Simplify Your Life with Anderson .Paak

Grammy Award-winning artist Anderson . Paak joins the show today! He talks to Michelle and Craig through his music career, including his early days as “Breezy Lovejoy,” the devastating moment he thought his career was over before it started, and his big break with Dr. Dre. Have a question you want answered? Write to us at imopod.com http://imopod.com. Use code imo at https://incogni.com/imo to get an exclusive 60% off. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Speaker 00

  Somebody said my teeth were like the Temptations. Everybody wanted to see Lee.

• 0:04Speaker 00

  So, back then, it was, it was tough. I got the braces on and then, um, it was, it was a long process. It just, it just happened like this. I didn't, I didn't come out like this. It was a whole process.

• 0:14Michelle Obama?

  Yo, if your teeth were like that, you probably had the retainer, the night thing, the... They were like, we gonna work on it.

• 0:21Speaker 00

  Yeah, we gonna work on it.

• 0:21Michelle Obama?

  Jaw fasteners and all that.

• 0:23Speaker 00

  I didn't have all that. Why you gotta do me like that?

• 0:24Michelle Obama?

  I'm sorry.

• 0:25Speaker 00

  I didn't have headgear. Damn.

• 0:28Michelle Obama?

  I was like, I stopped short of headgear. Just hold on.

• 0:31Speaker 00

  Say, gotta get a jaw thing and...

• 0:35Speaker 00

  Yeah, so...

• 0:35Michelle Obama?

  And you were a chubby little dude, too.

• 0:38Speaker 00

  Yeah, I was a hefty critter.

• 0:39Michelle Obama?

  Yeah, I was.

• 0:39Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 0:40Michelle Obama?

  So you were eating your way through the pain.

• 0:46Speaker 00

  I eat because I'm unhappy. Yeah, that was it. My mom, she worked so much, so she...

• 0:52Michelle Obama?

  Right, right.

• 0:53Speaker 00

  You know, she, she knows how to cook. She can burn, but she not time to time.

• 0:56Michelle Obama?

  Right.

• 0:57Speaker 00

  She'd just be like, here's 20 bucks, figure it out.

• 1:10Craig Robinson?

  Hey.

• 1:11Michelle Obama?

  Craig in black.

• 1:12Craig Robinson?

  I am in black today.

• 1:14Michelle Obama?

  The man in black.

• 1:15Craig Robinson?

  Michelle in blue.

• 1:16Michelle Obama?

  You know, this, uh, this episode today, um, made me, reminded me of, uh, wanted to ask if you remember when you used to take, uh, drum lessons?

• 1:28Craig Robinson?

  Oh, yes.

• 1:30Michelle Obama?

  How old were you when you started?

• 1:32Craig Robinson?

  I was in elementary school, and I had to be like in fifth grade?

• 1:39Michelle Obama?

  Well, yeah, I thought you were even younger than that.

• 1:42Craig Robinson?

  Yeah, no, I don't think it...

• 1:43Michelle Obama?

  Okay.

• 1:44Craig Robinson?

  I, i, if, if anything, it was fourth grade, but I didn't think it was fourth grade. I think it was fifth grade. But, um, and, and folks out there, drum lessons back in the day, I had drumsticks?

• 2:00Craig Robinson?

  And I had a drum pad that was made out of solid rubber. It was a solid rubber pad and it was on an angle.

• 2:08Michelle Obama?

  Yeah.

• 2:09Craig Robinson?

  And it had a little circle in the middle.

• 2:11Michelle Obama?

  And then you eventually moved to like a pad that was a drum.

• 2:15Craig Robinson?

  It was a pad that had like a, the material that is actually a drum was on a pad about this big.

• 2:23Michelle Obama?

  Yeah, yeah.

• 2:24Craig Robinson?

  That was the extent of my drum lessons. I could not get past that drum pad.

• 2:30Michelle Obama?

  Back on how music was taught when we were coming up.

• 2:34Craig Robinson?

  Man.

• 2:35Michelle Obama?

  You know, it is the opposite of wanting to get kids interested in music. Because we come from a family of musicians on both sides.

• 2:43Craig Robinson?

  Musicians, singers.

• 2:45Michelle Obama?

  And we grew up with our Aunt Robbie who lived downstairs and was a piano teacher. So the music was always strumming through our house. So I, from four years old, wanted to play the piano.

• 2:58Craig Robinson?

  Right.

• 2:59Michelle Obama?

  Because I could hear the scales happening and I could imitate the scales even at four. But you know how she would start us out with the piano keys on a cardboard?

• 3:07Craig Robinson?

  Oh, it was terrible.

• 3:09Michelle Obama?

  We're sitting next to the piano and I'm like, I want to go on the instrument. And she's like, nope. And we did that for weeks and I was so mad.

• 3:16Craig Robinson?

  Yeah.

• 3:17Michelle Obama?

  Because I was like, I didn't, I didn't come down here to play on a, so, you know, I, I think the approach to teaching kids music these days is a little better.

• 3:27Craig Robinson?

  Yeah, yeah. My son, who is taking piano lessons, his teacher, first thing comes out of her mouth, what song would you like to play?

• 3:36Michelle Obama?

  Yeah, yeah.

• 3:36Craig Robinson?

  And he said, Old Town Road. And she found him the sheet music for it. That's how you, you, you grab, because he's still taking lessons now and he's 16. And it's, it's just such a better way of teaching. That's like taking a kid out to a basketball court. You want to teach him basketball and no ball.

• 3:57Michelle Obama?

  And no basket.

• 3:58Craig Robinson?

  No ball.

• 3:59Michelle Obama?

  Just like, just imagine it.

• 4:00Craig Robinson?

  Out here running around.

• 4:01Michelle Obama?

  Think about it. Hold your hands in the right position.

• 4:04Craig Robinson?

  Yeah.

• 4:05Michelle Obama?

  Our guest today is a musical genius who hopefully has a better story than we did.

• 4:11Craig Robinson?

  Yeah, yeah. I can't wait to hear how he got into.

• 4:14Michelle Obama?

  Exposed to music. But thank God, he wasn't, he didn't have Aunt Robbie.

• 4:19Craig Robinson?

  I want to find out if he had a practice pad.

• 4:21Michelle Obama?

  Yeah, that's, that's, yeah, yeah.

• 4:23Craig Robinson?

  To start straight on the drums.

• 4:25Michelle Obama?

  But why don't you introduce him?

• 4:26Craig Robinson?

  I will, I will. And he's a young'un too. He's a youngster.

• 4:31Michelle Obama?

  Oh, let's see how young.

• 4:33Craig Robinson?

  Yeah.

• 4:33Michelle Obama?

  He's got a baby face.

• 4:37Craig Robinson?

  And we're talking about Anderson Paak, who is a boundary pushing artist, producer, now director, and nine time Grammy Award winner. He emerged from his roots as a teenage church drummer in Oxnard, California, with a breakout album, Venice, and the universally praised album, Malibu. He's expanding his creative reach through his newest film, K-Pops, which you all have to go see.

• 5:08Michelle Obama?

  It is so good.

• 5:09Craig Robinson?

  Wonderful, in which he stars, co-wrote, and directed. So, Mr. Paak, will you come join us?

• 5:29Craig Robinson?

  Man, did they make that in the double X?

• 5:31Speaker 00

  They might, man.

• 5:33Michelle Obama?

  I mean, I want to zoom in on the shoes. Like, can we do that? I mean, you said that's a, that's a Japanese brand. Are those high, high tops? Or those, those are, are they, are they mules? What's the back? Lift up the heel.

• 5:52Michelle Obama?

  Those are fire, fire. Well, welcome.

• 5:57Craig Robinson?

  Welcome, man.

• 5:57Speaker 00

  Thank you for having me.

• 5:59Michelle Obama?

  Yeah. Yeah.

• 6:01Craig Robinson?

  Are you kidding? We're honored.

• 6:03Michelle Obama?

  I mean, I love you.

• 6:06Speaker 00

  I love you too.

• 6:06Michelle Obama?

  To death. I mean, you are more than just talented. I mean, you, you got, you got, you quadruple threat, or all the threats. You know, personality, talent, you can act your butt off, you can produce. You, you are a gifted musician and seem like a really, really good man.

• 6:25Speaker 00

  Wow, thank you.

• 6:26Michelle Obama?

  So.

• 6:26Craig Robinson?

  And now actor and director.

• 6:28Speaker 00

  That's right. As if I wasn't doing enough stuff.

• 6:31Craig Robinson?

  Yeah, well, welcome to the club. Talk to her about that, man.

• 6:34Speaker 00

  Thank you so much. Yeah.

• 6:37Michelle Obama?

  Did you have a drum pad? Did, did you have a better start?

• 6:41Craig Robinson?

  Did you start with a practice pad?

• 6:42Speaker 00

  My drum pad was the couch.

• 6:44Michelle Obama?

  See there?

• 6:45Speaker 00

  It was the bed, pots and pans. And then I was driving everyone crazy. And eventually they got a drum kit in the house, my step pops.

• 6:54Craig Robinson?

  How old were you when you got a drum kit?

• 6:56Speaker 00

  I was about 12. I was in like sixth grade.

• 6:59Craig Robinson?

  You had real drums in sixth grade.

• 7:01Speaker 00

  Yeah, but it almost didn't happen. I was supposed to play, I wanted to play saxophone.

• 7:06Craig Robinson?

  Okay.

• 7:06Speaker 00

  And I wanted to serenade the ladies. I wanted to be, you know, outside the window.

• 7:13Speaker 00

  And they was like, we out of saxophones. And I was like, well, I damn sure ain't playing the flute.

• 7:17Craig Robinson?

  Wait, you went to get a saxophone and they said they're out?

• 7:21Speaker 00

  I was, it just started sixth grade and, and, and, uh, middle school and I was gonna, I was like, I'm going into band. Cause before that, I was really into music, dancing, everything. But I was like, I wanna play instrument now. And, um, it was the first day and I was so dead set on the sax and there was no more left. And they said, all we have is the drums. We have the bass drum or the snare drum, which one do you wanna play? And I was, I didn't even think what was gonna be my plan B. So I was like, I guess I'll pick the drums. I picked the bass drum. And they had us in there playing on these big ol' things. I'm like, I can't get no girls with this.

• 7:54Speaker 00

  And, um, I was about to quit. Baby, I love you.

• 7:57Michelle Obama?

  I'm at the window, standing in the garden. Hold on, let me put this thing on.

• 8:02Speaker 00

  Playing George the Jungle, getting the cuffs called on me. Yeah, it would've just been all bad. So I was about to quit and, um, I, I was walking home one day and my step pops had a drums kit in the house and he was playing on it. He was playing along to some Prince records. And I didn't even know he played and he was like, yeah, I heard you're playing drums now. So I got a drum kit. And I didn't think about the whole drum kit in a sense, cause in band, it was just separate drums.

• 8:25Craig Robinson?

  Right, right.

• 8:26Speaker 00

  So he had the drum kit and I was like, okay, this is cool. And when he finally got off of it, I, uh, I hopped on and it was the first thing I ever did where I, I just picked it up really quick.

• 8:36Craig Robinson?

  You did.

• 8:37Speaker 00

  Uh, like instrument wise and before that I was trying to play basketball, everything. I was really terrible and I got on that kit and my mom came running out dancing and she started dancing. I'd never really seen her dance before, so I was like, whoa, like, this is crazy. Like, I'm, I'm making a beat that's causing people to dance. I wanna keep doing this.

• 8:53Craig Robinson?

  And so your step pops, do you call them?

• 8:57Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 8:59Craig Robinson?

  He was a drummer.

• 9:00Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 9:01Craig Robinson?

  So you learned just by hearing him play? Or you really learned when you were in band?

• 9:05Speaker 00

  Yeah, he was showing me a few things.

• 9:07Craig Robinson?

  Okay.

• 9:07Speaker 00

  And then, right when I started playing in the house, my mom gave me like all her records. She was like, okay, you need to learn. Archibyl and the Drows need to learn. Earth, Wind and Fire and Free. Learn these beats. And so I was just doing that every day at the house after school. And then my god sister came by and she said, oh, you're playing drums? You need to come to church with me. And she took me to church. And it was the black gospel church.

