- 3 years ago
QuestloveInterviewBabydollFoxy
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00:00so how are you i'm great um we're currently in the bay bay area right now
00:08oh my bad are we starting i'll sound more alive sorry yes we are starting okay okay
00:15all right no you know i'm good um right now uh the fourth tour with ll has you know we made our
00:24way to the west coast right now we've been on the road for like a month and a half and
00:29you know i will say that you know of the 30 years i've been doing this this is probably the hardest
00:35i've ever worked in my life like you know no i kind of i tend to make things look easy when we
00:42do it like it's no sweat right um and then once you once you enroll at camp cool jay um you know
00:51ll's like the the drill sergeant of all drill sergeants when it when it comes to everything
00:57even as even as rehearsals are as are as intense as the actual shows we do
01:02okay well um i'm excited either way we've actually uh me and my person we were live streaming
01:10a show you guys did um you had like erica badu come on balal came out it was just a beautiful
01:17i don't know and my person he's like yo can you imagine being there i'm like no that's why i cannot
01:23wait for this show in september because that's right right magical no it's it's what this is
01:31what i want to stress to people um i know oftentimes when you see these multi bills of all these names
01:38you'll just be like all right well i know i just want to see ll cool j so let me let me take a wild
01:46guess and say that he'll come on at 9 30 and then some people get there and they'll they'll hit me in
01:51dms later like yo how come he didn't do around the way girl or you know doing it or his hits and i'm
02:00like that's because he did it earlier like what we're doing is um kind of a throwback to how motown
02:09used to tour back in the 60s which is instead of like an opening the neck and then you know the
02:16intermission and the next act and an intermission and the next second intermission we're just
02:21basically doing a three and a half hour mixtape where one act will come on and then you know the
02:28next act will do two songs and the next acts will come and do two songs and then some other act will
02:33come back and do another song and then the roots return and do a song and then ll does the second set
02:38so it's just not it's literally like a live dj set for three and a half hours with no breaks in them
02:46and you know people are it it takes some adjusting to get used to but you know i i see that that's
02:54probably more exciting than doing something traditional which you know i'm about i'm about
03:00pushing the envelope and and figuring out what other creative juices we got inside of us so
03:05definitely i can't wait it's gonna be epic i can just oh my god we're not even gonna get into all
03:12of that but i'm so excited to be interviewing you at all like thank you my mother who is like when i
03:19say i have a traditional southern mom who is all about her game shows her soap office and jesus um and
03:26she's like you're interviewing class love i want to go with you to work and i'm just like that never
03:30happens okay i know man i went from college kids to now grandparents everywhere love me now so you
03:39know i'm covering all my bases tell her tell her thank you i appreciate that well you made my mama
03:44proud of me today so that never happens i appreciate it all right thank you well give your mother love i
03:50i love that thank you so like you're halfway to like towards your egot basically at this point so
03:57do we have halfway you are so you got some plays in the works like what you got coming yeah you know
04:04believe it or not um we do we've been um even before summer of soul i'd signed on to bring soul train
04:14to broadway um this is this has been about seven years in the making so right now in san francisco
04:22there is um you know in in the very beginning of then this is the same people that brought you the
04:34temptations the very successful temptations on broadway uh play um they're working out the kinks
04:40right now and you know we we should have soul train on broadway uh mid uh for the 2024 season it's kind
04:50of weird how that all works out because i think with my music career um i was so i guess you could say
04:59laser focused and calculating on you know how to win a grammy like what what what what do i need what
05:07steps i need to take and what's weird is that um when the pandemic came and all of us were at ground
05:15zero as a people like we didn't know if we were coming or going we didn't know what we were doing
05:21it's kind of weird for me that my world started opening up once i stopped treating this like a
05:29business you know there's a point where like you're excited you know you get your record deal you're happy
05:35you're making your first few records and it's exciting and then you know once you get to your
05:40sixth and seventh record i think with human beings like you know we get once you become an expert at
