West Love Supreme is a production of iHeartRadio.
I'm from Raleigh, North Carolina. Man, you kidding me?
And it starts right.
I'm recording now, recording. Oh hell no, I ain't. Come on.
Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to another episode of West Love Supreme.
It was quest Love with me of course. Uh, Team Supreme fon Tigelow in a new location.
Yeah, man, yeah, man came down to Charlotte.
He gets working for a couple of days and yeah, bro, yo, yo man, I had to I'm meant to tell you too.
I think I may be joining you. I ain't going as crazy as you going with.
It, but I've drastically cut down my meat into.
There you go bright like drastically. I still I mean, I still do my fish.
I love.
I can eat fish like every day of the week, and uh still do my you know, my chicken. I do like you know chicken, but uh like beef or like I think, yeah that.
It might be wrapped. Bro, we might make it the seventies.
Make sure you're replacing that iron. Just make sure you're replacing that iron with something.
Man, I be drinking metal musle in the morning. I feel old.
Keep doing George Loe Man listen to keep that cholestero all down.
Speaking of what's up sugar, Steve? How you making out?
Oh my god, you're just talking about meat? Makes me want a steak. You know, I don't know, I do everything bad, so I might I might not make it to seventy.
But I love y'all, loveye, I'm everything's okay to be with with everybody here and looking forward to great.
Everyone's fine. You just you just recorded an album for your label.
We recorded, We recorded two full records in two days for David Murray was one of the records and London, a h Norwegian guitarist was another one. That's JMI Recordings dot Com. Everybody.
We we joke, we joke about Steve's new Fountain celebrity. But Steve has definitely done a lot of pivot work in the last few years, developing really just living in his dream, like you know, recording and putting out is you know, after you collect every jazz record, I guess.
The next thing is you have to be start making them start. Yeah, you're the new tailor, so that's right.
You know.
The label started right around when this podcast started, about five years ago.
Five years old. You have a new background. You look like you're on a tour bus right now.
I'm not.
I'm in my new spot, but.
You just have tour bus curtains.
Well, from this, this is way better than the paper with the paper clip.
You just it looks it kind of looks like a tour bus.
Okay.
These are the factory blinds they gave me at the new spot, and I'm real happy to be.
At Okay, Well, you're making out everything's fine.
Living good and the blackest and neighborhoods in Los Angeles. Holly Louijash shout out to a Stelle who took me around and showed me the good corner stores I am living.
That's like, yeah, we'll just.
Be careful because a lot's going on in LA that.
Is happening to very rich people, very rich people who have.
Say that to me, Like, because everybody who tells me to well, I'm being specific because people have said that to me a lot out from outside of LA and I don't think they understand that the people who are getting robbed are not in my tax.
It's like criminals just figured out rich people.
Yeah, so that's what Well, Okay, let's hear everyone's moving to a pivot where we now you know, now, let me not even put that out there, lazy gentleman. I will say that our guest today is the founding member of probably one of the most legendary futuristic electric funk duos professionally and better known as The System. What made The System unique is the kind of space that they occupied at a time period in which new ideas and new concepts were happening in real time.
And this is like the post.
Disco Leroy Burgess era of boogie, in which it was needed of a jolt. You know, It's like new wave was sort of coming in for a lot of the pop acts. And you know, of course, Prince finally had control of the wheel and made the entire world take notice of his vision, even made like Leon Silvers in
the West Coast take note of his vision. Meanwhile, I'll say that in New York City, you know, club culture, dance culture sort of reached a boil where hip hop was slow creeping into We're dipping their toes in the water, and you know, for the first time you're hearing songs with a little harder edge to it, and R and B and funk you know, acts were slowly dipping their toes in the water using like futuristic synth sounds and harder drum programming, and you know, and I feel that
that particular pocket is very influential.
Duo occupied.
Let me just get it, get him out of the way first, please, welcome to the cost Love Supreme Mike Murphy of the System, Thank you, sir, Thank.
Your brother, thank you quest Love, thank you fam Wait.
I wanted to know because you occupy there's there's a very specific period of New York City that I'm unaware of. Like we've had many guests that can sort of put me down with what was happening in Los Angeles between
like seventy seven to eighty five. But for the first time, I think we're really going to dive into what R and B and what dance culture and what black music in general was going through in between you know, nineteen eighty eighty one, eighty two, eighty three or forty five for those that weren't under the Purple Umbrella and for those that weren't directly doing hip hop, like especially in New York City.
So you know, thank you for doing the show Man. I appreciate it.
Thank you for having me. I really appreciate it. Brother.
So you're you're speaking to us now from.
Where East Harlem, New York City?
And okay, so you're still a Harlem resident?
Yes, yes, I am. Okay, but well I grew up in Jamaica, Queen, so this I'm a I'm a twenty year transplant of each Okay.
Well, before we started taping, you were letting Fonte know that you two are from the same hood.
We're probably sorry.
I'm born and raised in Raleigh, North Carolina.
Wow, yep, crazy Morgan'll the.
Cores, the Austin's, Yeah, we big, We rolled deep down there.
That's so dope, some of them, I'm sure I do. I went to Central, so I went to kind of Central, so that was where I came from school. And then and uh, Raleigh. I mean I've moved to Riley in like five but been there ever since. But yeah, man, it's you know, cool city. Real it's going up like everywhere else, like the rent and all the property is going nuts.
But but it's it's a beautiful city. Man, That's what's up.
How long did you live there before you moved to New York?
Oh? I was I moved up here when I was a baby. But every summer, you know, how mom, do you're gonna go down your uncle Jess. You're going to your uncle Jesse's this summer. So I did that till I was like thirteen fourteen. Once you finally was like all right, okay, you know, because I started, you know, playing in bands and stuff, and we were gigging a bunch and she was like, all right, I'm gonna let you, gonna let you get some okay.
Was it were those good memories of having to go down south or was it always like I mean, I want to play with my friends in the summer up in New York.
Or No, my cousins were friends. Bernard Fowler is my first cousin. Yeah, that's my first cousin.
Of course. So is this the Queens as well?
Yeah, he's from Queensbridge, and you know, as kids, we would we were best friends, running back and forth to each other's house. Is our mother his My father and his mother are brother and sister, so so she was like my she's my real auntie. And we spend weekends together hanging out, playing and stuff. So we've tight. Wow.
So he's your actual first cousin.
He's my actual first cousin.
That's incredible, all right.
So for our listeners out there, like Bernard is pretty much you know, he's who's the who of background singing. You know, he's known for his work with the Little Rolling Stones.
Yeah, and lead singers and lead singers. She's he's definitely one one of the absolute best.
Yeah, I gotta say the infamous House classic, well Peach Boys don't make Me wait?
Maybe it won't make me wait. Yeah, that's all Bernard.
Yeah, yeah, not to mention like the work that he's done with Bill as well and and Herbie.
Hancock and the recently departed HYBYI.
Wow.
Okay, absolutely.
So the question I usually start with, can you tell me what your first musical your first musical memory was.
You know, as a kid, my mother loved music, so we used to go to the Apollo all the time, and it was at a time when you could see five shows in one day. You could just sit there, hang out and watch all the shows, and so I did that a lot. Those are my earliest, my earliest memories you know in music in the house of course, the Jackson Five, who I emulated in my first band, and kind of That's how I got my start.
What did your mom do for work, man, My mother.
Was my mother. No, my mother was a a plan reader engineer for Ma Bell for Bell Telephone Company, and she was a rebel, like she was the original liberated woman. She really was community leader and she used to give back. In the day, there were a lot of social groups that gave dances. So whenever they'd have a dance, of course, my little band, the Soul Shakers, we'd be like the floor show. So they would have like a well known
kind of orchestra. One was Ron Ron Williams and the Band of Renown, so they would be the big band playing, and then we would come on and do like a Michael Jackson James Brown floor show.
It's interesting to hear normally a lot of our guests on the show, if their formative years were in the sixties or seventies, nine times out of ten secular music is taboo.
But it sounds like to hear like was was. Were your parents strict with music?
You're not allowed to listen to any music but gospel or any of those things.
No, I didn't have any of that pretty much. I mean in my house it was like Brooke Benton was King. You know, it's like the Black King, Cole was King, the smooth, the smooth r and b love the Love of Boys singers. So I kind of grew up really actually loving Brooke Benton, those kind of classic songs with the strings, with the deep, deep melodies and the deep lyrics, and that's kind of what I cut my teeth on. And later it developed into more more of the funky stuff.
Okay, how many siblings do you have? Where do you fall in your family line?
I'm I'm firstborn, so the only of three.
