Ep 2.6 - Vahn Black

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[SPEAKER_01]: I'm Van Black, and you're listening to when we see each other.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Hello world.
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[SPEAKER_00]: My name is Nikisha McLeod, and you're listening to when we see each other, presented by Stereoactive Media.
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[SPEAKER_00]: When we see each other, it's a podcast that focuses on music and art by Bipop, queer, trans, and non-binary artists, as well as artists of met and known for some time.
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[SPEAKER_00]: This episode we're interviewing vocalists, producer and memory worker, fan black.
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[SPEAKER_00]: First, we'll play their soulful single, reckless game off of the album Walk in the Rain.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Then, we'll jump right into the interview.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Here we go.
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[SPEAKER_03]: I've been on a treasure hunt, and I'll go back and hunt fine Back at square one again, just getting seem to get it bright Holding on to fairy tales of the stories of a deep mine Wishing for happy endings, but the stars are never a lie And somebody comes alone, get me thinking they're the one
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[SPEAKER_03]: Turns out again the road of a chance I'd day, another hot break.
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[SPEAKER_03]: But I keep planning on the tendons on and on.
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[SPEAKER_03]: Too pitot is getting old, losing to win as a painful end.
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[SPEAKER_03]: In this reckless game.
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[SPEAKER_03]: This reckless game, reckless game, reckless game No, this reckless game No, this reckless game No, this reckless game No, this reckless game
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[SPEAKER_03]: I just want to try to keep it simple.
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[SPEAKER_03]: If I can't seem to lay this go, that's something inside of me, just long so no.
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[SPEAKER_03]: That feeling, what it's like to be sure that it's on someone once you saw.
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[SPEAKER_03]: Lame the ring when the dead bite into the soul.
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[SPEAKER_03]: Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh,
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[SPEAKER_03]: Breakfast game, this breakfast game, breakfast game, breakfast game, breakfast game, no, this breakfast game, no, this breakfast game, no, this breakfast game, no, this breakfast game, no, this breakfast game, no, this breakfast game, no, this breakfast game, no, this breakfast game, no, this breakfast game, no, this breakfast game, no, this breakfast game, no, this breakfast game, no, this breakfast game,
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[SPEAKER_03]: So tell me where is my kite?
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[SPEAKER_03]: Where is my kite?
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[SPEAKER_03]: Where is my kite?
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[UNKNOWN]: Where is my kite?
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[SPEAKER_03]: Hi, Van.
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[SPEAKER_03]: Welcome to when you see each other.
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[SPEAKER_03]: How are you today?
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[SPEAKER_01]: I'm good.
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[SPEAKER_01]: I'm happy to be here.
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[SPEAKER_01]: Thank you for having me.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Of course, of course.
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[SPEAKER_00]: So I just wanted to first start off with like giving space to what is happening right now in the U.S.
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[SPEAKER_00]: And you know, because it's on everyone's mind, you know, basically, you know, who is back in office and I wanted to know how have you been dealing with all of this.
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[SPEAKER_01]: I have been somehow surviving.
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[SPEAKER_01]: It is a bit frustrating to see everything as it rolls out.
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[SPEAKER_01]: And, you know, for some reason I get the New York Times emails, I'm not really sure how to turn them off.
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[SPEAKER_01]: But they can be, you know, they keep me up to date to some extent and just seeing the things.
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[SPEAKER_01]: It makes me very sad.
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[SPEAKER_01]: And some days I do feel a little hopeless, but I also am feeling hopeful about the fight that a lot of our people have in them.
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[SPEAKER_01]: We persevere before, we press on before, and I have no doubt that we can do it again.
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[SPEAKER_00]: So you brought up Hope, which I totally agree.
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[SPEAKER_00]: I've been swearing by this quote by I think it her name is Maryam.
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[SPEAKER_00]: I can't remember her last name, but it's by this social justice activist where she says hope is a discipline.
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[SPEAKER_00]: At first I thought that was kind of like fluff and I was just like, what does that really mean?
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[SPEAKER_00]: But then, you know, when men actually trying to practice hope, I realized how hard it is and how, like, how much of a discipline it is to do that.
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[SPEAKER_00]: But anyway, how are you practicing hope for the next four years?
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[SPEAKER_01]: Well, for the next four years, I'm trying to honestly get my discipline up and stay as helpful as I can, which, again, is like super hard, but I'm just staying hopeful and, um,
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[SPEAKER_01]: Just filling myself with things that have been created during times of turmoil, listening to a lot of free jazz, a lot of spiritual jazz.
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[SPEAKER_01]: You know, they were going through it in the fifties in the sixties.
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[SPEAKER_01]: And here we are, again, dealing with similar flavor of craziness.
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[SPEAKER_01]: And it's just a reminder of, you know, the resilience that we can have.
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[SPEAKER_01]: So the helps me build up my hope.
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[SPEAKER_05]: Okay.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Awesome.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Awesome.
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[SPEAKER_00]: So let's get into the music.
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[SPEAKER_00]: I mean, for me, at least listening to your album has brought me a lot of joy and a part of hope is having joy and experiencing joy and just like reveling in that.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Not to just fill everything with a quote, but I remember this one quote, a joy being an act of resistance.
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[SPEAKER_00]: So yes, anyway, yeah, your music has brought a lot of joy in my life.
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[SPEAKER_00]: And I feel like that is a part of my resistance to most of the things that are happening right now.
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[SPEAKER_00]: So let's get into it.
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[SPEAKER_00]: So first off, what inspired you to first start making music?
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[SPEAKER_01]: Oh, there's so many things that inspired me to start making music.
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[SPEAKER_01]: I mean, from a very young age, my mom and dad were playing music around the house.
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[SPEAKER_01]: My mom played piano and my dad was a singer, self-talk, guitarist and percussionist.
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[SPEAKER_01]: And every Christmas or every couple of Christmas is I got a new instrument.
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[SPEAKER_01]: And it was like, hey, figure out how to play it.
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[SPEAKER_01]: And I'm an only kid.
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[SPEAKER_01]: So I had a lot of time on my hands to figure out how to make stuff shape and also being from Detroit, you know, music is everywhere.
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[SPEAKER_01]: And it's really like ingrained in the culture and Detroit to enjoy music, be a part of music, be musical.
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[SPEAKER_01]: So it's just, I feel like I just kind of was born into it.
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[SPEAKER_01]: I just kind of slipped into it.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Right.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Right.
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[SPEAKER_00]: So it was just something really natural to fall into.
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[SPEAKER_01]: super natural.
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[SPEAKER_01]: It was like reading air.
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[SPEAKER_01]: It was in the air.
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[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.
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[SPEAKER_01]: Awesome.
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[SPEAKER_01]: Awesome.
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[SPEAKER_01]: Awesome.
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[SPEAKER_00]: So do you remember like the first song that you ever wrote?
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[SPEAKER_01]: Oh, man.
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[SPEAKER_01]: The first song that I ever wrote, I know for a fact I was in the second grade.
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[SPEAKER_01]: And I used to carry around this giraffe print pink and green notebook.
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[SPEAKER_01]: And I remember it was a love song.
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[SPEAKER_01]: And it wasn't a full song.
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[SPEAKER_01]: It was a burst.
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[SPEAKER_01]: And it just, I can't exactly remember the words, but it felt very like, you know, speed and innocent.
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[SPEAKER_01]: Oh, my God, I love you so much.
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[SPEAKER_01]: I want to feel the love.
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[SPEAKER_01]: But yeah, and I remember seeing it to my friends and then being like, this is, this is, I don't know what this is, but it's kind of fun.
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[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.
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[SPEAKER_01]: And there was, there was a lot more of that to follow after that first love song.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Oh my god, that's amazing.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Did you have a title for it?
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[SPEAKER_01]: I don't know.
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[SPEAKER_01]: I feel like I'm going to remember this after we get off.
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[SPEAKER_01]: But like, because I spent so many years talking about it, like whenever someone would ask me, I could tell them and I knew the name and stuff.
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[SPEAKER_01]: I have the notebook somewhere I'm going to check it out, but I just know it was a love song.
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[SPEAKER_01]: I know it was.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.
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[SPEAKER_00]: That's really awesome.
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[SPEAKER_00]: I love that.
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[SPEAKER_00]: So you said that you grew up in the household that was, you know, basically
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[SPEAKER_00]: playing music all the time and introducing you to your parents or introducing you to different instruments.
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[SPEAKER_00]: I believe you did go to school for music, right?
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[SPEAKER_00]: I did, yes.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Can you like talk about that experience and where you went to school?
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[SPEAKER_00]: Yes, so when I was in middle school,
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[SPEAKER_01]: That's when I discovered that being a musician was something that I actually wanted to do.
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[SPEAKER_01]: And I started imagining it being done professionally, like sitting in class, drawing the pictures and making up all the ridiculous like stage names, like I'm going to be a star.
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[SPEAKER_01]: And so going from there, I did a talent show at my middle school.
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[SPEAKER_01]: I taught myself how to play the guitar and saying, hey, low by Beyonce.
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[SPEAKER_01]: You know, one of the teacher aids, she was like, oh, do you know about the Detroit School of Arts?
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[SPEAKER_01]: I was like, no, like, because the school was a middle school in high school.
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[SPEAKER_01]: So I just assumed I was just going to stay and just continue with that.
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[SPEAKER_01]: And she's like, yes, like a special arts high school, you have to audition to get it in and it's free.
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[SPEAKER_01]: And I beg my mom to send me to the audition and she did.
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[SPEAKER_01]: At first she was like, I don't know, your grades.
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[SPEAKER_01]: Now, look at some good girl.
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[SPEAKER_01]: You might need to out.
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[SPEAKER_01]: But she let me audition and it was great again.
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[SPEAKER_01]: And so that started my proper music education.
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[SPEAKER_01]: in schooling.
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[SPEAKER_01]: Like, I had the music education from church growing up and stuff, but that was my start of being classically trained and trained in jazz.
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[SPEAKER_01]: And so, you know, we did a lot of cool stuff.
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[SPEAKER_01]: Like, they teach you the fundamentals in the basics.
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[SPEAKER_01]: I already knew how to read music, because I took piano classes.
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[SPEAKER_01]: They teach you how to site read, their rotation is magical, their rotation is classical stuff.
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[SPEAKER_01]: We sung a lot of Baroque, which may be falling on the Baroque music.
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[SPEAKER_01]: And yeah, and you know, we saw, we got to sing at Carnegie Hall, which was really great.
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[SPEAKER_01]: We were like the whole school in that program that song at Carnegie Hall for that season.
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[SPEAKER_01]: It was truly an experience.
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[SPEAKER_01]: And that was just amazing.
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[SPEAKER_01]: I learned a lot from being at that school.
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[SPEAKER_01]: I learned a lot about
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[SPEAKER_01]: what it means to be a vocalist and a performer.