05:46something then it's like no longer fun it's just like your job um and it wasn't until i realized that
05:53i have to do other things that are creative um that somehow i got my groove back you know so i i will say
06:03that it was once i stopped chasing the awards and try to chase the hit singles and you know what
06:10musical achievements can we do like once i just started like being curious and doing other things
06:15then suddenly like the world is opening up for me so i kind of want to stay in that place where
06:20yeah if i if i become an egot i i welcome that i absolutely welcome that but i think right now
06:28i'm just trying to be you know proverbial the nine-year-old that that's curious about how this
06:35works and how that works and and you just follow your bliss exactly we we should all be nine years
06:42old and following their passion so that's that's what i'm about now how do you wake up at 6 23 every
06:48morning like how does that happen um you know previously i will say that sleep was not a friend
06:58of mine i didn't think that i needed sleep and then in the pandemic once everything well for starters
07:05we had nothing to do during the pandemic like there was a point where we weren't even doing the tonight
07:09show but then on top of that um i was like quarantining with a family that had a farm
07:15and kind of in that farm there's really nothing to do but just sit with yourself and sit with your
07:22thoughts and read and meditate and all this stuff and so i'll basically say that um kind of the 2.0
07:30version of myself started rearing its head and i realized that sleep is important um and also not
07:39overloading myself with that much work i mean i work hard now but you know i was i was the
07:45absolute mess before 2016 where in one day i could teach college host a radio show do the tonight
07:54show score a movie go do a dj gig and do some songwriting for a roots project like i would do
08:00like six to seven things a day and that was really just that that that's not chasing a passion that's
08:07like avoiding avoiding myself so i think you know now i i wake up early in the morning and you know
08:17i do my morning routine i do my breath work i do i kind of do my grat my gratitude hard because i've
08:24i've tried breath work i meditate and you transcendental meditate and that is a hard for i know
08:31it's ignorant to say a hard meditation but that's a hard meditation i try it here's the thing i will
08:37say that um i'm reading a book now which basically says that any habit any habit can form if you just
08:47consistently do it at least 18 days in a row you know and i you know think of like a diet or something
08:57you know what i mean like when you drop sugar for you know you like cranky and by day four you're
09:03staring at that bread crust in the trash like you know whatever like it's going through the motions
09:10i will say that in the very beginning uh it felt very silly very hippie-ish very this is not me
09:20side-eyeing a lot of my friends that are like doing this um and it's kind of weird where the
09:27universe pushes you like again if you remember where we were in in the pandemic like in may
09:35especially like of 2020 where you didn't know if you were going to live or die the next day um
09:40life sort of has a way of i mean i wish it wasn't that way where you know like sometimes you got to go
09:47to rock bottom in order to change your life um i kind of think the pandemic was really a gift
09:54like most people have to go to jail or get shot or have some very extreme circumstance happen to them
10:03for them to be like okay i'm gonna change i'm gonna change and kind of with the pandemic was our one
10:08chance where the universe is like all right we're gonna play nice now and you have a choice to make
10:13either you're gonna pivot now or you're gonna perish which one are you gonna choose and you know at
10:19at that rate where at least a close friend of mine was literally dying week after week after week after
10:26week after week i was like uh you don't have to tell me twice i'm gonna start getting my rest start
10:33getting my exercise i was like 400 pounds doing the pandemic and you know i dropped like 120 and just
10:39really started started examining what my life was and yeah so i just think every every person reaches
10:50that place in their life where it gets to you know hopefully um for a lot of us it won't be to
10:56the detriment of our life or a loved one passing away for us to want to change so that's that's what i'm
11:03going through right now you know i just get up in the morning and it's not hard i just i take five
11:08minutes out to say what i'm grateful for you know thanks for waking me up this morning thanks for
11:13the color brown thing you know whatever yeah do my breathing and then i do my affirmations like
11:18you know you gotta oftentimes like we we will say the worst things to ourselves like that we wouldn't
11:26let another human being ever say to us and we talk ourselves out of everything so you know i i wish i