Okay, so I'm the leaders passing it down to you.
How do you because normally, if most I noticed that most of people in MU are usually the younger person. You know, there's always an older sibling that's passing the music down. Here, listen to this. This is James Brown.
This is kind of nobody. But my aunt Jennis. You know, like I told you, my mother worked for mob Bell. My aunt Jennie, who moved up from North Carolina, would keep me during the day and she could sing like Aretha Franklin, real real talk, but she would only sing, and she would only sing in church. So during the day when my mother would be at work. She'd be like, Michah Micah Owen is what you call me, get up on the table and put on a show for me.
And she put me on the table and you know, have me sing different songs, the Jackson Five particularly, and uh, you know that's kind of where my love for music and performing came from my aunt Jenny.
So I assume that at one of these concerts you saw the Jackson Five perform, Like, would you say that that was like one of the more memorable concerts that you've saw or.
Oh yeah, well the Fought. There were a lot of There were a lot of young groups. The Five Stare Steps may have been the first group that I saw at the Apollo of Young Guys, and Black Ivory actually performed at the r KO on Jamaica Avenue in Queens. When I saw them perform, I'm like, Wow, I can do that. I can do that because I don't I think they're just slightly older than me. And when I saw that they were able to perform and and actually make a living at it, I was like, wow, I can do this.
Were the Stairsteps actual musicians in concert?
Because yeah, I know that it was studio musicians. But I know that Kenny.
Kenny, Kenny Burke played, Kenny Burke played on stage. My memory doesn't serve me how well he played at that time, but he was definitely he was definitely playing on stage back then at the Apollo.
Did when did you start your well you talked about as far as your musical development was concerned. Was that a school thing that school encouraged or did you get her on your own?
No? I was. I was really I went to egghead schools. I was busted to schools, and you know, I was very much into magnet kid math and science. To be honest, I was really an egghead. But my best friend, this kid, Robert Fontaine. He and my mother a Rain Fontaine and Shirley Austin. They could not be separated, and she was like, they dressed the same, they hung the same. So rob was her child. So we became close friends, even though
it was a couple of years older than me. He had a band, and of course he didn't want to let me in the band because I was too young. I was like a little perp. But eventually two of the band members, especially the singer, they started getting into drugs and everything, and my mother's like, you should hear Michael sing. I'm telling you you'd hear him sing. And so I started singing with that band and that's how, you know, initially got my start singing and performing. And
the band was the Soul Shakers. And I don't know if you know Ronnie Drayton.
You know that name, Yes, Ronnie, the late Ronnie Drayton.
Correct, Yes, the late Ronnie. Yes. Indeed, he was the drummer in the band.
Wait, isn't Ronnie related to FLAVEO?
Ah, yeah, we don't know if he.
Okay, I might be mistaken because there was another Drayton that I met that used to work at Tower Records that is related to Flave.
I know that Flave came from a large family.
But no, Ronnie's not related to No no no. But we grew up two blocks from each other. He lived around the corner for me, and also growing up, he was kind of inspirational for us because he left the band as a drummer and said, I'm going to be a guitar player. I'm gonna start playing guitar. We're like, I want to stick to drums because you're such a
good drummer. But eventually he kept going at it. He got a gig with the Chambers brothers and so they were going on the road and we were, you know, we were kids in pro keads and we were go around the corner and watch him being picked up by the band the station Wagon with his amps and everything, and we're like, wow, he's really he's really doing it. So he was an inspiration at all as well.
It just hit me that Ron used to play with Noah Hendricks.
That's right, he was really her band leader Edvin Bird's song Noah Hendricks.
Yeah, yeaeah.
He's a legend, you know, very very sad to see see him past.
He was at our age, he was like the most serious musician. I mean, I grew up around a lot of really talented funk bands, like in my neighborhood and Jamaica Queens. Literally every other block there was a there was a band. There was a funk band, Mother Night, you know Eddie Eddie Martinez.
Of course, the legendary Eddie Martinez.
Yeah, Mother.
Yeah, rock Box yeah yeah yeah yeah.
They were one of our local bands. And we had some hell of funky bands back then.
Yeah, where would these shows happen at high schools or like how like give me a typical rundown of Okay, if you have a neighborhood band, one, where do you rehearse? Because I know that, at least for the Midwest, families with garages, you know, hence the term garage band, like that's where bands are formed. But if you're in New York City and you form a band, first of all, where do you rehearse at.
We're in Jamaica, Queens everybody had a garage and a basement, so you're the You're you're either rehearsed in the basement or the garage. My next door neighbor was Eddie Hazel's father, Eddie Hazel. He lived next door to me, so the parliament back in the day would come and and pull around on the back of you know, basically give parties. But his father, he did all the processes in the neighborhood. All hair processes.
Could also do hair. I forgot about that.
I'm saving a hair chapter until get the.
Wow, oh that's crazy.
Who who else were your were your contemporaries growing up as far as like who you went to school with or other people?
Well, yeah, when I was in public school, it was really you asked about how where we would gig. There were five or six local clubs. There was the Club Ruby, the Linden Manor, there was after Rochfield Village was built, there was a big concert venue there. Everybody would play it. There were a lot of clubs. There were a lot of bars, local bars, and they all had bands. I mean we're talking before DJ before they realized, oh we can just get a DJ to come in. You know,
we give it every everybody would gig. There were bands like the Firebolts, who were really kind of the leaders for us local bands because they had it organized so they played. They gigged every weekend like they always had shows for different cotillions. And there were a lot of gigs back then and when we were like the band under them, so we would sometimes be the opening act basically the floor show.
Is this a thing where you can if you're that top band, can you make a nice living?
Well, first of all, how old are you doing this period?
I'm like thirteen, fourteen, fifteen when.
You can go into a nightclub and do a show and it's not because a culture wasn't a thing yet.
Or my mother was a mamager and she was a beauty, so nobody said no to Shirly, so she would kind of she was kind of book us on gigs. And then, like I said, during that era, everybody was a member of a social club. So they would be uh shinnecock Rod and Gun club and they would give an annual event. There might be the motorcycle. The Fat Back Band was the official band for like the Linden Boulevard Biker Biker Club. Really they would all have event yeah, yeah, yeah they would.
They rehearsed from Linden Boulevard. How far from where I grew up.
I didn't know that Fat Back was from there.
Okay, yeah, Fatbacks from Linden Boulevard.
Yeah, wacky for like thirty minutes. Yep, I've heard about their series.
So all these social clubs, they would have a contillion where they'd bring out the young ladies. There would be a lot of events you could play. You could really make a living. I mean I was a kid and I was I'm making like one hundred dollars a weekend all the time. And you know, back in.
That a teenager period.
Yeah yeah, yeah, back then, what.
At what point for you at least are you even considering making this a profession.
And I gotta know. I know that the group clear played a.
Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes. So I'm not there yet because I'm really, like I said, I'm an egghead. I'm going to Brooklyn Tech. I'm gonna be I'm gonna work for NASA. That's my that was my head. That was my DUTs in my head. That's that's what it was. I'm going to NASA. But I was in the band the Soul Shakers, and at some point we were like, let's try and see if we can get better. And a young lady named Laala the Forest Cope you give
good love, Yeah, La La joined the band. So La La changed a lot from me because she was she was like the first female rebel who always said, well why not, why can't we get this? Why can't we do that? Why can't I was more like in pocket, like come on, let's see, we'll get it so down, so down. So once her energy came into the band, we were forever seeking the better drummer, the better bass player, the better guitar player, the better sounds is the better gig.
So she changed a lot for me, you know, and.
Just so we can make it clear.
I don't you mentioned it earlier, but I wanted to make it clear for our listeners that don't know. La Laud wrote Whitney Houston's very first single, you Get You Give Good Love Love You've Give.
Yeah, we didn't want to admit we didn't know who Lai was, but we didn't thank you.
No, no, lad You know, she made noise and she did some stuff with like full force and as a solo artist around like eighty six.
