One Song - Doja Cat's "Paint the Town Red" with Laci Mosley

Episode Date: February 29, 2024

This time on One Song, Diallo Riddle and LUXXURY discuss an instant classic: Doja Cat’s 2023 hit, Paint the Town Red. The fellas are joined on the podcast by the Scam Goddess herself, Laci Mosely. Join the trio as they break down Dojo’s journey from Mooo! to her critically acclaimed album, Scarlet.  Artist: Doja Cat Album: Scarlet Released: 2023 Genres: Pop, Hip-Hop/Rap Featured songs: Walk on By by Dionne Warwick, What The World Needs Now Is Love by Burt Bacharach, Anyone Who Had a Heart by Dionne Warwick, I'll Never Fall In Love Again by Dionne Warwick, Do You Know the Way to San Jose by Dionne Warwick, San Jose by Frankie Goes to Hollywood, Walk On By by Burt Bacharach, 2 Wicky by Hooverphonic, Mona Lisa by Slick Rick. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Luxury by man, what's up? D'all, my friend, I'm doing great today, and how about yourself? I am doing great. I'm so excited because we're going to be talking about a new song. Yes. Today on one song. On this show, we usually celebrate songs for the past. We've covered era-defining classics like Nirvana smells like Teen Spirit,

Queens Under Pressure, the Beatles come together. And that's a little by design. It's hard to write history as it happened. That's true. There's no grand perspective yet. But we like danger here at one song. We live on the hedge. We live on the edge.

It's scary. Don't mind being wrong. So we are going for it. Today, we are going to be talking about a song by one of the leading artists of right now. Number 15 global artists on Spotify. Absolutely. This song dropped last summer, and we think it could be around for many years to come. That's right.

It's a song that went to number one in 19 countries, including Brazil, Bulgaria, Lithuania, and even here in the U.S. of A. It also topped the Billboard Global 200 has the distinction of being the fastest song by female artists to amass 100 million streams. That's real. And more than that, it represents the creative zenith for an artist who was once dismissed as a novelty act. That's right. I said what I said. And this is that time on one song where we're going to do. Doja Cat.

And the song is Paint the Town Red. All right. I'm actor, writer, director, and sometimes DJ Diallo Riddell. And I'm producer, DJ, songwriter, and musicalist luxury, aka the guy who talks about interpolation on the internet. And today we have a very special guest. with us to talk about all things Doja Cat. You might know her from her roles on a Black Lady's sketch show and I Carly. You may have seen her on Sherman Showcase if you did.

Thank you. And you might also know her as the scam goddess. That is the title of her hit podcast. Lacey Mosley, welcome to the show. Hey. Why why the other one clapping? Yeah. Why are you not clapping for me?

You know. Merge your hands in a violent motion. Violence with your hands. I don't accept West. But the West, the Western civilization tells me it's the proper way. Okay, my brother. Give me some snap. I looked at you and gave you an approving nod. Because that's what we did in the motherland.

We didn't do this. We didn't do this in the motherland. Show me applause in the motherland. We was never over there. We don't know what they did. I did the research. That's my favorite awkward question when people were like, oh, where are you front? Like, where's your family, your genus?

And I'm like, yeah, I don't know. West Africa is somewhere they could dock a boat. Like, somewhere over there. I looked mine up. It was Angola. I'm not giving the government no more of my information. I gave them all my DNA. My cousin's got two strikes.

We can't do it on that. They're like, we've got a match. Okay, so Lacey, my friend, we're discussing Doja Cat today. I want to start off by asking you this. If an alien fell to the planet Earth and had no knowledge of pop culture, how would you explain to this alien Doja Cat? Because we are friends, I am here. Did I put you on the spot with that? I'm sorry.

No, you didn't. No, I'm glad you. said it because discussing musicians has got me in a lot of trouble recently. Well, so I'm here for you. We were going to stay far away from that. I'm here for you because I love you.

I'm here for you because I love you. But I guess I would describe Doja Cat as some, like, okay, welcome to our planet. I'm trying to do y'all voice. You're getting the accent. Yeah, you're going to find it. Because I got accents.

It's a 1960s alien, first of all. I'm glad you picked up on that. And it's like, like, so Dojester. cat is an internet sensation. What your children have been watching on live. She's constantly online. And she started off with like making these videos on a, on a camera that broadcasted them to the world.