• 9:27Michelle Obama?

  Yeah.

• 9:27Speaker 00

  And there wasn't very many black people in the city of Oxnard where I'm from. But they were all there at the church.

• 9:34Michelle Obama?

  They all went to that one church? He's like, this is where everybody is.

• 9:37Speaker 00

  Yeah, yes. And that's where I learned, really learned how to play. It was the best musicians in the world coming through and playing behind a choir, playing behind, you know, organist and choir directors. I'm a church kid. So I grew up playing drums all the way till I was, you know, about 30 years old when I, you know, I couldn't really do it anymore because I was traveling a lot. But since I was little, I was picking up on groups and I was really into dancing. Like, I wanted to be like, I was, grew up in front of TV. My mom was always working and my sisters pretty much raised me and, you know, in front of the TV. So I grew up watching like BT, MTV and music videos and stuff. So I would want to learn every new dance that came about. And, you know, now when I listen to music, it's tough because like I produce, I write and everything. So it's tough to kind of like turn that off

• 10:22Speaker 00

  and just like, just enjoy a song sometimes. But I really love when something has a nice groove, good drum tones. And I really love chords and also likes clever lyrics.

• 10:33Michelle Obama?

  Yeah.

• 10:33Speaker 00

  So I think that could be, you know, anything. But, um, yeah, when it comes to like dancing and stuff, I guess I'm.

• 10:40Michelle Obama?

  It's funny when you, our generation, when you say, I watch TV all the time and I used to, I was waiting for you to say Soul Train. But I was like, oh, my God.

• 10:48Speaker 00

  That too, Soul Train.

• 10:49Michelle Obama?

  Yeah, but it wasn't even on when you were little.

• 10:51Speaker 00

  Yeah, yeah. I mean, you know.

• 10:54Craig Robinson?

  You know of it. You know of Soul Train.

• 10:56Michelle Obama?

  Yeah, I've heard of it. You know, people have said it. The Soul Train line is part of everyone's culture. But we were there. That's where, but it's like I got to, you know, I'm getting old. And I'm like, oh, yeah, they had MTV.

• 11:08Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 11:08Michelle Obama?

  You know? You talk about Oxnard, there weren't a lot of black folks in your neighborhood. Tell us, who lived in Oxnard? And, you know, were you born there? Was your mother from there? Was there, you know?

• 11:21Speaker 00

  Yeah, Oxnard is a beautiful place. It's a small town. A lot of people think it's like the valley. It's about an hour north of LA going towards Santa Barbara. And it's a beach town. It's a lot of agriculture, so a lot of Latinos. And when I was coming up, it was mostly Latinos, like second generation Latinos and white people. And I was like the only black kid in my high school. And my mom ended up there because she, well, my mom's story is crazy, but, you know, long story short, she was an adopted kid during the 50s during the Korean War. She was a found kid. Her and my uncle were found abandoned. And she was adopted, brought to Northern Michigan, adopted by black parents who were in the military.

• 12:01Speaker 00

  And so she was raised in Compton, California, all around LA up until her 20s. And she met my dad. He was in the military as well. He's from Philly and he was stationed in Point Mugu, which is in Oxnard. And they met there, they met in the club. And eventually my dad battled with addiction and several different things. But they had me and my little sister in Oxnard. And that's where we were raised until my pops went to prison. And then we moved to Ventura, which is just the next city over.

• 12:32Speaker 00

  But yeah, we were just like, just a tight family. I grew up, I'm a middle boy of three sisters from my mom. And my pops was Rolling Stone. He had a bunch of kids too, but mostly women. So I was just, yeah, the boy that was there to like provide entertainment and fun. And sometimes therapists, you know, everybody's talking about each other and I'm in the middle like, I know, I told you something crazy. And I'm saying the same thing to the other sister. Yeah. But yeah, we're all really close to my mom. And she just, you know, she was a workaholic. She also worked in agriculture growing up. So she was gone a lot doing her own thing. I never seen her work for anybody. She was entrepreneur. And, you know, she was just like all about her family, keeping her family together and working hard. And we had a lot of fun.

• 13:17Speaker 00

  It was a lot of trauma too, but.

• 13:19Michelle Obama?

  Yeah, yeah, you have had an amazing story of a lot of ups and a lot of downs and few curves.

• 13:27Michelle Obama?

  But did you feel like you had a community of friends in Oxnard? Being the only black kid in your school? What was that like for?

• 13:37Michelle Obama?

  For you just making it as a kid.

• 13:41Speaker 00

  Yeah, I dealt with all kinds of stuff. It was really dope though and a blessing that I grew up playing drums in church. Because I had different communities, so I had my church family. Which was, that was where a lot of the black culture and everything surrounding that was where I, you know, thrived at. And then I had, when I go to school, it was like my white friends, my Mexican friends, then I had that. And then at home, everybody was doing their thing. My sisters were listening to all kinds of stuff. From, you know, SWV, the new edition, Mariah. And my mom wouldn't go past like Tony, Tony, Tony, Freddie Jackson. You couldn't play nothing, you know, nothing after that. It was always, you know, don't touch it. Earth went afire, it was like, you know, that was what was going on.

• 14:22Speaker 00

  And then I go to school and they were listening to Nirvana and Radiohead and all this, the Foo Fighters and I was getting all of these things and I was, um,

• 14:32Speaker 00

  growing up, really quickly, I felt like I can't wait to get out of this town. It's not enough diversity. It's, I'm too big for this town. Especially when I started doing music. I wanted to escape to all these different places that I seen like on television, or on movies, or on records out here. And looking back on it, I was just dead set. Soon as I graduate, I'm going to LA, I'm gonna make it, I'm gonna get signed, I'm gonna be doing all these different things. And it didn't happen exactly like that. And I'm actually glad it did because, you know, build a lot of character. And I'm glad that I grew up in a small town now because I think it gave me a different kind of perspective. And I don't even know if I would have survived coming up in LA when I look back at it now.

• 15:12Speaker 00

  It was, it was different. But yeah, I battled with like identity stuff, you know, thinking I wasn't black enough with the kids that I grew up with in church. And then I go to suburbs and I'm the only black kid. Then I thought I had to be the black spokesman for the whole school.

• 15:24Michelle Obama?

  Right.

• 15:25Speaker 00

  I think my mom saw that too. And my mom deals with, you know, being an orphan and

• 15:29Michelle Obama?

  And she's biracial too, right?

• 15:31Speaker 00

  She didn't know anything about her Korean culture, you know, and we grew up black in a black household. And I didn't know about, anything about Koreans, anything. When I found out my mom was Korean, I just took it as something I could tell to people and it made me exotic.

• 15:44Craig Robinson?

  How old were you when you found out? Realized she was Korean.

• 15:48Speaker 00

  I was about like, I think she was telling us this when I was about ten, eleven. When we started sitting down, she started telling us her story.

• 15:55Craig Robinson?

  Uh huh.

• 15:56Speaker 00

  And she wouldn't always do it, but she would open up sometime, you know, and she would like, "Yeah, I'm adopted, you're your uncle, we were found and this and that." We'd be like, "What? That's crazy." And, "Okay, so we're Korean. Okay, I'm mixed. Nice. I'm about to tell everybody."

• 16:10Michelle Obama?

  Yeah, that's a, that's a story to tell. When did your, when did your mom tell you the story of your biological father? Because she, did you remember him? Because he was in prison like you were seven.

• 16:25Speaker 00

  Right.

• 16:25Michelle Obama?

  And did you, did you remember that story? The story of him, the story of what happened with them?

• 16:31Speaker 00

  Yeah, yeah, totally. You know, my pops went to prison when I was around six or seven. And I saw him, he was a twin and.

• 16:39Michelle Obama?

  Which is a trip down.

• 16:41Speaker 00

  Yeah, there's a whole.

• 16:42Michelle Obama?

  We gotta talk a little bit about that.

• 16:43Speaker 00

  Crazy story with that, yeah. But you couldn't tell them apart. So, you know, I remember we were with my babysitter at the house and I seen, I heard someone screaming. I go outside and my pops is on top of my mom, there's blood in the street. And he's like, "Get back in the house." And my babysitter's screaming like, "Don't do it, don't do it." And he's like, "I got a gun." And I didn't know, I was in complete shock. I was really in denial. I was like, "No, that must be my uncle. Like, this can't be." Because my mom didn't tell me about any of this. I didn't know that.

• 17:11Michelle Obama?

  And you didn't see anything?

• 17:11Speaker 00

  I didn't see anything. I never saw them fight. Now that I think about it, he was gone from the house, but my mom was always saying like, "He's working, he's getting his health together." But I didn't know that he was actually going through rehab. And my mom was trying to get him help through AA. And he was estranged. She was, she didn't know where he was. And she was telling me, you know, he was on drugs and everything, but she felt like she was going just as crazy, just trying to get him off. She would be chasing people down, trying to find him, doing all these things. And everything just came to a head that day. And, you know, we left, ran out the house. And my pops ended up getting arrested and sent to prison for years after that. But it was around that time that she told me, you know, your pops had a very different life, you know, than a lot of people. He, he came up in Philly, he got kicked out the house when he was a teen.

• 17:55Speaker 00

  This is in North Philly, in, you know, in the seventies. And he was a kid out there trying to raise himself and got, somehow got into the military early. And just grew up, you know.

• 18:06Michelle Obama?

  Yeah.

• 18:07Speaker 00

  You know, in a different way and then was really, she's always told me was really a beautiful person and a great dad. It was just when he got addicted to drugs, he just really turned him into someone different and he couldn't just, he couldn't win that battle. And um, yeah, she told me about that, how they met and everything and um, but it was, it was crazy because even though she went through all that stuff with him, she never said anything bad and it was always very positive.

• 18:28Craig Robinson?

  Very noticeable in your whole story. She's still trying to, hopefully.

• 18:34Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 18:35Craig Robinson?

  Um, hoping that he could turn it around and not, not um, ruining your vision of him until she absolutely couldn't help it.

• 18:47Speaker 00

  Yep.

• 18:48Craig Robinson?

  That says a lot about her.

• 18:49Speaker 00

  For sure. Yeah. And you know, after she got back on her feet, she was just like, alright, we got a new chapter now, you know? We're gonna move out of this house and I'm gonna get back to work and son, let there be example. Do not touch no drugs. Don't get into no drinking. Stay away from all of it.

• 19:04Michelle Obama?

  Did that do it for you?

• 19:06Speaker 00

  Uh, yeah. It was, it was always like a, a warning for sure. And I, I knew that I, I had a, um, there was a thing in my family where we battled with addiction, you know? And so I was always weary and I didn't do very much anything. It was really scared straight, you know? All the way up into my twenties, twenty-one, when I moved to LA. I hadn't done really much anything and I, and I was in church, so I was scared of everything. I didn't want to go to hell. So I was just like, I'm just doing this.

• 19:35Michelle Obama?

  It's like, let me just play my drums.

• 19:36Speaker 00

  Yeah, play my drums, be cool. I was late bloomer. And so, yeah, you know, that helped, but you know, you get older, you go through life, you gotta experience stuff for yourself. Um, but yeah, she, she's still like that, you know? My mom is.

• 19:48Michelle Obama?

  Yeah.

• 19:48Speaker 00

  You know, the strongest person, but um, and you know, it was um, my mom, that when they got together, she found out that he had other kids and everything and she had two kids, older kids of her own from another marriage and my mom was, you know, going through every husband she went through, something crazy. But um, she was big on him getting all the kids together. So I remember when we were young, she got us all together with our, our sisters and uh, and brother, my brothers that I had from Philly and brought us all together at the house and And we met everyone. It's like a big family reunion. And then when he got put in prison later, and I got in my twenties, it was my sister from his side that really was like, you should talk to him. He's not doing well. He's, he just got out of prison, but he's not, his health isn't well. And he really wants to talk to you and he really wants to kind of make it right.

• 20:33Michelle Obama?

  And were you who you are now?

• 20:36Speaker 00

  No.

• 20:36Michelle Obama?

  Or were you still making it?

