0:00

Of Course Love Supreme is a production of I

0:02

Heart Radio. This classic episode

0:04

was produced by the team at Pandora.

0:08

Hey, what's up y'all? List you man, Fonte, Fontigo,

0:10

New Takolo, Nicotin, Takelo and right now.

0:12

This is yet another Quest Love Supreme classic

0:15

from February, first seen

0:18

pre Roll when we sat down with

0:21

hip hop mogul Kevin Loud where

0:23

he talked about the early Baltimore scene,

0:25

his rise to president of def Jam

0:28

at the value of hard work, and also

0:30

a lot of people didn't know his little his very little

0:33

known role in writing a song called

0:35

Girl. You know it's true. This is an amazing

0:37

episode, so listen check it out,

0:40

y'all know where to get it. Fontakolo, Quest

0:42

of Supreme classic, Dessert Suprema,

0:55

roll Call, Suma, Suprema

0:59

rod called Subprima, sub

1:02

Frema roll call, sub Prima

1:05

some sub Prima rogue

1:07

card and course love Girl Yeah,

1:09

I am course love Girl, Yeah, I

1:11

am course love girl. Yeah. And this

1:14

is true Subprima

1:18

road call, sub Brima, Subrima

1:22

road All. My name is Fonte, Yeah,

1:25

feed me seymore Yeah, shout

1:27

out to all my yea niggas

1:29

I and be more. Sub

1:34

Frema roll call sub Prima

1:37

subprima roll

1:39

car name is Sugar Yeah with

1:41

Kevin Lyles. Yeah, Quest

1:43

love Suprema. Yeah, don't change

1:46

that tile rob

1:48

Brima subrima

1:50

rog call, sub prima sub

1:54

prima roll call on pay Bill,

1:56

Yeah, going wild Yeah,

1:59

Quest loves Supreme. Yeah, Kevin

2:02

Moro calla Brima

2:06

road call, Prima Frema

2:10

road call. It's like yeah,

2:14

yeah, having nothing lady. Yeah,

2:17

but these dudes got damn rod almost

2:22

road Prima Prima

2:26

road called. Receiver's whack. Yeah,

2:29

say it's about Bill. Yeah yeah,

2:31

I said that ship. Yeah, just keeping

2:34

it real. Road

2:42

road call my name iss Kevin, Yeah,

2:45

I guess I'm here. Yeah, I

2:47

want to tell you. Yeah, I have

2:49

no fear. Rolla sub

2:54

Frema road call, frima

2:58

road called spell you weary road.

3:09

Oh that's so much

3:11

just happened. That's first

3:19

of coldown.

3:25

Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to Engineer

3:28

All Opinion video. Now

3:31

calmdown, come to Quest of Smoking.

3:34

Come on, ladies and gentlemen,

3:36

welcome to another edition our

3:38

first February Black History

3:41

month. Bruary to uh Quest

3:43

of Supreme. Then I say February with a brew.

3:45

I don't know because I say February,

3:48

but without the brew. Yeah, yeah, February.

3:50

It's weird Wednesday. Those

3:53

are like names that like it's like a black teenage

3:56

mother name those like.

3:58

This is all these extra letters in part

4:03

of Africa's in February comes from I

4:07

stole that from the pound cake speech

4:09

from Bill Cosby. Bill

4:13

Cosby, Oh

4:18

my god. Uh well you

4:20

know this this is uh

4:22

well, it's not necessarily a special edition, of course,

4:25

love supreme. But we have a very special

4:27

guest, um who in my

4:29

opinion, uh, he's the example

4:32

of true excellence, entireless

4:36

determination and work and

4:39

long hours um from

4:42

interning in the mail room to ordering

4:46

in the lunch room. I feel like Jesse Jackson in

4:49

the mail room, to order in the lunch room,

4:51

to room to meeting firing

4:58

iron in the boardroom. Ladies

5:00

and gentlemen, please give it up for Mr

5:03

Kevin LIUs. Welcome

5:06

about the welcome man,

5:09

Okay, I

5:11

have to say, first

5:14

of all, thank you for accepting and clearing

5:17

your schedule, because you are probably

5:19

the hardest working executive I've

5:22

ever known. I can tell you know

5:24

so I do I

5:28

do my research. Really, I mean to me that

5:30

the difference between you and another

5:32

well known uh public

5:35

figure CEO. Is that

5:37

you're not about the spotlight.

5:40

You're the one that didn't want to be up on all

5:42

the videos and dancing. Can

5:45

I ask you, once you realize that that was allowed,

5:48

did you like regret like, well, I'm the one that actually

5:50

had the hit. I can't dance, So I'm good.

5:56

No, I'm good. I enjoy the

5:58

culture, enjoy the opportunity that that

6:01

that God gives me. And I'm miss a worker, you know,

6:03

I don't. I think you lead by example.

6:05

You don't just um do

6:08

it for the job, but do it for the glory. I

6:10

think there's a lot of gut before the

6:12

glory, you know what I mean. So that's me, you know, I

6:15

mean just based on your history and where

6:18

you know a lot of your lean years,

6:21

the work that you put in. Um,

6:24

I had to also say that you also might be a

6:26

glutton for punishment because

6:30

we're gonna get into that. We're gonna get into that. Um

6:33

take a little bro. What up? Happy

6:36

February? Happy February? It

6:40

is it's black history buff right,

6:43

it's black Wait? Why is it? I thought we were last

6:45

month? Because because I'm black, you know, I'm real, real

6:47

black. So have you know just

6:50

you yea in this room? How

6:52

your blackness get to claim the whole month on

6:55

the Kanza episode? Bro, this is

6:57

still about Klanza because your

6:59

own that was a long time ago.

7:02

But we regret that because I had to look up

7:04

who uh that? Who's

7:06

the Carina? No, the

7:09

person that you talked to York Chi.

7:12

No, what

7:16

happened on a previous episode was that Fante

7:19

like to compare the founder of York

7:22

and that's the that's the rabbit.

7:27

How come I are you late? Yeah?

7:30

I was late. I'm also in my forties, so why

7:32

would have to know about

7:34

Joey and the camera? Yeah? I only know just from

7:37

Twitter that you know. That was how I found

7:39

out my research

7:41

on Quae. This is why because

7:44

I'm black. I mean, you know, once Chuck

7:46

Woolery agreed with the Fante then and

7:51

we'll be back into Okay,

7:56

okay, okay, anyway, Mr

7:58

Liles, Um, we usually

8:01

start with the timeline at the beginning.

8:03

So you're you're from be more correct,

8:05

yes, be more You're

8:07

claiming Baltimore too, I'm I'm sorry, sir. I should

8:09

say yes because I went to Morgan State, so every

8:12

city when in

8:18

Baltimore, don't. They're very different. Well,

8:21

cousin the cousins, you know, we

8:23

were family always like

8:25

each other. Shout out to Buzzy.

8:27

You know, I'm I'm I got a lot

8:30

of family in d C. You know, a lot of family

8:32

and be more. The whole d m V is like I've

8:34

made my tracks there, so you know, I love all

8:37

of it. You know, you know I'm coming. I'm surprised you still

8:39

have your Baltimore accent, like I still

8:41

hear your twos and you you

8:43

cut me up and I'm be more. You

8:46

know that. That's just what it is. And I've been accepted,

8:49

uh here in New York. I've made a twenty five years,

8:51

so it's like, you know, I'm

8:53

getting New York to you know what I mean. So, but you cut me

8:55

up and I'm being more forever. I

8:58

didn't know that too. And you that's

9:02

a joint, that's a join or

9:04

that's I don't think Baltimore has a dawn.

9:07

It's just the what do you call the you

9:09

know what? Though? Okay, not that

9:11

I should hold near and dear what.

9:14

I don't want to be that person that references the wire

9:16

like well, on the wire, I saw, but

9:19

I actually heard Snoop's character

9:21

used the word John when describing UM

9:25

like wiggle it jiggle

9:27

it came on young. Wait

9:30

was yes he was? Did

9:32

you sign him? No? You were

9:34

still there? I was there, Okay. I thought

9:37

because of Baltimore you were there. Okay,

9:41

Well yeah, basically like Snoop

9:45

use the word John. She might have said

9:47

Joe because Joe is kind of like but no,

9:50

she meant like, that's my joint us

9:53

that to yeah, Yo, you know, I'll

9:55

use yo for everything. Yo. I

10:00

thought you was a New York thing as But

10:02

I appreciate you because you you still go back. You would

10:04

just at Morgan like writing that recently, Like you

10:07

constantly go back and get back to ye And

10:10

I try to tell people you're nothing without

10:12

bringing people with you. So I just go as

10:14

a beacon of light. We're raising two fifty

10:16

million dollars for UM Morgan

10:19

and if you go there. When I went there, you

10:21

know, we stayed at Commings and now it's

10:23

like one of the top you know, five universities

10:26

for engineers, the number one African American

10:29

UM University for engineers,

10:31

you know what I mean. So I'm a former engineer, so it's

10:33

as a blessing to go back all the time. My whole

10:35

family is there too, so it's like the most up north

10:37

HBCU as well. Yes, yes, man,

10:41

you are really giving back, Like I

10:43

feel bad, Like I think I gave a drum

10:46

set to my high school. Whatever

10:49

bore you are there? Yeah everything,

10:52

Yeah, that's my my city. You know, one

10:54

thing when you come from humble beginnings and you

10:57

know, like I tell people, most of my

10:59

journey comes from real life ship you know what I mean?

11:01

So like I didn't, I've been in it. You

11:03

know, you talk about the why that was my that was the

11:06

error, you know what I mean of like my

11:08

uncle's and everybody and and for for

11:11

me to be here and um

11:13

just talk about it, still talk about

11:15

my city. UM just recently keen

11:18

on Compiter, who went to Woodland after

11:20

me, younger than me. Um, I

11:22

built the stadium. He would always play for

11:24

the Falcons. He came home. He would always do

11:27

a class for kids who wanted to play football,

11:29

track and field and things like that, and

11:32

developed a great friendship. And one thing

11:34

about Balding. If something ever happened in Bottleware, I get

11:37

it. I get it. So not

11:39

to start off in but you know, I always gotta

11:41

be spiritual. Um. So he was playing

11:43

for his son and you love this quest um

11:46

in a way. Um, but you also

11:48

it was a sad moment. But playing for his sign, made

11:51

a mistake and hit his head, went into a coma and

11:53

that you know, thirty nine years old past. Now

11:57

I tell that story because when you talk

11:59

about Baltimore, you

12:01

owe it to where you're from, to always

12:04

go back because something

12:07

it's gonna happen to somebody at some point

12:09

in time, and people need light, they

12:11

need something positive, they need something.

12:13

One of the reasons why you do the show, you know what I mean.

12:16

People need light, people need guidance. And you

12:18

know when people speak about Baltimore, that's like that's

12:21

my city. That's like it's really my city, you know what I'm saying.

12:23

So to me, um, I just love

12:26

and I don't know how I went there. And then I guess what's on my heart?

12:28

So fuck it? So how did you? No? No, no, I

12:30

mean what I want to talk about that like my

12:33

depiction, Like I used to

12:35

go to Baltimore a lot, Like I had an uncle

12:37

and aunt down there. We go like summertimes,

12:40

you know, weekends. There's sort of things. And I didn't

12:43

see the Baltimore that's

12:46

you know, depicted on TV.

12:49

I mean, like does it do

12:52

you feel some sort of way when you

12:55

hear the I guess there's

12:57

somewhat fetishizing of

13:01

the Wire culture with other

13:04

I mean the inside joke is always like more white

13:06

people of the Wire than black

13:09

people, do you know, like they will. I've

13:11

seen many Wire references in every

13:13

like highbrow comedy show

13:16

on TV or whatever it is. It's always like some inside

13:18

joke about it. But you know, it's a lot of

13:21

people the Wire is

13:23

like what they feel is

13:26

Baltimore And like how do you, I mean, how

13:28

did you? What was your Baltimore

13:31

you growing up? And and like

13:34

your experiences with the city all that, all

13:37

that, all that, um, and I

13:39

have to be honest with you. So when

13:42

I grew up, it

13:44

was probably highlight you know, well

13:47

the dope scene, you know what I mean, um, and

13:51

you know, if you want, it

13:54

was there. It was everywhere. I always say, you know, you

13:57

have the drug store, the

14:00

a could lick a store, the church in

14:02

Thedulk Corner. It was there. That's

14:04

that's there. So that's what people talked about that's

14:06

what people were. You want to know how to make

14:09

money. You wanted to be with that guy who was on the corner.

14:11

He always had the money and he was giving back to the

14:13

kids, and that all everything. You that the wire

14:16

trold a true depiction of what

14:18

was happening, and that that the

14:20

city at the time to the point where

14:23

when it got to where people are saying it's the

14:25

home of the wire. Um, Martin

14:27

O'Malley, who was at that time mayor

14:30

about to go for government, a friend of mine said,

14:33

um, that's not what I want us to be known for,

14:36

not under my you know, my jurisdiction.

14:39

And he actually went who was one of the guys

14:41

to say, hey, we shouldn't go, you know, we

14:43

should stop it and do something. And from that point

14:45

on, Rich Carton Four Seasons

14:47

turned the whole in a harbor. JOHNS. Hopkins

14:49

invested into Feld's point, like so

14:52

many big things that Morgan State went to a different

14:54

level. But you know, to say, why I

14:56

appreciate life and why I appreciate moments,

14:59

you know, even like this, is because I

15:02

come from very humble beginnings. I said, I didn't grow up

15:04

with a silver spoon in my mouth. My ship was rusted,

15:06

you know what I mean, So I know I know what

15:08

it is. So it was like that. Though what's crazy

15:10

is Martin O'Malley was really depicted in the wire

15:13

as Mayor Garcetti, who was very yes,

15:17

Martin all

15:19

and these all people, you know, we're

15:21

just retired up. She retired

15:23

herself up, Senator mc kowlski um

15:26

and you know you I'm forty

15:29

eight now, so I've seen it, you know what I mean, even

15:31

from a very young age, you know, back um

15:35

mayor smoke. Back then, I was always

15:37

thought that if if you had politics, if

15:39

you could put yourself a position of power

15:42

by being around that. And so I've

15:44

been with every mayor, governor,

15:46

city council member the whole not Also

15:49

when people got in trouble, I can get them out. I

15:53

could always wear some things out. So it's a it's just a you

15:55

know, it's it's the truth. Though I love the Wire,

15:57

though I loved um. It was

15:59

a homen in cultural uh history

16:03

to me um for TV, for Hperio.

