What Really Happened Behind the Milli Vanilli Scandal | Fab Morvan

Fab Morvan opens up about the rise and fall of Milli Vanilli, winning a Grammy while hiding the truth behind their success, and the scandal that changed his life forever. He reflects on becoming a global superstar alongside Rob Pilatus, the pressure to maintain their image, and the decisions that would ultimately bring everything crashing down. Fab revisits his relationship with producer Frank Farian, the moment their secret was exposed, and the devastating impact of going from worldwide fame to public humiliation overnight. He also speaks candidly about his childhood, how his search for love and belonging shaped his life, and the struggles that followed the scandal. He opens up about his friendship with Rob, the addiction that took hold of his bandmate, and the heartbreaking reality of watching someone he loved struggle. Fabrice reflects on the lessons he has taken from their story, how he rebuilt his life, and what he wishes people understood about Milli Vanilli. Fab Morvan, We Need To Talk This episode includes discussion of mental health. If you’re struggling, remember you’re not alone. You can find help and resources at the links below: MIND: https://linkly.link/2dx8b Samaritans: https://linkly.link/2dx7Z CALM: https://linkly.link/2dx8H Follow us here: https://www.instagram.com/needtotalk https://www.tiktok.com/@weneedtotalkpod Sign up to our newsletter https://linkly.link/2eXHX Brand partnerships enquiries: [email protected] Follow Fab here:Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/fabmorvan TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@fabmorvan_off (00:00) Intro(01:56) Fab Morvan's Childhood in Paris(07:41) How Therapy Fuels Creativity(09:04) Fab's Early Love of Dance(10:27) Why Fab Moved to Germany(12:22) Being Black in 1980s Germany(17:38) Rob Pilatus' Childhood(18:38) How Fab and Rob Met(20:44) Fab and Rob's Early Performance Style(25:56) Fab and Rob Before Milli Vanilli(28:56) Creating Milli Vanilli's Signature Look(34:31) How Milli Vanilli Was Formed(40:22) The People Behind Milli Vanilli(41:48) Why Milli Vanilli Didn't Sing on Their Records(44:41) Signing the Milli Vanilli Record Deal(54:44) When Fab and Rob Discovered They'd Lip-Sync(59:11) Preparing to Perform as Milli Vanilli(01:01:18) Milli Vanilli's Sudden Fame(01:09:52) Milli Vanilli's Global Success(01:12:55) Anthropic Ad(01:13:48) Milli Vanilli at the 1990 Grammys(01:22:47) Fab and Rob at the Grammys(01:31:20) Fab and Rob's Relationship During Their Rise to Fame(01:33:54) Winning a Grammy: Fab's Experience(01:38:08) The Downfall of Milli Vanilli(01:48:11) Life After the Milli Vanilli Scandal(02:00:32) Fab Morvan's Family(02:03:03) Fab's New Projects(02:05:05) Most Memorable Conversation(02:09:03) Paul's Key Takeaways Sponsored by: Anthropic - https://www.claude.ai/talk Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

• 0:00Speaker 00

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• 0:30Speaker 01

  I haven't seen a scent from any of the royalties to this day. My image is used everywhere. I couldn't fathom the fact that somebody else was gonna sing and we were not. No, we're not doing nothing.

• 0:42Speaker 02

  So how do you prepare to lip sync?

• 0:44Speaker 01

  Man.

• 0:50Speaker 02

  The name Milli Vanilli is known globally. But I don't know if we truly know Fabrice.

• 0:56Speaker 01

  Growing up, there was a lot of darkness at home, so the minute I turned 18, I'm out. But because Rob was there for me, I felt safe. Rob told me, "Hey, we're going to Frank Fire." Music, genius. Nobody would go against him. He said, "Don't ever F me." It was a definite warning.

• 1:15Speaker 02

  Did you read any of that contract?

• 1:18Speaker 01

  No, it was in German, and they never gave me a copy.

• 1:21Speaker 02

  You're nominated for a Grammy. Is it correct someone had paid some money to allow you all to lip sync at the Grammys?

• 1:29Speaker 01

  Well, Frank pushed a button and blew it up and told the world that he'd sing and lip.

• 1:35Speaker 02

  So I saw that press conference. It looks like a lynching.

• 1:37Speaker 01

  Giving up, I did, thousands of times. But then, at the last moment, the voice said, "No, he come right back here. You're gonna go through this. There's more to that story."

• 1:50Speaker 02

  Look, pause with me for just a second. Now, whether you've been with us every single week since day one, or you just drop in when a guest catches your eye, I see you. I truly appreciate you. Every comment, every share, every time you show up, it matters. We're building a really special community here. If you want to support what we're doing without spending a penny, please, take a second and hit the follow button. It costs nothing, but it signals to the world that these conversations matter. Thank you for being on this journey with us. Now, let's get started.

• 2:29Speaker 02

  The name Milli Vanilli is known globally.

• 2:33Speaker 01

  True.

• 2:34Speaker 02

  But I don't know if we, as an audience, truly know you, Fabrice.

• 2:42Speaker 01

  That's right.

• 2:43Speaker 02

  Can we go to little Fabrice?

• 2:45Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 2:46Speaker 02

  Because that's an area that I have not heard you talk about much. And if you're open to going there, is when you think about you as a little boy, what were, what was the structure of your family and where did you live?

• 3:03Speaker 01

  Well, I lived in Paris. My parents were from the Caribbean.

• 3:08Speaker 02

  So you were born in France, in Paris?

• 3:12Speaker 01

  I was born in Paris.

• 3:13Speaker 02

  So you were born, so you're the oldest of how many?

• 3:15Speaker 01

  Three.

• 3:16Speaker 02

  Of three?

• 3:17Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 3:18Speaker 02

  Okay. And so, do you remember love between your parents? That feeling of them loving each other and loving you?

• 3:31Speaker 01

  Not really.

• 3:34Speaker 01

  No. As far as I can recall, no. The only time where I saw love being the, you know, the piece of string that ties to fiber.

• 3:51Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 3:52Speaker 01

  You know, of family, was music. And that's why I kind of went towards music, because certainly the parental wall between my parents and I disappeared. They were on the dance floor, we're in the island, they're dancing, the Caribbean dance, because you know, you have certain Caribbean dance. My mom is doing like the dance, my dad is dancing. I'm like, wow. And I never saw my parents like that until that music, Groca, from the Caribbean came around, and I was old enough to see.

• 4:23Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 4:24Speaker 01

  And then they were smiling with each other, but my memories of my parents is fights, is physical. So that, right there with the music, smiling and dancing with each other, I was like, I'm curious. What is that? And I talk about that into my book, Blame It on the Game, is that I was afraid for many years to become my father because of his attitude towards my mother and what I was witnessing day in, day out. You know, so that was, I didn't want to be my father. Like, many people are afraid to become their parents, but then they let it happen.

• 5:10Speaker 01

  So I think that, just like your DNA, you can hack your DNA.

• 5:14Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 5:15Speaker 01

  You can hack yourself to flip and turn into something else. But it takes work.

• 5:20Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 5:21Speaker 01

  Knowledge.

• 5:22Speaker 02

  But Fab, something to help me understand is, so I was privileged, because when I grew up, I wanted to be like my father. I saw him and I wanted to emulate everything he did. And if he achieved something, I thought, I can now achieve something because I saw him achieve this.

• 5:44Speaker 01

  That is normal. That is the normal way. That is the proper way. That's when the family structure is balanced and love is present and care is present. Safety is present.

• 5:58Speaker 02

  Yes, yes.

• 5:59Speaker 01

  But I had none of that, growing up. None at all.

• 6:03Speaker 02

  Did your parents ever tell you that they loved you?

• 6:05Speaker 01

  No, I can't recall that. I went to see a psychiatrist for many years.

• 6:10Speaker 02

  Starting at what age?

• 6:12Speaker 01

  I think it was like, my parents were divorcing between like 13, at the age of 13, they were divorcing, because she put me into like a psychiatrist, just because it showed that he's not the same person. I wasn't. I was a happy kid, I was funny, you know, I was making jokes and stuff. But when that happened, when they separated, I think that everything came crashing.

• 6:41Speaker 01

  You know, and then I hoped that they could stay together, I think. I was hoping they could work it out. But then, when my dad left, it's like a piece of the household disappeared.

• 6:55Speaker 01

  And that kind of, you know, touched me deeply. So this is why, she saw that and the school saw it. She was calling to school and, you know, and then the next step was, next phase was, okay, well, let's put him into a place where he can talk and maybe work it out.

• 7:15Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 7:16Speaker 01

  And speak openly.

• 7:17Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 7:18Speaker 01

  About what's going on in that head.

• 7:20Speaker 02

  And Fab, only if you're open to doing this is, I'd be curious if you could take us to that moment where, if you recall where your father left the household, because I would imagine that's a pivotal moment in your life and really shaped the next, or actually, shaped you.

• 7:39Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 7:40Speaker 02

  Do you recall that moment?

• 7:41Speaker 01

  I don't really recall, but I know that his clothing were leaving. And he was a great dresser. He was like, oof, I think I got a lot, you know, I learned a lot from him. His suits, you know, and I could see the suits were, you know, his closet was, things were leaving, you know, as, and suddenly there was more of my mom's clothing in the closet, everywhere. You know, so the presence of my dad was being erased.

• 8:15Speaker 02

  Do you believe that there was a part of you that left at that age and never returned?

• 8:23Speaker 01

  I think that there's a, yeah, I believe so. But I think that by going to a psychiatrist, and the technique was, you drew, and then, and then he asked, he was asking like, "Oh, so what is that?" And also, you were trying to draw things that were happening in your life, and then the psychiatrist would say, "Okay, so what is this?" And that's where the conversation would come from.

• 8:47Speaker 02

  Ah, okay.

• 8:48Speaker 01

  And then you'd have a conversation. So we go from paper.

• 8:54Speaker 01

  To talking and it was a new technique at a time. I kinda looked into it. There's a word for that.

• 9:00Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 9:01Speaker 01

  You know, and, and that really helped me in the future.

• 9:05Speaker 02

  I see it.

• 9:05Speaker 01

  Fast forward.

• 9:06Speaker 02

  I see it.

• 9:07Speaker 01

  Because I draw and I paint. And right after everything that I've gone through, I felt the need to, yeah, that's gonna, to, to have this conversation, but there was no psychiatrist. So the conversations between me, the paper, or the canvas, or the writing. So this is why, for me, expressing myself alone in my little bubble was very natural. So maybe that's why I became who I became as an artist.

• 9:39Speaker 02

  At this point, you must have been dancing.

• 9:42Speaker 01

  Oh, yeah, yeah.

• 9:42Speaker 02

  Okay. So what, yeah, when, when did that begin?

• 9:46Speaker 01

  Oh, man, you know, in the Caribbean, you know, we danced.

• 9:49Speaker 02

  You were born and you danced, yeah.

• 9:51Speaker 01

  Yeah, we danced, you know, like I remember, you know, family members, you know, because everybody was a musician, you know, so what, so you take the pen, one takes the pen, the other one takes the guitar, the other one takes the forks, the other one takes the spoon, and suddenly you have a hole, and they're singing those traditional songs. That's how, that's what I witnessed growing up, you know, that's my, that's my experience. You know, so I am Creole, I grew up on that, you know. The skins were always there, you know, the conges were there, so there's always that, so we danced. There was no fear of, because everybody was dancing in front of each other, so dancing, and when you go back to Paris and you play the radio,

• 10:34Speaker 01

  then you dance, you know, but dancing makes you feel good.

• 10:39Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 10:39Speaker 01

  And it, it does something to your body, it's been proven, you know, there's studies on, on the fact that singing and dancing makes you feel better, so because of what was going on in my household, of course, I went closer to music when my parents divorced as well, to answer your question where it started, because I was looking for sanctuary.

• 11:01Speaker 02

  So something I'm curious about then is, why did you leave Paris?

• 11:07Speaker 01

  Well, you know.

• 11:08Speaker 02

  And, and why go to, to Munich?

• 11:11Speaker 01

  Because I was taking dance class, some friends of mine were gonna teach dancing in Germany.

• 11:17Speaker 02

  Ah, okay.

• 11:18Speaker 01

  So I went, and then I came home with some Deutschmark, and the Deutschmark was two to one to the French francs back then. And then I was like, mm, I like that. I had the freedom of being my own man.

• 11:32Speaker 02

  I see it.

• 11:33Speaker 01

  So the minute I turned eighteen, I was like, I'm out.

• 11:41Speaker 02

  I'm gone. So you finally go to Munich. What happens, because at least according to, to what I've read is, is that then it was hard to then find work.

• 11:53Speaker 01

  Oh, yeah, it was very difficult.

• 11:54Speaker 02

  In Munich.

• 11:55Speaker 01

  But because I had gone to Nürnberg and taught there, those people gave me the confidence that I could find work there, but it didn't happen so quickly. So we ended up with the friends that I had left Paris with, you know, in the streets, in the train station, sleeping, standing up, and sleeping at hostels with other people, we didn't have much, you know, who, who were, were poor, you know, so. But I was so proud, I didn't wanna call my mom for money. So I was trying to, until I had to, to reach out and say, hey, I need some money. And then she, she, she got me some money,

• 12:39Speaker 01

  and then not long after I was able to find a place where I could teach.

• 12:44Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 12:45Speaker 01

  And then from that point on, I was working. And then I was working as a model as well, then, of course, ran into Rob.

• 12:54Speaker 02

  All right, so now, please, help me understand how you ran into Rob, but right before that, a question I have is, Munich in the eighties.

• 13:06Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 13:08Speaker 02

  Must have been challenging.

• 13:09Speaker 01

  Oh, yeah.

• 13:10Speaker 02

  As a black man.

• 13:11Speaker 01

  Oh, yeah.

• 13:12Speaker 02

  So can you paint that picture, because that's what I.

• 13:15Speaker 01

  I'll tell you how crazy it was. In the eighties, in the subway, there was, um, they were doing ticket controls, right? But the guys were in civilian clothing.

• 13:29Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 13:29Speaker 01

  So the door would close, boom, Personale als Weis, identity card and your ticket. I never understood why they would ask for your, your identity card. I guess they were looking for people like me, maybe, I don't know. And, um, so a few times I got stopped because I didn't have my ticket. So then they, they take you back to a place in the subway, and then the people who come and get you were dressed like literally with black boots up to the knee, the uniform that was reminiscent, reminiscent of the forties, the nineteen forties.

• 14:11Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 14:12Speaker 01

  Black cap going up for a German shepherd. And then they would take you to a police car, take you home, and you had to pay cash.

• 14:23Speaker 02

  To the police?

• 14:23Speaker 01

  To the police, for the ticket. They wouldn't wait for, no, it was, you had to pay right there.

• 14:30Speaker 02

  And what would.

• 14:31Speaker 01

  They would take you home, and then you'd have to pay.

• 14:34Speaker 02

  What happens if you didn't have the money?

• 14:36Speaker 01

  Well, lucky me had the money.

• 14:38Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 14:38Speaker 01

  At home.

• 14:39Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 14:40Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 14:41Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 14:41Speaker 01

  That was scary, so that's, so that's one side of it. And of course Bavaria, very conservative. We were called names, and that's when I learned how to fight. In Paris, I never had to fight like this. But when I met Rob, and he would never take an insult, he would never walk away from an insult, never. Because he had gone through it, growing up as a, as a, as a young kid. That's why it took me some time to realize, why can he back down, like, leave it, dude, there's four guys there.

• 15:19Speaker 02

  Right.

• 15:20Speaker 01

  He was like, no.

• 15:22Speaker 02

  So can, can, can you, can you take me to a moment, your, your first fight in Germany?