• 20:37Speaker 00

  No, I was still making it. I was just barely, I mean, I was doing music, but it was, I was, no, nothing was going on for me. And I had just gotten my first like shows and started going on tour. And I was, you know, thought I was too busy to talk to him. I didn't really want to have a relationship. I thought I didn't. I thought I didn't need it. And I was, it was still like that trauma when I seen him and knowing all that stuff. But I'm glad I did end up talking to him because I didn't know that like, you could be going through stuff and not even know it, you know? And when you talk to these, to people that you, you feel like your parents were always your parents and they, they don't, they weren't adults and having to go through life, just like how you have to go through life. And so I got to talk to him and he told me how proud he was of me and how he wanted to be a singer too.

• 21:21Speaker 00

  And I learned that he was like on the Gong Show. And they, they were auditioning. They had a group and he was, he wanted, he had big dreams too.

• 21:36Craig Robinson?

  Okay, so fun fact, Kelly has always loved reselling stuff online, whether it's furniture, clothing, old sports memorabilia that only I like looking at. I'm not sure if she's ready right now to open up her own business, but the day she does, I know we'll be checking out Shopify. Because Shopify really is where you go when you want to turn something from just an idea into an actual business. It gives you all the tools to build something real. And these days, you want your business to be everywhere people are already shopping. And Shopify helps with discovery through Google, YouTube, TikTok Shop, the Shop app and more.

• 22:21Craig Robinson?

  And even just as a consumer, I so appreciate that purple shop.

• 22:27Craig Robinson?

  Button, their signature at checkout. It makes everything fast and easy, which is great for customers and great for anybody trying to actually close the sale. Thinking about starting a business? This is your sign. Get started today at Shopify.com/IMO. My kitchen has never quite felt completely put together, like it's always felt like something is missing. And then Kelly and I found these striped linen cafe curtains on Wayfair, and the effect has been perfect. Once we realized we wanted some curtains, it was just a matter of typing our ideal item into Wayfair's search bar. And of course, they have what we want plus 10 other options.

• 23:10Craig Robinson?

  Their inventory truly cannot be beat. I especially like being able to look through customer photos and reviews before I decide. That's what sealed the deal for us with our new curtains, as well as all of the other amazing pieces we have from Wayfair in our house right now. Wayfair has more than 20 million verified five-star reviews, so you can actually see how something looks and works in real people's homes. Find pieces made for real life and get even more value with Wayfair Rewards. Join Wayfair Rewards today to get 5% back on every purchase. Head to wayfair.com to shop all things home. That's W A Y F A I R dot com.

• 23:53Speaker 03

  Wayfair, every style, every home.

• 23:56Craig Robinson?

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• 25:30Craig Robinson?

  Given, given all the stuff that you've been through at a, at a young age like that, how did you remain so positive, so, so bright, so, you know, because what I'm, we, we met briefly for the first time when, before we came out here, and you have this light about you that, this great spirit. How were you able to keep, or, or did you?

• 25:53Speaker 00

  Yeah, I mean, there's times, you know, I have my moods and everything. I've been called moody and there's a lot behind the smile. And I, I did an interview recently with a rapper named Norrie, who, who pointed this out. He said, usually people like that, that, you know, they have that smile and they've been through all this crazy stuff. They're trying to protect their peace. And I think that's probably what it was.

• 26:15Speaker 00

  Me having this, how I am now is, there's a part of it that's natural, but there's a part of it too, that's like, I feel like defense mechanism, a coping mechanism that I have from the things that I've seen, things that I've gone through. And my peace is important for me. The things that, that I do were kind of like escapism, I feel like, for what was going on in my reality. When I think about me going, watching the TV and learning how to dance and then learning how to play drums and moving on to everything that I'm doing now. It's always that kid that was running to his room and getting away from the craziness, I think, and, and creating my own world and. Music was that. Music was that. And the smile is just, you know, thank God my mom got me some braces

• 27:00Speaker 00

  because the smile wasn't always this nice. It was coming at you in 4D.

• 27:06Speaker 00

  And so she was like, we gotta get a grip on that. Somebody said my teeth were like the temptations. Everybody wanted to see me. So back then, it was, it was tough. I got them braces on and then, um, it was, it was a long process. It just, it just happened like this. I didn't, I didn't come out like this. It was a whole process.

• 27:24Michelle Obama?

  Yo, if your teeth were like that, you probably had the retainer, the night thing. They were like, we gonna work on it.

• 27:30Speaker 00

  Yeah, we gonna work on it.

• 27:31Michelle Obama?

  Jaw fasteners and all that.

• 27:33Speaker 00

  I didn't have all that. Why you gotta do me like that?

• 27:34Michelle Obama?

  I'm sorry.

• 27:35Speaker 00

  I didn't have headgear. Damn.

• 27:37Michelle Obama?

  I was like, I stopped short of headgear. Just hold on.

• 27:41Speaker 00

  Say, gotta get a jaw, a thing and. Yeah, so.

• 27:45Michelle Obama?

  And you were a chubby little dude too.

• 27:47Speaker 00

  Yeah, I was a hefty critter.

• 27:49Michelle Obama?

  Yeah, I was.

• 27:49Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 27:50Michelle Obama?

  So you were eating your way through the pain.

• 27:56Speaker 00

  I ate because I'm unhappy. Yeah, that was it. My mom, she worked so much, so she, you know, she would, she knows how to cook. She can burn, but she not a time. So she'd just be like, here's 20 bucks, figure it out. And, you know, we go order some pizza and Taco Bell and, man, that's how I was doing. I didn't have good eating habits for so long. I didn't know I didn't have good. It's just how I grew up. Cup of noodles and Tom Rama and everything. And, um, yeah, I was as big as a house. And then, yeah, when I, after my senior year, I was like, screw this. I'm, I'm still a virgin.

• 28:27Michelle Obama?

  I'mma be fly.

• 28:28Speaker 00

  I'm gonna be fly. Y'all gonna see.

• 28:30Michelle Obama?

  I put that snare drum down.

• 28:32Speaker 00

  Exactly.

• 28:33Michelle Obama?

  I'mma get me a girl.

• 28:37Michelle Obama?

  Your mom is, sounds incredible. I mean, because it's like, you know, she also was taking care of your stepbrothers and sisters like they were her own.

• 28:51Speaker 00

  Absolutely.

• 28:52Michelle Obama?

  Even through all that she went through with your father.

• 28:55Speaker 00

  Yep.

• 28:55Michelle Obama?

  Right? Um, and never treated them differently. You know, it's like you all were all one family. And for her to be able to hold it together like that through all that she was dealing with. But she had some tough times and I'm sure that had a lot to do. I'm, well, let me not put words in your mouth, but talk about what your mom went through and how that affected. Cause you guys were on the upswing with her business. She was into strawberries. Can you talk about that?

• 29:25Speaker 00

  Yeah, my mom had a strawberry company in Oxnard. And, um, you know, we went from, after my. Pops went to prison, we were in, you know, apartments and um every year just the business got better. And by the time I was in a senior high school, we were in a big mansion. And we were used to always like changing, you know, different houses and everything, but we were doing good. And um I again, I didn't, my mom, she kept stuff from me, she, you know, she, she thought kids business was kids business. And she was gonna work and we didn't need to know everything. And um I remember just like having everything, I had my own studio. My sisters, my two older sisters, they were married, but she was taking care of them as well. And everything was on the ups and uh I got called into the principal's office one day.

• 30:10Speaker 00

  And my principal just slid the newspaper to me and was my mom on the front cover. She had been arrested and my step pops was in cuffs too. And they had both been arrested and I was just like, what the hell is going on? He's like, you know what's going on? I was like, nah. Then my, my brother in law called me, he's like, yo, they got mom, the, the, they got, they've been building a case on them for years. And um they got her for like seventy five counts, you know, securities fraud and all these different things. Um and I was just in shock and the whole school was looking at me like, mm-hmm, that's how you got that house. And I'm like, you know, it was like, again, only black kid in the school. And um it was just like, damn, it was messed up. And um everything just turned upside down and you know, so.

• 30:51Speaker 00

  By my pops being in prison and my uncle, now my mom, my step's pops, it was just like nonstop and um.

• 30:58Michelle Obama?

  Where did you guys go after, cause she had, she went to prison, she was sentenced?

• 31:03Speaker 00

  Yeah, so she was, she was actually in county for like a year and a half. Um we were trying to figure out how to get her a lawyer and see if we're gonna fight it and all this stuff. And she was like, I don't wanna fight it. We couldn't get, she was like, we're not, if we can't get a great lawyer, I just gonna do my time. I know what I did, I know they're trying to put me under the prison, so I'm just gonna do a plea, do what I, my time and I'll be out. You should get a job, Brandon, cause your sisters are gonna come in and watch your little sister. And as soon as you can work, you should figure out something. I know you wanna do your music, do that as well, but you, you should get out the house and be a man and go and um lighten the load.

• 31:36Michelle Obama?

  How old were you?

• 31:37Speaker 00

  I was seventeen. Yeah, so I uh.

• 31:40Michelle Obama?

  What did that feel like? I mean, what did that feel like to your seventeen year old soul to have your world turned upside down and then be told? You, you gotta, you gotta figure it out.

• 31:50Speaker 00

  Yeah, I mean, one hand it was crushing, cause my mom is. I just, it would just kill me to know like she was in prison. Like I know she was not a violent person, the sweetest person, no criminal record. So I was just always so worried like what's going on in there with her and I hope she's okay. And, um, and then on the other hand, she was just so positive and optimistic and strong that it made me wanna get my stuff together and just keep going. And, um, she was very just like, yeah, man, I'm gonna be all right, you know? Um, I'm worried about you guys more so, like you guys, you know, do what you guys have to do. Don't worry about me. And so, um, and at the same time, I thought I was gonna be like signed by then.

• 32:32Speaker 00

  Like before that, I was making mixtapes, I was DJing, I had my own like demo that I was selling at school. Couldn't nobody tell me I wasn't gonna be right out of high school like signed to Jay-Z, you know? And, um.

• 32:44Michelle Obama?

  It was like that big record scratch.

• 32:46Speaker 00

  Yeah. So there was still a part of me like, okay, I'm still gonna try to do this. But my world's upside down and I had to move out and all this stuff. So right after I graduated high school somehow, and I was like, all right, I'm gonna, I'm gonna go to LA. I'm gonna make the move, gonna try to do my thing and, and I'm gonna take some meetings. I had a manager at the time that was taking me around. And my, my two older sisters were taking care of my little sister. And I pretty much was off into the world after there. And I did a bunch of stuff. I went to Atlanta and, you know, was trying to get a record deal. Got every door closed on me and got a rude awakening that, you know, yeah, this is cool, but can you do more something like this? And, um, we don't, we don't get it. Like you wanna rap, you sing, what do you, you know?

• 33:27Michelle Obama?

  Yeah, what were you doing then?

• 33:29Speaker 00

  I was doing a lot of everything. I had, I had a little demo that I was taking around and I was rapping, I was singing. I made all the beats, I was playing drums. And back then, it was, it was a lot of emulating. And so I was back in, in Oxnard and I, I was, my sister lived in Northridge. And I was like, okay, well, let me try to live with you. And that's kinda LA, so she was like, you can sleep on the couch if you want. But if you live here, you're gonna have to help on these bills. And so, um, I tried to do stuff and it wasn't happening. So then I had to get a job and one of my first jobs was working at Ralph's Grocery with my brother-in-law. And I was bagging groceries, um, and pushing in carts. And I was writing songs still, I was still writing.

• 34:12Michelle Obama?

  What was your look then?

• 34:13Speaker 00

  My look?

• 34:14Michelle Obama?

  Yeah.

• 34:17Speaker 00

  Very regular dagular. You know what it was? I was very anti, after I got. Chewed and spit out. I was very anti hip hop, very anti.

• 34:26Michelle Obama?

  It's like, I'm going this way.

• 34:28Speaker 00

  I'm going complete hipster. I don't listen to that. I listen to Beck. I listen to Radiohead, Coldplay. I have specs, black frames, skinny jeans. Button ups with the sweater.

• 34:39Michelle Obama?