16:05

I think it was one of those soprano moments for

16:07

our culture, you know, with the wild So you

16:10

saw places and those things and

16:12

just you saw memories and

16:15

you and I need to go. I mean, you not need to take a walk in

16:18

Baltimore. And I'm being the the

16:20

way I'm being serious about because I think, um

16:23

I could, I could show you the owner new I can show you

16:25

some of the stuff that was happening

16:27

back then where it's happening now. But also

16:30

mean you can go have tea at the Four Seasons,

16:32

you know what I mean? You and I can go and visit

16:35

Johns Hopkins and and go to the Moregan and

16:37

see the new engineer and building. You know what I mean. Yeah,

16:40

I was gonna say, is it going through a gentile yes

16:42

occation? And are they

16:44

phasing out the residents or is it inclusive?

16:48

Um? No comment? Oh

16:52

no comment, because my apartment was fo I

17:00

see. Now let's take let's take a walk

17:02

this year though that definitely I would love to do with you. I'm

17:05

down you join us, like, yeah,

17:07

I would love to. I love to see where Baltimore is gone.

17:11

I'll go. I got people in Baltimore. Okay,

17:13

you can call if you go down. Yeah, don't

17:17

everybody. I'm just me

17:20

and Bill go. But we're standing in harbor cool

17:24

me too, So

17:27

in your your where does where does music

17:29

play? Because before I mean, most people know you

17:31

as an executive, but um

17:34

there there might be millennials

17:36

or whatnot. Uh, I don't know that

17:38

you were actually an artist yourself.

17:41

So what was music

17:44

music's role in your life? And did did Baltimore

17:47

really have a music culture? Like well,

17:49

I'm okay, I know that there's this whole

17:52

d M v idea

17:54

of this unity thing, but you know, for

17:57

most people that I speak to from d C, they're

17:59

just claiming Go Go and not Baltimore.

18:02

And then Baltimore is like claiming house music

18:04

and nothing else. And I'm not sure where

18:06

in Virginia North Carolina falling down.

18:10

It was just everything. Yeah, so

18:13

you guys had an active Go Go We

18:15

didn't. Well, we had it, but it was it

18:17

was transplants. I mean, the thing with North Carolina was

18:20

that, you know, back to what Kevin

18:22

was saying with the the drug trade, Uh,

18:25

new North Carolina was you know, it

18:27

was on the route if you were going south,

18:29

so pretty much and we had where

18:32

I grew up in Greensboro, we had like a lot of college

18:34

It was a college town, so you had a lot of northerns

18:37

coming up and going to school now South and

18:39

they were bringing the music with him. So go

18:41

go, I mean, go go was like crazy.

18:44

I mean college

18:47

was the reason to Yeah, so a lot of all the

18:49

go go then, I mean all the classic you know early

18:51

eighties, you know New York hip hop stuff.

18:53

I mean that's what we were listening to. So that was why, like

18:56

when we came out as a little brother, they

18:58

were like, y'all don't sound like y'all from the South, and it was like, well

19:00

the South there we were from. That's

19:02

what we listened to because

19:04

that was that was our biggest influence. That's

19:06

coming down the seaboard. Baltimore Club though our

19:08

house music that didn't make it. The Baltimore

19:10

Club didn't make it. I didn't. I didn't figure out the club

19:13

until it was later because that was like really hot, I

19:16

know what I know as Baltimore house music

19:18

that made it sort of entry

19:20

in the hipsters lives, like two thousand

19:22

to two thousand three. Was that always

19:25

a thing, always a thing, always

19:28

the things? So how how far back

19:31

it depends when you saw you go? I mean like so

19:33

with me, i'm an I started uh

19:37

m C. But also DJ the whole thing with New

19:39

marks. Uh. We had ten turntables

19:42

and so we would mix. We would do our

19:44

mixes with ten turntables, you know, I mean something. I would

19:46

play the bass beating the people scratch records

19:49

over top of it and blended and we went around during

19:51

that. And then the whole rap thing

19:54

came with run DMC and thing and it

19:56

was like yo, my man said, yo, you wrap. I

19:59

said, now I write poets. He said, well, I rapped,

20:01

so we're gonna be brought in KG and I was

20:04

KG and I was like cool. And then

20:06

this was back when Uh in

20:08

Baltimore there was a group called We Rock Crew UM,

20:10

Charm City Crew UM and

20:13

a couple of it and we would battle all over

20:15

the city, you know what I mean. And so UM,

20:18

I don't want to say the house

20:21

music thing. You know I did all that too. I mean you can

20:23

go like North Avenue record, I maade about

20:25

the street that we used to I'm

20:27

running or down with the cars. Um.

20:31

I love that because that was Baltimore music.

20:33

But what was really in me was hip hop UM.

20:36

And I was like a true fandom. I lost my mind

20:39

when I heard some records. And you

20:41

know, so I can take you back to when

20:44

the radio station was w E B B and

20:47

all they played was for four

20:50

hours the Mac James Show. Two. Now

20:53

every radio station time at the station hip

20:55

hop and on B it's it's all day, you know. They played

20:57

every day, you know, I mean that's everywhere now. But back then,

21:00

I had slept on the floor, mixed

21:03

wrapped. I opened up your Love This, so I

21:06

think my record got a little big or whatever.

21:08

And so l L was coming to place

21:11

called forty six or four Liberty Heights, and

21:14

so I opened up for l Out No

21:17

I'm one. Somebody pulled

21:19

a gun. They started shooting in there

21:22

and up in up judgment with Tar,

21:24

he said, yo, y'all crazy. I

21:28

said, that's how you girls don't. Don't worry about

21:30

it. So but not just him running

21:32

him. See, I opened up for salt and pepper. I

21:34

opened up for um raw

21:37

Base rab bas Uh and the

21:39

vert I went on tour with. I mean, like when

21:41

you when you talk about it, it's like, that's why I know how

21:43

to treat an artist, because I know what I know how I wanted

21:45

to be treated Will Smith. They actually

21:48

they would actually let you left

21:51

me. I was big in the city quest I was big I'm

21:56

arena arena. Throw

21:59

your hands in the I was arena big Well

22:03

no, just like today,

22:05

artists, I mean not even today, like you

22:08

just come in, you get on the mic, and then

22:11

you out, like I can't remember the last

22:13

time the BI

22:16

I met a little brother because like the Route show got

22:18

rained out and I was like, all right, let me walk into artists and

22:21

shake some hands. When I was yeah,

22:23

like I

22:25

wanta got the demo and I want to tweet

22:27

about it or tweet it. Well, okapelaired

22:30

about it, but uh, I'm

22:33

just saying that what what made you well,

22:37

not what made you want to in your mind

22:39

where you like, Okay, I'm gonna be a diplomat

22:41

to these you know, for the city and and

22:45

give me these artists. Or it was just like hip

22:47

hop was so scarce in the mid

22:50

to late eighties that you

22:52

just had to know every m C or

22:55

act that came down. You know what, you know

22:57

what it was. I

23:00

ran the streets, so it's like I knew everybody. And then

23:02

the promoters would tell artists

23:04

say, you're gonna do the show, but we gotta put this group New Marks

23:07

on because they local, they're gonna bring about

23:10

you know, tickets and things, so you should

23:12

put them on. And the way we used

23:14

to run because we DJ on the radio for

23:16

four or five hours and we used to do shows.

23:19

We kind of like ran the

23:21

city when it came to music, you know what I mean. So it's

23:23

like they just loved having

23:25

us open up. And then me always treated it like

23:27

a business, you know what I mean. Wasn't about me hanging out

23:30

with people or just meeting somebody. I

23:32

wanted to have a value proposition, so I

23:34

made sure when artists came down that they

23:37

felt like they got to be more love, you know what I mean.

23:39

It was something special about them coming down. So one

23:42

artist would tell another artist that, yo, them kids,

23:44

you gotta they can take you where you got to go. They can

23:46

get you anything you want and they don't. So

23:49

that was really my my mindset. Who

23:51

Al was in New Marks Who with other members of the group UM.

23:54

The one of the original founders was

23:56

DJ Spen. He still plays House of Music today,

23:59

UM shout out to Spin and UM beat Master

24:01

Mole was a kid named Wayne Mallory. He's married

24:03

in Florida. Junie jam was

24:06

one of my neighbors and his cousin Rod

24:09

was Rod Rod and KG you know me. So

24:11

it was five. It was five of us. And when it kind

24:18

of it was at the time I could I can truly tell

24:20

you man that you know, being from Baltimore,

24:22

and they had had a certain sound before

24:24

the house music thing was hip hop and

24:27

they started to develop back. I mean Crystal

24:29

Waters and the Basement Boys and all like.

24:32

This was all stuff that we did. Um

24:34

I'm coming up. It was a place called Paradox

24:37

that people used to go to for for

24:40

club music. But then Frank Ski, which

24:42

you know, you know, he used

24:44

to do this thing called hammer Jacks.

24:48

Hammer Jacks is a club like it's like a house

24:51

of blues. But it was in Baltimore. And when

24:53

I tell you we brought

24:55

you know, and I started interning for Death Jam that

24:57

I brought everybody from DMX Man

25:00

Method Man Blah blah blah, everybody at

25:03

As even when I became the president, brought everybody would

25:05

come. We had to do Hamma Jacks. It was like the spot

25:07

and they see we had to do. So you know, although

25:09

I was you know, I grew up on the house music,

25:12

hip hop was always like part

25:15

of it, you know what I mean. So I always try to say, Yo, guys, we

25:17

really gotta I gotta have that edge

25:20

with us, that the thing with us, you know what I mean? Even though

25:22

I did the Girl true thing, it's still like, you know, you

25:24

gotta have that edge, you know what I mean? All Right,

25:26

I wanna let's let's bring up the elephant

25:29

in the room right now. Let's

25:32

all right, well, let's play the elephant in the room

25:35

right now. Let's do it. So what are you doing that? Well,

25:38

set back and thought about the things we used

25:41

to do together. They

25:43

really meant a lot to me that

25:46

you're talking. Yeah, yes,

25:49

you know, you know it's true. You

25:53

know what, even

25:58

even though I've heard the on

26:00

and off uh since

26:03

I found out that you were the author of A Girl,

26:05

you know it's true. Um. But

26:09

in preparing for this interview and

26:11

listening to it about a good three times, that

26:15

was a well crafted song.

26:18

Thank you. Now, this is the other thing, Uh,

26:22

everyone knows about my soul train addictions.

26:25

And I happened to be watching

26:28

an eighties six episode of

26:31

a Soul Train with Star Point and

26:34

Don and then we're talking about you know, they

26:37

were just making a big thing of Merland and Baltimore

26:39

and everything, like, you guys the biggest thing to come out there,

26:41

and then yeah, you know what I mean, they were embalancing

26:44

like yeah, you know, we can't even walk in the malls all people,

26:49

um, and then made at the end of the interview

26:51

they were like, yeah, we you know, we want to develop more acts

26:53

and everything. Like they really played it like

26:56

they were the bell of the ball of of Baltimore

26:58

area in a and I mean, you know, they

27:01

had object they had hit. I

27:03

think they were promoting the next

27:06

joining he wants My Body or what was the join

27:08

of Teddy Riley? I want you, you

27:10

want you don't, you don't,

27:12

I can't Teddy Riley produced

27:15

their adi A joint. But my point was

27:17

that, like,

27:19

were there being

27:21

as though they were the biggest act

27:23

of the eighties, were they at present a presence

27:26

at all in and

27:29

were they at all in your radar like during

27:31

that time period. So you you want to hear the craziest

27:34

thing, there's a god star pointing named Kai

27:38

Kai did oh I love

27:40

you? I

27:43

wait what seriously

27:45

he wrote the lyric exclusive

27:53

exclusive Wow

27:59

wait a minute. I I just thought my

28:02

whole point was that, like the start point

28:04

was really claying, like yeah, we just we're thinking

28:06

Baltimore. I didn't even know that y'all

28:08

cross baths. I was just did we cross path?

28:11

Bill Petaway Um who works

28:13

with Timland Now, Um had

28:16

this, let's tell you a little bit about the have this record

28:18

this track. And you

28:20

know I was a rapper, so I wasn't really didn't

28:22

write the songs, so you know I do all that. But

28:25

um he said, Yo, we probably

28:28

need KA to help us do say. I didn't

28:30

really know like that, you know what I mean? So he

28:32

said, yeah, stop myself. Oh okay, cool, you

28:34

think I said, let's right there. So he wrote that

28:36

part of the record, and it's wanted

28:39

to. That's why I say that the group

28:41

I had to give them paid respect and and the other other

28:43

group was Rasons, you know what I mean. Dave Druma,

28:46

the drummer for Rasstions, was my engineer from

28:48

my first album. I may actually made an album too, but we

28:51

can you can look that up. Like you

28:57

recorded in the oxing Hill, Maryland right, oxing Hill,

28:59

Maryland Studio Records. The

29:02

last record it was made in ox in Hill, Maryland. All

29:06

Right, I gotta do more homework. I

29:09

have to do more homework. Actually wet.