• 15:26Speaker 01

  I can't remember my first fight, but I know that there were times where we'd walk down the street, El Poel Schasse, it's a big street, and we would, we would get a name already, we'd start to get a little famous, and then, you know, he was Bavarian, you know, he spoke Bavarianish. You have Holte, you have High German, and you have the dialect of Bavaria. And he was, he was, like, they called Baja. He was from Bavaria, so he spoke with that accent. So he knew the dialect, so if anyone would say anything in the dialect, thinking that he wouldn't understand, there's no way. And especially, I think it, it hit home because they addressed him a certain way

• 16:11Speaker 01

  in the dialect that he grew up with, so he went deep in. That's, that's his childhood, so that's why he was like, no. But I would tell him, hey, look, now there's three, there's four, like, we're just two, and I'm not the best. You know, but he was like, no, man, you're gonna learn. He was two years older than me, so of course, he would handle the bulk of it, you know, and then I had to just, but I, I did full contact growing up.

• 16:39Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 16:39Speaker 01

  In French boxing, so I knew how to fight, but I never had to like street fight. I was club fighting, but not street fighting, because you know, when you take, when you pick up martial arts, you're not supposed to fight outside. So I had skills, but I had never used those skills in the street.

• 16:59Speaker 02

  Right.

• 16:59Speaker 01

  And when I realized that I had skills, then I used those skills.

• 17:05Speaker 02

  And, and you said, and Rob never, never would turn, if there was any insult, he would never.

• 17:09Speaker 01

  Never.

• 17:10Speaker 02

  Never turn away from it?

• 17:11Speaker 01

  Never, not once. He, and I understand, because he got hurt, because he was, he was little and took it, made him feel bad. To a point where, when he beat, because he was a breakdancer, so breakdancing was like the gym. It developed him, he became super masculine, because he takes strength to breakdance.

• 17:36Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 17:36Speaker 01

  And he was one of the best in Germany. Right?

• 17:41Speaker 02

  Right.

• 17:42Speaker 01

  So that's why, like, when you would fight, I was like, whoa, man, he just goes in. But it was because of that, it's almost like that ancestral pain that comes out of being called this, this name so often. Until the point where I know there are people that we crossed again, and they were like, no, leave it. But he was ready. He would egg people on. Like, I was like, oh, man, dude, you gotta stop that, man.

• 18:12Speaker 02

  Wow. And ju- just to e- explore Rob's background, and then we'll definitely get into you two meeting each other. But just only because we're there right now is, from what I understand, was it his father was an American serviceman?

• 18:25Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah, his father.

• 18:27Speaker 02

  And his mother?

• 18:29Speaker 01

  Was a German lady.

• 18:30Speaker 02

  German lady, okay.

• 18:31Speaker 01

  Redhead.

• 18:32Speaker 02

  Okay. And he didn't grow up with his parents?

• 18:38Speaker 01

  No, he was adopted.

• 18:39Speaker 02

  He was adopted?

• 18:40Speaker 01

  He was put in an orphanage at an early age, you know, so, you know, who knows what happened there, too? You know, there's horror stories in there, too, you know? I wasn't there, but I was told, you know, and, you know, again, I like to use that term, cause and effect. It really is that. So he was a product of growing up in an orphanage, being bullied at a young age in the eighties in Germany, where there were no black people or mixed people around. So, you know, kids can be mean.

• 19:12Speaker 02

  So then, when you met Rob, what was that? Wha- what happened? How did you two meet?

• 19:19Speaker 01

  He was very standoffish, very arrogant. Because it was like, there were not many black people in the city. So when we met for the first time, it was like, hmm, who's that? So he was very arrogant. And then we started dating the same girls.

• 19:35Speaker 02

  Oh, wow.

• 19:36Speaker 01

  And he was like, yo, hmm, my turf, you know? And we would run into each other. And I've told stories before, he would call me, hey, what's up, star? And I was like, oh, that's funny. Why does he call me that? You know, so I would return the favor, hey, what's up, star? And he would just move away. But I always thought that he was a very, you know how you call that, a social guy, you know? Known by everybody, loved by everybody, but he was always alone. When I ran into him, once I stayed longer in Munich, Germany. And I was like, hmm, that's weird, by himself?

• 20:21Speaker 01

  Then I would meet him in other places, but he was always mostly alone. Alone or just like me. And it came a point where we couldn't avoid each other, you know, and then we started talking to each other. And then we realized better to join forces.

• 20:37Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 20:37Speaker 01

  Than to go our separate ways. And when we did that, then the world started to notice that we were there.

• 20:45Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 20:45Speaker 01

  We got more action.

• 20:47Speaker 02

  So when you said you decided to join forces, was it you two, what, moved in with each other?

• 20:52Speaker 01

  No, no, no, it was just, first of all, it was like, the conversations we had were like, wow, he loves music as much as I love music. He loves dancing as much as I love dancing. We'd go to the club. Everybody's like, you know, looking at what we're doing. We're entertaining the whole club, the energy goes up. And this is where we learned how to perform together. We took on the room in that club called P. Eins. I mean, you had everybody go through there in the eighties. Any band you can think of was at P. Eins. And years later, I would run into some of those bands that came through. I was like, oh, were you the guys from P. Eins? He's like, yeah, from Charlie Wilson to.

• 21:33Speaker 02

  Wow, what?

• 21:34Speaker 01

  To Whitney Houston.

• 21:36Speaker 02

  Really?

• 21:37Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 21:38Speaker 02

  Goodness.

• 21:38Speaker 01

  You know, Whitney Houston and us were on the same label. And I remember, you know, she knew exactly that we were those guys who danced, that were hired to dance behind her at a release party at P. Eins.

• 21:52Speaker 02

  Look at that. All right. So at first, you were going to the club, just the two of you, just to have a good time?

• 21:59Speaker 01

  A good time.

• 22:00Speaker 02

  And then it got to the point where people recognized?

• 22:03Speaker 01

  Well, the thing is, when we, because we had long conversation, you know, I said, okay, well, we wanna go into the music industry? How do we do that? Rob played guitar, so we wrote songs, he played blues chords. We sang together, worked on harmonies. And we said, okay, how can we get into the music industry? You know, so first, let's start to sing together, write some songs, and let's go out and let people know we're here. So that's why we danced and entertained the troops in the clubs and hang out with the DJ and then, can you play that song? You know, and of course, back then, the music was mixed, you know? Prince came to P. Eins as well during Son of the Times.

• 22:46Speaker 01

  You know, we'd play Prince, we'd play U2, Earth, Rain, Fire. I mean, you know, that time, late eighties, going into the nineties, you know, because there was a lot of the early, mid-eighties music that was being played in the club.

• 22:59Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 23:00Speaker 01

  Talk about like, the richness of it all, you know? New Order, you know, The Cure. So much music I can think of right now, that was, but it was so eclectic. But we still managed to get the room to sing along. And this is where we gained our skills as performers and knew what to do when put in front of an audience.

• 23:29Speaker 02

  Ah, I see. So at a certain point, then the club has hired you both? Or they pay?

• 23:35Speaker 01

  No, but special treatment.

• 23:37Speaker 02

  Special treatment?

• 23:37Speaker 01

  Free drinks.

• 23:39Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 23:39Speaker 01

  And that club was, I mean, that club must have been one of the longest-running club in Europe. Called P. Eins.

• 23:48Speaker 02

  P. Eins, in Munich?

• 23:49Speaker 01

  In Munich, in a building that was built by someone that was at the head of the Third Reich.

• 23:57Speaker 02

  Oh, okay.

• 23:59Speaker 01

  And the building was called Haus der Kunst. And it was called House of Art. And in the beginning, and it looked like a Roman building. And the beginning of the building, the rest was for art exhibit.

• 24:13Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 24:14Speaker 01

  And then the front was a small room. And in this room, some of the richest, most influential people in the world ended up. They were, it was like a Studio 54 of Germany.

• 24:26Speaker 02

  I see it.

• 24:27Speaker 01

  On the highest level.

• 24:28Speaker 02

  All right, I see.

• 24:29Speaker 01

  Lavish, lavish parties, like, you know, with sponsorship, by correspondencehip, like, it was just, there was so much budget there. It was like crazy.

• 24:39Speaker 02

  And you and Rob, I can see it now, had special treatment, preferred treatment?

• 24:44Speaker 01

  Oh, we were always invited. Because we were part of that P. Eins family. Even though we were not on the payroll, we were part of that. And that gave us this aura of fame. As a matter of fact, we became so famous in the club that an artist called Theo Crash decided to paint us in a painting like this size right there. All those frames that you have together?

• 25:10Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 25:11Speaker 01

  Like Rob and Fab by James Dean, Marilyn Monroe, and I think Alice Presley.

• 25:18Speaker 02

  All right.

• 25:19Speaker 01

  So there we were immortalized at P. Eins. And then I remember once, true stories. I'm on the second floor of the club, Prince is up there.

• 25:29Speaker 02

  Prince?

• 25:29Speaker 01

  Yeah, Prince, with a lot of women around. The security comes to us and say, hey, you know, you have to go down. Because Prince didn't allow men that he didn't know to be on the same floor, that's what we were told. And then we said, no, we're not moving. Look at the painting.

• 25:56Speaker 01

  And then he went back and never came back. So then Prince was like, okay. But we didn't try to go bother him or go to, you know, we stayed where we were just to make a point. Eventually, we went down, because it was boring. No action there, you know, the action was downstairs. But just to, you know, to make our point, like, yeah, we're famous through here.

• 26:19Speaker 02

  Yeah, look at the painting.

• 26:20Speaker 01

  We were super fans of Prince.

• 26:21Speaker 02

  Yeah. So Fab, I have to show you something. All right, look at this. I have lots of little surprises. All right, so I want you to tell me, what was happening during this moment? What do you remember about it?

• 26:34Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 26:38Speaker 01

  Wow. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, so what happened was

• 26:46Speaker 01

  we ended up, we started modeling. You know, because I was teaching dancing. And there was an agent, there was a dance school who would organize, who would supply models for the fashion designers.

• 27:02Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 27:03Speaker 01

  And then we started working for. And as a matter of fact, the dance school who supplied those models for those fashion shows was the place where I met Rob for the first time.

• 27:15Speaker 02

  Ah.

• 27:16Speaker 01

  Yeah. And then out of that system, we were getting jobs. So that's why you see that, right?

• 27:26Speaker 02

  And when you, you kind of hesitated at first when you looked at that. What's your, what's your initial reaction? What was it?

• 27:33Speaker 01

  Takes me back to a place where who was struggling, man.

• 27:38Speaker 01

  You know, like. But you don't see that there.

• 27:41Speaker 02

  Mm-mm.

• 27:41Speaker 01

  There's no sign of it.

• 27:45Speaker 01

  Totally in character. You know, and I think that I learned to, to do that. Even though struggling, having to steal bread

• 27:57Speaker 01

  and chocolate. I have something on the table. That's that time. But because Rob was there for me,

• 28:09Speaker 01

  I felt safe. So I must say that, you know, at the beginning, because our relationship evolved and changed.

• 28:17Speaker 01

  But he had my back. 100% at first.

• 28:21Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 28:22Speaker 01

  But Rob always had issues because of what happened to him. You know, so, um.

• 28:28Speaker 01

  Yeah. Wow, look at that.

• 28:30Speaker 02

  Yeah. You know, so how old are you in this?

• 28:34Speaker 01

  Eighteen.

• 28:35Speaker 02

  You're eighteen?

• 28:36Speaker 01

  Yeah, eighteen, nineteen.

• 28:37Speaker 02

  What, what a one, two-year period for you. You, you knew some, some German.

• 28:43Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 28:43Speaker 02

  But you didn't know German, though.

• 28:45Speaker 01

  No.

• 28:45Speaker 02

  When you got there.

• 28:46Speaker 01

  No, no, no, no.

• 28:47Speaker 02

  I'll hold on to that.

• 28:47Speaker 01

  I didn't, I didn't. And, um. But I went to the library to continue my studies.

• 28:54Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 28:55Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 28:55Speaker 02

  So you taught yourself?

• 28:56Speaker 01

  So I taught myself.

• 28:58Speaker 02

  So then with, with Rob, would you say that he was, early on, you two were, would you call yourself best friends?

• 29:05Speaker 01

  Oh, yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah, we were. We were the best friends, man. He was like, like I say, he was the, the big brother I never had, who had my back. And he was funny, too. He was dark, too. But he was funny, too. And, and I liked making him laugh.

• 29:25Speaker 02

  It, it's almost as if fate brought the two of you together.

• 29:29Speaker 01

  100%.

• 29:30Speaker 02

  Yeah. Can we talk about how you and Rob? Because I imagine before Milli Vanilli comes together, performs as a proper group, you two wanted to be musicians.

• 29:43Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 29:44Speaker 02

  And then is it, is it this correct that you studied others and began to figure out what the style was going to be?

• 29:50Speaker 01

  We got to thank BBC for that.

• 29:52Speaker 02

  BBC?

• 29:52Speaker 01

  Oh, man.

• 29:53Speaker 02

  All right, how so?

• 29:54Speaker 01

  You know, because the BBC, man, the level, the documentary that the BBC was producing in the seventies that we got to see in the eighties about all the major bands, behind the scene. And then we had noticed that the majority of those stars, just like I mentioned, you know, from James Zine, the hair. Elvis Presley, the hair. Marilyn Monroe, the hair. Bob Marley, the hair. The Beatles, the hair. So there was something about that. And then I noticed, I noticed that you knew the silhouette. When you look at Michael Jackson, you're like, oh, that's Michael.

• 30:35Speaker 02

  That's interesting, the silhouette, yeah.

• 30:37Speaker 01

  The silhouette.

• 30:38Speaker 02

  Yeah, okay.

• 30:39Speaker 01

  Elvis, same thing, the silhouette. Bob Marley, the silhouette. If you take the color out and you just take the shape, oh, that's Bob Marley.

• 30:48Speaker 02

  It's Bob Marley, yes.

• 30:49Speaker 01

  Everyone knows.

• 30:50Speaker 02

  That's fascinating.

• 30:51Speaker 01

  Michael Jordan.

• 30:52Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 30:53Speaker 01

  The silhouette. You know, so we noticed that. And we said, okay, we got to come up with our, um, silhouette. What is it? And of course, we used to go to, to those stores with a bunch of clothing. And sometime would end up in the ladies' section. Because everything looked like colorful. And it was like, oh, that's kind of cool, you know?

• 31:20Speaker 01

  And then I was thinking, well, but that's, those are women's clothing. But you know, when you're young, you're like, oh, forget about it. Let's try, just put it on. And then the lady, the, the sales lady would come and say, wrong section, it's men is here.

• 31:37Speaker 01

  Don't matter.

• 31:38Speaker 02

  Right.

• 31:38Speaker 01

  We want to try. And then we'd be, we were small, skinny. So we'd put the blazer on, it was like, oh, it's cool.

• 31:46Speaker 01

  That looks cool.

• 31:47Speaker 02

  Interesting. So the, the hair even, I mean, this shows you how ignorant.

• 31:52Speaker 01

  The hair, you know, it was, I think that Terrence inspired us, too.

• 31:56Speaker 02

  Terrence Trent Darby?

• 31:58Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 31:58Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 31:59Speaker 01

  Of course, you know, Terrence was there, he was amazing. Of course, we were looking at Bob Marley. For us, Bob Marley was the, the figure. And then when you'd go to those shops, you'd see the woman working on a, you'd say, oh, that's cool. It'd be cool on us. That'd be cool. And we tried, and I'm telling you. Phew. When we put that on, it was all she wrote, man. We never had problems with ladies, never, never. It was never an issue.

• 32:29Speaker 02

  I was going to say.

• 32:30Speaker 01

  When we did that, it was like.

• 32:32Speaker 02

  It was a game.

• 32:33Speaker 01

  Game changer.

• 32:34Speaker 02

  This is what I think, there will be a group of people that believe that at that time, that was your hair.

• 32:42Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 32:43Speaker 02

  But it was weaved in.

• 32:44Speaker 01

  Yeah, it was, we called that, there was no dress, right? Like I have now. It was braided.