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[SPEAKER_01]: And I got to get my feet wet, playing at a jazz band, leading a band, writing and arranging songs for, you know, we used to do singer-grams for the kids.
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[SPEAKER_01]: I paid their money and we come to the classroom.
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[SPEAKER_01]: We sing a little to to do.
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[SPEAKER_01]: So I got like a really, I got my footing at that school and it really inspired me to go into music education initially.
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[SPEAKER_01]: because I was like, what kids deserve music education and they deserve to be exposed to broke music and all this classical stuff.
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[SPEAKER_01]: It is our best training.
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[SPEAKER_01]: And so I was passionate about attending a historically black college because I'm from Detroit.
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[SPEAKER_01]: I, that's all I'm gonna say.
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[SPEAKER_01]: I'm from Detroit.
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[SPEAKER_01]: And I was the president of a woman's ensemble in high school, and I was like, I would like to be a part of something with that, that, for lack of a bit of words, Ikki Ikki, sisterhood, filling.
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[SPEAKER_01]: And so,
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[SPEAKER_01]: And I knew I wanted to move to Atlanta because I was very inspired by Genone and Wonderland.
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[SPEAKER_01]: So I was looking at schools in Atlanta and I stumbled upon Spelman and I was like, OK, cool, this is expensive, but let's do it.
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[SPEAKER_01]: So I somehow ended up at Spelman despite them not having a music education program.
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[SPEAKER_01]: And my advisor at the time, Dr. Kevin Johnson.
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[SPEAKER_01]: He was like, what's you can do is you can double measure an education in music and I was like we're not doing that.
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[SPEAKER_01]: I'm not graduating after five years.
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[SPEAKER_01]: I want to get out of here.
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[SPEAKER_01]: And so he kind of encouraged me to start looking at my artistry and my gifts as something that can be a profession like actually I'm finally actually seeing it now.
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[SPEAKER_01]: I can do this as a profession.
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[SPEAKER_01]: And at the time, there wasn't a composition program there.
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[SPEAKER_01]: So what we were doing together, like figuring out songwriting classes and production classes, that was something new, and it was very weird kind of like when you start baby locks, you got to start a locks.
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[SPEAKER_01]: It's very awkward.
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[SPEAKER_01]: It was very awkward.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Yes.
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[SPEAKER_01]: The long story show where it also learned a lot there and did a lot of songwriting and collaborated with people at Morehouse and Clark Atlanta and stuff.
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[SPEAKER_01]: And that experience, it was interesting.
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[SPEAKER_01]: I mean, I'm sure you probably heard from other music school grads.
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[SPEAKER_01]: You know, there are some car stings.
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[SPEAKER_01]: There are some car stings that might happen and you might leave having some complex feelings about yourself.
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[SPEAKER_01]: But I'm grateful for the experience.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, definitely.
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[SPEAKER_00]: That's awesome.
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[SPEAKER_00]: And I wanted to also ask you brought up earlier that your parents would give you with different instruments and you basically had to learn how to play these instruments.
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[SPEAKER_00]: So, and I know, I think you played the guitar, like, and most of your songs.
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[SPEAKER_00]: So, what are the instruments do you play?
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[SPEAKER_01]: The guitar was my first love.
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[SPEAKER_01]: It was one of the first instruments that I successfully taught myself how to play.
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[SPEAKER_01]: But the bass has my hearts.
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[SPEAKER_01]: I adore playing the bass.
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[SPEAKER_01]: I'm a short-skill, for string player.
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[SPEAKER_01]: I also play all the bass on my tracks.
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[SPEAKER_01]: Wow, really.
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[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, I do the thing.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Oh my god, so okay.
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[SPEAKER_00]: So there's one particular song where the bass is just like, I'm like, oh my god, this is so good.
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[SPEAKER_00]: This is so good.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Is this settling down?
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[SPEAKER_00]: Yes.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Oh my god.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Oh my god.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Like, you know, it's just like it was just speaking.
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[SPEAKER_00]: It was like, hmm.
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[SPEAKER_00]: It was just like there and it was saying things.
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[SPEAKER_00]: It was guiding everyone.
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[SPEAKER_00]: It was bringing in the horns.
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[SPEAKER_00]: It was telling the horns, you know, yes, you can do a solo now and I'm going to keep you know, I'm just going to keep doing my thing right here and I'll support you.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Just go ahead and do it.
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[SPEAKER_01]: God, so good.
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[SPEAKER_01]: The best line is definitely, I think it's my favorite one that I've ever recorded.
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[SPEAKER_01]: It came at a time where I was studying a lot of prints in Larry Graham.
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[SPEAKER_01]: Of course, Larry Graham, the year prints, because prints was obsessed with Larry Graham.
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[SPEAKER_01]: This all was listening to a lot of Graham's central station, and I was playing one of his songs called Hair, and I was also playing Pow.
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[SPEAKER_01]: And it's got that crazy, I don't know, like those crazy, active sounds and that quick feeling.
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[SPEAKER_01]: And I just, yeah, the baseline pretty much came from studying all of that.
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[SPEAKER_01]: I'm obsessed with that song as if I didn't write it.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Hey, look, the first person to really inspire you is yourself.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Hello.
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[SPEAKER_00]: I think, you know, so if that is your favorite, yes, yes, I agree with you.
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[SPEAKER_00]: I totally agree with you and I support that.
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[SPEAKER_00]: But anyway, you were telling us all the other instruments that you play.
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[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, so I also play a baritone ukulele.
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[SPEAKER_01]: Baritone ukulelees would actually brought me back into my love for guitar because that took me in the guitar.
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[SPEAKER_01]: We had a quite tumultuous relationship.
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[SPEAKER_01]: over the course of like twenty years.
18:29.465 --> 18:30.566
[SPEAKER_01]: It's ridiculous.
18:31.087 --> 18:33.329
[SPEAKER_01]: Um, but fair to have to go into that.
18:35.711 --> 18:40.195
[SPEAKER_01]: You may have to explain, like, really what is this?
18:40.455 --> 18:42.897
[SPEAKER_01]: There was so much I didn't know about guitar.
18:42.917 --> 18:44.659
[SPEAKER_01]: You know, has kind of like guitar is
18:46.710 --> 19:01.266
[SPEAKER_01]: guitar is kind of like one of those things where it's like just a part of like society and culture right people like think they know it like it's a thing that's there it has these strings it has this whole or something but.
19:03.538 --> 19:06.419
[SPEAKER_01]: You know, like I used to think, oh, every guitar is the same.
19:06.879 --> 19:08.660
[SPEAKER_01]: And it hurts when I play this guitar.
19:08.760 --> 19:09.580
[SPEAKER_01]: And I suck.
19:09.600 --> 19:11.201
[SPEAKER_01]: So I'm not going to play anymore.
19:12.321 --> 19:17.483
[SPEAKER_01]: But when the pandemic happened, I didn't have enough to do.
19:18.584 --> 19:19.264
[SPEAKER_01]: I was laid off.
19:19.964 --> 19:22.285
[SPEAKER_01]: And my acoustic guitar was just sitting around.
19:22.845 --> 19:23.986
[SPEAKER_01]: And I hadn't played it in a while.
19:25.326 --> 19:26.827
[SPEAKER_01]: And so I picked it up.
19:27.647 --> 19:28.387
[SPEAKER_01]: And I started messing around.
19:28.427 --> 19:29.708
[SPEAKER_01]: I was like, this is kind of nice.
19:30.308 --> 19:31.768
[SPEAKER_01]: But I don't like the way my hand feels.
19:31.788 --> 19:32.668
[SPEAKER_01]: I did some research.
19:32.708 --> 19:34.129
[SPEAKER_01]: I learned about strings.
19:34.189 --> 19:36.349
[SPEAKER_01]: I learned about trust laws.
19:36.369 --> 19:37.489
[SPEAKER_01]: I learned about action.
19:37.529 --> 19:41.450
[SPEAKER_01]: And all this other stuff that's super important to customize your guitar.
19:41.470 --> 19:44.090
[SPEAKER_01]: So like you're playing style and like you're anatomy.
19:44.631 --> 19:46.911
[SPEAKER_01]: So I basically have to go on through all of that.
19:47.511 --> 19:57.993
[SPEAKER_01]: And as of like within the last year, messing around and discovering that I don't have to play like everybody else, like the basic G, A, E chord.
19:58.813 --> 20:06.758
[SPEAKER_01]: And I started fiddling around and I was like, I just want to play two, three, four strings at a time, discovering I was playing jazz, show chords.
20:08.680 --> 20:09.480
[SPEAKER_01]: I don't know where.
20:09.760 --> 20:11.101
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm like, this is amazing.
20:11.161 --> 20:12.782
[SPEAKER_01]: Just out of exploring.
20:14.023 --> 20:14.664
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm here now.
20:16.365 --> 20:17.305
[SPEAKER_01]: Oh, we're back.
20:17.365 --> 20:17.846
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm back.
20:17.886 --> 20:21.148
[SPEAKER_01]: The guitar is in my baby and that's all thanks to the baritone ukulele.
20:21.188 --> 20:23.790
[SPEAKER_01]: I picked one up and I was like, maybe this will be easier.
20:24.950 --> 20:34.373
[SPEAKER_00]: Hey, hey, you know, sometimes you have to just like go out of your way, go out of your comfort zone to come back into your comfort zone.
20:34.653 --> 20:34.973
[SPEAKER_01]: Uh-huh.
20:35.093 --> 20:35.833
[SPEAKER_01]: Take a little journey.
20:36.333 --> 20:37.494
[SPEAKER_00]: Yes, exactly.
20:37.674 --> 20:42.035
[SPEAKER_00]: So yeah, I totally applaud that and I think it's cool.
20:42.895 --> 20:51.122
[SPEAKER_00]: And so any other instruments, so we have the guitar, we have the bass, the other ukuleles, too, even though I hate the way they sound.
20:52.523 --> 20:56.146
[SPEAKER_01]: And I'm piano proficient just because I had to graduate.
20:56.446 --> 21:01.750
[SPEAKER_01]: I used to actually be like a classically trained pianist, but then, you know, you know, use the muscle you lose it.
21:02.411 --> 21:04.633
[SPEAKER_01]: But I can still work around and I can play.
21:05.888 --> 21:07.009
[SPEAKER_06]: Okay, that's awesome.
21:07.729 --> 21:12.032
[SPEAKER_00]: So based on that, like, what is your approach to creating?
21:12.692 --> 21:13.733
[SPEAKER_00]: What is your process?
21:13.793 --> 21:22.618
[SPEAKER_00]: Like, do you start off with like an instrument or you hear a melody and you start playing it or you start, you know, you're also vocalist.
21:22.658 --> 21:31.943
[SPEAKER_00]: So, or do you just start singing a tune and then think, oh, that could be something or maybe it's all of those things and something else.