Anyways, sorry, yep, yep, but but part of her thing was she would write songs way back then and I would kind of fool around with ideas imitating other people's songs. But she was the first person I was around who would just sit at the piano, make up a song and break your heart. And she was in the band and we would do gigs and she would sing like songs like Gladys Knight in the Gladdys Knight song last what is it? Last time I'm leaving Midnight, and she
would she would tear the house down. She would do things like Billy Holliday. She just had that soul and that spirit that she would tear the house down with these songs and songs like you give good love. She was writing no songs when she was sixteen. She was already right, she had written that she had written ten of those by the time she was sixteen. So that kind of made me start noticing, you know that, oh,
this songwriting is a thing. Songwriting is really a thing that you should be focusing on, particularly, you know, in the band thing. So moving on, we got into this band called Jack SaaS, The Jack SaaS Band. Former members included like a lot of local talent in Jamaica, queens and really good musicians, so we really had to step up the bar a little bit. But our band, we were playing all over the East coast, would play the Jersey Shore, we would play Miami, we would play Virginia,
but we couldn't get a record deal. So along this time, this guy comes to town. We used to play this club uptown called the Seller with band this ban Kinky Fox. I don't know if you know Timmy Allen. They were like they would play one weekend, we would play another weekend. So this guy Fred Petris, little Macho Music, who produced Change and BB Change. Yeah, yeah, so he comes to town. I'm still deciding if I'm really gonna do music. So he comes to down and he says, hey, I really
like you guys. I want you to be I had this record out called Peter Jacques Band, which was a huge hit in Europe. He's like, I want you to guys to tour and pretend you're Peter Jack's band. So we're like, okay, because you know he's gonna pay us, we're going to put well, basically we didn't record anything on the album, but we were going to perform the touring act of Peter Jacks Band and we would be
the artist. So that kind of fell apart. But then he called me one day and he said, hey, Murphy, I want you to introduce me to bands in the city, all the best musicians, and I want you to work for me. I want you to work in my office. I want I'll teach you publishing, I'll teach you recording, I'll teach you everything. But just connect me with all the bands. And so I did, because I knew I
knew all of the musicians. Not I didn't know all of the studio recording musicians because in New York at the time, they were really they kept it real tight. You couldn't even get you couldn't get a session, you couldn't get to record anywhere. They had it on lock, Fid Thornton, Color, They just they had sessions, Yogi Horton, you know that whole crew. They had the session world on lock. So a band like ours didn't stand a chance.
But through through my relationship with him, he actually did bring me in to run his office and I would hook him up with the musicians and do demos, and I would go to the sessions when he was out of town make sure everybody was recording, booked the sessions, learned about publishing, and at that time it became real for me because I could connect my brain with the creative part on how this can how this is a real business, and how you can really you know, how
you can make things happen. So that's when when I started, Yeah, that's when I started to think about music as a real profession for me.
There's one thing I wanted to ask about your tenure and your band, and you were doing these club gigs on an average one, how long were you expected to perform at.
These these shows?
And how big is the repertoire, like just in terms of I understand like every band had to know the top forty so you had to have of course, So how how does that work? Is it like every Friday you go to the local record store, you get all the forty five's and you're like, okay, damn, we got to learn to how to trap by the commodorees or like, what's that process?
Walking through that process.
As the point where we got serious. We were rehearsing four days a week and we were were the shows. When look, we went from being like a floor show band actually having to hold on a club and generally you'd be booked Friday, Saturday, Sunday, so that's five sets, three nights in a row, so you had to have And also we were doing originals cut because at that point were we started figuring out how to manipulate our sound and create a sound of our own and Jack sass.
Actually it was a really killing band. I don't know if you know. Liz Chisholm was the bass player. She's one of the original female bass players in New York. Liz Chisholm Omar Jakeim was an early drummer in the band.
Legend.
I mean, we were, we were, we were, we were pretty serious, like we were coming up on a funky rock thing. We were doing things like we were doing rare earth songs. We were doing uh, we were just doing our own brand. We would we would hit them with with the top forty hit, but we'd also hit them with something that's in the vein, like a song by war or you know. We were coming off a little bit left of center, but it was really working. It was working.
You mentioned queens, and also I wanted to know whether or not at the time was anyone like from the Jamaica Boys like in also in the sphere I'm talking about like Bernard right, you know, Marcus Miller, all those.
So all those cats are in the mix. Bernard Wright was in the Junior Firebolts. So the Fireballs I mentioned earlier, who had really gotten it down to a science where they were gigging all the time for weddings. So they created a spinoff called the Junior Firebolts, and Bernard was in the Junior Fireballs.
You're so popular, you have your own sequel.
Yeah, all these bands were in the mix, and all these bands were killing.
Okay, so you right now you led us to the point where you're learning the business. How are you getting talked into being a tour manager. And at what point are you entering Clear's life like, because I remember, like it's weird that I know, like intimate connections is a staple. But I'll admit that only after hip hop that I learned intimate connections because I always knew Clear because of like their early part in nineteen eighty where they had the song called win.
Yeah, I'm around them this whole time. So I'm in Brooklyn Tech High School and Dennis King is the chief mastering engineer at Atlantic Studios right on fifty ninth Street. So he was someone who took interest in my early band, Jack says, and actually was the first person to ever take us into the recording studio. So he worked at Atlantic, and I would come home and I would stop at Atlantic Studios, and he lived near me in Queens and I would ride home with him. But that stopped entailed
waiting around in Atlantic Studios Columbus Circle. I'm telling you, I saw everybody record Aretha. I saw the Stones come through there, Ricky Lee Jones, I mean like everybody who was anybody. I'm talking the days when you know all the actually the Cats, A lot of the Cats from Philly, the guitar player, and the bass player, Bookatie Owms, what's his name the keyboard player. They would all be around there,
Jeve yep. So I got to kind of blend in through that and also view recording sessions and learn sessions. So Dennis at the time was working with the band Clear, who was from Baltimore, and they had one small record that didn't do a lot, but by the time the
second record came, they were in demand to tour. So he obviously couldn't go on the road because he was a mastering engineer at Atlantic, and he knew I knew the road because I had taken my band everywhere and I knew all the details, booking hotels, all of that. So he asked me to be their road manager. So the first tour, well, the first big tour I get to go on is Prince Rick James and Clear. I felt I done it. Clear was the opening act. I thought I died and way to Heaven. I thought I
died and went to heaven. Brother, So oh, it's crazy. I mean I have actually pictures from the tour of Prince when he was doing the jockstrap and the reset ladder thing. I have pictures back there, Rick Jane All, I have pictures of all the madness. And he Rick had had kind of a crush on the clear girl, so you know, he liked him as the opening act. And we did. We must have done like fifteen dates. And I'm telling you, Prince killed Rick. Prince killed It
was so funny because killed Rick. He killed Rick every single city. He killed him. First they started out. You know, it's the opening act. You might have six feet of depth and they peel you off. And the next act, you know, have twelve feet of depth. They peel him off, and then Rick has his whole big show, right. But Prince Prince had those stairs and he had like a little light rig that said Prince. And I'm telling you they were kicking ass and taking names every single gig.
It was crazy, it was. And I'm standing there with my mouth of him because in a way, my band Jack sass. We had this guitar player, Vick Vaughan. I hope he hears this. Vic Vaughn was as good as Prince. He was good a guitar player and as good as singer, but he didn't have that you know, that extra thing that makes you want to stick to the business. He ended up he ended up moving to the midwest, South Dakota somewhere, but he was kind of the New York
City embodiment of Prince. So when I saw Prince, I was like wow, And it also made me kind of decide, you know what, I can do my own I can come up with my own thing that's different than all of this, but I could do my own thing. So that's when kind of my road management dream turned into you know, I want to create some thing.
What were touring conditions? Like whoa, I'm so glad you're tour manager because it's like.
Weird y'all know y'all know everything? Yeah, exactly because musicians you'll put the fires out sort of, you know, have very selective memory. But if you're touring in nineteen eighty, you know a bandlike Clear, Are you guys in a fifteen passenger van?
Are you tour bus status yet? What kind of hotels are you in? Like I want to know, like the boring stuff, like what what is that like?
In nineteen eighty it was it was right, it was correct. Al Hayman was the tour promoter, so everything they don't have to war you don't have to worry about the money. You just had to be there on time. I always book connections. I don't even know if they're still in business connections, bus service. You know. We had a budget for hotel room. Hotels were cheap back then. You could get you could get decent hotels for one hundred dollars. It was. It was smooth and correct. It was smooth.
Every per diem was solid. I was handling the money. Everything was smooth. I had three bands on tour together. I had Clear, Change and BBQ all on the road at the same time. I was a little twork. I was a little twork, but I knew I knew how the right job.
Because I wanted to know about those groups.
And in the case in the case of Change, of which I believe it was Jimmy jam that revealed to me that Change was really well in name the two Italian guys.
Uh yeah, Malavas.
Were they in concert? How did that work?
