And The Writer Is...with Ross Golan - Ep. 63: Warren 'Oak' Felder

Episode Date: June 10, 2019

His remarkable story wasn’t the result of any long-term plan, but more a tribute to his hard work and creativity. Recent chart-topping hits include Kehlani’s “Distraction”, The Chainsmokers new single “Who Do you Love?” with 5 Seconds Of Summer, and Demi Lovato’s “Sorry Not Sorry” for which he recently won a BMI Award. He has co-written and co-produced breakout hits for Nicki Minaj, K. Michelle and Alessia Cara and worked with stars like Rihanna and Alicia Keys. He has 5 songs on the new Alessia Cara album and co-wrote and produced 8 records on Kehlani’s 'SweetSexySavage’ album. Our guest has celebrated consecutive #1 Billboard Mainstream Top songs with Alessia Cara’s “Here” and “Scars to Your Beautiful”, and two Grammy Awards for his work on Alicia Keys’ ‘Girl on Fire' (Best R&B Album) and Rihanna’s ‘Unapologetic' (Best Urban Contemporary Album). And The Writer Is… Oak Felder!This episode is sponsored by SONOS and BMI. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Welcome to Season 4 of And The Writer is. I'm your host, Ross Golan. I've written with hundreds of artists and writers over the years, and my favorite part of each session is the first hour when we catch up about life, the industry, politics, composition, whatever. So this is a journey of learning why people write songs, how people write songs, and most importantly, who the people are who write the songs. I'm producing this with the Great Joe London,

big deal music publishing and mega house music management. If you want to listen to the songs we discuss in this podcast, follow us on our socials, find out about special events, or buy some of our merchandise, go to our website www. www. www.andthe writer is.com.

Oh, and if you enjoy End the Writer Is, please rate and subscribe to us on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or whatever your preferred podcast listening site is. This week's episode is sponsored by BMV. Full disclosure, Joe and I are both BMI songwriters. So we didn't write this, but we believe it. BMI, we celebrate your talent, value your music, and champion your rights. To all our songwriters and composers, your passion is ours.

BMI, music moves, our world. Hey, I think it's weird that we as musicians spend so much time in a studio, making sure our songs sound amazing, and then we go home and we play them on speakers, that aren't very good. And my friends at Sonos recently sent me a speaker, and I took it out of the box. It took about one minute to set up,

to download the app, and listen to the music that I had written earlier that day in a studio, and have it sound exactly how I wanted it to sound in my own living room. The bass was bumping, the vocal clarity was there, full transparent frequency range. Genuinely, the experience that I needed to have at an affordable cost because I'm not about to buy my studio monitors for my home theater. And the coolest thing about Sonos is that you could just add more speakers if you want

and your app is intuitive. It'll help you set it up. So it's so simple. It's so easy. I recommend that if you need a speaker at home or even if you don't and you want to try a better one. They're pretty affordable. So go to www.sonos.com. You can play Apple, Spotify, whatever your streaming service is. And it's just that easy. You're going to order it. It's going to show up at your front door and you're going to open it and you won't be sorry. Again, go to www.sonos.com.

Welcome to And The Writer is. I am your host, Ross Golland. Today's Grammy-winning super-producing. has taken his literal worldly background to the tippy top of the urban and pop charts. He burst on the scene with records on classic artists like Alicia Keys, Jennifer Lopez, and Rihanna, but has since defined some of the newest names in music with songs like Here and Scars Here Beautiful for Alicia Cara. He also helped reinvigorate Demi Lovato with their four-times platinum hit, Sorry Not Sorry, Not Bad for a Kid from Istanbul, Turkey. That said, his most impressive trait, in my opinion, is how he controls the session as well or better than any producer with whom I've ever worked.

By way of Atlanta and Sherman Oaks, this gentleman believes in creating a healthy music industry for the next generation of up-and-coming songwriters. So he knows his way into my heart. And the writer is, the only guy I know who has designated indoor sneakers for the studio. Oakfelder. How you doing, man? You're really good at that. Thanks, man. You're amazing at that. I feel like it's like, you know,

have people been listening since episode one. I think they're probably hearing an improved version. Oh, see. Go back and listen to episode one. Yeah, it's like before and after. It ain't like that. Oh, man. That's really cool.

It makes me sound great. You know, honestly, it's like how often do you get to tell other co-writers and producers how you feel? I mean, you're a pretty emotional guy. Yeah. Pretty emotional. But it's unusual to be in a place, like a safe place where you can just sort of say how you actually feel.

That's very true. Especially during a recording session a lot of times, you're so focused on like guiding the energy in the room that you can't really put a lot of your own honest energy into the room. If you're like having a shitty day. Can I say shitty? Yeah, you can say whatever you want. Nothing's like, this is not PG-13 or anything like that.

No, no. If you're having like a shitty day, obviously that can't go into the room, right? but do you have moments where you walk into the session that this is just a terrible day oh man yeah all the time all the time right you just wake up or you know get a really bad phone call or just have a shitty day in general and then walk into the room and it's like hey let's do an up tempo that's like a clubbanger and you're like yeah and you're sort of crying inside it kind of makes me look at people like you know news anchors i don't know if you've ever been on a tv show where you you see these people who have to,

it just doesn't matter what their personal life is. Right. They can't. Every day they have to show up and be like, the weather is. Yeah, exactly. They can't just say, like, at home, my wife left me, and then the weather is, you know,

like, you have to go in with that same pizzazz. Like, whatever. Yeah, exactly. But you know what, though? The funniest thing to me is, like, when they're doing the news and they have to tell, like, a really sad story and then follow it up with something really upbeat.

So it's like they ended with and everybody unfortunately did not survive. In other news, Bozo the clown, and it's like they have to switch from one to the other. That is so awkward and amazing. I mean, it's a learned talent. I don't think that's natural for any human to communicate like that. No, for sure.

And somehow we all watch it, so we must have learned how to hear it also. Yeah, for sure. And be able to be, oh, yeah, that's right, that news. And I'm not going to fault this human for having no soul. Yeah, that's... Okay, so look, you have one of the most unique stories in pop because you started, not just pop, songwriting in general, because of where you grew up. Right.

