ITS Home Edition: Aloe Blacc

by Alo Black's kids, because that's what he does. In the latest home edition of the show, he explained that when he was recording his new album All Love Everything, he'd play the music for his two young children in the car on the way to school, and if later on he heard them humming it around the house, he

knew he was onto something. The home edition of Inside the Studio is all about letting you inside the creative process of musicians during Lockdown, and although Alo told our Quarantine correspondent Jordan Runtog that All Love Everything was recorded before the pandemic, he also said it's exactly the kind of music we need right now. It's it's all about

love and togetherness. If you want to know about his process during the pandemic, one of the main things you should know is that although he's still working on songs right now during Lockdown, he does it after puzzle and playtime. Kids come first. Alo Black also told us about his social justice work and why he asked Bob Dylan to change the lyrics to one of his most famous songs.

Here's a fact checking side note. I'd never heard the story that Alo told about Gene McDaniels one album, Headless Heroes of the Apocalypse getting banned by the nix It administration, but for sure I've heard the one about Spiro Agnew, Nixon's vice president, calling up Atlantic Records and complaining about the lyrics. Anyway, if you enjoyed this episode, be sure to check out the I Heart Radio podcast that Jordan's hosts. It's called Rivals Music's Greatest Feuds, and it is available

wherever you get your podcasts. Hello everybody, My name is Jordan Runtud, Been enough about me? My guest today is a musician and activist who burst onto the scene with songs like I Need a Dollar, the Man, and Wake Me Up. His collaboration with a VICI because work fuses elements of hip hop, soul, folk, and E d M, but he doesn't care much for genre labels. Instead, he says his music fist into a theme that he calls am a I am that stands for affirmation, inspiration, and motivation.

That's the message behind his new album, All Love Everything, his first collection of new songs in seven years. I'm so happy to welcome La Black. Thank you. It's so great to talk. We met many years ago when I was at VH one and you or are you ought to know Artists of the month. It is so great to talk to you again. Thank you so much for taking the time today. How are you? Thank you? I'm very good. Oh man. Well, it has been seven years since your last album, or should I say your last

non Christmas album? Uh, and that time you've become a father. How much is family influenced all of everything? Well? Um, family has been the supreme influence on all of everything because the album is about family. The first song on the album is called family, and a lot of the songs are about my wife. There's a song called Nothing Left but You. There's a song called Glory Days. There's a song called the title track All of Everything, and then there is the first single that we released, I Do,

which was dedicated to our tenure anniversary. Now, your personal life isn't something that really tackled much in your music. Was that a struggle for you at all to go there. You know, I, UM have always tried to be kind of a generalist in the way that I write my songs and make songs about motivation and inspiration, and I've

avoided being deeply personal. So this was quite different, and I found it liberating in a sense that I got to share my relationships and the way that I engage my family with my fans, finally kind of humanizing who I am in a way that I had done before. The video for I Do is so special, as she said, it was the tenth anniversary You're reproposing with the help of your children. That was so special. How did that

idea come about? Oh? Wow? Well, you know, I was just thinking about what I could do for my tenth anniversary, and um, I had been writing a song with some really talented songwriters who are very good at doing romantic ballots. So I figured, why not try making a romantic ballad with these talented songwriters, and I think it worked out. They helped me put something amazing together. And then I was playing the song you know for my kids as I was driving them to school pre pandemic, and uh,

and they sort of let the secret out. The bag, but they were like, oh, what's the song about. I said, oh, it's a song I made for your mom. And then they started singing around the house and my wife would ask him, well, what are you singing and they say, oh, that's the song Daddy made for you. So the song was no longer a secret. But what we were able to keep secret was the surprise engagement and wedding and that was beauty. I mean, you had her her mother

fly up from Australia and everything. She had no idea. Oh yeah, she had no idea. She's certainly was surprised by seeing her mom. My mom was there, her best friends from Australia. Her one of her best friends friends is a designer named Weave, and she was able to create an amazing wedding dress for the occasion. So everything was very very secret and private. Even me taking the kids out of school to do the surprise engagement was completely a secret and surprising. Beautiful. Do you often play

your songs you're working on to your kids. I play a lot of the music that I'm working on to my kids. They hear it either on the way to school or um just in the car when I'm taking them somewhere. They they're lucky they get to hear everything early. They give notes like I need a little more reverb. There, need a little more, not more reverb. They definitely tell me which songs are better than others, and and I can recognize it right away when they are either requesting

it or singing it. I guess that's true. I guess kids know a hook better than anyone. I guess they really do. They know good song. Tell me about the album's title, all of everything. What are the significance of those words? All love? Everything is to me painting love over everything that we do, from music and my art, to family and two friends and even the activism that