• 32:50Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 32:51Speaker 01

  But I'm telling you, that, when we started, we didn't have the money to pay for the super treatment. But when we had the money, it was, it was like over a kilo of hair.

• 33:06Speaker 02

  It must have been human hair at that point.

• 33:08Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 33:08Speaker 02

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 33:09Speaker 01

  We had the money, so.

• 33:11Speaker 02

  And so was it the look, the dance, the, the interaction that you were having with the crowd? Is that what caught the attention originally of the gentleman who signed you?

• 33:23Speaker 01

  Well, what happened was we were in Munich. And as we were making noise and working with small producers in the city, then we worked with the studio musicians of Frank Firen that we were playing football with.

• 33:37Speaker 02

  Ah, okay.

• 33:38Speaker 01

  And that's how it got connected. Then we started performing with those soccer players who were working with Frank Firen as studio musicians and performed at a club called P.I.S.

• 33:52Speaker 01

  And then from there, then the noise was going around, you know? And, and that's how we were working it. Like, okay, let's push, let's push it, let's push it. Let people know that's what we do.

• 34:04Speaker 02

  Okay. And at that time, you were known as what, just Robin Fab?

• 34:07Speaker 01

  Robin Fab. So when it came to Milli Vanilli,

• 34:12Speaker 01

  because I was not a native and Frank Firen and his team didn't speak English very well, everything went through Rob.

• 34:21Speaker 02

  Ah, okay. Can, can we break this down? I have a million questions.

• 34:26Speaker 01

  On that?

• 34:27Speaker 02

  About the signing of Milli Vanilli. Because it seems like this is where

• 34:33Speaker 02

  it feels like it started on a lie. And, and you tell me differently as we, as we break it down. Hey there, I just want to say thank you for choosing We Need to Talk. Doing this podcast is one of the greatest joys of my life. And I want to continue to share it with you. So hit follow and the bell icon. It takes just a second and it helps us to continue to grow this podcast.

• 35:02Speaker 02

  So what happened? Tell me, how did, how did Frank reach out to you? And then what, what were you aware of who he was?

• 35:13Speaker 01

  Well, I was not aware of who he was. I had no clue. I grew up in Paris listening to lots of disco music. Seron and so on and so on. And a lot of American music.

• 35:27Speaker 02

  You must have loved Chic.

• 35:28Speaker 01

  Chic, Roger, which I met.

• 35:30Speaker 02

  Roger, yeah.

• 35:31Speaker 01

  Super cool.

• 35:32Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 35:32Speaker 01

  And, um. What happened was Bon Iam was not my favorite. In those little parties, we called them Boom. But we danced, everything, teenagers dancing. I was more like a disco kid.

• 35:45Speaker 02

  Okay, and Bon Iam was Frank's group?

• 35:47Speaker 01

  It was Frank's groups. And in every parties where I went, they were playing it. It was, it was huge, it was huge. And then Rob told me, hey, you know, we, someone connected us.

• 35:59Speaker 01

  We're going to Frank Firen. Oh, okay, cool. I didn't know who I was. Until he told me, oh, that's Bon Iam.

• 36:06Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 36:07Speaker 01

  So he was more familiar with the man, the legend, all right? As a producer. As a person, no one knew really the enigmatic Frank Firen was.

• 36:18Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 36:20Speaker 01

  But there were things that had popped through the years and people knew he was, he was, he had a strong character.

• 36:27Speaker 01

  And Robert, a strong character.

• 36:30Speaker 01

  So we got over there.

• 36:32Speaker 02

  This is to his house?

• 36:34Speaker 01

  Yeah, because what happened was through his, the musicians who were connected and said, okay, we want to see those guys, Robin Fab. So we came to the studio. And when we came to the studio was, I mean, it was like entering Quincy Jones's recording studio. Because I had seen documentaries about Quincy Jones on television.

• 36:54Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 36:55Speaker 01

  And you see all the platinum records, the gold records on the wall. It's like, wow. I mean. No, you're eighteen, nineteen, you're maybe twenty.

• 37:07Speaker 01

  And when you enter a temple, because it looked like a temple. And then as you pass the studio door, it opens up and you see a console.

• 37:17Speaker 02

  Right.

• 37:18Speaker 01

  That is five meters. You're like, oh my god, like, this is the real thing. Because until that point, we worked with guys who had a studio in their apartment. In a bedroom.

• 37:30Speaker 02

  Right. This is the real deal.

• 37:32Speaker 01

  We had never experienced that kind of professionalism and accolades through sales of records. Bon- Bon Iam, boom.

• 37:42Speaker 02

  I see it. And then Fab also, when you go, so this is a studio in his house or just a separate studio?

• 37:47Speaker 01

  No, that's a compound.

• 37:48Speaker 02

  Oh, it's a compound?

• 37:49Speaker 01

  Compound.

• 37:49Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 37:50Speaker 01

  With four studios in there.

• 37:51Speaker 02

  Four studios.

• 37:52Speaker 01

  Four.

• 37:52Speaker 02

  When you go, are you thinking, and it's Rob that told you that you're you're going to go. Are you thinking, we're going to sign a deal?

• 38:00Speaker 01

  No, no, no.

• 38:01Speaker 02

  No.

• 38:01Speaker 01

  No, we we we're going to meet people because we didn't know how the industry works.

• 38:07Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 38:07Speaker 01

  I had no idea. I mean, Robert and I did because he had an, that's other deal before. But that's on another level.

• 38:16Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 38:17Speaker 01

  And I was not, I had no idea about how things worked. So when we got to the studio and, you know, we sat there in the kitchen and his assistant, who did all the dirty, dirty work, came, you know, like, you know, the, you know, the snake in the Jungle Book.

• 38:35Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 38:36Speaker 01

  You know, nice, gentle, almost like a mother figure. That Rob and I, because of our complicated childhood, never really had. So she was that mother.

• 38:53Speaker 02

  I see.

• 38:53Speaker 01

  So nice, you know, friendly, soft spoken. And then you got the daddy that comes in, boom.

• 39:00Speaker 02

  Who's Frank?

• 39:01Speaker 01

  It's Frank.

• 39:02Speaker 02

  Yes. So it's just the two of them there?

• 39:04Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah. And it and suddenly it's like, like, um, it's like the parents you never had. That you think, oh, that is my family, my musical family. So, you know, you're never gonna bite the hand that was gonna facilitate this dream of yours.

• 39:23Speaker 02

  Yes. But can we go into the details of this?

• 39:27Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 39:27Speaker 02

  All right. This is where I'm super curious. I wanna go deep on this one.

• 39:32Speaker 01

  All right.

• 39:32Speaker 02

  Because I can, I can empathize and sympathize, especially being in the industry.

• 39:42Speaker 01

  Right.

• 39:42Speaker 02

  Being in television.

• 39:43Speaker 01

  And how things work.

• 39:44Speaker 02

  How you could walk into big production and it feel like your, all your dreams are going to come true.

• 39:52Speaker 01

  You have arrived.

• 39:54Speaker 02

  You've arrived.

• 39:55Speaker 01

  You haven't signed anything, you still have nothing in your pocket, but in your mind, in your heart of heart, man, I made it.

• 40:05Speaker 02

  Right.

• 40:05Speaker 01

  And I am that thing I've always dreamed of.

• 40:08Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 40:08Speaker 01

  And that's crazy.

• 40:10Speaker 02

  But what adds a layer of complication that I've never dealt with is is they're all speaking German, right?

• 40:17Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 40:18Speaker 02

  So, so you, I mean, it sounds like you don't understand everything that's being said, but you understand a lot of what's being said.

• 40:27Speaker 01

  I understand a lot of it.

• 40:28Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 40:29Speaker 01

  You know, but I'm the third wheel.

• 40:34Speaker 01

  I didn't feel that at first.

• 40:37Speaker 01

  But meeting after meeting that took place, I was like, okay, I'm not being really truly acknowledged here. Hmm, that's weird.

• 40:46Speaker 02

  So, so Frank and his assistant, they're just focused really on Rob?

• 40:50Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 40:51Speaker 02

  And interacting with Rob?

• 40:52Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 40:53Speaker 02

  So.

• 40:53Speaker 01

  And then everything's relayed to me after.

• 40:57Speaker 02

  I see.

• 40:57Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 40:58Speaker 02

  Okay. So ju- just to break this down for everybody. I have a whole chart here, Fab. Got a whole chart.

• 41:05Speaker 01

  Show the comms. First of all, there was Charles Shaw.

• 41:09Speaker 02

  Yes, yes.

• 41:10Speaker 01

  Who did the rap for Gurren Oh, It's True. Good guy.

• 41:15Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 41:15Speaker 01

  Good guy.

• 41:16Speaker 02

  And then John replaces Charles.

• 41:19Speaker 01

  Because Frank removed Charles.

• 41:22Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 41:23Speaker 01

  Because Charles had a strong personality. And Frank didn't deal with guys who had strong personalities. So the minute you stuck your neck out and started to say no on the plantation,

• 41:38Speaker 01

  kicked out.

• 41:38Speaker 02

  You're chopped. And then in addition, there's Brad Howell.

• 41:42Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 41:43Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 41:43Speaker 01

  Who had been working with Frank for years as a, as an artist.

• 41:48Speaker 02

  All right.

• 41:49Speaker 01

  So then it ended up being John Davis and Brad Howell.

• 41:52Speaker 02

  And there's also, is it Linda and Jody Rocco?

• 41:55Speaker 01

  The background singers.

• 41:57Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 41:58Speaker 01

  Background singers.

• 41:59Speaker 02

  Background singers. So Frank is working with them and he's developing.

• 42:04Speaker 01

  He's making.

• 42:05Speaker 02

  He's, he's making songs and at the same.

• 42:08Speaker 01

  Or he's covering songs.

• 42:10Speaker 02

  Oh, he's covering songs.

• 42:11Speaker 01

  Because Gurren Oh, It's True is a cover.

• 42:14Speaker 02

  From?

• 42:15Speaker 01

  Numark.

• 42:16Speaker 02

  Numark, okay, okay. Yeah, okay. I didn't know this.

• 42:19Speaker 01

  Oh, yeah.

• 42:20Speaker 02

  So girl, so he's just covering songs. Now, is it, what is, is it that he doesn't like their look? And that's the reason why he's searching for a.

• 42:30Speaker 01

  Frank Fiennes. Music genius. He had a career as a, as an artist. And he was making like traditional German music.

• 42:42Speaker 01

  But he had this love for black music. Big time. It's clear. Then I heard that he was working on a project for himself, went to the label, and the label said, hey, that's black music, you're white.

• 43:01Speaker 01

  So what do you do as an artist? You're gonna find a way to live your dream. Hint, hint, Bon Iam. He did the vocals for Bobby Farrell.

• 43:13Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 43:13Speaker 01

  That's where it started. That's why this lip syncing thing affair started in his mind.

• 43:19Speaker 02

  Okay. And just to break that down for everyone, because Bobby Farrell is black.

• 43:23Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 43:24Speaker 02

  Right? Yeah. But Frank.

• 43:26Speaker 01

  Did the voice for Bobby Farrell.

• 43:28Speaker 02

  I didn't know that.

• 43:29Speaker 01

  And did you know that? Oh, you didn't know that?

• 43:30Speaker 02

  I did not know that.

• 43:31Speaker 01

  I opened a can of worms for you there.

• 43:33Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 43:33Speaker 01

  Did you know that Bon Iam is one of the very few groups to have diamond?

• 43:40Speaker 01

  They've sold.

• 43:42Speaker 02

  Diamond is ten million, right?

• 43:44Speaker 01

  Man, we're talking.

• 43:45Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 43:45Speaker 01

  They're multi, like, we're talking, I mean, Bon Iam, I would have to research that.

• 43:50Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 43:50Speaker 01

  But we're talking over thirty, forty, like.

• 43:54Speaker 02

  Okay, millions.

• 43:56Speaker 01

  There were many albums made.

• 43:58Speaker 02

  Interesting.

• 43:59Speaker 01

  So that's where the mad scientist started to think.

• 44:03Speaker 02

  I see it.

• 44:06Speaker 01

  Milli Vanilli, why? He never got to America.

• 44:12Speaker 02

  So Bon- Bon Iam is Europe, Germany mostly.

• 44:16Speaker 01

  No, no, no. Latin America, huge.

• 44:19Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 44:19Speaker 01

  Around the world.

• 44:21Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 44:22Speaker 01

  But America.

• 44:25Speaker 01

  And he had his, his sight on. Any producer in Europe wanted to get to America.

• 44:29Speaker 02

  Right.

• 44:29Speaker 01

  That is the goal.

• 44:30Speaker 02

  Right.

• 44:31Speaker 01

  London.

• 44:34Speaker 01

  First up, important spot, and then.

• 44:37Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 44:37Speaker 01

  U S. You know, so

• 44:41Speaker 01

  he was like, I'm gonna find a way to get the American market.

• 44:44Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 44:45Speaker 01

  And that's where it stems from, this architecture that he built.

• 44:49Speaker 02

  This makes sense.

• 44:49Speaker 01

  Made the music, worked it out, and then looked for two guys.

• 44:55Speaker 02

  So, so now, help me though understand is, is it that he didn't, because he started working, so the only part Fab that I don't understand is, why did Frank not just work with Brad, showcase them as the, as the talent? He, did he not like the look? Was that it?

• 45:13Speaker 01

  Control.

• 45:14Speaker 02

  Control.

• 45:14Speaker 01

  Of course, of course. Of course he, you know, of course he was into the aesthetic of things. If you look at Bon Iam, they were amazing. You know, visually, it was like the girl singers who all sang. And then this guy that was just dancing and had so much flavor, which you could have done, you could have done that.

• 45:33Speaker 02

  So the contract, that day, did you know that you were walking in to sign a contract? Or you just thought this is another meeting?

• 45:43Speaker 01

  No, we didn't know.

• 45:45Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 45:45Speaker 01

  It was just like, okay, we need you to come here and, you know, and then this. It started to talk about everything. I didn't have a manager, I didn't have an attorney. I didn't know what it took to, um, I didn't know what it took to, to, to sign a contract.

• 46:00Speaker 02

  Right.

• 46:01Speaker 01

  What was necessary. The only thing I knew as a kid is that when there was a contract, you sign it. And then you give it.

• 46:12Speaker 01

  And I never had that contract. They never gave me a copy.

• 46:17Speaker 02

  You never got a copy of it? When you signed, what did you believe you were signing?

• 46:27Speaker 01

  I didn't know what I was signing. And listen, I never had, I never had a deal. So I just think I signed for the money. That's what I, I told myself.

• 46:39Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 46:40Speaker 01

  Yeah, well, you always a contract. What does that mean, a contract? I was too young to know, no experience. So the only thing I know is that the money's on the table.

• 46:51Speaker 01

  We have to handle our business. We have to leave here and go and, and pay the rent, otherwise we're gonna get kicked out.

• 46:57Speaker 02

  Okay. And the, the amount of money, was it fifteen hundred?

• 47:01Speaker 01

  Yeah, it was very low.

• 47:02Speaker 02

  Uh, Deutschmarks?

• 47:03Speaker 01

  Yeah, it was very low.

• 47:04Speaker 02

  Which?

• 47:05Speaker 01

  Cause we divided in two, in two as well.

• 47:07Speaker 02

  Oh, it wasn't fifteen hundred each? Really fa- I thought it was fifteen hundred each?

• 47:11Speaker 01

  No, no, no. We divided that.

• 47:13Speaker 02

  So, so that is about maybe four hundred and eighty pounds?

• 47:16Speaker 01

  Yeah, it's nothing.

• 47:17Speaker 02

  So that's like two hundred and forty pounds a piece?

• 47:19Speaker 01

  Yeah. But we needed that money.

• 47:23Speaker 02

  And you had it right away?

• 47:24Speaker 01

  Right away.