And so I want you to just sort of start with telling me, you know, your childhood, where you're born. Yeah, it was born in Istanbul, man. I was born and raised in a part of town of Istanbul called Kadikai, which is like an art district. I guess you could say of the city. I grew up, for the most part, my uncle's studio, my uncle's recording studio. So he had me in there, like, doing notation and, you know, learning how to cut tape

and all that other good stuff in the recordings. Doing notation, like you were actually writing out charts? Writing out charts, yep, exactly. Did you get a formal education in music? I didn't. He sort of taught me how to do it. Yeah. Yeah, he taught me how to do it.

And then, funny thing is that not too long into doing it, he introduced me to this program called Notator. that sort of did it naturally. Like we would trans- It's MIDI. Yeah, we would transcribe all the MIDI. Notator was made by a company called E-Magic. I don't know if you're familiar with them.

I'm not. Okay. So I'm going to give you a quick... Yeah. We'll give you a quick digital audio workstation lesson. Here we go. It started off as Notator, and then it became Notator Logic

after they added music sequencing. Oh, wow. And then they dropped Notator, and to this day, it's just called logic. And the function is still in there. You can actually still do notation in there. launched. I'm sure you've seen that. Yeah, sure.

But you're like, why is this here? It's usually because I hit the wrong button. Yeah, right, exactly. You're like, why would everybody use this? Yeah. I think it's like right next to the mixing, mixing console. Exactly. It's right.

You hit the wrong button. It's like, no, I didn't want that. Yeah. I didn't want that. That's awesome. And then go back. Yeah. But yeah, I've been using it for years.

Did you start off wanting to be a producer or writer? Or did you even have any idea what you were doing? Neither. Being around my uncle, First of all, okay, I'm Turkish, so that makes me a cynic. Being around my uncle, being around my uncle sort of demonstrated to me how impossible it is to get into the music industry. Like, for every one of me, there's like 50,000 that failed. For every one of you, there's like half a million to a million that totally failed, right?

So I knew how slim. What is that? What do you mean by that? In other words, for every one person that made it to the level that you made it, there's another 500. thousand people that tried and now they're like driving ubers or they're working at a grocery store or they're doing security or whatever they're not in the music industry it's difficult right it's it's it's it's it's it's it's it's it's a slim chance so so my perspective was always as a realist to say i'm gonna learn how to do this so that i can sell the dream to everyone else who's trying to do it i'm gonna learn how to do this so i can be the engineer that's working with the songwriter that's trying to get in

I'm going to learn how to do this so I can be the producer who does the track for the singer who's trying to get in. And after, you know, moving to the United States, one of my side hustles was that. Like, I would do songs for random people for like 500 bucks a pop, produce and recorded. Wait, when is all this? When are you starting to work with your uncle? When are you starting to do this? I started working with him when I was around eight, eight or nine years old. Whoa.

Yeah, I was a kid. Did you speak English? then? Yeah. Yeah, I spoke. It's probably about 60 or 70% fluent by that point. Because we start fairly early in Turkey. Like you have to learn at least another language fluently. What's the main language? Turkish. It is Turkish. Okay. It is absolutely Turkish. That would make sense. Do you still speak it? Yeah. With your family a lot? Do your kids speak it? Yeah. My kids are learning. They're definitely learning. They understand it when I speak it. Their pronounce, pronunciation, enunciation, which way...

Pronunciation? Technically the right way to say that. Their pronunciation is not right on point, but they understand it fluently. Is your wife Turkish? Did she learn any? The curse words. She cursed me in Turkish.

Yeah, exactly, right. So you move here when? 2001. 2001. Third year college. Where did you move? Atlanta, Georgia. When you say third year of college,

were you in school and then you decided to... I was going to Istanbul. University. For music? No, for a networking technology. What is that? That's a guy who basically strings computers together for a living. All right.

But my focus was in artificial intelligence study. So that made it possible for me to create like, they call them entities. This is how scary it is. Artificial intelligence entities that existed across multiple computers. That was my focus. And then I... Damn, that's it. so far ahead of where to start that then.

Yeah, this was back in, what, 2000? This explains your love for Star Wars. Yeah, I'm a sci-fi. Yeah, exactly. And then I had a chance to transfer, yeah, and I transferred to Georgia Tech, which is why I moved to Atlanta. Okay.

Yeah. How was that transfer? Difficult. Why? Language barrier being one of them, right? So when I moved to the States, I spoke English fluently. And I could almost pass for a native speaker at that point.

I feel like now I could. Every once in a while, the accent jumps out there. I've been around you many times, and I don't think I've ever heard a word where I was like, oh, that's weird. Versus like if I say, hey, my band and my Chicago accent's worse than your Turkish accent. You've done something right. But when I first moved here, so if you know anything about Atlanta Airport, it's in college park in Atlanta, right?

So here's this airport, this international airport. College Park's a nice part of town, but some of it is in the hood, right? And so I get off the plane and the person that's supposed to pick me up is not there to pick me up. This is 2001, so I don't have a cell phone. I have to ask for change. So I walk up to this brother, and he's like environmental services, right? He's mopping the floor. And I was like, excuse me, do you have 50 cents that I could borrow?

I have to make a phone call in what was an accented English. What does that sound like? Excuse me, do we have 25 or 50 cents I'd like to make a phone call? Well, so is that strong. Yeah, it's pretty strong. Yeah, because I mean, it's Turkish. It's like Eastern European. Sure.

It's like the mix. So he kind of looks at me and he goes in his own accent. Shotta, you sound funny a hill. Shout to where you from? Shout to you from. Shout to you. And I'm flabbering. I'm like, what the hell did he just say to me?

What? I said, Shada, you sound funny. Hey, Sada, what are you from? I'm like, oh, where am I from? I'm from Turkey. And he goes, Turkey or Kentucky? You don't sound like you'd phone no damn Kentucky. And I go, let me just get 50 cents.

That was my first interaction with an American in the United States. Amazing. I lived in the South, man. So it was, I mean, I couldn't understand anybody the first six months I was there. Were you able to make friends? Yeah, of course. Yeah, absolutely. Eventually.