11:33knew this at 30 but i know it at 50 and i'm sticking with it yeah yeah my i got my listeners
11:40on a 28 day gratitude challenge so maybe we'll try some uh well tonight tonight tonight is important
11:46tonight is is the biggest full moon of the year it's gonna be like blue isn't it yeah the blue moon was
11:54last night so now now's the season for you to write out what your life goals are what you want to
11:59what you want to achieve and all those things and that's what i do i like you just you gotta you
12:04gotta physically write it out so that your brain literally knows what what your future wants to be
12:11because oftentimes we just think it in our heads but you have to physically say out loud you know
12:18i want to expand my business or i want to leave my job in a year and move to that and i'm become a
12:27chef like that's what you physically have to do those things and so you know i what i say to you
12:34is just for two minutes a day when you wake up go to the mirror and just say your affirmations and for
12:41me just simply say you know every day in every way i get better and better and better like that's
12:48literally what i do and you know it it makes a difference you we got to retrain our brains to
12:55think different so it's it's it's it's a struggle in the beginning but you know i've been doing this
13:01for like two years now and it's it's it's just as simple as as breathing to me now so if i could do it
13:09anybody could do it i understand i got you i i went vegan uh like two and a half years ago and people
13:15like how do you just and i'm like it's weird but it's it's okay like i'm okay i gotta be a bad see
13:23i'm i'm i'm sort of like whatever my mood is i'm a mooditarian like okay i'm like let me go plant
13:29based this weekend it's hard to maintain that on the road but you know imagine it's hard to maintain
13:36it on the road but yeah it's hard to maintain it when you're stationary so i get it exactly
13:42exactly exactly okay yeah but um i had what like what is your greatest because you've had some
13:51amazing musical collaborations throughout your career what is your greatest or your favorite
13:56just your favorite um you know for me um oftentimes people don't know when they're when
14:06they're in a historical moment like they they realized that they were doing something important
14:10like maybe 10 or 20 years down the line um i will probably say the four years that i took uh creating
14:20the the voodoo album with d'angelo was probably for us it was like high school like we were like long
14:30lost brothers that discovered each other and we took four years to make this record and while we're
14:37recording this record like we're getting this this massive education where night after night you know
14:45prince might come say what's up to us and then the next night you know we're jamming with q-tip or
14:51something like that like every night was like something that was further uh kind of imperative to our
14:58our musical growth so just just making that album uh for that four-year period which subsequently also
15:05just spawned off you know common got word that we were making this record it's like yo i want a piece
15:11of that magic so he came by the studio and started making his record and of course erica badu and then
15:16kind of everyone that's in that soul querying click like yeah most deaf and talib kwali and balau and all
15:22that stuff so um yeah i'll just say like definitely ushered in a new era of hip-hop like yeah you
15:30stopped me from being a weird girl in school and i got it like i was cool you know because because of
15:35that era in hip-hop but before that i was a weird oh she's a weird right see part part of the dope
15:43thing about doing this tour with ll especially with all the acts that are on the show um you know i'd
15:50never every time i see de la soul like i know they start eye rolling like ah here's zamir again but
15:56you know i tell the man like they single-handedly stopped any type of bullying i ever got on my block
16:04like the second the me myself and i video came out then all the kids on the block were like
16:08oh you're like those kids like you're like one of the cool kids and i'm the dumb jack so i gotta change
16:15and be the cool kid and literally like in a snap it just you know suddenly i i became i wasn't the
16:24nerd or the dweeb i was the cool guy so yeah it happened for me like de la soul was that was de la
16:31soul for me in high school so yeah so yes well thank you for doing that for me well i appreciate it now
16:37now you you got to pay it for it and you know someone's going to follow you and then they'll follow
16:42them and that's that's why it's important that we got to stay on our path and stay on in our
16:47integrity so that other people because other oftentimes i think artists don't realize how
16:54they affect other people i know that we all like to say like i'm not a role model or and you know for
17:00the most part i don't think that the weight should should fall on artists to be quote unquote role models