I do, like leaning into life with love. It's just, uh, you know, an interesting phrasing, but combining two separate phrases, all love, which is how we'd probably say something to someone when there's like when someone apologizes, instead of saying I forgive you, say 's all love right or um? And the either idea is that everything we do should come with love. So and love everything from the ecology to your family and friends, you know, just love everything

and building off of that. Your music incorporates so many different elements from soul, E d M. Folks, you name it, but you've said, you know, I don't really work in a genre. I work in a theme, and that theme is aim, affirmation, inspiration, motivation. Can you describe that a little more to me? Yeah? So in people ask me what kind of music I make, It's hard for me to pinpoint it because I use all different kinds of genres in order to communicate the message of the song.

I grew up making hip hop music, so I've sampled from everything, and then I started learning to make everything. One through line, though, is thematic is that I make songs that are motivating, that are inspiring, songs that can be the soundtracks you living your best your life and achieving your dreams. And that's what I want to do. I want to be the light within the darkness of the music industry or the media that you consume on

a daily, weekly, monthly basis. Probably one of the best songs on your new record, illustrate this is My Way, which is all about self determination and fighting for your goals and dreams. Tell me about that song, Where did that come from? For you? My way is certainly about fighting for your your goals and your dreams. It's part of the aim theme for sure. It's a song that makes me think about my time as um developing artists.

I was always engaging my art as a pastime, as a hobby, and never looking at it as this is gonna be my career move. I was in business a business consultant for quite some time in college as an intern, and then when I graduated, spent two years as a full time business consultant, and then I got laid off. So this was my first real a bout with adversity, and it was that that moment I had to decide what it was I was going to do with my life.

I thought, well, I could go back to school, get another degree, I could get another job, I could go into academia and teach. But music kept choosing me. It kept on showing me that the ten thousand hours I had put in were valuable, and so I was able to use my expertise and my skill and my passion as my career. And I hesitate to use any genre language. But as you said earlier, you started off making hip hop records. What sort of led you over to the

type of music that you make now? Well, I was inspired by singer songwriters, are r and B artists, folk artists, soul artists who would touch the heartstrings in a different way than what I was able to do with hip hop,

and I wanted to make music like them. So I started listening to more of artists like Stevie Wonder and Nina Simone, Marvin Gaye and Aretha Franklin, and more artists like Joni Mitchell and James Taylor, Cat Stephen and Elton John And these were very inspiring singers, and most of them write their own songs, so that was also inspiring. And I wanted to tell stories in a way that

could really affect people and last a lifetime. So many of the songs on your new records seemed Taylor made for this moment we're in right now of pandemic and protests, But I know, I think all of it was completed before the fact, long before COVID hit. I'm thinking specifically renew Single, Hold On Tight. Did the pandemic alter your choice of singles in any way or just or how you put together together the record in any way? No,

the pandemic um ironically is just it's a coincidence. It's just that, you know, the music that I ended up putting on this project fits with this time where we are experiencing a huge social issue, and I'm hoping that my songs can be comfort for people during this time. But many of the songs were written within a four

year period prior to the album. I compiled the songs that best fit the theme that I wanted to describe or that I wanted to share around love and togetherness, and then they were all recorded prior to the pandemic, and I think mixing and mastering happened right around when the world shut down, so the song selection was already chosen. It's just a real amazing coincidence that it's the kind

of music I think we need right now. Have you been writing much music well at home in in lockdown, if you've been feeling productive musically, Yeah, I'm still writing songs and getting involved in songwriting sessions with other artists through virtual conferences, but um, for the most part, trying to focus on family because you know, the day is is only so long, and I've got two kids and my wife who all need attention to and and love, So I try to do my sessions later at night,

after dinner and and time with my kids and time with my wife. What do you all like to do together? Anything and any any new traditions formed during this period. Yeah, after dinner is um, you know, the kids take a

bath and and then we do family time. So during family times a lot of puzzles and games that we play, you know, and go fish and then and then my wife and I may find after the kids go to bed, we may find something on television to watch, or just kind of have a debrief of all of the current events that are happening, either in our lives or in in the world at large. I wanted to ask you

earlier this year. You were one of I think forderd and fifty artists to sign an open letter to the U. S. Congress calling for police reform in the wake of George Floyd's murder. One of the major points outlined was putting it into a system of qualified immunity, which effectively stops police officers from being held accountable for their crimes in

civil law suits. I wanted to ask you more about qualified immunity, why it's harmful, and what people can do to put a stop to right So, the movement right now that has been growing since the murder of George Floyd by the police in Minneapolis is one that has gained support from all kinds of allies and co conspirators and accomplices. Black people have been screaming that there is a problem for decades, if not centuries. It's now becoming a much bigger voice with the addition of white allies.

