QLS Classic: Deniece Williams

Deniece Williams talks about her Grammy-winning solo career after working with Stevie Wonder and Earth Wind & Fire

• 0:00Speaker 00

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  This mood check is brought to you by State Farm. Porque tu bienestar también merece protección. Let's keep it real for a second. Honey German checking in contigo. If your animal is low, your group chat's dry, and not even your música is hitting like usual, respira profundo. You don't have to do it all today, un día a la vez, little by little. You're doing better than you think. Like a good neighbor, State Farm is there.

• 0:59Speaker 00

  Questlove Supreme is a production of iHeart Radio.

• 1:09Speaker 00

  What's up, y'all? All right. So every weekend, as we prepare to give you a new episode of the Questlove Show, we are showcasing moments from Questlove Supreme catalog. Damn near a decade. Fonte, Laia, Sugar Steve, I'm Pay Bill, and Boss Bill and I use this platform to interview the greatest music, comedy, film, books, and activism. The show evolved a lot over the years and really became a place of joy as Questlove Supreme went to Zoom over the pandemic. Please enjoy these episodes and get information in the description. QLS forever.

• 1:57Speaker 00

  Okay. That's a negative today.

• 2:01Speaker 03

  Take three.

• 2:02Speaker 00

  Like a cough and a sneeze and a sniff is not a cough and a sneeze and a sniff in 2022. Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to another episode of Questlove Supreme. I am Questlove, your host, and with me is the almighty Team Supreme. I feel like Don Cornelius every time I have a superlative.

• 2:23Speaker 03

  Wow, we're almighty now, you guys. The mighty Team Supreme.

• 2:27Speaker 00

  Yeah, you're not the mighty, but you're the almighty.

• 2:30Speaker 04

  I think somebody just got Soul Train on their mind.

• 2:32Speaker 00

  Yeah, I'm actually watching Soul Train right now. Anyway, Sugar Steve, what's up, bud?

• 2:38Speaker 03

  Oh, my gosh, so much.

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  You feel like a new man now, don't you?

• 2:42Speaker 03

  I feel different, yes. After.

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  What happened, Steve?

• 2:45Speaker 03

  I recorded an interview for Questlove Supreme with.

• 2:51Speaker 00

  Well, let's not give it away yet. Let's not give it away yet. But Steve, Steve took the lead and did miraculous Jimmy Jam numbers, four hours with an incredible guest. And, you know, we'll hear that episode.

• 3:04Speaker 03

  Yes.

• 3:05Speaker 00

  Soon. He got the nerd out. I mean, I was there as a train and wheels, and then Irish exited and, you know, left him on his own, but.

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  Can't wait.

• 3:13Speaker 00

  Sounded awesome. But you're fine, Steve. Everything's fine?

• 3:17Speaker 03

  I'm fine. I thought you said you're the Fonz, Steve, and that is how I feel, like the Fonz after. It's like, hey, yeah, I'm definitely cool now.

• 3:24Speaker 00

  Great, great. Fonte, how's it going, man?

• 3:27Speaker 05

  I'm coolin', bruh. I'm coolin', man. Coolin'. Happy to have Miss Denise here today. This is my childhood. Close and personal, for real.

• 3:35Speaker 00

  Absolutely. And, you know, Laia cannot contain herself.

• 3:39Speaker 04

  Listen, I am so, you don't even understand. I am pumped beyond pumped and.

• 3:44Speaker 05

  Yes.

• 3:45Speaker 04

  Less than.

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  Well, our guest today absolutely needs an introduction. She's a legendary songbird with over seventeen albums, nineteen top forty R&B singles, two number one pop singles, thirteen Grammy nominations, four wins. But basically, just for the last five decades, has blessed us with that angelic voice of hers, be it as a member of Wonderlove, you know, where we first got to see her on a national level, or just her illustrious solo career in soul music with her own solo records on Columbia Records,

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  or her pop career, or her gospel career. And yes, in my opinion, one of the voices of one of my all-time favorite TV themes.

• 4:40Speaker 06

  Yes, yes, I'm here.

• 4:42Speaker 00

  We'll get into that. This interview has been a long time coming. Ladies and gentlemen, please welcome to Questlove Supreme, the one and only Denise Williams.

• 4:53Speaker 05

  Yes, sir.

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  How are you? How you doing?

• 4:58Speaker 06

  Wonderful. I'm wonderful. I'm really excited to be with you guys finally. We've been trying, so here we are. We make it. And it's lovely. I'm excited to be here with you.

• 5:09Speaker 00

  I have one question. I am going to start at the beginning of your life, but I gotta get this out the way. So when my parents brought home, This is Nisi, your first record on Columbia. All right, I was six. I, you know, since then, I've had the record in other iterations, like eight-track and cassette and CD. But, you know, the actual vinyl, like, I only remember that from my childhood. Is the name Junior or June? Is Junior in your name or June something? Because in your liner notes, I remember seeing that as your name. And I, you know, I have an uncle named Junie.

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  And I was trying to ask my mom, like, wait, how's her name Junie? And she's a lady, like,

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  what is, what is your full name?

• 6:00Speaker 06

  My full name is June Denise Williams. I was born on June 3rd, so my full and first name is June.

• 6:08Speaker 00

  Ah, okay. I get it now. I think throughout time, like, you know, like, when you see something once and then, like, decades go by, I think at the time, I thought maybe your name was Denise Williams Junior or something like that, but I.

• 6:24Speaker 04

  Because she was young.

• 6:25Speaker 00

  I didn't, yeah, I didn't associate the name June. When I saw that name, I thought of my uncle Junie. I'm like, wait, how does she have his name? So I get it now.

• 6:34Speaker 06

  Related, you never know.

• 6:36Speaker 00

  I see. And you're a Gemini?

• 6:38Speaker 06

  Yes, I am.

• 6:39Speaker 04

  Oh.

• 6:40Speaker 00

  All right, I forgive you. Anyway.

• 6:43Speaker 03

  Nobody's perfect.

• 6:45Speaker 06

  I am a Gemini. My mother, I would wake up in the morning, my mother would look at me and say, okay, who are you today? You June or you Denise? Which one am I today?

• 6:56Speaker 00

  Oh, really?

• 6:57Speaker 06

  You dealing with the both of us.

• 6:59Speaker 00

  Duplicities.

• 7:00Speaker 04

  Is that who we have today? We have both today?

• 7:04Speaker 04

  Okay.

• 7:05Speaker 05

  Let's get it.

• 7:06Speaker 06

  I keep myself entertained, too.

• 7:10Speaker 00

  All right, I get it. I get it. I know that you were born in Gary, Indiana, so I usually start with where were you born? But I want to start with a different question. Could you please tell me what your very first musical memory was?

• 7:25Speaker 06

  My very first musical memory is I was three years old and I was sitting on the back porch at my grandparents' house. And I said, we will now have a selection from Denise. And I started singing this song called There's A Man Waiting Way Beyond The Clouds. And my dad's sister, my aunt heard me, and she came out and she said, if I asked you to sing that song in church on Sunday, would you do it? And I said, okay. And so I sang this song. And next thing I know, I was in the children's choir at my church. That's my very first musical memory.

• 8:08Speaker 00

  And what was it about that song that attracted you to it?

• 8:13Speaker 06

  I just loved it. I love the melody. I love the message of the song about someone in heaven waiting for me and the beautiful melody and the fact that I just liked the sound of it when I was singing it, the sound of my voice on it.

• 8:32Speaker 00

  Of course, you were born in the Midwest. You know, there's another famous nearby family. It's kind of synonymous with that city of Gary, Indiana. But could you give me your version? Like, when I hear Gary, Indiana, besides the song Gary, Indiana, you know, I only know of the Jacksons' version of Gary, Indiana, which is basically the tale of a father using hook or crook to get his kids out of that city. But what are your memories of Gary, Indiana?

• 9:10Speaker 06

  I love growing up in Gary. We had, in my neighborhood, you know, one thing I realized is that I didn't know that we were poor. You know, I thought we had everything. As long as we had tuna fish, I was fine.

• 9:22Speaker 00

  I love you. I'm making tuna fish right now.

• 9:27Speaker 06

  You know what I'm saying? So, uh, you know, I had a upbringing in the church. I spent a lot of time on the weekends with my grandparents and my grandmother was the mother of the church, Faith Temple Church of God and Christ over in East Chicago. So I was there.

• 9:44Speaker 06

  And basically, uh, you know, just grew up, went to school, very Christian, uh, youngster, you know, didn't know a lot about what was going on. I think I was very innocent. I remember one time one of my neighbors said, you know, the way you got here is your mom and dad, they did the duty and I, I, and I fought with her. I said, they did not. And so, you know, I was, you know, very innocent, raised up with my brother, uh, two brothers and a sister. And I really liked Gary in those days, you know, school was fun. I had a lot of fun friends.

• 10:22Speaker 06

  And I didn't know much about, you know, the political system or what was happening, but we did have the first black mayor, which was Richard Hatcher. And so, you know, a lot of the history of Gary and the black communities was really, really great, you know. Um, later on, of course, there was the drug scene and that, but I grew up, uh, I didn't start singing until I was a teenager. And so, uh, my math teacher owned a record store and I asked him for a job. I got a job. So I was singing, you know, a lot of stuff in there. Uh, I had seen Michael and the Jackson Five perform at the Masonic Temple one time, and I think

• 11:02Speaker 06

  he was about five years old or something. And so, um, the, uh, their cousin, the drummer in the group.

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  Johnny?

• 11:11Speaker 06

  Uh, Johnny had a crush on me. I thought it was a crush on my sister and maybe it was. And so he used to come over to the house and we would see them. Uh, I remember, you know, some girl showed up at my house and they said, uh, we want to sing on the talent show, but one of our singers is, is sick and we heard that you can sing. And one of the girls looked at me and said, can you sing? I said, well, if you came to church, you'd know. Okay. So, you know, I sang in a talent show, but I said, well, the Jackson Five is going to win the talent show, but we sang. And actually I said, we sang, It's Going to Take a Miracle.

• 11:47Speaker 00

  Really?

• 11:48Speaker 06

  That was the song we sang in the talent show.

• 11:50Speaker 00

  Full circle.

• 11:51Speaker 06

  And so, um, you know, I loved growing up in Indiana. It was a great time to be raised there. It was great. The discipline and the growing up in the church and, you know, the way the elder black people were at that time and how proud they were as, you know, doing their work and that kind of stuff. Of course, later on, as a teenager, I did, you know, joined the NAACP and I did some marching for Jim Crow, you know, the John Birch Society and them folk. So that was also part of my upbringing, but it was really wonderful to grow up in the Midwest where you had rules and regulations. You, you really knew who you were and, you know, and, and what was going on. So it, it was wonderful. I'm, I'm

• 12:36Speaker 06

  grateful for my upbringing in the Midwest and in Gary, Indiana.

• 12:41Speaker 00

  Did you have any, uh, sort of, uh, interaction with, um, other notable Gary people? Like, I know that, um, Kim, Kim Mizell's from Gary as well.

• 12:51Speaker 05

  Yeah, Kim Mizell, yeah.

• 12:53Speaker 06

  I didn't know.

• 12:55Speaker 00

  Okay. Or like Fred Williamson or Ernest, I know Ernest Lee Thomas, uh, who played Rod's from What's Happening.

• 13:03Speaker 06

  That was a funny story because my grandfather was a pastor. He had, you know, his membership, there was maybe about 20, 25 of us up in my grandfather's church. And he was a pastor, he was a, um, musical director, he was the choir leader. And so the choir existed about five of us and Ernie Lee To- Ernie Thomas was one of the members of my grandfather's church. We grew up together.

• 13:28Speaker 00

  Wow, okay.

• 13:29Speaker 05

  Wow, that's what's up.

• 13:31Speaker 06

  I've known him since I was about 10.

• 13:35Speaker 00

  Probably in the early aughts. I, Common had did a show at, uh, the House of Blues and, you know, Ernest Lee Thomas was in the, the, the foundation room, like all excited, wanted to come backstage and, you know, I see him walking down the hallway and I'm all excited. And he's like asking me permission to like, yo, can I, can I meet him? Can I, you know, take a photo and everything, da, da, da, da. And he's like, I love this album and everything. He's like all excited. And he goes to Common, he's like, yeah, just, you know, I'm trying to be respectful because, you know, uh, you know, ask your bodyguard first if you could, uh, you know, if you could take a photo.

• 14:10Speaker 05

  Wow, you were his bodyguard.

• 14:14Speaker 00

  I'm gonna tell, I'm gonna tell you something though, fine. That was the day where I was like, I have to lose weight. So I, when I never, I never shared this story, but it was that day when.

• 14:28Speaker 05

  Now I gotta get more famous. I gotta lose weight.

• 14:31Speaker 00

  Yeah, no, no, but the thing was, I was like, wait a minute.

• 14:34Speaker 04

  Or wear some colors.