No? They never showed up to concert. They were studio musicians and brilliant ones. They had an amazing sound and Michael Brower would engineer most of the projects. It was all the best suit. Lutha Vanress, who I also worked for on the road after I think it was like, yeah, I think early shows. Yeah, I was. I was a guy with the fog machine and I was the guy with the spotlight, and I was paid Lutha. Lutha paid his guys. It was crazy. I had to listen. I
love working for Luther so much. And that was another point where I was like, Wow, I love I could I want to I want to entertain again. But I did one tour where I drove from New York City to Los Angeles for his on his first tour, all down through Texas, myself and one other road guys. So I've I've done. I've worn all the hats I've worn, like the road he hat, I've won the drive and truck hat, hold the spotlight, I won.
Any of them know about your talent? Did anybody know that?
No? No they didn't, They didn't know. Let me tell you a great story. We're on the road in South Carolina somewhere and Clear, which were on with Clear and David and I had made the record in Times of Passion. We made it like one weekend, actually like in one day, twenty four hours. We made the record, went to the studio got it out. I knew a couple of people Atlantic because I had worked with with Dennis and I had worked with Clear, and they always said to me,
you know, because I was a good looking young fella. Yeah, They're like, hey, if you ever, if you ever make a record, so why don't you bring it, Why don't you bring it to me? Let me hear it. So we made in Times of Passion and one day I took it to Atlantic. They signed it the same day, but I didn't I didn't make any noise because Clear, I was working for Clear, and I don't know, if you know Woody. Woody was a little bit of a
kind of jealous guy. Yeah, yeah, yeah, exactly exactly. So we're on the road in South Carolina doing an outdoor date and I'm carrying you know SVT bass amps, I know those spg ampeg I'm carrying an SVT bass cabinet to put below the bus, and David's on the tour bus and he's yelling, make our songs on the red our songs on the radio. In time the Passion was playing on the radio.
That's how everyone found out that you were yes singer. So can you well, since you already you brought the great David Frank into the picture.
Can you explain the story? What am I to believe?
And he told me this once was was Madonna originally supposed to be in the system and you replaced her.
Yeah, So what happened was we were all we all were growing. We all kind of circulated around the music building on eighth Avenue and thirty sixty whatever. Okay, you know, all the bands rehearsed there. People would kind of share recording spaces, like you'd have a space and you'd have it from two to five and someone else would have it from five to nine. So I got I got a back up because I got David. I got Dave in Clear. I got on to be the keyboard player
and Clear. So what happened was Dennis King was prettying together the tour for Clear, and they didn't have a keyboard player. So one night he took me to this club uptown and he said, yeah, come with me. I want to see this singer. You know, I want to see the singer and then tell me what you think. So we go to this club. I didn't think much of the singer, and I said to him, Hey, that keyboard player is really good. I mean you should maybe
you just consider him from clear. But they were playing kind of like steely Dan's style, you know, it wasn't it was nothing like the electro that you come to know David as at the end of the player you come to So he did that for he did that tour. This was not the rig James tour. It was the next tour. He did that tour. And when I when I would work, I guess I would sing sometimes or I would sing along the songs, not making anything of
it or paying attention. But one day he had cut this track that he'd been working on because he got a DSX, a DMX and he got an Overheim, which he actually kind of bought it with another one of the musicians in the music building. So out of the blue he calls me and he says, hey, I wrote this song, and you know Madonna was supposed to sing it, but you know, Steve Bray wants to put guitar and they want to put this on it and that, and I don't. I don't want to do that. I don't
want to do that. So he was like, why don't you come to the loft and listen to it? So I go to his shared loft in the music building. I don't know what I'm expecting because I've only heard him play in the clear mode, which is kind of jazzy soul with some pune basically, and that's not what I wanted to do either. I wanted to do something completely different musically than that. So I get there and he said, well, you know, listen, geor it tell me what you think. He hits the button and it's the
track of in Times of Passion. But I died and went to heaven because it was exactly what I what I had been thinking of, because I was thinking, if what if you put Rick James and craft work together, what would that sound? And when he hit when he hit that button, I was like, this is this is it? You know, this is I've been looking for. I hadn't yep. She said, well, yeah, Madonna was gonna and I knew Madonna too. There's a story there too, she said, yeah,
Madonna'll think. Okay, Well, when when I when I was in the band, when I was in Jack Sass, we used to play at the Queen's College, rath Scaler. She would play on Wednesdays and my band would play on Thursdays, so I knew her from that, so, you know, you know how you go and check the competition out. I'd gone to check her out then, and and you know, and we also knew each other around the music. Mcmathe, Are you want to do it? Mcmathein that time? You want?
That's time? She was like that. She was like, she was like, you know, I knew she had the attitude, but I didn't you know, I didn't know what how far she was going to take it. So anyway, David said, yeah, Madonna was going to record it, but she backed out at the last minute. Can you can you record it? And I said, well, what was the title she had? She said, Crimes of Passion. Said okay, let me see what I can come up with. And I was just singing along with the track, humming and kind of crimes
a Passion, kind of falling with it. He was like, that's great, that's great. Now go home and write the song. I'll pick you up in the morning, we'll go to the studio and record it. I'm like, write the song right tonight and we're gonna record it tomorrow. So, you know, I had had the dream of what I wanted to sound like, but I had no idea what I wanted to say, So somehow I stayed up all night. David came to pick me up my mother's house in Queens at like seven o'clock in the morning. We go to
the studio in Long Island. We recorded all day. We laid it on the parts, I sing all the leads, all the backgrounds. We mix it, and the next morning, when he dropped me off at my mother's house, I had a big sound system innovation because I always owned the band's pa. So I put the cassette tape in and I played it, and I was like, this is this is the one. If you don't do something with this,
you're never gonna do anything. So I immediately, like at nine o'clock, called Dennis King, Hey, Dennis, can you can you cut a couple of acetates of this thing I cut yesterday? So he said sure, So I went to the studio Atlantic. He cut three assetates, of which I have I have two of them now, And I went and I went to the two people who I knew in the record business who had said to me, if you ever, if you ever come up with anything, let me know. One was Jim Delahant who worked for Atlantic
Records with Jerry Greenberg. Okay, and the other one was was r f C Records, and they, you know, they were big because they had you know, Socio and they had they had a lot of really popping electoral soul.
Right, So I went to yeah, okay, ye, yep, he's the president of mag is he not?
Yeah, he was a president, but at the time he was president of Atlantic. He had just come stepped down from being the president of Atlantic.
So he was the president of Atlantic.
He was the president of Atlantic, Yes, but when but he was forming his own label, and I think he had only he had signed he had only signed one act so far. So I take the record to Jim Dellahan and I said, Jim just cuts this. He plays like thirty seconds of it, and he says, hold on a second, and he disappears through a door and out comes Jerry Greenberk. My jaw is on the ground because Jerry is the cheese. I mean, he's he's the man. He comes out, he kind of looks at me, sits in his chair, turns
around to face the speakers. I'm looking at the back of his head. He listens to like thirty seconds of it and he turns around and says, get yourself a record deal, just like that, one day, one day, it was that easy. Well yeah, at that moment, at that moment, and the record came out and it it caught a fire, It really did. It caught a fire.
So this wasn't a case where you had to like a relationship with Larry Love or someone to like, you'll play my thing, test it out on the crowd and see how it works. So you just instantly had an end with the Brass Atlantic.
Absolutely, and thank god, Frankie Crocker love the record. Okay, Frankie Crocker loved the record. He ran it into the ground. And he you know, Frankie was a DJ at the time. If you like something, he's playing it. He doesn't care what the trend is, he doesn't care what anybody says. Yeah, yeah, yeah, So he played that record to death. And then you know, as far as the system, the rest is history.
You said something really interesting about your interaction with David frank and what you said was he pressed a button. So can you explain to me at the time your willingness to embrace kind of a new culture, which is programmed, you know, at the age of you know, sort of
seventy nine eighty. New drum machines are being invented, New synthesizers are being which I could imagine could be intimidating, because the thing is is that there's a watershed moment for black music after the sort of post disco fallout where a lot of these bands that were foundational, name them like Brass Construction, mass Production.
Mask, any band with like eight niggas on the cover, you just know what it is.
No cameo, same thing.
No real talk. I was already there because I was already. I was already listening to craft Work, I was listening to Yazoo, the Arrhythmics, I was eating I was eating.
Up every record until UK and of course early Garan.
Of course the Thompson I was. I was there already, I mean I was, I was. I was eating off of soul and funk. But I was already there because of what you're saying. I had been on the road with brask and fifteen Pieces, and I'm like, how these guys making money? How you know, it's like this is this something makes this makes no sense to me. I don't get the math here, and you know, there were a lot of there were a lot of brass construction like bands, phrasey, all these bands from from the Midwest.