21:33.168 --> 21:36.650
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, it depends on the day honestly, all of the above.
21:38.110 --> 21:44.553
[SPEAKER_01]: Some days I'm practicing bass and I get a really cool idea based on what I've been practicing.
21:46.574 --> 21:58.240
[SPEAKER_01]: Most of the time these days, it comes for me just playing random chords on the guitar and I'm like, I like this progression and I kind of start humming over it, saying nonsense words as we all do.
21:59.600 --> 22:07.545
[SPEAKER_01]: Um, other times like the other day, you know, I was just walking around and I got a little melody and I heard a bass line and I also heard the rhythm.
22:08.226 --> 22:12.729
[SPEAKER_01]: And so I just, you know, quickly record something into my phone trying to do all the things I want to say Michael Jackson.
22:15.812 --> 22:18.334
[SPEAKER_01]: not quite near, but I begin my Michael Jackson all.
22:18.534 --> 22:19.575
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.
22:19.795 --> 22:21.937
[SPEAKER_01]: So it pretty much just depends on the day.
22:23.238 --> 22:30.544
[SPEAKER_01]: Sometimes, most of the time, it takes a lot of time for an idea to come out of my voice memos into my computer.
22:31.264 --> 22:33.286
[SPEAKER_01]: Like, there's so many voice memos.
22:34.267 --> 22:42.473
[SPEAKER_01]: I feel like whenever I have an idea and I'm at my computer and I can just get out of my head, it'll happen faster than if I just put the idea into my phone.
22:42.773 --> 22:44.775
[SPEAKER_00]: Right, right, right, right.
22:44.995 --> 22:46.596
[SPEAKER_00]: That's totally dope.
22:47.517 --> 22:53.122
[SPEAKER_00]: And I'm really curious to see what your voice models and what it looks like.
22:53.743 --> 22:54.403
[SPEAKER_00]: Crazy.
22:55.965 --> 22:56.845
[SPEAKER_00]: Crazy land.
22:56.966 --> 22:57.586
[SPEAKER_00]: Oh my god.
22:57.706 --> 23:04.873
[SPEAKER_00]: So do you ever like, you know, do something like say, maybe you thought of something like maybe last year.
23:05.493 --> 23:08.616
[SPEAKER_00]: And then you come back to it and say, hey, this might be something.
23:09.730 --> 23:16.876
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, I have a habit of holding on to songs for a very long time and revisiting things.
23:17.816 --> 23:33.569
[SPEAKER_01]: So morning off of this last project, I recorded a voice memo for it in twenty eighteen and I recorded a start of the demo for it in twenty eighteen and I didn't come back to it and finish it until last year.
23:34.009 --> 23:34.369
[SPEAKER_06]: Okay.
23:34.810 --> 23:35.150
[SPEAKER_06]: Wow.
23:35.270 --> 23:35.571
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.
23:36.051 --> 23:40.235
[SPEAKER_01]: So it takes Tom sometimes or return to some things.
23:40.255 --> 23:42.978
[SPEAKER_01]: I go through and I try to delete things and make space.
23:43.478 --> 23:43.718
[SPEAKER_06]: Right.
23:43.798 --> 23:45.840
[SPEAKER_01]: And then I'm like, Oh, this is a kind of cool idea.
23:45.880 --> 23:48.182
[SPEAKER_01]: Let me like revisit this and it becomes something else.
23:48.423 --> 23:53.487
[SPEAKER_01]: So that's that's actually true for like a few songs on this project.
23:53.768 --> 23:53.908
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.
24:12.215 --> 24:12.936
[SPEAKER_00]: this project.
24:13.597 --> 24:19.984
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm so really impressed and I love it so much.
24:20.304 --> 24:27.011
[SPEAKER_00]: I really want to hear all the things regarding what inspired you to create this.
24:27.031 --> 24:30.075
[SPEAKER_00]: How do you did it?
24:31.276 --> 24:32.798
[SPEAKER_00]: Because I know it's a three piece
24:33.618 --> 24:36.580
[SPEAKER_00]: sort of saying a three-piece series.
24:38.360 --> 24:52.807
[SPEAKER_00]: And so you started out with, and I know also it's about the project, it's about the black ones, lesbian, drag, king, blues, performer, from the Harlem Renaissance period, glad it's built, gently.
24:54.548 --> 24:57.069
[SPEAKER_00]: So like, what made you want to do this?
24:57.169 --> 24:59.190
[SPEAKER_00]: What inspired you to do this?
24:59.250 --> 25:01.190
[SPEAKER_00]: I mean, she is very inspiring, but
25:03.372 --> 25:15.485
[SPEAKER_00]: But what was like the impetus around deciding that you wanted to create these songs and also like in a series like the series that you've created.
25:17.872 --> 25:25.895
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, so to the series, my brain likes to break things up into pieces.
25:27.115 --> 25:34.917
[SPEAKER_01]: And so the way that I think about Gladys Bentley's stories sometimes is an act, even though, of course, life is continuous.
25:37.038 --> 25:53.016
[SPEAKER_01]: I just think about, you know, her younger years and, you know, when she came to New York and when she was figuring things out, then I move on to the time where she gained success and she was this big star.
25:53.476 --> 25:57.060
[SPEAKER_01]: And then I go to the part where things seem to start
25:58.201 --> 26:09.826
[SPEAKER_01]: to follow a part where the world is in a more tumultuous state and she is changing tremendously changing.
26:11.287 --> 26:22.412
[SPEAKER_01]: And so just thinking about it in that way, that's how I thought about the project and I had so many ideas I didn't want to make, you know, one, thirty track long album because I know about it a time for that.
26:24.534 --> 26:31.822
[SPEAKER_01]: But I just, I knew for a while that I wanted to make a project about.
26:33.168 --> 26:40.771
[SPEAKER_01]: femininity and masculinity in wrestling with that as a black woman or a black person who doesn't identify as a man.
26:40.791 --> 26:49.253
[SPEAKER_01]: And so I knew about Gladys Bentley did some research on her in college, heard about her in college.
26:50.434 --> 26:54.035
[SPEAKER_01]: And as I was creating in like
26:55.473 --> 27:14.699
[SPEAKER_01]: Twenty-nineteen, or maybe like, twenty-twenty-twenty-one, I was thinking about all the feelings that I was have about how I embody femininity and masculinity, and how sometimes those things can make me feel really itky, specifically like the femininity side of things can make me feel very itky.
27:16.920 --> 27:23.542
[SPEAKER_01]: And in writing the songs that I was writing at the time about those feelings, I started to think about Gladys again,
27:24.962 --> 27:30.644
[SPEAKER_01]: And I found that I'm a woman again article in reading it brought a lot of feelings.
27:31.824 --> 27:45.669
[SPEAKER_01]: And it made me think about, you know, how much I kind of relate to some of this stuff that she was saying and how just thinking about the way that she was probably thinking about herself and her own identity and her sexuality and her presentation.
27:47.099 --> 27:53.682
[SPEAKER_01]: how that aligns kind of with the shifting and the shaking that was going on in my mind and in my life.
27:54.222 --> 28:04.047
[SPEAKER_01]: So I just really thought I was important to tell her story because a lot of people don't know about her still and she was as huge star, which is ridiculous to me.
28:04.527 --> 28:06.448
[SPEAKER_01]: She has a very small archive.
28:06.488 --> 28:08.208
[SPEAKER_01]: There's very little left behind.
28:10.009 --> 28:16.112
[SPEAKER_01]: So yeah, I just, I thought it would be really cool to tell that story and you know, let our lives collide.
28:16.430 --> 28:27.193
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, yeah, that's amazing because now it seems like this is sort of like a historical album in a sense.
28:27.533 --> 28:34.435
[SPEAKER_00]: I want to say in a way these this series is kind of like writing through history.
28:35.375 --> 28:36.075
[SPEAKER_00]: Would you say that?
28:37.355 --> 28:42.236
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, yeah, I would say it's writing through history, taking parts of her life.
28:43.897 --> 29:00.941
[SPEAKER_01]: Using with City of Heartman calls critical fibrillation, taking some things from history and bridging the gaps in that history and like reimagining things or imagining what could have been or the things that you don't see imagining what could be in those spaces that you can't see.
29:01.001 --> 29:01.341
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.
29:01.361 --> 29:03.201
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, the unseen.
29:03.221 --> 29:04.581
[SPEAKER_00]: Wow, that's amazing.
29:07.442 --> 29:08.682
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, I love that.
29:08.902 --> 29:14.884
[SPEAKER_00]: Basically, it sounds like you embodied lettuce Bentley's story and spoke her truth.
29:15.144 --> 29:18.866
[SPEAKER_00]: Was there any moment where you felt, well, you kind of brought this up?
29:20.026 --> 29:26.748
[SPEAKER_00]: Was there any moments where you felt like you were in conversation with her, particularly?
29:27.737 --> 29:48.328
[SPEAKER_01]: Sometimes I do feel like, or I try to put myself in a space where I feel like I am in conversation with Gladys because I think it's important to get to know whoever you are trying to talk about and get to know whoever story you're trying to tell.
29:49.889 --> 30:04.740
[SPEAKER_01]: is one thing to know facts, listen to something, read something once, but it's something else to like choose to intentionally engage with a person's story and they're being in their flaws, right?
30:04.821 --> 30:09.284
[SPEAKER_01]: They're downpaws, they're ups, you know.
30:09.544 --> 30:12.847
[SPEAKER_01]: So I do, I try to keep myself
30:13.768 --> 30:21.618
[SPEAKER_01]: in conversation and connected to Gladys' spirit as much as I can as a mortal human.
30:25.641 --> 30:34.167
[SPEAKER_00]: So how was that experience, like, for you, like, you know, moving through the process of creating and retelling the story of Ms.
30:34.207 --> 30:36.528
[SPEAKER_00]: Bentley through sound?
30:36.869 --> 30:38.630
[SPEAKER_00]: Like, how was that experience to you?
30:38.710 --> 30:46.175
[SPEAKER_00]: Like, did you, did you discover some inner knowledge, some introspection?
30:46.195 --> 30:49.377
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, like talk about that a little bit.
30:50.873 --> 30:54.275
[SPEAKER_01]: This journey has been very exciting and educational.
30:55.176 --> 31:01.739
[SPEAKER_01]: And it is pushed me to, I would say, new heights musically.
31:01.759 --> 31:08.443
[SPEAKER_01]: It affirmed that I am a memory worker.
31:09.404 --> 31:10.765
[SPEAKER_01]: Wanted to be an archivist.
31:12.786 --> 31:19.730
[SPEAKER_01]: And it just, it got me really comfortable with being uncomfortable and writing about the ugly stuff.
31:21.190 --> 31:29.895
[SPEAKER_01]: And confronting my emotions because some of these songs like morning and walk in the rain, they were about personal situations.