• 14:36Speaker 00

  Because he, he, he knew everything of that album. And I'm like, wait a minute, how do you know Common but don't know The Roots? And how do you not know that I'm a member of The Roots? And he's like, oh, I'm sorry. No offense, sir. I, I thought you were his bodyguard. And I was like, ah, man, I gotta lose weight. So that, that was the day.

• 14:56Speaker 05

  Wow.

• 14:57Speaker 00

  I had to do that, man. Shout out, shout out to Ernest Lee Thomas. Okay. So the thing is, is that you grew up in a church environment. What were, uh, first of all, how many siblings did you have in your household?

• 15:10Speaker 06

  Uh, there were two brothers and my sister, Derek, um, is under me, Diane, and then Donell.

• 15:17Speaker 00

  Are you the baby or the?

• 15:19Speaker 06

  I'm the eldest. I'm the oldest.

• 15:21Speaker 05

  Oh, you're first, okay.

• 15:22Speaker 04

  Was the D for, stand for anything? Why everybody was a D?

• 15:25Speaker 06

  My mom thought she was being unique. You know, what can I say?

• 15:30Speaker 06

  I mean, my name is D E N I E C E.

• 15:33Speaker 04

  Right.

• 15:33Speaker 06

  My sister is Diane, but it's D Y A N N E.

• 15:38Speaker 00

  Different spelling?

• 15:39Speaker 06

  She was, you know, trying to be unique and artistic and whatever else she was.

• 15:45Speaker 00

  Well, you know, well, hey, she knew she was naming, like you, you.

• 15:49Speaker 06

  That's right.

• 15:49Speaker 00

  You were an artist. You gave art to the world.

• 15:52Speaker 06

  That's right.

• 15:52Speaker 00

  So, so growing up in that environment, how, like, often kind of the, and a, a, a common theme with, uh, some of the singers that come on the show is often like secular music is frowned upon, like you have to stay in the church. So often they're, they're transitioning from the church to kind of, you know, secular music, whatever is sort of met with a frown. What, what was the general feeling of secular music back then as far as your household was concerned?

• 16:28Speaker 06

  Well, it was frowned upon. You know, if you did the devil's music, you want a, a Winnie Rose Bickett on your way to hell, you know? So I was trying to stand to hell, but.

• 16:38Speaker 00

  So you weren't allowed to listen to Motown?

• 16:40Speaker 06

  Oh, yeah, I did. Of course.

• 16:42Speaker 00

  Oh, that was it? Okay, that was it. Okay.

• 16:44Speaker 06

  That, you know, but the bottom line is that my mother, who was born and raised in the church under my grandmother, said, no, she got grown, she was never going to church again. And so.

• 16:54Speaker 05

  Oh, man.

• 16:55Speaker 06

  She would drop us off at church on Sunday when I wasn't with my grandpa and she would pick us up, but she did not go in. She was doing the drop off pickup service. And my mother was an incredible music fan. So she had a, uh, turntable in her bedroom and all of these different records. So when she would go to work and I would get home from school before she got it there, I would sneak in my mother's room and play all her stuff. I mean, I wanted to look like, sound like, dress like Nancy Wilson. That was my girl. You know, I'm Nancy Wilson, Dakota State and, you know, uh, uh, Billy Eckstein. Uh,

• 17:36Speaker 06

  I was listening to all of them at, you know, with my, uh, through my mother's music. She had a very, um, eclectic collection. Like I learned a lot of standards songs because she had an album on Jackie Gleason and Jackie, it was the Jackie Gleason Orchestra and they did all these standards, but no lyrics. It was just oohs and ahs. And I learned, you know, I would sing along with all of these, you know, these records, Marlena Shaw. I mean, so my whole upbringing with music, yeah, the secular music was going on in my house. I just, you know, my mama didn't know I was sneaking in there, listening to all her stuff. But I was, I was up in there. And then on television, when you would see

• 18:21Speaker 06

  certain artists, like I even told Johnny Mathes, I said, honey, I do this duet because I've been listening to singing with you for 30 years. I was already.

• 18:29Speaker 00

  Oh, okay.

• 18:32Speaker 06

  Because I've been in all these shows and I've been a rehearsal for a long time. So it was my mother's record collection, you know, that really introduced me to secular music. And then, and you know, and then also, uh, growing up and my mu- math teacher had the, um, record store. So I was over there doing that. So I listened to all of them, you know, I, I, I loved all kinds of music. So, you know, there was a way made for me to listen, even though it was forbidden. I was carrying all my secret music life and enjoying myself. Mm-hmm.

• 19:16Speaker 01

  Hey, it's Nile Rodgers, host of Before the Moment, a Lincoln original series. I'm driving across the country, meeting some of today's most fascinating artists. We're exploring the stories before the moment that changed everything. This week, I'm joined by Miguel.

• 19:34Speaker 07

  Man, I'm a black and Mexican kid from San Pedro and I grew up in Inglewood as well. I never liked to be like boxed in. Both of my parents colored outside of the line. I mean, even them being together at the time in LA was just not typical. And so I think that has always been a part of my DNA. There's a defiant, something in me that feels like what we get to do with, with what we're given that's greater than us is to maybe connect people to ideas that they wouldn't naturally, you know, connect to. That's really me. I'm just kind of like defiant with love though.

• 20:10Speaker 01

  Experience Before the Moment, a Lincoln original series on the iHeartRadio app, YouTube, or wherever you get your podcasts.

• 20:19Speaker 00

  Behind every chart topping hit, you know by heart, there's an original. Writing it someplace where nobody was listening. Some basement, some bedroom, somebody with headphones on at three in the morning, chasing a thing they couldn't even name yet. Behind the culture that marks a generation, there's an original. Already moving, already shaking things up, already looping that one bar, already off tempo, on purpose, because on purpose was the point. Behind every night that changed the room, somebody.

• 20:51Speaker 05

  Had to walk in first, not knowing it would land, but doing it anyway. Originals are out there, living stories worth telling. What's yours? Behind every original, live in Levi's.

• 21:11Speaker 00

  You know, I can't imagine a time where, you know, music almost had the same sort of status as, you know, in some black churches as almost like pornography, like it was just forbidden. So what was that like for you as a teenager? Because, you know, being as of the year that you were born, you know, by the time that's your thirteen, fourteen, fifteen, where like, there's now black psychedelic rock, there's, you know, Motown's going through new phase, there's Sly and the Family Stone, like, how was that affecting your teen years?

• 21:47Speaker 06

  Well, I tell you, it did. And probably the most impactful thing that happened to, uh, to me was that, um, I did do a local, um, record, you know, when I was, I think I was eighteen, called Love is Tears. And it was written by Eugene Records of the Shy Lights and Barbara.

• 22:09Speaker 05

  Oh, yeah.

• 22:10Speaker 00

  Oh, wow.

• 22:11Speaker 06

  Love Makes a Woman, Barbara Ackland and Jean.

• 22:14Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 22:15Speaker 06

  Because my teacher who owned the, um, the record store, he was, he came in the back one day and he heard me singing by an Aretha Franklin record. I think I was singing Ain't No Way, something like that. And then he came out into the record party, he said, I didn't know you could sing. I said, cause you don't go to church, you know?

• 22:36Speaker 00

  That was the thing?

• 22:37Speaker 06

  Yeah, that was my thing. So he, he had talked to my mom and said, can I bring over some record people from Chicago to hear her sing, you know, to think about a, a, a recording her? My mom said yes, cause you know, she, she was like, listen, honey, you sing what you want to sing. Them other people in that church, they crazy.

• 22:55Speaker 04

  Nice.

• 22:58Speaker 06

  They came over and they heard me and they, and we recorded this song called Love is Tears. And so, but when my church found out that I had recorded that song, they stood me up in church, they stripped me of my membership. I was singing in five choirs at that time, Indiana State Choir, all these, they said I couldn't sing in the choirs anymore. And they went off on me because I was, um, a, a, I was a sinner and, and I had done this. So, you know, after they did that, I kind of swung over to my mother's side in a minute, like, I'm not coming back. And so, you know, do what you want to do.

• 23:40Speaker 06

  All you unhappy women getting up on Sunday, snotting and crying at your husband's street. I'll tell you, anyway, so.

• 23:48Speaker 05

  Talk about it, talk about it.

• 23:50Speaker 00

  I love this.

• 23:51Speaker 05

  And Ms. Denise, so that first, that first song you did, the Love is Tears, you did that under your name, that wasn't under alias or anything?

• 23:57Speaker 06

  It was under Denise Chandler because Williams is my separate name. So it's Denise Chandler, Love is Tears by Totley Town Records. You know, I have one over there in my safe, I kept a little, uh, kept a little copy somebody sent me. And yeah, they, they got mad with me and stripped me of my membership and, you know, I couldn't go and, you know, my best friend at the time were my cousins and we used to travel with their father who was the pastor of singing. And they told me, oh, we can't have anything to do with you because of your choice. And I said, honey, I said, I am really, um, that really hurts me.

• 24:37Speaker 06

  I'm, I'm sorry to hear that, but you have to live by what you believe and I have to live by what I believe.

• 24:44Speaker 00

  So come nineteen seventy-six, did you get your moment?

• 24:50Speaker 06

  I sure did and I'm gonna get you more.

• 24:54Speaker 00

  We'll get to that. We'll get to that. All right, we'll get to that. When did you wind up leaving Gary, Indiana?

• 25:00Speaker 06

  I, I left Gary, Indiana, I think when I was eighteen, I went away. Um, my, you know, my band teacher, Mr. Bryant, was like my father to me. And he, um, got me into college. Uh, his roommate from college was the president of Morgan State.

• 25:20Speaker 05

  Oh, yes, sir.

• 25:21Speaker 04

  Yes, I went there.

• 25:24Speaker 06

  All right now, so he sent me to Morgan State, uh, uh, you know, after that. And so it was like, I went there and I majored in sex and drugs and.

• 25:39Speaker 06

  You know, they, them church people turned me aloose. I went to Morgan State and lost my mind. I, quest, I lost my mind.

• 25:48Speaker 04

  Oh, wait, can you really say?

• 25:49Speaker 05

  We all did, it's okay.

• 25:51Speaker 04

  What was Baltimore like back then though, when you went to, when you went to Morgan?

• 25:54Speaker 06

  You know, Baltimore was wonderful. I enjoyed it. But I had a, a, a friend that lived in the dormitory and she was from Philadelphia. Her name was China. So then, um, you know, I, I was there on a student work kind of a, a program. And so I went into the high school in Baltimore to be a TA, a teacher, teacher's assistant. And them women in that class, they already had babies, tenth graders had babies. They looked rough, like they could eat me up. So I was.

• 26:29Speaker 06

  So China said, uh, girl, I heard they looking for a singer and a dancer down at this club. And so she said, let's go down there and audition. And, and so we went down to the club and I got the job singing and she got the job dancing and we were singing and dancing in a cage. She'd be on one cage and I was on another cage. So.

• 26:50Speaker 05

  Wow.

• 26:51Speaker 06

  I told my mom, no, anyway, so.

• 26:55Speaker 05

  Hold on, hold on, let's go back to the cage. Okay, okay, let's go back to the cage.

• 26:59Speaker 06

  Because it was the church.

• 27:02Speaker 00

  I've already seen the graphics for her episode.

• 27:05Speaker 06

  We was the opening act for these five guys that was called the Feminiks. They was waiting for, they, um, they changed, uh, body, their surgery at a John Hopkins Hospital.

• 27:18Speaker 04

  Oh, Baltimore, yes.

• 27:21Speaker 06

  With the, uh, opening.

• 27:23Speaker 05

  Okay.

• 27:24Speaker 04

  Yes, yes. Oh, I forget the club that was popping in Baltimore that was known.

• 27:29Speaker 06

  Oh, yeah.

• 27:29Speaker 04

  Yes.

• 27:30Speaker 05

  So Ms. Denise, what was your attire in the cage? What was your outfit?

• 27:34Speaker 06

  I had on a little jumpsuit, you know, and China had on little jumpsuits and we was in the cage and I was singing by, you know, the records, Aretha and all that kind of stuff. And she'd be down, but yeah, I made more money in that cage than I would have made if I stayed at school.

• 27:51Speaker 00

  This was your first time out of, away from home and?

• 27:54Speaker 06

  I'm telling you, it was my first time because my mom borrowed my, uh, a neighbor's car, Ronnie. He borrowed Ronnie's car and she drove me from Gary, Indiana to Baltimore. And when my mom would have us standing there.

• 28:09Speaker 06

  And then I peek up and she'd be down the road.

• 28:13Speaker 06

  And then she's gone. And then I couldn't see her, I said, ooh.

• 28:22Speaker 00

  Man, listen.

• 28:25Speaker 05

  Oh, wow.

• 28:26Speaker 04

  Morgan is that school. I'm glad it had the history.

• 28:30Speaker 06

  Free and last, thank God almighty. And they already had me, church had me set up in a church at Baltimore as people that was gonna pick me up on Sunday and take me to church. So that lasted about two months.

• 28:43Speaker 05

  Oh, it lasted that long? That's, I'm surprised it lasted that long, yeah.

• 28:47Speaker 06

  It lasted that long.