And they were her eating burgers and drinking milkshakes and playing music on her computer. And then we got a beautiful. life-changing, iconic zenith. Ooh, there it is. That word's going to come up a lot in this episode. Called, bitch, I'm a cow. So she was doing that kind of stuff before moo came. Yes, before moo came out.

Before I go, moose. Yeah. And we're going to get into a little bit of moot. Yeah, and I just love that we are all kind of these drones. She's sending it out to the people and we're like, whatever you say, Doja Cat, whatever you make up in your bedroom while you're eating burgers and old shit. We are going to do it.

And then she exploded into this kind of jose. John Rabinding odd, very much child of the internet, had all of the MySpaces up to the, you know, TikToks that we have now. And to be clear, I mean, like, you know, we're going to be, you know, talking about Doja Cat as we dive into her music. But, like, she had actually been signed before Moot. Like, she had been signed to an actual label. And, you know, she was doing all this weird stuff on, like,

Eibom's world in MySpace. But, like, she was signed before, you know, she ever had sort of, like, the weird breakout. I didn't know that. That's a good scam, honey, because she had that parasycial scam where it was just like, I'm just a girlie in my regular apartment just like y'all. And I'm just over here with like probably thousands of dollars worth of equipment, but we don't know what that stuff costs. You do. You do luxury. So that's interesting. So you think, because like I've kind of grown up, my assumption of her is that she came up exactly as you put it. Like almost like in my mind, I'm kind of think there's like a through line a little bit like she and Lil Nasaxx are kind of in a similar realm of like coming from. from internet performative and really knowing the language of the internet

and being involved deeply. And like the music is almost like it could have been something else. They could have, they're sort of memeers in a way. They're meaning with music in a lot of ways. So do you think that that was a front she was putting on like,

because she does have a little bit of a, her background does seem to have a little bit of like privilege if that's what you're, it sounds like you were kind of referring to. Well, yeah. And I mean, and with Yallo's sharing that like she was already signed, what I'm saying more is,

and I do this. too. I'll tell you all my scum. But like the parasycial relationship with your fans, and I don't take it too far because if you open the door, they're walking in, okay? So it's like I open a window and be like, hey, you're all blues, tabby Brown. But like creating that kind of authentic

relationship with our fans and knowing how, like you said, luxury to communicate on the internet, like it does create this like authentic character that doesn't seem like an industry plan or doesn't seem like something that's being shoved down your throat. It's like we all got to feel like we organically found her. And we all know the people who really love music, I don't gay keep like this.

But I do feel very special if it's like, I listen to your mixtapes and now you pop it. I'm not going to hate on you when you pop it. Like, do your chart toppers. You know, I loved House of Balloons from the weekend. Right. But, you know, it's kind of still my favorite thing by it. It's my favorite thing.

It's my favorite thing of his. And then when he was like, I can't feel my face. I said, go ahead, King, do that. But I was happy. I was there for the Vegas residency. I was happy. I was there for so far gone. That's what she's saying.

Like her true fans are sticking with her through the highs, the lows, the like popular, the unpopular. That's exactly. You sound like one of the true fans that she wouldn't be trying to like shake off. Right. Because I don't feel entitled to people that,

and probably also because I work in this industry, but like I don't feel entitled to people's work or who they are or what I projected onto them. Like I think that's really unfair. I'm like, get your bag, girl. You know? If those can't want to throw some ass but target i'd be like yes if you're a true fan of the artistry you're there for the journey right

yeah you know i want to put it out there um you know just to make it very clear she was signed in 2014 okay to kimo sabi records that's dr luke's uh label yeah exactly um record songs produced by him yeah and they had a song called so high and it was featured on empire and it was supposed to be sort of a breakout you know it did something right you know it didn't do a entire that's a tough spot to put it on yeah it's like There's so much music on Empire. Like, listen. I know.

Drip, drop, drip, dripp, dribb-drib-di-drop. That was, that look, that-lubu-you-law. By the way, breaking songs on Empire, that's first season. Second season, I don't know what they could break. But first season, oh, absolutely. And I have to point out, so after she leaves that label, she was briefly signed to O.G. Mako's label. I did not know this before we started to prepare for the show. For those who don't know, O.G. Mako is, he's very sort of mid-20 teens famous for the song.

You guessed it. Let's just play a really brief snippet of that. Bitch you guessed. You was wrong. I mean, that was such a huge hit when that song came out. You saw the rash. She just jumped out of me. I was like, bitch you guess.