29:15

We don't, we don't, we don't have yeah,

29:22

shout out to the war. Um, so

29:26

explain to me the journey

29:29

of girl. You know it's true, um

29:33

for our fans that are born

29:37

after nineteen Um,

29:43

I mean this song was bigger

29:45

than life and basically pretty

29:47

much it was one

29:50

of the biggest singles of

29:52

of for the

29:54

Aristi label and caused an empire,

29:57

Like just the the entire story, Like

30:01

I want to know the journey of the song, but

30:03

then I just want to know what

30:05

your reaction was that you helped

30:08

build an empire and

30:11

the fall of that empire and the scandal

30:13

that broke out, And I mean, how

30:15

many times were you like but that to me, like

30:17

how many people came up to you like I thought you

30:20

were a gazillionaire because your song? First

30:22

of all, why didn't you or did

30:24

you like

30:27

how close were you guys? Did actually trying to

30:29

bring this to a major or or

30:32

take it to a major label? And because

30:35

it's a well crafted song, so

30:37

for a local record, is a very well crafted

30:39

song. So his the thing it was

30:42

inspired by I need love, I'm

30:44

taught. Um

30:48

I UM, I

30:50

wasn't doing it to be a big artist like that. To

30:52

be honest with you, you know what I mean, I was doing it because

30:55

on purpose, or you just didn't think, oh

30:58

this song could actually with a

31:01

hundred kids through college, or honestly

31:04

it was just another another record. It's actually

31:06

another record. I love more than it. But um,

31:09

when creating that record, I knew it was

31:11

special. I knew it was special. Every time we

31:14

would play it, people would

31:16

just freak out over and then I knew when we performed

31:18

it, it's like the whole crowd saying

31:21

yeah, I knew it was special. So we sold like a hundred

31:23

thousand copies with Studio Records. And

31:26

I remember, um,

31:29

I'm home chilling and with

31:31

this girl, and I said, they've turned

31:33

the readio off and she said, that's not the radio. I

31:36

said, what do you mean, it's not the ready off? She said no,

31:38

I said, baby, it's the readio that I don't have a video

31:40

for the record. She said, I know that's not you, but

31:43

that's that's that's your record right there. And it was really

31:45

really performing my record. That's

31:47

how I found out on

31:50

TV. So so Frank Ferrian for

31:53

those who don't know, going in there.

31:55

All right, So here's the deal. So Frank

31:57

Ferrian was Reducer

32:00

and a member of a seventies funk outfit called

32:02

bony m. Um.

32:06

Steve's laughing because he knows the story. I'm gonna

32:08

tell what a side note. I

32:11

once thought I was hired

32:13

to do a bony m record and

32:17

the round was bony James. Now

32:20

I can't get rid of my BFF.

32:23

But at the time I thought I was doing a bony M

32:26

I was like, wait a minute, smooth jazz

32:29

like Marcus

32:31

Miller anyway, Um,

32:35

yeah he I

32:37

guess he heard this on a German

32:40

ninclub and an army base or something like so.

32:43

Um. Unbeknownst

32:46

to me, my label Studio Records,

32:49

we're getting calls off from all over the world

32:51

for Greg True the new box

32:54

and instead we

32:57

want Chrystalist Records came and said we

32:59

want to you guys up. I

33:01

didn't. This is this is all I found out afterwards to

33:03

the court and he uh,

33:06

he said, well, I

33:08

want money, and so he wanted to

33:10

cash advance and Bluebird, whoever

33:13

the label was, gave him the money. But Christmas

33:15

wanted to develop the group, but he didn't care

33:17

about that part of it. He cared about getting

33:20

money. So the label you released

33:22

it on wasn't your label, per se no,

33:25

no, no, okay. So the person who's the head

33:27

of the label at that time was a guy named

33:30

Franco something. I forgot his name, but

33:32

he uh sold it to

33:35

Bluebird. Bluebird didn't

33:37

distributed to z y X and the

33:40

uh what what do you call that? Denolux

33:44

countries, UM and Japan

33:46

was on some label and Frances on some label. And

33:50

in the club they were playing my virgin

33:52

of the record, and so uh

33:55

c w Shaw, who was

33:58

an Army veteran, he

34:00

was in army. He sends me this long letter.

34:02

You don't know me. Um, I

34:05

actually sung your record,

34:08

um and millivanilly

34:10

singing acting like they singing

34:12

there. He actually I got a letter from

34:14

C. W Shaw who actually said I'm

34:17

the voice. So he's that guy that's singing and rapping

34:19

from from Houston. He said said,

34:22

I love you guys. I love your version of it.

34:25

Um. They came and asked me to resing the

34:27

record. He said, it's not out yet. And

34:30

so now this is when the record is eight team many copies

34:32

and I'm working on the second album. You

34:34

know I did I did that one

34:36

girls too um, what's my Diane Warren

34:39

did blame it on the Range. So we think about what we're gonna

34:41

do next with the next album, and then

34:43

the whole thing thing blew up. You couldn't

34:45

have wrote the story, you know what I mean. You couldn't wrote the characters

34:48

in it. So Diane Warren did blame it on the Rain

34:50

on New Walks first. No, no, no, no, no, I'm

34:52

saying I met her because I had Girl

34:55

you know, which was the first single, and she didn't

34:57

blame it on the Range. Only one voice for

34:59

Millian that was a one. I didn't even realize that that

35:01

that was one man. No, he did, he

35:03

did, he did. It was really two of him, but I only

35:05

know the one. Uh c w

35:07

shock, so shout out, you know. He he told me about

35:10

it, but I didn't know what was going on. I was making

35:12

money because I sued and got my

35:14

publishing and my writer's stuff back.

35:16

What I'm saying like, they didn't even clear

35:18

it with you. And I woke up a

35:21

girl said that's

35:23

you on the radio. I want

35:25

to on the TV. That's how I found out,

35:27

and so I had to get a lawyer. Yeah,

35:31

hurt beyond and

35:34

I wouldn't. I wasn't mad. It was that how

35:37

can so, how can somebody do that? Like And it

35:39

was that that moment that I said, I don't want to

35:41

be in the music business. I want to be in the business of music.

35:43

It was at that moment and I changed everything the

35:45

whole Folks. That made you want

35:47

to get behind the camera, behind

35:50

in the boardroom instead of in front of the microphones.

35:53

And I never wanted to happen again. I never wanted to happen

35:55

to to anybody again. You

35:57

wanted to be this person because you wanted to protect

36:00

someone from getting gangd and and

36:05

well from from

36:08

the situation that happened to you. Like, yes,

36:10

it really made me want to love the star.

36:13

Started to see things differently than I

36:15

would go to a show and say, damn,

36:18

that's a lot of glow sticks. I wonder how much they cost?

36:20

Damn um the tickets prices

36:22

this, And I would start thinking

36:24

the business of everything around me. And so that's

36:27

what made me go back

36:29

and said I'm an intern because I didn't understand

36:31

enough, you know what I mean, how how long for

36:35

a situation like that, especially without

36:37

the Internet or something to

36:39

help rush the process of information

36:42

I mean, how long was it of

36:45

you crying wolf? Like? Wait,

36:47

I wrote this song, I wrote the song and getting

36:51

an answer and eventually getting

36:54

to Clive Davis or like, I

36:57

can't even believe that they

37:00

would be so careless as to release

37:03

a song, market a song, sell

37:06

the song without checking to see

37:08

if you know, do some

37:10

research. Everything's clear. It's like with us,

37:13

like even if a miniscule sample,

37:15

is it? Wait that laughing in mirror? What's that laughing

37:18

on? That? Is that pink Floyd? And you know,

37:20

like you're you're you gotta

37:23

So how long was it from the moment

37:25

you heard the record in a eight till

37:28

like they finally

37:30

did right by you and said, well, I don't think.

37:32

I don't think. I don't think people ever did

37:34

did right. I say, you don't.

37:36

When you do right, you do right When you have to sue,

37:39

that's not doing right, you know what I mean? So? Oh

37:41

so that was the last resort? Did

37:44

you the first resort? Oh?

37:46

You just okay? I'm phil Asbury.

37:48

Shout out to phil Asbury, Philadelphia International,

37:53

phil Asbury. Show them

37:55

what it is to be you know, don't

37:57

don't mess with kids, because I was. I was when

37:59

I wrote the record. I think I was sixteen. I

38:05

don't even remember, since you're right

38:07

on my record that was when the album came out. Okay,

38:10

so I'm not sure. I'm not. It's somewhere around

38:12

there. Um. I think I wrote it through three originally,

38:16

me and my my partner and you

38:20

know, just a weird time. But I never I didn't. I didn't

38:22

play with it though it wasn't It wasn't. It

38:24

was something I felt like, like you

38:26

said, y'all, you had audacity to

38:29

not check do it? So?

38:31

Eighteen million copies? And then did

38:33

they try to deny it? No,

38:36

you could. No,

38:38

they just well, we live in two thousands

38:40

sixteen, where the lies the truth, we

38:44

are not least right. So

38:51

it's definitely I forgot where we were.

38:54

No, I'm just saying, you know, the lot could be the truth. And you

38:56

know, Black Hid

38:58

in Baltimore says we stole song like it

39:02

was a little bit and isn't it a shout

39:04

out the cloud? And sad it was never. I never

39:07

faulted them. I always fought to Frank ferry

39:09

On always faulted uh

39:12

Steve Franco, the owner Studio Records,

39:14

because I might be sitting

39:16

here as an artist. You know, I mean, if

39:18

if they would have did the right thing, you know what I mean,

39:21

I could have never did for Green True what what reliving

39:24

really did for Girtes? True? You know what I mean. I'm not

39:26

wearing tight pants, I ain't jumping up like that.

39:28

I mean, I'm not doing this and all

39:30

that. Those things that happen,

39:32

and so I think God

39:35

makes, if anything, this is kind of a blessing in the

39:37

disguise it was. It was, and I always tell people,

39:39

if I had to do it all over again, I

39:41

would allow it to happen because a

39:43

lot of things came out and I made a lot of money at

39:45

a young age off the record. I

39:48

traveled the world. Off of the record, I

39:50

opened up for people who eventually

39:52

were signed to me. There

39:55

I developed friendships that

39:58

to this day we're raising kids

40:01

now, you know what I mean. Became

40:04

the I became an intern. Was Arica

40:06

come the president in seven years of

40:08

Definitely because I knew how artists

40:11

should be treated because I was one. I traveled,

40:13

I did did everything that they could do. So

40:15

to me, why would I want to write

40:18

it differently? I couldn't. I couldn't

40:20

imagine doing nothing to it. He had just still the next one

40:22

too, if you want you know, all

40:29

right, this is of course of supreme. We're here with Kevin Lyles

40:31

and he's telling us the story behind the song he

40:34

co wrote called Girl. You know It's true? Um

40:37

so am I

40:39

to assume that New Marks kind

40:41

of imploded around this time as well? And nah,

40:44

so you guys still went strong, Like how

40:47

long did the group last time? Well, we went from

40:49

five members down to three members.

40:51

And when we became me and Rod

40:54

and DJ Spin and we

40:56

started to do quote unquote

40:58

more uh Baltimore

41:01

music along with hip hop stuff that I

41:03

like. There's a record that we put out. One we made put

41:06

on label because we had a little money and called Marx Brothers

41:08

Records, And there was a record we put out

41:10

called Dropped Down to Your Knees and

41:12

the record we call do You Want

41:14

To? And they were probably the last records

41:17

that I made. But we kept going and

41:19

doing it. And then again, what

41:21

made you well, what was the deciding

41:24

factor of the straw that broke the camel's back? Like maybe

41:27

this isn't the route to take and I

41:29

should do something else. Um, the

41:34

MIDI Vanili the milivanili thing

41:36

really paid to play the role in it. But then

41:40

the internship at deaf Jam. Um,

41:43

yeah, so how does that happen? Like you're at

41:46

least a a compensated

41:49

established figure, and

41:52

how did you how did you get in the sights

41:55

of Russell Simmons for him to say you're

41:57

gonna work in the mail room? Was it

41:59

just a joke test for you? Like you

42:02

know, I'm gonna start you at the very bottom.

42:04

And literally remember Jack the

42:06

Rapper, Remember

42:08

Impact Wisconsins. I used to go

42:10

there and be the mad Rapper.

42:14

Why why I know? I want to sign me. I sold records.

42:16

I did this, y'all know, that's why wouldn't I was mad,

42:19

you know? And then I ran into uh

42:23

my mentor, West Johnson um

42:25

Gard rest his soul. West says,

42:28

um cab man, you know when I was in Balton

42:31

used to play your records. I said, yeah, welst, I know he used to

42:33

play my records. You know what I mean? He said, you know, I'm

42:35

the senior vice president of marketing promotions

42:37

for Death Dand I said, get out of here. I

42:40

said, well, sign me the def Jam. He

42:42

said, I don't really sign in promotions. I

42:44

said, well, give me a job. He said

42:46

no, but you can intern. Now what

42:49

you said, I was making money, okay,

42:51

I said, intern intern

42:56

def Jam intern. Cool.

42:59

So west Johnson said,

43:02

you know what, I'm had this guy into. He said, by the way, we're

43:04

hiring a guy named Kevin

43:06

Mitchell from Boston. This

43:10

is the kind of

43:12

guy from from Boston, and we're gonna

43:14

put him in the mid Atlantic. We like him.