• 28:49Speaker 00

  I see. So, okay, you're in Baltimore, but the thing is you released a single. So in your mind, when you made that single, was that just a one-off thing? Okay, I made a, I made a forty-five and whatever. But, I mean, are you actively pursuing, like, okay, I want to do this for real. I want to get a record deal and release music? Or is it just like, okay, I did that, that was fun?

• 29:17Speaker 06

  You know, I never wanted to sing.

• 29:20Speaker 00

  With that voice?

• 29:22Speaker 06

  No, because I grew up in a church with a lot of great gospel singers. My cousins, they would, you know, they would sing and folks would be slaying in the spirit and falling out and shouting and running off through the church. And I would sing and they would listen and cry.

• 29:39Speaker 04

  Yeah, yeah, well, yeah.

• 29:40Speaker 06

  And I was thinking, I'm doing something wrong because they're not falling out and speaking in tongues and doing all of that. They're just listening and they're crying. I mean, they would be boo hoo crying when I was singing. And so I just thought I, I didn't have it. And, and my mom was a nurse's aide. My grandmother worked in the hospital as the nurse's aide. I had an aunt who worked in sterilizing instruments. And so I wanted to be a nurse. That's what I was gonna do.

• 30:06Speaker 00

  That's right.

• 30:07Speaker 05

  Oh, wow.

• 30:08Speaker 00

  John Pernew just called you Nurse Nisi, I remember that, okay.

• 30:11Speaker 06

  I wanted to be a nurse. I wasn't thinking about the music industry or pursuing that at all.

• 30:17Speaker 04

  So who explained the tears to you and what they really meant?

• 30:21Speaker 06

  Who, who's playing what?

• 30:22Speaker 04

  I said, who explained the tears to you? Like, who explained?

• 30:25Speaker 05

  And let you know you were doing a good job.

• 30:26Speaker 04

  Yeah, because at the end of the day, you know, you still do that. So, but it's, it's a good thing, so.

• 30:31Speaker 06

  They weren't saying anything to me, you know? They weren't saying a whole lot to my cousins that was falling out, you know? They would have their experience and.

• 30:39Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 30:40Speaker 06

  Falling out, but they didn't explain their reaction or their connection to what we were saying. Probably the only one that did that was my cousin who was kind of like my music teacher, you know? He was, you know, Denise, there's, um, if the altos are not strong enough or the second soprano, first soprano, just fill in the hole, you know, just wherever the weakest part is.

• 31:03Speaker 04

  Oh, no Denise, I mean, did anybody ever explain to you that those tears meant so much more, you know, or?

• 31:09Speaker 05

  You have a gift.

• 31:10Speaker 04

  Yes, because to this day, those songs, like your songs, I was listening today, just remembering and tearing up. So that's a thing.

• 31:17Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 31:18Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 31:18Speaker 06

  But they never said anything, you know? They would just, you know, got critical when I did the R and B song. You know, that was the first time.

• 31:27Speaker 04

  Thank you.

• 31:27Speaker 06

  Really expressed, you know, their thoughts about my, my talents. And my cousins who had people falling out, you know, they were the big, big cheese. They were the big.

• 31:38Speaker 04

  Oh, wow.

• 31:39Speaker 06

  And, you know, the pastors', uh, children. And so they were the big folks in the church. And so I never thought I had it. So I thought I better go to school and be a nurse, you know? So that's the reason why I went to Baltimore. And like I said, I don't remember one professor's name, Professor Dix. And that was because she had gone to Africa and had all this fabulous jewelry, you know, from Africa. And I remember her. I don't remember the rest of it, except being in the cage.

• 32:08Speaker 05

  Man.

• 32:08Speaker 00

  I love the storytelling. Well, first of all, is that was that your first like true professional experience? Uh, singing background or with the national artist that I mean with Stevie Wonder?

• 32:23Speaker 06

  He was a very first. Uh, well, no, let me back up. Uh, when I did the local song, uh, I was asked to sing at the Masonic Temple on this, uh, show, uh, with Jerry Butler. And, and then I, um, was asked if I would, you know, sing Let It Be Me with him. Cause I think he sang with, uh, a, a.

• 32:50Speaker 00

  Brenda Lee Russell, I think.

• 32:53Speaker 06

  Yeah, yeah. So I sang Let It Be Me with, with, um, with Jerry Butler. And I was like, oh God, I thought I had died and gone to heaven, you know, cause I loved his voice. He was huge in those days in the Chicago area and, you know, all over with music. And so that was my first time singing with a professional person. But the second time would be with Stevie Wonder.

• 33:17Speaker 00

  So what led you to that journey?

• 33:20Speaker 06

  I had a cousin, John Harris. And when, uh, John's grandmother and my grandmother were sisters, but John lived in Detroit. So the first time John came, oh Lord Jesus, I fell in love with that black man. He had conk hair. He was, you know, he, he had that conk in his hair, girl. Like, okay. And so, um, he would come. So, uh, my sister said, don't even think about it. That's your cousin. That's blood. Y'all get together. You gonna have idiot children. You know what I mean?

• 33:58Speaker 06

  John, so John would come in, you know, every, every summer for one week. And then what? And so he's from Detroit. So he kept telling me, telling us, you know, I work for Stevie Wonder. I said, boy, you put no k o, your nose is growing. You don't know Stevie Wonder. Everybody in Detroit said they know Stevie Wonder. And he told me that for like three years that he knew and was working with Stevie Wonder. So when I went to school in Baltimore, he called me, he said, okay, Stevie's doing a concert in Baltimore. And I'm going to give you a backstage pass. And so I went to the concert. He introduced me to Stevie. I think I first met him when I was 18. And he introduced me to Stevie. So I was apologizing to John. Y'all look so tired and bleeding.

• 34:42Speaker 06

  So anyway, um, that's how I first met Stevie. Do you know I let him drive my car with his blind self?

• 34:50Speaker 04

  Yo, it's like a whole long list of people who let him do this. Why is he?

• 34:54Speaker 00

  We, we can do a compilation on the amount of times Stevie Wonder has driven someone's car.

• 35:03Speaker 06

  And my light flashed in front of my eyes and he is too. But anyway.

• 35:08Speaker 05

  So you were in the car while you weren't just letting him drive it. You were riding with him.

• 35:12Speaker 04

  Got around with it.

• 35:13Speaker 06

  I was my foot on the brake.

• 35:18Speaker 06

  I love Jesus, but I wasn't trying to see him that day.

• 35:24Speaker 06

  So anyhow, uh, about two years after that, uh, John called me, he said, hey, what you doing? And I said, man, I, I had to leave school because that science was kicking my butt. I said, I don't know what I have to do with myself, but I, you know, I can't handle the science. He said, well, you want me to get you an audition with Stevie? I said, there you go. There you go. He said, no Denise. He said, I, you know, he's auditioning for singers. And if you want to, I'll get him to give you a ticket to come to Detroit. And, um, you can, uh, you know, audition. And that's what happened. I went in. There was about 20 of us and I was one of the three that he chose for Wonderlove.

• 36:07Speaker 00

  I mean, I consider the core, you.

• 36:10Speaker 05

  Jim Gilstrap, was he?

• 36:12Speaker 06

  Jim was there in my first game aboard.

• 36:15Speaker 00

  Okay. I, I never saw Wonderlove with a male singer. Okay. That's dope.

• 36:19Speaker 06

  Lonny Groves was there. Jim and Lonny Groves was there when I joined. And then, uh, Shirley came a little bit after me.

• 36:27Speaker 00

  Okay. Well, Suzanne Green also, but before the Supreme.

• 36:32Speaker 06

  They came after too, after Lonny left.

• 36:36Speaker 05

  Yeah. That's Jim singing. If I'm not mistaken, is that Jim singing the first verse of You're The Sunshine Of My Life? Is that him?

• 36:41Speaker 06

  Yeah. Yeah. That's Jim Gilstrap. Yeah.

• 36:44Speaker 00

  He's also the male voice on Good Times.

• 36:54Speaker 01

  Hey, it's Niall Rogers, host of Before The Moment, a Lincoln original series. I'm driving across the country, meeting some of today's most fascinating artists. We're exploring the stories before the moment that changed everything. This week, I'm joined by Miguel.

• 37:12Speaker 07

  Man, I'm a black and Mexican kid from San Pedro and I grew up in Inglewood as well. I never liked to be like boxed in. Both of my parents colored outside of the line. I mean, even them being together at the time in LA was just not typical. And so I think that has always been a part of my DNA. There's a defiant something in me that feels like what we get to do with, with what we're given that's greater than us is to maybe connect people to ideas that they wouldn't naturally, you know, connect to. That's really me. I'm just kind of like defiant with love though.

• 37:48Speaker 01

  Experience Before The Moment, a Lincoln original series on the iHeartRadio app, YouTube, or wherever you get your podcasts.

• 37:57Speaker 05

  Behind every chart topping hit, you know by heart, there's an original. Writing it someplace where nobody was listening. Some basement, some bedroom, somebody with headphones on at three in the morning, chasing a thing they couldn't even name yet. Behind the culture that marks a generation, there's an original. Already moving, already shaking things up, already looping that one bar, already off tempo. On purpose, because on purpose was the point. Behind every night that changed the room, somebody had to walk in first. Not knowing it would land, but doing it anyway. Originals are out there, living stories worth telling.

• 38:40Speaker 05

  What's yours? Behind every original, live in Levi's.

• 38:48Speaker 00

  I gotta tell the story since we mentioned Jim. His singing partner on that, uh, is another artist that was on Motown that Stevie was managing at the time named Blinkie.

• 38:59Speaker 06

  Uh huh.

• 38:59Speaker 00

  And.

• 39:00Speaker 06

  Off her voice.

• 39:01Speaker 00

  Oh, you know, okay. But, uh, there's one scene in Summer of Soul that I had to leave out. Blinkie was like a performer on the, on the festival and they were doing a cover of Light My Fire. And, you know, these are, uh, union musicians, not like people that are familiar with the music. And a gust of wind came and blew the music sheet off of their stands. So it's one of the most hilarious moments of them not knowing how to end the song. So they're, they keep playing in a round circle and it's, it's the greatest car crash I ever heard in my life.

• 39:37Speaker 06

  Oh my gosh.

• 39:38Speaker 00

  Of her trying to end the song, but you know, it, it couldn't happen. But I always wanted to know, like, was Blinkie one of his background singers or just?

• 39:48Speaker 06

  I never heard that she was one of his background singers. I know her as a singer and as a, as a recording artist, but I never heard that she was actually one of the females.

• 39:59Speaker 00

  She wasn't in Wonderlove? Okay.

• 40:00Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 40:01Speaker 00

  Uh, he managed her, or at least according to the contracts that, that we had, he was one of her managers, but.

• 40:08Speaker 06

  Okay.

• 40:09Speaker 00

  Her and Yvonne Fair, um, were under him. But, okay, I always wanted to know like about the other singers that were in the stable and if they were Wonderlove members or whatnot. Um.

• 40:22Speaker 04

  Can we ask real quick?

• 40:23Speaker 00

  Can you talk about that experience?

• 40:24Speaker 04

  This is about the ass, the audition. I was like, what was that like?

• 40:27Speaker 00

  Yeah. What's that experience like?

• 40:29Speaker 06

  That was scary because, you know, some of them showed up with their piano player or they had music they wanted to sing. I just showed up and, and just watching everybody, you know, in their professional audition. I was sitting there saying, oh God, oh God, I don't know why I came. So then he called me up and I started to cry. I said, I don't know what to sing. I don't know what to do. So he started playing Teach Me Tonight. And then I would, you know, sing along with him and I'd learn and I'd, you know, do some riffs or something with Teach Me Tonight. And then all of us at the very end, you know, it had split up into four part harmony. And we all ended with singing Teach Me Tonight. And that was my audition. I was not prepared.

• 41:14Speaker 06

  I was not ready, but he saw something.

• 41:18Speaker 00

  I see. All right. That, that makes sense. For our listeners who don't know, everyone in that band was a legend. I mean, from drummer Ali Brown to, of course, we know Ray Parker Jr., uh, Michael Simbello, um, just like. Yeah, yeah. Michael Simbello, all those people, but even like the, so just in general, like I was, I always thought of Wonderlove as, as an army. What was it like? For you? How was your experience in touring with that unit?

• 41:50Speaker 06

  Um, well, I was scared. So it was difficult, but I came in, Dave Sambar was on saxophone. The Brecker Brothers were playing with Stevie.

• 41:59Speaker 00

  That's right. Yes, they were. Yeah.

• 42:01Speaker 06

  Sambar and the Brecker Brothers were there. So, uh, um, there was a lot of incredible musicians that came through Stevie's stable. Uh, it was hard for me, uh, in the beginning because I, when I actually came, by the time I did the audition, um, I, I had one son, you know, I had been married and I had, I had had a son. So me trying to balance motherhood and balance the professional, uh, business of, of, uh, the recording industry was really tough, but he really worked with me because, uh, you know, I'd be singing and one of the girlfriends would be standing on the side with the baby. No.

• 42:42Speaker 00

  Right. Okay.