I was like, how everybody, so I was, I was, We've interviewed all those bands.
I was just laughing, Yeah, we've been interviewed.
And is the thing is though, is because you know, even though I was like nine in the eighty like when like terms like new wave were being invented in all those things, I'd never truly understood or got a chance to ask a guest on the show, like is this a Titanic synchrosus.
Whim moment for you?
Like do you learn new technology or do you just, you know, defiantly say no, I'm gonna keep my horn section and these Fender roads and this clabinet.
Let me tell you one of the reasons why I loved jac sass. So we had we always had great drummers, but a lot of times they were nowhere to be found when it was time to do. We had this cat Lino Reyes. I don't know if you know who he is, Leno. He ended up playing with rig Games, but we had a couple gigs lined up and he just didn't show up, and I had bought a rolling drum machine, like a little Mini eight o eight. I was like, come on, guys, we can use this for
the gig. Let's just do the gig. And they laughed me out of rehearsal. They laughed me out of rehearsal. But I was like, all right, you know, somebody's somebody's working on this. And I'd already been geared up, you know, reading Nmy Out of the UK and like you said, Gary Numan, all these bands in my image. I was already dressing new ways and I was always thinking new wave, but I didn't know how to create it on my own with the with the musicians that I had around me.
So I was already playing with technology and drum machines and all that kind of stuff. When I met Dave Can, I just ask.
A question about radio, because you mentioned that, like Frankie Crocker popped off your popped you off on radio, and I'm curious that you mentioned a new wave, like, so what happens after that? How do they decide, Okay, we're going to continue to service these black radio stations, We're going to service the pop radio stations.
Like how does that happen? What happens after.
Frankie response, the response to the people calling in what is that? Actually when that record first played, you know who tu May is, right, yes, oh yes, yeah, so in to May like two days later and and Tue May called and said, man, I heard your record and I had to pull onto the side of the road outside out of the Midtown Tunnel. What are you doing? I'm doing a session now. He was doing Juicy Fruit. He was recording that at the time, and he invited David and I to play on that session because he
wanted that. He yeah, we're We're told that session.
I forgot, yeah, he.
Told So we went.
Yeah, we went and played on that session, and we started getting We started getting a lot more calls like from the UK, come to the UK produced this artist and groups and and you know in America also, hey produce us, can you give us give us some of that that system funk. So we started doing pretty much right out of the box.
So they never put you in a radio box, so you were never just in the Frankie Cracker in urban box.
Well we you know, everybody starts in an urban box. But once you start breaking out, don't forget we had. You know, after after the results of that record starting to take off like that, I had another meeting with Jerry and he was like, you guys want to do a twelve inch And because of what I had learned with Petras, I was like, now we want to do an album. Well, what would you what would you give us to do a twelve inch? And he gave us a number and I was like, give us double that.
We'll do an album. Now we had already been we had already been writing songs like, we had already been working on songs. So basically our process in recording was we would get together and maybe spend a couple hours. David might have some ideas he's working on, We're do an arrangement, I'd work on a vocal, I'd sing a melody, and you know, we basically had seven songs for the album already, so it was basically we go into the
studio record all the parts he had pre recorded. Now, I don't want people to think that pressing a button means you're just pressing a button and something's coming out that's been pre recorded. There's a lot that song in Times of Passion. If you ever listen to it. He's using an OB eight. He made four different keyboard sections on the instrument.
I was gonna say, was MIDI a thing? Backman?
Yes, MIDI was a thing. Midy was just becoming the thing.
Because I always wanted to know, like, yeah, you guys had intricate arrangements, especially on that first record, and I was trying to figure out, like, are you programming in this in real time? Or is this MIDI? Like is MIDI culture in eighty three? I never knew when Mitty came.
So no, he's playing. He's playing in real time. But as you know, you can either sequence it or you can let it play in real time, so he's recording it. He's really Actually David is a is a great physical player, like great, so he was. He divided the keyboards into different sections. So there might be one section of course in the lower and that's the base, and another section
might be a pad. Another section might be a little squeaky thing, which you could you could you could change programs while you're recording and it would record the program changes. So those sounds like Bud is him basically pressing different program buttons, and then you had to drum machine so you have you know, you could have six, seven, eight parts would play back automatically.
You know, And none of this was a tea at all.
No, because after we we did in Times of Passion, I kind of knew how the system could work and how we could take it to another level with the instrument because basically you had you were basically it was a digital recording, you know, without tape. You could record all the songs except for the vocals, because they had nothing at that time where you could actually record the
vocals and still be in sync with everything. So being someone who had played in bands five shows a night, I could I could hit it on a dime, like every gig, the harmonies all.
Lot before I get into sweat and you're in my system. There's one thing I always wanted to know, you know. At this time, also like hip hop is also finding its legs and developing, and you know, pretty much, I guess the the modus operandi of hip hop was was kind of like, Okay, there's no more music lessons in school, so we got to figure out how to make music.
Ah, we'll make hip hop.
And you know, I'm certain that you're growing up and and you know, are firsthand witness to this culture as it's starting. How how did that not call you and you still maintain like singing and traditional R and B and funk like you could. Well, yeah, you've done rap on your records, and I got to ask you about that too, But no, not really.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, Actually, if you listen to some of our stuff, those beats are actually imitating some of the hip hop that was coming around.
Yeah, that's what I'm saying.
But you just Africa Bombarda because I thought there was a place for melodics and storytelling in the way I could. I wasn't a rapper, was I wasn't a rapper, and I thought there was still a place for the context of what I was doing over these bombastic beats that would still work so and there were other guys who were just they were just doing it so much better, and I just had to remain kind of authentic to what system is.
That was what I was leading into, because the thing is is that you know the kind of the genre of freestyle, you know, the kind of Stevie B Planet Man Tronic sort of eight a weight lead break dance and music, which is clearly more on the hip hop side of the fence than you know, there's some other guys like I don't know the names, like the guy that saying like your little brother, or.
Nolan Thomas, Nolan Thomas, how do you know that.
I'm in a nucleus jam on it, Yeah, or even like the street dance guy.
I forget his name, I forget his name, but yeah, Like however, it's it's like the particular lane that you guys occupied, even though it has the ingredients, like I know,
like the DMX was was sort of the the secret weapon. Yes, so you guys weren't using a lin drum and you weren't using an Ato eight yet I almost feel like, you know, between what Prince was developing, which was more purple print whatever I call it purple music, yeah, and the freestyle stuff that was more closer to Shannon, you know, you know, like the Shannon freestyle breakdancy nuclear stuff. You guys were closer to New Jack Swing to me minus minus the go go overs. No no, no, no, no,
I don't mean that. What I'm saying is the seeds, like your your beats were hard enough to wrap over and it's kind of a space that Jimmy Jam and Terry Lewis weren't occupying just yet because they were in anally territory. But what I wanted to know is, like, how like as far as you like going to nightclubs and whatnot, Like, are you guys saying yourself like, yo, we got to compete with these loud ass drums and no.
But did you hear baptize the beat? Ever?
Baptized the beat? Street sounds right?
Our record? Yeah? Our record baptized the beat? That was that off kilter. We were doing it. We just were doing it our way, and we were listening to everything that was going on. And you know, my lesson was always be different, just just stay just stay the course and be different.
I have a prince question. Has anyone played you his version of your in my system?
Yeah? I've heard it, yes, yes, wow, okay, yeah, it's mostly Line and him kind of okay.
So, in in light of the the Beatles documentary that you know is on Disney now, the Get Back documentary, which I you know, I feel is fascinating people not baptized the music, We'll say that it might be a little excessive for nine hours of watching them try to
make a record. However of it I think that's a very important documentary only in the fact that you truly get to see how records get made, which in the case of the Beatles, it seems like they're two default go to places whenever they get stuck for an idea, like Paul will tend to go back to earlier Beatles songs, so he'll go back to you know, he'll start singing Lovely Redo or.
Mad or.
He'll go back to that.
And John Lennon's go to thing is either Little Richard or Chuck Berry, like every three seconds is like wop boba bamboo. And the thing is is that when you're writing songs, you have to do you know, I've gone on record to say, like, you know, D'Angelo and I would do entire prints albums, and then one song will spark an idea like, well keep on doing that again,
and then you morph into another song. So in the case of Prince I always wondered and obsessed over the fact that when he's creating music, like is he aware of other music at the time, or is he just in his own private bubble in which you know, he's just alone, isolated and coming up with this brilliant stuff, or is he actually aware of what black music is doing and then creating his own thing and kind of you know, I finally got my answer and hearing, so
you know, I, you know, after he died in selling like just a whole mountain load of Prince sound checks and mainly like his sound checks to me, like tell the best story of his creativity, because you know, he'll riff on a line for five hours in a row before it's lunch breaking.