• 47:25Speaker 02

  So you had that and then you used it for, for what?

• 47:30Speaker 01

  Food. You know?

• 47:32Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 47:33Speaker 01

  We need, but I think, I think it was more, it was the rent first. It was because the rent was due and we were about to get kicked out. So we need to, to, to get that money.

• 47:42Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 47:42Speaker 01

  So it was welcome.

• 47:44Speaker 02

  Was the name Milli Vanilli given to you at that meeting?

• 47:50Speaker 01

  No, that came much later.

• 47:52Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 47:52Speaker 01

  And, and you know, the thing is, we loved Secreti Palidi. Which was an English band. Great music. And we loved the cadence of the name, Milli Vanilli, Secreti Palidi. Milli was the little name of the secretary of Frank Faring.

• 48:14Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 48:14Speaker 01

  That's what his little name, that's what he called her. And somehow we combined those two together.

• 48:22Speaker 02

  Alright.

• 48:23Speaker 01

  We became Milli Vanilli.

• 48:25Speaker 02

  And, and so the, the assistant, this is Milli, this is who became the mother figure?

• 48:29Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 48:29Speaker 02

  For, for you and Rob? Okay. Also, I'm curious, Fab, at this point, early on, right when you signed, so let's just go back, right when you signed, did you trust Frank?

• 48:40Speaker 01

  Hundred percent.

• 48:43Speaker 01

  Hundred percent. Why, I mean, he had the apparatus, studio, staff, success. But I had noticed that he was, um, he appeared to be very detached from wherever he was. Like he was full on music. He didn't care about nothing else. And I felt like he didn't really care about us. I sensed that.

• 49:14Speaker 01

  At, at the beginning, he played a role.

• 49:16Speaker 02

  Right.

• 49:16Speaker 01

  You know, contract signed, everything's good, got him locked out, got locked in, you know? And then I had noticed that when we come to the studio to do some things, it was very short.

• 49:31Speaker 01

  You know, never really looked in your eyes. Boss is busy.

• 49:37Speaker 01

  But I was thinking, that's weird, he's not very, not very nice. And this is why when

• 49:45Speaker 01

  everything was exposed to us finally, and telling us, you're not gonna sing on a record. You know, first we heard the instrumental, that was amazing, and I felt, you know, just like you were saying, you're in the studio, you make, you're making movies in your head. Oh wow, amazing.

• 50:03Speaker 02

  Of, of the possibilities?

• 50:04Speaker 01

  Of the possibilities. Oh man, that's, that track sounds great.

• 50:07Speaker 02

  Could, could I ask you, even before that part, one thing that I have read, and just for you to clarify this, is did, when you signed, did Frank lean to you all and say anything? Cause there was that, there's this-

• 50:22Speaker 01

  Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 50:23Speaker 02

  He, he did?

• 50:23Speaker 01

  He did.

• 50:24Speaker 02

  At the signing?

• 50:25Speaker 01

  At the signing.

• 50:26Speaker 02

  What did he say?

• 50:28Speaker 01

  He said, don't ever F me.

• 50:32Speaker 01

  And everything was nice. In that moment, he was like, he was like, damn, what happened? You know?

• 50:42Speaker 01

  But it, it was

• 50:45Speaker 01

  it was not with anger though.

• 50:49Speaker 01

  But it was almost like sarcastic.

• 50:55Speaker 01

  But it was a warning. That it was a definite warning upon signing. And I thought it was weird. I forgot about that part.

• 51:05Speaker 02

  Okay. Can I, can I show you this photo? This is a photo of, of you both and him. Just wanna tell you, cause sometimes it's, it's triggering to, to, to see him.

• 51:17Speaker 02

  This is interesting to me.

• 51:21Speaker 02

  And the reason why is because you and Rob

• 51:26Speaker 02

  don't look happy.

• 51:27Speaker 01

  No.

• 51:28Speaker 02

  But he sure does.

• 51:30Speaker 01

  Man, you know how much money he was making? And I don't know exactly when that was, but we were not in good stance.

• 51:39Speaker 02

  Okay, here.

• 51:39Speaker 01

  Yeah. We were not. But we were going through the how you say that? The motion. Going through the motion and taking the photos because the label was there. I think that was a label party.

• 51:52Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 51:52Speaker 01

  Of some sort. And we just had to play the role.

• 51:55Speaker 02

  So, so, so this is after the success?

• 51:58Speaker 01

  Oh, success is here.

• 51:59Speaker 02

  Success is here, right here.

• 52:01Speaker 01

  Success is here.

• 52:01Speaker 02

  Isn't that interesting? Success is here, and you and Rob look miserable.

• 52:08Speaker 01

  Oh yeah, it's just

• 52:12Speaker 01

  like numb.

• 52:13Speaker 02

  Yeah. Look, like, like zombies almost.

• 52:17Speaker 01

  Totally.

• 52:18Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 52:18Speaker 01

  Even, even being side by side, that's, that's not even something that, you know, when we met, we never it was nothing.

• 52:27Speaker 02

  Never hugged.

• 52:28Speaker 01

  Never.

• 52:29Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 52:30Speaker 01

  But for the photo, you had to play the role.

• 52:32Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 52:34Speaker 02

  So, do you believe that Frank's intention was always for you and Rob to only lip sync?

• 52:42Speaker 01

  Always.

• 52:44Speaker 02

  From the beginning?

• 52:45Speaker 01

  From the beginning. He never had, the intention was to control everything.

• 52:50Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 52:51Speaker 01

  Because that's how, that's the type of person he was. You know? If you look at how artist development is handled on an artist that just starts his career, first album.

• 53:06Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 53:07Speaker 01

  Songwriters, uh, vocal producers, I mean, you got a whole team.

• 53:12Speaker 02

  Right.

• 53:13Speaker 01

  You know, we were talking about one single. We could have

• 53:18Speaker 01

  worked for like a month, one month. And then work it out. It was not that difficult. As a matter of fact, our equipment broke down when I was on tour, on MTV tour, and we had to do the show. We had to, you know, do those songs.

• 53:38Speaker 01

  So it, it, it could have been, it could have been, but it was not in the cards. For him, he wanted to control the whole situation. But I'll go further. He had an idea in his mind, as a producer, and obviously he was working on the music. He was not gonna scrap all that.

• 54:00Speaker 02

  Right.

• 54:01Speaker 01

  He had been working for months on the music, and he comes from doing Bonnie M and Bobby Farrell's vocals.

• 54:10Speaker 02

  Right, the blueprint's there?

• 54:11Speaker 01

  The blueprint is there.

• 54:12Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 54:12Speaker 01

  There's no way I could switch, is, get him to change his mind. Oh my God, no. Frank, whenever he made a decision, that was all she wrote.

• 54:22Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 54:23Speaker 01

  It stopped right there. You could never move that guy. He was so powerful. Generated millions of Deutschmark for BMG. Nobody would go against him. And this is why when we started to go against him and wanting to sing, you know, after the first single, it's blowing up, like, Rob and I were like, yo, come on. And, but we didn't know that Charles Shaw sang, rapped on Girl You Know It's True, was kicked off, and then John Davis came after.

• 54:53Speaker 02

  Was repl- yeah.

• 54:54Speaker 01

  We had no clue.

• 54:54Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 54:55Speaker 01

  You know, people still don't know, like, they're gonna be listening to that, watching and saying, why is that the same rapper from Girl You Know It's True to Big Don't Forget My Number to Girl, I'm Gonna Miss You? And so on and so on, all or nothing?

• 55:07Speaker 02

  Yeah, look at that. He was so

• 55:10Speaker 01

  Calculated.

• 55:11Speaker 02

  Calculated, with, with-

• 55:12Speaker 01

  Premeditated.

• 55:13Speaker 02

  With it, yeah, it, it's just, it's, it, it blows my mind. It blows my mind. So does Frank then call you in and play you the, just the track for Girl You Know It's True?

• 55:24Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 55:24Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 55:25Speaker 01

  But you know, now years later, after being in major studios, you know, they would put the tape on, I still it's in my head. You know, there's tapes that you hang on the wall?

• 55:35Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 55:36Speaker 01

  For when you switch sessions or, well, it was written. So the vocals were there. They would mute it.

• 55:43Speaker 02

  Oh.

• 55:44Speaker 01

  Because they had been working. Cause when I talked to John and gave me, giving me kind of like the timeline, I was like, oh, okay, so it was all done. When we came into the picture-

• 55:55Speaker 02

  It was done?

• 55:56Speaker 01

  It was done.

• 55:57Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 55:58Speaker 01

  They were just muting the vocals.

• 56:01Speaker 02

  So you hear it thinking-

• 56:03Speaker 01

  Instrumental.

• 56:04Speaker 02

  It's, this is like, this is our song?

• 56:05Speaker 01

  Like, wow. Like, pow.

• 56:10Speaker 01

  And then he said, I need to talk to you. So he took us to another room. And

• 56:19Speaker 01

  of course, the way things were done, we talked to Rob. Don't talk to me. And then I hear people raising their voices. And I hear Rob raising his voice, and I was, and then I see Frank leave. I'm like, oh damn. What did you do? Because I know Rob, from experience, messed up a lot of things in the past because he was so high strung. So you have, you have two high strung personalities here.

• 56:48Speaker 01

  And then Frank leaves and of course, the story was being told, hey, this is how you're gonna play that game. So at that point, I'm like, no, we're not doing that. That makes no sense. You know, that, that breaks everything we, we intended to do. To then, the secretary is the one that's, you know. Another figure comes around and she talks to.

• 57:20Speaker 02

  Talks to Rob.

• 57:21Speaker 01

  Talks to Rob.

• 57:22Speaker 02

  Wow, okay.

• 57:23Speaker 01

  You know, why not us? We're not good enough? You never tried us.

• 57:27Speaker 02

  Right. At this point, had they even heard you sing?

• 57:29Speaker 01

  No, they never did. They never tried our vocals. If they would have tried it, they would have recorded it, they would have sent it to the world. He would have kept it like, oh, this is what it sound like.

• 57:44Speaker 02

  Right.

• 57:45Speaker 01

  But at some point, he had to tell the musicians, Joshua was already, you know, out. And then Brad Owl, and then told, okay, this is how we're gonna do it.

• 57:56Speaker 02

  Right.

• 57:57Speaker 01

  And John was not happy.

• 57:59Speaker 02

  Okay. How, how, how do you know John at that point? But you didn't know John at that point?

• 58:02Speaker 01

  No, no, no, no, no. They kept us.

• 58:04Speaker 02

  Separate, yeah.

• 58:05Speaker 01

  Of course.

• 58:05Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 58:06Speaker 01

  You don't, you don't, you don't mix them together.

• 58:08Speaker 02

  Right.

• 58:09Speaker 01

  Because then there would have been, as a matter of fact, Frank kept John Davis and Brad separated until they came together. And then we started, like, John kind of started a little rebellion. But Brad Owl was connected to Frank. So the loyalty.

• 58:37Speaker 02

  Was there.

• 58:38Speaker 01

  Was for the, the guys gonna pay the bills.

• 58:41Speaker 02

  Okay, okay. How much do you believe you owed to them at that time?

• 58:47Speaker 01

  It could have been five thousand.

• 58:49Speaker 02

  Like five, uh, Deutschmarks?

• 58:51Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 58:52Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 58:52Speaker 01

  That's a lot of money.

• 58:53Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 58:54Speaker 01

  For us, it was a lot of money.

• 58:56Speaker 02

  So there, so did you and Rob talk about that and say, all right, we could try to work to pay them back? Or it was just like, nope, we, we just, we can't make the money back, so we'll do this one time and that's it?

• 59:07Speaker 01

  No, it, it was like this, like, when she came with like, that money has to be paid. We didn't know how to do that. You know, you, you're like, okay, I don't have a job. Like, how can I do that? Money ain't free.

• 59:25Speaker 02

  Right.

• 59:26Speaker 01

  So the quickest way to get out of debt is to do it. And they knew that. So you, you said, okay, we'll do it. We do, go and do it through, and then we're finished. And that's how we, that's why we said it, like, we're done. But we didn't know, we signed a full, three albums contract.

• 59:51Speaker 02

  Three album contract. So how do you prepare to lip sync?

• 59:56Speaker 01

  Man, I didn't even look, I, I didn't look at it like that.

• 1:00:00Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 1:00:01Speaker 01

  You know, I, I took it like, you know, when you're a dancer and you prepare for a play? You prepare for, you know, you study. So you study the lyrics.

• 1:00:11Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 1:00:11Speaker 01

  And you try to make sure that you get closest possible to what is done. And that's what I was doing. So I didn't look at it as, I'm lip syncing, I'm learning the song right now.

• 1:00:23Speaker 02

  I see it, I see it, okay.

• 1:00:24Speaker 01

  I'm learning the song, I'm gonna be doing it, I'm gonna create, because I created the choreography as well. So I'm gonna create something that is gonna work for us both. Because obviously, he's a break dancer, I'm a dancer. I studied ballet, jazz, street dance, I study all those things. So I'm, I'm a dancer, I'm a taught professional dancer. So I had to get him to make some moves that are gonna match, that are gonna make us look great together.

• 1:00:52Speaker 02

  Yes. So then at a certain point, I, I, I would assume Frank says, okay, let me see what you've been working on.

• 1:00:58Speaker 01

  Well, the way they did that, they invited us to go to this, uh, studio for this original TV show. And I would perform the song there first time, and it went crazy. It picked up. And that's when they said, all right. That's when, there was a switch, suddenly it became serious. And I think that's what they were waiting for. But I didn't know how the agenda, how they were running their play. Because I, I looked at it like, okay, this is wrong, but I'm learning something. I'm learning to rap right now. But I'm a singer.

• 1:01:39Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 1:01:40Speaker 01

  I've always sang. But I guess, Rob wants to do this? Big brother, I, I cannot go against my big brother. It's not gonna work. So I have to take that on.

• 1:01:50Speaker 02

  Okay. So Rob is the singer, he becomes the singer of the group?

• 1:01:54Speaker 01

  He becomes singer.

• 1:01:55Speaker 02

  You become the rapper of the group?

• 1:01:56Speaker 01

  I become the rapper.

• 1:01:57Speaker 02

  Okay, okay. So then, that first performance, you said there was strong reception?

• 1:02:03Speaker 01

  Strong.

• 1:02:04Speaker 02

  And then that song, from what I understand, it shoots to number one in Germany?

• 1:02:08Speaker 01

  Yeah. So, so what happened was, uh, once, it, it was tested originally. And from there, I think he went back to the record company, and that's when they started to budget. Because then you have to allocate budget for videos, for, you know, everything they need to do.

• 1:02:32Speaker 02

  All right, all right. So there, so that.

• 1:02:35Speaker 01

  So that, that, all that was aligned.

• 1:02:37Speaker 02

  Okay, okay. And at the same time.

• 1:02:40Speaker 01

  But we don't know about that.

• 1:02:41Speaker 02

  Okay, you don't know?

• 1:02:42Speaker 01

  I have no idea. I found that out later. You see, everything I'm telling you, I found out, much later.

• 1:02:50Speaker 02

  Right.

• 1:02:51Speaker 01

  Years later.

• 1:02:54Speaker 02

  How did you feel after your first performance?

• 1:02:57Speaker 01

  It was fun. Even though, as the track is played loud, you're lip syncing. So I hear myself, you know, rapping, and I'm like, oh, man. You know, I'm believing that it feels real.

• 1:03:11Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 1:03:12Speaker 01

  Because I, I didn't go, I didn't go like that. The dancer that I was, in, in my work ethics, I was like, yeah, I gotta, I gotta do it. Otherwise, it's not gonna connect emotionally. Like, you won't see the vein, you won't, I'm not into it. So I was doing it for real and got better at it. Nobody heard it, but I was doing it. And I think because of the fact that I was going so hard on it and spent hours, it looked real.

• 1:03:45Speaker 02

  It did.

