did that happen?

How did it happen? Because I would have thought, okay, well, okay, knocked out. That was upstart L.A. baby face. But now that they're the shit, let's, like, she's in industry now.

Y'all were doing Aftershock first, right?

She wanted to do, she wanted to do something different. She was, this is where.

I, She wanted to make an artistic statement. Yeah, she did.

She wanted, she didn't want to feed the machine. No, she didn't want to do, she felt like she was, she wanted to do something different.

To move past that.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

That's why I give her a lot of credit.

She was big enough to make her own vows.

And she's really underestimated in terms of her artistic intellect and discipline. So when she heard Rush Rush, she flipped over that. And we were working with a group called Aftershock. We did an album for Virgin. So that's how she kind of heard about us. And after she heard Rush Rush, she loved that. And then what else did we write?

Then I think. Blown Kisses in the Wind. Blown Kisses in the Wind, Promise of a New Day. Yeah, Promise of a New... They Marry Me.

So did I hear that?

No, Promise of a New Day was so dark the way those dissonant.

Strings came in.

But the juxtaposition of the video being so sunny and.

Everything, I was like, But listen, the coolest song on there, I'm sorry, it was Viobology.

Oh, Viobology.

I remember Viobology.

What happened?

I think the MTV Award performance did a disservice.

That did it in.

It did it.

Because literally the next day.

Yeah, we were watching it.

We were watching it.

We were like, oh shit. So the next day. The managers told us, yo, Reddy is literally saying, you're not sending us the fat song, are you? Ain't that a bitch?

Yo, man.

She wasn't even fat. Can I put it in context with you, Laia?

I'm Googling the video.

No, it's not even the video. She performed at the MTV Awards. And because, you know, I mean, pre-social media, I don't even know how people managed to collect... Like, I knew the collective thought was that, oh my God, what happened to Paula?

Exactly.

It was ridiculous.

And they blamed the song. Right, they blamed the song. And I liked the song. That was the next single.

What did they- And they like, they just sort of- She gained weight?

No.

No. This is when you're a costume, you know when you have like the- She had a weird costume on with some headlights on the ass. But it was a wireless microphone, I think something on the back or something that kind of made it jet out funny. Right, so she looked funny. So it made it look, she's two pounds, if that, and it made it look like she was three pounds. Really?

Three.

Yeah, exactly.

So literally, the radio, because they were sending the single the next day, they were like, you're not sending us the fat song. And it just killed the momentum of that song. And honestly, I mean, if I'm going to tell you, the backgrounds on that song for me is the most proud I am of any background I've done recorded in my career because of the fact that I got to use my classical training. Oh, yeah.

Vibology.

All of that.

I did all of them voices from the bah to the ah. I did all of those.

Can we ask you about that? Because Bill sent a video, audio of when she was in high school. And I was like, this can't really be Sandra.

It was like the opera.

I do.

We're nerds. I know how to find things. Uh-oh. We're nerds. We're the government. Uh-oh. We're the government. I hope they don't find that Vanessa Del Rio tape.

Oh, that's play school now.

That's another thing.

I know, right?

Well, wait, Sandra St. Victor.

Range, ma'am.

Well, no, I mean, I was trained. I mean, you know, I went to like music and art where Erica went, where Roy Hargrove went, Nora Jones.

All that shit went out the window when she met us.

Listen.

They told me to stop being so perfect. And I was, you know, it was like, oh, really?

Okay. Rock and roll. I'm like, did it erase?

Can you still hit the, you still got it?

Of course.

I mean, yeah, that's in you, you know. So the classical training never leaves you. But that's what I got. The best training I got is being in the studio with Pete and Jeff telling me the feel is the most important thing.

The feel.

Don't lose the feel. I'm like, can I do that again? They're like, no, I felt good. You're not doing it again. I'm like, please, can I do it again?

They're like, nope.

So, like, yeah. Yeah, they didn't let me, you know, perfect it. They don't let me perfect it. So, you know, they're like that.

So after two takes, then it's like, that's a wrap.

Whatever to take is right.

Whatever to take is right, yeah.

And I want it to be like something else, but if it feels right, and they both end up, you know, they're like that and Mark Batson is like that. Those producers don't care if the note is right, if the pronunciation, they want. The take to feel right. That's the prime objective. So, you know, that's important because, you know, I listen. I was actually today listening to a bunch of, like, you know, 70s and 80s stuff like Gene Karn and, you know, Infinite Eyes. And I'm like, she ain't singing. It ain't like perfect. It's about the feel. It's about, you know, it's about where she's coming from with the note. It's not about where the note lands.

Where she come from.

But it's funny because she still has a similar background as you were. She knows how to do it classically.

Oh, yeah.

She's classically trained, too. Yeah.

Jeff, you're not getting away with this. I'm sorry.

Come on, man. I have to.

At least back up the tree in at least 15 years just to start with. For starters, you were taught by Yusef Latif?