17:07but it's also like all right we're not dumb we know that i know that you know there's there's like
17:14roots children and like i know that i'm being watched and i know that my words are being heard so
17:19yeah kind of with anything that i do i do it with the intention of you know kind of planting seeds so
17:27that once i do leave this earthly plane that i can leave it in a better condition than when i came to
17:33it and that's that's important to me well you've created quite a legacy for yourself and i'm just
17:41i'm just honored to even get to talk to you now i know you say you listen to 100 new songs a day
17:47every day you know what i try to do so there was there was a point in the there was a point in the
17:54pandemic um where uh a certain world leader of ours uh would often give his like summer list or his
18:03yearly list of what he's listening to and you know occasionally i'd i'd eye roll like all right
18:10for real he no but here's the thing like he will listen to ice spice but i also know it's like okay
18:18i get it you you got to relate to people out here you're the world leader and you know of course you
18:24got daughters and all those things but you know i want to be a person in his life that also introduces
18:30him to music that he might not know about so um i'll say that around two years ago uh
18:37aforementioned world leader and and his uh his awesome wife kind of uh made it my job to be the
18:48the the music curator the music czar of which i created these uh i give them about 50 songs a month
18:56and thing is word started getting out and then other people were like well if you made it for
19:02them can i get it too so initially i was just making it for like 10 people and now i think as of last
19:10night my list is closer to let's see yeah i'm up to 347 people so at the top of the month i gotta go
19:21through 500 songs and the reason why i do it is so that it i challenge myself because you know we
19:28we can all get stuck in our ways like you know the five records you like you know the the 20 songs you
19:34like when you're in the gym you listen to the same we do the same thing every day like we're habitual
19:39especially as we get older we brush our teeth the same we go to the same job we get the same food
19:45order the same starbucks like we do nothing different and for me i don't want to be the guy
19:51that like only knows like the songs between 1974 and maybe 1991 that i like so this this also helps me
20:02break out of the habit of not discovering like new artists so like without doing this list i probably
20:09wouldn't know who uh salt was or hiatus coyote from australia or even like you know how how dope
20:20doja cat like if i just trusted the internet like based on their comments of doja cat initially like
20:27i probably wouldn't have gotten into it but you know she's making dope music so it's it's like for me
20:33this this also helps me uh not get stuck in in my habits of safety yeah yeah and i think staying
20:44off of social media um definitely helps you separate the artists from their art so i definitely think that
20:51that helps clear your mind too exactly exactly what new um indie artists are you looking at right now
20:58that we haven't heard of man uh jesus now now you're going to catch me like trying to figure out
21:05i'm looking like right now on my list like i will say right now my favorite group uh there's i don't
21:12know if you heard of salt but salt's kind of like this mystery group of like i personally know who they
21:21are but they're they're the kind of group that doesn't want to be revealed because all five of them
21:26are individual kind of like salt salt is like their moonlighting gig like okay you know you do your
21:35day job but what you really want to do and have fun with your friends like you do a little side thing
21:40so salt is basically a super group of which um you know they make these like amazing records like if
21:50if the roots had the roots came out instead of like 93 like if we came out in like 2013 we would have
21:58been salt so like right now that's like the the group that i'm feeling right now but i don't know
22:04i'm kind of boring like right now i'm listening to a bunch of like uh i guess you could say um
22:10binaural beats it's like these people think i'm so sure right i listen to binaural beats yes right
22:23it gets it gets it gets um it gets embarrassing at the end because you know spotify likes to snitch
22:30and tell the world like what you're listening to yeah and um you know if you know fonte from little
22:36brother i love fonte right one day fonte looked at me like hey man you okay and i'm like why what
22:44would you hear and he was like yeah man i saw your your year-end list of all the songs the top 20 songs
22:51you listen to and he's like and none of them songs was music and i was like oh damn i forgot like people
22:58can see what i'm listening to but yeah like i i all the time like i need i need to be in a constant