• 1:03:46Speaker 01

  It looked like I embodied this character, like, it was, that's it, that's real. There's, there's no question about it.

• 1:03:53Speaker 02

  Yes. And did you also have hope that this was only a one-off? And you would be able to sing on the next one?

• 1:04:01Speaker 01

  Well, I didn't know about the next one. Remember, I didn't know about the contract.

• 1:04:07Speaker 02

  That, that's, that's true. So you, you were like, one, and then we're done?

• 1:04:11Speaker 01

  And then we're done, bro. We walk out of here like we're free of the plantation, finished, over.

• 1:04:16Speaker 02

  Okay, good point, good point.

• 1:04:18Speaker 01

  But then, when you taste that life, now they put you in a hotel. You come from nothing, you dial a number, you order your food, it comes in your room, served on a platter? You got an own hotel room that they clean when you mess it up? You can throw parties, order alcohol and the room service? You never have to pay for it. You go on to the next show, oh, it's recoupable, have you heard?

• 1:04:52Speaker 02

  Right.

• 1:04:52Speaker 01

  You don't know that term?

• 1:04:53Speaker 02

  Yeah, you don't know about recoupes?

• 1:04:55Speaker 01

  You don't know about recoupes, nothing.

• 1:04:56Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 1:04:57Speaker 01

  All you feel is like, wow. I'm a star now. And I'm loving it. So, you know, first phase, you're loving it. And then you're like, hmm. Because we know the music industry, there's, there's gotta be another song then. But this time is gonna be, it's gotta be us. It, it can't be like, we can't keep doing the same thing.

• 1:05:28Speaker 02

  Right.

• 1:05:29Speaker 01

  And then we, we'll receive the like, you know, you guys are joking. No, no, no. It's gonna be a second single, but you're gonna keep doing what you're doing.

• 1:05:40Speaker 02

  This is Frank that tells you this?

• 1:05:42Speaker 01

  I can't remember who, but that was the message. So at this moment in time, what options do we have? None. So we, we say to ourselves, can we keep going? And we partly live our dream, and then eventually, maybe we can pivot to something else. In the meantime, we get in front of people, and it's like, we're totally delusional at this point. But you know, that feeling was like no other.

• 1:06:21Speaker 02

  That is what compels you to say, okay, we're, we're gonna.

• 1:06:27Speaker 01

  One hundred percent.

• 1:06:28Speaker 02

  All right, we're, we're gonna do this again?

• 1:06:29Speaker 01

  One hundred percent. But then, that became hope, that became the burden. That that secret.

• 1:06:37Speaker 02

  Right.

• 1:06:38Speaker 01

  Started to weigh a ton.

• 1:06:41Speaker 02

  Because you're, you're worried you're going to be caught?

• 1:06:43Speaker 01

  Worried you're gonna be caught, and then when you, at the end of the night, when the people leave, you look at yourself in the mirror, and it's like, hmm.

• 1:06:54Speaker 01

  Damn. Because it's me, myself and I. So maybe me, I'm cool.

• 1:07:01Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 1:07:02Speaker 01

  But myself and I are like tripping like, yo, wake up.

• 1:07:09Speaker 01

  So the instinct within myself is saying, it's not gonna end well. That is going in a place where, because I can see Rob, that's now going into drugs more. And I'm going into drugs as well to forget the fact that the weight is heavy. So in order to forget that the weight is heavy, you numb yourself to a maximum with everything you can.

• 1:07:36Speaker 02

  Were you, before you, you started to chart in the US, were you and Rob starting to consume drugs?

• 1:07:44Speaker 01

  Yeah, we, yes, we started. Yeah, we did already because it was,

• 1:07:52Speaker 01

  I was doing it in social. It was a social thing. But I noticed that when you did drugs, you were like locked out. Locked out of that room where everything happens and you're aware of everything that happens.

• 1:08:10Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 1:08:10Speaker 01

  So you lock out. You don't feel nothing. It's like, I'm cool. I'm cool with it all. I'm tired, but it is, it is where I'm at now. When will I be able to get out of there? I don't know. But until that point, I'm gonna, I'm gonna medicate myself and see what happens.

• 1:08:33Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 1:08:33Speaker 01

  In the meantime, I was taking much less than what Rob is doing.

• 1:08:40Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 1:08:41Speaker 01

  And I could see the decline. It's in his eyes. It's in the movement. It's in the intensity of the show because he's not present.

• 1:08:53Speaker 02

  In the show. So, so he was, he was consuming drugs even before the performances?

• 1:08:58Speaker 01

  No.

• 1:08:59Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 1:08:59Speaker 01

  No, he wasn't because we had a massage therapist, acupuncture, that would just wake you up like, you know, we, and we'd run 5K before the show.

• 1:09:10Speaker 02

  Oh, wow, before the show?

• 1:09:11Speaker 01

  Before the show.

• 1:09:12Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:09:12Speaker 01

  After that, I stopped running and I would swim 45 minutes.

• 1:09:16Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 1:09:16Speaker 01

  To get ready, but the, but the night before, until seven or eight, going hard.

• 1:09:23Speaker 02

  On drugs.

• 1:09:23Speaker 01

  Pff, full on.

• 1:09:25Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 1:09:26Speaker 01

  You know, so it was a dichotomy in our behaviors. We look super healthy and, but not.

• 1:09:33Speaker 02

  Right. Right.

• 1:09:35Speaker 01

  But we were young.

• 1:09:36Speaker 02

  Right.

• 1:09:37Speaker 01

  And that youth could handle that path.

• 1:09:41Speaker 02

  Yeah. And also, the, the, the stage performance, though, it was incredible. You know, I've, I've, I've literally read comments of people that said, today, they say, just the stage performance alone should have won them a Grammy.

• 1:09:55Speaker 01

  I know that was going.

• 1:09:56Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:09:59Speaker 02

  It was like, just that by itself.

• 1:10:01Speaker 01

  Yeah, listen, we worked hard, man. And I, you know, I'll say, I worked hard. Because there was a time where my dude gave up. He was not giving. Because he was, he was becoming disillusioned.

• 1:10:18Speaker 01

  It felt like there was a battle that he couldn't win. You know, we, we, it looked like nobody was gonna come and save us.

• 1:10:27Speaker 02

  But what was happening, and I think part of the challenge probably for you was how quickly and how popular.

• 1:10:35Speaker 01

  We became.

• 1:10:36Speaker 02

  You became, it, it, it is actually mind blowing.

• 1:10:39Speaker 01

  Timeline?

• 1:10:40Speaker 02

  The timeline, so it was 1988.

• 1:10:44Speaker 01

  Right.

• 1:10:47Speaker 02

  Girl, You Know It's True hits number one.

• 1:10:49Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:10:49Speaker 02

  First, what, Germany?

• 1:10:51Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:10:52Speaker 02

  Okay. Then.

• 1:10:54Speaker 01

  Europe.

• 1:10:54Speaker 02

  In, in Europe. And that's 1988. Then one year later, by 1989, Milli Vanilli has sold more albums than Michael Jackson.

• 1:11:04Speaker 01

  I know. That's insane.

• 1:11:07Speaker 02

  That's just.

• 1:11:08Speaker 01

  I, I, you know, because I don't, I don't look at stats, you know, but people always, they tell me, you know, and, or people in Brazil, some radio DJ hosts on social media, they, they show me their, their shrine. And then you look like it's Milli Vanilli and Michael Jackson.

• 1:11:29Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 1:11:30Speaker 01

  And they tell me, nobody bigger. And I'm like, really? Because I didn't know about that. But year after year, people now because of social, I'm aware of Milli Vanilli around the world. Oh, I heard you on the radio today. But that happens all the time.

• 1:11:51Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 1:11:52Speaker 01

  And then when you had Monsters, the TV, the, the movie Monsters.

• 1:11:55Speaker 02

  On Netflix.

• 1:11:56Speaker 01

  On Netflix?

• 1:11:56Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 1:11:58Speaker 01

  It went viral. It went number one on all music platforms. Suddenly, kids that were 14, my goddaughter, Lana in LA, tells me, the kids in my class are singing your songs.

• 1:12:09Speaker 02

  Oh, yeah, yeah.

• 1:12:09Speaker 01

  And I'm like, wow.

• 1:12:11Speaker 02

  Yeah, my, my kids' age, they know your songs.

• 1:12:14Speaker 01

  It's amazing.

• 1:12:15Speaker 02

  Yeah, isn't it?

• 1:12:16Speaker 01

  I love it.

• 1:12:17Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:12:17Speaker 01

  That means it allow, it will allow me to stay longer.

• 1:12:21Speaker 02

  Yes, yes.

• 1:12:22Speaker 01

  As a result.

• 1:12:23Speaker 02

  But, but now, here's, okay, here's where we also have to go though, right? Because, so 1988 hits number one. Then there's an album.

• 1:12:34Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:12:34Speaker 02

  Obviously. And?

• 1:12:37Speaker 01

  Oh, wow.

• 1:12:38Speaker 02

  I've got it right here.

• 1:12:39Speaker 01

  Dude.

• 1:12:41Speaker 02

  When's the last time you saw this?

• 1:12:42Speaker 01

  I have one at home.

• 1:12:46Speaker 01

  I've said.

• 1:12:47Speaker 02

  He's like, Paul, get that out of here.

• 1:12:48Speaker 01

  No, no, no, I, I do, as a matter of fact, for my birthday, some, my, my, my very good friend got me a, a European version because I have mostly American versions. I don't have many.

• 1:13:00Speaker 02

  All right. This is, so I'm just, I mean, like, like, Girl, You Know It's True, you know, Is It Love? All or Nothing? I'm gonna miss you. Did you have a favorite to perform?

• 1:13:14Speaker 01

  Back then?

• 1:13:14Speaker 02

  Back then.

• 1:13:16Speaker 01

  Girl, You Know It's True was always the, the one that, that, that started it.

• 1:13:23Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 1:13:24Speaker 01

  It was fresh. It was, it was, it was innocence.

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• 1:15:22Speaker 02

  So as you begin to dominate the charts very quickly, you're nominated for a Grammy?

• 1:15:29Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:15:30Speaker 02

  All right.

• 1:15:31Speaker 01

  And that is, that was crazy because, you know, we, you know, who, who's ever said that, I don't want that? Nobody's ever said, I don't want that. Because that thing is gonna blow up. It's gonna blow up in our faces, just like a pow. And then we're gonna get exposed.

• 1:15:49Speaker 02

  But do, do you feel that way, though, when you're nominated? Do you feel like it's only a matter of time before you're going to be exposed?

• 1:15:56Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:15:57Speaker 02

  Okay, so you know it's coming?

• 1:15:58Speaker 01

  Tick tock, tick tock.

• 1:16:00Speaker 02

  Are you then more so covering your tracks? Because I think like.

• 1:16:04Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah, yeah, your, your, your senses are.

• 1:16:10Speaker 01

  Alerted, you're more tense. I remember that I couldn't identify anymore, anymore, if a smile was a smirk. I couldn't tell.

• 1:16:23Speaker 01

  He knows.

• 1:16:26Speaker 01

  That was, it was, it was, so we walked through life like that. Wow, they know. You know, and then suddenly you feel it in your body like, ooh.

• 1:16:37Speaker 02

  Right.

• 1:16:38Speaker 01

  Man, you got an accent, man.

• 1:16:42Speaker 01

  Oh, I didn't know you had an accent.

• 1:16:46Speaker 01

  You know, and that started to happen more and more because Arsenio was also on our back. We're living color and making jokes and making skits on, on the fact that

• 1:16:59Speaker 01

  Milli Vanilli sound funny. But they sound. They sound foreign and they don't.

• 1:17:06Speaker 02

  Right.

• 1:17:06Speaker 01

  What is it? You know, so we, we had to deal with, with all that and, and there was nobody to, there was nobody there to come here and say,

• 1:17:18Speaker 01

  oh, make us feel like you guys are safe. Don't worry. The transition is gonna come.

• 1:17:23Speaker 02

  Right.

• 1:17:24Speaker 01

  Don't worry, we're gonna work this out.

• 1:17:26Speaker 02

  Instead, you've just felt like it's, you're, you're going to be exposed at a certain point.

• 1:17:30Speaker 01

  You're gonna be exposed at the height and then you know where we're gonna be falling from.

• 1:17:36Speaker 02

  Hmm, okay, I see it.

• 1:17:38Speaker 01

  You see what I mean?

• 1:17:39Speaker 02

  Now, the big question always is, did Clive Davis and Arista know that Milli Vanilli were, you say, of course?

• 1:17:49Speaker 01

  No doubt.

• 1:17:50Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:17:51Speaker 01

  Everyone knows who Clive Davis was. One of the most iconic executives in the music industry.

• 1:18:00Speaker 02

  Right.

• 1:18:01Speaker 01

  If a pen dropped in a building

• 1:18:05Speaker 01

  from the 50th floor, he knew about it. He ran his business tight. I met the man, I saw how people were like, you know, walking around him and stuff.

• 1:18:17Speaker 02

  Right.

• 1:18:18Speaker 01

  I knew, I, I knew stories, I heard stories. You know, he, he created superstars. That's what he did.

• 1:18:27Speaker 01

  And for him not to know that,

• 1:18:30Speaker 01

  it's a joke. But because he was so powerful,

• 1:18:35Speaker 01

  nobody would touch that man. Nobody would, ever. You know?

• 1:18:41Speaker 02

  Right.

• 1:18:41Speaker 01

  And I'm not gonna speak heel about him.

• 1:18:44Speaker 02

  Sure.

• 1:18:44Speaker 01

  You know, he's six feet below.

• 1:18:46Speaker 02

  Right.

• 1:18:47Speaker 01

  You know, but you know,

• 1:18:51Speaker 01

  I think that people have spoken.

• 1:18:54Speaker 02

  Right.

• 1:18:55Speaker 01

  You know, I don't have to hammer that, you know? And people have spoken, you know, obviously, you know, whose son, you know?

• 1:19:05Speaker 01

  You know, there's not much I can say, like, of course.

• 1:19:08Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 1:19:08Speaker 01

  You know?

• 1:19:09Speaker 02

  So when you-

• 1:19:10Speaker 01

  But what I, but my question is-

• 1:19:12Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 1:19:12Speaker 01

  And I never asked that question. I never asked, I mean, I'm gonna ask it today.

• 1:19:18Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 1:19:19Speaker 01

  For someone as iconic as him, with a wall of some of the most iconic pop stars,

• 1:19:31Speaker 01

  why would you take that on?

• 1:19:34Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:19:35Speaker 01

  And then it goes back to money.

• 1:19:39Speaker 01

  They were killing it in Europe.

• 1:19:42Speaker 01

  And any smart man, businessman, because I didn't look at the music industry as a business. I didn't know it was a business.

• 1:19:51Speaker 02

  Right.

• 1:19:51Speaker 01

  You know, there's, there's music business. I only saw music, music, music, music. Oh, no, come on. Business. And it's not one or the other. It's music business.

• 1:20:06Speaker 01

  That's what I never got. You know, and I'm at a point now where there's new music, there's an EP.

• 1:20:13Speaker 02

  Right.

• 1:20:13Speaker 01

  I've been working for years and now because of you, and I hope that many more, millions of people discover that who Fab is exactly.

• 1:20:22Speaker 02

  Oh, yeah, definitely.

• 1:20:23Speaker 01

  And who I always was.

• 1:20:24Speaker 02

  Right, oh, yeah, I mean, I, I am, I'm already, I mean, we're just at the Grammy piece and I've already learned a hundred things about you that I had no idea. Nor do I think were portrayed and I now see that they were, they were, they were intentionally held back.

• 1:20:43Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:20:44Speaker 02

  You know, but I have to ask this is, among your friends and family?

• 1:20:50Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:20:52Speaker 02

  Did they know that you and Rob were not singing the music?

• 1:20:57Speaker 01

  Well, my dad was like, my dad knew.