• 42:43Speaker 06

  It, you know, he really worked and was hard because I was the only one that was a parent. Nobody else had any children, so they weren't leading that double life of, you know, having this profession and touring, but still having to raise, you know, my child, uh, raise my child. And I think by the second year I was with him, I had another baby, you know, so, um, it was, you know, it wasn't easy. I was, uh, scared. Um, you know, the very first concert I did with him, somebody said we were going to be doing in Philadelphia. And I remember it was a club in, in a King of Pressure, Philadelphia. I saw them from outside the hotel, you know, saying Philly that way. We were in King of Pressure, but you know, it was just me.

• 43:28Speaker 00

  I know it well.

• 43:29Speaker 06

  A difficult thing for me was balancing, um, a career and being a mother.

• 43:35Speaker 00

  It's nineteen seventy-two.

• 43:36Speaker 06

  Mm-hmm.

• 43:37Speaker 00

  You know, cuz I think in everyone's mind, especially by the seventies, it's like, "Oh, you're on television. You must be a millionaire. Oh, my God. They're on Sesame Street. They gotta be rich." So, was singing with one of the premier acts of his era, was that a good living back in nineteen seventy-two?

• 44:03Speaker 06

  I think it was an okay living, you know. We made it work. But no, Stevie was making the money. And, you know, we were getting our salary that was, you know, was okay, but it wasn't great. The thing that really helped me is that my mom left Indiana and moved out to California, so she was helping with the kids and we were living together. So that was a great help to me that my mom decided, you know, "I want you to have this career and I don't want you to be, you know, so concerned about the boys." And actually, it had not been for my mom coming out. I couldn't have trusted my children to anybody else. She took that off of me.

• 44:46Speaker 06

  And collectively, you know, we did okay. Was I rich or...? No. You know, but, you know, we made it work. You know, definitely, we made it work.

• 44:59Speaker 00

  So, in being in Wonderlove, one of the requirements was, well, not requirements, but you felt it was wise for you to move to Los Angeles? As opposed to just going north to New York, or?

• 45:11Speaker 06

  Initially, in the beginning, we did go to New York. But then after being there for a couple of months, Stevie decided to move to Los Angeles, and so we went to L.A.

• 45:22Speaker 00

  And did this also include session work as well? Like, what notable songs are you singing background on?

• 45:29Speaker 06

  I didn't do a lot of session work with him. I started doing a lot of session work when I left him, you know. So, you know, I sang quite a bit with Roberta Flack, who then eventually hired me, Lonny Groves, and Patty Austin to travel with her as background singers. It was the three of them.

• 45:47Speaker 04

  What was that?

• 45:48Speaker 05

  All right.

• 45:50Speaker 06

  I think I'm on "That's the Time," "I Feel Like Making Love," and Roberta Flack. You know, so, but when I was with Stevie, I didn't do a whole lot of background work, you know. I was on a retainer. I was on a salary. And I felt a responsibility to stay there and sing with him and not go out and do a lot of stuff. But the minute I stepped away, I was doing quite a bit.

• 46:15Speaker 00

  Okay. Who else was poaching you at the time when you were in Wonderlove to come sing with me?

• 46:21Speaker 06

  Well, I had a real frightening experience with Ike Turner, you know.

• 46:26Speaker 05

  Wow.

• 46:27Speaker 06

  Ike tried to talk to me, and I think he had me speaking in tongues up in there. I was telling him, "Jesus, I got to go."

• 46:37Speaker 06

  Kenny Gamble and, you know, Philadelphia heard me singing, and they approached me, and I said, you know, "That's okay." Because Kenny Gamble's had like a chair that sat like a throne, and he's sitting up high, and he had you sitting down. And I thought, "I don't think I like this too much." So I said, "No, thank you," you know.

• 46:57Speaker 00

  Based on the aesthetics of his positioning of sitting.

• 47:00Speaker 04

  I ain't mad. I get it.

• 47:01Speaker 00

  I'll sit on the floor from now on.

• 47:03Speaker 06

  And tell me to go up in there, and I wasn't going. I was scared. And he was saying, "I don't think this is for you, Denise." And I said, "I agree. It's not. Bye."

• 47:11Speaker 04

  So, wait, can you tell us, what's the word? Did Ike say words to you that made you go, "Mm," or was it?

• 47:17Speaker 06

  I wanted to know what I wanted to do and what I wanted to do with my career and where, you know, I think I wanted to go. And I said, "Uh, I think I'm gonna stay right there with Wonderlove for right now, and thank you so much for considering and talking to me. Thank you."

• 47:33Speaker 04

  You're good for taking the meeting.

• 47:34Speaker 05

  Yeah, I think you made the right decision.

• 47:36Speaker 00

  I should note that, you know, in seventy-two, one of the more unusual pairings,

• 47:45Speaker 00

  again, even as unusual pairings go, like, for those that have seen, you know, Bill Graham's lineups, like, it was very typical for you to see, like, Miles Davis and the Grateful Dead one night, or like Jimi Hendrix and, you know, like, some other act that's the opposite of him. But you guys happened to be on tour. And, you know, for those that follow the history of the Rolling Stones,

• 48:13Speaker 00

  it should probably be noted that perhaps their nineteen seventy-two tour documented very well in a yet unseen documentary called "Cocksucker Blues" was really like one of the first sort of ganders into what we now think like debauchery rock life was. You know, the idea of private airplanes and groupies on the road and just, at least, at least the half hour of that documentary that I saw.

• 48:51Speaker 00

  Can you talk about, and I'm mainly asking this because, you know, ten years later, they'll try the same thing with Prince, and the experience was not good for Prince, where, you know, he was famously booed offstage. But at the time, when Stevie Wonder is being asked to tour with the Rolling Stones, was there any trepidation at all? Like, okay, what do they want with this whole act, and how do we... Like, what was the audience's response night after night to Stevie Wonder, who had yet to really prove himself as an adult artist?

• 49:27Speaker 06

  Well, they absolutely loved him. I mean, Stevie got, during that particular tour, he got, you know, mad reception from the audience, and I think that, you know, that's what really blew him up when he opened for the Rolling Stones, who were renowned and well, you know, known, and the music well-known. So that opened up the door, a giant door, for Stevie to be there with them, and the reception was, you know, was good. He did very well.

• 49:56Speaker 00

  So you guys weren't pelted with any tomatoes or any of those things? Are you familiar with the Prince story at all?

• 50:06Speaker 06

  No.

• 50:07Speaker 00

  Yeah, so, you know, Mick Jagger's a fan of dirty mining controversy and asked Prince to open up for the Rolling Stones. And about one song in, just, you know, the first time was this merciless booze and some Jack Daniels bottles. But the next day, they came armed with, like, you know, chicken and watermelon and, you know. So it wasn't, yeah, it wasn't, which is weird, considering that it's Los Angeles. You would think, like, Los Angeles is way harder to please than New York City was, but...

• 50:41Speaker 04

  You can't do that to a blind man, though. You can't be throwing watermelons on stage. You can't be doing that.

• 50:45Speaker 06

  No, I didn't know that that had happened to him. But, you know, we were fine. I think the thing that terrified me, especially as a little church girl, is the drugs that were circulating. They had their own doctor on the road with them to keep them pumped up. It was like, "Ooh, Jesus." So, you know.

• 51:06Speaker 00

  We haven't had an artist on here that has been on a tour of that magnitude. So what, can you describe, you know, I mean, we have, I mean, we can imagine like what it's like on a wild, crazy tour. But can you just generally describe what you saw, like, during that time period?

• 51:26Speaker 06

  Well, you know, it was really funny. What usually happened with me on those tours, and it started with that tour, is all the roadies really liked me. And they would say, "You know, you want some hashy? You want, you know, we got some coke. We got that." And I would say, "Not in Jesus' name. I don't want none of that." Real quick, that I'm not gonna be bothered with none of that. You can't have no coochie, and bye-bye.

• 51:56Speaker 06

  I had to play the Jesus card, you know. You know, because once I went to preaching and talking about Jesus, they would back up, like, "Oh, yeah, she really is. She's cute, little girl, you know, but she really is that. She not gonna do nothing." You know, but they, you know, they would offer me, "Woo, we got this." And they'd walk up with the rose stuff or walk up with stuff. And I said, "No, no, God don't like that." So I, you know, I played the Christian card. And after a while, they would see that I wasn't interested, so they would leave me alone. But I remember one night, for some reason, I got caught coming out late. And we were supposed to come out and get on the bus.

• 52:37Speaker 06

  And for some reason, I don't know why, I got disconnected from the group. And so I went out. The crowd outside was crazy. It was in Chicago, and they were throwing tear, the police were throwing tear gas. And so I got caught up in that. I dis- I bust, and I hopped on. I got on it, but I did the, you know, the tear gas thing. And what had gotten my eye. So that was probably one of the worst experiences I had with them, except for the after-party at the Playboy Mansion in Chicago, when it took me a long time to get out of there, because I couldn't find a door.

• 53:15Speaker 04

  Oh, my God. I love you so much, Denise. I just...

• 53:18Speaker 06

  Find a door, girl.

• 53:20Speaker 04

  How long, I wonder how long you was in there trying to find the door and all the savage...

• 53:25Speaker 06

  At least forty-five minutes. I even went, I was in one room. I walked down the hall, and there was nothing in the room but a hole in a pole. So I thought, "Maybe if I go down the pole, I'll find a door." So I went down the pole.

• 53:41Speaker 00

  So you're sliding down like a pole, like a five-minute pole?

• 53:44Speaker 04

  Listen, I'm trying to be out. Down means out. Go ahead. So you slid down the pole?

• 53:49Speaker 06

  Yeah, I was trying to get out of there.

• 53:51Speaker 04

  The first and the last time you slid down a pole?

• 53:53Speaker 06

  Last, first, and the last. I said, "Lord Jesus, if you get me out of here, you don't have to never worry about me coming up in here again."

• 54:01Speaker 00

  Wow, okay.

• 54:09Speaker 01

  Hey, it's Nile Rodgers, host of Before the Moment, a Lincoln original series. I'm driving across the country, meeting some of today's most fascinating artists. We're exploring the stories before the moment that changed everything. This week, I'm joined by breakout singer-songwriter Alex Warren.

• 54:29Speaker 03

  I had this dream of being a musician, and everyone I had known was kind of like, "You're not good at music, you know, you should probably have other things, a backup plan, whatever." Felt like I didn't have anyone close to me, and my wife had flown out to visit, and she found out I was sleeping in a car, she didn't know. And she was like, "Let's do it." And she slept in a car with me. And for the first time in my life, I realized that in a life full of what I thought was things happening to me, something was finally happening for me.

• 54:56Speaker 01

  Dude, that's like the most romantic shit I've ever heard.

• 54:59Speaker 03

  It's the coolest thing ever.

• 55:00Speaker 01

  Experience Before the Moment, a Lincoln original series on the iHeartRadio app, YouTube, or wherever you get your podcasts.

• 55:09Speaker 00

  Behind every chart-topping hit, you know by heart there's an original. Writing it someplace where nobody was listening. Some basement, some bedroom, somebody with headphones on at 3:00 in the morning chasing a thing they couldn't even name yet. Behind the culture that marks a generation, there's an original. Already moving, already shaking things up, already looping that one bar, already off-tempo. On purpose, because on purpose was the point. Behind every night that changed the room, somebody had to walk in first. Not knowing it would land, but doing it anyway. Originals are out there, living stories worth telling. What's yours?

• 55:54Speaker 00

  Behind every original, live in Levi's. Wait a minute, wait a minute, wait a minute. I would like to get her version of this story. Now, you know, your fellow Wonder Lovian, Ray Parker Jr. Kind of gave a very ambiguous hint, wouldn't totally confirm it. We also, I mean, this is way before Greg Villengains' time, but I need to ask. Okay, so the week that Intervisions gets released, you guys are booked somewhere in North Carolina.

• 56:37Speaker 00

  Stevie Wonder is in an accident. What is your version of what happened?

• 56:43Speaker 06

  I believe my cousin, what I remember is that my cousin John was driving, they're in a car, and John fell asleep.

• 56:51Speaker 00

  Your cousin was the driver?

• 56:53Speaker 06

  I believe John was, yeah.

• 56:55Speaker 00

  Oh, okay.

• 56:57Speaker 04

  All these QLs are really tied together. This is so.

• 57:01Speaker 00

  Yeah, yeah. Wow, okay. I, I, I wasn't even ready for that. I sort of had the feeling that they were trying, Ray was trying to allude to me that this is one of those moments where Stevie insisted on driving or whatever, and so.

• 57:17Speaker 06

  I don't think that he was driving. If I remember correctly, my cousin John was driving, and, and he nodded, he fell asleep or something like that. That's my recollection of the story, doesn't make it true, but that's what I was, I heard and I have always thought happened.

• 57:34Speaker 00

  Because, because I was too young to remember it and only heard about it in sort of like retrospect, was there, were you guys basically like, well, he won't make it? Because I remember, Stevie was in a coma for at least a month or so, correct?