You was right. I mean, you was right. I was like, this is a hit song. Like, it's so simple. And I'm proud to say I'm the piano player on. Are you serious? I am. No, you know, I did under a gnome to plume.

That is not true. But I did always say that that would be like great. Braggie Rice would be the person to play at the piano. It feels like a cat. It seems like a cat doing that. Yeah. Accidentally. She was signed to OG Meko.

Believe it or not, OJ Meko could not break her big. She ended up breaking herself big. We're going to talk about Moon a second. But right now in the current moment, Doja Cat has hit a creative high point, her zenith, if you will. She dropped her album, Scarlet, last year in 2023. Luxury, I know you've been listening to Scarlet recently.

Lacey, I'm sure you've already heard it. Let's start with you, luxury. What did you think of Scarlett? I got to admit, like, she's becoming one of my favorite artists. And I think maybe this happens when you kind of lean into an artist and you start to get all the nuance. But in particular, there's something about Doja. First of all, the music, I love the music, musically speaking. Like, she's doing really cool stuff, like mixing rap and like she's, like playing with different characters and different voices.

Like, I was listening to the first song, Attention, I think. That was the first single from Scarlet. And I was like, it sounded a lot like, there's one cadence where she's like, I thought it was Ladybug Mecca from Digable Planets, you know. And then she started jumping around these different characters. She can sound like a lot of different. It's like an actress. He sounds like a lot of different people.

The music takes a lot of twists and turns genre-wise. And as a person, I was just drawn in by the charisma of this human. I was just like, I just really like her as a person, which is the core of what a pop star is what they're doing at heart. It's their persona. They're going along for the ride. And what they're doing visually and musically and kind of in the culture, is all a part of that package. But it comes down to the person.

So I'm really attracted to the person as a person. Like, I want to hang out with Doja. You find Doja Cat attractive. We got it. As a person. No, I'm like. No, that was way too eloquent. I had to step in with my silliness.

What do you think about Scarlet? I love Scarlet. It very much gives me, like, early aughts of Lady Gaga's career. I can see that. You know, like a lot of shock, a lot of camp, a lot of, like, big swings. and things that we've seen before, but kind of bend on their head a little bit. You know, Scarlet Gaw, Baudy, honey, like, you know what I mean?

So it's still sexy, but it's also just, like, you know, kind of weird and and androgynous and, like, dark, but, like, in a way that's still giving me pop. It's just giving me, like, Lady Gaga meat dress, you know. I'm so glad you said Lady Gaga, because, like, I didn't want to interrupt, but, like, just really quickly on that point, when I said Lil Nas X, to me, there's, like, a through line. There's lots of artists in here.

But, like, I think from Bowie to Gaga, to Lilanax and to Doja, there's a connection where, again, it's music is important, but it's not everything. There's the persona. There's the, like, what they look like, what they dress, how they communicate in public. Performance art. It's performance art. Thank you. It feels like performance art of which music is an important part, but not the only thing. Yeah, but the aesthetics are the things that last with us forever. Like, you think purple, you think prints. You think of that phallic guitar. You know what I mean? Like those things are also a part of the performance. And unfortunately now that we don't have as much artist development happening in music, it's like they pluck a girl out or whatever.

And they be like, get on that stage, girl, just do a two step and do whatever. You know, and it's like we're happy with that because consumerism and like our attention spans are so short that we're like, okay, yes, girl, get up in your sponge bob pajamas and give us nothing. And it's like, it's nice to see someone who's put some thought into it and put a little something that lasts with you. And it seems so genuine. And it makes it more sustainable. because we all can think of artists that I won't name,

or you can sort of like mix and match what they sing with who they are, and they don't really have that hold on pop culture. And that's all, that is what's happening behind the scenes, by the way. A lot of these songs are kind of like being traded from one artist to the next, and it almost doesn't matter. Or stolen, that's right. But with Doja, it all feels, to me at least. It feels a lot more like an authentic artist is at the core of it.

I like what you said about, like, you know, artist development and how it takes some time. She got signed in 2014. Like, think about it. She's been getting developed. She feels like she just got here, but she was signed 10 years ago. And I think that's important maybe to some of the listeners out there who are trying to break. Like, it takes some time even after you think you've made it to actually blub. But if I can get my own take on Scarlett, what I actually liked about it is, you know, like her planet her was like a pop record.

Right. There's a lot of actual rapping going on on Scarlett. Like just the fact that she's got a song called like 97, like she was like, I want to let people know that I am a rapper. You know what I mean? Like, I really feel like Scarlett at its core is a retort to anyone who didn't take her seriously as a rapper. In fact, back when Twitter was still called Twitter, uh... It still is to me. I'm glad.