  What'd you do with your hair? What were you doing with it by then?

• 34:41Speaker 00

  I got a little part in my hair.

• 34:43Michelle Obama?

  No, man.

• 34:45Speaker 00

  Line up, nothing, very.

• 34:46Michelle Obama?

  Just.

• 34:47Speaker 00

  Yes, natural.

• 34:48Craig Robinson?

  Oh, natural.

• 34:49Speaker 00

  Yeah, oh, natural.

• 34:50Michelle Obama?

  Did you have an accident? Did you play around with that a little bit? You did, oh, no.

• 34:55Speaker 00

  You listened to them old songs back then. I was like, boy, you are not from Wells. Like, where are you getting this from?

• 35:01Michelle Obama?

  Who was your crew? Who were the people that you were? Were you working too much to have friends?

• 35:07Speaker 00

  I had a crew. Shout out to Benji and Yuli is my crew from like high school. And I had a few people that, you know, that were still.

• 35:15Michelle Obama?

  Cause Benji's still with it. Did you guys do some stuff together? Didn't one of your friends?

• 35:20Speaker 00

  No, it's a different one, yeah. This before I actually met my crew that I hang with now. Cause I eventually made my way to music school. But I had a few people that, um, that I knew from high school that were, you know, taking me and letting me live at their garage and different stuff. When I was still kinda do, always doing music, but I was working jobs cause I couldn't make money doing music.

• 35:36Craig Robinson?

  So how did you get? How did you figure out, okay, this is gonna be the lane I'm gonna be in now? Style wise or?

• 35:43Speaker 00

  Wow, it took a lot, man. It took a lot of just making a lot of different music. I was playing for a lot of people. When I finally got to LA, I did a lot of like, um, you know, putting bands together for other artists. And I would see how they do stuff. And everybody was like, you're a great drummer. So I played behind a lot of different people coming up. And some of them were really talented, some of them weren't. And I picked up a lot of different stuff from different people. And eventually, I got to a point where I met this guy. And he told me, he's like, you know, you're really talented, but you don't have any work ethic. And I think that because you're so multifaceted and talented, it's kinda working against you. Cause look at all the things you're doing. And this is, you know, I was getting close to 30 at this point.

• 36:28Speaker 00

  And I thought I was gonna be young forever. And at this point, I had my little, my son and my Korean wife. And I was still like trying to play drums with this person, make a song over here, do this stuff. And he was like, if you just sat down. In a room.

• 36:44Michelle Obama?

  Sit your ass down.

• 36:46Speaker 00

  And just work on you. Don't invite anybody, just work on you. You could probably do something. You get a whiteboard, start figuring out how you want to go about it, what kind of artists you look up to. Maybe you could do something different, draw from there, and simplify your life. And he brought up your great husband's quote where he said, you know, "I only had a couple suits and I simplify my life. I don't want to worry about what I'm gonna wear every day so I can make better decisions." And so, that's what I had to do.

• 37:11Michelle Obama?

  He did say that.

• 37:12Speaker 00

  He sure did.

• 37:13Michelle Obama?

  He still does that.

• 37:16Michelle Obama?

  We need to get him that jacket.

• 37:17Speaker 00

  Right, right.

• 37:18Michelle Obama?

  It's like you can unsimplify a little bit.

• 37:21Speaker 00

  He's fly, he's fly. Come on. I see him, bro. I know you're a fly guy.

• 37:25Michelle Obama?

  Don't say that. Now his head is just going, "Anderson Paak says I'm fly. I'm gonna hear that for the rest of the year."

• 37:33Speaker 00

  Yeah, but it was those words, man. And I finally, he said, "And if you do it, if you..." I was like, "How am I gonna do it? I gotta pay your rent. I gotta figure out how I'm gonna do it." He's like, "I'll pay your rent. How about that? If you just sit in this room."

• 37:45Craig Robinson?

  And who was this?

• 37:46Speaker 00

  This was a manager at the time. His name was Brian Lee.

• 37:48Craig Robinson?

  Okay.

• 37:48Speaker 00

  Yeah, he gonna run with this one. Take this little clip. You gonna have a documentary series out there next week. See, he heard what Obama said about Obama and not say that.

• 38:02Michelle Obama?

  Is that Brian Lee?

• 38:03Speaker 00

  Brian Lee. He said, "I'll pay your rent. I'll get the little computer." I was like, "But I need all this?" He's like, "No, you gonna get just this little computer, Mac Mini. Get you a little mini board, and you gonna figure out how to record yourself. You're gonna sit here, you're gonna make a bunch of songs, figure out your sound, and just do it." And it was in that room that I went from being Breezy Lovejoy to Anderson Paak.

• 38:25Michelle Obama?

  See, that's what I wanted you to say. You were Breezy Lovejoy. Where'd that come from? What does that mean? Where'd you get that? Tell me, tell me.

• 38:34Speaker 00

  I got you. I got a little bit back for you.

• 38:36Michelle Obama?

  He's not the one. It's like you two.

• 38:39Craig Robinson?

  See, she's mad because she knows I DJ'd at college.

• 38:42Speaker 00

  Oh, you did? What's your DJ name?

• 38:44Michelle Obama?

  Craigie Craig.

• 38:45Speaker 00

  Craigie Craig.

• 38:46Michelle Obama?

  Just like Breezy Lovejoy.

• 38:48Speaker 00

  Come on, Craig.

• 38:48Craig Robinson?

  Man, we would have been killing back in the day.

• 38:51Speaker 00

  Top life security in the world, Craig.

• 38:53Craig Robinson?

  Shoot.

• 38:54Speaker 00

  That's incredible, yeah.

• 38:55Craig Robinson?

  The old head and the young one.

• 38:57Speaker 00

  That's right.

• 38:58Michelle Obama?

  There's still time.

• 38:59Speaker 00

  There's something to it.

• 38:59Michelle Obama?

  There's still time.

• 39:00Speaker 00

  We can make it work.

• 39:01Craig Robinson?

  Telling you.

• 39:02Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 39:04Michelle Obama?

  But.

• 39:04Speaker 00

  Breezy Lovejoy. I mean, OK, well, there's the, there's a story. I used to tell people, and it was a real story about how I got breezy. But I used to tell people because I'm Aquarius, you know, I'm an air sign. I go with the wind, where the wind blows. I'm breezy, I'm easy breezy.

• 39:18Michelle Obama?

  Yeah, yeah.

• 39:19Speaker 00

  And the Lovejoy is like something you need more of.

• 39:21Michelle Obama?

  Mmm.

• 39:22Speaker 00

  But the real story is I was passing gas a lot as a kid. I was just a little chubby kid farting all around the room. And my brother-in-law was like, I'mma call you breezy, you always farting.

• 39:30Craig Robinson?

  No.

• 39:31Speaker 00

  Like a gust of wind when it hits you. That's what we gonna go with. So that was that.

• 39:36Michelle Obama?

  Before you got your diet together.

• 39:38Speaker 00

  That's right, exactly.

• 39:40Michelle Obama?

  That sort of fast food diet.

• 39:41Speaker 00

  Exactly.

• 39:42Michelle Obama?

  Mess you up.

• 39:42Speaker 00

  That Taco Bell wasn't a grin. It wasn't an agreeance. Yeah, so I had to switch it up. And yeah, Brian was like.

• 39:50Michelle Obama?

  What did Breezy Lovejoy look like?

• 39:52Speaker 00

  Breezy Lovejoy was chubby. I mean, no, you know, Breezy Lovejoy went through that transformation too. So he had like Dreadhawk. He was, he was like, you know, after the transformation, I was working out a lot. So I was always in like a cutoff tee, a real rock image.

• 40:07Michelle Obama?

  And still rapping?

• 40:08Speaker 00

  I was still rapping.

• 40:09Michelle Obama?

  About what?

• 40:09Speaker 00

  I was doing all kinds of rapping about.

• 40:11Michelle Obama?

  What was breezy's life about?

• 40:13Speaker 00

  Rapping about, you know, being in the streets of Venice and, you know, I was like.

• 40:17Michelle Obama?

  Were the streets of Venice hard?

• 40:19Craig Robinson?

  The mean streets of Venice.

• 40:21Michelle Obama?

  They hard?

• 40:22Speaker 00

  I was going to that music college. So I have been exposed to a lot of different relationships. And I was like a crooner too. I was playing piano, so I was making songs about. You're my girl's best friend. And I don't wanna be alone no more with you. That was like one of the Breezy Lovejoy.

• 40:38Michelle Obama?

  Air breezy, breezy.

• 40:40Speaker 00

  Oh, my God, talk about it. He was still happy-go-lucky, but he was really trying to find his, his sound. He didn't really have one sound or even one unique tone. And that's where breezy was at. And I remember Brian was like, you gotta change that name. That's the last thing we gotta do. Now you done did everything, now we gotta change that name. And I was like, what you talking about? I got 200 followers on MySpace. This name stays. I don't work for that. He's like, Roy, this name stays.

• 41:11Craig Robinson?

  And that's that.

• 41:12Speaker 00

  And that on Jack. And he said, you really gonna meet Dr. Dre one day and tell him your name is Breezy Lovejoy? And I was like, damn.

• 41:20Michelle Obama?

  You got a point.

• 41:20Speaker 00

  You got a point. He was like, you should go by your real name. Just go by Brandon Anderson. I was like, Brandon?

• 41:27Michelle Obama?

  Brandon.

• 41:27Speaker 00

  Are you kidding me?

• 41:28Michelle Obama?

  Well, Brandon is a little... I love Brandon. Brandon's a mother's name.

• 41:33Speaker 00

  My mom loves it. Brandon Pak Anderson. And so that's my full name. And so we did a little, you know, jigsaw. And we went with Anderson, Anderson Paak. And I was like, well, it's pronounced Pak. And he said, nah, say Pak because they won't know if it's a group or a band. And people will argue if it's Pak or Pak. And it'll make you the talk of the town.

• 41:51Craig Robinson?

  So that was intentional?

• 41:52Speaker 00

  Yeah, yeah.

• 41:54Michelle Obama?

  So where'd the period come from?

• 41:55Speaker 00

  The period came, I put the dot on there because, so at this point, I was, you know, damn near 30 years old. And I felt like I had been overlooked for so many years. I was, I felt like, you know, I used to call myself the most underrated elevated. Like when we play in the band and we used to, everybody would be making it. And we just, I felt like, you know, we got ignored a lot. And I put the dot because I said, you know what? When I make it, I want to make people put that dot. They're gonna have to pay attention. Because they didn't pay attention to me for so long. And now they gotta remember to put that dot. So it was always, period, oh, period.

• 42:28Michelle Obama?

  They would say, period.

• 42:29Speaker 00

  That's right. It was like my, my green M and Ms, you know, my thing. And I was like, y'all gonna do it. And I took the chance. I done worked all this, you know, this time to get here. And so it's a, it's a dot for detail. And, you know, to remember like it's the small things, the little things that can get you to a big place.

• 42:51Craig Robinson?

  Something I've learned about grilling is that there's always one thing you forget. You can plan the whole meal out perfectly. And then suddenly you realize you're out of charcoal. Or maybe you had enough burgers, but not enough burger buns. Because they sell them in non-equivalent quantities for some reason. That's why I've really come to rely on Shipt. With Shipt, you can get the steaks, the seasoning, the sides, and even that emergency extra bag of charcoal delivered same day from stores nearby. And the shoppers with Shipt really pay attention. If I'm ordering meat for the grill, I want someone who's actually picking out good cuts, good produce, all of it. That level of detail matters.

• 43:37Craig Robinson?

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• 44:19Craig Robinson?

  That's S-H-I-P-T dot com slash offer. Terms apply. Today's show is sponsored by Incogni. Now, whenever I get those scam calls or texts, it's always infuriating to not know how they got my number or email. I'm quite careful in giving those out, but having my info exposed to scammers still felt unavoidable. Our sponsor, Incogni, is a must for the digital age. They go out and contact data brokers on your behalf and request that your personal information gets removed from these databases. You could do it manually, but it would take you years. The setup was really easy.

• 45:03Craig Robinson?