And one of the things that I've identified through the help of my friend Brandon Paradise, who is a legal expert, a legal scholar at Rutgers University, is that qualified immunity is a Supreme Court doctrine, the highest court in the land, that blocks any accountability, civil accountability for police officers who violate your civil rights. And so when you have a law, a rule, a doctrine that is so strong, it is

ultimately creating and supporting this culture of abuse. There are a lot of things that we are trying to change, and some people are asking for removing chokeholds and removing militarization. But even if an officer still uses a chokehold, it may be against the law, but he can never be punished for it because he's immune. So until we remove the immunity and install accountability, this culture of abuse will continue.

So many of these elements very state to state. This sounds like one of the few top down changes that can be made at a federal level. Right qualified immunity, specifically, as a federal statute, this is a doctrine coming from

the Supreme Court. It's an interpretation of an actual civil rights law which was meant to protect citizens, has been perverted by a judge, potentially a racist judge who knew exactly what he was doing when he created the judgment, and it has become precedent, so all the lower courts must follow it for federal cases. On a state level, every state has their own measure of immunity for police or other state agents, and in California, we're trying to

overturn that. Unfortunately, the police unions use their money to either demean and belittle candidates who are standing up for citizens and to support other candidates who are just puppets for the police unions. UM. Some states have made this change. Colorado has made the change. They have passed a law to remove the immunity from police on civil cases. And the reason why it's important is because you know, district attorneys will never really charge police officers in a criminal case,

so you won't get any justice on the criminal side. Um, we're hoping to at least get justice on the civil side. And you've been speaking to so many people, people like Harry Belafonte's legend of the civil rights marches in the fifties and sixties. What kind of insight did he share in at the present moment on making these kinds of positive social changes. For Harry Bellefonte, my relationship with him has been extremely instructive and very inspiring. What I understand

from him is that we cannot stop. It's about constant vigilance. The darkness in the world will continue to try to swallow up the light, and we have to continue to be the light and continue to fight for justice and equality. And speaking of civil rights marches, he recently performed a really beautiful version of Blowing in the Wind, which Bob Dylan performed at the March on Washington in there. What led you to that song? What would have impact does

it have on you? Well, Harry Belafonte has you know, a part in that as well. So he's recorded version of Blowing in the Wind, He's recorded the instrumental to it. Um, he has not recorded his vocal yet, and this was decades ago that he was supposed to do it. He never did it. So his daughter, who's a friend of mine, Gina Belafonte, contact of me and said, Dad would like for you to sing his version of Blowing in the

Wind that he never got around to. And I said, you know, I'd like to do that, but can we contact Bob Dylan and ask for a lyric change. The answer is not blowing in the wind. If we continue to say that, then that's just like saying, oh, racism exists. The answer is somewhere out there, will never find it. No, the answer is right here within. So I asked for the lyric change, and he obliged, probably the first time he ever obliged the lyric change. And I'll record that soon.

So the answer, my friend is not blowing in the wind. The answer, my friend is right here within. Wow, I did not realize any of that. I didn't realize that, Harry. I wonder why he didn't get around the recording it. That's so fascinating. Yeah, I don't know why either, but I know that, Um, it's something that inspired Sam Cook. That song inspired Sam Cook to write change is going

to come, and it's a really important song. I just believe that we need to be at this point more specific and not so general, like when Marvin Gay said, what's going on? You know you can ask that question. But one of my favorite soul artists Eugene McDaniels, he wrote an album in one called Headless Heroes Are the Apocalypse, which was banned by the Nixon administration, which is why you don't really know. Nobody knows who this guy is,

but he wasn't asking what's going on. His album literally talked about police brutality, him being beaten by police in a supermarket. His album talked about genocide and colonialism, with a song called the Parasite talking about the Native Americans, the plight of the Native Americans. So, you know, I tried to find ways with my music and the music that I listened to and that I want to share, to be specific at this point. Some symbolism is important. We all need it. It helps to inspire us. But