43:17

Um uh, and you could intern from

43:19

him. So I said, Kevin

43:21

Mitchell's intern. Kevin Mitchell's

43:23

intern, Kevin

43:27

thing. He's gonna let you know Kevin Mitchell was but for

43:29

the roots if you know, of

43:32

course, like no routes are listening to my radio show

43:36

them about this. Um when we signed

43:39

to Geffen, I mean basically because

43:42

there was no staff, but

43:44

they had millions. Um

43:47

they did some unheard of ship which basically

43:50

here, you take the credit cards, show

43:52

us the receipts. Don't overspend like again,

43:56

you know, dayls record was made for like twenty thousand,

43:59

Cyper Shiel's records made for sixty. They

44:01

just gave us an open credit card. And

44:04

also like two employees

44:06

from loud r c A and three employees

44:08

from def Jam, which were Francesco

44:10

Spireau, Derrick Jackson, and

44:13

Kevin Mitchell. They would they would uh moonlight

44:17

uh with Geffen and

44:20

my. Our experience with Kevin was that he was Mr McGoose.

44:23

He was blind. He was the cartoon figure that

44:25

had bottle glasses when

44:27

he's driving. One night he was just asleep

44:30

at the wheel and we

44:33

were on the other side of the road like in dumb

44:35

and dumber, like he just somehow wound up with

44:38

oncoming traffic at three in the morning.

44:40

We woke up like like we

44:42

were going to die. So yes, but

44:44

Kevin Mitchell is my man. Besides trying to kill us.

44:46

He was. He's a really

44:49

great friend and and still a friend to us

44:51

now. But you were his intern. I was

44:53

Kevin's intern, and it was so it

44:57

was you. You love the story.

44:59

So keV didn't know Baltimore

45:01

whatever. So keV hits

45:03

me said West West said you're gonna help me out and

45:05

say, Yo, yeah, whatever you need West my man. Now again,

45:07

I'm making money. I'm good. I'm worried about

45:10

it wasn't the money thing. So

45:12

Kevin called me said, Yo, I'm downstairs

45:15

at um at V one oh three, but

45:17

I can't get upstairs. I said, you

45:20

can't get upstairs. So what you called

45:22

me for? He said, because your man is one Frank. I said

45:24

yeah, I said, so you're

45:27

calling me to get you upstairs

45:29

and that's your job. Now they're paying you to do this. Now, I had

45:31

a little attitude about it, That's how I said. So

45:33

I called Frank Frank yo my man. He one of us

45:36

here gooding me. And Frank Frank was my wedding.

45:38

That's my my guy guy. So he he

45:40

said, Kee, I'll see him whatever you want me to do, blah blah blah

45:43

this, and it was that moment. While I always paid

45:45

respect to Kevin Mitchell, Kevin

45:47

got on the conference call. He would let me listen on the conference

45:49

calls to to learn. Kevin

45:52

said, my intern is

45:55

gonna run the company, and

45:58

you're all can act crazy if y'all want the because the

46:00

ship he can put off here I'm

46:04

and so that's really how he

46:06

let me. He let me live and

46:08

I did work, but he let me live. You know, I mean, all

46:10

right, I'm gonna let you know something, um

46:13

because most of the into the street folklore

46:16

that at least people my age

46:18

know about is the story

46:21

of of Sean Combs getting

46:23

on a train every day at Howard and

46:26

going to New York every day, and you know, outtown

46:28

records, blah blah blah blah blah. But I'm

46:30

gonna tell you something. There's

46:32

two stories I always heard that

46:37

set or at least set me on the path

46:40

for how I dealt

46:42

with interns. You don't even know this. You

46:44

don't even know this one

46:46

was you always heard stories of James

46:48

Brown. James Brown used to always tell like all his

46:50

band members, find the lowest.

46:54

He would call him the coffee board, the water boy. He

46:57

says. They I guess the term intern wasn't

46:59

out back in the fifties or sixties, but James

47:02

Brown used to always say, find the coffee

47:04

board the water boy, and make him feel like he's

47:06

on top of the world because one day, in twelve

47:08

years, he's going to be signing your

47:10

checks. Um My

47:13

my inn or Wendy Goldstein told

47:16

me a story where she

47:19

was like, look, we're gonna have to do real grassroots

47:21

stuff. It's not gonna be glamorous or whatever.

47:23

You're gonna do these college radio shows and

47:25

stuff, because then we have lofty goals.

47:28

It was nine four. You you've seen all these videos

47:30

and everything, and you're like, well, when's

47:32

our when's our Hype Williams video

47:34

moment gonna happen? And you know, we're like nineteen

47:37

to a van and all this stuff. And she just told me, like, look,

47:39

patients, stay the course and

47:42

whatever you do, always

47:44

be nice to the interns and

47:46

the lowly people because it's gonna pay off in

47:49

ways you don't know. And she told me the story

47:51

you know Kevin Long he wrote, you

47:53

know it's true. It's still was

47:55

there. She would tell me these stories of like,

47:58

I guess your reputation is that you would

48:00

show up to work earlier than anyone

48:03

and lead the latest, just to let them

48:05

know. And she told

48:07

me that, and like

48:10

that stuck with me. It's not like I was like, WHOA,

48:13

Okay, well would be nice, but because

48:15

it just always stuck with me. And I'll

48:18

say to this day, every

48:21

CEO or

48:23

ahead of a company that I've ever done

48:25

business with, at least in the last

48:27

ten years between two thousand

48:29

and six and two thousand and sixteen, and I've done

48:31

a lot of business like pay

48:35

my mom a house off business, they

48:38

it all starts with the same story that I forget,

48:40

which is, Hey, I don't know you don't remember this,

48:42

but this is one time we

48:45

were at Brown University and you know, I was intern

48:47

at this college radio station and I

48:49

asked you if I could do it, and you gave me like a nine

48:51

hour interview. I

48:54

want in five minutes. And that's because

48:56

I always remember really

49:00

shocked the host of the podcast. Yeah,

49:05

well I'm okay, I'm I'm chatty, but

49:07

I'm not. I'm

49:10

just saying that Havin, Kevin and

49:13

Wendy and Press, Jessica and Derek like always

49:16

tell me make sure that when you

49:18

go to these coustters you treat the intern like

49:21

that stuck with me and you were like always their

49:23

example. So I mean you

49:27

entered death Chair when so

49:31

this period um days,

49:33

man, not quite. I feel like it was

49:35

the last I feel like the

49:38

last good year of the

49:42

the old death Cham. I mean, you know it's kind Yeah

49:44

that was not for real. That was classic

49:47

logo depth jam mare. That was the last period.

49:50

So when you were there, what were

49:52

your duties as intern? Well,

49:54

you know, I was still in Baltimore, so it

49:57

was whatever Kevin Mitchell needed,

49:59

you know what I mean. And at that time

50:01

we was Death Comedy Jam was coming

50:03

and all these things were being created

50:05

and Fat Farm and all it. So,

50:08

so Russell was having you work all of his products,

50:10

not just yeah. It was

50:12

to shut them down, remix and make sure these DJs

50:14

get it. You. We used everything

50:17

for everything. So we

50:19

used to do radio programs where we fly people

50:22

into Death Comedy Jam. So I five

50:24

all the program directors, artists, everybody

50:27

in promotion. They

50:29

wanted to close the wear so it were giving

50:31

fat Farm, you know, So we

50:33

we did that. Everything it kept evolving, so

50:36

it wasn't and it wasn't worth quest.

50:38

To be honest with you, I got to wear so you wanted

50:40

to remember names and shake hands

50:42

and kiss babies, and I wanted

50:44

to make people feel like

50:47

they met me, not like they

50:49

shook my hand. But what was

50:51

the end game for you? Like

50:53

back, if you're like, okay, I'm

50:56

meeting this figure and dada, da dada. Are

50:58

you thinking down the line like one I'll start

51:00

my own label or not? I

51:02

just I'm that's a different dude.

51:06

If I'm cooking, I want to make the best meal. If

51:09

I'm intern, I want to be the best intern. If

51:12

I'm um rapping,

51:15

I want to be there. I just wanted to be the best, So I never

51:17

thought about being the president. Do

51:20

you think coming from Baltimore that

51:22

I would be the president of CEO? No,

51:25

nobody knew me. I don't have a half family

51:28

in New York. But the thing is that because

51:32

you were kept, because that you were Kevin Mitchell's

51:34

intern in

51:37

one and by you're the president

51:39

of the damn label, that

51:41

tells me that you had a

51:44

very marksman like determination

51:47

and ambition. I'm sorry where

51:49

you Oh no, no, no no, I

51:51

don't mean like in in a in a a

51:55

give you get some point. I never I never wanted to be president.

51:57

I never I never knew what to be honest,

52:00

which I never didn't know what it was. I thought Russell

52:02

would be there forever I thought I

52:04

thought Leo would be. I never knew that

52:06

was attainable from a kid from what

52:08

told you? All? Right? First of all, is that folklore

52:11

I heard that was true? Mitchell would

52:13

say, like you'd show up at eight

52:15

in the morning like most people get into

52:17

ten. I'm serious. So

52:21

what tells you I need to be there

52:23

at eight thirty am every

52:26

day before everyone gets there. I

52:28

went to school to be electrical engineer. My

52:30

scholarship was from Nassau. I

52:33

wasn't playing with from

52:37

Baltimore CEP timing Now

52:41

I was. I was again I was UM.

52:45

I guess I was a cool NERD you know that

52:47

I always wanted to be the best. And I remember

52:50

when I came to definitely was the joke that

52:52

I would say, oh, come in when I came to New

52:54

York, and I was like, why people come

52:57

here tender? Not my clock? You

52:59

missed the radio stations on twenty four hours a

53:01

day, seven days a week. Why you what do you mean?

53:03

And then by time you get that, get your coffee? Had a water cooler

53:06

moment to lunch was

53:08

there was there a teacher's pet

53:10

kind of uh uh

53:14

scarlet letter attached her shoulder

53:16

like uh, you know Kevin over

53:18

there, Like, no, they're trying. They

53:20

try to throw me out the building. A couple of times

53:22

people would tell on me. I had people flip over deaths

53:25

in front of me. Um. I

53:27

had somebody tried to get me fired at

53:29

Howard because UM,

53:32

I left them because

53:35

they were late and I had to get the group to the radio

53:37

station. So I don't play that. What

53:40

I'm about the group doing? What they're supposed to do. So I left

53:43

them. So they sent this long letter, and so I

53:45

had to be you know, being an engineer, you know you you

53:47

do weird stuff. So I had to write a response

53:49

to that letter. Mine

53:52

was like this, this after everything, every

53:56

single thing, it was, you

53:59

have notes weird tho I kept it

54:01

was weird. Oh ship, you know what I mean. But but but

54:04

I tell you. But it taught me that all the

54:06

engineering I used to manage a telemarketing

54:09

office of four hundred people three different

54:11

shifts, taught me how to orate, how to

54:13

communicate. Um engineering

54:15

taught me to be be thoughtful in being an artist.

54:18

That's taught me how to treat people

54:20

how you know I want to be treated. And

54:22

so I would really work hard.

54:25

Like I said, it wasn't easy because they tried to throw me out

54:27

to building. I remember my first mistake,

54:30

well, now my first thing, well one of the mistakes they almost

54:33

got me looked at crazy. I did

54:35

a show with Biggie Small, method

54:37

Man, Red Man, Onyx and

54:39

somebody. But I did it in a museum

54:42

during howard home coming. Logo

54:46

on the building, Death College jam on

54:48

the Building three

54:51

hundred thousand dollars later, after they destroyed

54:53

the play Your

54:55

Guns, I

54:58

had to explain why I

55:00

would think doing the show in the museum. Explaining

55:04

the rational so I said, well, first off, nobody

55:06

would throw showing museum, and I think hip hop is art.

55:09

Hip hop deserves to be in the museum. Secondly,

55:12

I feel like if you shine your logo like a bad

55:14

time, people come to it. So I had two thousand

55:17

people out inside and another three thousands of people outside.

55:20

Thirdly, I thought by having Biggie

55:22

Smalls and method Man performed the what for

55:25

the first time I had

55:27

this opportunity to I thought it would be a

55:29

moment the time

55:32

honest never been in the museum, so it

55:39

was just a moment of time, and and and Lea

55:41

said, what did you learn?

55:44

I said, I learned that I would do it again, but

55:46

I would have insurance. And

55:48

what does it feel like twenty years later when Picasso

55:51

Baby comes out and it's like, I'm I'm

55:53

only I'm only telling you, like, it's like,

55:58

so yeah, but I never wanted to be That's

56:00

that's not to interrupt you. Sorry, Um,

56:03

I never wanted to be president. A matter of fact, in nineties

56:05

six, they came to me and said, you know, we want to

56:07

make you president. I said, but I don't know the world. I

56:10

don't I don't how can I be president? And

56:12

I don't know the world. I don't know what hip hop looks like in

56:14

London or in Paris, and in Japan.

56:17

I don't really know what it looks like. So I need more time.

56:19

So then seven came around and

56:22

it was like, yo, you really have

56:24

to we really wanna you

56:26

know, And then I

56:29

said, you know, I'm ready now okay.

56:32

Uh. There's a common denominator

56:35

for this show. We're still a baby.

56:38

Uh, and I feel like next

56:41

to uh Stories

56:44

of the Tunnel. For New York Rappers,

56:47

the second common denominator is

56:50

the lee or element either imitating

56:52

lee or or kind

56:55

of what yea?

56:57

What has Leo ever thrown anything at

56:59

you? I don't

57:01

have to believe you saying this question over

57:07

here? Question. So

57:13

of course you you got to work

57:16

in uh pre

57:19

yoga Russell's def jam, Uh,

57:24

maybe lunch storing leaders def

57:26

jam? What was

57:31

okay? Aside from working in Baltimore.

57:33

I mean, I'm sure there were a few times

57:35

you stepped in the actual building in

57:37

New York Elizabeth Street. Yeah, I was there I

57:40

was when Russell used to live on

57:42

top of Tower records. You know, I mean I was. I

57:45

was. I was in Baltimore, but I was

57:47

doing so well that they would say, come up to New

57:49

York and help with this program, or

57:51

help with this or see you work outside of

57:53

your markets. Yeo. I

57:56

remember Mike Haser love my man.