31:31.076 --> 31:36.319
[SPEAKER_01]: And then reading her story, I'm like, this really aligns with what she was going through and what she was saying.
31:36.359 --> 31:38.761
[SPEAKER_01]: And I think it's really cool that we overlap like that.
31:39.982 --> 31:41.883
[SPEAKER_01]: But it just taught me so much about
31:43.580 --> 31:50.944
[SPEAKER_01]: owning your life, being resilient, defining what resilience is for you, and just being your own person.
31:51.444 --> 31:55.806
[SPEAKER_01]: She's taught me a lot, just learning her story and writing about her is taught me so much.
31:56.635 --> 31:56.915
[SPEAKER_00]: Great.
31:57.936 --> 31:58.657
[SPEAKER_00]: That's amazing.
31:59.397 --> 32:03.581
[SPEAKER_00]: So basically, you felt a connection.
32:03.601 --> 32:05.622
[SPEAKER_00]: I mean, you did bring this up a little bit.
32:06.203 --> 32:10.126
[SPEAKER_00]: And I want, I kind of like one explore this a little bit further if you want to.
32:10.627 --> 32:14.230
[SPEAKER_00]: You mentioned you recognize some of your identity in exploring
32:15.150 --> 32:15.350
[SPEAKER_00]: Ms.
32:15.390 --> 32:26.577
[SPEAKER_00]: Bentley's history and her fluidity if we want to use that word and you share in that same sort of like understanding of your own self.
32:27.278 --> 32:29.359
[SPEAKER_00]: Can you just talk a little bit more about that?
32:29.519 --> 32:36.363
[SPEAKER_00]: How this project connected to your own personal identity and in general?
32:38.104 --> 32:40.746
[SPEAKER_05]: Well, just to start out
32:42.327 --> 32:49.269
[SPEAKER_01]: The idea of the black woman in America is very suffocating.
32:50.789 --> 32:55.611
[SPEAKER_01]: And I have always felt very suffocated by the ideas of what it means to be a woman.
32:56.851 --> 33:08.215
[SPEAKER_05]: And especially being in certain spaces that are very, how do I say this?
33:11.043 --> 33:15.929
[SPEAKER_01]: spaces that favor femininity in women.
33:17.651 --> 33:20.655
[SPEAKER_00]: You don't have to be play.
33:20.675 --> 33:24.079
[SPEAKER_00]: I just just wanted you to know that.
33:25.160 --> 33:26.842
[SPEAKER_00]: Thank you for that.
33:28.952 --> 33:49.459
[SPEAKER_01]: I have always felt some kind of tension with identifying with womanhood, being the person that I am, experiencing the things that I've experienced, especially when society tells a lot of us that has historically told us that we can't be women, because you don't look like this.
33:49.519 --> 33:51.340
[SPEAKER_01]: We don't fit this stereotype.
33:51.360 --> 33:52.340
[SPEAKER_01]: We don't act like this.
33:55.778 --> 34:05.749
[SPEAKER_01]: And yeah, I just, I was raised in a household with a single mother and I watched her do everything.
34:06.390 --> 34:12.516
[SPEAKER_01]: I watched her embody what people would call those quote unquote masculine traits.
34:13.157 --> 34:21.706
[SPEAKER_01]: providing on her own, taking out the trash, doing all of the grunt work, doing the things that needed to be done.
34:22.107 --> 34:24.129
[SPEAKER_01]: And that was true for all the women in my life.
34:24.209 --> 34:27.312
[SPEAKER_01]: I was raised mostly by women who did it all by themselves.
34:28.273 --> 34:33.319
[SPEAKER_01]: And so I embody that power and that strength and hate that
34:35.033 --> 34:38.598
[SPEAKER_01]: that, you know, is often seen as taking away from someone's womanhood.
34:39.640 --> 34:45.989
[SPEAKER_01]: Um, I think to some extent, that's why femininity you're being called a feminine or a femme.
34:46.009 --> 34:48.272
[SPEAKER_01]: That's always felt so equidemy.
34:48.352 --> 34:48.453
[SPEAKER_01]: Um,
34:51.535 --> 35:07.141
[SPEAKER_01]: Just because I don't know, it's just like to be called this thing to be this thing to have to remove the other parts, but I like those masculine traits that I like them, like me who I am, the things that I embody more than this critical feminine divine energy, you know?
35:07.481 --> 35:10.782
[SPEAKER_01]: I don't know if I answered your question, but I have so many thoughts and feelings about this.
35:11.102 --> 35:14.044
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, no, you did answer my question.
35:14.785 --> 35:18.307
[SPEAKER_00]: And please feel free to share your thoughts and feelings about this.
35:20.009 --> 35:36.981
[SPEAKER_00]: Like, I mean, what I'm hearing from you is just like the performative aspects of gender and how that's like, it's the designated for certain people and how ridiculous that is to a certain degree, right?
35:37.601 --> 35:39.563
[SPEAKER_00]: In terms of like, well,
35:41.244 --> 35:50.812
[SPEAKER_00]: That's so limiting, you know, saying that you can only do this thing based on X, Y, and Z. Yeah, it's so ridiculous.
35:50.992 --> 36:07.565
[SPEAKER_01]: And I really wish that none of it mattered and that we could all just exist as, you know, whatever we choose to exist as with all of the things that we want to embody without being judged or being discarded.
36:08.386 --> 36:09.407
[SPEAKER_01]: or being harmed.
36:09.747 --> 36:17.851
[SPEAKER_01]: You know, it's amazing how I realized how different I'm treated based on how I present on different days.
36:18.411 --> 36:19.612
[SPEAKER_01]: It's really wild to me.
36:19.932 --> 36:21.533
[SPEAKER_01]: There's especially in Atlanta.
36:22.133 --> 36:28.096
[SPEAKER_01]: You know, I had the big hair and the blue bejowed and the skirts and it's like, hey, queen.
36:28.116 --> 36:32.278
[SPEAKER_01]: Hey, queen, holding doors.
36:32.358 --> 36:32.838
[SPEAKER_01]: Hey, baby.
36:34.570 --> 36:39.393
[SPEAKER_01]: I got the snapback one and the joggers and the ball's head.
36:39.613 --> 36:40.314
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm not there.
36:42.795 --> 36:44.516
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm just just regarded.
36:44.536 --> 36:46.437
[SPEAKER_01]: It's just, it's amazing to me.
36:46.497 --> 36:48.498
[SPEAKER_01]: It's really interesting and I really hate the matters.
36:48.899 --> 36:49.259
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.
36:49.739 --> 36:50.019
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.
36:50.079 --> 36:53.081
[SPEAKER_00]: It's like I said, it's very limiting.
36:53.441 --> 36:55.463
[SPEAKER_00]: It doesn't allow for expansion.
36:55.503 --> 36:57.344
[SPEAKER_00]: It doesn't allow for multitudes.
36:58.485 --> 37:02.447
[SPEAKER_00]: And we are multitudes and, you know, it's just kind of like,
37:03.679 --> 37:04.762
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, I agree with you.
37:04.782 --> 37:05.865
[SPEAKER_00]: I totally agree with you.
37:05.905 --> 37:06.828
[SPEAKER_00]: I don't want to look like that.
37:08.295 --> 37:11.496
[SPEAKER_01]: At all, I don't want to be suffocated by these things.
37:11.596 --> 37:12.636
[SPEAKER_00]: Let me be.
37:13.016 --> 37:14.117
[SPEAKER_00]: Right, exactly.
37:15.637 --> 37:22.839
[SPEAKER_00]: So I sense what when I was listening and I'm obsessed with your music right away.
37:22.859 --> 37:25.520
[SPEAKER_00]: Thank you.
37:26.140 --> 37:26.740
[SPEAKER_00]: You're welcome.
37:27.781 --> 37:30.401
[SPEAKER_00]: Everyone should be obsessed with your music, honestly.
37:30.421 --> 37:33.282
[SPEAKER_00]: I feel like I'm just going to put that out there.
37:33.362 --> 37:36.503
[SPEAKER_00]: And if you disagree, you can come speak to me about it.
37:39.292 --> 37:51.370
[SPEAKER_00]: So I noticed that the majority of the songs are about love loss, and I'm speaking in general in terms of walking the rain, which you released in February, right?
37:53.527 --> 38:02.631
[SPEAKER_00]: And so yeah, I notice like most of the songs are discussing love lost and maybe even a yearning for love.
38:04.332 --> 38:05.033
[SPEAKER_00]: Is that right?
38:05.133 --> 38:07.234
[SPEAKER_00]: I might, you know, getting it right.
38:07.254 --> 38:08.474
[SPEAKER_00]: You're absolutely right.
38:08.514 --> 38:09.615
[SPEAKER_00]: You're absolutely right.
38:10.575 --> 38:15.778
[SPEAKER_00]: So is there a particular reason for this direction in terms of, like, Ms.
38:15.818 --> 38:16.858
[SPEAKER_00]: Bentley?
38:18.759 --> 38:29.744
[SPEAKER_00]: Is there something in her history that, because I don't know enough about her history to really speak on that, but if you do, please share.
38:31.167 --> 38:57.158
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, so Gladis Bentley in nineteen fifty two wrote an article for Ednie magazine titled I'm a woman again and this trilogy is based on this article in this article Gladis writes about her struggles growing up as you know
38:58.840 --> 39:10.985
[SPEAKER_01]: a girl who this wasn't necessarily wanted by her mother when she was born her mom wanted all boys and she went even harder when she was born and she talks about.
39:12.206 --> 39:18.109
[SPEAKER_01]: Feeling that that those early feelings of abandonment and not feeling loved.
39:19.029 --> 39:27.815
[SPEAKER_01]: And she traces her present feelings as an adult, feeling the desire to be loved, those feelings of loneliness.
39:27.935 --> 39:37.262
[SPEAKER_01]: She traces those back to those moments of her childhood or being born and being treated that way.
39:39.543 --> 39:44.827
[SPEAKER_01]: And throughout her life, she had lovers, of course, they didn't stay.
39:47.282 --> 39:54.468
[SPEAKER_01]: Uh, as what happened with many as they would say lady lovers, you know, the ladies come, the ladies go, they lead them from in.
39:55.829 --> 39:56.970
[SPEAKER_01]: It just didn't stick around.
39:57.030 --> 40:07.919
[SPEAKER_01]: They break your heart and she talks about because of that and because of the, you know, quote, quote, lifestyle that she was living at the height of her life.
40:08.559 --> 40:12.843
[SPEAKER_01]: Um, just feeling very, very alone, feeling very.
40:14.617 --> 40:16.359
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, very sad and alone like that.
40:16.600 --> 40:30.779
[SPEAKER_01]: So the songs are inspired by those feelings of loneliness and those feelings that she described of yearning for love and being afraid to let somebody love her the way that she needed to be loved.