No, I studied with him for a second in college. For a second, I wasn't taught by him. I went to Borough of Manhattan Community College for about a year. That was just my extent of college. Because once I made it out of high school, I don't know how, I said, let me give college a try. So I got in there and I studied with him for a little while. And he was, you know, he was showing me some things. In fact, I didn't even know he played flute. I didn't know the flute was his thing.

Right.

And, you know, I was just... Once a week, I go and we just do some private lesson things. That's about the extent of me studying with him.

What is your preferred weapon of choice as far as your arsenal? Is it soprano, alto, tenor?

I've been playing a lot of soprano lately. I don't want to.

I mean, gun to your head, what's your axe? Because you have so many.

Tenor.

Don't say gun to. Tenor. With this guy. That's right.

Do one.

You don't want that one.

Put my shit on.

Tenor, but I've been playing a lot of soprano probably the last maybe four or five years. I've been playing a lot of soprano. A lot of soprano.

I love you on Barry, though. I love you on Barry.

I love me on Barry too, but that doesn't make me enough.

Okay.

So here's the question I have. So our particular sax player, uh ian hendrickson smith okay uh formerly of the dab kings oh um and so the thing is that ian hates when i make him break out the soprano he doesn't now for us it's hilarious But he hates the sheen associated.

With the Soprano.

Well, I mean, that and, you know, it's almost like, I guess the unwritten rule is, like, after Coltrane, you know, is done with it. Who else wants to? And more power to Wayne Shorter. More power to, you know, I know there are other greats that I've touched.

I didn't like Coltrane's sound on Soprano.

You serious?

I didn't like his sound on Soprano.

You are one of a kind.

I didn't like his sound on Soprano. He said it loud, yes. Tanner, he's my favorite all time, but Soprano, I didn't like his tone on Soprano.

Who did you like on Soprano?

I like Wayne Shorter.

Oh, yeah, okay. So you feel the.

Definitive sound of the Soprano sax is Wayne Shorter?

No, not the definitive sound. His sound just connects with me more on Soprano. Coltrane, because I think he got, if I remember correctly, that was something that was a gift from Miles, right?

Yes.

Yeah, so he picked it up. I guess he was trying to do something. But I wasn't crazy about his sound, sonically his sound. I wasn't crazy about his sound.

So what were you looking for as far as engineering? I wasn't looking for anything.

I wasn't looking for anything. It just wasn't connecting me. It just sounded kind of.

Contrived.

No, not even contrived. I think he was sincere about what he was doing, but it just didn't sound... It wasn't for you. It wasn't for me.

That's the best way I could describe it. So what's your favorite period of Coltrane then?

Giant Steps.

All right, it's mid-period. Pre-spiritual or?

No, the stuff when he started going out.

You don't like the primitive and?

The stuff when he started, I mean, I like the, I mean, the stuff when he started going out, it just got a little bit too out for me. Okay. But the era of Giant Steps before that. You know, stuff he was doing in the 60s with Miles was, I loved all of that stuff. I mean, he had like a sound to me. He just had, his sound just connected. I remember.

So who's your sax guy then? Because I just naturally assume that everyone worships the Coltrane no matter what.

Yeah, Coltrane no matter what. I mean, I like Michael Brecker. He was like that cat to me.

Unsung hero, okay.

You know, I mean, those two guys. I mean, there's just so many guys. I mean, I could go back to Dexter Gordon. Prez had his own sound, you know, the smooth thing. Bird was just, Bird was fast. I mean, man, Bird was just, I don't know, man.

So explain to me, because the thing is that you managed to capture, The one thing I always hear about when an iconic solo is captured in a song, it's always the same story. And the story is, okay, guys, I'm ready to cut it. Nope, we got it already. Thank you very much. I know that's your story.

Yeah.

But did you know that you captured Lightning in a Bottle with your saxophone solo on Caribbean Queen?

No.

No, that I have to give credit to the producer, Keith Diamond, at the time, because he was the one that he knew pretty much what he wanted in terms of the song. So we would just take sections because, I mean, I went into the studio and I was just kind of trying to get a feel of what the song was. And they had the tape rolling. He told Bob Rosa to roll the tape while I was playing.

And I was in front of the mic. They were trying to get a sound. So I said, okay, I think I got something. And then he said, no, come on in. So you were just warming up? I was just warming up.

You didn't beg them to let me just do a take of it?

No, no.

That song was pieces, because he had the whole tape rolling, and he took pieces of what I played from the beginning of the song to the end. I want you to play this part here. And we just kind of constructed the solo. And the interesting thing about it is after that song blew up, man, I was getting calls.

Everybody and their mother was calling me. And my friend Van, he said, yo, Jeff, you need to start charging people because I was undercharging people. He said, you know, your shit is hot. You need to get paid for it. So I just started charging people.

Going up a little more?

Yeah.

I went up a lot more.

Steve can attest to this. So when Billy Ocean finally agreed to come on our show, and this is after six long years of begging him, please come on the Tonight Show.

Please, please, please.

Tonight Show.

And he finally agrees to come to the show, and we're losing our shit. And then I'm looking at Ian, our sax player, and we were like, dude, you have to do it note for fucking note. And do we spend two hours just singing that shit to him?