57:58

He said, Yo, I had my life and shat

58:02

can you come up um and

58:06

get the eighteen pass Devan and and bring Whodini

58:09

down? Do you know who didn't want to know? The death Dan? But

58:11

we managed him rush. So

58:13

I actually drove up came to pick the

58:15

group up in there. And this is how like again, I didn't

58:17

have to do it, I'm the intern, but it

58:20

was a way for me to meet Hohodini, get it

58:22

in the rush, talk to people and do something

58:24

for us, somebody who was a friend

58:26

of mine. Gosh, you know what I mean? So I

58:28

did that, you know what means to me? It wasn't so

58:31

what was what was the building? Like

58:34

I tried to ask Faith. I

58:37

tried to ask Faith Newman this question.

58:39

And she's rather diplomatic

58:42

and not too

58:44

descriptive. But for

58:48

a person, and you know, this is not It's

58:50

not about like throwing people under the bus or whatever. But it's

58:53

just that I've heard so

58:56

many stories of like def

58:59

jam but between in

59:03

nine or pre PolyGram, So the

59:07

Christmas parties, the you

59:10

know which which models now

59:12

working in the room,

59:15

you know, during the whole Griff

59:18

jd L situation, and all the guards

59:20

that had to be out front and all that stuff, and just

59:23

like what was it like,

59:25

give me a deaf jam, an old politically

59:30

incorrect death jam story, Like wow

59:36

that you want to get arrested for? Um

59:39

rock and roll? Man? I mean, I mean every every

59:42

bit of everything you could imagine.

59:45

Um we were. I never really considered

59:47

it. It just it was it was really

59:50

when I tell you rock and roll, everything

59:53

was happening that could ever happen. I'm

59:56

gonna give you a story I was trying to get just

1:00:00

like when when the routes

1:00:03

finally got to like the industry, everything

1:00:06

just stopped, Like everybody

1:00:09

was like vegetarian the party

1:00:12

and you know the

1:00:14

word plutonic gotten just

1:00:19

you know now listen,

1:00:22

Uh, All I can say is is this,

1:00:26

there were no rules. You

1:00:29

were morally incorrect, period,

1:00:32

There was nothing. The only thing we

1:00:35

would know we had to do was work hard. That's

1:00:37

what the mindset was, work harder

1:00:39

than anybody else. But when I tell

1:00:42

you I Sawdom

1:00:44

go more that

1:00:48

I have seen so much stuff and and but

1:00:50

it's I understand we were kids too,

1:00:53

so we and with money and you know,

1:00:55

growing and people having for people growing up

1:00:57

together. I got friends. So I've been me

1:01:00

and was twenty five years now. So

1:01:03

he was twenty three, no, thirty

1:01:06

somewhere around there, and I was twenty

1:01:08

three. Think you

1:01:10

were an intimidated by Lear because I

1:01:13

even I even people that love and respect

1:01:16

even people that respect Lee or if

1:01:20

I first, if I gained the trust and first

1:01:22

mentioned his name, I'm in at least

1:01:24

a minuscule I roll happens

1:01:26

like le

1:01:29

or like the thing like people

1:01:32

have their Have you dealt with Leo when you guys

1:01:34

were Atlantic, we did. We had a meeting with him.

1:01:37

Uh it was um interesting, I'll

1:01:41

be real with you like I mean, and

1:01:43

I hopefully we haven't on the show. He probably remember the joint.

1:01:46

But for me, my meeting with Leo was very

1:01:48

much to bring it back to the wire. It was

1:01:50

the canard that's omar. That

1:01:54

was my moment. I was. It was like that's old because

1:01:57

to me, like he was like we were talking

1:01:59

about um. It was around the town when

1:02:01

our album, I think Mistell Show had just came

1:02:03

out, and so we had a meeting

1:02:06

with him and it was just very impromptent.

1:02:08

We were just like in the hallway and he was like

1:02:10

eating a sandwich or something and he was just kind

1:02:13

of standing up. And you know,

1:02:15

again from seeing him like in documentaries

1:02:17

and stuff, he's like a very like intense, like he looks

1:02:19

like that kind of guy. But then I met him and

1:02:22

he was just like, oh, yes, so Kanye drive

1:02:24

Slow. I loved that song like coming

1:02:26

Here, and I was just like, oh yeah,

1:02:29

that's a cool song. But our album

1:02:31

about to come out, Niggle what you're gonna do? And so

1:02:34

it was just you know whatever. I remember it was

1:02:36

me. It was it was always it was three of us, me, Pooh

1:02:39

and Ninth and manager though, and

1:02:41

then James Lopez who used to be and

1:02:44

he was there, and so we

1:02:46

just had that brief interaction and then we walked

1:02:48

off and I remember asking James, I say, man, what do you think

1:02:51

that? Yeah? I was like, what do you

1:02:53

think it's gonna mean? And he was just like, man, I don't know, and

1:02:57

that was it, you know what I'm saying. But that was the only

1:02:59

real time I had had amuseing whenen but the

1:03:01

times I had just that one instance.

1:03:03

And then he came to our show the opening night we did

1:03:05

at UH at BB King's UH. It

1:03:08

was like I released Party or something

1:03:10

like that. I can't remember, but we were on tour when the album

1:03:12

just came out, and I mean sold out show. How

1:03:14

many minutes? How many minutes

1:03:16

did he stay? Yeah? Um, I want

1:03:18

to say he stayed for like a good he stayed

1:03:21

may be calling like the opening set. He probably called

1:03:23

like the first fifteen twenty minutes, wow,

1:03:25

I think yeah, because he could you want to know my president

1:03:28

minute? I think

1:03:38

I think jay Z and Beyonce watched

1:03:41

one verse Ship Theory

1:03:45

and I turned what

1:03:51

happened? You said? I came? Yeah?

1:03:54

They yeah, they yeah, they he gave. I want to say,

1:03:56

I don't know if you were there. I know the time that me

1:03:59

and Kevin was when we did the UH.

1:04:01

It was a listening part and it was somewhere downtown.

1:04:03

I can't remember, but apparently,

1:04:06

like I remember, the fire alarms kept going

1:04:08

off that night and we had to cut it short. But that

1:04:10

was the first time that me and you had met outside

1:04:13

the office, and I remember you came up and

1:04:15

uh but yeah, I mean my time working with him

1:04:17

again. This is post ninety

1:04:19

you know, everybody you know, stop start

1:04:22

doing yoga, stop doing coping ship. So it's different.

1:04:24

But so

1:04:29

wait if you if it interest in quest of supremea

1:04:32

I've been doing. We're here with Kevin Lowns. We're

1:04:34

trying to get uh Cohen

1:04:36

stories. The thing is, I

1:04:40

you know, I respect Lee

1:04:42

or I know, like it's basically I've

1:04:45

I've heard everything about Leric Cohen. He's

1:04:48

liar Cohen, or he's an asshole, or

1:04:50

he's a good businessman, or he's honest with you. Um,

1:04:53

I mean I respect because

1:04:55

the people in my circle are so blunt and

1:04:58

so you know, just

1:05:01

outright with what what they are like. They

1:05:03

don't hide the truth or anything.

1:05:06

I mean, I can respect that. So

1:05:08

for for you, what was it about Lee or

1:05:11

I mean, did le or intimidate you in the beginning

1:05:13

or I always

1:05:15

say, man, it just must be some brotherly

1:05:18

love or or such respect.

1:05:22

Um. He

1:05:24

never and this might be sounding weird to you, guys,

1:05:26

Leod never yelled at me, what

1:05:29

did you do to not get

1:05:33

from Baltimore? Maybe he was, And

1:05:35

be honest with yourself, what was the perception?

1:05:38

What's the perception of you as you're slowly

1:05:41

First of all, how long did you

1:05:43

intern before they said this guy

1:05:45

is kind of valuable, let's cut him a check.

1:05:48

Two years? It took

1:05:50

two years for them to finally and

1:05:52

you didn't complain once he paid

1:05:54

it already? No, I didn't. I didn't like it really

1:05:57

was. I was doing it for the experience and I had to be

1:05:59

honest with So if ONYX is throwing oranges

1:06:02

at you because the

1:06:04

shifty single didn't get out of the MTV

1:06:07

or something, you're

1:06:09

not having a they don't pay me enough for this moment,

1:06:11

Like I looked at

1:06:13

it's not making fun of you. Because I looked

1:06:16

at it. They were all they were all counterparts

1:06:18

to me. They were colleagues. They I wasn't working

1:06:20

for them, and I just looked at

1:06:22

it differently. It's like, yo, I know what you need,

1:06:25

I'm gonna go, I'm gonna get it done. I'm gonna make

1:06:27

sure. Because it was like but we I like felt

1:06:29

like I'm living. You understand something once

1:06:32

you're an artist and then you get on the other side.

1:06:35

Um, I'm really living through all of them.

1:06:38

So the songs they make when they're throwing the guns

1:06:40

and there and M E. T A and the red

1:06:42

I'm living. I would be on stage.

1:06:45

The joke is even to this day. If you ask for one of my artists,

1:06:47

they where it's Kevin stage right. I

1:06:50

said, would always yo, tell

1:06:52

me what the libe you need me to make? If

1:06:55

are they jumped in the crowd, I would jump in the crowd. After

1:06:57

I was just I was just a fatherly kind

1:07:00

of like, yo, we crew. So I never

1:07:03

I never looked at it like that. The time I got was

1:07:05

kind of funny when a Kevin

1:07:07

Mitchell was moving up. You know, he did such a great

1:07:09

job in the mid Atlantic moving up to Nashville.

1:07:11

Take Bob Barbato's job mix

1:07:14

show. So they

1:07:16

said, well, Kevin, um, you know you

1:07:18

should come interview for the job. I've

1:07:22

been interning for two years doing

1:07:24

the job and

1:07:26

you want me to come interview for the job. Cool.

1:07:30

So engineer keV had to come back out. I

1:07:34

put my whole package at my briefcases, put

1:07:36

my suit on, got my whole discover for me of

1:07:38

everything, everything I did. I go up

1:07:40

there. I'm sitting in the room, so everybody

1:07:42

laughing at me. Yeah, I don't have suit. Was

1:07:45

in the briefcase. I said, I came

1:07:47

here to take the job. That's what I came

1:07:49

here to do. I'm wearing showing them everything that I've done. And it said,

1:07:52

well, you know, good interview,

1:07:54

you know great, and appreciate all

1:07:56

the paperwork. One month go by, two

1:07:58

months go by, three months ago by Uh, I'm

1:08:00

starting to feel a certain way because

1:08:02

I know it's nobody better than me, especially in that area.

1:08:05

Nobody, nobody is better than me. And that Philadelphia, DC,

1:08:07

Baltmore, Virginia. So then

1:08:09

I get a call. I remember Julie calls,

1:08:11

but it says, um, Kevin Lows

1:08:14

was at a marketing gig. She said,

1:08:16

um, um, this is Julie

1:08:18

from Deaf Him, you know, West's assistant. Um.

1:08:22

We we think we want you to we

1:08:24

want you to come work with us. I said, great,

1:08:27

I said, She said, we want to pay you thirty thousand

1:08:30

dollars. Like you

1:08:32

realize I'm making it up, Okay,

1:08:35

I said, well, I said, well, um

1:08:39

um, I can work with you all for that. Julie

1:08:41

said, no, you'll work for us for that. That's

1:08:45

why Julie story yet so we it's I

1:08:47

just never word about it. Man, what about

1:08:49

the money? Anything to me that's interesting to hear

1:08:51

because at least for me leor

1:08:56

Lyles, Julie sometimes

1:08:58

Mike, like, all your names are synonymous

1:09:00

with each other. So you guys all

1:09:03

started together at Deaf Jam minus

1:09:06

Lee or at in lower positions

1:09:08

like when Julie came in? When

1:09:11

did she? Julie was West's was

1:09:13

Julie was interning and

1:09:15

working at Rush. Then when

1:09:18

when Leo went over to Deaf Jam, Julie

1:09:22

came was working with West assistant

1:09:24

Leo a little bit and then started working with

1:09:26

West. Um Mike Kaser

1:09:29

was working at at Tower Records, and

1:09:31

Russell lived on top of tower. Wait,

1:09:34

that's how Mike got Hirard. So he

1:09:36

said, yo, um, you do you do a good

1:09:38

job with that? You know you want to do? Ready home Wait

1:09:41

a minute, exclusive,

1:09:47

I'm editing the story a little bit, but that's

1:09:50

he met his mental records and we

1:09:53

that's how he started. We read it. We remember

1:09:55

said I was in Baltimore the UM. I

1:09:58

remember them saying, yo, you're

1:10:00

gonna do rhythm radio and I'm like, well, damn,

1:10:03

rhythm radio is white. Why do you give it? Said,

1:10:06

why don't give it them? But they put guys in the desks,

1:10:08

and so you're gonna do rhythm radio. He became one of the number

1:10:10

one rhythm radio you know people out there,

1:10:12

And that's that's my Did he have experience? He

1:10:15

worked in tower records, you

1:10:20

know, that's the that's that's the trooper. Yeah, but you gotta

1:10:22

understand something with so every

1:10:24

time Julie went you know me,

1:10:27

we were like brother and sisters, you know what I mean. So it's

1:10:29

like that's like family, like people

1:10:31

talk about. I never lead.

1:10:34

Is the kind of guy if we went to war today,

1:10:37

he's gonna be throw me the fucking bullets.

1:10:39

I don't take offense to that because

1:10:41

we're at war. I understand, and

1:10:44

it's intense that I understand. I don't. That's not

1:10:47

you know what I mean, not no idiot,

1:10:50

I say, that's he that's never went there

1:10:52

with me. And but here's the other thing though, when

1:10:54

he looked to his right, when he looked stage right,

1:10:57

you know, he ain't worry about that. Even that's the difference.