So there's a moment.
There's a moment where kind of at the tail end of the nineteen ninety nine rehearsals before they go on the road, you know, they pretty much they play you know, karaoke and for them. But the reason why, you know, people of diden't ask like, well, why didn't he learn the song? I think the whole idea is not to learn the songs or learn the changes. Like you learn one part of it and hopefully if you repeat it
enough then it becomes something else. And there's a moment where you clearly like in this forty minute version of your and my system, he will eventually morph that into what we know as the bird, but it starts. I find it fascinating that once once you know, once I spent a year just listening to those sound checks. Then I realized, like, oh, so he listens to modern radio and then learns it and then tries to unlearn it and morph it into his music.
Like how I mean to know what he morphed into.
I know, back then it probably wasn't obvious that he was gonna be king or like a god in music. But I mean, I'm certain that it has to feel somewhat like validating that you're definitely one of the pegs that helped him climb to a hit, which is you know, the Bird for the Time.
Yeah, no, it feels good. I mean, if you're trying to get around to how to how David and I right, I don't do that at all with David. So our process is more David thinks more like he's Beethoven. I'm not, I'm being honest with you. Yeah, he's thinking, yeah, does it fit into the context of what's going on now in music? No, that's kind of my job to edit that music together, because sometimes you hear long landscapes of some of the things we have or what they became.
There's modulations and then there's time. So I kind of I'll inspire him when he thinks and ideas no good like he played during My System for me the baseline when we because we were working on the album. I would go, we'd spend two three hours, you know, writing songs because we both had to do other gigs to survive, and that was one idea. He was like, I don't know, what do you think I don't like. I'm like stop. I'm like stop, yes, yes, that baseline. I'm like, no, stop,
give it to me. So a lot of times it would be like what he thinks is the chorus, I think is the verse? You have a section, Maybe he thinks that's the A section. But I will edit it together, even back then from the beginning. I'll edit it together and move things around to make it be what I hear as not commercial, but something that that I could sing over and somebody else could sing over. You know. People ain't singing over modulations and people ain't singing over
you know. So I will edit into a piece, and I'll send it back to him and say, hey, try this, and then we'll take it a step Further'll be like, oh, yeah, I never thought of that. We'll take no, that's not he'll be like, no, that's not the chorus, that's the verse. I'm like, let me give me a minute, let me let me ride this out for you, let me get sexy on you, let me show you, and then you will come up with you in my system. So that's kind of how it works, and that's kind of how
it's worked throughout our career. You know. We never I don't listen to anything else and suggests, Hey, we need something that sounds like this. Okay, So he may have ten ideas on a on a cassette and send them from you, just little pieces, and I'll say, I like this piece, this piece of that piece. Let's work on these,
and we'll work on it. I'll be like, we need a B section, or we need a we need a chorus, we need the chorus to hit more, and we'll work on that and we'll mold it and slowly, but surely, I'm saying solely surely, but sometimes only within an hour or two hours, we'll have the shape and the form of a song.
Wait a minute, I'm so glad I'm talking to you right now, because there's two questions I've been dying, dying to ask you or Frank and I can't believe this is the moment. First of all, one one of the secret sauces in the group, in my opinion, was always you gotta please tell me about the great Paul Pascoe on guitar. Next, what what David Williams is to Michael Jackson.
You know, David Williams has probably been the most consistent, steady thing and Michael like not even Michael Jackson is consistent and steady through his career, through you know, creativity, physicality, whatever. David Williams is almost the most consistent. The sound of his guitar from like that line of Billy Jean to want to be starting stuff, Like the sound of that loud pluck guitar. I think next to David Williams, Paul Pesco has one of the most distinctive act sounds, like
he's well speaking of Madonna. Uh, he's that work on I think Lucky Star, that's him.
Yep, Yep, he's on. He's on a lot of that stuff.
Oh, he's the the ah CC Music Factory.
Absolutely, yeah, he's on a lot of stuff.
Haull of notes like adult education.
All that tell me about Paul Pesco, Like I never heard any stories about him.
Yeah, so Paul is just a wonderful, wonderful guy. We this is for you. This is Paul Pesco. I don't know if you know our song this is for you. Uh huh, this is for you. He's the guy. He's the guy. Really, him and him and David, they would get together and cook up some things. This is for you as one. I want to make you feel good. That's Paul and David cooking up that that plectrum on I want to make you feel good. The lines. Yes, he's he's basically like a line and a kachunka guy.
But also he's he's very cordy. He knows his chords, he knows how to create atmosphere and mood. Just a brilliant guy. Love. I love the guy. I love the way he plays, I love the way he thinks.
Okay, my second question, when you know your your your first record comes out when I'm twelve, and I swear to God, I swear up and down because I swear that's your voice.
I'm hearing.
I swear up and down. There's a there's a local hit. Well, I don't know if it's a local hit or a local group New York group. I need to know, did you have anything to do? There was a song that used to always play in Philadelphia. It's the name of the song. It's not Attitude. It's a song called We Got the Juice. Do you know the song?
Yeah, of course I know. We produced Attitude is our group. We created Regia gem In Lewis. We created that group. Bernard singing on that. I'm singing La la, Chris Tello, that's that's swear.
You boys don't need to find like you're you always yelled on your.
Records and it's when.
I was a kid, I always thought that was the system and someone corrected me, like at a record store once and I never you know, I forgot the name of the song, but I always swore that We Got the Juice was like the follow up.
So that was Bernard Powers group or.
No, well that was if that look. I was following the Fred Petroz model. You have a band, you have a band, the system, and then you can expand that sound to another use kind of change the attitude of it and create a whole other bank of songs. We wrote all of Cindy Mazell sings on it. Who was someone who sang a lot of Yeah, she sings on Lisa Fisher sings on it, La La sings on it. Bernard follows sings on it. It was just our way to spread the juice.
But it was clearly that song could have been the next single on the System album.
Like so obviously you're you're saying you're creating your your your not your competition, sort of like printing the time, like you had to grow your own.
Crist Yeah, exactly, to be honest, Yeah, that's what we're that's what we were doing. Exactly what my that was my idea.
I found out recently that Charlie xc X finally admitted to me that what's the name of the idiom song that's.
Uh yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, I don't care.
I love it.
Yeah, yep, I love that song. Yeah.
Charlie actually basically admitted to me that that group never existed. They just found two models to sing that song.
Band.
Yeah, But she was more coming from the place where she felt that the song was still cartoony, that no one would take her series as an artist. So like the the compromise was, we'll still release the song, but we'll do it under like it won't be a Charlie X record.
I get it now. So did you just feel that we got the juice wasn't like serious enough for the System, but it was still a good song that worked.
No, well, we had I think we had the System System record then and it was still climbing and we were still touring it. And I really took a page at a Prince's book with the Time, because actually I saw I saw Prince at the Ritz and the Time was an opening act, but I know it was Prince's band. They had on these black robe hoodie costumes. You couldn't see their faces, so they were the band playing and I was like, wow, we could could do something like that in New York. We could like, I could come
up with another group. We have enough musicians around. Really, that was really the thinking, to be real honest with you.
So was was that song also your version of the Times wild and Loose? Always?
You know, I always keep clear like derivative of wild and loose, like that was your version of it?
You know, I didn't. I really didn't listen to the Time that much except seven seven, seven ninety three eleven.
That was.
That was my joint back then. That was my joint. Oh, Frankie Kraker had this saying on the radio, we got the juice, so I knew we could come up with something using that that he would play it, and he did and it spread, it spread it Just.
So, how is how is touring for you guys? Doing this when when the album takes off?
Well, I mean that's if I have any regrets, I kind of regret that we didn't turn the touring thing into a bigger thing, because when the records took off, we had calls to produce records in the UK. We had called We produced a lot of Howard Johnson, Nick and Valerie Simpson.
What did you work on?
I can Nick and val Yeah, it comes, it comes with the package, you know. That's all. We did like three songs on that album. Okay, I think we're the only people ever produced to produce them. We did. Uh, We produced a lot of records and I think that was an era for what we could have done, you know from the live avenue. So we we did some victures. We did Marvin Gaye's tour that was a that was a big tour. We did Ready for the Yes, Yes, that's correct, Yes, can you.
Oh wait, was it you guys Imagination?
Well, we did in the UK. We did do some dates with Imagination also because they were kind of a similar We were in a similar.