Yeah. Were you immediately going into music? When you were in school, were you, I mean, I know you're studying technology, but you've been doing music since you were eight. Were you, you know what? Yeah. I mean, I was going to, like, gigging and, like, playing, you know, keys at Audenem places around Atlanta. Going to recording studios, you know, for fun or whatever. Not too long after I moved there, I opened, like, a commercial recording production business

where, like I said, I would charge, like, $500 for people to come by, I would produce records. Do you know that's what you were doing? Were you like, oh, I'm in the business of producing records? No. It was a side hustle. It was extra money. Right.

I mean, you're in college. You're broke. So it was extra money. It was a side hustle. Was any of it good? Yes. And the reason I can say that is because some of the stuff that I did during that period started my real career.

Right after I graduated from college and started working for a technology company or a networking company, I was still doing the commercial sessions. enjoyed it like i liked doing it and one weekend a guy came by and asked me hey yeah let's do three songs together and i was like cool and we did three songs and that guy i don't know if you know him his name is sterling sims do you know stirling sims do you know oh yeah yeah that's how we met he was he was an artist back then and uh we did like three records together and six months later he got signed off of those records that's how my career actually started whoa so were you still in school then when he got the no no this was after school this was after school i was i was

probably into the workforce by like a year at that point. But here's what's funny. So I had my salary or whatever and I knew what I was making. About six months into it, he gives me a phone. Sterling calls me. He says, yo, man, you want to come up to New York and meet L.A. Reed? I'm like, yeah, that sounds awesome. Hell yeah, I'll do that.

So I hopped on a plane and went to New York. I sit down with L.A. Reed. He's like, yeah, we're going to sign Sterling. I'm like, oh, man, that's great. He's like, yeah, we love your music. I'm like, oh, man, yeah, that's good, too. It's like, oh, yeah, we're going to pay you $6,000. I was floored.

I was charging 500 bucks, right? I don't think Sterling ever paid me for those. Actually, no, those. Yeah, exactly. But I was like, you're going to pay me six grand for three songs? He's like, no, man, we're going to pay you six grand each. I was like, man, I'm clearly in the wrong business. I need to do what y'all doing over here.

And that's when my career started, honestly, sitting in the office, talking to L.A. So are you sitting across from L.A. being like, I'm moving to New York tomorrow? No. Or are you like, no, okay, great, this is awesome. Send me a check. I'm going to go down in Atlanta. I'm going to... Well, yeah, because you got to remember back then, what, was this 2004?

Back then, like, the urban music scene in Atlanta was popping. Yeah, it's the hottest place. Yeah, so there was no need for me to go to New York. All the writers and artists that I knew were all in Atlanta are in. Right. So after that, I mean, I immediately started working with, like, some of the dopest names in R&B music at the time. People like Mario and Marchand Bluio's from Floatree and Chris Brown.

She's the best. Oh, she's amazing. I love her. Her voice is nuts, man. Does L.A. remember that meeting? He does. So sick. He does remember that meeting.

Yeah. It's kind of fun when you meet people on the way up who were friendly, and so you just feel like, you know, as you, obviously you've done a lot of work with him since. So, I mean, it's pretty cool. And you guys can always wink at each other knowing where it started. For sure, man. Yeah. Was it a meeting with him not too long ago?

And I bet he offered you more than $6,000. Yeah, well, you know what? He knows not to mention money while we're sitting in a room together. I'm like, you know, I just call my management about that. Right. $6,000 to show up to this meeting to talk about how much money

you're going to pay me for this song. More like that. So the first, you know, real record that I could find is 2005 with Chris Brown. That's a different, it's a different level when you have a song on a number one album. Yeah. How did that change?

change your career at that point? Well, that song happened to be my first official release. Whoa. Yeah, that was the first record I ever had come out that more than 40 people had heard. And I'm going to be honest with you, it didn't really change a whole lot because the hype around me as a producer was already sort of really high. So I was already making the rounds and working with like a lot of different artists. I want to say Sterling's album came out

not too long after that one came out. Sure. So, yeah, it changed, obviously, being on a number one album. I was super proud of that fact. But, you know, when you're a junior level creative, you tend to get overshadowed by, like, the senior people that happen to be on the song.

So when people look at that record, they see, oh, Sean Garrett wrote this record. They don't see that some guy named Oak produced it. To this day, it surprises people when I was like, yeah, produced ain't no way for Chris Brown. And they're like, what? You did that? Right.

To this day. still happens. But that's kind of interesting how people's perspective changes because I guess just from my experience, you know, when you, or better yet, when you have a song right now that you show that you wrote then, that might be relevant now, they might hear it with different ears because of how, you know, you have a whole discography in between that. So when someone looks back at that now, I don't think that they have, there's no way they have a feeling of, oh, this is one, you know, this name is as big as the other name now. At the time, if I'm seeing that for the first time, my perspective, I didn't, I mean, I know Sean, I didn't look at that even for a second and think like, oh, that's, oh, well, Sean's record. I mean, you know what I mean? Yeah.

No one who sees it for the first time feels that way. I'd say that now, for sure. I mean, but that's by virtue of the fact that I've had whatever career I've had between men and now. Did you expect, was your goal to do, did you have a specific genre you wanted to work in? Well, here's the thing, man. when you are a black record producer in Atlanta, Georgia, there's pretty much only one style that they're going to accept from you. So people are surprised to learn that the industry is still very much a segregated industry.

Not because there's a prejudice or not because there's like a racism, but because that just sort of naturally is how it shakes out. I noticed a couple of years ago. So do you know Seven, Seven Streeter? Yeah. You know Julia Michaels. Yeah. Two sides of the same industry.

One of them is an urban songwriter and artist. The other one is a pop songwriter and artist. Three years ago, although everyone in their perspective sides of the industry knew who they were, they did not know who each other were. They didn't know each other. Because at the time, I remember asking Julia, do you know seven? She was like, no. And I remember asking seven, you know Julia?

She was like, no. Do you get what I'm saying? So the music industry very much is still sort of split, like between black and... White. Right. Back then, it was even more so. If you're in Atlanta and you're black,

you are doing rap or R&B, period point blank. What was ironic for that, for me, though, is that I didn't really get acquainted with every music until after I moved to the U.S. Because I grew up listening to rock. You know what I'm saying? That's the stuff that I listened to growing up. I wasn't like a hip-hop head or an R&B had grown up.