1:11:00

I'm not I'm not I'm gonna be there before him. I'm gonna

1:11:02

make sure everything's right to this day. I'm

1:11:05

gonna make sure it's right. Russell. I'm gonna make

1:11:07

sure it's right to this day. They changed my life. They

1:11:09

change the traject three of my family. They changed.

1:11:11

They gave me first generation

1:11:14

money, so

1:11:16

so I might always pay respects. Here was did

1:11:19

you really did you have a relationship

1:11:21

with Russell? And where is Like

1:11:24

if you think def Jam, You're always want to think Russell

1:11:27

Simmons. But you know, I

1:11:29

know that in ninety one he had

1:11:32

sort of this octopus vision of

1:11:35

developing the clothes line and developing

1:11:39

uh definite

1:11:41

comedy jams like but

1:11:44

still, uh, I

1:11:47

know that the higher

1:11:49

upset Sony, we're

1:11:52

kind of in different

1:11:54

And then like, can you explain

1:11:57

that the R A L

1:11:59

period because the rust associate

1:12:02

labels period? Because

1:12:04

from my point of view,

1:12:06

as a fan who always

1:12:09

read Billboard every week and charted stuff,

1:12:12

I always love the fact and kind of hated

1:12:14

the fact that you guys def Jam used

1:12:17

to formally flaunt Well, you know, we've

1:12:19

only been out for five years with five artists,

1:12:21

and you know it's just like L L the

1:12:23

slick rick and that's it. And then the third base

1:12:25

and then that's it. And then one day was

1:12:28

like all these Rust associated

1:12:32

artists came through the door resident alien

1:12:34

and then yeah, so

1:12:39

with all with suddenly like twelve

1:12:41

to thirteen acts to deal with and

1:12:43

kind of losing their uniqueness? What

1:12:46

it do? You know what the

1:12:48

environment was with with with with Mantola

1:12:51

and Donnie and the Sony higher

1:12:54

ups with def Jam and what caused

1:12:57

the eventual exodus to PolyGram

1:12:59

was next correct? So what

1:13:02

was that period between one

1:13:05

and three where things were a little

1:13:07

cloudy with what

1:13:10

made that jam wants just the powerhouse

1:13:12

that it was like? What was what was

1:13:14

that environment like? Especially like with you

1:13:17

and Russ were you more ale or guy or

1:13:20

a Rust guy? Like was Rust the Beatles and le

1:13:22

or was the Rolling Stones? And you had to choose? You

1:13:26

never had to choose because Russell was

1:13:28

the visionary um Lee

1:13:31

or was task with. All

1:13:33

I wanted to do was be the greatest recommend

1:13:36

He didn't care about fat farm or

1:13:38

comedy and that wasn't his thing, you know. He really wanted

1:13:41

to build a great American record company

1:13:44

UM and at that time he was he got the Rocks.

1:13:46

So Russell associated labels quote

1:13:48

unquote Russell and Lee or I

1:13:57

never knew that it was Russell,

1:13:59

but the rest of the leal so um,

1:14:02

it was just before it's time. Now, I'm

1:14:04

gonna sound kind of nerdy here. Sometimes

1:14:11

as visionaries you try

1:14:14

to put things into

1:14:17

play that it's not just time. We

1:14:20

didn't have the infrastructure built to support

1:14:23

uh a quote unquote associated label

1:14:25

venture. But if you think about four or five

1:14:27

years later, after the infrastructure stability,

1:14:30

people came to work and all that kind of stuff,

1:14:33

we were able to do ROCKEFELLERMA piece.

1:14:35

It was. It was a great vision, but

1:14:37

the two earlship too early at the time

1:14:40

because the infrastructure. It gave me hope. The

1:14:44

infrastructure wasn't right, But it was those

1:14:46

days, man, Like I said, everybody want

1:14:48

you know Rick was gone and everybody wanted to prove

1:14:51

they were the next and upgrade an R and this one

1:14:53

knew this one. But the real fact that most

1:14:55

of the artists that I've ever signed in my life

1:14:57

were referred to me by other artists like,

1:15:02

wait, we're not going to get there. He

1:15:05

left me, did you? I'm saying like that. That

1:15:07

was really like, if you think about it, um

1:15:11

to me a six degrees of separation. You you wanna

1:15:14

you got E P and D on the road and his kid current

1:15:18

uh scratches crates. His name is red Man. I

1:15:22

mean, I can you know Shokazulu,

1:15:24

who we both know worked for

1:15:27

me, was at the college radio station. He

1:15:29

had a friend called, um, Chris

1:15:32

Love a Lover who was on the radio, and

1:15:35

he wanted to you know, time

1:15:38

out. You lived in Atlanta as well. I

1:15:40

transferred from Morgan and went to seek

1:15:45

for Bright Street where he was. He was against Chris

1:15:47

Love a Lover and poon Dad and La

1:15:49

La. I don't trust nobody that has more than twelve

1:15:52

addresses. So

1:15:57

no, it's like, um, so I always met

1:16:00

people through other people. Um,

1:16:02

And it wasn't until the whole research

1:16:06

thing came that I started to see

1:16:09

things outside of the people that I knew. But I

1:16:12

knew everybody who knew you

1:16:14

could touch somebody with any you know. We just

1:16:17

uh, I can't say. But

1:16:19

there's this kid that's going up someplace

1:16:22

right now and we just did a big didn't

1:16:24

a deal with him, and it's, um, we

1:16:28

heard it somebody said it was popping and we

1:16:30

got it in and got it you know first. So it's like it's

1:16:33

changing now, but I really believe we

1:16:35

gotta I gotta kid Johnny Stevens from

1:16:37

Holly Suspect rock band, number one rock

1:16:40

record right now. I believe

1:16:42

he's going to find the next star. And

1:16:44

I believe that we did the deal with

1:16:47

Young Thug for y s L. I believe that Young

1:16:50

Thug puts out so much music and everybody

1:16:52

wants to that he

1:16:55

is. And so I just believe you

1:16:57

believe in connectors and bridges. Yes, yes,

1:17:00

that's an important thing. It is important.

1:17:02

Um So when de chim what

1:17:06

what was the what was the

1:17:09

transferring from leaving Sony to

1:17:12

PolyGram? Were you at all worried

1:17:14

that you guys might

1:17:17

lose your casher or your uniqueness,

1:17:19

or that it might go under or

1:17:22

having to deal with like

1:17:24

who is who is the motol and the the Donnie

1:17:27

Iron of PolyGram at this point

1:17:29

when you guys go there, m

1:17:34

hm, Wow they

1:17:36

hit of distribution? Was Jim Caparo?

1:17:40

I think who is

1:17:42

the Wow? I really,

1:17:44

honestly, I can't remember. Damn is that bad?

1:17:47

That bad? My mind? Is that bad? Um?

1:17:49

Okay, you can remember. Let let me tell you what I

1:17:51

never you

1:17:54

put you put Leo Russell together I

1:17:57

don't see how you fail. So

1:18:01

I never did it. Didn't see.

1:18:03

How was it that Sony just didn't understand them

1:18:06

or no? I think it was we

1:18:08

who welcome. You can yell at people

1:18:10

so much to a point where um

1:18:14

people and you understand, this was early

1:18:16

early days of our

1:18:19

culture, you know. And so you're

1:18:21

going up into Tommy's.

1:18:26

Has there been a Tommy

1:18:29

Lee or a moment of sandwiches

1:18:33

exchanged? I never said,

1:18:35

I never saw it. Heard about some conversations,

1:18:38

you know, I heard Russell flipped over a couple of deaths and

1:18:40

things like that, but I never never experienced

1:18:42

it myself. Phone. Okay,

1:18:45

so I know that at

1:18:48

least my perception is that in

1:18:51

ninety four, the the

1:18:54

anchor record of that year

1:18:56

that really established def jam

1:18:59

too the next decade was

1:19:02

Orangees album. Now it

1:19:04

was written, let me tell you really what it was, the first

1:19:06

record we released from Colombia

1:19:11

to PolyGram

1:19:15

Domino. It was Saturday

1:19:17

morning. Yet yeah,

1:19:21

okay, so by that point, you

1:19:25

know, you were heavy at least

1:19:27

in your your knowledge of East

1:19:29

Coast from you know, the Baltimore

1:19:32

I would assume that you were the d m V guy, the

1:19:35

Tri State area guy. You might know

1:19:37

down South markets, did you know West

1:19:39

Coast at all? Like who

1:19:42

was there to really let you guys know? Or

1:19:44

was it just like the chronics ripple

1:19:47

was so strong that it was like we gotta grab

1:19:50

whoever guessed it on Dr Dre's chronic

1:19:52

record and give them a deal. Now, Like, um,

1:19:55

I mean, I'm say I can't put it so you

1:19:59

can me open him hip hop? So

1:20:02

in w A you couldn't talk

1:20:04

too short that I'm It's like I was

1:20:06

a fan. I was a fan. I'm young still,

1:20:09

I'm a fan. So to me,

1:20:12

wait, I just want to say, as

1:20:15

an East Coaster, I want to meet

1:20:17

a person that had my my viewpoint

1:20:20

on what the West Coast was because I

1:20:22

wasn't getting I wasn't open to West Coast hip

1:20:24

hop. I mean until I mean I heard the police

1:20:27

and like I gave him. Okay, I'll give you guys

1:20:29

an exception and ice Cube working

1:20:31

with the bomb squad, But like, for

1:20:34

the most part, there's no

1:20:36

way you can tell me that the West Coast was

1:20:38

going to outdo the East Coast ever culturally

1:20:41

or sales wise. And then

1:20:45

suddenly one day it was like New York just lost

1:20:47

it's it's it's

1:20:49

Steve, But why can't you tell I never

1:20:52

looked again. Well, I was young and dumb. I'm

1:20:54

weirdo. Because I looked at

1:20:56

it. The story that needed to be told

1:20:59

needed to be told by different tongues, and

1:21:03

a Baltimore story in New York story. There's still

1:21:05

a ghetto story in the West everywhere

1:21:07

you know, never where you go. And so to me, I

1:21:10

really looked at it a storytelling. Uh.

1:21:13

No, one was a joke, but then it was the police,

1:21:15

but they both saying kind of the same

1:21:18

thing to me. So I really looked at it as storytelling.

1:21:21

And we went into it with

1:21:24

def Jim West Um, Paul Stewart.

1:21:26

UH hired p and P hired

1:21:29

him. Um. First record

1:21:32

I think was this

1:21:34

is how we do it. But

1:21:37

prior to that out, this is how I learned

1:21:39

the West Coast. There was a group called a

1:21:42

guy called Mellow from Compton and

1:21:44

a group called South Central Cartel. Yeah,

1:21:46

there was original having. So

1:21:52

they said they want to do a West Coast promo tour and

1:21:54

they loved how I put together promo toys.

1:21:57

Uh, and so I got in

1:21:59

a car. We went from Seattle

1:22:02

all the way down to San diego

1:22:04

over to Phoenix in Colorado.

1:22:08

You can tell me about that. I know, the West Coast. I

1:22:11

wrote the Bible of what should be done.

1:22:14

But I hung. I was in Compton. I remember my first

1:22:16

year. I'm gonna tell you sorry, gonna let you go. I'm

1:22:18

in Compton and

1:22:22

it was what we called but you know,

1:22:24

dead version of the bodega. So

1:22:28

I'm getting some iced tea. Back then,

1:22:31

then bottle started shaking, so

1:22:33

like this. So I'm like, who the fund is back there?

1:22:36

What the fund are you doing? I'm I'm

1:22:38

mad, Like, yo, stop working with me. The lady said,

1:22:40

I'm in the middle of an earthquake. And

1:22:49

that was the north Ridge, the Big,

1:22:51

the Big. So you

1:22:53

was in the corner store. It was

1:22:57

Compton. Say,

1:23:02

why are you saying everything?

1:23:09

You know? Every reference the goodness?

1:23:13

I don't know what I told a story but that. But that's my love, my

1:23:16

love. I lived there twice in

1:23:18

my life, and now I appreciate storytellers

1:23:21

being able to tell the no matter what

1:23:23

it was. I just appreciated people telling the story. So,

1:23:27

I mean you had no Internet

1:23:29

back then. I mean now anyone could have the

1:23:32

power. I mean the power that you had

1:23:35

googling something and finding out, Okay, where can

1:23:37

I, uh you know, where

1:23:39

can I promote this record or hang these posters

1:23:42

or or bring my group to meet those

1:23:44

things. But you you're

1:23:46

saying you're writing the Bible on this, Like, how do

1:23:49

you who's giving you your research to know this

1:23:52

particular market, that particular market, this particular

1:23:54

market like touching the people you

1:23:56

taught you? You you find

1:23:59

a hot girl and the god the

1:24:01

hustler, and you go and you

1:24:04

go to the mall. You say, well, y'all going to this

1:24:06

was real. You generally like people because

1:24:14

because we were to take and we were to take

1:24:16

a question of supremes. All right, slight

1:24:19

detours special. Do

1:24:24

you like people? Oh, sugar

1:24:28

ste do you like people? I love good

1:24:30

people. I hate ship heads. You're

1:24:34

lying out already know you hate

1:24:36

people everyone?

1:24:40

I love people, you know I do? I love people? To Bill,

1:24:44

do you believer? I don't believe anything? She says.