  I made my account, authorized Incogni to work on my behalf, and now I can track everything from the dashboard. I also like their new custom removals feature on the Unlimited and Family Unlimited Plans. If your information shows up on a specific people's search site or random website, you can flag it and one of their privacy agents handles it for you. Go to incogni.com/IMO and use code IMO for 60% off. Incogni helps wipe yourself from the internet. Click the link below to claim your 60% off and get your personal data off the market.

• 45:51Michelle Obama?

  What was the first break? The first reel where you were like, mm, I'm, I'm, I'm in?

• 45:59Speaker 00

  Yeah, yeah. When I got the call to work with Dr. Dre, that was a big break.

• 46:04Michelle Obama?

  And how did he hear about you?

• 46:06Craig Robinson?

  What precipitated that?

• 46:08Speaker 00

  So I had a couple of songs that were circulating at the time that was big in the streets. This was before like Spotify was a really big thing. It was really just about SoundCloud and, you know, Reverb Nation and stuff like that where...

• 46:20Michelle Obama?

  Can you hum a few bars? What did it sound like? What was the song?

• 46:23Speaker 00

  Can I say this song?

• 46:25Michelle Obama?

  Oh, yeah.

• 46:25Craig Robinson?

  Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 46:27Michelle Obama?

  It's his song.

• 46:29Speaker 00

  It was a song called "Suede", and the song simply goes, "If I call you a bitch, it's because you're my bitch. And as long as no one else call you a bitch, then it won't be no problems. Now, if I call you a trick, it's because you paid rent. And as long as you don't call up the six, then it won't be no problems. Now, rock with me now."

• 46:46Michelle Obama?

  Yeah.

• 46:49Michelle Obama?

  Oh, you meant, could you say that?

• 46:51Speaker 00

  Yes.

• 46:51Michelle Obama?

  Oh, yes. No, you absolutely can.

• 46:54Craig Robinson?

  So Dre heard that.

• 46:56Speaker 00

  That did it all for me.

• 46:57Michelle Obama?

  That did it.

• 46:58Speaker 00

  Yeah, well, it was, yeah, I recorded that song and it was moving around. People knew about it and, you know, and so when, when they said Dre wanted to hit me up, I was a little shook because that's like the final boss. I grew up in the West Coast and nothing's bigger than Dre.

• 47:12Craig Robinson?

  Yeah.

• 47:13Speaker 00

  And so there was a little bit of shook and also a little bit like self-savaged. I was like, I ain't going to that session. I don't need that. Like, they gonna try to make me something I'm not. And who knows? He ain't, he ain't putting out no album no time soon. I'm working on my stuff and this and that.

• 47:28Craig Robinson?

  And really, you were afraid that you might fail.

• 47:30Speaker 00

  Looking back on it, yeah. You know, Dre's known for, he don't care who you are, what hype. You know, if you don't like it, don't like it. And so they begged my, my new manager at the time. He was like, please go, man, you know? Adrian Miller, shout out to Adrian Miller. Can I say Brian Lee? Shout out to Adrian Miller.

• 47:44Michelle Obama?

  Yeah.

• 47:44Speaker 00

  He was like, come on, man, show up. Let's just do it. And I show up and... First person I meet was Dr. Dre.

• 47:50Michelle Obama?

  Man.

• 47:50Speaker 00

  And him in the DLC and they was like, hey, man, I heard a lot about you, you know? That's what's up? Cool. And then they go off, they was watching the playoffs and they ushered me into the studio and I met these two writers, King Mez and JT and they were like, we love your song Sway. Like, we love it. We've been playing it non-stop and we want you to help on this Dr. Dre album. It's top secret. No one knows about it. Don't tell anyone. Bad. Cool. So they played me some music. I'm like, great, let's start working. And they say, hold up, before we play this, we want to play your song Sway for Dre. And I was like, oh, no, he hasn't heard it yet? Like, come on.

• 48:25Speaker 00

  Let's get some, let's just go on. I'm in here now.

• 48:27Michelle Obama?

  Really?

• 48:27Speaker 00

  What if he doesn't like it? You know, like, damn.

• 48:30Michelle Obama?

  It's like, just leave it.

• 48:31Speaker 00

  Yeah, it's all good.

• 48:32Craig Robinson?

  That, that, that would be deflating.

• 48:35Speaker 00

  Oh, my god.

• 48:35Craig Robinson?

  That would be deflating.

• 48:36Speaker 00

  Yeah, actually.

• 48:37Craig Robinson?

  You thought that's why you were here, because of Sway, right?

• 48:40Speaker 00

  Little I know Dre didn't have a clue. He thought I was a runner. He was like, dude, here. Go ahead, man. Yeah. And they were like, we want to play it for Dre. So I was nervous and he came in there and they threw on the record and I was like, I didn't know where to look. I was just looking at the floor. I was looking at his feet. And that's where I realized, like, oh, Dre wears the same shoes every day. White Air Force Ones. All right, and so.

• 49:02Michelle Obama?

  It's like, check.

• 49:02Speaker 00

  Yeah, check.

• 49:03Michelle Obama?

  Noted.

• 49:04Speaker 00

  Simplify your life, okay? Got it. And so he playing the music and man, he cranks it, you know, he playing, cranks it up. They blasting it. And I look up and he's like, I play that again. What's your name again? AP? Okay. And what should I call you? AP. We gonna call you AP. Play it again.

• 49:24Michelle Obama?

  You, you didn't like focus on the period?

• 49:26Speaker 00

  Yeah, yeah, no.

• 49:26Michelle Obama?

  Uh, excuse me.

• 49:28Craig Robinson?

  It's an A period P.

• 49:29Speaker 00

  That's Mr. Fact, yeah. No, none of that. Whatever, whatever it is you like, honestly. You like it, I love it.

• 49:37Craig Robinson?

  Yeah. You just glad they didn't kick you out, right?

• 49:39Speaker 00

  Yeah, exactly. I was like, play it again. You're that's gangster. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Let's work. There's too much talent in the building. And he just threw on the mic. And on the mic, started doing stuff and boom, like, I was back every day, every day. He hit me up to work on stuff and they told me it's top secret. Don't tell anybody about this. I told everybody. I told my cousin. Man, I was telling everybody, man. I'm like, I'm on. I'm with Dre. Don't talk to me. Don't, don't, I don't like your tone, bro. I'm, I'm working with Dre now. I ain't got time for all that foolishness.

• 50:09Craig Robinson?

  Oh, no.

• 50:10Speaker 00

  Yeah, so I was like, I was hyped. That's when I was like, oh, man, this, this is good. Because before that, man, it was, it was, it was tough. I was making low headway, but man, it was, it was still struggling. I wasn't making any money really as, as an artist, and I was full-time artist. And so it was tough, and I had a family. When, when that, that moment came, I was like, wow. And then he put out an album. He put, he, I woke up and he, he had dropped a surprise album called Compton, and I was all over the album. It was like on six tracks. They was calling me six-track pack.

• 50:39Michelle Obama?

  Yeah.

• 50:39Speaker 00

  And then, um, he had a movie, Straight Outta Compton, and he did the beats deal, and Dre was popping. And so I was like, wow. And, um, I was like, well, shoot, guess I should put out something now. And, um, it was cool because he was so busy doing his thing that he didn't sign me right away. So I got, I was working on an album called Malibu, and I had it like halfway done, but now like people were looking. So I was like hitting up producers that, you know, I, this, this album was like my dream album that I had been holding on to these songs for a while, and I didn't want to, I was like, when this comes out, I want people to be able to hear it. And now like I had a lot of like leverage and people were, had a lot of eyes on me. So I, I was hitting up people like Knife Wonder and, uh, Malib and High Tech. And, uh, these people were helping me complete the album now, and I was getting these features.

• 51:24Speaker 00

  And, um, Dre was still doing his thing, so I got to put it out independently. And, you know, now I own the masters on those.

• 51:30Michelle Obama?

  That was probably the best thing that happened. It was like how fortuitous that he was too busy.

• 51:35Speaker 00

  Yeah, and I was trying to, you know, we were trying to break our necks, trying to, everyone was knocking down my door now, trying to sign me. Before, I couldn't buy a deal. And everyone was like, yeah, we want to sign you now. And, um, I was like, if I do sign anything, I'm gonna sign to Dre whenever it comes back around. And I was on tour after that for ye, for years. I didn't, I didn't, I didn't see.

• 51:54Michelle Obama?

  How did you finance your tour?

• 51:55Speaker 00

  So it was a lot of things that happened. We started very, after Malibu came out, it started circulating and I got a Grammy nom for Best New Artist, different things like that. And people were seeing that, oh, he's not like just a rapper. Like, he could play, that he has a band. So we started getting festival offers to play at festivals and stuff. And so, you know, money, the rates started getting better. And then, we got on a show called NPR Tiny Desk.

• 52:24Michelle Obama?

  Oh, I love you on Tiny Desk. That was...

• 52:28Speaker 00

  And that really opened it up. People started seeing, wow. And I didn't know that like playing drums and being the frontman was gonna be a big thing. And it was really that, that kind of like opened everyone's eyes. And man, then we started getting booked for all kinds of gigs. And then our shows were starting to get lying around the corner and...

• 52:44Michelle Obama?

  So how did you know how to line up your team? So that financially, you would... Because they're the story of a lot of artists.

• 52:52Speaker 00

  Well, I went, before that, I was gonna be with anybody who could help pay my rent. I would sign anything. And I got, out of the manager who made me change my name, he is like, hey, I don't know what to do now. You're off, but if you ever do make it, you owe me this much. And so, I learned a little bit like, oh, nothing of this stuff is free. Like, these are all partnerships. So he was like, you will make it.

• 53:15Michelle Obama?

  Rent.

• 53:16Speaker 00

  Exactly.

• 53:16Michelle Obama?

  It's like, I pay your rent. No, you're not paying my rent.

• 53:19Speaker 00

  Exactly.

• 53:20Michelle Obama?

  Yeah.

• 53:20Speaker 00

  This is an investment. I want ROI eventually. I don't know what to do with you now, but you gonna figure out. And so, he gave me a big old receipt of how much I owed. And then, I was, I had a bunch of music, but I just was in debt and no connections. And so, I met another manager and he said, hello, young fella. Look, just look at me. I remember the first thing he said is like, just look at me as your personal ATM. And I said, bet. I got this debt, I got my rent, I got a wife, I got a kid. I wanna do all this stuff. And he said, great, we're gonna get you a deal. I'll help you with all that stuff. Just, we're gonna sign a management agreement, though. And I signed to him, a new manager. And he put together a financial team and a lawyer, everything. Some of the people I still have to this day.

• 54:05Speaker 00

  He wasn't perfect, but he was... You know, a bridge over troubled water. He was a guy that gave him an opportunity. I didn't have no opportunity. And he was one of the people that got me in front of Dre. And he didn't have all the knowledge of it, but he did teach me certain simple stuff like, don't sign your publishing no matter what. The very first thing people want to do is sign their publishing because they don't have a lot of finances and they need a big check up front. So then they sign these publishing deals and that's your everything. That's your kids' kids' stuff. And you get locked in for years. So I didn't know what he was talking about. And people, up until then, man, people were trying to give my publishing five thousand here and there. I'm like, let's sign it. Like, really, I'm broke. Like, that's five thousand dollars. We ain't walking away from that. That's generational wealth.

• 54:51Speaker 00

  And he was like, boy, don't sign that. I'll give you five hundred to get you to the next. Yeah, here. I'm like, alright, calm now. I was just hungry.

• 55:01Speaker 00

  But yeah, he would do something like that. And like, you know, to this day, you know, I haven't, I'm holding on to that. And so, yeah, he was, he was the person that got my initial team together. And then I started making money and didn't know where it was going. Never was the type to have a bank account before that. I was in collections, like, I didn't ever had a...

• 55:22Michelle Obama?

  It's like, that's all you knew about the bank.