I was in Istanbul, Turkey. I was like one of eight black people that lived in the whole country. So the music that prevailed was like, you know, I'd go to like Rage Against the Machine concerts and Oz Fest and all that other shit. I listen to like modest mouse and all of that. Like that's the style that I kind of grew up listening to.

So it wasn't until after I moved to the U.S. and was like, oh, there's this. This is dope. And of course, being a black guy, it appealed to me, I guess, on that level. So I was like, yeah, this is fire. And then learning how to do it and produce it. But prior to that, no, man, I grew up not,

I grew up not really exposed to it. This week's episode is sponsored by BMI. At BMI, music moves their world, just like it moves mine. BMI is my performing rights organization. They're the bridge between people who create music like me and the businesses that bring it to the public. They make sure I get paid when my music is streamed on apps or shows, played on radio, at live shows, or in bars, gyms, basically anywhere where music is played. And they do this for over 900,000 songwriters, composers and music publishers, with more than 14 million songs across genres. But it's more than that. They help us navigate the music industry. They create opportunities for aspiring writers and composers through stages

at festivals, song camps, and workshops. And they connect us with the right people. They're also on Capitol Hill fighting for copyright protection. and fair royalties. And they work hard to ensure the future of music. They have my back and they'll have yours. Learn more at BMI.com. Listen, recently, I had a friend who told me, hey, you've got to have a speaker in your living room

that's as good as the speakers that you have in your studio because you're spending all this time writing and recording music for a living and then you want to play that music for your family and friends. So you don't want to shortchange the speakers that you listen to your music on just because you're not in your studio when you're at home. So recently, Sonos sent me as a couple speakers, and they're bananas. I mean, truly, like, it's what we've been playing my new album, The Wrong Man on, for all of our friends and family who come over. Because the vocal clarity is great, the bass is great, you know, a true spectrum of, of, of, that's clear and transparent.

And it's so easy to set up. You take it out of the box. You turn on the app and it's basically right there for you. You can add whatever speakers you want to it if you want to build a bigger system. But the gist of it is that it's so easy. It's so easy to get. It's so easy to set up. Go to so knows.com.

If you want to grab a speaker, two, three, whatever you want. But trust me, that is the best speaker that we have had that is not. in my studio. So again, thank you Sonos and trust me, go grab some. I think one part of that that's interesting is that when you study rock or that kind of music, you know, that you mention and you go and you write in an urban session, I find that in those urban sessions, my first sessions were all with Dre and Vidal. Okay, yeah, from Philly. Yeah, and which is how I knew Marcia. Oh, cool. You know, I was the one white guy in the session. But I was in a band, but I was like, oh, they were like, oh, no, this guy's a musician.

And there was a, my first session that was a big name was with Chris Brown and them. Wow. And they flew me. I remember I was in Chicago, and they called him, so do you want to come to work with Chris Brown the next day? And I was like, yeah, of course. I mean, this Chris Brown in his heyday, I actually think it might be like the day that he took the plea deal with Rihanna. So it was not maybe the best day of his life. Right.

But I remember going and there was this, you know, it was an entourage of people and all this. And there was one white guy out of 20 people there and it was me. Right. And somebody went up to Drey and Vidal was like, yo, you got to get rid of that guy. Word. Like before we ever started writing or anything,

no, no, trust me. He's like, he's cool. It'll help. the songwriting for, you know, you want him to appeal to some white people. And, like, I mean, I always figure I, my, any, you know, I wrote maybe the whitest of Nikki Minaj songs, you know? It's like, you know, it's like, you know, it's like, any. Monstrous plaque sitting up there.

But, but, you know what I mean? It's like, I don't, I think that there's like this giant gray area where you can live, where if you do land in the middle, then that makes your urban song. when you go to Atlanta having your background, that's going to make them cross over easier because you're naturally thinking like, oh, well, yeah, but check out this one kind of modest mouse guitar line to build this track off of.

Right. Just like I'll be, you know, naturally, I'm going to, you know, I'll naturally sing things that sound probably more like a Weezer melody than like a ludicrous melody. So, you know, those things really, if you land in between, genres, especially now. I mean, then it was even different because

there were still aisles and stores. Right. But right now, it's like, if you land in the middle, you know, you win. You almost win having the background, if you have the opposite background. I mean, look, that was definitely a benefit for me, man.

I call it the salt on the caramel. I think everybody's so used to making things that taste sweet. And if you come from a salty background and add what you do, it's unique and it's awesome. and it's balanced, right? You seem to have had a really a good childhood.

You speak very fondly of your family home and all that, yeah? Yeah, definitely, man. I mean, I had my difficulties growing up. You know, anybody does, right? Like what? Oh, well, the challenge of being, like I said earlier, literally one of the only black people in the whole country. Like, you know, there might be...

And you might not be the smallest human? Not the smallest human on Earth, yeah. So, like, they're definitely noticing. Yeah, so I stood out. I stood out, whether I was famous or infamous, I definitely stood out while I was there. Yeah. Why would you say infamous? Were you aggressive or something?

No, it wasn't aggressive. What is it infamous mean? What I mean by that is when you are unique and you stand out, people are going to either really like you or really hate you. Oh, wow. You know what I mean? If you don't stand out and you blend in and people like you, they're just kind of like you. If they don't like you, they don't know about that guy.

But if you stand out and you're a sore thumb, people tend to have stronger opinions. So it takes less action on your part for people to form that strong opinion. Did you think that there was racism in Turkey? Yeah, for sure. Definitely. I think that it's not as defined and as pronounced as it is here in the United States. Racism is a strong word. There were people that definitely had a prejudice. They would prejudge you based on how you looked.

And sometimes it wasn't negative. sometimes they would just automatically assume that you could sing or they'd automatically assume that you were great at playing basketball or football which I happen to be a good football player but like they tend to believe that you were you know they'd put the stereotype on you or sometimes it would be ignorance man like one time I was on a bus I was maybe 14 years old

this little girl this little Turkish girl's like staring up at me and then she goes like this on my leg because those weren't short she goes She rubs her finger across my leg and then looks at her finger to see if the blackness had rubbed off to her finger. And I thought it was funny at the time, right?