• 1:21:00Speaker 02

  He knew.

• 1:21:01Speaker 01

  And then, uh, he said something very sarcastic, I don't remember, verbatim. But it was like, okay, well, something like, when, when he stops, you better sing.

• 1:21:15Speaker 01

  And I, and his tone, you know, when your father says something to you and it's like, oh, boy. And it's like, cause you know, I'm a Frenchman.

• 1:21:26Speaker 01

  And I've been speaking English for a big part of my life. But when I go to France and hang out with my friends and I speak my mother tongue, and I still remember to this day, I was like, why did he have to go and do that to me? I was already messed up. So now, you know, I'm sharing that, never shared that. But as I'm doing extracurricular activities, I have my father's voice resonating. You know, like, so when he blows up, like, you're gonna sing, right?

• 1:22:00Speaker 01

  And then I think that statement kind of prepared me to, to that next chapter, like, what am I gonna do? And that statement alone that I carried for a long time was, in a way, a gift that I didn't see as a gift at first.

• 1:22:21Speaker 02

  Okay, okay. Fab, do, do you think your father and mother were proud of you?

• 1:22:30Speaker 01

  Hmm. I don't know.

• 1:22:35Speaker 01

  Because for my mom, she, it was so foreign. For her, it was like a whole other thing. She never got it to even, you know, after we're able to make commands and try to reconnect with the help of Tessa, my partner, and Sasha, my first kid. So we'd go there every year and spend time with her and try to connect.

• 1:22:59Speaker 01

  I don't know.

• 1:23:03Speaker 01

  She never worded it like, I'm, you know, I'm proud of what you've become or, you know?

• 1:23:10Speaker 01

  She didn't have the ability because I think maybe because of medications, the medications that she was taking.

• 1:23:16Speaker 01

  I think that was taken away from her. So it was, or it wasn't there to begin with, never nurtured. But when I, when I think that she started to get sick and the medications she was taking, then for mental aspect of this or health, that was ripped away.

• 1:23:35Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 1:23:35Speaker 01

  So there's no way to go back and try it. I had tried before, I said previously, when I still could get to her.

• 1:23:44Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 1:23:44Speaker 01

  But it, it never worked. I was met with like a brick wall.

• 1:23:48Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 1:23:49Speaker 01

  You know, and what, all I was trying to, to get to was, I just wanted to, I just wanted to sorry. That's all I wanted. I just wanted her to say, yeah, I'm sorry for what I did to you or how I treated you. You know, but I never got it. So I have to live with that. That's why the book was very therapeutic in the sense that I wrote her a letter too. You know, to address that.

• 1:24:18Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 1:24:18Speaker 01

  In order to work it for myself.

• 1:24:20Speaker 02

  Yes. And, and so, you know, let's, let's get to-

• 1:24:24Speaker 01

  Always got another one, he's got another one.

• 1:24:25Speaker 02

  Oh, man, I have, I have endless.

• 1:24:28Speaker 01

  I don't know how long we've been talking, damn, we got stamina.

• 1:24:30Speaker 02

  Endless, endless photos.

• 1:24:34Speaker 01

  Hmm, yeah.

• 1:24:36Speaker 02

  When you see this today, what do you, what do you think of this photo?

• 1:24:42Speaker 01

  Hmm, I think I started drinking early that day.

• 1:24:47Speaker 01

  We had to.

• 1:24:49Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 1:24:50Speaker 01

  Hot girl liquor, man. We had to, to just, it was a scary, it was a scary day because we didn't wanna have nothing to do with that. Cause we were at the end with Frank.

• 1:25:05Speaker 02

  You, you, how did you know you were at the end?

• 1:25:07Speaker 01

  You could feel it.

• 1:25:10Speaker 01

  We could feel it and then we were trying to pivot to other situation.

• 1:25:17Speaker 01

  He already started on the second album, wanted us to go back to Germany. And we were like,

• 1:25:25Speaker 01

  no.

• 1:25:28Speaker 01

  We essentially pushed him

• 1:25:32Speaker 01

  to throw us out of the plantation.

• 1:25:38Speaker 01

  Forgetting that first sentence that he had uttered to us upon signing the contract.

• 1:25:46Speaker 02

  Yes, don't F with him.

• 1:25:49Speaker 01

  Don't F with him. So while we were delusional and thinking we could leave him and leave the plantation unscathed, he was never gonna let that happen. So as much as we were preparing things, and I don't know if he ever heard about everything that was happening, he pressed a button, "Nuke."

• 1:26:19Speaker 01

  "I'm taking you out." Checkmate. So when he went to New York and told the world we didn't sing and flew right back, it was specifically to destroy any chances we had of creating a career for ourselves.

• 1:26:37Speaker 02

  In that moment where you and Rob won a Grammy, which is, is it 89?

• 1:26:43Speaker 01

  Eighty-nine.

• 1:26:43Speaker 02

  Eighty-nine. Do you know how much money that you all were making at all?

• 1:26:49Speaker 01

  Well, you know, that's also weird because my journey down this road of success and fame and music, I never really paid attention to how much money I had. I was just going, I was just going and living. And this is why, at the end of that short career, there wasn't much, there wasn't much left. So I was left with nothing. And sometime I tell myself, "I'm glad that I didn't have much more."

• 1:27:30Speaker 01

  Because that rock bottom forced me to fight and to understand the value of money and not lost myself in trying to live that old lifestyle. Because a lot of people who, who become successful, who gained and still have a little bit of their money left, always tried to keep up with the Joneses.

• 1:27:53Speaker 02

  Right.

• 1:27:53Speaker 01

  And lost themselves, lose themselves in trying to do that. I had nothing left, very little. So what was most important to me was being able to become a singer-songwriter-producer. And I locked myself in to learn how to play guitar, write songs for five, six, seven hours, nine hours, in my, in a closet, because it were clothing and it was absorbing the sound while I was playing guitar.

• 1:28:23Speaker 02

  Right.

• 1:28:23Speaker 01

  And there I was recording myself on cassettes, playing. So I dedicated myself to my craft.

• 1:28:29Speaker 02

  You know, what, something that you just said that shocks me but doesn't shock me is you said, when I showed you that photo, you said, "I started drinking early that day."

• 1:28:40Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:28:41Speaker 02

  So was that the darkest period for you?

• 1:28:50Speaker 01

  Uh, no, no, oh, no.

• 1:28:53Speaker 02

  It came after.

• 1:28:54Speaker 01

  After.

• 1:28:55Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:28:55Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 1:28:56Speaker 02

  So, so that day, I understand that you had to, you and Rob had to perform at a Grammy party.

• 1:29:03Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:29:04Speaker 02

  And you were supposed to perform.

• 1:29:06Speaker 01

  At the Grammys.

• 1:29:07Speaker 02

  You were supposed, at the Grammys.

• 1:29:08Speaker 01

  Yeah, so, you know, I usually never drank before the show, but it was the Grammys. All my musical heroes were gonna be sitting in the audience. I knew that because I watched the Grammys as a kid.

• 1:29:24Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 1:29:25Speaker 01

  I knew exactly what, I saw Michael Jackson receiving his Grammys full hand. Like, I knew who was gonna be in the room, and that drove me crazy.

• 1:29:35Speaker 01

  I knew that I was gonna perform, I knew I was gonna do an amazing job, partly.

• 1:29:49Speaker 01

  And we were very afraid of the fact that because we were performing, we had a feeling that we were gonna win this award, which we didn't want to receive.

• 1:30:03Speaker 02

  You truly did not want to win.

• 1:30:05Speaker 01

  No, no, there's another, another thing as well. One of the reason why, you know, we agreed to perform at the Grammys is because we all, we were working on the world tour and separating ourselves from Frank. We were gonna do this world tour and had nothing to do with Frank. The touring had nothing to do with Frank's. This is why we were able to support ourselves.

• 1:30:31Speaker 02

  I see.

• 1:30:32Speaker 01

  Without his support, because he stopped paying everything. As a matter of fact, I haven't seen a cent from any of the royalties to this day. My, my image is used everywhere, every Best Of album, I don't touch a cent.

• 1:30:50Speaker 02

  All Milli Vanilli songs?

• 1:30:51Speaker 01

  Nothing.

• 1:30:51Speaker 02

  Nothing?

• 1:30:52Speaker 01

  Nothing, even though when I perform, money's being made, you know, from the publishing, from everything, when Monsters on, when Monsters and the songs are.

• 1:31:01Speaker 02

  Everywhere.

• 1:31:02Speaker 01

  Everywhere, I don't touch a cent out of that. Let's, let's make sure that people understand that. I don't get nothing out of that.

• 1:31:10Speaker 02

  How, how's that, that stems back to the contract?

• 1:31:13Speaker 01

  Comes back to the contract. And other things that were made, that's another conversation, it's complicated.

• 1:31:18Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 1:31:18Speaker 01

  But yeah, I don't touch nothing.

• 1:31:20Speaker 02

  Okay, so you had to tour in order to support yourself?

• 1:31:24Speaker 01

  To support ourselves.

• 1:31:25Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 1:31:25Speaker 01

  So when it was the Grammy time, we're like, "Okay, we'll perform, but that's gonna help us worldwide, because everybody from around the world watched the Grammys, just like I did as a kid."

• 1:31:35Speaker 02

  Right.

• 1:31:36Speaker 01

  You know, so I knew it would help our tour.

• 1:31:39Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 1:31:40Speaker 01

  But between receiving the Grammys that we didn't want

• 1:31:47Speaker 01

  and the world tour starting, Frank pushed the button.

• 1:31:55Speaker 02

  And blew it up.

• 1:31:56Speaker 01

  And blew it up.

• 1:31:56Speaker 02

  And blew it up.

• 1:31:57Speaker 01

  And told the world they didn't sing and lick.

• 1:31:59Speaker 02

  All right, so, so now, before we get to this blow up.

• 1:32:02Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:32:03Speaker 02

  At the Grammys, is it correct that someone from Arista or the production company had paid some money to allow you all to lip sync at the Grammys?

• 1:32:19Speaker 01

  Well, you know, I know that, I've heard that, that the assistant of Frank Firen was privy to a lot of information, she knew a lot of things, and she voiced that, she mentioned it. And it's very possible.

• 1:32:41Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 1:32:41Speaker 01

  Very possible.

• 1:32:43Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 1:32:44Speaker 01

  I, I can't confirm, I can, nor can I deny.

• 1:32:50Speaker 02

  Okay. At that moment, when you win the Grammy, how is your relationship with Rob?

• 1:32:56Speaker 01

  Well, he, yeah, he was, he was very destructive during that time.

• 1:33:05Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 1:33:05Speaker 01

  He was becoming more and more, you know, if you look at the timeline.

• 1:33:09Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 1:33:09Speaker 01

  He was becoming more and more destructive to himself. He was tired.

• 1:33:14Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 1:33:14Speaker 01

  He was tired of the charade, and I believe that he had given up on the possibility of even having a career, a possible career. I was still delusional. I was still thinking like, I was looking at any opportunities where I was on stage or being in the studio as, "I'm doing this, I'm never gonna stop." But he gave up on the idea of even staying in show business.

• 1:33:43Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 1:33:44Speaker 01

  And that's where I saw the decline, but that was different because I could see like, gave up. And that was, and I knew him, and I, and I, and I could see that, that giving up was due to drugs. And with drugs, I knew that it was either you're gonna get, end up in a police station or the cemetery or the hospital.

• 1:34:10Speaker 02

  Right.

• 1:34:11Speaker 01

  So nothing good was gonna come out of what he was doing at the level that he was doing it at, you know? And that's when I tried to give him as much support as possible. You know, you can give as much love as possible, but in the end, the person has to do the job for themselves.

• 1:34:33Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 1:34:33Speaker 01

  And I think that's the hardest part with, when you're a co-dependent, a bystander, and you can't do nothing about it. As much as you try to like, save that person, you can't do it, they have to do it.

• 1:34:49Speaker 02

  They have to do it. With Rob now having given up on the career possibilities, who do you have that is a safe space for you?

• 1:35:03Speaker 01

  Yeah, there was nobody.

• 1:35:06Speaker 01

  There's nobody there. It was just, it was, Rob and I, we, we had a lot of hangarons as well, and, because, you know, it was like buying your friends, "Come hang out, let's go eat." But when things started to go down, the phone didn't ring anymore. You could see, so your fair-weathered friends were disappearing, one by one. And that taught me a major lesson, because we were so naive. So here we are.

• 1:35:41Speaker 01

  At the Grammys, you know, sitting in the front, mind you.

• 1:35:47Speaker 02

  Front row.

• 1:35:48Speaker 01

  Front row.

• 1:35:49Speaker 02

  Front row at the Grammys.

• 1:35:50Speaker 01

  Yeah, we had performed already, but after our performance, they brought us back to the front. And that's when I was looking at her, I was like, ooh.

• 1:36:01Speaker 02

  Who was in your row, do you remember?

• 1:36:03Speaker 01

  I can't remember who was next to me, but I, I sensed that, I guess, we might have to walk up the stairs. And, you know, and the winner is Young MC, who I performed with on the Isle of the Nineties.

• 1:36:21Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 1:36:22Speaker 01

  You know, in the United States, I'm doing some dates, I'll be seeing him next month.

• 1:36:26Speaker 02

  Love it.

• 1:36:27Speaker 01

  No, this month. And there he was, you know, saying the name with Christopherson. And there you had it, having to go up the stairs.

• 1:36:40Speaker 02

  And the winner is?

• 1:36:41Speaker 01

  And the winner is, and then you rush out, you know, and, and you're on stage and I'm sure you saw the footage. And at night, Rob said something without saying something. You know, talking about us and receiving this awards. This awards went to every other artist in the world who's trying to make it. We never said, yeah, we never did that.

• 1:37:11Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 1:37:11Speaker 01

  We give it to, we, we gave hope to other artists that it is possible.

• 1:37:16Speaker 02

  And then what's your immediate feeling when you walk off of that stage?

• 1:37:21Speaker 01

  Oh, wow, never realized that.

• 1:37:26Speaker 01

  It's over.

• 1:37:29Speaker 01

  Because now, the media, the attention.

• 1:37:34Speaker 02

  Right.

• 1:37:35Speaker 01

  That we always were running from, we won't be able to escape it because they're gonna wanna talk to you.

• 1:37:42Speaker 01

  And, and Arista has, had done their best to protect us from talking to the press. Obviously because we had an accent.

• 1:37:53Speaker 02

  Right.

• 1:37:54Speaker 01

  You see? So, how could you hide from the media knocking at your door like, hey, we won't talk to Robin Fab? And the majority of them knew exactly that we were foreign, had an accent. It's okay to be foreign, but I'm saying that they had a foreign accent.

• 1:38:14Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 1:38:15Speaker 01

  When they spoke, so I knew that that was the next step, and that's what they were gearing up to.

• 1:38:19Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 1:38:20Speaker 01

  I knew that.

• 1:38:21Speaker 02

  So, so you were incredibly scared then?

• 1:38:23Speaker 01

  Oh, yeah.

• 1:38:24Speaker 02

  Coming off that stage?

• 1:38:25Speaker 01

  I was like, I knew our days were counted.

• 1:38:34Speaker 01

  I knew those days in the light, that stardom, that fame. Everything that came with that was about to, I didn't know how quick it was gonna disappear though. Because, you know, fame has a way to, just like water, super hot, and it gradually changes temperature.

• 1:38:56Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 1:38:57Speaker 01

  But with fame, our fame, the Millivanelle fame, it went from boom, boom. And from one day, we lost everything. And it was like, I, I, I like to use that, that, that fame to shame. Trying to, everyone was trying to shame you, you know, trying to, to make jokes. And then, of course, Rob attempted to, didn't really attempt to kill himself by jumping off a balcony, but it was a cry for help.

• 1:39:28Speaker 02

  Is, is this before or after?

• 1:39:31Speaker 01

  It was after.

• 1:39:31Speaker 02

  The press conference?