23:05state of calm because of i do so much that you know without it this is where you're susceptible to
23:14like new addictions like i'm not trying to start a cocaine habit because i can't think of an idea
23:20or like i feel like i feel like you know so yeah oftentimes when i talk my myself down off the ledge
23:27of panicking i gotta put on one of those like 10 hertz like you know tones just to breathe and
23:35bring myself down to to you know to uh to the earth you know what else helps me um passion flower
23:43you take those i've heard of it yeah i've heard of it i've not i've not done it but okay passion
23:50flower yeah when my job sticks me on a stage and i'm about to like jump off because i'm so nervous and
23:55i'm gonna die um yeah wait so you still don't like hosting and your your personality i i have to
24:00get i just like jumping from a plane for me you know i just have to go ahead and do it people don't
24:05know i just know it's an internal panic no no no no you you and i are the same like people people
24:12are very shocked at um you know for for a lot of the summer of soul campaigning i did um you know
24:22one of the things i had to admit was like getting over imposter syndrome like we all have a level of
24:27imposter syndrome where we feel like we're not worthy or like uh someone's gonna think i'm a
24:32fraud because i don't do this as good as that person or whatever yeah and you know some some of
24:39the interviews are like rather shocked that i would admit that because they would just think like well
24:43you know you do television every night and you did 200 shows every night like how are you
24:47like how are you uh an imposter syndrome person and i realized maybe like starting with this ll tour
24:55that we're doing that basically oftentimes our brain will tell us like we're not ready yet and let me
25:03think about it and then i'll psych myself into it you can't think about improvisation you can't think
25:11about you can't calculate or think about making a move you literally just the key to life is just
25:17one step at a time you know we we can look at we can look at mount fiji and be like i'll never
25:22climb that mountain in my life or you could just be like left foot right foot left foot and then you
25:28do it so yeah i i too have paralyzing fear of of giving speeches um then they showed me how much the
25:38check is then i got over there no even to this day i don't i i get in my head about speeches but i'm
25:47getting better about it so well people love to hear from you because you just have such great insight on
25:52so many things so definitely don't you also you also have to be rigorous you got to be rigorously
25:58honest and that's i think that's the thing that's working with people i think oftentimes when people
26:04are get to a successful plane you know we kind of want to hide the the the blemishes and you know
26:12you don't want to let people know that you cry or that you have insecurities or fears you know you're
26:18supposed to be superman like no one wants to see clark kent but i just think that now we live in a time
26:23where you know people watch more reality show than they watch scripted shows and i think for the most
26:32part people resonate with people that are just more honest and vulnerable about where they are in
26:39life and so i i i absolutely positively have no qualms about sharing like any struggles that i've had
26:47uh you know any of those things and so and oftentimes people will hit me in dm be like yo i really
26:55appreciate you saying that because i felt the same too and so now i see that you have those same
27:01fears i i don't feel as you don't you don't beat yourself up as bad once you know that everyone's
27:07going through it so we i think post pandemic this is the most that black people have talked about
27:13um you know mental health and and that sort of things right because before it was just like i'm
27:21going to church i ain't doing all that talking about my feelings and but that's not serving us because
27:26if you if you hold it inside your body's going to keep the score and then suddenly you're going to
27:33you're going to start a habit you're going you know you're going to self-soothe a little too much
27:38and especially now like the the amount of people that we're losing to like fentanyl
27:43it is yeah people we're literally dying out here so no we we got to do better we got to do better
27:51and that doesn't mean we got to be perfect we just got to do better well i agree with you fully i
27:58appreciate you taking this time out to talk to me i could talk to you all day but i'm not allowed to
28:02so the show is september the 10th um here in raleigh at pnc yep i will be there so de la soul juvenile
28:11the roots lo cool j like it's we're coming so we cannot wait i'm so excited my sister is flying in
28:19from texas just so we can go together so yes that's awesome all right that's good i can't wait
28:25to come to your show thank you for giving me your time today thank you i'll talk to you later all right
28:30bye-bye