It's ignorance. It's innocent ignorance, right? But then there are some people over there that sort of get cues from people who have a little bit more experienced with the ugly side of racism and they emulate it. There are those people there too.

There are those people everywhere, in my opinion. Did you ever feel any sort of racism with, you know, in the music industry. I mean, I get the genre segregation, but did you ever feel any racism? I mean, there have been times when certain A&Rs, especially early in my career, wouldn't give me a shot on certain projects

just because of me being a black guy. Like if I was new and they hadn't really heard anything I'd done, they sort of judged me as soon as I walked through the door. Like, I'm here to work on, well, I'm not going to name projects, because then you'll know what A&Rs I'm talking about, right? I'm here to work on this pop female that you have. You? Really?

Where are you from? Istanbul. What? You know what I mean? So, yeah. Yeah, I definitely encountered that. And it was like, no, I don't want to give him a chance. Do you work with those A&R people now?

I try not to. I try not to have, I hold a grudge, man. I try not to have contact with any of those people. You hold grudges? Yeah. Why? I'm an emotional person, like you said earlier. A very emotional person.

I definitely hold grudges. So, you know, after 2005, you write a bunch of records, you write a lot more records, you have a bunch of records that do well, and then you meet Pop. Pop Wanzell. You got to go down this, you know, I need to know about, you guys, here's your infamy. You know, you guys become Popin' Oak. It's hard to get, you know, that's as big of a name in pop since I've been working in music. Man, listen.

Tell me the story of Poppin Oak. Popin Oak was the result of an argument I was having with my then manager. So do you remember Ice Box by Omarion? Yeah. And you remember that was one of the first records that incorporated a great song, right? But what made that song such a forward-thinking record is that incorporated what would usually be in trance music into an art. R&B song. Like this arpeggiated scent.

You didn't really hear that in R&B prior to that. Right at that point, R&B started making this shift to like a more electronic thing, right? Four on the floor. Pop, pop, pop, pop, pop, pop music. Everybody's moving in that direction. Let's move away from R&B music and do pop music. Unless you were doing pop R&B, you were doing old school R&B. Like, this was the thought process, right?

And so my mentality, being the guy who grew up listening to R&B, rock music and pop music and alternative music and like tricky not tricky stewart but the european tricky like listening to all that kind of stuff i was all for that shift i was like this feels natural to me i mean i love rmb music i love urban music but this feels more natural so i'm telling my manager i really want to focus on this and he goes well why don't you want to stay with urban music i said urban music doesn't really offer anything new right now and he's like i think you're making a mistake because urban music like culture flows from, and this was his thought process at the time, music culture flows from black to white. I was like, what do you mean by that? He goes,

a lot of times when you have genres of music, it starts on the black side. R&B started black, rock and roll started black, blues started black. A lot of different genres started black and they flowed into mainstream culture and became lighter and lighter and lighter as it went. You want to stick with the source. You don't want to go with the flow. You'll flow out. You'll be gone. Smart guy. I was dumb at the time. I wasn't listening. So he enlisted Pop in that argument. Pop, to me, represents the embodiment of soul music. His father is Dexter Wanzel, who was a producer for Philly International back in the 60s and 70s and 80s. He's from the most soulful city in America, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. And he understands.

that culture very, very well. So Donnie, my ex-manager, tells me, hey, man, I want to introduce you to this kid. He's going to give you a new appreciation for it. So he flies from Philly to Atlanta. We sit down and we have an hour-long conversation. And the ego side of me says, I got a lot I can teach this kid.

Because he didn't know anything about digital audio workstations and running a room as a producer. He doesn't know anything about AI. Exactly. He doesn't know anything about artificial intelligence. routes and switches. He doesn't know anything about that. But the ego side of me is like,

I got a lot to teach this kid. It wasn't until later that I realized I learned just as much from him as he learned from me. Yeah. Well, he grew up with it too in such a professional way that there's something with people who grow up with that

as their second language. For sure. So they understand things like recording and touring in a way that you just, there's nothing. It's, you know, our parents aren't. aren't famous musicians or weren't involved in it.

So of course we're not going to have that language. Yeah, exactly. But that's his, you know, that's his, if not his, that might be his first language. Yeah, exactly. So that's a great partnership there. No, he definitely brought a lot of appreciation for like the root of urban culture to my, to my world. And I brought a lot of appreciation for sort of more alternative culture to his world in understanding things like pop.

melody and symmetry in writing a song. Yeah. Things like that. Did someone teach you that or were you just because you would listen to records? Yeah, that sort of was like a natural thing for me. Yeah. Yeah. I don't know.

I mean, you can be taught. You know, like when everyone, obviously we talk about things like song math all the time or composition or whatever you want to call it. But I guess when you're doing charts all the time, when you're eight, you're probably really good at being like, oh, yeah, this A section comes back. again. Exactly. You know, you start to emulate what you know.

Exactly. I think some people don't want to actually do the basic homework so they miss out on it. I mean, that started early for me, man, just growing up in a studio. Yeah. So the concept of sequencing was like... I guess when you think about your uncle, too, being in, it's like both you and pop were able to... We have that in common. Yeah.

We definitely have that in common. I think that's why we connected because we both kind of came from a background that made it a second nature thing. Yeah. How quickly after you guys started writing together, did you start having success together? Almost immediately. I want to say your love was like the fifth or sixth record we ever did together. Okay. Which wasn't intended to even be a record that saw the light of day.

It was something that pop recorded the hook and attached it to an email to send to himself, forgot to send the email. Later on in the day, send an email to Nikki. Because he had a relationship with Nikki from like a long time ago. sent an email to Nikki about something unrelated and that song was attached to the email and she hit him back saying, yo, this is dope.

And then she wrote verses and sang the hook. But she was hesitant about putting it out because nobody had ever heard her sing before that. Right. I guess I'm sort of jumping ahead to that record, but yeah. I mean, it's fine. It's 2010. Let's go for it. Yeah, that's around that period.