• 57:50Speaker 06

  I didn't know it was a month or so, but I know he was badly injured, yeah. He was out of it for a while.

• 57:57Speaker 00

  But, okay, so in your mind, is it like, he may make it, he may not make it? Like, what's going through the mind of the band, at least, in terms of?

• 58:05Speaker 06

  We didn't know exactly if he was gonna make it or not. You know, we didn't know what was happening after that, but, you know, you just pray and hope for the best, and, and he did come out of it, you know, so, and I was grateful for that, even for his sake, for John's sake, for feeling so guilty and so bad about to carry that load. So for him to come out of it and, and would accomplish the things he accomplished really helped the spirit and the heart of John.

• 58:37Speaker 00

  All right, so I also know that you're one of the last people to work with the great Charles Stepanie, whom, you know, for our QLS listeners, really, I mean. Rotary Connection. Yeah, anything on Cadet Records? Ramsey Lewis. Ramsey Lewis, the 70s output of the Dells, you know, even some of the blues artists like, you know, Muddy Waters' record and the Electric Mud album, and many Riperton's Come to My Garden album. But, you know, most notably, his, he's the one that really took Earth, Wind & Fire

• 59:22Speaker 00

  and was a mentor to Maurice White. So a big part of that Earth, Wind & Fire sound that we're so in love with, you know, is due to the colors that Charles Stepanie painted. Knowing nothing about him, really, could you describe what Charles Stepanie was in your world and just in general for just that whole organization?

• 59:45Speaker 06

  Well, Charles Stepanie, like you said, brought a color and a style to Earth, Wind & Fire that was really the most beautiful collaboration in their music, as far as I'm concerned. Charles Stepanie was just brilliant. When I was doing a song call on my first project, If You Don't Believe, and, and he just lifted up the top of the piano, he took a guitar pick and just strum on the strings. And that's what you hear in the very, in the very beginning of If You Don't Believe, he and Oscar Boucher on trumpet, and he's just taking a guitar pick and strumming on those strings.

• 1:00:29Speaker 06

  I don't know who else would have thought of that. The way he heard my music, the way he heard my voice, even the way he heard Minnie Riperton's voice, and what he did with the Rotary Connection and with Minnie. The way he, you know, Charles Stepanie was just a brilliant producer and arranger. And you can tell how the music changed and how he was missed after Charles passed away. The sound of Earth, Wind & Fire changed. It didn't change in a bad way, but it changed in a different way. You've now got a whole different sound than the sound that Charles Stepanie created with That's the Way of the World and those, you know, those songs.

• 1:01:13Speaker 06

  It, he, it was, that whole flavor, that whole feel, that whole touch was gone. He was very, very, very, very powerful, played such a big role in my music, the emotions music, Earth, Wind & Fire's music, Minnie Riperton, the Rotary Connection. There's just nobody like him. I know that Maurice went with another arranger, and he was very, very good. Tom Tom 80.

• 1:01:40Speaker 00

  Tom Tom 84.

• 1:01:42Speaker 06

  But Tom Tom 84 and Charles Stepanie had two very, very different sounds and approaches. And I believe that once Charles passed away, you could hear it.

• 1:01:53Speaker 00

  At the time, are you hoping that perhaps you could have your own career as a singer or maybe Wonder Love does a record? Because, you know, at the time, Stevie's doing the Serita album, he's also working with, you know, he does stuff with the Supremes, he does stuff for Pointer Sisters. They had Miracles. Yeah, exactly. So for you, what was it about whatever Maurice White was bringing to the table that made you to decide to go with that camp? And how do you leave the Wonder Love camp, and was it amicable?

• 1:02:40Speaker 06

  I don't think, no, it wasn't amicable. I think if you asked Ray Parker the same question, he'd probably say, no, that wasn't amicable.

• 1:02:47Speaker 00

  All right, so walk us through, how do you leave the situation?

• 1:02:53Speaker 06

  Well, for three years, I was with Steve for three, three, three and a half years. And for three years, he promised to do a project on Wonderlove. And it never happened. We would be in the studio writing and, you know, rehearsing. And he never would record us. It was always one excuse after the other for him not to record us. Like you say, he was working with other artists, other artists, you know, that had careers already. He did something with the Jackson Five, you know. You know, he, he was working with other artists, but when it came to Wonderlove, he wasn't doing anything. And finally, we had a discussion about it.

• 1:03:34Speaker 06

  And he got, you know, upset that I chose to confront him on this issue. And so I said, okay, I'm done. So what happened is, one night when Wonderlove was performing, we would always perform one of our songs. And so this one night, they said, let's do Denise's song, "Free", you know, which I had written when I was with Sue Say Green and Nathan Watts when we were in Wonderlove, which was one of the songs that we were hoping to record as Wonderlove. And so that night, they said, we're, you know, let's do Denise's song. So I sang "Free" that night. And but what I didn't know is Maurice White, Philip Bailey, Verding White, and their attorney was sitting on the front row.

• 1:04:17Speaker 06

  Singing "Free", so then the attorney came backstage and he said, oh, we loved your, your performance. Who wrote that song? Whose song is that? I said, well, I wrote it with a couple of people in the band. I said, but I got other songs too. And Philip can sing them because we got a same register. So that's how it happened. That Maurice White, Maurice and those guys heard me sing. And that's, you know, that's how I got introduced to them. It was while I was with Stevie. So I, I think another six, seven months went by and Steve still wasn't doing anything. So I left. And I left him. And I got, that's when I joined Roberta Flack with Lonny Groves and Patty Austin.

• 1:05:00Speaker 06

  And while I was doing Roberta Flack, I got a call saying that Maurice wanted to meet with me. And I, you know, I had the, a meeting with them. And the seven songs that I sent, hoping that Earth, Wind & Fire would cover them, and Philip was singing, is the seven songs that Maurice wanted, decided to do my first project on. So that's how that happened. Now, you know, I, I just got, you know, a little tired of waiting on Stevie to do what he kept telling us he would do it. And like, even like six months after I'd been there. And he, you know, he wasn't doing it. He, he did, you know, many River Tens, perfect.

• 1:05:42Speaker 06

  I was on, you know, Minnie's album, of the Perfect Angel album. And he was doing all this stuff with other people. And I understand that, you know, they had record deals, they had money to pay him for his production. I understood that. But I felt like you could, we could at least record one song every other month or something to start a project together. And he was just really lax in doing that. And, you know, I said, no. And especially when, you know, I made great money with Roberta Flack. And I will always be grateful to her because Wonderlove, the girls, you know, we traveled with the band on the bus when we were singing with Roberta Flack. She said, no, no, no, you're riding the limousine with me.

• 1:06:26Speaker 06

  And it was a whole different treatment. She taught me a lot about how to treat the people that you're on the stage with. That, you know, that is always carried with me because, like I said, the ladies, we were on the bus with the band and the equipment and stuff. And with her, we were riding the limousine. And then, you know, Maurice reached out, we had a meeting, and I ended up recording with him.

• 1:06:52Speaker 00

  Songs in the Key of Life isn't even created yet. Was there slight regret, not regret, but, you know, Songs in the Key of Life comes out, and of course, this is Stevie's magnum opus. Like even at that time period, did you have any sort of worries or trepidation? Like, ah, we might have jumped the ship too early because this is a project that sets him off in the stratosphere? Or was it just like, okay, I'm out here on my own, let's just, no regrets, let's go for it?

• 1:07:26Speaker 06

  I wasn't on my own. I was with Earth, Wind & Fire. And I was with Roberta Flack, you know, two groups who I respected and who were interested in working with me, you know. So I did not feel like I was on my own. I was very happy for him and I was more happy to be a part of that whole situation. I mean, I have.

• 1:07:50Speaker 00

  Oh, we can see your hardware in the back. Oh, we love it.

• 1:07:54Speaker 06

  I got him up here somewhere because he gave me a plaque, you know, for being on the,

• 1:08:00Speaker 06

  being on the, on the project. But in my heart and in my spirit, I felt it was time to go. I did not feel that there was any room to grow. I just felt like, you know, we're going to be here for the next 20 years. In fact, he has a band member that I was in a band with. Nathan Watts is still there and it's been 35 years.

• 1:08:22Speaker 00

  I was going to say Nathan is still his bass player.

• 1:08:25Speaker 06

  He's still with them. And that could have been, you know, any of us if we had decided to stay. And I had babies to feed, I had mouths to feed, I didn't have time to be sitting there.

• 1:08:35Speaker 04

  Those job lessons right there. You're supposed to give it, what, two, three years? And if you know, it ain't no movement, then you got to.

• 1:08:40Speaker 06

  On that third year, it finally dawned on me, this, this could go on for a while. And I, I really didn't want to, to be there another three years or so years. And he's still not do, you know, for Wonderlove what he was doing for other people. But like I say, you know, looking at it, you know, he was being paid to produce. They had record labels, they had budgets, and, you know, he would have to do for us. So, no, I didn't feel alone. I mean, especially when I jumped over there with Earth, Wind & Fire. There was nowhere to feel alone. And of course, Philip Bailey and I became very, very, very close friends. You know, for that time, that was my buddy. So.

• 1:09:21Speaker 00

  Were you, were you, were you opening for them at the time when you went to their camp?

• 1:09:27Speaker 06

  I did, I was the opening act. I would trade off with the emotions. I would, you know, do a couple of the tours and then the emotion came on. And then they had both of us as opening acts for Earth, Wind & Fire.

• 1:09:40Speaker 00

  So what did it feel like the first time in which you're in charge now? Where you're the artist and you have a band and all these things? Like, was it weird now having to have the, the heavy lifting and decisions be up to you? As opposed to getting an itinerary and see like what the thing is? And how did that feel for you, like that first few months?

• 1:10:06Speaker 06

  It was very scary, you know, because I'd been in the background. And now I was in the forefront. And they were literally pushing me out on stage. I didn't want to go. I was backstage and they were talking, calling my name. And I said, I don't think I can do this. I don't want to do this. I don't think I can do this. You know, and they'd be back there, you gotta do it, push, you know. I went out there. I mean, it was like maybe three, four years before I felt comfortable going out there, you know. But, you know, it's very different, like you said, when you're, you know, somebody is taking care of everything, booking your hotels, booking your flights, you know. Everything is going through, you know, somebody else. And then all of a sudden, you've got to do this.

• 1:10:49Speaker 06

  So you have people that are doing it, but still, you're, you know, you're the head person and you've got to talk them through it. So it was very frightening, you know, for a while. And very frightening because one of my first tours as a solo artist was with the Ohio Players. Them crazy folks, so.

• 1:11:08Speaker 00

  Wow.

• 1:11:10Speaker 00

  You toured with Sugarfoot, with Sugarfoot. What was that like?

• 1:11:15Speaker 06

  I was saying, okay, Jesus, okay, Jesus. I mean, them boys was nuts.

• 1:11:20Speaker 00

  What were they doing?

• 1:11:22Speaker 06

  One night, and, and shook my hand and put his hotel room key in my hand and say, you know, I want to see you at midnight. So I ran to my road man.

• 1:11:34Speaker 00

  Who, Sugarfoot?

• 1:11:35Speaker 06

  Not him, but one of the others.

• 1:11:38Speaker 00

  Satch, Billy, Jimmy?

• 1:11:42Speaker 06

  It's which one it was.

• 1:11:43Speaker 04

  It was one of them.

• 1:11:45Speaker 03

  It was a player.

• 1:11:47Speaker 00

  He was a player.

• 1:11:49Speaker 05

  They're Ohio players, not in Ohio preaching.

• 1:11:51Speaker 06

  Well, he put his letter and I would run it to my road manager, who was Leonard Smith, who was the big six foot eight guy in the show with Earth when the fire that hit the gong. And he was out there on the road with me. I said, Leonard, they just told me I gotta be in this room at midnight.

• 1:12:09Speaker 06

  He said, don't worry about it. Give me the key. Man fooled me after that at all. That was it.

• 1:12:15Speaker 00

  He showed up.

• 1:12:16Speaker 05

  Right, right. He showed up at midnight.

• 1:12:18Speaker 00

  Come here, Pee Wee.

• 1:12:19Speaker 06

  He showed up at midnight. Yeah, I got your keys right here. But the nice thing about the tour with them was, um, is that they had about thirty grand worth of lights and special lighting and stuff. And so the, all of the light guys, all the little, you know, all the little roadies, they just loved me. So they said one night, they said, you know, we don't use half of what we have, so we been using it on you. I said, oh, you know, I was open. I've been using it on you. And then as I was out there with them free, kept climbing up the charts. And, and so they got mad at me.

• 1:12:56Speaker 05

  Oh, you was showing them up.

• 1:12:58Speaker 00

  Yeah, cuz you were.

• 1:12:59Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 1:13:00Speaker 00

  Yeah, it was your turn.

• 1:13:01Speaker 06

  Just saw, you know, going up the charts and they were just doing all they love, you know, spending the thirty grand on light. They said, they not using half of what we got. So we been using them on you. I said, oh, thank you.

• 1:13:13Speaker 00

  Wow.

• 1:13:13Speaker 05

  Love it.