• 55:24Speaker 00

  Deep in collections, that's all I knew about banks. I get a card, I max it out, and I'll be like, alright, on to the next. Yeah, and I had debt, I had school debt, all kinds of stuff. My credit was abysmal. And yeah, it was like, I did, when I started making money, it was just like, I just, you know, here, I had a team that he put in place, but I never was checking to see where it was going and all this stuff. They were just, you know, putting it in places. And thank God, you know, they were, my first initial team did do really cool stuff that to this day, I'm really happy about, you know.

• 55:56Michelle Obama?

  I mean, you were lucky.

• 55:58Speaker 00

  Very lucky, yeah, very lucky.

• 56:00Craig Robinson?

  Nobody's sorry.

• 56:01Michelle Obama?

  It's like, it's like, the story, I'm waiting for it. It's like, I didn't know nothing and I gave everything to them.

• 56:07Speaker 00

  Well, that's true.

• 56:07Michelle Obama?

  And I still have it.

• 56:09Speaker 00

  That's like, no, no, I lost a lot. I had to go through the growing pains. I had to fire everybody, it was a whole bunch of stuff. But, you know, people, artists... See a lot of these things where it's like, they took me for this and that and all this stuff. But you only, you only do what you allow people to do. And I, there's no reason why I couldn't picked up one of these contracts and looked it through and figured it out. And maybe waited and stuff. But um, it's not, I didn't, it's not that I didn't know better. It's just like, I was just trusting and doing what I can. And, and these people um, were helping me out of time and I didn't have anything. And so um, I needed the help and, and they saw something in me when no one saw it. And I think, you know, you gotta take the good with the bad sometimes.

• 56:50Michelle Obama?

  Right, right, right. Man, dude.

• 56:54Speaker 00

  Then I met Bruno.

• 56:55Michelle Obama?

  Ah, yeah.

• 56:56Speaker 00

  And I learned a lot about debt.

• 57:00Michelle Obama?

  Talk about that. How'd you meet Bruno? How did you guys uh, come together?

• 57:05Speaker 00

  We met, I opened up for him at the 24 karat magic. It was one of my first big like uh, opening tour offers when, when Malibu had came out. And he took me all over Europe, big arena shows and.

• 57:18Michelle Obama?

  Your first big arena shows?

• 57:20Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 57:20Michelle Obama?

  Yeah, what was that, what was that like?

• 57:22Speaker 00

  It was incredible.

• 57:23Michelle Obama?

  Breezy love joy is like, look at where we are now.

• 57:26Speaker 00

  We done made it. Yeah, it was, it was crazy. I remember um, you know, like after one of the shows, cause, cause our whole thing was like, yeah, he, we gotta make it so that, you know, he messed up having us open, we about to steal some fans, we gonna be killing it. Now that was our whole mentality and Bruno has that mentality too. Like we come from like, you don't wanna come on the stage after we go. You know, like that's what we, we wanna kill the stage and give people the best show possible. We don't care who's coming after. And um, that's how we went. And I remember one day we played and like, we had a standing ovation, I was like, ah. And I was like, yeah, we killed that. The next day they said, Bruno wants to talk to you. And I said, oh shit.

• 58:06Michelle Obama?

  It's like, oop.

• 58:07Speaker 00

  And I'll see a letter, he's like, meet me at for dinner tonight, I wanna talk. And I'm like, oh damn, I'm talking to my band, I'm like, shit, I hope we didn't kill it too hard.

• 58:15Michelle Obama?

  Bruno wants to meet. This might be it.

• 58:16Speaker 00

  Yeah, yeah. Then we go and um, we go to this, this restaurant, it's like at the top floor. He in there smoking a cigarette inside the restaurant, that's when I knew, I was like, oh, this is different type levels of famous. I was like, are you not, like, I don't think you're supposed to smoke in here.

• 58:29Michelle Obama?

  It's not, it's not, non-smoking. Uh, excuse me, sir, do you see the sign?

• 58:35Speaker 00

  No, you put that down. Yeah, yeah. And so he's like, I like you, you, you did great, you know, that was real cute. He said, he said, listen, I want you to come on the rest of the tour with me, you know, I'm gonna do, we got San Antone, we got, we got New York, I wanna come on the American leg. And then, you know, my crazy self, I'm like, well, okay, but I need a little more money, you know, cause I got the band and this and that. He's like, you know, the tour is sold out. And I said, okay. So that means I don't need you to do this. So you're gonna take it or leave it, buddy. I'm gonna do the like it. It's not because I need you.

• 59:13Michelle Obama?

  Right.

• 59:13Speaker 00

  So I said, damn.

• 59:14Michelle Obama?

  Oh, you got a point.

• 59:15Speaker 00

  Yeah, you got a point there. Yeah, I'm learning business quick, yeah. He said, alright, uh, I'll be back, we'll figure it out. And um, that was a big decision because, you know, at that point, I had Malibu and then Dre was like, hey, man, when you gonna come back and make your next album? And I was like, oh, wow, that's right, I need to make another album, it's been years. You know, and um, I had been on the road non-stop and I, and if I would've kept going with him, I would've, I mean, he's just coming off that 24 karat, you know, he just put out new things. So it's like, it's easy to, to um, you know, get caught up in that where you can be on the road for a long time and you forget, or doing different things because it's like, it's fun,

• 59:56Speaker 00

  or because it's like lucrative and stuff, and then you forget, like, okay, well, I gotta, I still got stuff over here, also I had a family, I also had different things going on. So um, I had to make a decision, it was a tough one to be like, okay, this, I'm gonna leave the tour, I'm gonna go work on my album, work on my stuff, um, go back, be with the family and, and um, you know, tap in on my own artistry. As, as fun as it is to open up, I don't want, I didn't wanna get stuck in being an opener, being like some sidekick or something, so.

• 1:00:23Craig Robinson?

  What was Bruno's reaction to that?

• 1:00:25Speaker 00

  Good luck.

• 1:00:27Michelle Obama?

  He's like, tour's still sold out.

• 1:00:29Speaker 00

  Still sold out, yeah. Yeah. Ain't nobody come to see you in the first place. And so maybe we kept in touch and we made some music and it was just like, right away we hit it off. I hadn't met anybody that was that talented, was my age and that could make hits and was a mega star. You know, like it was, I worked with a lot of people that were older or maybe younger and I was always like, felt like the Lone Ranger that was still like, the guy that really wanted to play and perform and listen to old school stuff and he was that even, and even more.

• 1:01:12Speaker 00

  And so I went off, did my stuff and eventually quarantine hit, so everything came to a halt. And everyone was stuck, no more tours and the blessing of it was I had to be home with the kids. And so my kids now are, you know, eight years old and I had a little baby.

• 1:01:31Michelle Obama?

  And you've been on the road since they were born?

• 1:01:34Speaker 00

  Yeah, 2016, yeah. Even before that, that was my life, you know, bread and butter was, put something out, go on the road for months. And you come home and life still goes on without you, you know, and your daddy's home. And the kids run up to you and then they come out like, "Long time no see." "Nobody saving you no chicken, you don't get the big piece of chicken no more." And everyone's like on the iPad, like, you know, so it became apparent like, if I wasn't gonna have a lot of time, it was very important about what you do with the time and being present. And I know daddy's working and all these things cost, you gotta do all this stuff, but while I'm here, I wanna be present. And that was really what quarantine did for me. I got to be present, create a bond with my son, figure out what he was into. He's like, "I like YouTube, I wanna be YouTuber." I'm like, "Okay, what's that?" "I like K-pop."

• 1:02:19Speaker 00

  I'm like, "K-pop? What you know about Tupac?" Boy, BTS, what you know about BET? How long I've been away? What the hell is happening in this house now? I gotta rectify some things. Yeah, so then I had to tap in and then I see he like do YouTube. So I'm like, oh, let's make some skits. Like, I remember brought me back when I was a kid making like funny skits with my sisters. And I used to love like editing and filming and making home videos. And it brought me back to doing that. And so I became one, I wanted to be a YouTuber more than him by the end of it.

• 1:02:50Michelle Obama?

  Really?

• 1:02:51Speaker 00

  Come on, son, let's do this. And I realized how funny he was. And he had been in dance classes forever. So he was like a little dancing machine. And I'm like, wow, this is, this is 2.0. Faster, more handsome.

• 1:03:02Michelle Obama?

  Does he have the same kinda energy as you do?

• 1:03:06Speaker 00

  Even cooler energy.

• 1:03:07Michelle Obama?

  What's that in like in the house with you two?

• 1:03:11Speaker 00

  He's, you know, he's a sage and I'm Aquarius. So I don't know, y'all can do the research on that.

• 1:03:17Craig Robinson?

  No, Julia knows it. She already knows it.

• 1:03:20Michelle Obama?

  We're always talking about this.

• 1:03:22Speaker 00

  So it was a lot of just us staring at each other like, alright.

• 1:03:26Speaker 00

  Go ahead with your bad self. Alright, I see you, I see you over there. You know, I used to do a little, and so he's really much like, I got, I see you doing that. I'm gonna have my own thing. And so.

• 1:03:35Michelle Obama?

  Kinda like you.

• 1:03:36Speaker 00

  Yeah, yeah, very much so, and his mom. And you know, and he's got the Korean side too. His mom is full Korean and he's got a different.

• 1:03:43Michelle Obama?

  Is she musical?

• 1:03:44Speaker 00

  She's musical, sings, plays keys and everything.

• 1:03:46Michelle Obama?

  Alright, so the K-pop's is fully your story.

• 1:03:50Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 1:03:51Michelle Obama?

  Not fully.

• 1:03:52Speaker 00

  Fully, but I was pulling from the well.

• 1:03:53Michelle Obama?

  Yes.

• 1:03:55Speaker 00

  Yeah, that was why I was like, son, I'm gonna write a script. Like, this is, this could be something, what if I didn't know?

• 1:03:59Michelle Obama?

  So you thought of that in COVID?

• 1:04:00Speaker 00

  Yep.

• 1:04:01Michelle Obama?

  Yeah.

• 1:04:01Speaker 00

  Yeah, I was.

• 1:04:01Michelle Obama?

  But we're talking about K-pop's.

• 1:04:03Speaker 00

  Yeah, my movie.

• 1:04:04Craig Robinson?

  The movie.

• 1:04:05Michelle Obama?

  Yeah.

• 1:04:05Speaker 00

  My feature film and I knew I wanted to, cause at that point I saw that, okay, touring stop. I love music, it's always gonna be there, but. That's when I realized like, oh man, you know, different, I could tell different stories in different mediums. And it might take a while for me to learn a new medium, but that's the joy of the whole process.

• 1:04:29Craig Robinson?

  So this was your first script?

• 1:04:30Speaker 00

  Yeah, yep.

• 1:04:31Craig Robinson?

  And you taught yourself how to do it?

• 1:04:34Speaker 00

  Yeah, so I had a co-writer.

• 1:04:35Craig Robinson?

  Okay.

• 1:04:36Speaker 00

  I had to come up with the idea first and, you know, what if I didn't know I had a son? That son could be the next K-pop star. And I come into his life and I'm teaching him about his black culture and he's teaching me about the Korean side because I didn't know anything about my Korean side until I met his mom and then I was reintroduced. So I had all these unique experiences that I could pull from and put them in this movie that I didn't think anybody had really done before, like especially Asians and black people. Like that was real, like we got rush hour, you know? And that's about it. So I was like, this could be cool. And then I didn't want it to be, I know I had a lot of different things that I could pull from and trauma and different things, racism, things that we all been through. But I wanted to kind of pull from the things that helped me cope with all those things, like the love, the music, the fun, the comedy.

• 1:05:20Speaker 00

  And I felt like there wasn't a lot of movies that were bringing families together where you saw families on the screen. It was family comedy, no one dies, you know, it's like different things.

• 1:05:31Michelle Obama?

  My kind of movie.

• 1:05:32Speaker 00

  Right.

• 1:05:33Craig Robinson?

  Very uplifting.

• 1:05:34Michelle Obama?

  By the way, I mean.

• 1:05:36Speaker 00

  Yeah, and my mom too, she's like, Granny, you know what? This is like a Hallmark movie. I was like, Mom.

• 1:05:40Michelle Obama?

  Oh, don't say that.