So the record leaks. The record leaks. man and it charted as a leak it jumped up to like 46 on the hot 100 as a leaked record with like no label push that's that's really sort of the first time and I mean I know you have some songs that are crossing over and you have but that's that's such a superstar at that point that's really like the point where she really breaks yeah you know so to be part of that is is one step further than even working with big names is one thing. Working with an artist like that and sort of the beginning of their real pop career is a whole other level. Man, breaking an artist is one of the best things you can do

as a producer or as a writer. But it takes such risk, doesn't it? I mean, you just, when you work with a famous name, your floor is so high because you assume that they'll sell certain amount of units because that's what they've done. Right. But when you have that new artist, I mean, the floor could be as low as it can go. And, you know, so it's hard to take that risk. We can all sit here, though, as musicians and say that we're all risk takers. You are, I am.

Anybody's in the music industry as a risk takers. There's no net for this job. You know, you fail, you fail. But I'm happy. I'm happy that I was able to, because it was her first successful single. And I think it was the record that sort of put her in the mainstream. She had features prior to that,

like that monster feature she did. I mean, obviously, that's really, really put her on the map as a rapper, but as an artist, I feel like your love put her on the map. Did you feel pressure to repeat after something like that? Or was it sort of, are you in this mode of just creativity where it's like, oh, well, this is just sick. This is happening over here. I'm in a studio. I mean, you don't seem to be that affected by outside pressure. But am I wrong by that? Not at all, man. I'm not. The only pressure I have is for delivering for the artist the day of. I get nervous before sessions. Oh, interesting. Yeah. So you prepare a lot before

an artist comes in? Yeah, I prepare a lot. I do a lot of homework on the artist and I do a lot of mental preparation. But I am, I'm a nervous wreck before every session. That's, that's the extent of pressure. But as far as like repeat success and catching another hit and catching, I mean, obviously we all want to, we all want to catch big records. But I'm just glad to be able to make a living, making music, dog. And if I catch a hit along the way, then I catch it along the way. Why are you and Pop, why did you go and do, go sort of your separate ways? Or maybe you guys didn't really go your separate ways, but... Pop and I were managed by the same person for a long time.

Pop made a decision to sort of go another way regarding that. And right around that time, I wanted to explore different avenues and do different styles. There were certain artists. that I was really interested in working with that Pop didn't have the same interest. But the truth is that throughout our careers, we always were separate producers. We've always been that.

Like, there are records that he's done on his own. There are records that I've done on my own that did well in whatever perspective, you know, genres they're in. And every once in a while during that period, we would come together and do stuff. But me and Pop have never been a formal partnership. Like, we all, we just, genuinely fuck with each other as people.

Yeah, and everyone just started calling, you know. Everybody just assumed. It's everyone else is saying like, oh, you know, Popin' Oak, Popin'n' Up and Popin'n'u. Right, exactly. It's not necessarily, well, yeah, cool. Like, people would probably assume that Jimmy Fallon and Justin Timberlake were like a formal group if you took that thinking to that level, right?

Me and Popper just really close. Like, we're really close friends. So it's like, hey, man, what are you doing? Oh, man, I'm doing such, such, such, such. Hey, why don't you come up to the studio, man, let's cook. Because he and I bonded over that. really good cook. And I'm a really good eater.

See what I did there? I like that. I like that you came into our kitchen and the first thing you thought of is like, oh, I could cook some food in this place. Oh, man, you have an amazing kitchen there, bro. Come on. It's another one. I mean, look, man, it is so,

you know, you say, yeah, it's great to break an artist. Right. But I've had a lot of singles for artists that are major label artists, that are new artists, and it just didn't work. for one reason or another. And it seems to have happened

multiple times for you. So why does here work? Why do Alicia Kara songs? How did that break through? She is unequivocally herself in all of her music. I'd be lying if I said to you that every artist I worked with was the same. I do know that some artists have a caricature of themselves

that they project. I know that. I'm not going to name any names because you and I both know a lot of the same people. So I don't want to get shot. But there are some people who as artists

put on a little extra something and then they project that out there. And not that they're being disingenuous or being fake because, you know, you have to have yourself in the music that you make. But at the end of the day, it's wrestling, in my opinion.

It's wrestling. Hulk Hogan was really Terry Ballet. Now, he might have been a very patriotic guy, you know, in his real life. But I doubt that he wore red and yellow as much as he did on the canvas. Right? Right. Alessia is the antithesis of that idea. She is who she is all the time.

At home, you know, in that environment, in the studio, being interviewed, out shopping, on stage, you know, know, at a swimming pool, whatever, whatever she randomly happened. She is the same person in every situation and almost unapologetically so. And she also happens to be one of those rare people who are talented enough as a songwriter to capture the essence of what it is. She wants to say in who she is. And people, I think, relate to that. They understand that, right?

I mean, just the concept of that first record here, how many of us have been in that situation? And it's not cool to talk about how whack a party is. You know, in the music industry, we're taught to be, yo, this party is live. This party is hype. I'm drunk. I'm having a good time.

This party sucks. Let's write a song about that because that's how I feel. And she did. And I think a lot of other people felt the same way. And then Scarce Your Beautiful comes out, and that's sort of the, you know, the timeliness of it probably couldn't have nailed that

any more than you did. Stars aligned, man, for that record, for sure. Yeah. I mean, the whole thing is just, it's just interesting when you find somebody who's that young who then teams up with a producer that's that venerable

and somehow that whole thing works. I love how I'm venerable. I love that word in relation to us. Thank you. I appreciate that. That's just a nice way to say old as hell. You know, they're venerable. producers that are almost dead that are closer

foot in the grave yeah exactly makes the music better it's like you're closer to you know you're closer to 70 than you are to zero wow good point you know yeah geez you're right you live with that

you're gonna trigger my midlife crisis like today I'm gonna leave here and get an earring and buy a sports car if I could fit in one man I took my earrings out once I had a beard because I was just too many accessories Too many things to keep up with. Alessia is a very intelligent person.