Vibe, so he wanted somebody really contemporary to open.
Yeah, and we had I don't think, I'm not sure what do we have. Don't disturb this group at that time?
What do you know that this is your and my system?
This is like eighty three eighty four, so it's probably the Experiment record and Sweat Yeah, and.
It also may have been out Himan too, because you know, I want a neat, neat concert, show up on time, do the gig, get on, get off, easy, turnaround, no big nine piece horn band. You know, we we fifth the bill in a lot of ways because we travel light. But that's kind of my one regret that we didn't really build up what we could do live with the system.
When you're performing live, because the albums are so have very distinctive like electronic sounds how and you know, also going off these Prince rehearsals, which I know he had to sort of turn serious miracles to get the sound of the studio to duplicate that live.
Like how easy is it to do? That stuff live.
Nah, that was easy. Look, we have we have a keyboard player, Chris Kello. I don't know if you know who he is, but he's a phenomenal Now he wrote, he's the one who did all the arrangements for Dian Warren. But he was a young kid. He was like maybe fourteen or fifteen when his mom when I asked his mom, can you let him come on the road with us? That I'm putting him in fifte maybe he was sixteen. Maybe maybe him and Bernard Wright were arch rivals in
that area of Queens. They were both like idiots, suvant genius keybop players, but all that sixteenth note and he could do all of that stuff. So we really didn't have a live both him and David David very dexterous, both hands keep what Chris, very dexterous, Paul. That was
That was not the hard part. Hard part was kind of convincing David to maybe add a drummer or ad you know what I mean, add that other component that would allow us to have that push and pull that you know you can only get with a live band. Those hits, those accents, you can only get that with a live band. You know, and have to playing with live bands. I know you need that. So and also it was very compelling all these production offers and and you know, you kind of just you write the songs,
you get to publishing, you get the production fee. You know, it's you're on the road, you're spending spending, spending, spending, you know what I'm saying. It was like that kind of balance of you know, being away from home.
And right, I have I have a this is My Night question?
Of course, you know you you and David are You're brought aboard by the great Uh.
I always mess up his name. This guy's my my hero. Yeah.
How you know, Atlantic house producer and you know average wipe in He produced Shaka Cohn's first like six solo records, and you know, it was a it was kind of a big deal when Shaka's I Feel for You album came out, in which you know, this is clearly them acknowledging the power of hip hop and where music is going. So it's a less jazzy record and more leaning towards
the future. But there's there's a question I always had about this is My Night, and this leads to a I don't know if the grace period has passed that I can actually say the name of this particular Thursday night institutional comedy show that all of America religiously watched all the eighties. But there's a moment in in that particular black comedy show on NBC at eight o'clock on Thursday, Yes,
before Family Dies. So there's there's an iconic episode. There's an iconic episode where the youngest daughter of the brood has a sleepover and you know, one of the one of the kids that are having a sleepover is.
Is Alicia Keys. So there's there's there's a really funny, cool moment that connects you guys with this episode in which kind of, uh, just randomly call these two kids THEO and Denise maybe yeah yeah maybe yeah where where they are.
Having a quickie like dance party with the kids and they're dancing to a version of This is My Night that is not the album version of This is My Night. And I make fun of Alicia Keys because she's the only kid in this in this group you YouTube it Rudy sleepover, it like she's the only kid that clearly
has two left feet, uh, in the scene. It's funny, but it might assume that before that song was submitted to Shaka, that you guys demoed it, or because that version of this is My Night is not the version from Shaka Khan, but it's clearly like a different So I just wanted to know, like.
I gotta hear it. But we demo. To be honest, we demo every song. We never go and cold the record, so we demoed. So the way that came about we were recording at Atlantic Studios. Reef was in the studio A. We were in Studio B, the Hallway studio, and we were working on Don't Diserve This Groove, and he came and asked, hey, you guys have anything for Haka, and we worked on it like overnight. The next day we turned it into him and he was like, yeah, we're
going to record it. But he also, don't diserve this groove. You if you if you know the song in the middle section, there's a female, right, So we played them don't diserve this group because we respected him, We respect him so much, and he said, all you need to do is add the girl at the girl in the middle, that's all. And you have a you have you have, you have a smash, So we added the girl in the middle and we had a smash And.
He talked about that.
He was talking about the middle part in the hook that.
No, no, no, no, no, we had we had that already, We had that close the door and turned up. Yeah, we had that hook already. We had everything, but the middle we didn't have that. But he said at the girl at a groot in.
The middle, who was the girl who was singing that part?
We had Orgie Wheeler, Cindy Mizelle singing in the chorus, and wait.
Jie Willard from uh uh Unlimited touch ar you will yep.
Yeah, a lot of our stuff.
You killing give that facts she's lessend there.
BJ Nelson, that's that's BJ. In the solo section, that's my girl. I love you BJ. Yeah. BJ sang the middle eight, Audie Wheeler, Cindy I think sang with me on the hook, or maybe it was just Audrey and BJ on the on the chorus hookst BJ sang the lead in the middle of the call and response.
What did you think of Michelle's cover of that I Love her? So Look Miche.
Michelle and so so I co I co produced her first album. The first three songs. I got shafted out of the credit. I was a vocal.
Product plantation, yeah, dread dreadlocks, Yeah yeah, I produced that vocal yeah yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah I got.
I got kind of shafted by the credit by someone who I brought up in the business, in the game. Who kind of I ended up? I ended up?
I was thinking Gamson, No, not.
Gamson, Gamson's my man, bets I got. I got chefted on the credit. Yeah, I got shifted on the credit. But yeah, she acknowledged it, she said. When the song was released, she said, for those in the know, McMurphy co produced you know, my first, my first record.
I know she'sout giving credits because she.
Yeah, yeah, I love I love Michelle, love her from day one, love everything she does, everything she touches. I'm just you know, I was. I was so proud to actually I to that point. That was my proudest production moment really honestly, because the whole record was so beautiful and just attitude, and you know, I love her and everything she does.
Is there any other stuff you worked on that you.
I co wrote Secret Garden from Madonna. I didn't get a proper credit. Yeah, yep.
So y'all did end up working together.
Yes, yes we did. And I wrote another song. So I wrote the song to your father, which she called me up when she was working on the album, called me. She said, McMurphy, McMurphy, I'm gonna make you rich. You're gonna be You're gonna be rich McMurphy out of the song. The song didn't make it on the album. And and Secret Garden I played. I played the instrument and the chords too. I didn't get any credit, but you know, life is life, man.
Another cat I wanted to ask you about from from that era that was kind of moving and shaking chet Pettybone.
Did you guys ever have any dealings working together?
Yeah? Well, he remixed a bunch of System cuts, and uh, I know David played on a bunch of his remixes. Okay, but he did remix a bunch of system songs at some point.
Okay.
Oh, can you can you please settle this once and for all? All right?
I recently found out that it wasn't you, but I will say that for the last thirty five years I would have put my life on the fact that you were the voice so glow of glo.
Shut up. Really that was that was That was Chris. That was Christopher, Yeah, that was Chris was who we were. We were really good friends, you know, we were real we were real friends and we still were still that was Chris Max. Yeah.
So since we mentioned so, can I ask you about the hair and the maintenance? And because I don't disturb this groove, it was.
Yeah, I had, I had, I had well started. My first One of my first girlfriends was a hairdresser, so she taught me early to maintain and she would like she would print it and get it right, and it just it just it became like a vegetable that just kept growing. It took on the life of its own.
Some aquaint would help with help with the.
You know, I would tie it up at night. I would tied it up at night like a bouffonp.
I love it like the girl on a chair.
Yes, you see, I sleep on the pillows right here, just like like Friday.
She doesn't let her hair touch the bib.
Yep.
Do you remember when you were we all recorded I know the song Baptized Beat, but recording the scene for Beat Street.
Do you remember anything about that?
They was that? Yeah, very clearly. Well, it was that what's this club on twenty second Street? The uh, it was a roller skating rink. It was a roller skating rink on twenty seven, twenty eighth Street, and everybody was there, all these different acts, and I know we we performed the song and when we were done, they were like next. In the edits, they said next. But I thought we had. I thought we had the slam in the song. I thought baptized the beat, And to this day, I think
it's one of the most inventive songs lyrically. Beat wise changes the bridges, everything about it. Yes, it's it's it's some fly shit for me, it's it's.
Not y'all would definitely better than Andy.
Be Bad, Shine and Wine.
Yeah, you can tell when he planned his career, he knew like.
Yo, man, I'm just in and out.