• 1:05:42Speaker 00

  You mean Sundance? No, this is Hallmark. This is ready for Hallmark. And I was like, alright, but I understood what she was saying. It's like, you know, sometimes you want escapism of knowing that everything's gonna be alright. And, you know, that doesn't mean you can't put different things in there, but it's beautiful when you can, it's really hard to do those kind of movies. So, yeah, that was the genesis of it. And I started doing the process and I met with my buddy Dumfounded because once I knew I wanted to direct and everything, people didn't want me to do it. And I wanted to be in it and I wanted my son to be in it. And they were like, okay, that's a lot, it's very ambitious. Like, why don't we give it to somebody, give it to this? I'm like, I don't want nobody around my son.

• 1:06:17Michelle Obama?

  Don't you know who I am?

• 1:06:18Speaker 00

  Come on now.

• 1:06:21Speaker 00

  Formerly Breezy Lovejoy?

• 1:06:22Michelle Obama?

  Really?

• 1:06:23Speaker 00

  Ring a bell?

• 1:06:23Michelle Obama?

  I do hard.

• 1:06:24Speaker 00

  Exactly.

• 1:06:27Speaker 00

  Yeah, so I eventually got my boy Dum Founding, who was one of my best friends that I met coming up in L.A., who started music but was making the venture into movies, was working with this company Stampede and EST. And he said, "Bring it to them. They're taking chances on, you know, different stories." And I pitched them the idea and they said, "Yeah, cool. We'll give you some money to do it." And I was shocked. I was like, "Whoa, all right, cool." So, and they were like, "You wanna, you wanna direct it, right?" I was like, "Yeah." And they're, "You wanna write it?" And I didn't know how to write a script. It had none. So I was like, "Maybe I need a, I would love to have a co-writer, actually, 'cause I need, just to show me structure or whatever." And they blessed me with this really young co-writer, Kayla Amazon, this young black writer who was a military brat and who also happened to be a K-pop fanatic.

• 1:07:12Michelle Obama?

  Oh, wow.

• 1:07:13Speaker 00

  So she was like, right when got in there and was just in here just like this and then like this. And I'm like, so she's like, "All right, this is K-pop one-on-one. This is movie structure one-on-one." She graduated from, you know, film school and everything. And I think it worked out because it was those two worlds and she taught me structure and she taught me the idea that I had gained all these layers. Because it wasn't, it wasn't as deep as him being on a show and all these different things. And I learned more about the structure of K-pop and how they have this, you know, this incubation system and this whole thing about this person is this person and that and all this thing. And again, it was making me think of groups that I came up with. And so I was like, "This is gonna be a cool opportunity to show like how things relate and how much in common things have and how, yes, people will take and pull from different things

• 1:07:57Speaker 00

  and have their own interpretation, but that's been going on for years."

• 1:08:00Michelle Obama?

  My favorite scene in the movie is when you're out with, I shouldn't say, when Pops is out with his son and they go by the record store.

• 1:08:08Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 1:08:09Michelle Obama?

  And he starts pulling out the albums. It's explaining, this is what, you know, trying to teach his son some soul and understand what it means. That was beautifully done.

• 1:08:19Speaker 00

  Thank you.

• 1:08:19Michelle Obama?

  You know? And is that the first time you acted?

• 1:08:22Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 1:08:23Michelle Obama?

  I mean...

• 1:08:24Speaker 00

  I've done different things, but this is the first.

• 1:08:26Michelle Obama?

  I mean, you were really good in it.

• 1:08:28Speaker 00

  That's talented.

• 1:08:29Michelle Obama?

  Funny and... And, you know, lit up the screen. Really, truly, you know, I mean, I'm, I was laughing out loud watching the movie. Really sweet and your son, I mean, so now your son is, you said is man.

• 1:08:44Speaker 00

  Yeah, I mean, it took forever. He was like eight years old. He was obsessed with K-pop. And then by the time we got to shoot, I got all the money and stuff. He was like 11 years old. And he's like, man, I don't like K-pop no more. I like Slipknot. I'm like, contractually, son, here's the thing. I need this to work. We're doing this. I owe a lot of money. So he was like, all right, I guess, you know, he's going into his teens and I had to adjust things for him. But he was like, I'm gonna do you a solid, dad. You seem really into it. And I'm like, thank you, dad, uh, son. Let's do this.

• 1:09:18Michelle Obama?

  Thank you. This is about your tuition and your life.

• 1:09:21Speaker 00

  This is gonna mean more than you know later. And so, um, yeah, and it was cool cause like, the whole thing was like, I really loved being on set with him and, and being able to kick it with your son and like see him grow and, and we're working together and we're creating a bond. But we also have to be on set really early and I'm seeing him learn about how to be, uh, learn the language of being on set. You know, be on his mark and he's taking his, his, uh, acting classes serious and learning his lines and getting me on my game. And, um, it was just so much fun and, and, um, you know, at the end of it, I was like, it was really surprising. Cause like, I didn't know how he was gonna take it and I could see him having a lot of fun. Mind you, before this, he was in homeschool all his life and now he's like around other kids and adults.

• 1:10:05Speaker 00

  And I've seen him blossom socially and everything and I'm like, okay, we might have a little acting bug. K-pop's too. And I'm like, what you think, son? Would you do it again? How'd you feel? He's like, it was great. I think we had a lot of core memories. I think you had a lot of fun, Jack. But I would just like to be a kid. It doesn't, it's not my passion. And, uh, yeah. That's pretty mature. We'll leave it there.

• 1:10:25Michelle Obama?

  Pop your bubble.

• 1:10:26Speaker 00

  Yeah, I was like, dang. He's like, but it does depend on the script, dad, so. And that was cool. I was fine with that. And now he's going to school. Now he's like, it's funny when you like back off of them. They get to do their thing their own way. Now he's playing guitar, he's playing bass, making beats. I'm right back in his face like, alright.

• 1:10:43Michelle Obama?

  Yeah.

• 1:10:43Speaker 00

  Come on now. You gonna produce the next album.

• 1:10:45Michelle Obama?

  It's gotta be their idea.

• 1:10:47Speaker 00

  It does.

• 1:10:47Michelle Obama?

  You know? How's your mom doing?

• 1:10:50Speaker 00

  My mom is doing great.

• 1:10:51Michelle Obama?

  Yeah.

• 1:10:52Speaker 00

  She has narrowed it down to one boyfriend now.

• 1:10:54Michelle Obama?

  Okay.

• 1:10:55Speaker 00

  She got, she's vegan.

• 1:10:57Michelle Obama?

  Okay.

• 1:10:58Speaker 00

  Pissing off every restaurant we go to. She is a Dodger fanatic.

• 1:11:03Michelle Obama?

  Oh my god.

• 1:11:04Speaker 00

  She got me into the Dodgers. So now we be all obsessed with the Dodgers.

• 1:11:07Craig Robinson?

  Congratulations.

• 1:11:08Speaker 00

  She love F1, exactly. Shout out to Dodgers.

• 1:11:11Michelle Obama?

  She's F-

• 1:11:11Speaker 00

  F1.

• 1:11:12Craig Robinson?

  She's F1 too?

• 1:11:13Michelle Obama?

  He's an F1 fanatic too.

• 1:11:15Speaker 00

  Boxing fanatic.

• 1:11:16Michelle Obama?

  Oh my god.

• 1:11:16Speaker 00

  All of it. So I'm broke, having to get all these passes and tickets. She gotta be front row and everything.

• 1:11:23Craig Robinson?

  Did she go to the Vegas race?

• 1:11:24Speaker 00

  She went to, yup, the Vegas race. She went to the last fight. She gotta feel the sweat coming off of them. I'm like, dang. Yeah, so she's loving life and, you know, she's, she's out in Atlanta. And, you know, sometimes she'll tap in, be a grandma. She'll watch the kids and she be dipping out. She's jet setting now. I'm like, mom, cause mom for some reason, she's like, I don't wanna go anywhere, Brandon. I just, I don't trust it. The things that people eat, I don't, uh-uh. I'm like, mom, why is that stopping you from going anywhere?

• 1:11:56Michelle Obama?

  Really?

• 1:11:56Speaker 00

  Go travel. No, they doing some foolishness over there with how they do the chicken. You seen that?

• 1:12:02Craig Robinson?

  The things that people eat.

• 1:12:03Speaker 00

  Have you seen that? I don't trust it. I'm scared of that. But now she traveling, she was in Puerto Rico.

• 1:12:10Michelle Obama?

  She's packing her own food, no?

• 1:12:11Speaker 00

  Yeah, yeah, she will. That's one way to piss her clean off. To hell with the whole country. Yeah, so she bringing her food and she's gonna travel. London now, finally gonna get her to go over across the pond. And yeah, she's doing, she's great. That's my, that's my dog. That's my best friend and.

• 1:12:28Michelle Obama?

  Well, she did a great job in raising you, dude. She really has and been through a lot and stayed strong.

• 1:12:34Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 1:12:35Michelle Obama?

  You know, and I like to think that that's also, you know, where you get your steadiness and your, your drive. And like you said, your mom, you know, has taught you a lot of it. And you can see it, it's spilling out on this table.

• 1:12:51Speaker 00

  Thank you. Shout out to mama.

• 1:12:53Michelle Obama?

  Yeah, shout out to mama. Forget Brian Lee.

• 1:12:56Speaker 00

  Yeah, mama. You did it. You did that. Did your big one, mama.

• 1:13:00Michelle Obama?

  Shout out from the Obamas and the Robinsons. That one. Yeah, yeah. We see you.

• 1:13:05Speaker 00

  We see you, mama Benda.

• 1:13:06Michelle Obama?

  We see you.

• 1:13:07Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 1:13:09Michelle Obama?

  You want to do the listener question?

• 1:13:10Craig Robinson?

  Yeah, let's, let's hear from Amanda in Boston.

• 1:13:15Speaker 03

  Hi, my name is Amanda and I'm from Massachusetts. My husband and I have started to discuss growing our family. As a teacher and future parent, I often grapple with the idea of building resilience in young people. I had a fairly unstable childhood. My father battled alcoholism and actively worked on his recovery while my mother worked long hours trying to make ends meet. Because of this environment, I was forced to develop resilience and grit. I had to learn to guide myself and power through uncomfortable feelings without the guidance of my parents. I find myself being able to handle adversity in adulthood because of this learned resilience. I truly believe that I have my childhood and struggles to thank for this. As I think about raising independent and resilient future adults,

• 1:13:59Speaker 03

  I worry that I won't be able to provide my children with opportunities to naturally build this resilience. How do we balance this idea of giving children a predictable and loving home while also allowing them to naturally build resilience? I want to give my future children everything I did not have, but this can become a slippery slope. Thank you so much for your time.

• 1:14:21Craig Robinson?

  Okay, Amanda asked, it's getting the answer from Mr. Resilience himself.

• 1:14:26Michelle Obama?

  Yeah, really.

• 1:14:27Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 1:14:29Speaker 00

  Can't be afraid to let them go through their own struggles, you know? Sometimes like, you know, especially my kid, he remember, my oldest one, he remembers like the little apartment, you know, and me going, us taking the bus and then when we first got our place and first got a car and he still remembers that my little one, he just born in first class, you know?

• 1:14:46Michelle Obama?

  Really?

• 1:14:46Speaker 00

  It's like, he's born, you know, after we had the stuff. So, you know, sometimes I take him through coach and tell him, go ahead, like, y'all gotta sit back there. I'm sitting up front. Y'all figure it out, you know? Work your way up like how, you know? Take him down scare row, let him see like this could be you now. Get out the car, go walk. No, you want to be tough, right? Go ahead. That's what it's gonna get you. Get your ass in the car. Let's get out of here.

• 1:15:06Craig Robinson?

  That's some old school lesson.

• 1:15:08Speaker 00

  That's some old school stuff. You gotta do it. And now, I wanted to protect him so much. I want to give him the life I didn't have, all this stuff. And I realized, like, all this stuff that I went through made me me. And it wasn't like, it wasn't, I don't know how it would have been if, if, you know, the tables were turned and I got to live in that lap of luxury and my mom and everything worked out, I might have been still a chubby little spoiled brat, you know? And I know how to treat people and all this stuff.

• 1:15:33Craig Robinson?