40:32.180 --> 40:46.131
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, so I thought it was really important to dig into those feelings that she was having because I think love plays a very large role in her life and her story.
40:46.431 --> 40:46.771
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.
40:47.712 --> 41:00.722
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, like when when I was listening, I was thinking, well, one, I need to read more about her and the other thing too was just kind of like I was thinking about love in terms of like,
41:02.123 --> 41:06.285
[SPEAKER_00]: knowing the time period that she was living and knowing what she was doing.
41:06.306 --> 41:12.609
[SPEAKER_00]: And then also, that's the sign of wanting love, honestly, I felt like.
41:13.509 --> 41:19.432
[SPEAKER_00]: And just wanting people to accept you for who you are.
41:19.452 --> 41:22.674
[SPEAKER_00]: And that's a part of living and caring.
41:22.694 --> 41:26.756
[SPEAKER_00]: And how a scary and scary step was back then.
41:31.559 --> 41:57.950
[SPEAKER_00]: So yet to hear her story about her past, her childhood, that's like a huge ramification right there because it's just kind of like, you know, your first encounter in the world, your first breath in understanding the world is a disconnection from being loved by the one person in that, you know,
41:58.530 --> 42:01.093
[SPEAKER_00]: the person that actually brought to you into the world.
42:02.255 --> 42:06.300
[SPEAKER_00]: So, wow, that's, yeah, that's pretty huge.
42:07.040 --> 42:07.401
[SPEAKER_05]: Yeah.
42:07.621 --> 42:07.881
[SPEAKER_00]: Wow.
42:08.482 --> 42:08.682
[SPEAKER_00]: Hmm.
42:09.463 --> 42:10.204
[SPEAKER_00]: Thor breaking.
42:10.825 --> 42:12.106
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, it's very heartbreaking.
42:12.607 --> 42:15.050
[SPEAKER_00]: Um, is there a biography of her?
42:15.811 --> 42:17.533
[SPEAKER_00]: I didn't see anything like that.
42:18.932 --> 42:34.383
[SPEAKER_01]: uh there's not an official one as far as I do know uh there is a recording of her on a talk show um and before she performs she says that she's writing an autobiography called
42:35.458 --> 42:36.479
[SPEAKER_01]: Um, it this be sin.
42:36.919 --> 42:41.641
[SPEAKER_01]: Um, however, there's no proof of this writing and it doesn't exist.
42:41.701 --> 42:42.502
[SPEAKER_01]: We haven't seen it.
42:43.082 --> 42:44.363
[SPEAKER_00]: So nobody knows.
42:46.484 --> 42:49.205
[SPEAKER_00]: Well, I think you started something honestly.
42:49.225 --> 42:51.647
[SPEAKER_00]: I think you really started something.
42:52.627 --> 43:05.914
[SPEAKER_00]: Um, so one other thing that I noticed as well is, uh, I sense it were reoccurring the theme of rain where this album, one is called, uh, walk in the rain.
43:06.794 --> 43:10.616
[SPEAKER_00]: And the first intention of the project is tidal.
43:11.496 --> 43:12.697
[SPEAKER_00]: And I may screw this up.
43:13.257 --> 43:16.399
[SPEAKER_00]: Petraca, Petraca, or how do you say that?
43:16.419 --> 43:18.040
[SPEAKER_06]: That's a core, Petraca.
43:19.240 --> 43:37.875
[SPEAKER_00]: the joy of Gladys Bentley and Petricor literally means a pleasant smell that frequently accompanies the first rain after a long period of warm dry weather and then of course the first song the introduction was fluidity
43:38.855 --> 43:45.577
[SPEAKER_00]: And I only thought about it in terms of, like, Gladys being fluid, her gender being fluid.
43:46.437 --> 43:54.039
[SPEAKER_00]: And so it made me think about, like, well, okay, rain being a symbol of fluidity.
43:54.059 --> 44:03.501
[SPEAKER_00]: I was searching for the understanding of the theme itself and just kind of like, if he can just help me in that direction, that would be awesome.
44:04.468 --> 44:12.030
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, it's absolutely about fluidity and because I just feel that Glad has been the represents fluidity.
44:12.210 --> 44:21.492
[SPEAKER_01]: Like, she's a great example of what it means to be fluid in terms of the way you present in terms of the way that you identify.
44:23.753 --> 44:42.739
[SPEAKER_01]: And so Petra Core, the Joy of Glad is Bentley, was meant to be an outline or an imagining of what it may have been like when she was at the top of her career when she had several women on her arm when she did.
44:42.919 --> 44:45.700
[SPEAKER_01]: Ballsy things like, quote unquote, mirroring a white woman.
44:45.720 --> 44:50.221
[SPEAKER_01]: And yeah, okay, I did not know that.
44:51.190 --> 44:55.514
[SPEAKER_01]: Oh, yes, this said that she married a white woman and New Jersey, I believe.
44:55.694 --> 44:56.135
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.
44:56.635 --> 44:58.397
[SPEAKER_00]: Back then, seriously.
44:58.457 --> 44:58.897
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.
44:59.237 --> 44:59.778
[SPEAKER_00]: Wow.
45:00.038 --> 45:03.001
[SPEAKER_00]: Who was a minister who basically oversaw that?
45:03.021 --> 45:05.083
[SPEAKER_00]: I would love to know that.
45:05.163 --> 45:05.503
[SPEAKER_00]: Yes.
45:06.264 --> 45:17.814
[SPEAKER_00]: Like, seriously, like, I want to know, you see, this is why she, someone needs to write, you know, this biography, because we're missing a lot of information right here that with
45:17.954 --> 45:21.835
[SPEAKER_00]: And this is why we have critical fabulation shut up to the department.
45:22.095 --> 45:22.675
[SPEAKER_01]: Okay.
45:23.196 --> 45:23.676
[SPEAKER_01]: Awesome.
45:25.976 --> 45:34.359
[SPEAKER_01]: But yes, just just doing the things that she was doing that probably brought her pleasure brought her joy.
45:34.379 --> 45:37.620
[SPEAKER_01]: I just really wanted to.
45:39.723 --> 45:40.903
[SPEAKER_01]: embody that feeling.
45:41.423 --> 45:52.606
[SPEAKER_01]: And so it being named petrochore, you know, I feel like I associate the greatness in her career and in her life with warmth, sunny days, hot summers.
45:53.706 --> 46:05.329
[SPEAKER_01]: And of course, no petrochore, the onset of the first rain in a while, you know, storms are usually associated with moodiness, sadness, all these emotions.
46:05.749 --> 46:09.270
[SPEAKER_01]: And so walking the rain, the title itself,
46:10.471 --> 46:21.924
[SPEAKER_01]: Just represents her navigating through those changes, moving through that storm, preparing to come out on the other side, as which he shows to be towards the end of her life.
46:23.626 --> 46:28.132
[SPEAKER_01]: So yeah, that the theme of rain and fluids, that is very intentional.
46:28.272 --> 46:28.652
[SPEAKER_01]: Okay.
46:29.073 --> 46:29.834
[SPEAKER_01]: Wow, that's...
46:30.354 --> 46:32.155
[SPEAKER_01]: That's awesome.
46:32.656 --> 46:34.097
[SPEAKER_00]: So what came first for you?
46:34.497 --> 46:36.138
[SPEAKER_00]: Was it the lyrical parts?
46:36.398 --> 46:40.161
[SPEAKER_00]: Or was it the melodies, the instrumentation?
46:40.941 --> 46:48.126
[SPEAKER_00]: Or did you just like went on a, you just went down and you know did all this research?
46:48.326 --> 46:51.448
[SPEAKER_00]: Because I feel like this is not only is it like
46:53.289 --> 46:59.032
[SPEAKER_00]: a production of music, but it's also a research project on Ms.
46:59.052 --> 46:59.853
[SPEAKER_00]: Bentley's life.
47:00.713 --> 47:04.295
[SPEAKER_00]: And so like I feel like, well, where did you start?
47:04.375 --> 47:05.276
[SPEAKER_00]: Where did you begin?
47:05.356 --> 47:13.240
[SPEAKER_00]: Did you start doing the research first or did you just say, come up, you know, you start hearing the music or what letters now?
47:14.778 --> 47:27.362
[SPEAKER_01]: So some of the songs they did exist, or they, some of the songs that I did for the songs, they existed before starting my research.
47:28.802 --> 47:39.106
[SPEAKER_01]: So some of the songs that would be a theme, or it would be a name, or a verse, and then starting research and looking through different things.
47:40.106 --> 47:42.087
[SPEAKER_01]: I was like, oh, okay, I can plug this here.
47:42.107 --> 47:43.808
[SPEAKER_01]: This song should be about this.
47:43.868 --> 47:46.870
[SPEAKER_01]: I can make this about this specific thing that happened in her life.
47:47.991 --> 47:53.094
[SPEAKER_01]: Um, so yeah, things were kind of happening simultaneously.
47:53.114 --> 48:08.083
[SPEAKER_01]: Um, and the ideas that I have before were fleshed out more and they became more certain once I did more research, like walk in the rain was, you know, for a lack of better words, a breakup song initially.
48:08.843 --> 48:25.290
[SPEAKER_01]: But learning more about Gladys' story helped me plug in the lyrics and write the lyrics, tailoring them to her experience and just thinking about what it could have been like for her to navigate through all these changes.
48:25.310 --> 48:26.590
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.
48:27.470 --> 48:28.731
[SPEAKER_05]: Yeah.
48:29.071 --> 48:29.471
[SPEAKER_05]: Awesome.
48:30.932 --> 48:31.292
[SPEAKER_05]: Awesome.
48:32.303 --> 48:43.668
[SPEAKER_00]: So, I mean, I kept wondering, and this might be very trivial question, but I was wondering, like, why a trilogy?
48:44.328 --> 48:50.871
[SPEAKER_00]: I mean, I feel like, especially now as we're discussing this, I feel like you could possibly do a deluxe
48:53.772 --> 49:09.185
[SPEAKER_00]: and kind of like the thing where it's, I don't know, I, yes, so I was just kind of like wondering why, you know, a trilogy for the series, is there a particular reason behind that or is it just like, you know, you just felt like it?
49:10.466 --> 49:15.671
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, like I was saying, I'd like to break things up into pieces and, um,
49:18.062 --> 49:23.223
[SPEAKER_01]: I just wanted to give each section of her life as I thought about it.
49:24.383 --> 49:25.503
[SPEAKER_01]: It's own attention.
49:25.583 --> 49:26.824
[SPEAKER_01]: It's own platform.
49:26.884 --> 49:27.844
[SPEAKER_01]: It's own situation.
49:27.864 --> 49:29.584
[SPEAKER_01]: It feels like a better words.