I know it is to me. I'm going to call you with your mom name. She was working on Scarlett and she said, and I quote, don't ever fucking disrespect me as a rapper. After the last song drop, you will respect my pen and that's fucking that. And I got to say as somebody who writes stuff, bravo to you. I'm going to start talking to the studio. like that. After the last script

I submitted to y'all, y'all will respect me as a rapper. At the very least. Respect my pen. Clearly I need to write a rap script. Anyway, after it's released, the album was lauded by critics and widely regarded as Doja's best work and a

showcase for his skills as a rapper, that's now. But I want to rewind us back to 2018 when a lot of people first became familiar with Doja. Lacey, you touched on this earlier. It was because of this song. It is the famous, maybe infamous, moot.

Bitch, I'm a cow. Bitch, I'm a cow. Bitch, I'm a cow. I go moose. That made me so happy. Now, some of our listeners, I guarantee you. I know. Those of you watching on YouTube just got a great show.

And Lacey, great hat, by the way. We said we were talking doja, so I had to bring some energy. Oh, you had to, and I love it. I love it. Listen, I know some of our listeners don't know Doja Cat that well, and they definitely have not heard moods, and they're probably like, what the hell is happening on one song today?

But we're so happy to be talking about this because this is a song that I think had, you know, one intention when it came out, but like among, you know, younger hip-hop musicians, they were like, they were all over it. She wrote this, like, on a live stream or something. I watched that live stream when it was happening. Yeah, because I was following her,

and I really loved her in her bedroom. I told her she would wear the cutest outfits, and it was very, like, anime-girly, and also she was, like, playing music. So when this song, dropped. You were aware of it. Yes, I was there. You watched this get me. That's so dope. That is so cool. And also

like what I love about it, I'm like a secret. What I love about moo bitch I macau. Well, like, I'm a secret music lover. Like, I can see I used to do like musical theater. You better keep that secret. I'll never want to be a song. Oh no, later. I'm going to sing through, but I, come on

now. But it's like the thing that I'm kind of, it's like, you know, basketball players want to be rap. and rappers want to be basketball. Comedians want to always do music. Comedians want to do music. And it's like, we have to do it under a pseudonym. We have to like childish Gambino it.

And then if they like it, then we're like, it's me down a glove. You know what I mean? Like I want to do that too. It's like my secret like little embarrassing thing. But one thing that I really loved about moo and I think why it was so catchy is like, you know, when you get like a sample track or something sometimes,

like remember when Kanye did this to Drake on a song that he was supposed to give to him? And it was that scoop did he woo. Skippity doo. Scoopity doo. Scoop, scoop. Like, I actually know the whole thing we did a bit for a sketch show,

but the whole point is like, this is the beat. This is where the words should be. These are the syllables. Right. It's doing placeholder stuff, but that works. Yeah. And so Cal to me feels like

campy placeholder. Or it's like you would have loved the song like, got milk, bitch, got peace, got steak, hope, got cheese. It's like you're feeling the motion of it more than the words. Sometimes it's music.

Black hot peas are. great at that. Come on now. All these songs is like, boom, boom, pat. Like, what are we doing? And such a testament to, like, the power of improvisation and the power of just, like, trusting your gut and your instinct. Because that was, first idea, best idea, right? Isn't that what we're supposed to be?

I always come back to the Beatles scrambled eggs. Yeah. You know, scrambled eggs becomes yesterday. Oh my darling, how I love your legs. That was the beginning of yesterday. A lot of people didn't take Doja Cat seriously as an artist because of this song, but I think looking back, it's not fair because, like you said, it's all just the creation and, like, the syllables fall.

where they need to fall. Luxury, you had the stems for this song, and I just wanted to play just two parts that I thought were kind of wild. So this is something I never noticed until I heard it, isolated. Check this out from the stems of moo. I'm excited. I'm a cow, I'm a cow, I'm a cow, I'm a cow. I'm a cow. I'm a cow. I'm a cow. I'm a cow. Now, I never noticed how much like Soldier Boy with the long vowel sounds. Like a long vowel sounds, like a long vowel sound just to get really reductive. Woo! Moo! Yeah, exactly. It's like, doja cat up

in this. So, like, you know, that was something that jumped out to me. And then one other thing, I mean, like, I knew that there was a sample in there, but now to hear it, you know, played, um, this is Pocodots and Moonbeams by West Montgomery, the song that underlies, Mooh.