1:24:47

I think you've lived in too many places to tell this. I

1:24:56

think I think I think unpaid Bill is

1:24:58

the only person in the circle that actually

1:25:01

but you know what I think I mean from my

1:25:04

people now, I'm with you. I love you guys,

1:25:06

But I'm with you this what's the

1:25:08

same hell as other people. But

1:25:11

no, I think from listening to what he's saying, from

1:25:13

what he was saying, you know when you're talking about

1:25:16

how it wasn't about you know, I plan to be

1:25:18

the president. You just want to add value to

1:25:20

a situation value proposition,

1:25:22

you know what I mean. And so to me, like I'm in that way,

1:25:25

like I don't do I like people. No, but if

1:25:27

you give me a job and say do this job,

1:25:29

then I'll do what I gotta do because I want to deliver

1:25:32

on the job. So if I got to go talk to people,

1:25:34

if I can't just look oaks, how many

1:25:36

followers through this nigger guy, like I gotta really

1:25:38

actually do that, I would do that. So it makes it

1:25:40

makes my joint is like, all right,

1:25:44

my my goal

1:25:47

And that's not like a thing where you're thinking riches

1:25:49

and on stuff. But in general,

1:25:53

my thing was always like, yo, I

1:25:55

just want to take care of my mom and

1:25:59

sugar steve reparations

1:26:04

for the diabetes. Just

1:26:09

take care of my mom. Put out

1:26:11

some fires. Yeah, and put

1:26:13

out some fires, which basically take care. If

1:26:16

you're black, you're a you're automatically taken

1:26:18

carefully seven to fourteen people

1:26:21

in your life just to put out the fire,

1:26:23

you know, Uh, like,

1:26:27

did I think back in

1:26:31

Okay, let me oh, I'm gonna be on the late

1:26:33

night show one time? You know? No, hell no, I didn't.

1:26:37

Somebody sees that fart. I

1:26:39

get you not seeing that, but you

1:26:43

do kind of have this live each

1:26:45

day to the fullest, connect

1:26:48

with people, remember names,

1:26:51

you know, and never

1:26:54

burn a bridge at

1:26:57

like I don't hear uh

1:27:00

Kevin Liles stories like I hear and

1:27:02

I'm gonna get to the you and Dame

1:27:05

history, but I never hear Kevin

1:27:07

low stories like I hear Simmons

1:27:11

like is he really that nice? As not

1:27:14

even nice? But I mean, like your reputation

1:27:16

even even if like

1:27:21

like there's not even rumors about

1:27:23

you doing someone shady or any of those

1:27:25

things. I'll tell you so

1:27:29

some people would. Here's here's what I

1:27:31

get from people. I might not remember

1:27:35

everybody's name, but obviously

1:27:40

it's like like tonight, I have to get something

1:27:42

from each one of you guys, or

1:27:44

why be in the room. So I'm

1:27:47

meeting you and sharing things,

1:27:49

and I'm meeting people all over the world.

1:27:53

But obviously God put me in that place for reasons.

1:27:55

So I have to share a part of myself.

1:27:58

So I wear my heart on my sleeve. And when

1:28:00

you wear your heart and your sleeve, you fear none. You

1:28:02

just don't worry about You just make

1:28:05

people feel like they met you, not

1:28:08

like you. Just But what about the ship heads.

1:28:11

You're not talking about the ship heads, So

1:28:14

so let me tell you about ships. I met a couple

1:28:16

of ship

1:28:19

hits. But but I even understand

1:28:21

them. Some people, um,

1:28:24

that's the only way they could survive, um

1:28:27

and so. And I'm not trying to

1:28:29

get philosophical. I

1:28:32

just I just I really

1:28:34

believe that I was put here for a greater

1:28:36

purpose, and that purpose

1:28:40

might Jesus.

1:28:42

Jesus walked amongst the thieves,

1:28:45

the killers, the liars, um

1:28:48

to make away ship.

1:28:51

He is cool, y'are. You're not gonna change You're not gonna

1:28:53

change who I am. At a matter of fact, I'm

1:28:55

gonna work on being so nice, so

1:28:59

nice that hopefully

1:29:01

you understand that you

1:29:03

don't need to be as much of a ship hit

1:29:07

as I wish. I knew you that

1:29:12

my first anyway,

1:29:15

I want to get some motivational speaking from lids, like in the

1:29:17

morning. I want to wake up exactly. But seriously,

1:29:20

how do you maintain that is that is that motivation? Motivation

1:29:22

is meditation? Was

1:29:25

that you Is this hindsight

1:29:27

speaking or is this in I'm

1:29:31

not okay now, I want

1:29:33

to get to the artists you have to deal with because

1:29:38

or you gotta put on that ship to you right,

1:29:40

because I'm saying that as

1:29:42

an artist, I know the

1:29:45

the plight of the artist, and I know the

1:29:48

plight of employee at the label and

1:29:50

management company. And some

1:29:52

of the biggest clashes ever

1:29:55

mankind are are with artists

1:29:57

and managers or the other side of the table.

1:30:00

So that said, uh, okay,

1:30:05

now that def jam Is is ten years old

1:30:07

at least in this timeline. How

1:30:10

how are the older established

1:30:13

or minus l L who actually weird

1:30:16

enough had the biggest mark

1:30:19

of his career ten years into his career. I

1:30:22

mean, I assume that Mrs Smith surpassed

1:30:24

Mom said knock you out as far

1:30:27

as comebacks are concerned. But I mean,

1:30:29

at this rate, a lot of your first

1:30:31

generation acts, you guys are dealing with Slick

1:30:33

Rick and his his jail

1:30:35

incidents. First of all, how how

1:30:40

did you guys even manage to get eighteen

1:30:44

songs out of Slick Rick with

1:30:47

six weeks of his

1:30:49

life before he's about to do five years

1:30:52

or right, like what was that? What was that period?

1:30:54

Like? Um? I

1:30:57

was that was more so like an

1:30:59

intern period. It for me, you know, um

1:31:01

I was just coming up. And the

1:31:05

Slick Rick story was. Rick was a

1:31:07

storyteller, so he just knew he

1:31:09

had to do write a lot of records

1:31:11

and it was he would

1:31:14

know he would listen when I when I tell you Rick and

1:31:17

the Rick is a good good friend and and I'm

1:31:20

hoping to answer the question right because I'm gonna go

1:31:22

ou outside of Rick. I think my

1:31:24

job at that time was to preserve

1:31:27

legacy with those guys

1:31:29

and understand that that tird

1:31:32

you put the D N def jam in public, geting me, you put

1:31:35

the E and def jam Slick Rick, you put

1:31:37

the F and def jam. You know I had to

1:31:39

so I treated them like that. I didn't treat

1:31:41

them like they were old. I

1:31:43

didn't treat them like they were yesterday.

1:31:46

I treat him like they were important and today. And this

1:31:48

is why to this day, you know, Rick

1:31:51

and Mandy A call mean and say hey, we just want to tell you

1:31:53

we love you. Tired to say yo, you

1:31:55

know, come me and Simone doing this

1:31:58

chucka hip me and said, yo podcasts

1:32:00

with you know, I still get

1:32:03

and and so that moment and

1:32:05

I remember when um we did

1:32:07

behind Bars he was

1:32:09

locked you know, yeah, the orangy you know,

1:32:12

um that was my ship and I love that

1:32:14

joy that was how

1:32:17

did y'all do that? How did y'all make a record? And

1:32:20

then I did it again with Sean

1:32:24

when he was behind bars that I did

1:32:27

his uh that the Godfather Buried

1:32:29

Alive or something like that. Yeah, Um, I did

1:32:31

it. And when they're recording

1:32:34

under this drest like how I'm

1:32:36

just trying to figure out how are they able

1:32:38

to even produce uh

1:32:42

results with with

1:32:45

with that imaginary

1:32:47

guns in their head like they have to. I

1:32:50

don't think when you when it's when it's argument is what you

1:32:53

do. It's like saying telling a guy you got

1:32:55

to build a house in um

1:32:58

instead of a year, you gotta build it in six month. It

1:33:00

might be impossible. He still knows how to build a house. And

1:33:03

so I think that I think that at the end of the day, these uh,

1:33:06

these kids, I think then the day they felt

1:33:09

that they decided to feed their family.

1:33:11

And when you when how you when you work in the feed

1:33:13

your family, you're not writing records? Right?

1:33:17

You surviving? You know we'll speaking in behind

1:33:19

bars. I gotta give a shout out to

1:33:21

the Warrangry remix to of bars.

1:33:24

This is behind bars or on quest of Supreme.

1:33:26

We're here with super

1:33:28

Guru Kevin. You

1:33:32

are bro check this out this morning.

1:33:34

Gee, you know what I'm saying. Chill them with my man

1:33:37

slick Rick, you know, and we're gonna give you all

1:33:39

a little tail about that jail stuff. You know. So

1:33:41

Rick, why don't you running home? Get

1:33:44

down? Innocent lord played with he wasn't

1:33:46

having anything. I was raised the blades and supposed

1:33:49

situation seeing Roles.

1:33:51

Hey, your money was sidespon

1:33:54

me to one other sprang up that

1:34:00

was behind bars by a slick Rick.

1:34:04

That's right, the Warringy Remix behind

1:34:06

bars on Quest Love Supreme. Um,

1:34:08

there's one question I don't want to ask you. Um,

1:34:11

so by this point

1:34:14

in that I can say

1:34:16

that you're safely in the defam office not

1:34:18

intern um. What

1:34:21

was what

1:34:24

was you guys reaction to

1:34:27

music in our message by public enemy?

1:34:31

Because I remember the day I

1:34:34

remember the day that ursa

1:34:36

smith and uh

1:34:39

well back when Set to Run, you

1:34:42

guys had so many Rush associated

1:34:45

companies. But when Ursula became

1:34:48

her own uh publicity

1:34:50

firm, Uh, she was

1:34:52

our first, the roots first publicist,

1:34:55

and I used to just always hang in her office and

1:34:58

she called me in, says mir, I got the new Public

1:35:01

Enemy album. You want to hear it? And

1:35:04

that was That

1:35:07

was one of the most coldest days ever

1:35:09

because because every

1:35:12

Public Enemy album from

1:35:16

Nation of Millions, well every there was three

1:35:21

four I forgot even even

1:35:23

when bum Rust the show, Like every

1:35:26

time I listened to a Public Enemy album for the first

1:35:28

time, it was such a life changing

1:35:30

moment and for me it was like, wow, can

1:35:32

they do this to me for a fifth time? The

1:35:35

no, the answer was yes, but

1:35:38

it was it

1:35:40

was in the wrong way. But in hindsight they

1:35:45

were onto something because they were five years

1:35:47

before the rage against

1:35:49

the Machine, you know, rock rap

1:35:52

thing. But I

1:35:54

mean I have the same reaction that had the same

1:35:56

open mouth draw dropped. Are

1:35:59

they allowed to do this? Like it was such a

1:36:02

radical album? What

1:36:04

were you guys? Please be

1:36:08

Chuck has been very honest about how you guys felt

1:36:10

about it when you

1:36:12

got the record. What

1:36:16

did y'all talk about I

1:36:18

didn't know what to do, like

1:36:21

Chuck played in front of you guys and looked at your

1:36:24

faces, or just like I didn't know what to

1:36:26

do because

1:36:29

because at least with Apocalypse, when you're

1:36:31

like, okay, I

1:36:34

can work with that, you know what. But but but but

1:36:37

here's the great thing about writing about

1:36:39

deaf Dan. Once

1:36:42

you proved yourself, who

1:36:45

am I to judge? That's

1:36:47

where we're going. I don't

1:36:50

know what to do, but okay,

1:36:53

we're gonna We're gonna see what it is. Well, it was also well

1:36:56

not the second to last album, because that was he got game.

1:36:58

But like

1:37:01

there was there was just no precedent for

1:37:04

I mean, there was the Goats, you know, the goats

1:37:07

who were economising, they were rocking

1:37:09

the wrapping and raised against the Machine, had one

1:37:11

album out beforehand.

1:37:14

But did you guys

1:37:16

at least have a warning that

1:37:20

you know, because by that point, even

1:37:22

even though I

1:37:24

mean, WU Tank still wasn't a fully

1:37:27

formed figurehead

1:37:29

and you know, the group that we

1:37:31

will worship. So in

1:37:33

my mind, like publicanmy still

1:37:35

had run DMC status to

1:37:39

that point in ninety four, and then I

1:37:43

don't know, maybe I just felt

1:37:45

they were so angry at Were

1:37:48

they angry at you? Guys? Were they angry?

1:37:50

Was it just like a lot of inga a

1:37:53

lot of anger? Um, what was the relationship

1:37:56

like? Because I would think that they were your

1:37:59

crown jewel, like you know this, this

1:38:01

is the group that gets the white

1:38:04

critics respect, and they

1:38:06

always they always would would be the crown jewel.

1:38:09

But you you gotta understand,

1:38:12

Um, when when your kids

1:38:14

and you grow up together, Um, sometimes

1:38:17

a big brother little brother thing comes into

1:38:20

play. And when you finally

1:38:22

got a point where you sold the Left records, you want to do what

1:38:24

you want to do too, So a

1:38:26

lot of that has to have to come. You gotta They

1:38:30

were young kids, man, you're talking about back

1:38:32

then, you know Todd fifteen sixteen,

1:38:36

and they're going all over the world, you know

1:38:38

what I mean, public enemy you

1:38:41

know, people with them, people not with them,

1:38:43

people against them. People they're fighting

1:38:46

wars that you know, the Griffin. It's

1:38:48

it's so much so you had

1:38:50

to allow that to happen. And when

1:38:53

I'll see and talk to you about it. But when

1:38:55

a rock act or a pop

1:38:58

act when they make that album that you don't

1:39:01

what's that? We just

1:39:03

say it was just a time for them

1:39:05

republicaning at that moment again,

1:39:08

they would early. I'm with you, they were just early

1:39:10

and we wasn't built for that. We

1:39:13

just wasn't built for it. And that was the and but

1:39:15

that was the expression. So who were we to judge?