49:31.204 --> 49:39.226
[SPEAKER_01]: And the intention at the end of this is to bring the three projects together in some way.
49:40.346 --> 49:45.267
[SPEAKER_01]: But I just wanted everything to have their own space and time.
49:47.033 --> 49:48.694
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, it will collide at some point.
50:06.905 --> 50:15.731
[SPEAKER_00]: So how does this project differ or maybe is similar to your previous works sound-wise?
50:16.403 --> 50:36.724
[SPEAKER_01]: So I would say the thing that makes walking the rain a little different from my past work is I feel like I'm finally embodying the sound that I've always wanted in terms of the atmospheric heart felt
50:38.045 --> 50:41.827
[SPEAKER_01]: folk roots inspired sound.
50:41.847 --> 50:43.148
[SPEAKER_01]: I really love roots music.
50:44.169 --> 50:46.570
[SPEAKER_01]: I love what some people would call a coffee shop music.
50:47.611 --> 50:54.374
[SPEAKER_01]: And I have always been very inspired by Michelle and to go to hello for one.
50:54.474 --> 50:54.875
[SPEAKER_01]: Yes.
50:55.715 --> 51:05.225
[SPEAKER_01]: And yeah, just the way that she's navigated in her career and the way that she has shifted, sonically, has always been so inspiring and amazing to me.
51:05.245 --> 51:10.490
[SPEAKER_01]: And so walking the reins, the album that I've always wanted to create.
51:11.151 --> 51:14.073
[SPEAKER_01]: taking from that sound world, making it my own.
51:15.153 --> 51:23.819
[SPEAKER_01]: And so I feel like it's the first project where I'm finally building off of those sounds that I wanted.
51:23.839 --> 51:33.144
[SPEAKER_01]: And like, you know, telling them to me and morphing them with my jazz influence and getting deeper into my jazz influence, making that more present.
51:33.164 --> 51:33.564
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.
51:34.945 --> 51:37.006
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, so it's very special to me because of that.
51:37.326 --> 51:42.287
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, and I totally hear that jazz experience and especially when you're scouting.
51:42.407 --> 51:44.327
[SPEAKER_00]: Scouting, yes, yeah, exactly.
51:44.947 --> 51:49.288
[SPEAKER_00]: And I, you know, and you did it in a way that was very fresh.
51:49.389 --> 51:49.949
[SPEAKER_00]: It was new.
51:49.969 --> 51:55.370
[SPEAKER_00]: It wasn't like not nothing against a whole way of scouting.
51:56.203 --> 52:01.425
[SPEAKER_00]: Um, but it was just more like it felt more contemporary if that makes sense.
52:01.925 --> 52:09.768
[SPEAKER_00]: Um, and like I really appreciate that like giving it a new nuance to, you know, the whole style.
52:09.788 --> 52:14.330
[SPEAKER_00]: And I mean, I feel like that whole thing is really intimidating.
52:15.190 --> 52:18.732
[SPEAKER_00]: to do scatting, honestly, to do it successfully.
52:19.512 --> 52:24.194
[SPEAKER_00]: And I feel like that's kind of why some of us wouldn't want to do that.
52:24.934 --> 52:26.215
[SPEAKER_00]: We'll shy away from it.
52:27.155 --> 52:32.137
[SPEAKER_00]: So for you to actually make it your own, that's pretty huge.
52:32.658 --> 52:34.438
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, I like to say I'm just a bean.
52:35.219 --> 52:36.659
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm just a bean.
52:38.960 --> 52:41.001
[SPEAKER_01]: Shout out to the queen, Ella Fitzgera.
52:41.161 --> 52:42.462
[SPEAKER_01]: Oh my god, seriously.
52:43.569 --> 52:48.954
[SPEAKER_01]: And and just me all horn who is like just sharing the sketch tradition on her back.
52:49.034 --> 52:49.635
[SPEAKER_00]: Yes.
52:50.195 --> 52:50.796
[SPEAKER_00]: Yes.
52:51.316 --> 52:51.897
[SPEAKER_00]: Oh my god.
52:52.538 --> 52:53.058
[SPEAKER_00]: Definitely.
52:54.900 --> 53:00.285
[SPEAKER_00]: So how long did it take you to create the album for both albums?
53:00.596 --> 53:04.337
[SPEAKER_00]: And what would the third album for the series look like?
53:04.397 --> 53:09.019
[SPEAKER_00]: Sound like will it follow the same direction around themes?
53:09.919 --> 53:13.860
[SPEAKER_00]: The discussion of love, heartbreak.
53:14.860 --> 53:19.342
[SPEAKER_01]: So Patrick Warren walk in the rain combined, took about three years to create
53:20.122 --> 53:28.348
[SPEAKER_01]: They are made up of some ideas and some things that were started as far back as twenty eighteen, but actively created them.
53:28.388 --> 53:29.929
[SPEAKER_01]: It took about three years or so.
53:29.949 --> 53:39.995
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm super excited for the final part of this project, which is named after the article that Gladys Bentley wrote, I'm a woman again.
53:40.015 --> 53:42.317
[SPEAKER_01]: It is going to embody
53:44.238 --> 53:55.640
[SPEAKER_01]: Or just like imagine how Gladys felt or would feel like living in her truth, her new found truth, you know, a lot of people reading this article.
53:57.503 --> 54:11.230
[SPEAKER_01]: You know, if people are torn, they'll say, oh, she was just writing this article saying that, you know, she's a quote unquote woman now and took hormones and it worked because she needed money because of McCarthyism because of all these things.
54:12.490 --> 54:15.832
[SPEAKER_01]: But I think it's also fair to take her for her word.
54:17.092 --> 54:25.115
[SPEAKER_01]: And just imagine, like, what if she, I mean, we know that this formal stuff is BS.
54:25.635 --> 54:31.917
[SPEAKER_01]: But what if, like, she actually felt very happy in this new way of life?
54:32.317 --> 54:35.058
[SPEAKER_01]: Like, what if she actually felt like she had arrived in her life?
54:35.999 --> 54:42.105
[SPEAKER_01]: So just toying with concepts of what it means to be a woman, what womanhood actually is.
54:42.726 --> 54:44.027
[SPEAKER_01]: What that means to me.
54:44.988 --> 54:46.429
[SPEAKER_01]: What that could have meant for her.
54:46.449 --> 54:46.529
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.
54:47.991 --> 54:49.533
[SPEAKER_01]: And I'm so excited.
54:50.621 --> 54:53.983
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, I'm excited too.
54:54.563 --> 54:56.685
[SPEAKER_00]: This brings up so many things.
54:56.805 --> 55:04.990
[SPEAKER_00]: Honestly, just going back to what we were discussing in terms of being pigeonholed into one particular thing.
55:06.151 --> 55:13.915
[SPEAKER_00]: And then for her to say to announce, I'm a woman now, now, now.
55:13.935 --> 55:15.836
[SPEAKER_00]: What do I mean?
55:17.277 --> 55:21.959
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, it's just kind of like, well, what does that really mean?
55:22.359 --> 55:32.583
[SPEAKER_00]: It's almost like she was searching, trying to understand what this means and that she found what it meant to her.
55:32.603 --> 55:44.427
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm going to assume it's none of the things that we're taught and basically indoctrinated into.
55:45.147 --> 55:48.609
[SPEAKER_00]: Well, at least for some, you know, it's, it's, it's multi-faceted.
55:50.110 --> 55:51.811
[SPEAKER_00]: So, wow, that's amazing.
55:52.191 --> 55:56.454
[SPEAKER_00]: So, yeah, I'm looking forward to that, like, seriously, and me too.
55:58.255 --> 56:00.076
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm excited for everyone to, like,
56:01.197 --> 56:06.018
[SPEAKER_01]: Catch the sonic vibes for lack of better words.
56:06.278 --> 56:08.958
[SPEAKER_01]: It's definitely going to be a fun project.
56:09.418 --> 56:12.099
[SPEAKER_01]: It's going to be more collaborative.
56:12.119 --> 56:17.140
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm going to have my long-term collaborative training alone, plays trumpet.
56:17.200 --> 56:18.080
[SPEAKER_01]: He's going to be a part of it.
56:18.120 --> 56:20.720
[SPEAKER_01]: Jeffrey Trent, who plays saxophone, also want care too much.
56:22.901 --> 56:28.462
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, this project is also, it's acting as a bridge to the other things that I really want to do.
56:28.482 --> 56:30.362
[SPEAKER_01]: So I'm super excited for a sonically.
56:30.940 --> 56:31.301
[SPEAKER_06]: Okay.
56:32.244 --> 56:35.674
[SPEAKER_00]: And when do you expect this to happen when it's just gonna come out?
56:37.288 --> 56:38.409
[SPEAKER_01]: I can't sing.
56:38.689 --> 56:40.250
[SPEAKER_01]: Okay.
56:40.631 --> 56:42.372
[SPEAKER_00]: Not too long.
56:42.652 --> 56:43.813
[SPEAKER_00]: Not too long from now.
56:43.833 --> 56:44.674
[SPEAKER_00]: Okay.
56:44.994 --> 56:45.335
[SPEAKER_06]: All right.
56:45.815 --> 56:50.399
[SPEAKER_00]: So I'm just going to switch gears now and thinking about your influences.
56:51.059 --> 56:57.925
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm curious which artists you get compared to the most and whether you appreciate those comparisons.
56:58.465 --> 57:05.311
[SPEAKER_00]: And then also, also, is there anyone who influenced you that you think people would find surprising?
57:05.971 --> 57:07.693
[SPEAKER_01]: Ooh, that's a good question.
57:07.713 --> 57:07.793
[SPEAKER_01]: Okay.
57:11.296 --> 57:19.263
[SPEAKER_01]: So, artists that I get compared to the most, uh, Indiarri is the first one.
57:19.283 --> 57:23.827
[SPEAKER_01]: That can one is Leila Hathaway.
57:32.007 --> 57:34.869
[SPEAKER_05]: The third one has a blade on TikTok has been lettucy.
57:35.710 --> 57:36.510
[SPEAKER_00]: Who is that?
57:38.132 --> 57:38.612
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm sorry.
57:38.792 --> 57:39.213
[SPEAKER_06]: What?
57:40.393 --> 57:43.776
[SPEAKER_00]: Okay, so did I just embarrass myself on air?
57:44.016 --> 57:45.777
[SPEAKER_01]: Not fully, not fully.
57:46.218 --> 57:49.340
[SPEAKER_01]: Lettucy is like a OG so girly.
57:49.740 --> 57:51.081
[SPEAKER_01]: You've seen her before.
57:51.102 --> 57:51.962
[SPEAKER_01]: Okay.
57:52.222 --> 57:59.488
[SPEAKER_01]: You know that clip from like the, I think it's a beat to your words where it's her and three other people singing for black women.
58:02.163 --> 58:04.545
[SPEAKER_01]: Oh, and she's like, my name is Pete.