• 1:13:14Speaker 00

  Okay. My favorite album of yours was your, your sophomore album, Songbird. That, uh, I believe that the single from that record was Baby, My Love's All For You.

• 1:13:23Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 1:13:25Speaker 00

  In my mind, I always thought that was like a massive big hit. But what happened for that period in Songbird for you? That didn't happen for the debut record? Cuz I thought that album was bigger. It was my favorite, so I thought it was bigger. But can you talk to me about what happened there?

• 1:13:43Speaker 06

  I think that the main thing that happened there is that Charles Stephanie passed away and the sound changed.

• 1:13:50Speaker 00

  Okay.

• 1:13:50Speaker 06

  Maurice was turning down original material that I had written to bring in outside material. So I think that that was two of the biggest problems with the project is that he no longer wanted to hear my personal expression and he brought in other people to write. And, and that, um, Charles Stephanie had passed away and we were now dealing with Tom Tom, uh, eighty-four, eighty-eight. And, and those were the things that I think, and I think people saw like, wait a minute, we heard this and now you're doing this. And we needed

• 1:14:28Speaker 06

  another project like This Is Nisi to solidify who I was. And, and yet Maurice, uh, not, you know, not anything due to him, but it changed up. And people were scrambling to find out, well, who is she really? You know, cuz this is not what we heard the first time around. And then I was also fighting with Sony, I mean, uh, Columbia, uh, I did God is Truly Amazing. And they were saying, we not praying her to sing gospel stuff. What is this God is Amazing stuff? You know, and they were mad with me. I said, listen, if we got ten songs on a project,

• 1:15:10Speaker 06

  I'm gonna give him one. Get over it. And so we fought for the next couple of years about me doing gospel music on my secular project. So that was going on too. They were mad.

• 1:15:21Speaker 00

  Really?

• 1:15:22Speaker 06

  I don't.

• 1:15:22Speaker 00

  Was this, was this the Walter Yetnacaw period of, of Columbia or?

• 1:15:27Speaker 06

  It was Walter and those guys, yeah. Very nice to me though. You know, I would go in there and say, Martin, I need another couple of hundred grand. What are you in here? But he would give it to me. So anyway, uh, that was the bottom line. I didn't care how much he fuss. Go call Marvin down there in Legal and send me my money. Baby Nee Shoes. And he always gave me the money. So, um, you know, and, and no feels, no nothing. You know, get back up. Just write the check now, you know?

• 1:15:58Speaker 00

  Oh.

• 1:15:59Speaker 05

  Talk heavy.

• 1:16:00Speaker 00

  So that was still, that was prevalent, that was prevalent just throughout?

• 1:16:05Speaker 06

  Oh, yeah. I loved Walter Yetnacaw. He was very, very good to me. Bruce Lundvall started and then Walter. They were always very, very good to me, uh, and very respectful. And I would say, you know, I'm praying for you. You know, so they said, oh, oh, there she go. But they were very, um, not happy with me with doing the gospel stuff.

• 1:16:26Speaker 00

  That's crazy cuz I, of, you know, of all your songs, I, I definitely remember that, that made an impression on my household, like God is Truly Amazing and all those things.

• 1:16:36Speaker 04

  And that's a thing now for R and B singers to do, to prove themselves on records now, putting their gospel record on.

• 1:16:42Speaker 05

  At a gospel jam last.

• 1:16:44Speaker 00

  Did you feel the need to do that to sort of send a smoke signal back home to Gary, Indiana, to the church?

• 1:16:52Speaker 06

  You know, I did it because of my love for Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. I did it for me. I didn't do it for them at that time. I didn't really care about their opinion. But that's, you know, I was raised in a church and I felt like if people were gonna have a total overview of me as an artist, I would have to do some gospel because that was a part of who I was. And so that's why I did it. Um, you know, I, I did it for me and to make a statement to, um, to God that, you know, I'm really grateful for what you're allowing to happen in my life. And so I'm giving you this, you know, I'm dedicating this portion to you.

• 1:17:32Speaker 00

  But eventually you do return to Gary, Indiana. What is the response now that you're an established artist?

• 1:17:42Speaker 06

  Oh, very different. And now I'm, I'm okay now, you know? Church people is.

• 1:17:47Speaker 00

  Well, no, no, I meant back in seventy-seven, seventy-six, seventy-seven.

• 1:17:50Speaker 06

  Yeah, they're still acting a little funny, you know, cuz they still don't support or agree with what I'm doing. But, um, it was funny. Yeah, I came back around that time and I attended church with my, um, two sons and my uncle decided to preach a whole sermon, uh, into church that Sunday on how I was going to hell cuz I had on makeup and fingernail polish. And so I got up and my children were there. So I got up and I came back and, you know, I was crying. I told my mother about it. So my mother wrote a letter to them, said, I, I heard what you guys did with my daughter. And this is what I want to tell them. I heard you been burning up the mortgage

• 1:18:33Speaker 06

  papers cuz you didn't pay it off the church. My daughter paid for that church. I want her money back with interest or shut the hell up.

• 1:18:40Speaker 04

  Oh.

• 1:18:41Speaker 06

  You, what?

• 1:18:42Speaker 04

  I never heard another word.

• 1:18:44Speaker 06

  The next time I went to church, my uncle said, amen, Sister Denise is here.

• 1:18:51Speaker 05

  Switch that tune up quick.

• 1:18:54Speaker 04

  Good for you.

• 1:18:56Speaker 05

  I love it.

• 1:18:56Speaker 06

  Them off. She said, I want her money back with interest. You over there burning the mortgage paper. We know how you burning them. That's the tie she been slant money.

• 1:19:04Speaker 04

  I said it. Didn't I say it, y'all? Didn't I say she be in the tie?

• 1:19:08Speaker 05

  You called it.

• 1:19:09Speaker 06

  She said, I want the money back with interest or shut the hell up. And then another word.

• 1:19:20Speaker 01

  Hey, it's Nile Rodgers, host of Before the Moment, a Lincoln original series. I'm driving across the country, meeting some of today's most fascinating artists. We're exploring the stories before the moment that changed everything. This week, I'm joined by breakout singer-songwriter Alex Warren.

• 1:19:40Speaker 03

  To this day, Ordinary would not have done anything and I would have not been able to put it out if, uh, Book Talk didn't back it up and if my wife and her friend didn't back it up. So, pretty crazy how like, just one thing.

• 1:19:52Speaker 01

  Right.

• 1:19:52Speaker 03

  I mean, you, you, I bet you, we could point to nine different things in our careers where it's just one thing, all of a sudden. If that one thing didn't happen, then I wouldn't be here.

• 1:19:59Speaker 01

  What you're talking about right now is what I've been talking about since the beginning of my career. There's these things outside of you that make everything happen. These other forces somehow came into contact with each other and helped propel you to this place.

• 1:20:17Speaker 03

  It's just insane.

• 1:20:18Speaker 01

  Experience Before the Moment, a Lincoln original series on the iHeartRadio app, YouTube, or wherever you get your podcasts.

• 1:20:27Speaker 00

  Behind every chart-topping hit, you know by heart, there's an original. Writing it someplace where nobody was listening. Some basement, some bedroom, somebody with headphones on at three in the morning chasing a thing they couldn't even name yet. Behind the culture that marks a generation, there's an original. Already moving.

• 1:20:47Speaker 00

  Already shaking things up, already looping that one bar, already off tempo, on purpose, because on purpose was the point. Behind every night that changed the room, somebody had to walk in first. Not knowing it would land, but doing it anyway. Originals are out there, living stories worth telling. What's yours? Behind every original, live in Levi's.

• 1:21:18Speaker 00

  Your first number one single comes a year later, in probably the most unusual way. But the song was inescapable when I was a kid. Could you talk about the decision to pair up with Johnny Mathis? And What will we do? Well, just what that whole experience was like? And the irony that the second to last song on that record, in my opinion, winds up being even more popular than Too Much Too Little Too Late, which is of course, the theme the family ties without us. Could you talk about that whole experience in doing that record?

• 1:21:58Speaker 06

  Well, it was wonderful. I was on the road opening off of Earth, Wind & Fire, but I got a call from my manager and he was saying, you know, Johnny's considering doing a duet and your name has come up. What do you think? I said, oh, my God, I would love to sing with him. I've been, you know, looking and singing along with him on television all these years. I would love to do that. And so, you know, they said, okay, Denise is willing to do it. Because they first went to my other, the artists on the label. They went to Barbra Streisand and she said, no.

• 1:22:28Speaker 04

  Oh, thank you.

• 1:22:28Speaker 00

  Wow.

• 1:22:29Speaker 06

  Yeah, she said, no. So then they came to me, you know, the second strongest female artist on the label.

• 1:22:35Speaker 04

  Damn.

• 1:22:36Speaker 06

  Yeah, so it was funny. So when I told my mother I was going to sing with Johnny Mathis, she don't, ooh, girl, I gotta get my nails done. I wonder if

• 1:22:46Speaker 06

  and oh, yeah, I say, Mom, I'm not taking you up in there because

• 1:22:49Speaker 04

  No.

• 1:22:51Speaker 06

  I knew my mom was gonna be buck wild. We weren't gonna get no work done because she did that to me with Marvin Gaye. So I, no, you just

• 1:22:59Speaker 00

  Oh, wow. Time out. Hold up. Time out. Go back, go back, go back.

• 1:23:04Speaker 06

  And Will, I'll introduce you to Johnny later. And I did.

• 1:23:08Speaker 04

  Wait, that's two stories. Go back.

• 1:23:11Speaker 00

  Wait, what happened?

• 1:23:13Speaker 06

  Well, Marvin Gaye's brother was performing at a club called The Troubadour. And and I wanted to see him. So we went down, I took my mom, I took Troubadour. We went down to see Frankie sing. And so what happens is we sitting in our seats, but then here come Marvin. He come walking in there and my mom was went off. Oh, distant lover. Oh, love.

• 1:23:38Speaker 06

  Come here, honey. And she just went off with Marvin Gaye. And I looked at her like, excuse me?

• 1:23:46Speaker 06

  Johnny rode around, I wasn't taking no chances. Right. You'll meet him later, but you are not going to the studio. She didn't talk to me for a day or two, but she met him and it was all cool.

• 1:23:58Speaker 04

  Okay.

• 1:23:59Speaker 00

  Wow. That is hilarious.

• 1:24:00Speaker 04

  Best daughter ever.

• 1:24:02Speaker 00

  So in, in recording that record, though, and especially with the song like Too Much Too Little Too Late, which, okay, yes, you, you're not the ilk of a tenor baritone gospel singer, you know, of, of, of the Mahalia, Aretha. First of all, you're, you're a soprano. So even with your, the voice that you have, what is your octave range? Like, are you able to also sing low as well? And you just chose to sing, sing in your upper register or?

• 1:24:36Speaker 06

  I think I have a really nice low register that most people have not heard. But for some reason, when I was writing, I was just writing in those registers. So that's, you know, that's what I did. I never did write in the lower register or think in the lower register. And a lot of what you hear me do is my mom. I used to, you know, my mom would sing in the shower and I'd be standing outside of the shower, listening to her and, you know, all that stuff she did. You know, I got that from my, I got that from my mom. She used to do So I, I think a lot of what you hear is me mimicking her and she did not, you know, sing. I didn't hear her a lot in the lower register,

• 1:25:18Speaker 06

  but I do have a really nice, warm lower register.

• 1:25:23Speaker 00

  So that said, because, you know, if I were of age of then, I wouldn't have been, been able to call that particular duet, simply because I don't know Johnny as a, a belter or an ad libber and that sort of thing. And of course, you know, when, when you get to the end of that song, I mean, you're just, you're singing, you're not singing circles around him, but, you know, the way that your ad libs are, you're just, I mean, it's, it's near Jordan levels of display, like he's this, the, the, the, sort of like, I'm, I'm not trying to compare to Abbott and Costello. Like there's the straight man and then there's the punchline person, but

• 1:26:07Speaker 04

  Seinfeld and everybody else.

• 1:26:09Speaker 00

  Do you guys, do you guys discuss how you're going to do this? Are you singing together at the same time? Is it like, I'll sing my part first and then you come and add your parts later? And then I'll readjust it? Like for that album, are you singing, is it together in person? Or how do you handle that?

• 1:26:28Speaker 06

  Well, we would listen to the song and the song would go down. And, and then John felt comfortable with me telling him a little bit of how to sing, because he said, I've never sang with anybody before. And you've sang with Stevie and Roberta. So you know, you know, those kind of nuances. So basically we would run the song down and I say, I'm gonna sing this. You know, I'll sing this line and you sing that line. So basically he was the straight person and I would just kind of, you know, go around what he was doing and try to add some more color to it. And, and it was fun because when we did that, we complimented each other. We weren't running all over each other or not doing anything exciting.

• 1:27:11Speaker 06

  We just, you know, it kind of worked out like that for me to do more of the coloring than

• 1:27:16Speaker 04

  Right. He drew, he was the lines and you kind of colored. That's kind of, yeah.