1:39:19

Was their disappointment and their end

1:39:21

of you guys not finding because

1:39:24

even then I just thought like, oh, they're over, they

1:39:27

lost it, and I had no clue

1:39:29

that it. Later

1:39:33

when I found out, like, oh, because Ursula, their

1:39:35

publicists had to figure out how

1:39:37

to market them, and somehow she got

1:39:40

glowing reviews out of Vibe magazine

1:39:42

and and well tore

1:39:45

roasted them with like a two star review of Rolling

1:39:47

Stone. But for the most

1:39:49

part she got a lot of rock,

1:39:51

alternative fresh love that I

1:39:54

wasn't even expecting them to get. And

1:39:57

thus they started slowly creeping

1:39:59

in into alternative tours

1:40:02

out the norm. That opened up another lane form, right,

1:40:05

not just raps. It was like like, oh, okay,

1:40:07

there are c white people and rockheads

1:40:09

that want to hear bring the noise right this

1:40:11

stuff and I didn't. That

1:40:14

was that was the message. Two.

1:40:17

You could you could in

1:40:20

hip hop create many lanes. And

1:40:22

what they did was you

1:40:25

gotta think back then, nobody was thinking

1:40:27

that even with Beastie being

1:40:29

what it was, nobody

1:40:32

would ever think P would go there. You know what I mean,

1:40:34

you got a certain thing from P. You know what I mean, nobody

1:40:36

ever thought they would go there. But what what I

1:40:39

just chuck was saying, um,

1:40:41

And again I can't quote it because I don't remember

1:40:44

that this is where we are,

1:40:47

just where we are. One

1:40:50

of the more amazing, uh comeback stories

1:40:53

in my mind for death cham Um was

1:40:56

that Mr. Smith album and

1:40:59

i'd I personally didn't think he

1:41:02

could do it a third time. You know it's

1:41:04

like no, well, it's like yes,

1:41:08

initial well his initial l l

1:41:11

elness run And even

1:41:13

though I was a fan of Walking with the Panther and

1:41:15

you were the only one in the room. Look,

1:41:18

it came out the last day of school. It was a special

1:41:21

woman and I graduated. That

1:41:23

was my soundtrack at the summer. I like dropping

1:41:25

him. And then and then

1:41:28

uh, you know, Mom said knock you Out

1:41:30

was like the comeback, even though we weren't supposed

1:41:32

to call that. And then you

1:41:35

know, once the

1:41:38

thing was I read the source review

1:41:40

of of of fourteen

1:41:42

shots at the shot which

1:41:46

you know, yeah,

1:41:48

back seat and how I'm coming. What was

1:41:50

the other scene? But

1:41:53

not that remix. The remix was not on that record.

1:41:55

The remix wasn't had the remix was on the record,

1:41:57

I would give him something different, the

1:42:00

right I would get. But

1:42:03

you know, I mean, the legend is that Russell

1:42:05

lost his mind at the source of review and words

1:42:08

were exchanged and all this stuff. But all

1:42:11

that happened pretty much. People counted

1:42:13

ll out, and I

1:42:15

guess he wisely just

1:42:18

stayed silent for a year, all

1:42:20

of ninety four. And then the

1:42:23

first we saw him with his new ball head

1:42:25

and stuff was in the Flavoring Year remixing.

1:42:28

So was there was

1:42:30

there a marketing plan to two

1:42:35

bring LLL back? Or was it just like here's

1:42:38

some spaghetti and throw it on the wall and see what

1:42:40

sticks. Todd

1:42:42

And if you speak to him, he'll tell you. Let

1:42:45

me tell you something phenomenal,

1:42:49

phenomenal. He

1:42:54

like his good Luck Chump and the

1:42:57

Smith Mrs Smith, you know Garbags

1:43:00

last. Um that

1:43:03

was the last Todd album we

1:43:05

worked on together. UM because

1:43:08

he left UM soon after that. Um.

1:43:14

You gotta understand something. L

1:43:17

L cool Day is hot A usually DJ man.

1:43:19

You couldn't tell me now, No, rapper. I

1:43:22

was a fan fan, So you mean to tell

1:43:24

me that LLL No,

1:43:28

that's he. He was HiCon

1:43:31

to me. I I wanted to Todd,

1:43:34

So there was no way that

1:43:37

he was there. He was that. He was

1:43:39

always going to be this to me. To me,

1:43:42

so I treated him like that. And you're

1:43:44

saying this, I mean you're pointing up on a higher

1:43:46

level. He he was

1:43:48

always that to me and so

1:43:51

to me. I never looked at it as um

1:43:56

him making a comeback. I

1:43:58

thought every album was an ex ferimentation

1:44:00

of where he was as an artist and

1:44:03

certain things he tried. You know what I mean, because even

1:44:05

knowing fourteen shots, you know, I was trying

1:44:07

to tell your back it's back seat is the record, you guys,

1:44:10

is the back seat is the record? I said that

1:44:12

Pink cookies, what we talked, talked, we gotta

1:44:14

have a conversation like that back

1:44:18

seat we

1:44:22

I said, we had that real conversation. But

1:44:24

it was um, um, I have to be honest

1:44:27

with you. UM. That is why today,

1:44:30

UM we're still friends. Because we

1:44:33

went through every moment that you can go through. I remember

1:44:35

when when um he

1:44:38

dropped headstrong, Uh

1:44:42

yeah and uh he

1:44:44

he uh. That was his last number one album,

1:44:46

two hundred thousand copies, and he called

1:44:49

me and said, you always believed

1:44:51

in me. You never stopped

1:44:54

believing in me. I'm gonna love

1:44:56

you better, he

1:44:58

said. He said, you never stopped and

1:45:00

until this day, just so

1:45:03

I never looked at it like come back and come that.

1:45:05

I never looked because again these were they

1:45:08

were friends too. So what

1:45:10

you know now, did we have to go to work? Do we had

1:45:12

to do things differently? Do we had to go see different Yeah?

1:45:14

We had to do that. But that's what it's

1:45:17

all about. To me, That's what evolution is all about.

1:45:19

It's not about I'd rather have the hard

1:45:21

time. How about this? Let

1:45:23

me do that because you can remember me. You're

1:45:25

gonna know I went there, was with you the whole

1:45:27

time. Figured it out. So

1:45:30

for for a record like Mr. Smith

1:45:34

and for the potential singles that

1:45:36

had had Uh, there's

1:45:38

one important element in the story that

1:45:40

we kind of didn't mention, which

1:45:43

was the the the

1:45:45

uprise and the power

1:45:48

that a certain New York radio station had,

1:45:52

which was Hot nine. I hope I'm

1:45:54

allowed to say that, you know on

1:45:57

my own show Panto Scott,

1:46:00

Is that allow? Okay?

1:46:03

I just need to be technical. Um,

1:46:09

not that I would expect you to give

1:46:12

me the dirty low

1:46:14

down, but

1:46:19

I mean, by this point, especially with

1:46:22

coming up in the right, what's the telecommunications

1:46:25

that? Yeah? God, what

1:46:35

a paralegal you. You

1:46:37

deserve your own noise, a

1:46:40

fact check and

1:46:44

the fact

1:46:49

checker. I know that you

1:46:53

guys were playing the win. I

1:46:55

know that by this

1:46:57

point bad boys really established

1:46:59

trying to dablished themselves as as

1:47:01

the sheriff of the block. Uh. Oh

1:47:04

god, I didn't even mention death

1:47:06

row. Uh. You

1:47:09

know there are other labels that are vying

1:47:11

for that number one spot and

1:47:13

we know that. And for the most part, Uh,

1:47:17

in an hour, you could probably squeeze in six

1:47:20

to seven songs. You

1:47:22

guys are starting your muscle period at

1:47:25

least of of you know of

1:47:27

about to you know, so what,

1:47:30

But I'm just saying that it's

1:47:33

true though, you

1:47:38

know, is this some Mars Levy

1:47:41

Part two? Things like how

1:47:44

do you muscle radio

1:47:46

to stay on your side? Like? Is

1:47:49

it like, yo, I'm really feeling that song

1:47:51

doing it? Okay, I'm gonna just play it a whole

1:47:53

forty two billion times? Or

1:47:58

is it a new level of shaking hands and kiss

1:48:00

some babies that you probably can't technically

1:48:03

get into like

1:48:05

has that ever stopped? Uh?

1:48:08

Let me let me say this to you. And

1:48:11

I couldn't say this, not

1:48:14

one thing of what hatten any seven without

1:48:18

without I'm telling him

1:48:21

he's acting about we talked COT seven

1:48:23

right? Well yeah, I mean, well, you know, we live

1:48:25

in New York City and I'm hot. Ninety seven

1:48:27

is the station that if flex is

1:48:30

feeling it, then chances

1:48:32

are that the ripple effects gonna

1:48:34

happen. And this guy in Cleveland is gonna play it, in

1:48:37

the station in Seattle is gonna play it. But

1:48:39

the thing is is that I

1:48:45

wouldn't believe that. Okay, a fan is calling

1:48:47

in, Yes, I need to

1:48:49

hear doing it by l O like again.

1:48:52

But let me give the truth though. So like

1:48:55

you, you're you're a guy that had hits, You

1:48:57

have hits under your belt? How

1:48:59

do you make your those hits keep coming? And

1:49:02

that there? And I mean like a

1:49:05

song for you, A good day of

1:49:08

radio rotation is how

1:49:11

many times at its height, how many times

1:49:13

do you want your hit song

1:49:15

played a day on

1:49:18

one station? Is it thirty five times

1:49:20

a day? I don't think any one

1:49:22

particular record will play thirty five times

1:49:24

a day, because if it did, it would play thirty five

1:49:26

times seven and whatever. But but let

1:49:29

me give you this, and I'm not this is not a

1:49:31

hostile got your question. I

1:49:33

just I just want to know that the science of how

1:49:39

like for me growing up and remember radio,

1:49:42

it was like the DJ wants to be the cool dude,

1:49:44

and hey, I'm gonna put you onto this record. Oh

1:49:46

I might play this album cut where

1:49:48

now it's like, I don't think you know you guys

1:49:51

are a label with frown on an album

1:49:53

cut. Like if it were up to me, Mr

1:49:55

Smith, I would play that no

1:49:58

airplay is you

1:50:04

wouldn't no,

1:50:07

I see, I would play the Eric Eric Surton

1:50:09

remix something I

1:50:12

actually girl, you know it's true and didn't

1:50:14

get caught and I don't want to mention and get a lawsuit

1:50:17

on that.

1:50:21

Okay, a

1:50:23

record like doing it? What

1:50:26

are you expecting? Hot

1:50:30

nine seven? How many times

1:50:32

do you want to hear it in a twenty four hour period? Heavy

1:50:34

rotation? I mean, is that eighteen times a

1:50:36

day at least? So I

1:50:38

think at that particular time it was probably

1:50:41

most price sixty two times in a week.

1:50:43

So if you so, you're going by a week you're not going by

1:50:45

daily because you because program

1:50:49

changed over the weekend. They go to weekend programming.

1:50:52

It's like it's different stuff. And back then it

1:50:54

was call out, you know what I mean? Where if the record

1:50:56

called out? And it still is now and now it's PPM

1:50:59

and all these from kind of metrics and um

1:51:01

that are going on. But I have to say what

1:51:04

people forgot and what we try to radio

1:51:07

was the last stop with us. Okay,

1:51:09

we're doing it. Quest if

1:51:12

you came to the tunnel with me and

1:51:14

heard what Cap

1:51:17

did guard rest his soul um

1:51:20

and the walk in our and

1:51:23

then what Flex did doing

1:51:25

it? Drinks got spilled every

1:51:27

soon as that beginning came on, it was and

1:51:30

we made all make sure all our records that we

1:51:32

went to radio with they

1:51:35

had to get. We called it the tunnel tests.

1:51:38

If you plan between twelve and three o'clock

1:51:40

in the tunnel, get

1:51:43

at me dog when we dropped

1:51:45

me. So we knew it wasn't um

1:51:47

gonna be a big radio record, but it lit

1:51:50

the tunnel up. Redman, the

1:51:52

method man, the uh no

1:51:56

no no water

1:51:59

rock water. There's the two verses

1:52:01

in the but

1:52:05

you go when you went to the tunnel place.

1:52:09

And so my thing is, so, who do you have to convince

1:52:12

at whatever radios?

1:52:14

And I'm not even gonna sing ninety seven? Who

1:52:16

do you have to convince? At? First

1:52:19

of all, are you at this point talking

1:52:22

to a clear channel person who

1:52:24

control or who controls a

1:52:27

hundred sass across them? Are you not?

1:52:29

Back then, so you had individual individual

1:52:32

program director. So back then it was Steve

1:52:34

Smith and Tracy Clardy at Hot ninety seven.

1:52:37

UM. Today is THEA mitchem and

1:52:39

Ge Wears at Pole one oh five. I'm

1:52:42

just from New York. I mean there's a lot of but then

1:52:44

there's now there's clusters too. So THEA

1:52:47

runs a cluster, and there's Doc

1:52:49

Winner who runs the Urban Cluster fall of clear

1:52:52

Channels, UM, and then there's

1:52:54

uh J. Stevens for Radio one

1:52:57

UM cluster, and then Ken

1:52:59

Johnson and Foot's

1:53:01

one of those down the south whatever. So

1:53:04

it's it's clustered now, but back then with

1:53:06

individual program directors, the music directors.

1:53:08

Okay, so I'll say a few

1:53:10

episodes back um we

1:53:13

have former president beaten

1:53:15

former still president and BT. Sorry

1:53:24

and Stephen Hill mentioned,

1:53:28

uh one of his regrets when

1:53:30

he first worked at MTV was

1:53:32

that he probably could have lit

1:53:35

a fire under them to really give more

1:53:37

support to your all.

1:53:39

I need to get buy by Method Man and Mary

1:53:42

J. Blige And now in my head,

1:53:44

I was like, wait, that record is everywhere, So of course

1:53:46

he's like nope, He's like, it could have been

1:53:48

even stronger. It could have been so

1:53:51

much more bigger and way ubiquitous.

1:53:54