58:05.246 --> 58:05.746
[SPEAKER_00]: Yes.
58:06.487 --> 58:07.087
[SPEAKER_00]: Oh my god.
58:07.488 --> 58:09.209
[SPEAKER_00]: So I, no, I did not.
58:09.569 --> 58:16.355
[SPEAKER_00]: Okay, so I did not realize that that was her, but, you know, it's okay.
58:17.916 --> 58:20.258
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm going to, you know, I'll take the heat for this.
58:20.658 --> 58:22.620
[SPEAKER_00]: You know, I didn't do my research.
58:23.541 --> 58:25.442
[SPEAKER_00]: I didn't, you know, I just, yeah.
58:26.003 --> 58:27.544
[SPEAKER_01]: You're fine.
58:27.664 --> 58:30.326
[SPEAKER_01]: You were learning exactly.
58:30.527 --> 58:34.290
[SPEAKER_01]: That's what I'm going to do on TikTok lately and I'm like, hmm, that's interesting.
58:34.310 --> 58:35.431
[SPEAKER_01]: Okay.
58:36.011 --> 58:37.032
[SPEAKER_01]: Um, yeah.
58:37.072 --> 58:40.655
[SPEAKER_01]: So those are the main people that people bring to me.
58:40.675 --> 58:40.715
[SPEAKER_01]: Um,
58:42.676 --> 58:47.418
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, someone who has influenced me that people would not expect.
58:49.339 --> 58:50.059
[SPEAKER_01]: Oh boy.
58:50.079 --> 59:11.308
[SPEAKER_01]: I don't know about people, but I know people probably wouldn't expect that I am very inspired by like horror core and metal and screamo.
59:12.003 --> 59:12.332
[SPEAKER_00]: Really?
59:14.182 --> 59:14.362
[SPEAKER_00]: Wow.
59:14.982 --> 59:15.882
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.
59:16.123 --> 59:18.503
[SPEAKER_00]: So that is that is definitely surprising.
59:18.523 --> 59:19.983
[SPEAKER_00]: Oh, it's a rhythm.
59:21.044 --> 59:22.244
[SPEAKER_00]: Yes, exactly.
59:22.564 --> 59:24.384
[SPEAKER_00]: You know, I can see.
59:24.524 --> 59:25.784
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, I can see that.
59:26.245 --> 59:28.265
[SPEAKER_01]: This is a band name horror.
59:28.945 --> 59:30.605
[SPEAKER_01]: They're from New Jersey.
59:30.625 --> 59:39.367
[SPEAKER_01]: And I actually, I did a research paper on them and college and they were nice enough to let me interview them.
59:39.387 --> 59:41.528
[SPEAKER_01]: That was a very interesting interview.
59:43.408 --> 59:53.256
[SPEAKER_01]: They basically blend like metal with like horror core, like the traditional hip-hop horror core situation and it is awesome.
59:53.376 --> 59:56.498
[SPEAKER_01]: It is like something you probably never heard before.
59:56.578 --> 59:57.539
[SPEAKER_01]: It's very unique.
59:57.579 --> 59:58.600
[SPEAKER_01]: The rhythms are so good.
59:58.660 --> 59:59.360
[SPEAKER_01]: It's very gritty.
59:59.400 --> 01:00:00.521
[SPEAKER_01]: It's very soulful.
01:00:01.342 --> 01:00:02.623
[SPEAKER_01]: Oh, I just love them.
01:00:03.143 --> 01:00:03.483
[SPEAKER_00]: All right.
01:00:03.563 --> 01:00:06.185
[SPEAKER_00]: So I'm definitely writing that down right now.
01:00:06.706 --> 01:00:07.246
[SPEAKER_00]: H-O-N-N-N.
01:00:07.326 --> 01:00:08.067
[SPEAKER_00]: H-O-N-N-N.
01:00:10.008 --> 01:00:10.588
[SPEAKER_00]: Oh, no.
01:00:10.829 --> 01:00:11.109
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.
01:00:11.229 --> 01:00:11.649
[SPEAKER_00]: Oh, no.
01:00:12.109 --> 01:00:15.291
[SPEAKER_00]: All right, definitely we'll check that out.
01:00:15.411 --> 01:00:16.092
[SPEAKER_00]: Anyone else?
01:00:18.833 --> 01:00:20.854
[SPEAKER_01]: Oh, this is so hot.
01:00:20.954 --> 01:00:27.018
[SPEAKER_01]: Like a person that I'm influenced by that people would probably be shocked by.
01:00:27.038 --> 01:00:28.859
[SPEAKER_01]: Oh, man.
01:00:28.879 --> 01:00:30.380
[SPEAKER_01]: I listen to so much stuff.
01:00:30.420 --> 01:00:32.741
[SPEAKER_01]: I feel like it's hard to say.
01:00:32.881 --> 01:00:35.923
[SPEAKER_01]: And I feel like a lot of the stuff that I listen to that influences me.
01:00:36.623 --> 01:00:38.524
[SPEAKER_01]: People would probably be like, oh, yeah, I could see that.
01:00:41.410 --> 01:00:42.651
[SPEAKER_01]: I don't know.
01:00:42.731 --> 01:00:44.092
[SPEAKER_01]: That's really hard to say.
01:00:44.112 --> 01:00:45.393
[SPEAKER_01]: I got to think about that one.
01:00:45.413 --> 01:00:47.995
[SPEAKER_01]: All right.
01:00:50.396 --> 01:00:51.097
[SPEAKER_00]: It's all good.
01:00:52.438 --> 01:00:55.199
[SPEAKER_00]: So onto the next.
01:00:55.840 --> 01:01:00.443
[SPEAKER_00]: How would you say your sound differs from other genre-related artists?
01:01:01.915 --> 01:01:12.225
[SPEAKER_01]: Well, people put me often in the R&B category, which I personally don't agree with, because of the state of modern R&B.
01:01:12.245 --> 01:01:16.289
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm not fully aligned with that sonically.
01:01:17.865 --> 01:01:18.806
[SPEAKER_01]: And in other ways.
01:01:20.988 --> 01:01:30.917
[SPEAKER_01]: But, you know, I'm close to the areas like if there's like a circle and there's a fence, the fence is open and I'm standing at the fence.
01:01:32.479 --> 01:01:42.989
[SPEAKER_01]: So if we're talking about like me with current R&B artists at the time, like of this time, I guess maybe taking from
01:01:44.550 --> 01:01:49.115
[SPEAKER_01]: different genres that are like more instrumentally focused.
01:01:50.677 --> 01:01:56.504
[SPEAKER_01]: I feel like not to be that person, but I feel like a lot of what's missing in music in general today.
01:01:59.527 --> 01:02:07.476
[SPEAKER_01]: is, you know, real instrumentation and that person to say that be that person.
01:02:07.596 --> 01:02:16.526
[SPEAKER_01]: I don't want people to eat me up, you know, people get in their film as a bar and be, but I'm just like, you know, the feeling is kind of being sucked out because a lot of people
01:02:17.266 --> 01:02:21.928
[SPEAKER_01]: are just saying over songs that were hits themselves twenty years ago.
01:02:22.508 --> 01:02:24.809
[SPEAKER_01]: People aren't creating the poor progressions.
01:02:25.649 --> 01:02:33.211
[SPEAKER_01]: People aren't improvising, which has been a big part of Black American music and culture for the past over a hundred years.
01:02:35.312 --> 01:02:40.794
[SPEAKER_01]: So yeah, I think the instrumental components and the
01:02:42.605 --> 01:02:42.906
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.
01:02:43.668 --> 01:02:48.540
[SPEAKER_01]: I wish everybody would just throw in some saxophone and some trumpet more often.
01:02:49.061 --> 01:02:49.422
[SPEAKER_01]: Right.
01:02:49.723 --> 01:02:51.187
[SPEAKER_01]: Just a little scuba boop up, you know?
01:02:51.207 --> 01:02:51.287
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.
01:02:52.838 --> 01:03:00.801
[SPEAKER_00]: I mean, it's totally fine to have what we have right now, but just not everything be that exact thing.
01:03:00.961 --> 01:03:02.561
[SPEAKER_01]: But variety would be nice.
01:03:02.581 --> 01:03:09.324
[SPEAKER_01]: I feel like a lot of people are doing the same thing, or endless similar vibe right now.
01:03:09.504 --> 01:03:14.265
[SPEAKER_01]: And it's unfortunate because, I don't know, it's like the diversity is lacking.
01:03:14.866 --> 01:03:15.146
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.
01:03:16.066 --> 01:03:19.167
[SPEAKER_00]: Definitely need some tea, I, and that.
01:03:20.868 --> 01:03:21.628
[SPEAKER_00]: So anyway,
01:03:22.188 --> 01:03:26.129
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm not going to get involved with that.
01:03:28.229 --> 01:03:29.750
[SPEAKER_00]: So which do you prefer?
01:03:30.110 --> 01:03:31.970
[SPEAKER_00]: Studio work or performing live?
01:03:34.871 --> 01:03:38.112
[SPEAKER_01]: I've always said that the record comes first.
01:03:39.552 --> 01:03:48.014
[SPEAKER_01]: But I really love playing with the people that I went to high school with, like playing with them, feels so good.
01:03:48.354 --> 01:03:51.595
[SPEAKER_01]: And I love engaging and interacting with the audience.
01:03:52.396 --> 01:03:53.036
[SPEAKER_01]: So I don't know.
01:03:53.056 --> 01:04:04.731
[SPEAKER_01]: I guess I'll say live because then I can bring the stuff I spent so much time working on the studio and I can read a match in it and it's just like this really addictive thing.
01:04:04.751 --> 01:04:06.373
[SPEAKER_01]: So yeah, I say live.
01:04:06.393 --> 01:04:07.534
[SPEAKER_05]: Okay.
01:04:08.095 --> 01:04:08.395
[SPEAKER_00]: Awesome.
01:04:09.802 --> 01:04:17.604
[SPEAKER_00]: And well, we know some of your future plans in terms of like the third installment of the series.
01:04:18.865 --> 01:04:19.905
[SPEAKER_00]: Any other plans?
01:04:20.545 --> 01:04:25.027
[SPEAKER_00]: Maybe shows coming up, maybe a video, maybe.
01:04:26.247 --> 01:04:26.867
[SPEAKER_00]: The chore.
01:04:27.767 --> 01:04:30.648
[SPEAKER_01]: Well, I have a lot of things that I'm working on in planning.
01:04:30.668 --> 01:04:33.549
[SPEAKER_01]: I am currently, I'm not being dramatic.
01:04:33.589 --> 01:04:35.490
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm actually working on three albums right now.
01:04:35.830 --> 01:04:36.010
[SPEAKER_00]: What?
01:04:36.808 --> 01:04:37.208
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.