• 1:27:20Speaker 00

  With, with the massive success of that song, was there never a discussion to have a follow up record as well?

• 1:27:29Speaker 06

  Um, no, uh, well, you know, we wanted to do stuff, but really his managers were really scared of me because, you know, I'm, I'm a black woman and I'm telling what to do and he started listening. And so I think that they came to conclusion, we need to get her on out of there. So they did.

• 1:27:52Speaker 00

  Seriously, they just one and done?

• 1:27:54Speaker 06

  Well, because Johnny, you know, started really listening to me and I'm a strong independent woman. And that's not his personality. And so after, you know, talking with him and hanging out with him a couple of times, they said, she's a little bit too much of an influence over him.

• 1:28:13Speaker 04

  Mm hmm. I see that. I see that.

• 1:28:17Speaker 00

  So the thing is, is that I, I can't, you know, Philip talked about it a little bit, but, you know, he didn't really go into it. But of course, like the second big producer that comes into the Earth, Wind & Fire stratosphere is David Foster.

• 1:28:32Speaker 06

  Mm hmm.

• 1:28:33Speaker 00

  And, you know, like our, our listeners know that David, you know, did like Wildflower. Everything.

• 1:28:39Speaker 04

  Right, everything.

• 1:28:41Speaker 00

  Yeah, I mean, well, I mean, but mostly just as a soul guy, like did like New Birth and all that stuff. And of course, even, even though Earth, Wind & Fire was able to coast to a fine level with the All in All record with Maurice at the helm, of course, David Foster comes aboard. And it's always been controversial with David Foster. I think in real time, people were sort of grumbling about David Foster's production. And of course, now the decades have gone by, everyone's like, oh, I always loved after the love is gone and all those things. But I know that Foster worked on the When Love Comes Calling record.

• 1:29:20Speaker 00

  And I'm not certain what, with the chart position was of I, I Got the Next Dance. I remember hearing a lot on black radio in Philadelphia. What was your experience or your feeling about the When Love Comes Calling record? Because I know that sounded very radically different

• 1:29:40Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 1:29:41Speaker 00

  than the first two albums produced by Maurice and Maurice and Charles. But for When Love Comes Calling, who decided to really change it up?

• 1:29:52Speaker 06

  Well, Maurice was working with David and so then they, they said, well, let's put Denise with David. But it was not a good pairing for me and David to work together. First of all, he was very condescending, you know, producer to artist. And he, you know, said something to me one day and I took the headphones off and I came in. I said, you know what? We will not work together if you do that again. I said, I don't even want to go there. I said, you will not try that with me. I don't know who you talk to like that, but you won't be talking to me like that. I said, we will not be doing this. I said, you're gonna respect me like you want me to respect you. And if you can't do that, then you need to walk out of here now because I am not having it.

• 1:30:36Speaker 06

  So I left the studio, I told Maurice, I said, if he don't turn his attitude around, it's not going to work with he and I. And the very next day, he was married to this girl from Alabama. And she said, I just wanted to, you know, apologize what, what happened yesterday. And I brought up, you know, a surprise for you, you know, something for you. And, and she set the plate down and flipped it over. It was fried because I understand you guys like fried chicken.

• 1:31:04Speaker 04

  Bitch. I'm sorry. Wait, what?

• 1:31:08Speaker 00

  Oh no.

• 1:31:10Speaker 05

  Oh my god.

• 1:31:12Speaker 00

  Wait a minute. Half of me.

• 1:31:14Speaker 05

  Soon as she said Alabama, I knew I said, yeah, it's not.

• 1:31:17Speaker 00

  I knew some food coming.

• 1:31:21Speaker 00

  But was it good though?

• 1:31:22Speaker 04

  No, shut up Amir.

• 1:31:27Speaker 06

  I told David, I said, baby, y'all about to get your, yeah, I don't even want to say.

• 1:31:32Speaker 04

  You done got the wrong one.

• 1:31:34Speaker 06

  Hurt up in here. Okay, somebody's gonna get. So we didn't work out. To this very day, David is scared of me and I'm, I like.

• 1:31:43Speaker 00

  So it's not water under the bridge at all?

• 1:31:46Speaker 06

  No.

• 1:31:47Speaker 04

  And you did not bite into that chicken, correct?

• 1:31:49Speaker 06

  No, I ain't none of that.

• 1:31:50Speaker 05

  Hell no.

• 1:31:53Speaker 06

  She could have, you know.

• 1:31:55Speaker 00

  Why you calling me out like?

• 1:31:56Speaker 04

  Wait, we were there.

• 1:31:57Speaker 00

  Why you calling me out like?

• 1:32:00Speaker 05

  Was it good though?

• 1:32:01Speaker 00

  That's not my kryptonite. Chicken is not my kryptonite.

• 1:32:04Speaker 04

  I wasn't calling you out. I was answering your question.

• 1:32:07Speaker 00

  Me, I don't care if it's Popeye himself. No, I'm not eating that chicken.

• 1:32:11Speaker 04

  I wasn't. I was just getting your question answered. That's all.

• 1:32:14Speaker 00

  But was it good though? I'm sorry.

• 1:32:17Speaker 05

  He didn't eat it.

• 1:32:18Speaker 00

  However, I, I, I will gladly skip, even though I was a, you know. I think when you're younger, you take everything in and, you know, I loved that record, even though I didn't realize.

• 1:32:31Speaker 06

  Yeah, you didn't have any idea of the back scene.

• 1:32:33Speaker 04

  Never do.

• 1:32:34Speaker 00

  However, you came to my hometown and actually, uh, my home studio of Sigma. To, uh, to work on your, your next few records.

• 1:32:46Speaker 06

  With Tom Bell.

• 1:32:48Speaker 00

  Did Tom Bell and, uh, uh, what's her name?

• 1:32:52Speaker 06

  Linda Creed.

• 1:32:52Speaker 05

  Linda Creed.

• 1:32:54Speaker 00

  Yeah, Linda Creed. At, at the time, did they stop working together by this period?

• 1:32:59Speaker 06

  They stopped working together because Linda Creed became very ill with cancer. I don't know.

• 1:33:04Speaker 00

  Okay.

• 1:33:04Speaker 06

  And that's what she passed away from. So Linda Creed, um, wasn't well, but also I had, uh, I started writing with Tom Bell, Tom Bell, and I started writing because he wasn't writing with Linda. And so, um, you know, that's what happened. The only songs that we didn't write together or, um, was, um, I remember sitting and we used to cook before we would record or, or work on a song. And so, uh, I told Tom.

• 1:33:32Speaker 00

  Really?

• 1:33:33Speaker 06

  You know, I've been, I've been walking around my house for twenty some odd years singing this song. I really like to sing it again. I said, I love this song. He said, what is that? I said, I love it's gonna take a miracle. By the Royal Less. I said, he got, left the kitchen, went on to the piano, started playing it. And then, uh, you know, we recorded it and it was what, like a top five, uh, pop hit for me. It's gonna take a miracle. And so, um, but the, the songs that I did with Tom Bell, we wrote together or either I wrote them and, you know, that kind of thing.

• 1:34:07Speaker 00

  I know you also worked with the legendary, uh, Clarence McDonald, who his, I know that silly. You did silly with Clarence McDonald and his, his resume is out of this world. Like, how did, how did that come about?

• 1:34:22Speaker 06

  Um, actually, uh, Lonny Groves was dating Clarence McDonald at that time and.

• 1:34:27Speaker 00

  Ah.

• 1:34:27Speaker 06

  We were wonderful and she said, oh, I'm, you know, dating this guy. He's doing a lot of stuff. He's doing a lot of stuff. And so we started going out, going over to Clarence's house and we started writing and that's how, uh, you know, couple of the big songs, especially on the first and second album came about.

• 1:34:43Speaker 05

  During your time, uh, working, uh, in the Earth When the Fire camp, did you have any dealings with Skip Scarborough?

• 1:34:49Speaker 06

  I did.

• 1:34:50Speaker 05

  What was he like? He's one of my favorite songwriters.

• 1:34:53Speaker 06

  Skip was, it's just an incredible, loving guy, really soft spirit. We went to the same church. You know, he was just a genius, just a genius when you.

• 1:35:03Speaker 05

  Absolutely.

• 1:35:03Speaker 06

  You know, don't ask my neighbor and all those songs that's.

• 1:35:07Speaker 05

  Love ballad, yeah.

• 1:35:09Speaker 06

  You know, it's just incredible working with Skip Scarborough. You're right. He's very special.

• 1:35:19Speaker 00

  Of course, he did two albums with Tom Bell and that's also like your, your, your last record with, uh, the A R C organization with Maurice White. What happened? Like, did the label just disintegrate or? And I'm, I'm only asking because like, again, that, that, that giant logo on, on the record was no longer there in your records. Yeah, the A R C logo wasn't there. So when I saw the I'm So Proud record, I was like, oh, that's it. And no more. So how did, how did that happen?

• 1:35:57Speaker 06

  Well, um, Maurice, uh, became, you know, Maurice and Columbia Records started having a following out, uh, differences of where, uh, where they wanted to go. So then Maurice called me and said, we're leaving. Um, and, uh, you know, just know that everything's going to be all right. You're gonna go with us. And they actually started talking to RCA. And at that time, you know, I hadn't had any relationship with Columbia or anything outside of, you know, going in and, and, uh, talking to Walter. I would talk to Walter. So we did have a relationship. Let me back up. But, um, I went into Walter and I said, listen, what's gonna happen? I said, A R C is leaving and, and what do I do?

• 1:36:39Speaker 06

  He says, oh, don't worry about it. He says, out of, you know, everybody on the label, uh, with A R C, you're the only one that we're keeping. And I was the only act at Columbia count.

• 1:36:49Speaker 05

  Oh man.

• 1:36:50Speaker 00

  Okay. Well, of course, your, your next collaborator, your most consistent collaborator, um, in my opinion, is the work with George Duke.

• 1:36:59Speaker 06

  Oh, I miss him.

• 1:37:02Speaker 00

  Yeah. Could you talk about working with them and just what it was like?

• 1:37:06Speaker 06

  Uh, I, I tell you, George Duke was one of them. It was an incredible genius. I mean, you could put George in any music genre and it, and it would come off incredible. I mean, you know, with, uh, Zappa, Frank, you know, Frank Zappa, you know, uh, Stanley Clark, all that stuff that George did. But, you know, he could do classical, he could do gospel, he could do R and B, he could do pop. George could do anything. And the thing that was most incredible about him is he was just a big teddy bear. He was a big teddy bear. I mean, I just, as a person, I loved him. I loved his wife, Corinne. And like I said, I missed him so much. I still can't even walk, drive by their

• 1:37:50Speaker 06

  street without tearing. Uh, that's how much I miss him. But it was funny because we were in the studio and we were recording Black Butterfly. And then we get this call and they said, oh, you know, they said, uh, we're doing a soundtrack to a movie and there's one song left and we want to know if Denise want to do it. So, um, I said, yeah, I want to do it. So, uh, they said, okay, here's, you go over to the songwriters and they're gonna play you this song. So we go over there, Dean Pitchard and Tom Snow on the piano, and they singing Less Here For The Boy and they gave us. We walk out of there and George Duke said, we ain't doing that song. I said, come on, I said, George, wait a minute, wait a minute.

• 1:38:29Speaker 06

  I said, it's in a movie. I said, you know, he said, we not doing that song. I'm gonna tell you right now, we not doing that stupid song. I said, George, you, I said, I just read an article. They say I'm a great baller to, you know, of our times. I said, I could do uptempo like that.

• 1:38:44Speaker 04

  Yes, you can.

• 1:38:45Speaker 06

  And then he said, I hate that song. And so I, you know, I tell him my show, I said, you know, the man is the head, but the woman is the neck. And she can turn that head any way she want to.

• 1:38:56Speaker 04

  Yes.

• 1:38:57Speaker 06

  George and I went to his wife, Corinne. I said, Corinne, you gonna do that song with me and I need your help. She said, girl, don't worry about it. I'll handle it. So we, we was in the studio. It's George mad as hell, but we was in the studio recording Less Here.

• 1:39:14Speaker 04

  Listen.

• 1:39:15Speaker 00

  And how do you feel when that, how do you feel when it went to number one?

• 1:39:18Speaker 06

  You know what I'm saying? And then when we did the unsong, they did this unsong on me and George is on that. I still don't like that song. So I said, you know what? Then give me your producer's royalty. I'll take.

• 1:39:28Speaker 04

  All right. Cause I'm gonna tell you, every little girl like me was like, that's the jam.

• 1:39:35Speaker 05

  I had that, I had that on a forty-five. I, I had that, I had it on a forty-five. I just love that song.

• 1:39:40Speaker 06

  Give me your money since you feel like that. And so, because I, I also tell them in my show, I said, one night I was at this club in Los Angeles and I was singing and I, I, before Less Here For The Boy, I always asked the good men to raise their hand. And so this guy in the corner in the dark raised his hand, but I couldn't see him because the lights was in my eye. So I looked up, I said, put your hand down. You not a good man. And so after the concert, my, uh, my son Forrest walked up to me and said, mom, do you know who you told to put their hand down? They weren't a good man. I said, no, the lights in my eye, I can't see. He said, that was Bobby Brown.