more than symbolism, we need action. If you're out in the streets protesting, then you need to convert that protest to policy and polls you did in your own life. You're You're working on the ground for so many causes. You're also involved with a really wonderful program called Music Units, which is a nonprofit program that provides musical education to UM schools in New York, l A, Chicago, and I

think other places as well. You've been a role model to so many who have been some of your role models, either musically or otherwise through about your life. Musically, I'd say Bill Withers rest in peace. You know. I had the opportunity to meet him and become a friend. His vocal style and music, songwriting, all of that was really inspiring to me UM and instructive. It gave me a

sense of how to use my voice. I really do appreciate Quincy Jones and all of the music and artist lives that he's touched has been quite inspiring to me. Has been part of my development for sure. Listening to Sinatra and all the crooners over time. I know that that Quincy worked with Sinatra. UM, listening to Michael Jackson as a youngster, and listening to some of the R and B music that Quincy was instrumental in making in

the in the eighties and nineties. For me, another inspiration would be, of course, the three Ms Mandela Mahatma Gandhi Martin Luther King. These three individuals are my m icons of civil rights and activism. A few months back in the spring, you were part of a twenty four hour live stream honoring the life of of vich your collaborator that you worked with on on Wake Me Up. I was wondering, is there anything that you learned from him that that you take with you when you're making music. Now, Yeah,

Vici was an amazing musician. He had a huge dedication to craft. And what I recognized in what he did was that he didn't rely on the lyricists or the vocalist to make the song catchy. It's icing on the cake for him. What he was doing was making instrumental music that was catchy in and of itself. And when you add on a great lyric and a great vocal melody, then you have way more elements that make the song

even better. But if you listen to a song like Wake Me Up, there was a musical melody that you can sing that you know exists and you it's it's part of the attractiveness of the song. And then there is the lyric, which stands alone, and then there's the vocal melody, which stands alone. And when you combine all of these elements, it really makes for great, great timeless music. I loved your your track that you did on his posthumous album tim S O S. Yeah, s OS was

a tough song to sing. I had received it because the label and the family had informed me that his notes mentioned he wanted me to sing s OS and it was unfortunate that I didn't get a chance to work on that particular song with him. I wonder if if just the idea of even writing a lyric s O S would have made me ask some questions, you know, but you know it's there's there's no way to tell at this point. The last few months have been hard

on all of us for so many different reasons. Has there been a favorite distraction for you when when you just need to unplug and reset for a moment, if it's going for walk, meditation, watching something on Netflix, is what's your favorite way to sort of just recharge? Favorite way to recharge is just hanging out with the kids. They definitely are a great way to avoid whatever is going on in the real world, and they don't have a care about any of the stuff that's happening. Of course,

they are aware that there's a pandemic. They know we have to wear masks. But when they're in play, they're completely present, and so we play together and that takes me into their world, so I don't have to worry about my world. Something very zen about play. My My girlfriend has been taking clown classes, which I, on the surface I thought sounded funny, but she's sort of explaining to me how they're all these sort of like you know, zen the art of clowning. You know, it makes you

present in that exact moment. I feel the same about play too, I suppose. Yeah. I think music does that for me. Songwriting sessions. You know, I dive into a songwriting session and I forget about everything else because I'm just creating a whole new world through the story that is in the song. Has there been a silver lining of this this time for you right now? Well, I think the silver lining is that from a personal and a social standpoint, we're all learning how connected we are.

It used to be, uh, don't touch me, you'll give me cooties. Now it's if you're breathing next to me. I could get cooties, and it just shows that we are quite connected as a as a human organism, we're connected with the ecology. I think in the first months of the pandemic, you saw waterways clearing up, skies clearing up across the world that we're usually quite polluted. I think humanity is recognizing something very important here and I'm hoping that my album can be part of that recognition

connection togetherness. I hope we can carry that through when when this is all over. And my my last question I've been asking everyone, this is my my last question. If you could snap your fingers and have everything go back to to normal, whatever your definition of normal is. Pandemics over, virus is gone, what would be the first thing that you would do? If I it's not my fingers, have everything go back to normal, first thing I would do was get on a plane to Australia with my family.

My wife were as raised in Australia and Sydney, and I would go and visit a family that we haven't seen for so long. As a beautiful lanceller, Alla Black, thank you so much for your time. Today's such a pleasure. Thank you. We hope you enjoyed this episode of Inside the Studio Home Edition, a production of I heart Radio. For more episodes of Inside the Studio and other shows from I heart Radio, check out the I heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.