01:04:37.228 --> 01:04:38.109
[SPEAKER_00]: Oh, my God.
01:04:38.129 --> 01:04:39.330
[SPEAKER_00]: All right.
01:04:39.390 --> 01:04:40.170
[SPEAKER_00]: Oh, so wait.
01:04:40.711 --> 01:04:42.392
[SPEAKER_00]: Now you tell us this now.
01:04:43.633 --> 01:04:46.214
[SPEAKER_00]: So what are these three albums?
01:04:47.235 --> 01:04:50.437
[SPEAKER_01]: So one of the albums is a root jazz album.
01:04:50.777 --> 01:04:51.117
[SPEAKER_01]: Okay.
01:04:52.158 --> 01:04:54.059
[SPEAKER_01]: It is one of the albums of my dreams.
01:04:55.760 --> 01:05:13.211
[SPEAKER_01]: And the other album is in dedication to two jazz grates that I won't name as of yet, but it is in the spirit of some of the biggest jazz people who would inspire me.
01:05:13.839 --> 01:05:15.841
[SPEAKER_00]: Wow, that's awesome.
01:05:16.681 --> 01:05:17.682
[SPEAKER_00]: That is so awesome.
01:05:18.163 --> 01:05:20.705
[SPEAKER_00]: All right, so I'm super excited.
01:05:20.865 --> 01:05:25.349
[SPEAKER_00]: Like, yeah, oh my god, like, wow, that's amazing.
01:05:27.030 --> 01:05:33.515
[SPEAKER_00]: Well, you know, letters know when you're dropping these and, you know, yeah, just let us know.
01:05:33.936 --> 01:05:39.981
[SPEAKER_00]: For sure, are there any artists you would like to shout out and recommend?
01:05:41.138 --> 01:05:44.379
[SPEAKER_01]: I would like to shout out Michael DeAngelo Archer.
01:05:44.399 --> 01:05:47.741
[SPEAKER_01]: I know people are sick of me, but listen, I love that man.
01:05:47.761 --> 01:05:49.702
[SPEAKER_01]: I love that man.
01:05:49.942 --> 01:05:54.524
[SPEAKER_01]: That man, I would not be van black if it were not for DeAngelo.
01:05:54.544 --> 01:05:58.305
[SPEAKER_01]: I would not be van black if it was not for John P. Key.
01:05:58.325 --> 01:06:02.007
[SPEAKER_01]: I would not be van black if it were not for his car Walker.
01:06:04.032 --> 01:06:05.753
[SPEAKER_01]: I would not be van black if he was not for prints.
01:06:06.494 --> 01:06:10.036
[SPEAKER_01]: I would also like to shout out who have been listening to lately.
01:06:10.056 --> 01:06:12.158
[SPEAKER_01]: I mean, a lot of pharaoh Sanders.
01:06:14.359 --> 01:06:16.120
[SPEAKER_01]: I would like to shout out Leon Thomas.
01:06:16.200 --> 01:06:20.804
[SPEAKER_01]: I mean, jazz Leon Thomas from yesterday, but also Leon Thomas from Nickelodeon.
01:06:21.704 --> 01:06:24.686
[SPEAKER_01]: Oh, because why are there two Leon Thomases and they're both great.
01:06:25.167 --> 01:06:26.708
[SPEAKER_01]: But I've been listening to the mud album.
01:06:28.223 --> 01:06:29.684
[SPEAKER_01]: Chef's kiss.
01:06:30.684 --> 01:06:31.004
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.
01:06:31.404 --> 01:06:34.145
[SPEAKER_01]: So those are the people I'm going to shout out just for today.
01:06:34.185 --> 01:06:35.766
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm not going to give you a long list.
01:06:36.266 --> 01:06:39.387
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm always listening to stuff, but those are my people's.
01:06:39.907 --> 01:06:40.347
[SPEAKER_00]: All right.
01:06:40.908 --> 01:06:41.268
[SPEAKER_00]: Awesome.
01:06:42.188 --> 01:06:44.929
[SPEAKER_00]: And then what books are you reading currently?
01:06:44.969 --> 01:06:49.651
[SPEAKER_00]: I know this is kind of like not well, it's sort of related to music.
01:06:50.291 --> 01:06:53.812
[SPEAKER_00]: So yeah, like what books are totally exploding your mind?
01:06:53.832 --> 01:06:55.593
[SPEAKER_00]: How job is blues?
01:06:58.396 --> 01:07:00.738
[SPEAKER_00]: Yes, I read that.
01:07:01.659 --> 01:07:04.501
[SPEAKER_00]: Yes, I read that and I have to read it again.
01:07:04.521 --> 01:07:13.088
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm definitely it's yeah when I read that it totally blew my mind and I I want to read it again.
01:07:13.109 --> 01:07:14.590
[SPEAKER_00]: It was so good.
01:07:15.210 --> 01:07:18.193
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, I'm working on I'm working my way through it.
01:07:18.553 --> 01:07:19.974
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm just like every page I'm like
01:07:21.205 --> 01:07:21.485
[SPEAKER_04]: Yes.
01:07:24.167 --> 01:07:24.807
[SPEAKER_01]: Exactly.
01:07:24.827 --> 01:07:28.309
[SPEAKER_00]: That's not book right now.
01:07:28.329 --> 01:07:29.050
[SPEAKER_00]: All right.
01:07:29.510 --> 01:07:29.910
[SPEAKER_00]: Awesome.
01:07:30.310 --> 01:07:30.791
[SPEAKER_00]: All right.
01:07:30.971 --> 01:07:33.332
[SPEAKER_00]: So we're nearing the end.
01:07:33.352 --> 01:07:38.655
[SPEAKER_00]: So I just wanted to invite you to let everyone know where they can find you.
01:07:39.716 --> 01:07:41.677
[SPEAKER_00]: And thank you so much again.
01:07:43.149 --> 01:07:43.449
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.
01:07:43.849 --> 01:07:54.995
[SPEAKER_01]: So you can find me at my website, vanblack.com, the AHN BLACK, and on all social media at vanblack, I am on the Tiki Taki app, and I am on the Instagram.
01:07:56.356 --> 01:07:57.036
[SPEAKER_00]: All the things.
01:07:57.636 --> 01:07:58.377
[SPEAKER_01]: All the things.
01:07:59.917 --> 01:08:01.058
[SPEAKER_00]: Well, thank you once again.
01:08:01.098 --> 01:08:02.599
[SPEAKER_00]: It was such a pleasure meeting you.
01:08:03.179 --> 01:08:06.281
[SPEAKER_00]: And I really enjoy your music, like seriously.
01:08:06.481 --> 01:08:07.341
[SPEAKER_00]: This is from the heart.
01:08:08.362 --> 01:08:09.002
[SPEAKER_00]: Thank you so much.
01:08:09.062 --> 01:08:09.582
[SPEAKER_01]: I feel it.
01:08:09.702 --> 01:08:10.823
[SPEAKER_01]: It's great talking to you.
01:08:18.005 --> 01:08:19.625
[SPEAKER_00]: So that was Van Black.
01:08:20.486 --> 01:08:22.366
[SPEAKER_00]: Isn't she just effing brilliant?
01:08:23.526 --> 01:08:25.587
[SPEAKER_00]: It was so refreshing talking with her.
01:08:26.227 --> 01:08:33.969
[SPEAKER_00]: Her music ventures off into a world of blues, jazz, soul, and really kind of reminds me of great such as Ella Fitzgerald.
01:08:34.909 --> 01:08:37.290
[SPEAKER_00]: Definitely check out her album Walk in the Rain.
01:08:37.950 --> 01:08:41.150
[SPEAKER_00]: It's available at all streaming platforms and band camp.
01:08:42.051 --> 01:08:46.132
[SPEAKER_00]: So we're going to play one more song by Van, called Gotta Go.
01:08:46.832 --> 01:08:47.692
[SPEAKER_00]: So listen up.
01:08:48.192 --> 01:09:01.180
[SPEAKER_03]: You know I got to go, go, go, you know I got to go, go, go, go, you know I got to go, go, go, go, go, you know I got to go, go, go, go, go, go, go, go, go,
01:09:12.048 --> 01:09:27.717
[SPEAKER_03]: The origins of a world I've heard that I've been long till We're all forsaken by no one's frozen song And tell the stories of a life so be reborn I gotta go
01:09:28.736 --> 01:09:47.225
[SPEAKER_03]: Go, go, you know I got to go, go, go I feel something calling me and I just can't ignore I can't get to come to phone now I got to go, just join the back
01:09:50.302 --> 01:10:04.543
[SPEAKER_03]: But broken heart and love are so seeking a man Ding, who come to fill the desires of his souls And live a life of wonder in places that don't hide
01:10:05.344 --> 01:10:34.013
[SPEAKER_03]: I wanna go, go, go You know I got to go, go, go After something wrong with me And I just can't make no I can't get to come to bone how I got to go So let me live Let me live, set me free So let me go
01:10:36.652 --> 01:10:39.780
[SPEAKER_03]: Let me leave, set me free
01:10:48.065 --> 01:11:08.411
[SPEAKER_03]: You're gonna let me go, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh,
01:11:11.214 --> 01:11:23.959
[SPEAKER_03]: I can't stop believing cause I know there's something wrong Can't get to come to Bono, I got to go Can't get to come to Bono, I got to go Can't get to come to Bono, I got to go
01:11:31.242 --> 01:11:33.323
[SPEAKER_02]: Game, game, game, game, game, game, game,
01:12:04.887 --> 01:12:07.089
[SPEAKER_00]: Thanks for listening to when we see each other.
01:12:07.489 --> 01:12:09.391
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm your host, Nikisha McLeod.
01:12:09.851 --> 01:12:13.234
[SPEAKER_00]: This show is produced and edited by Jeremiah McFeigh.
01:12:13.715 --> 01:12:18.419
[SPEAKER_00]: If you like what you hear in the show, please rate and review it in good pods.
01:12:18.999 --> 01:12:22.943
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01:12:23.483 --> 01:12:26.826
[SPEAKER_00]: And please follow us wherever you happen to listen to podcasts.
01:12:27.447 --> 01:12:31.790
[SPEAKER_00]: Doing so helps us to expand our audience and is much appreciated.
01:12:32.711 --> 01:12:39.318
[SPEAKER_00]: You can find more information about this show at stereactivemedia.com slash when we see each other.
01:12:40.279 --> 01:12:44.944
[SPEAKER_00]: And you can get in touch with us at stereactivemedia at gmail.com.
01:12:45.404 --> 01:12:48.547
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01:12:48.888 --> 01:12:52.431
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01:12:53.492 --> 01:12:54.113
[SPEAKER_00]: Talk to you later.
01:13:18.043 --> 01:13:20.687
[SPEAKER_06]: This podcast is produced by StereoActomedia.