Poor guy never had a chance. Yeah, so okay, can you There's the one thing I also wanted to know is how did the group dissolve after eighty nine? And you know, why didn't you guys sort of try to push it further past that point?
So let's see, we had don't disturb this groove. There's a massive hit we did big tours next record Rhythm and Romance. I think we kind of went down the rabbit hole of Teddy Riley style funk in our own version.
I really think pretty much at that time we kind of run our course for where our heads you're at right then in terms of we would either have to go really simpler, like really back to the basics, or I don't think we could get any bigger in terms of the music, in terms of the chord and the layers and the parts and the levels, And it had just to my head it had blown up into too much to too much to digest. And David actually has started to get a lot more session worker on his own.
What is this nineteen eighty nine, nineteen ninety I'm kind of looking for a new direction. I'm trying to think of something that's a little bit different. He had quite a bit of success in that era as a keyboard player and working and producing, and I was trying to find my own niche. I ended up going to la in nineteen ninety two ninety three and forming a band with uh Just. It was really like a summer camp,
like a musical summer camp. We had all kind of gotten divorced, or our record deal that ended, or we were trying to find ourselves with Andre Simone, Gard Nicole, Saint, Paul Peterson, myself. So we went there the summer nineteen ninety three, and actually that record just came out two weeks ago, The Mighty Soulmates. It just came out, and we recorded like twenty four songs. We recorded like twenty four songs and yeah, so we recorded actually a and
M record. John McLain kind of put us together because he was a friend from way back. He's the one that said keep an eye on prints. You know, once he loses that baby girl voice and starts singing in a full voice, he gonna be a monster. He gonna be a monster. And he turned us on kind of the Jimmy and Terry and he was really like a like a coher driving force. So I think he said, once you guys get together, to what you can do. So we hold up summer garding Nicole's house in Woodland
Hills for like four or five months. We wrote, literally we wrote maybe more songs when we finished twenty four twenty five songs.
Not torupt But John McLean is one of the most elusive hardest cats to get. He is our dream interview.
Like he's literally the common denominator of almost every other guest on this show.
And well, well yeah, but yeah.
Dick, he has reasons. He has reasons.
Yeah, he can't make it, But I know why, why is he such a mystery?
He kind of you know, I mean, I've spent time with him, like over the court because he really was a fan of the system. He really was. He put us together. He brought us to produce a couple so we did a couple of projects for him. But I would ride around with him in LA and we would kind of talk music and he would talk Michael John. He grew up with the Jackson family. His father, I think was I don't want to speak out out of line, but his father was in the underground under whatever in LA.
But John always had a brilliant ear for music and a personality to put stuff together and just a sense of kind of what would work and who would work. He's always had that. So he brought us together. We spent somemer together, wrote this record, and then the earthquake happened in January and we kind of all splintered and all went our separate ways. I think John changed labels or whatever. And this record is sat complete since nineteen
ninety four. So I was finally able to get a deal for it with Adya Warner and the record just came out on on December third.
Oh. Man, Wow, that's music to my ears. Literally wow, that's and over the course.
Also, Andre Simone and I have become brothers over the last Actually I met. I met Andre on the Prince Rick James Clear tour. He was the only person in the band because I'm you know, I looked like a roady. I'm basically a roadie. No one would no one would look for me, no one and talk to me. But Andre and I connected on that tour and we've remained friends ever since.
Okay, so are you You weren't in system mood yet, You were just one of the guys in as far.
As yeah, I was just one of the guys hanging around the edge. I don't know what you do exactly, but you ain't you ain't you ain't an artist, so you know you get so.
Love well that's beautiful man, yo. I just want to say, man, like I mean this, this is definitely a dream interview. Like I've always wanted to talk.
To you or you know you or David either or and this is one of the moments that, you know, definitely a highlight for me to get the nerd out and study history here.
Actually yeah, yes, absolutely one.
And I just want to say too, man like, don't disturb this grooves? Like one of my favorite songs of all times, like in any genre. I mean, you know that song just when I was a kid and I would just hear it like, you know, in the way like my mom taking me to school in the morning, you know what I mean, Like.
That was just I think it's kind of still one of my favorite songs.
Of all the eighties babies.
I mean it posted the video with jay Z just saying it in common and this casual language like don't disturb this groove, Like I kind of think it's like at least the top ten for most eighties babies.
No, it really might be.
I mean, no, that that song is just an amazing record, man Like, seriously.
That.
It's you know what they said, It's just.
That's a good story about that. There's a good story. We have time yeah, yeah, so so so when when when we would make records, generally the label. They just let us do what we do. They just you know, you just turn it in when you're done. So at this point it's like we had done a system, we had done experiment, we had done the pleasure Seekers, and now we're coming on. Don't disturb this group. The pleasure Seekers did. It made a lot of noise. So now
it's time they want they want they want payback. They want that money right, they need that big hit the money record. So we knew, David and I that don't disturb this groove was it? We we knew. So you know you're going to a and R meeting. You're gonna play all your ship, but you're gonna save the best one the last, right, You're gonna save the best one for last. So we start playing the songs on the album.
We play everything, and now we're like, okay, we got one more to play for you hit play on the record. It plays for about a minute, a minute and a half, and Sylvia's says, come on, baby, I know y'all got something. I know y'all got something else, but you got what you got for me? Yes. So Merlin Bob, who was also he was like, really that the yeah, Merlin Bob Merlin Merlin. Bob said no, no, no, no, no, just wait a second, let's listen to that one more time.
And they listened to the second time, and she still didn't want to release as the first single, but she said, all right, you know that if that's what y'all you know, if that's what y'all want to do, I'm okay with it. But you know, I think we is a little.
Stronger and a right about this, yes, right, all right, now, right right, yeah.
What was her come back to you hit? What was the comeback?
No, there was no, there was there was no comeback that that record just went through the ceiling was not yeah, no, no, no, we never got We never got that. But that was kind of I thought that was an interesting story about don't disturb the screw.
So they didn't label, didn't believe in it until it until it saw it hitting it and it went out.
Yeah, until they saw some recognition from some label out on the West coast, I think in Washington State or something. There was some taste to make a label. At the time. They said their phones were lighting up, so you know, that one blew up and and I really believe it's one of our one of our best.
Yes, yes, absolutely, yes. All right, so just before we sign off, any other secret projects you've you've done that we don't know about.
Come on, let's give you a lot.
I know I've done a lot, but I don't know what I think. I think that Michelle and the Madonna stuff is kind of really what I'm I'm kind of proud.
Of stuff you there. No, thank you very much.
Man, Thank you for having me. Man. I really appreciate you guys.
All right, man, thank you for the music well for real?
Yeah, yeah, I want to shout out to my brother, David Frank. We've been on this road since nineteen eighty one, even earlier because he was in clear. My love for him, my love for his talent, my respect for him, and him getting on board with all my crazy ideas and my crazy energy. I got so much love for him. And we actually we have a record on the griddle right now that's being mixed in LA. It's a new system record being mixed by Tom Lloyd Algae and Jimmy Douglas.
Okay, songs are finished, Jimmy Senator Jimmy d Yeah, yes, yes, okay.
No, we're not we're not playing but you know, we need the right we need the right place to write home to get it out in this new world. But it's I think it's going to be a sensational.
Record as as you're doing this, I promise this.
My last question, are you are you aware of the sort of the phase of like throwback that that sound that you guys helped create, like from groups like Tuxedo or up in Canada there's what's the a trax brother's.
Name, Oh, Chromeo, Chromeo like, and we're not We're not throwback, but the Foreign Exchange.
I mean, me and my brother, we are very much inspired by y'all. For real.
I was gonna say, are you against like Oftentimes people say like no, let's push forward, let's push forward, But I swear there's just a generation of people that are starving for like authentic like pulling out the DMX drum machine, pulling out the Oberheim synthesizer, that sort of thing. Are are you guys going back to square one with us?
We for the most part, yes, but we're down with your quest. You've got an idea, brother, we'll make a real, real, simple and basic I mean, well that's that's what we're about. That's what we're trying to get you right now.
This might be a mission for Zoe and.
Man.
I mean I'm listening. I mean listen. Here said, here's an.
Open for all. He's your man.
I will do the documentary on it, I promise ye.
Here's an open.
That's beautiful.
Well, once again, thank you very much for joining us, Sugar Steve anything any.
Thank you, thank you for chiming for your music.
Michael, thank you, thank you, thank you having me.
All right, all right, we'll talk to you later.
I'll be good.
M What's Love Supreme is a production of iHeart Radio. For more podcasts from iHeart Radio, visit the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.