She's a scary intelligence. She's almost intimidatingly intelligent, like talking to her. And it definitely makes it into her music, I think. So intelligence was something that I thought is interesting because when we have sessions, I feel like we have long conversations about things other than the music industry or the music industry in-depth. Right.

And you have, you think about the world in a, in a worldly way because you literally are from across the planet. Right. Do you find that you're able to use your intelligence in pop music, you know? Are you challenged? Yes. I feel like, oh, who is it that? Picasso, who uses his intelligence to paint a picture. painting that a child would paint. You kind of have to unlearn how to be complex, which in and of itself

is a very difficult thing to do. It's like a mental exercise. But then apply that to the role of a producer, which is to get a roomful of people to think that way. You get what I'm saying? Like simplicity. The lowest common denominator appeal to the, you know, we try to make records that as many people as possible love. So you've got to appeal to as many people as possible, which means you've got to appeal to the lowest common denominator. Not to say the dumbest, but just the most relatable, right? Get a room full of people, the songwriter who is smarter than everybody, the songwriter who can write 60 different melodies and four different keys, the keyboard player that like, you know, went to Berkeley. God bless Berkeley. I love that place as an institution. But some of the people

that come out of Berkeley, sometimes they come to my studio and they honestly piss me off. Sometimes they come to the studio and it's like, oh, let's add this crazy chord that I have to use my fucking elbow to play. You know what I'm saying? Chill out on that, okay? There's some people that I know that came from Berkeley and really understand the concept of being an amazing musician

is not the same as being somebody who writes hit songs. Applying that psychological sort of juju over a room, I think requires a lot of thought. It's a lot of application. You have to apply yourself a lot. Yeah, it is a challenge, absolutely. You're a businessman. I am.

Outside of the music industry. Absolutely. And I don't know if people know that about you. So I think you should tell people how much of a businessman you is. How much am a businessman? I'm not a businessman. I'm a businessman. No, I am a businessman.

No, but I think people don't realize that, you know, a lot of us have hobbies, but you're a businessman. And I thought that when we were, when we, were talking, maybe it was a couple sessions ago, and you were telling me about some of the things that you have going on and you know, that are just outside of the music industry, it's like, man,

what am I doing with my time? I'm obviously not working hard enough. I definitely own multiple businesses outside of the music industry. I am because I'm Turkish. Like I said, I'm a cynic. I think that at any moment, and a pessimist. So at any moment,

my career as a producer could potentially be over. Like, a career is producer's shelf life tends to be fairly short. Why? I think it's attention span. I think, you know, if you get caught slipping and you're not like staying ahead of the curve, which is a constant effort,

I think you become irrelevant really quickly. And we've seen it happen with like multiple guys. Like I think of the year, excuse me, the year that I started in 2005 and I can't think of any producers that are still around from those days when I started. Like, I can't think of any. Like, I really honestly can't think it's because they become irrelevant

or do you think it's because they have other pursuits? I think both. I think they make a fair amount of money. And then they're like, ah, you know, the effort of staying ahead of the curve is too much of an effort and I don't want to do that anymore. Or they don't stay ahead of the curve and nobody returns their phone calls.

But it happens quickly that I've noticed. All the producers and writers that I know, that sort of aren't in the game anymore. They all told me, man, one day it was all good, and the next day my schedule was just empty, and I could not fill it. And that's fucking scary. Like, as a producer and as a writer...

Yeah, it just made my summertime drop. Right? I'm sure it did. It scares the shit out of me. Like, when your livelihood depends on the attention span of the music industry, I love my fellow musicians. And when they're together to do something that's worthwhile, like the Music Modernization Act thing that you so amazingly helped organize.

Kudos, man, for sure for that, by the way. Doing it. You absolutely killed it, man. But when we put our heads together and we want to get something done, yeah, we can definitely do that. But sometimes we can be real mercurial people, man. You know, we'll watch a show for like 30 seconds

and then pick up our phones and look at Instagram and miss half of it. You know what I'm saying? Like, that's us. Your livelihood can't depend on that. So a lot of the money that I've made, over the years has gone into other pursuits and other businesses. Like I'm opening a cigar bar in Atlanta that's opening in January.

And I'm looking forward to that, actually. I'm really looking forward to that. I don't smoke that often, but I will be there. Come on, man. And I will smoke a cigar with you for that. We're going to have cigars and hookah. It's going to be awesome. Well, we were with our friend Nick Jonas last time.

He brought some quality cigars from Cuba. So that was very nice of him. Yeah. So in this next segment, I'm going to list five people, and you just tell me the first thing that comes off the top of your head. Oh, geez, I hate these. All right. I hate these.

It's like a terrible Roy Shack test. That's what this is. All right. L.A. Reed. Career starter. Pop Wanz out. Brother. Sterling Sims.

Hell of a drinker. He's the only guy I know that can drink more than I can. No, seriously, he'll drink me under a table, and I can drink, bro. Seriously. One of my first sessions, I think, was with him also. It was with the stereotypes. Oh, really? Yeah, he's close to them too.

Yeah. He's great. I know we talked about her, but Alessia Carrot. Prodigy. Lucas Keller. Oh, man, the first word that comes to my mind, this is terrible. I love you to death, Lucas, Bulldog. Yeah.

Yeah. I'm glad that I'm on his side. Yeah. I'm really glad that I'm on his side. Otherwise, he would scare the hell out of me. And I'm 6'5. Yeah. What's something that you would tell up-and-coming songwriters?

Give me a call. There's no other way to do it. Just call me. Really? Yeah, just call me. Anybody else, including Ross, they're not going to help you. No, I'm kidding. I'm kidding.

Well, you have a publishing company. You know, you are, you know, I said in the intro that, you know, you're looking out for the next generation of writers already, even though you are actually really young, regardless of what you think. But you're already looking out for them and you're already building a publishing company and you've signed...

You have a... The house in Sherman Oaks, with the studio, you have rooms where multiple people are making music. Absolutely. So why are you doing that? And be careful when you offer that, by the way. You're going to get a lot of listeners on this.

and so for all you guys, knock yourself out. Go for it. I'll give me an email address. I am a teacher, man. I really am. I'm sort of naturally a teacher. I can be long-winded and full of myself, and I think those are the two prerequisites to be a teacher. The true professor. Yeah, exactly.