But you don't know that.

Everybody knows that solo.

Between that solo and Carolyn's Whisper, those are the solos of the 80s.

But here's the thing, though.

It's like, I know a lot of Tariq's lyrics. Tariq, you know. I mean, Tariq, well, let me not misrepresent him. I think the average person knows, like, can retain like maybe 75 songs or 75, those things. But it's just like, I mean, I know that song because I DJed so much. I, you know, watch TV.

All the time. You're an American.

Americans who were born before 80 have to know that.

Yeah.

Note for note.

That's solo.

Chief is like deep jazz.

He's like Doug Karn. He's boozy jazz. I'll be fancy. Okay. No, no, no. Boozy jazz. Boozy jazz. It's not boozy.

It's like he's more avant-garde. That's where his heart is. I mean, he made his meat and potatoes as the Dab King, so all that, like.

You don't think it's bougie when you don't know the solo to Caribbean?

Come on, man.

No, no, no.

You know it, but I don't think... Like, anybody that's on The Tonight Show now... Like, again, my story is that I didn't grow up saying, hey, one day I'm going to be the new Doc Severinsen of The Tonight Show.

It just happened.

And I'm prepared for it, but part of the job of being on The Tonight Show is that you... All the pop culture sponging that you've done in your life, everything you've learned, now gets utilized on the show. So, you know. I mean, you know that solo, but it's like, now you got to execute it perfectly.

Execute it, that's different.

Well, yeah, that's, no, that's.

I'm sorry, wait up.

I love that solo, man.

Wait, wait.

All right, now you're singing Sanford and Sunderland.

When's the last time you had.

To play that solo verbatim?

Or don't tell me 35 years ago after I.

Did it, that was it. When I had to play it?

Yes.

I can't remember.

You didn't tour with him at all? Oh, no, no, no, no.

The only two times I really played with him was one night, the week, the night he was on Saturday Night Live. He did two nights at Radio City. Those were the only times that I ever played with Billy. And ironically, the last night that I played with him was when I lost the horn that I had. Because we went out- Wait.

You literally lost that horn?

No, let me tell you what happened. After- The show, you know, because he sold out Radio City two nights. I sat in with him two nights. The second night we went and we, after the show, we went to kind of celebrate, you know, went up, got a couple of drinks. I went down into the, after we were done, I went down into the garage to get my car.

the guy brought my car my horn was in the back of the car I didn't put it in the car yet I paid went and paid for the car and drove off and left my horn when I got home I looked in the trunk I was like oh shit so I went back to the garage of course they didn't see nothing they didn't see they didn't see nobody saw anything and so the only time I ever see that horn for reruns of Saturday Night Live.

Somewhere in life, there's like some grandkid that got a saxophone from the church not knowing what they just got.

Yeah, well, somebody, yeah, some.

Jesus Christ.

That thing should be in the Blacksonian.

Blacksonian, yeah.

So, Sandra.

Yes, I know. Okay, so your journey is just as rich as well. I'll tell you, we're not even going to properly get to the family stand. This is almost like a nine-part episode.

Prequels.

I know. Open doors.

This is fun.

How much pounding of the pavement did you do in New York?

Oh, wait.

Can you wait one second, please? We're getting a phone call.

Oh, really?

We're getting a phone call right now.

Oh, are we?

James Harris III.

Yes, sir. What's up, man?

How you doing? I'm currently right now taping an episode of Questlove Supreme.

Okay.

I regret to form you of this, and I've made it public. I've declared my loyalty, my allegiance to you since the history of my show. But you are now officially in second place. You've been demoted to second place because the Family Stand episode is the craziest thing I've ever heard in my life.

Is that right? Yes.

I'm currently right now with V Jeffrey, Sandra St. Victor, and Peter.

Okay.

And yeah, I had to tell you that live on the.

Air that- We love you, bro, by the way.

We love you, bro.

We love you, sweetie. You know that. Thank you for giving me the heads up on Prince. But I don't need sympathy, love.

All kinds.

They got to hit you on Sirius Radio.

By the way.

Now they're like, they're going to do your show. Yes, I know. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

We want to come on your show too.

We'll be there.

Just call us.

More sympathy love. More sympathy love. I'm sorry.

This is the craziest, the stories I've heard. It's, you know, like we're very organized. We're going in chronological order. No, it's just going all over the place. I can't wait to hear.

It, man.

Yes, man. Anyway, I just want to let you know you're number two, but you're still number one, but you're number two now.

This ain't going to be six hours.

What'd you say? I'm still number one as a solo act, though. Yes.

You're the number one solo act.

Thank you.

I'm just going to get my category together.

All right.

You're still the number one solo act on Quest Love Supreme.

Thank you. Okay, perfect. Okay, thank you.

All right, bro.

I'll talk to you later.

All right, bro. That's hilarious.

Oh, God. Of course, Love Supreme is a production of iHeartRadio.

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QLS Classic: The Family Stand Part 1

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