• 1:39:32Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah, that was after.

• 1:39:33Speaker 02

  So, so then, why did Frank then disclose the secret? Because he's making all this money with you?

• 1:39:42Speaker 01

  Oh, wow.

• 1:39:43Speaker 02

  Why does he do it?

• 1:39:44Speaker 01

  Uh, because we were, we were done. There was no way to, we, we had broken our chains. Because he had brought options to the table. He had tried to buy us in, tried to offer money, tried to do things.

• 1:39:59Speaker 02

  This is to do another?

• 1:40:00Speaker 01

  Yeah, to be part of, of the second album. He tried. And then, when he realized at some point that they were not budging, and the only option left was to let us go. But to let us go with a check made move so that they could never work again.

• 1:40:21Speaker 02

  All right.

• 1:40:21Speaker 01

  Because for him, he made us. I made you, I take you out.

• 1:40:26Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 1:40:26Speaker 01

  And nobody will benefit of what I built.

• 1:40:29Speaker 02

  All right. So then I, I have to ask this then, why not then just go along for a second album? Because you've, you've just won a Grammy, you are selling more albums than Michael Jackson, you, you have a world tour lined up? Why not just go along for the ride?

• 1:40:47Speaker 01

  We were done. You know, when you, when you, I, I can only imagine.

• 1:40:55Speaker 01

  You know, I never, I, I don't even know what the people that were enslaved went through. I can only imagine. But I think that if they, if they had the opportunity to, to run away,

• 1:41:10Speaker 01

  safely or unsafely, they would take it. And I think we were done being chained. He has the perks, he has the money, he has the, you know, the life. But nothing was real about that.

• 1:41:28Speaker 02

  So what did he then do? What did Frank do?

• 1:41:32Speaker 01

  Well, Frank didn't give us heads up. He just straight, he just flew right into New York and gave a press conference to all the media outlet. And everybody was like, what? They loved it. I mean, they weren't like, it was Desert Storm, Millivanelle during that time.

• 1:41:54Speaker 02

  And specifically, what did Frank say in that press conference?

• 1:41:58Speaker 01

  I can't really recall or paraphrase, but he was like, they didn't sing. And I don't think he, he, I don't know if he responded because in the movie, the movie as well, but I don't think he, you know, his English was not very good. The point he was making was, they didn't sing, pasta, that's it.

• 1:42:18Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 1:42:19Speaker 01

  I'm taking you out. There's more to that story though.

• 1:42:23Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 1:42:24Speaker 01

  Because he was a shrewd businessman, very shrewd. So as he walked away from Robin Fab, he had worked out another situation where he was not walking away empty-handed. And that's the one thing people don't know. Because at the end of his career, Frank wanted to work with me.

• 1:42:54Speaker 02

  With you?

• 1:42:55Speaker 01

  Yeah. So when he walked away from Robin Fab, Millivanelle, who was rocking, he didn't walk away empty-handed. He walked away with a chunk.

• 1:43:08Speaker 02

  Can I ask, from who?

• 1:43:12Speaker 01

  From Arista. But Arista was played.

• 1:43:20Speaker 01

  He played them like a chess player, master.

• 1:43:25Speaker 02

  I see.

• 1:43:26Speaker 01

  So they're lost.

• 1:43:27Speaker 02

  Right.

• 1:43:28Speaker 01

  Ooh, they're lost like major.

• 1:43:30Speaker 02

  So they wrote, they wrote him a check thinking they're going to get some thing else, something?

• 1:43:34Speaker 01

  Thinking things were in the works.

• 1:43:36Speaker 02

  In the works, right, right.

• 1:43:39Speaker 01

  He made his move.

• 1:43:40Speaker 02

  He made his, his chess move.

• 1:43:44Speaker 01

  Tac. That's, that's cashed in. Now I'm gonna.

• 1:43:50Speaker 02

  Now I'm gonna throw this up.

• 1:43:51Speaker 01

  I'm gonna tell the world. What do you think happens? It implodes.

• 1:43:54Speaker 02

  Right.

• 1:43:55Speaker 01

  That's the one thing right now I gave you. No one knows that.

• 1:44:01Speaker 02

  That, that, I mean, this is so dirty.

• 1:44:08Speaker 01

  Ooh.

• 1:44:09Speaker 02

  I have to say this is that, you know, I'm a body language watcher.

• 1:44:12Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:44:13Speaker 02

  I've been pulling out all these photos and showing you, and I see how you've reacted. When I pulled out that album, you appeared to have a negative reaction to it, which is why I didn't even hand it to you.

• 1:44:24Speaker 01

  Right. Well, it's because, you know, I made this, you know, I am part of, intricately. You know, I'm, I'm in the fiber of this.

• 1:44:36Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 1:44:36Speaker 01

  In every sense of the way. I have four children now.

• 1:44:43Speaker 01

  It would be nice to have someone said, hey, you know, it wasn't fair what was done to you.

• 1:44:52Speaker 01

  We should give you a little chunk. You know, we should definitely give you a chunk.

• 1:44:57Speaker 02

  Right.

• 1:44:58Speaker 01

  We're still making money, you know, my dad was, he wasn't fair.

• 1:45:05Speaker 01

  So, you know, how about this?

• 1:45:10Speaker 01

  But we haven't gotten to that table yet.

• 1:45:15Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 1:45:16Speaker 01

  But you know what? The turtle always finishes the race.

• 1:45:20Speaker 02

  Yes. Ken, I know this may be challenging. There's a photo that I want to show, just to give you a heads up. It's the press conference.

• 1:45:28Speaker 01

  Oh, yeah, painful.

• 1:45:29Speaker 02

  Yeah, but if I can, pull this out. Because I remember, I literally remember.

• 1:45:40Speaker 01

  You remember that, huh?

• 1:45:41Speaker 02

  I remember this. I remember watching this press conference. And this is the press conference that happened after Frank made his announcement.

• 1:45:50Speaker 01

  Yep.

• 1:45:51Speaker 02

  So you and Rob, is it that you both decided that you were going to host your own conference to clarify your position?

• 1:45:59Speaker 01

  This press conference was prompted because of the fact that we wanted to say something.

• 1:46:09Speaker 02

  Right.

• 1:46:10Speaker 01

  We just didn't want to, you know, okay, oh, it's been sent back or whatever. We wanted to talk to the people. Not knowing, not aware of the fact that the press and the media could be vengeful in many ways. The way this was handled was like, almost like, it was very racist to some of the comments that were made, you know? And it was just a cry for help. In this instance, it was just like, we wanted to tell the truth for so long, and then suddenly,

• 1:46:51Speaker 01

  you know, the granny was there, but too late.

• 1:46:56Speaker 02

  Right.

• 1:46:57Speaker 01

  You know, too late. And now it's like, we had to like backpedal and say, hey, listen. But everybody left. The label had left. They took the records, the platinum records off the wall. Publicis was gone. Felt with a friend, friends were gone. Everybody was gone.

• 1:47:16Speaker 02

  It was just you and Rob?

• 1:47:18Speaker 01

  It was just Rob and I and an executive from Ayula Records, from Munich, who was acting, his manager, his name was Carson Heine. And he was there, he had seen everything, he knew everything. He knew what they were doing for a long time. They were just using us. And just the machine was going and they didn't care.

• 1:47:38Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:47:39Speaker 01

  That's why when I refer to the label in America and people knowing and all that stuff, you know, of course, everyone was aware, but the money was so good.

• 1:47:51Speaker 02

  Right.

• 1:47:52Speaker 01

  You're gonna say no.

• 1:47:53Speaker 02

  Turn a blind eye.

• 1:47:54Speaker 01

  Blind, you turn a blind eye and then eventually it will stop, you know? I think everyone was aware of that.

• 1:48:00Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 1:48:00Speaker 01

  You know?

• 1:48:01Speaker 02

  Now, when I, so I saw that press conference in, that must have been, what, 1990, was it?

• 1:48:06Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:48:07Speaker 02

  Must have been like, so I saw, yep, so I saw that press conference in 1990.

• 1:48:12Speaker 01

  How old were you?

• 1:48:13Speaker 02

  Oh, my gosh. That's a good question. I mean, I was, that was, I must have been middle school, maybe?

• 1:48:21Speaker 01

  Right, right, right.

• 1:48:21Speaker 02

  Yeah. And I distinctly remember it then. I remember two observations, and then I re-watched it in preparation for you coming in. And I still have those two observations, but one has changed, one has remained the same.

• 1:48:39Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 1:48:40Speaker 02

  So what has remained the same is I distinctly remember you coming in, you kind of kick off the conference, but then.

• 1:48:48Speaker 01

  Moved back.

• 1:48:49Speaker 02

  You moved back and you're quiet.

• 1:48:51Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:48:52Speaker 02

  So that didn't change. The second observation was, I distinctly remember then, I thought, and this is terrible to say, but I have to tell you, is I remember watching it thinking, yep, this is right. This is what the press should be doing.

• 1:49:05Speaker 01

  Right, right, right.

• 1:49:06Speaker 02

  This is correct.

• 1:49:07Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:49:08Speaker 02

  They're roasting these guys.

• 1:49:09Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah, that's right.

• 1:49:11Speaker 02

  Now, when I watch it back.

• 1:49:12Speaker 01

  You see now?

• 1:49:13Speaker 02

  It looks like a lynching.

• 1:49:16Speaker 01

  It is.

• 1:49:17Speaker 02

  And so.

• 1:49:19Speaker 01

  And I don't know, I don't know if you, I don't know what angles of camera that you watched, because there were cameras that were taking sound from the back and you could hear what people were saying, because the journalists were fighting amongst each other. They were heckling each other, because it was very racist. And it kind of got tense between black journalists and white journalists at that press conference. It was very racist, the way they handled that. Because if my name was, you know, I don't know, David and Stefan, it would be different.

• 1:50:00Speaker 02

  Okay. Can you help us to understand the experience that you went through from that fame to shame? So when I asked about the darkest moment for you.

• 1:50:10Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 1:50:11Speaker 02

  You said it came after the crash. So at what point did that moment come?

• 1:50:18Speaker 01

  Well, it was dark in the sense that I felt lost and didn't know what decision to make. Because, you know, giving up, I did, thousands of times. But then, at the last moment, the voice said, no, you're coming right back here. You're gonna go through this. As painful as it is, there's something else. I don't know what that something else is, but that's what I sensed. And ever since that feeling said no, and that's how I lived my life, is voices or

• 1:51:02Speaker 01

  angels or protection or whatever it might be, it was very clear and I listened. Because it was clear, it was like, no, don't do that. Because I was thinking, okay, well, I'll go back to Europe, go back to Paris and it's over. Of course, I thought about it. But once, the first time I heard that no, then I repeated that, I repeated that no every day.

• 1:51:27Speaker 02

  That you were going to go back?

• 1:51:29Speaker 01

  No, I'm gonna stay in and I'm gonna stay focused and do what I have to do.

• 1:51:35Speaker 02

  Were you, did you not move back? I read that you, one reason that you didn't move back to Germany is you just didn't want to face the public of Germany at that time.

• 1:51:47Speaker 01

  No, no.

• 1:51:48Speaker 02

  No.

• 1:51:48Speaker 01

  Germany was, I didn't feel like I could be there. I don't, I felt like it was not the place where I could be.

• 1:51:59Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 1:52:00Speaker 01

  You know, I felt like something told me, no.

• 1:52:07Speaker 02

  You know, I read, and I don't know if this is true, is that you would go to the supermarket in the nighttime.

• 1:52:16Speaker 01

  Yep, that's true.

• 1:52:16Speaker 02

  So that's true?

• 1:52:17Speaker 01

  That's true. I would go in the supermarket at night, because a few times that I had gone during the day, when we go back to smirk and a smile, I didn't know, I couldn't identify it. And it made me feel very uncomfortable, because I felt like everybody was laughing at me. And I just, I remember shopping and leaving the cart and just going home, because I couldn't take it anymore. It was like so, so powerful how it came over me and how, it was powerful how it was affecting me. And I couldn't do nothing about it. But it was so subtle, but I couldn't do nothing about the feeling that was growing within myself.

• 1:53:02Speaker 01

  So I was like, I just left and sat in my car and I remember this person. Another time, me getting out of my car, he say, oh, that's what you drive? I was like, oh, my God. Like, wow, people have like, the audacity. What does that mean?

• 1:53:26Speaker 02

  They were expecting you to be in a more expensive car?

• 1:53:28Speaker 01

  Yeah, but I mean, you know, I took it like, I took the worst, you know, to like, man, loser. Oh, yeah, no talent.

• 1:53:37Speaker 02

  Right.

• 1:53:37Speaker 01

  You know, oh, look what happened to you. That's how my mind would compute, anything and everything that would come in my way that would make me doubt about what they were thinking about me. So I was super insecure about meeting, being social. I was not social at all, so that's why I would go in the night and hide and try to avoid people.

• 1:54:02Speaker 02

  And you lived in LA?

• 1:54:04Speaker 01

  I lived in LA, all over places.

• 1:54:06Speaker 02

  So where's Rob at this point?

• 1:54:09Speaker 01

  Rob is living from place to place.

• 1:54:13Speaker 02

  Okay, in the US?

• 1:54:14Speaker 01

  In LA.

• 1:54:15Speaker 02

  In LA?

• 1:54:16Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah, he's in LA.

• 1:54:17Speaker 02

  So you're both in LA?

• 1:54:18Speaker 01

  No, we're both in LA. We're both in Los Angeles.

• 1:54:21Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 1:54:22Speaker 01

  Yeah, so I knew about his coming and going. I would hear like, oh, he got arrested here. I have a story that I think I've told in the documentary as well. I mean, I don't make this up. This is like, it's like movie stuff. I'm at the Viper Room on Sunset.

• 1:54:45Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 1:54:47Speaker 01

  And there's two, there's, the entrance of the club is on the street, not on Sunset. On Sunset, you exit.

• 1:54:55Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 1:54:55Speaker 01

  And on the side, on this street, you just come in. I'm there, I'm there with the friend, I'm about to go in the club. And then I look out, because I see a homeless across the way. But when I look in their eyes, I'm like, I know those green eyes. There's nobody that has that. I haven't seen it anywhere else, but in those eyes, that's Rob.

• 1:55:25Speaker 01

  I'm thinking, God, don't let it be my dude. Not like that, not like in those conditions. That looks like a crackhead right there. Sitting on the side of the road. Ski drill vibe.

• 1:55:38Speaker 02

  Right.

• 1:55:41Speaker 01

  So I go there and I'm like, oh, no. Like, ugh.

• 1:55:47Speaker 01

  And I said exactly what I was afraid about.

• 1:55:50Speaker 01

  To see him like that. I'd, I'd, I'd heard things. But literally, I don't know why. Because, you know, in life, there is no accident. And I don't know why I was supposed to see that.

• 1:56:06Speaker 01

  I carried him with a friend of mine. And I went knocking and ringing on every doorbell on that, on that street. Bunch of apartment condos.

• 1:56:17Speaker 01

  And, um.

• 1:56:19Speaker 01

  No success. So then he, he, he kind of mumbles something and he's like, you know, points out. So we, we go where he points out. And, um. I get in.

• 1:56:32Speaker 01

  And then, hey, Rob. And I'm like. And the door is open. I see like smoke in there. I see it's a party.

• 1:56:42Speaker 01

  And I, I went in there and I was like, oh, boy. Pipes, et cetera. Like, that's not just smoking marijuana. That's like.

• 1:56:54Speaker 02

  Right.

• 1:56:54Speaker 01

  That's hardcore right there. What can I do in that moment? I bring him back. I said, please, you know, take care of him. Like, there's nothing I can do. I, I, I don't know where he lives. I can't bring him to my place because I know what it's like.

• 1:57:10Speaker 02

  Right.

• 1:57:11Speaker 01

  I, I did it before. And, um.