But on top of that, man, like, you know, but we've both been through so much bullshit in the music industry, how awesome would it have been to have a person sort of guiding, you that had good intentions. Right before I moved to the States, my uncle told me something that I never forgot, man. He said, I want you to pay attention to one thing.

Over here being in Turkey, if you sign a shitty deal, the fault is on the person that gave you the deal. Over there, if you sign a shitty deal, it's your fault. Wow. And that scared me when he said that because it's like, not to say that there's a lack of morality in the United States,

but I can definitely say that I've witnessed a lack of morality in the music industry in the United States. So my goal was to give people a safe haven. Like, look, you're not going to get screwed. You're going to have real opportunities. Like when I first signed the orphanage guys, Trevor and Zaire, or William Zaire Simmons and downtown Trevor Brown, I told both of them, you know,

you're going to get an opportunity to be in almost every session that I'm in so that you can get, you know, the credits that you're going to need to then go off and have your own careers. And whether that means you continue to work with me after that or not, you will have had that stepping stone to get to that point. And I feel like, man, if you put good energy out, you get good energy back, right? Yeah, that should inspire some loyalty, too. I think when you give open up doors for people and... But isn't that the point? You know, yeah, sure.

Like, why sign somebody if you're not going to open up doors? Right. Unless your only intention is to bleed them dry. And I can't think of a more evil thing to do to a human. Let me just take you and your dreams and benefit off of it and then discard you when I'm done. Like that's, there's a special place in hell for those people. So my goal is to create like a center for gifted students.

Right? Sort of like Charles Xavier's. Where? Sukasa, my studio, for them to come and learn the trade and understand what it is and get operative. And if they're good, shine, get placements, get number one records, get plaques, and then go have a career. And then turn around and say, yo, Oak is my OG. Yeah, so you're one of the five that get named when, you know, when it's their turn to get interviewed.

That's exactly right. Do your kids have any idea what you do? Yeah, yeah. They learned early because they, I was fortunate enough to. produced the end title for Moana. Which was a song that Alessia sang. Yeah, right. We just saw that.

The thing's incredible. Great movie. Great movie. It's a really good movie. And so I was able to produce the end title song that Alessia did at the end of the record. And my kids were fascinated by the fact that daddy did that song. Yeah. And he's like, well, what does it mean you did that?

My oldest one especially, he's five now. He's like, what does it mean you did that song? Can you show me? I was like, sure. And I put in the studio and did a track. And he was like, oh. And I'm like, you better not think about doing it. You go be a lawyer or a scientist or a doctor or something.

No, but for real, though, if they wanted to do it, you'd support the hell out of it. Of course I would. Yeah, of course, man. I mean, it would scare the hell out of me. But, yeah, of course. Yeah. But why, you think medicine's a more stable career these days? It's not about career stability.

but if you're a musician, you don't have a choice. If you're a failing musician, you're going to continue to be a failing musician because you love music. How many, like, guitar players that we know that are okay are still gigging for 50 bucks a gig, barely getting by because they love music. Like, music is a very harsh mistress, man.

Like, if she likes you, then, you know, we're lucky. She likes us now. I think that's that John Coltrane thing where he was married a couple times. And it's like, you know, whoever he marries is the mistress. He's, you know. Music is the wife. Yeah.

Yeah, man. Yeah, that bug is, that bug is, that bug is a motherfucker. That's funny. My mom used to say to people, you know, like, oh, he's a struggling musician. And I said, can you just call me a musician? Yeah. Exactly. Really?

Really? Like, I'm just a musician. Just because I'm broke is irrelevant. And I can tell you now, like, I'm still struggling. Yeah. In different ways. You know. I don't know, bro.

It doesn't think you're struggling to me. I'm what I'm saying? We're sitting in this beautiful location. But anyway, so where were we? No, but for real, man, first of all, thank you for doing this. Hey, man. Thank you for inviting me. I always enjoy, you know, every single episode we talk about how it's more important to have a good day than a good song.

And I know that if we have a session that we'll sit there and I'll learn something from you because you're very smart. And, you know, the Music Modernization Act, which by the time this comes out will have passed. Amazing. The president could sign it today, but he hasn't. So probably tomorrow, hopefully. Awesome. You know, he's got basically the end of his week. But I put up a GoFundMe.

I don't mean to blow up your spot, but I'm going to. I put up a GoFundMe for one day. And we raised, you know, I think, $18,000 in a day. day. But because of that, I was able to buy billboards in Portland and Salem to troll widen and bought, you know, we helped pay for different things throughout

the country for, you know, stuff in Colorado, stuff in Virginia, stuff in Boston, you know, you know, and the reason I said some cities, some states is because they were more spread out. But really started to look at what, you know, what we could do with that. But you were very generous

in your donation and I think what says is that none of us are doing, we're fighting for the Music Modernization Act so that we get paid more. We're doing it so that the next generation has a fair shake and that the music industry becomes

right. Exactly. It becomes fair. And that we change it to making it about this generation and not about the way it was. Right. And to find people who are like-minded in our generation I appreciate it because I don't feel so alone in that effort

and it was nice to see it was really nice to see you leading the way with that because it's hard we all went and we've all been you know we're putting our names on the line and it's possible that we could get some you know there could be some repercussions but none of us gave a shit and we were like no this is the right thing to do let's go

That's exactly right. And we just did it. And you're a big part of that. And so genuinely thank you for that most. Thank you, man. It was an honor and a privilege to just be a footnote in that situation. Yeah, man. I think we owe it to the people that we teach to replace us.

Yeah. We owe it to them for sure. Well, you're a good teacher. Thank you. And have a good session. My man. Thank you, man. I appreciate it.

Thanks for listening to this. episode of And The Writer Is. If you want to hear music from this songwriter I just interviewed, be sure to check out our Spotify playlist or visit our website at and the writer is.com. If you like what we're doing, please subscribe

to us. You can also like us on Facebook and Twitter. And The Writer Is is produced by Joe London, edited by Miles Bergsma, and published by Big Deal Music. A special thanks to David Silverstein from Mega House Music and Michael White. Until next

time, this is Ross Bowling.