• 1:40:19Speaker 06

  I said, that wasn't me. That was the Holy Ghost.

• 1:40:27Speaker 06

  I had dinner with Bobby and his wife about two months ago. I apologized. I said, Bobby, I'm sorry. He said, no, I'm okay.

• 1:40:34Speaker 04

  It was like, you was right. You was right.

• 1:40:38Speaker 00

  I, I will say that to me, Black Butterfly is one of my favorite all time songs of yours, more than.

• 1:40:46Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 1:40:46Speaker 00

  Free, more than any of those songs.

• 1:40:49Speaker 05

  I heard that song at every, like, any kind of black pageant, like, any kind of, like, graduation for, like, you know.

• 1:40:57Speaker 00

  That was a Deep record. E. Mel Luthers song. For Only One One Night is what the guys would say, and Black Butterfly was what the women would say.

• 1:41:06Speaker 05

  For real, for real.

• 1:41:08Speaker 06

  What happened was, um, somebody had sent the song to George. And George played it for me. And the artist, who's a well-known artist, and I'm not gonna name, was singing it was all over the place. So I told George, take him off, take him off, and let me live with it. And I loved it because it spoke about the trials and the tribulations and what it took for us to, you know, to to get here, our belief, our strength, and tell your sons and daughters, passing that message on. And I said, you know, I didn't write it, but I have to sing it. And for me to be nominated on the top 10 list of songs that Black Life Matters has been uh, playing and, you know, promoting with their thing.

• 1:41:53Speaker 06

  Um, that Black Butterfly was on that list really touched my heart, you know, because you do work, but you never know what's gonna happen or how you're gonna impact people. So that was a blessing for me.

• 1:42:05Speaker 03

  Wikipedia says Barry Manin Cynthia, Cynthia Will.

• 1:42:09Speaker 06

  Cynthia Will.

• 1:42:09Speaker 03

  Yeah, Wild, in 1982.

• 1:42:11Speaker 06

  Yep.

• 1:42:13Speaker 00

  What's your, your, your training like, like, are you a student of, uh, of Seth Riggs? Like, how do you, how do you train your voice? How do you, you know, does it, if you get easily hoarse, you know, is it the Rita Franklin thing where you have to have the air off in the room in order to sing and open your trachea to hit these notes? Like, what's your regiment?

• 1:42:39Speaker 06

  God. I mean.

• 1:42:42Speaker 00

  There you go.

• 1:42:42Speaker 06

  I, you know, I, I don't do anything special. I do warm up. God is amazing was actually my exercise vocal that I used to do before I actually wrote the song. Uh, to, you know, open up my vocals, but I, I just have to blame it on the Lord because, you know, just, I mean, but I haven't sang in about a month and yet,

• 1:43:08Speaker 06

  you know, it just happens.

• 1:43:10Speaker 00

  Right.

• 1:43:11Speaker 04

  But do you also like not smoke or you don't do the dairy? Like, did you do that stuff?

• 1:43:15Speaker 06

  No, I don't smoke anything. Uh, you know, I try to be cool, you know, in the club with a rum, rum and coke and a cool cigarette. But then when I found out that this was gonna be how I was making my living and taking care of my children, I stopped that. I said, no more. Uh-uh, I don't smoke. You know, I don't do any of that, anything that would interfere with my throat. I did hookah one time and she said, okay, you keep doing that and see if I cooperate with you. So I, uh, no, I'm very particular, you know, no. I don't wanna do anything that would interfere with the gift God has given me.

• 1:43:50Speaker 00

  I know that, uh, you had switched labels, that your, your gospel output was not on Columbia at all. You mean at no point did they just think like, yeah, this makes sense. Let's let her do a gospel record. Like, why did your, uh, gospel stuff come out on, I think it was Word Records, I believe?

• 1:44:14Speaker 06

  Uh, no, I was with Sparrow, but

• 1:44:18Speaker 06

  Phillip and I went to Columbia to Glether and asked them to give us a half a million dollars to start a gospel label for Columbia. And they said, no. So right as they said, no, let's hear it for the boy, you know, was number one. And my contract ran out. So I said, okay, this is it. I'm coming back, I'll resign, but I wanna do gospel music somewhere else. And they agreed. So I ended up on Sparrow and Phillip ended up on Word.

• 1:44:49Speaker 00

  Wow, okay. That, that's just, and even with your Grammy success with gospel and whatnot, like, they still didn't double back and just say like, you know what? Our bad, let's do, let's do something.

• 1:45:05Speaker 06

  No, what they did is they gave this other guy six million dollars to start a gospel label and he spent it on Arabian horses in Nashville. And they come calling up, fussing with me. I said, no, no, no, no, no. You went and gave him that six million dollars. I only asked you for a half a million. So now, don't, don't call me. God bless you, bye-bye.

• 1:45:26Speaker 00

  Hmm.

• 1:45:29Speaker 04

  I had to fast forward and see when Columbia got like deep in the gospel, because they did Mahalia Jackson. But I was like, man, okay, so Mary, Mary and La Cray, they got the, they got the message.

• 1:45:38Speaker 06

  Uh, they probably come down and they got the message in. All right.

• 1:45:44Speaker 00

  So with where you are now, especially, well, you said you haven't sang in a month. So is this the first extended break? Like, there's a lot of us, uh, post pandemic kinda had a, a, a, a complete world stop to sort of regroup for the first time in our lives. For you, was that like the first extended break that you took? When the pandemic started as far as, uh, not doing like a lot of gigs and whatnot, just relaxing? Like, how did you, how did you spend your 2020 when it occurred?

• 1:46:16Speaker 06

  Well, I've been working on produce, I'm co-producing a theater piece called Live at the Crescendo Club with Ella Fitzgerald, Sarah Vaughan, and Pearl Bailey. So I really sunk a lot of time into, um, you know, working on the theater piece. We hired our director, we hired our writer, we hired our music supervisor, we hired a theater company. So we've been working on that for the past two years almost, um, uh, on that particular theater piece and going through music for these three ladies. So I, you know, I've been doing that and I'm, you know, keeping my chops up for a lot of reasons. I'm still touring, but I'm also hoping to be able to do the role of Sarah Vaughan, especially in the beginning. I wanna do Sarah Vaughan stuff.

• 1:47:01Speaker 06

  So, uh, you know, I've been doing what I can to keep my chops up for that because I, you know, I don't wanna do anything that would embarrass this incredible, um, beautiful vocalist. You know, for Ella Fitzgerald, my, my wish list would be Patty Orville. We'll see what happens. And for Pearl Bailey, my wish list would be Loretta Devine. So we'll see, you know, what could potentially happen. But, um, that's what I've been working on with that Live at the Crescendo Club. And then with my other son, we have a children's cartoon that we've been working on. And we have a distribution deal with Roku. So we're working now and, um, filming episodes for Lizzie, the, the Lake Monster,

• 1:47:45Speaker 06

  which is our, our children's program. And then, um, my other son and I started our own coffee company. So we're, we have a coffee shop, so we're doing coffee, the Culture Coffee Company, we're working on that. And, um,

• 1:48:00Speaker 04

  You have a, you said you have a shop?

• 1:48:01Speaker 06

  Uh-huh, we have an actual shop and the girls got on hockeys tops and little short pants and stuff. So, yeah.

• 1:48:08Speaker 04

  Is this in Nevada or is it, where's the shop?

• 1:48:10Speaker 06

  In Las Vegas, I moved over my first store. So we are, you know, we're doing that. And then, uh, I'm beginning to get back into, you know, getting back on Facebook, getting back on my social media, because I backed up away from that. You know, just doing the writing and trying to be creative. Started three books, haven't finished none of them. So anyhow, that's

• 1:48:34Speaker 06

  you know, I mean, we weren't able to tour, but there were other things to be done, to be worked, other projects to be worked on. And so I've spent that, the, um, that, this time working on the other projects.

• 1:48:46Speaker 00

  Well, besides the play and whatnot, is there another kind of bucket list, uh, dream that you've yet to fulfill in your career?

• 1:48:55Speaker 06

  Nope. I think that, you know, with the various projects that we have, and we also have another theater piece called The Fairy Tale Chronicles, uh, that we're working on. So I, I think, you know, for me and the music industry, I accomplished more than I ever thought I would. And it made, it's made an impression, a positive impression on a lot of people who grew up with me, like you, and who love the music. But since we weren't able to go out and do concerts and stuff, I just started working on some other things creatively that popped up in my spirit. And so I'm excited to, you know, see this happen. I'm excited to get out on the road with the theater piece.

• 1:49:38Speaker 06

  I'm excited to get our episodes done for our, our children's cartoon. I'm just excited about all of the various projects that we're working on right now, you know, and my hands are full.

• 1:49:50Speaker 04

  It also sounds great for the people who saw your unsung. It's a nice continuation of chapter to see what, that you're working with your sons. Like, that's great, like.

• 1:49:58Speaker 06

  Yep, yep. One of the books is called, you know, uh, The Next Chapter, Chapter Two. No, the book is called Second Act.

• 1:50:07Speaker 04

  This is a children's book.

• 1:50:09Speaker 06

  No, a book that I'm writing for on.

• 1:50:11Speaker 04

  Oh, that you're working on one of the three.

• 1:50:15Speaker 04

  Okay.

• 1:50:16Speaker 00

  Well, you know, I, I just wanted, Fonte, you look like you're about to.

• 1:50:20Speaker 05

  Oh, no, man, I was just gonna say, just, uh, just, just thank you for the music. Like, I, you're, there, um, that This Is Nisi album, that's like one of the first records I remember seeing in my grandparents' house, like, coming up. And so I just remember as a kid, because I was, I mean, this is, I was probably like four or five years old, but I remember the front that you had on the, it's like the, the black and with the kind of yellow.

• 1:50:44Speaker 00

  I thought you were part of the wall.

• 1:50:45Speaker 04

  I thought she was singing in the floor.

• 1:50:46Speaker 05

  The wall, right?

• 1:50:48Speaker 00

  I couldn't understand that. I was like, what is she doing to trapping me?

• 1:50:52Speaker 06

  And I was, I was so afraid when that album cover came out because one of the leaves didn't entirely cover that titty. And all about this big, my grandmother sent that. Wait till Big Mama see that, but part of my titty is out. Oh, God, Jesus. I was, I was so.

• 1:51:15Speaker 05

  That would mess you up. Cause the back, seriously, the back cover that, I mean, I had the biggest crush on you as a kid. Just, that was one of the, just the first covers I remember seeing that I wasn't afraid of, because it was, because covers were so big, you know, but you on the back and I just remember you had like that big smile and I was like, man, like this is just, you look really beautiful on that. And, um, that's just one of my favorite memories from childhood and I love that album. So just thank you so much.

• 1:51:38Speaker 00

  I was kind of afraid of that cover, uh, Fonte, because again, I thought the wall was eating her up.

• 1:51:43Speaker 04

  I wasn't sure either, Amir. I was with you. I was like.

• 1:51:46Speaker 00

  I thought that Stevie Wonder was drowning in donuts on Songs in the Field of Life. So, you know, what do I know?

• 1:51:50Speaker 06

  Okay.

• 1:51:51Speaker 00

  I, I still to this day think that he's drowning in donuts, but you know, you know, we really thank you for, um, doing this this solid and coming on the show and sharing your story.

• 1:52:00Speaker 04

  And being patient, because this has been like our third time rescheduling this and I just appreciate you for that. And although you may not evoke all kinds of yells and screams through your music, the emotion that you evoke is priceless, timeless, and we just thank you for it.

• 1:52:15Speaker 00

  So can Steve anything?

• 1:52:16Speaker 03

  Thank you for Let's Hear For the Boy. I, I, I, from, from my heart, I'm not trying to make a joke. Thank you. Just even if, even just for that.

• 1:52:24Speaker 04

  For real, though.

• 1:52:25Speaker 03

  Cause that, that's where, that's, that's where I found you and then, and then went backwards. So, thank you.

• 1:52:30Speaker 00

  Yes, absolutely. Well, once again, ladies and gentlemen, this is Denise Williams on Questlove Supreme on behalf of Fonte Gallo and Laia and Sugar Steve.

• 1:52:40Speaker 03

  Oh, and, and based on that partial titty, I'm going record shopping tomorrow.

• 1:52:46Speaker 00

  Steve, anyway, this is Questlove Supreme.

• 1:52:52Speaker 00

  We'll see you on the next go around. This is Steve. Thank you. Bye bye.

• 1:53:07Speaker 00

  Questlove Supreme is a production of iHeartRadio.

• 1:53:13Speaker 05

  For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows. Behind every chart topping hit, you know by heart, there's an original, writing it someplace where nobody was listening. Behind the culture that marks a generation, there's an original, already moving, already shaking things up. Behind every night that changed the room, somebody had to walk in first, not knowing it would land, but doing it anyway. Originals are out there, living stories worth telling. What's yours? Behind every original, live in Levi's.

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