• 1:57:17Speaker 01

  And we went to rehab. We sat down with psychiatrists. We talked about, you know, my dependency. And I was told, hey.

• 1:57:30Speaker 01

  If you don't stop, you're gonna end up there too.

• 1:57:37Speaker 01

  He has to do it for himself. So we ended up going to some rehab, but dude went AWOL.

• 1:57:43Speaker 02

  Okay, so you had both gone to rehab together?

• 1:57:45Speaker 01

  Yeah, we did it like halfway.

• 1:57:47Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 1:57:48Speaker 01

  You know, because I was, I didn't really. And I didn't need to be there. I did. I did, because I had to do the work. You know, but I, I choose to go for halfway. You know, and but I went there with him so we could be together and. But, um. Now he was way too deep.

• 1:58:10Speaker 02

  Okay. And, and, and what, what's so tragic is that it feels like you then really rebuilt yourself.

• 1:58:21Speaker 01

  I did, and I was, and I felt like I was doing it. But he always told me.

• 1:58:26Speaker 01

  You know, and I heard it through grapevine through others, you know. You go do it. I know you can.

• 1:58:34Speaker 01

  He always told people, oh, if I was talented, he's gonna do it. You know, but that made me super sad because I always.

• 1:58:42Speaker 01

  My thing was like, hey, get better, man. We're gonna get back on the road. We're gonna show them what we do. You know?

• 1:58:49Speaker 02

  Right.

• 1:58:50Speaker 01

  That's all I could, I could, I thought it would motivate him. You know, I even, before he left, I wanted to give him a letter. And I turned that letter into a song called It's Your Life. It was on my first solo album called Love Revolution. I live through music. I, I, I heal through music. I heal through writing. So I had to do it like that and try to speak to him. Because what I was doing was working for me. So I was hoping that it would work for him too.

• 1:59:19Speaker 02

  Right.

• 1:59:20Speaker 01

  So I saw an interview that he did. And he had blonde hair during that time. And the words that came out of his mouth, I was like, oh, man, finally. My dude gets it. He was really speaking. It felt like he was really

• 1:59:40Speaker 01

  getting better.

• 1:59:43Speaker 01

  But the demons.

• 1:59:48Speaker 01

  Even though he could get rid of, of his demons, they would always come back and latch on his being. And sick the life out of him. And steer him in the wrong direction. Because it's a lot of pain.

• 2:00:01Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 2:00:02Speaker 01

  And, uh.

• 2:00:05Speaker 01

  You know?

• 2:00:07Speaker 01

  Yeah, it's, it's, it's, yeah, it's another chapter, but I feel like

• 2:00:15Speaker 01

  things could have been done differently. When we went back to Germany and

• 2:00:20Speaker 01

  was going up to the old camp.

• 2:00:24Speaker 01

  But he needed money.

• 2:00:27Speaker 01

  You know?

• 2:00:28Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 2:00:29Speaker 01

  To survive. So. Yeah. It was too difficult.

• 2:00:36Speaker 02

  Too. I believe it was, it was two years roughly from you seeing him.

• 2:00:44Speaker 02

  That night.

• 2:00:45Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 2:00:46Speaker 02

  That Rob then passed away. Uh, he was thirty-three years old.

• 2:00:51Speaker 01

  Yep.

• 2:00:52Speaker 02

  Young man.

• 2:00:53Speaker 01

  Young man. In his prime, he could have accomplished so much. If he would have, because you know, the thing is. Rob was a street smart.

• 2:01:03Speaker 01

  When he wanted to be focused, he could be focused. He could have been a professional soccer player. He was playing semi-professional when we were in Munich. He was lighting fast. He taught me how to play soccer. We were fun. It was fun to play together. I know that he could apply himself.

• 2:01:23Speaker 01

  And become successful. Like, super successful. He was made for that social media era, I think, because he was so out there.

• 2:01:34Speaker 01

  But I think that he would have catched up. And I kind of like, he was like, he had that Rob man vibe, like train rack. And people would have loved to watch the train rack. You know?

• 2:01:48Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 2:01:51Speaker 01

  You know, but I, I hoped for him to, to heal truly. He was a firecracker. But I still believe that if he would have applied himself, he could have turned

• 2:02:03Speaker 01

  something into something. Nothing into something.

• 2:02:06Speaker 02

  Nothing into something, yes.

• 2:02:07Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 2:02:08Speaker 02

  Yes. Can, can we talk about one thing that you've created that we haven't? And we need to give, give space? I have another one. I have another one, you ready?

• 2:02:19Speaker 02

  Bam!

• 2:02:20Speaker 01

  Oh, wow. Yeah, give me that.

• 2:02:23Speaker 02

  All right.

• 2:02:24Speaker 01

  For sure.

• 2:02:24Speaker 02

  Tell us, what, what's, what's going on in that?

• 2:02:27Speaker 01

  Oh, man, so, you know, starting to the left, at my left, you got Sasha.

• 2:02:34Speaker 01

  You got Mama Tessa. My queen.

• 2:02:37Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 2:02:38Speaker 01

  My partner. Person that came into my life and was destined to be in my life. Solange. Little angel. The twins that came between during COVID. The gift that keeps on giving. Oh, my God. And, and myself, you know, and, uh. It's a big family.

• 2:02:59Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 2:03:00Speaker 01

  It's an active life. I do everything for them. And, uh, I, I try to do, I try to be the example. And, and I don't try to, you know, with children, it's, it's weird because, you know. You raise them. I said a lot. They, they, you raise them, but they raise you as well. Because you're looking through their eyes.

• 2:03:24Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 2:03:24Speaker 01

  And then as you look through their eyes, and during the book, I did a lot of work.

• 2:03:29Speaker 01

  And when sometime I would look at them, I would observe them. And then it would take me back to myself as well. Of not being safe.

• 2:03:40Speaker 01

  And, and when I felt that, and I was like, man, never. You will never have to go through that. I will keep you safe.

• 2:03:50Speaker 01

  Yeah, this is, uh. That's, that's my everything. That's my power.

• 2:03:54Speaker 02

  That's the power. You know what I love so much about this? And I will, I can, I'll, I'll give that back to you.

• 2:03:59Speaker 01

  You know, and I, I could, I could never give, I, I, I have to, you know, give credit to, to Tessa. I have to stop and, and say, you know, when I'm gone on the road.

• 2:04:09Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 2:04:10Speaker 01

  She's there with all four. We don't do nannies. You know, I made a decision to have more children.

• 2:04:17Speaker 01

  And by making this decision, this decision, I was very real on the fact that, well, I started late. But I don't ever wanna have the feeling that I can't hang with my kids. Like, I can't run this, I can't hike that, I can't climb that.

• 2:04:35Speaker 02

  Right.

• 2:04:36Speaker 01

  So they're my motivation for taking it seriously. So, you know, everything that I did in the past was a long time ago.

• 2:04:44Speaker 02

  Yes, and you've clearly learned from it all.

• 2:04:48Speaker 01

  Big time.

• 2:04:48Speaker 02

  You have. I have to say this, is there's so many projects that you are working on. So the EP is coming soon?

• 2:04:56Speaker 01

  It's coming soon, October, you're gonna see the first single. First new single is coming in October. I have a few, before my EP starts, I have another project that's coming that I'm keeping on the rap until it's finished.

• 2:05:07Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 2:05:08Speaker 01

  It's a nice little, it's a nice little trinkle, a nice little surprise.

• 2:05:12Speaker 02

  Little surprise, okay, so the memoir?

• 2:05:16Speaker 01

  Yeah, the memoir is, you know, Blame It on the Game.

• 2:05:18Speaker 02

  Blame It on the Game?

• 2:05:19Speaker 01

  It's gonna be great, and I must tell the, the UK people, you know, that I will be coming more often.

• 2:05:28Speaker 02

  All right.

• 2:05:29Speaker 01

  I'm working on some things so I can come here more often.

• 2:05:32Speaker 02

  We, we, we need you here.

• 2:05:33Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 2:05:33Speaker 02

  We, cuz you're performing.

• 2:05:35Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 2:05:35Speaker 02

  All over the world.

• 2:05:36Speaker 01

  I have, I'm back in the United States now of America with, I Love the Nineties with Vanilla Ice.

• 2:05:42Speaker 02

  Vanilla Ice.

• 2:05:43Speaker 01

  Young MC. Calling Me Bad, Jazzy Jeff.

• 2:05:47Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 2:05:47Speaker 01

  And many others.

• 2:05:48Speaker 02

  Nice.

• 2:05:48Speaker 01

  And I've been doing that, and I started that, I started this, this year, and it's coming across really well.

• 2:05:54Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 2:05:54Speaker 01

  Well received, and twenty twenty seven is gonna be even more of that.

• 2:05:59Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 2:05:59Speaker 01

  Be working a lot in Europe as well, so UK is on the agenda, Germany also in the, in the agenda.

• 2:06:05Speaker 02

  Final question.

• 2:06:06Speaker 01

  Oh, boy.

• 2:06:07Speaker 02

  All right.

• 2:06:07Speaker 01

  Drumroll, we did, I don't know how long, we've talked here today, but it was, it was great, it was fun. Thank you for going the distance, you know, because, you know, you ask the right question, and when you ask the right question, it takes me to a place that I was never able to, to express on camera.

• 2:06:25Speaker 02

  Yeah, I, this was a beautiful journey, and it was truly a privilege to be able to walk this, this path with you. I, you know, I've been an admirer from, from the outside, right, looking in, and I feel like I, I was let in today, and I was.

• 2:06:42Speaker 01

  You were, man, this way, but you know what's funny is that you were let in into my world because, you know, but everyone is watching.

• 2:06:49Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 2:06:50Speaker 01

  Everyone is watching.

• 2:06:51Speaker 02

  Oh, yeah, we, we were all let in.

• 2:06:53Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 2:06:53Speaker 02

  Yeah, so thank you, thank you for that.

• 2:06:55Speaker 01

  Pleasure.

• 2:06:56Speaker 02

  So the last question, everyone gets this question, is you have had some incredible conversations in your life.

• 2:07:03Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 2:07:03Speaker 02

  When you think about the most memorable, who was it with, and what did you learn?

• 2:07:10Speaker 01

  Hmm.

• 2:07:14Speaker 01

  I'd say you ranked really high today.

• 2:07:16Speaker 02

  Oh, wow.

• 2:07:17Speaker 01

  Like, you know, because you.

• 2:07:18Speaker 02

  Appreciate it.

• 2:07:18Speaker 01

  You know, because you come at a point where, in my life and career, where I have evolved to another plane, right? And because you are who you are, you know, we've been able to travel on the same height.

• 2:07:36Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 2:07:36Speaker 01

  Right, so we are on the same level, you know, it has to be you, Mr. Puff.

• 2:07:41Speaker 02

  Wow.

• 2:07:42Speaker 01

  It has to be you.

• 2:07:43Speaker 02

  That, that's, that, that is a, that, that truly is, truly is an honor.

• 2:07:48Speaker 01

  I will add to that, is, is because the way you conducted this conversation, because it was a conversation, it was not a interrogation,

• 2:07:58Speaker 01

  not an interview. I know what an interview is, answer questions. You know, it's a conversation, and it's a conversation that, that, that I, that has allowed me to look at things that I didn't look at. So for you to be able to do that and bring that in my path, I'm thankful, I'm grateful, because you brought something else to my life.

• 2:08:24Speaker 02

  And I will say this too, in, in my, in my, my conclusion on this is that I, you know, I, so I listened to Milli Vanilli, right, and I then had stopped.

• 2:08:41Speaker 01

  Like many.

• 2:08:42Speaker 02

  Like many.

• 2:08:43Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 2:08:44Speaker 02

  And in preparation for you coming in, I went back through, and I started listening again.

• 2:08:50Speaker 01

  Fireworks.

• 2:08:52Speaker 02

  And it was like I've rediscovered, it's like art, we talked about art.

• 2:08:56Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 2:08:57Speaker 02

  I have this joy come, come over me, you know, and what's interesting to me is when I listen to the music, I see you and Rob.

• 2:09:09Speaker 01

  Of course, yeah.

• 2:09:11Speaker 02

  I see the dancing, I see the energy, I feel the energy.

• 2:09:15Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 2:09:16Speaker 02

  And I see just how much you contributed to what is Milli Vanilli.

• 2:09:23Speaker 01

  And that's the power of music, and that's the reason why I stayed. I stayed because I realized that my conversation with music was like, okay, so what do I do? And she said, well, prove me how much you love me. And I've done that ever since, and together, we're bringing back, and have been bringing back, this energy that is so needed, you know? Love is always needed, but I think like the world is changing, and the kids are growing differently, and social media, computer phones, AI, everything in the mix, I think love is necessary, and music comes through love.

• 2:10:04Speaker 01

  So that being said, with the new music I'm bringing, I, I hope that I can connect and, and, and continue where we left off.

• 2:10:15Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 2:10:16Speaker 01

  With new music.

• 2:10:17Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 2:10:18Speaker 01

  But this time, it's a little more evolved, you know?

• 2:10:22Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 2:10:22Speaker 01

  So we'll see.

• 2:10:23Speaker 02

  Oh, yeah.

• 2:10:24Speaker 01

  If you continue.

• 2:10:24Speaker 02

  We'll be here for it.

• 2:10:26Speaker 01

  And, and of course, you'll get, you'll get some, and you'll let me know.

• 2:10:30Speaker 02

  I'm, I'm ready for it.

• 2:10:31Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 2:10:31Speaker 02

  I'm, I'm ready for the London show. I'm, I'll be, I mean, my wife and I will be front row at the London show.

• 2:10:36Speaker 01

  Let you know.

• 2:10:37Speaker 02

  Oh, yeah, definitely, definitely, thank you.

• 2:10:39Speaker 01

  Pleasure, brother.

• 2:10:39Speaker 02

  Thank you.

• 2:10:42Speaker 02

  Fab Morvan, I lived it. I was there at the inception of Milli Vanilli, I remember the music, I remember their explosion into the United States, I remember them at the Grammys, but then I remember the implosion. And I never fully understood what actually happened.

• 2:11:09Speaker 02

  We got all the answers today. I am still shook by how lonely Fab was throughout the majority of his life. One question I always had was, why did you remain complicit in duping the public? And there was a moment where he talked about feeling loved from the audience, and I realized he had never felt that. It wasn't until this most recent phase of his life, where he has a partner for children, where you could see he is no longer alone.

• 2:11:51Speaker 02

  If he had love from mother, love from father, love from, from anyone, would he have made the same decision? Perhaps not. To even think about how Fab was methodical about the silhouette, and the hair, and the research in terms of creating the brand, and the dance moves, and how focused he was on delivering phenomenal stage performances. All of these pieces, I have become more of a Milli Vanilli fan.

• 2:12:24Speaker 05

  My rock bottom in the Backstreet Boys, I was drinking on stage, so I was ready to go the minute I walked offstage, like, straight to the bar.

• 2:12:34Speaker 05

  Like, I just loved the crowd. I'll never forget, they had shut down Times Square for about six blocks, a sea of people.

• 2:12:42Speaker 02

  Psychologically, truly, like, how, how does that impact you?

• 2:12:45Speaker 05

  God.

• 2:12:46Speaker 02

  Was it Lou Pearlman?

• 2:12:48Speaker 05

  Lou was the entrepreneur that put this whole thing together, but we didn't read the fine print.

• 2:13:00Speaker 05

  We wanted to simply to ask one word, one question, why? But I flew home, smelled like a bar, hadn't slept, went to give my youngest a hug, and she's like, hmm, you don't smell like my dad. Alex is who I've always been, AJ is a character in a band. It's nice to know that now each of us really truly has a voice to speak up, and of course, we've had our moments where it gets physical, or it's a full screaming match.

• 2:13:33Speaker 02

  You, you fought physically?

• 2:13:35Speaker 05

  Yeah. Let's talk about it.

• 2:13:39Speaker 00

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