  That's right.

• 1:15:33Speaker 00

  And so, um, you know, the kids have to go through their own trauma, their own set of different things in order, and you have to trust that the, the things that you installed in them is gonna stay with them when they go out into the world. So now, my son is going to school now. He's made his debut and he was homeschooled forever. I didn't want to put him in school. I didn't trust nobody and I wanted, I was like, nah, we're gonna keep him here. And, um, you know, he was like, please, Dad, I want to go to school.

• 1:15:58Michelle Obama?

  It's like, I want to get out of-

• 1:15:59Speaker 00

  I'm sick of this. I'm sick of my cousins. It's like, you don't like, you don't, who's gonna watch your little brother?

• 1:16:03Michelle Obama?

  And, right.

• 1:16:04Speaker 00

  It's all-

• 1:16:05Michelle Obama?

  It's like, not my job.

• 1:16:06Speaker 00

  Yeah, it's not my job. So now, he's out and, you know, I trust that, you know, I worry sometimes, but I trust that the things that he learned in the house and the way we raised him, he's, he's out there being a good representation and he's gonna learn, you know, on his own. And you have to be, you have to let him do that. And, and, you know, he's around other people and getting influenced and learning different things and, um, I'm excited for him, but I think that, that's what you have to do. You have to trust that you raised him right and that you installed a lot of those things, but can't be afraid to let him go out and venture and bump their head sometimes and get back up and it's a part of it.

• 1:16:39Michelle Obama?

  Yeah, that's a, that's a, that's a good point. You know, I think that sometimes parents, they have to get out of the way.

• 1:16:47Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 1:16:48Michelle Obama?

  You know, and I would say, Amanda, make sure that you aren't parenting out of fear or out of your own motives, right?

• 1:16:58Craig Robinson?

  Our mom was really good at that. She always used to say, I can't let my own fears get in the way of your growth.

• 1:17:04Speaker 00

  Wow.

• 1:17:05Craig Robinson?

  And when, uh, and the perfect example was when I got the chance to go out of town for the first time to a tournament.

• 1:17:13Michelle Obama?

  Mm-hmm. Basketball.

• 1:17:14Craig Robinson?

  A basketball tournament. My mom was scared to death and I was going to Kansas City in a van with a bunch of guys and some coaches. And I didn't realize it until I was, she never told me this until I was grown, but she was-

• 1:17:30Craig Robinson?

  Absolutely afraid the whole time I was gone.

• 1:17:33Speaker 00

  Yep.

• 1:17:34Craig Robinson?

  And she just ate that fear and let me experience it. And I tell you, it's just like what you're saying. It's, it's, it's not doing the homework, not getting in the way of your child's development because of your own personal fears too, so.

• 1:17:51Michelle Obama?

  You see it in coaching.

• 1:17:53Craig Robinson?

  Oh, man, I see it so much now in coaching kids that these parents are trying to curate the perfect childhood for them. And that's not sports. It's not gonna be perfect. You're not gonna go undefeated. You're not gonna ever not miss a shot. You're not gonna ever run into a kid who's better than you are.

• 1:18:14Speaker 00

  Right.

• 1:18:15Michelle Obama?

  And you're going to lose a lot.

• 1:18:17Craig Robinson?

  You are going to lose.

• 1:18:19Michelle Obama?

  You are going to, at some point in life, somebody is gonna be mean to you.

• 1:18:22Speaker 00

  Yep.

• 1:18:23Michelle Obama?

  That you gonna, you know, you're gonna be disappointed. Something's not gonna work out. That, I, we've all experienced that.

• 1:18:31Speaker 00

  Yes.

• 1:18:31Michelle Obama?

  So, we gotta prepare kids for that. That's what resilience is, you know? And you don't have to, you know, be flat broke to do it.

• 1:18:40Speaker 00

  Right.

• 1:18:40Michelle Obama?

  You know? You don't have to have extenuating circumstances to do it, but you do have to let go.

• 1:18:45Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 1:18:47Michelle Obama?

  Throughout their childhood.

• 1:18:49Craig Robinson?

  And Amanda, your kids will still love you.

• 1:18:51Michelle Obama?

  That's the thing.

• 1:18:52Craig Robinson?

  They'll still love you.

• 1:18:53Michelle Obama?

  That is the crazy thing about it, you know?

• 1:18:56Craig Robinson?

  Mm-hmm.

• 1:18:57Michelle Obama?

  And, you know, for a minute, you have to not care whether they like you or not.

• 1:19:01Speaker 00

  Yep.

• 1:19:02Michelle Obama?

  I mean, that's kinda, that's kinda the secret to parenting, you know? You gotta be able to be like.

• 1:19:08Craig Robinson?

  You gotta outlast them.

• 1:19:08Michelle Obama?

  I don't really care.

• 1:19:10Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 1:19:10Michelle Obama?

  If you like me, that's not my role in your life, you know? My favorite saying that my daughters say, I say, I say this all the time, I'm not one of your little friends.

• 1:19:19Speaker 00

  That was what my mom used to say too.

• 1:19:21Michelle Obama?

  I just not, and I never felt like I needed to be. Oh, you mad?

• 1:19:24Speaker 00

  Right.

• 1:19:25Michelle Obama?

  Oh, you mad? You got rent?

• 1:19:26Speaker 00

  Mm-hmm. Exactly.

• 1:19:28Michelle Obama?

  Oh, so who gonna be mad or longer? I was like, who's not, oh, you're not speaking to me?

• 1:19:32Speaker 00

  Right.

• 1:19:33Michelle Obama?

  It's like, great.

• 1:19:34Speaker 00

  Mm-hmm.

• 1:19:35Michelle Obama?

  I won't speak to you.

• 1:19:36Speaker 00

  Right.

• 1:19:37Michelle Obama?

  And guess who always wants? It's like, you gonna need to speak to me before, I could not speak to you for years.

• 1:19:43Speaker 00

  Wow.

• 1:19:43Michelle Obama?

  And my life wouldn't change.

• 1:19:44Craig Robinson?

  She's rough, man.

• 1:19:45Speaker 00

  That's what you go, you gonna go low, I'm gonna heal.

• 1:19:50Michelle Obama?

  That's right.

• 1:19:50Craig Robinson?

  She stays high and stuff with her kids.

• 1:19:53Michelle Obama?

  It's like, oh, we're going low?

• 1:19:55Speaker 00

  Crazy.

• 1:19:56Michelle Obama?

  Okay. All right.

• 1:19:58Craig Robinson?

  Let me show you low.

• 1:19:59Speaker 00

  Yeah, yeah, yeah. Wow. I like it.

• 1:20:03Michelle Obama?

  And that would build resilience.

• 1:20:06Speaker 00

  Absolutely, yeah. It'll hurt me more than it hurts you.

• 1:20:08Michelle Obama?

  There lies a little resilience there.

• 1:20:12Craig Robinson?

  They're never coming on. They're never coming on.

• 1:20:15Speaker 00

  They haven't been on yet?

• 1:20:16Michelle Obama?

  Oh, my God. They do not want anything to do with us. You know? That's why I'm telling you.

• 1:20:21Craig Robinson?

  Aaron wants to come.

• 1:20:22Michelle Obama?

  He's the youngest, but this is what you're saying. Your son now, he's like, please.

• 1:20:27Speaker 00

  No interest.

• 1:20:27Michelle Obama?

  Yeah, no. No, I don't know. It may change, but, you know. Especially when your parents are, you know, he's going to try to create as much distance between you and him.

• 1:20:38Craig Robinson?

  Yeah. What's the opposite of the drums?

• 1:20:41Speaker 00

  I'm serious, man. Well, he's, yeah, he's doing guitar. And I can't play it. I'm not a lick. I just be like, uh huh. Learn how to play this, though. You know, that's what I'm doing. And he's just killing it, so, yeah.

• 1:20:54Michelle Obama?

  Well, hopefully that helps. Amanda. You know, figures stuff out. Anything on the music front coming, coming our way?

• 1:21:05Speaker 00

  Yeah, I got some. I have a soundtrack that's going to accompany the movie, where I'm doing some cool K-pop collabs and also like R&B and reaching back to different groups that I came up with, like Earth, Wind & Fire and different, different stuff.

• 1:21:19Michelle Obama?

  I can't wait for that.

• 1:21:20Speaker 00

  I'm excited about the soundtrack.

• 1:21:22Michelle Obama?

  Like Anderson Paak plays real music.

• 1:21:25Speaker 00

  That's right.

• 1:21:26Michelle Obama?

  Breaking news.

• 1:21:26Speaker 00

  Bringing real music back, Jack.

• 1:21:28Michelle Obama?

  Please, keep doing it.

• 1:21:29Speaker 00

  Thank you. Y'all keep doing what y'all do.

• 1:21:31Michelle Obama?

  Yeah. And tell us about Andy's.

• 1:21:34Speaker 00

  Yes. Actually, can I bring in, can I give y'all a gift?

• 1:21:37Michelle Obama?

  Yes.

• 1:21:37Speaker 00

  I got y'all some.

• 1:21:38Michelle Obama?

  Please.

• 1:21:39Speaker 00

  Speaking of real music, it's becoming harder and harder to find places where you can perform real music, where you see people playing instruments.

• 1:21:45Craig Robinson?

  Yeah.

• 1:21:46Speaker 00

  Where you hear people, people, you know, having a good time and seeing people dance. And I'm trying to bring that back. And that's how I came up in L.A. And that was a big part of how we, we made it and made, got our buzz. And I think it's important to have a place where bands can cut their teeth and practice and it can be like an incubation place where that happens. And so I started a club called Andy's.

• 1:22:07Michelle Obama?

  What we got?

• 1:22:08Speaker 00

  Yes, this is a little so.

• 1:22:09Michelle Obama?

  Thank you.

• 1:22:10Craig Robinson?

  Oh, that's so nice of you.

• 1:22:12Speaker 00

  I got the supper club because I got food there. I got an excellent menu.

• 1:22:14Michelle Obama?

  We coming, I'm coming.

• 1:22:16Speaker 00

  Lot of music every night.

• 1:22:17Craig Robinson?

  Ooh, Andy's time.

• 1:22:18Speaker 00

  And I got y'all some Andy swag. A lot of chucker hat.

• 1:22:20Michelle Obama?

  And some breath mint.

• 1:22:21Speaker 00

  That's my, now, this is my other venture.

• 1:22:23Craig Robinson?

  Wham.

• 1:22:24Speaker 00

  Now, I know y'all do a lot of talking.

• 1:22:25Michelle Obama?

  Okay.

• 1:22:26Speaker 00

  Y'all be up here? And so I started, I started my own mint with my doctor. He's Harvard graduate.

• 1:22:31Michelle Obama?

  You know what? You look like you need, you could have a mint. You look minty fresh.

• 1:22:36Speaker 00

  Fresh.

• 1:22:37Craig Robinson?

  Minty fresh. I mean, everything about him smells good.

• 1:22:40Speaker 00

  And this is meant to be shared. Now y'all could be, because confidence is meant to be shared.

• 1:22:43Michelle Obama?

  He is.

• 1:22:43Craig Robinson?

  Appreciate you, man.

• 1:22:45Michelle Obama?

  Well, thank you.

• 1:22:45Speaker 00

  Thank you.

• 1:22:46Michelle Obama?

  Thank you for the gifts. Thank you for bringing real music back into our lives. Congratulations on the film. Everybody's got to see it. Congratulations on everything.

• 1:22:56Speaker 00

  I really appreciate it.

• 1:22:57Michelle Obama?

  Thank you for being here.

• 1:22:58Craig Robinson?

  Fans here, man.

• 1:22:59Michelle Obama?

  Yeah. Even bigger after this.

• 1:23:22Speaker 04

  Hi, I'm Molly Graham, host of Work Life, a podcast from TED. The most important lessons about work usually aren't the ones anyone teaches you. They come from experience, from uncertainty, from figuring things out as you go. On this show, my expert guests and I explore how careers really unfold. Through change, through doubt, through the decisions that shape who we become over time. Because those moments aren't the exception. They are the work. Listen to Work Life wherever you get your podcasts.