Check this out. I mean, it's so beautiful, right? This is why I love sampling. The juxtaposition of context, because in In moo, that sounds so fucking silly and like simplistic and dumb, like in the best possible way. And then it's like this like, we're at a smooth, silky New York nightclub in the

60s or something. Somebody was listening to West Montgomery. Yeah, that's classic. Jazz guitarist. And we're like, yeah, I'm put this out of it. Nothing is cool. I don't need a song about a cow. That's brilliant. I think that's also what she's really good at. Doja loves to troll and she's a child of the internet. So it's like you got trolled by listening to this song. that you didn't know had West Montgomery as a sample

that you didn't know had all these background stems and stuff. And you thought it was just like a fun little ditty bop, but it's like this was what music can be. And I also really love that because in the terms of like maybe not being taken seriously in language that you use through music and through art to speak things to people,

it's like her saying like, you think I'm goofy, but if you were actually smart, you would know how smart I am. Yeah. You got to be smart to know how silly this Exactly. And it's like, I love that shit. Like, even in fashion as an actress, like when I go on a carpet or a show or whatever, I talk to my stylist that I'm working about about what are we trying to say when I walk in this room? And that's how we make the outfit.

We start with the communication. And so it's like every little thing you see, like, if you are really an artist, it's not by accident. No. I always say that things like The Simpsons and Conan O'Brien, they're really dumb jokes for smart people. Not too much of my father, Conan. Oh, no, we love to be... No, I'm joking. I know you say something nice.

I just wanted to bring that up. Codin, please come on the show. Lacey... But I just flashed on something when you said that. I just saw this, like, TikTok the other day where someone pointed out, they were just like,

it was just like a woman in her car going like, I'm so tired of you. Like, so child... She points out how, like, childish canabino, like, when rappers say puns, they're like super clever, but like when we say it, they're like dad joke.

Exactly. It's a dad joke. The line between dad joke and like, and there's a childish Gambino line about like something, something, Acme and then it's like, you know, a cartoon character. It's really not fair. I always said like in my

20s I used to dress like a granddad. But then somewhere when I hit my 40s, dressing like a granddad, people just think you're a granddad. It's not fair. Context is everything. Yeah, because we call it coastal grandma. I'm like, oh my God, I'm giving dying Keaton, walking on a beach. Oh, that's the line between corny, the line between dad joke and profundity is all context.

Profundity, Zena. You know, come for the songs. Stay for the vocabulary. Lacey. When did Doja stop being the rapper With a song about Kowski Like in other words When did she stop trolling and really get rapping And like do you have like a favorite Doja Cat song?

It's funny because she's kind of like Disparaged her pop girl era It was like this isn't it And I feel like that's just her artistically Trying to get to the point where people are like Realize like I'm smarter than you She's screaming it at us But I think even the stuff she was trying to throw away

Like for me it was like I love streets. Street is amazing. That was pandemic. Like everybody was like, wearing a church dress and then turning their lights off and putting a red lights on and

the street is amazing. Love streets. Like, and also, I'm sorry, but I'm a say-so girlie. I love say-so. It makes me feel good. My kids like say-so. Yeah.

My kids like say-so. Let's play a little bit of streets. A lot of people might not even know that's a Dojicat song, but I guarantee if you've ever spit any time on TikTok, you do know this song. it is Streets by Doja Kelle.

Okay, see, y'all guys are, I'm like, I can't. We're a family show. Lacey, we don't do that here. We just had our make-out tape episode where we were talking about, like, what song do you make out with your better have? But I will say, one saw that definitely made the tape

with my wife and I need to know. Love your wife. Need to know. I'm going to tell her you told me. After the break, we'll start painting the town red and get into the origin story of the song at Samples Walk On By. No, but stay here. Don't walk on by.

Stay in the podcast. Please stay here. Let's Walkinize the name of the song. Just clarifying. Welcome back. Lacey, for those who haven't heard scam goddess, tell us about the podcast. Scam goddess is a comedy podcast that I used as a scam because five years ago, I wanted to do. It's a meta.

When I get scammed out of, I was just listening in my car, what did I lose? Listen, I'm going to get things from you. Don't worry about it. I get that. But no, five years ago, when I started the podcast, I had originally pitched something else. It was like a current events comedy podcast. They were like, we have too many of those.

The market is saturated. And Miles Gray, who I love so much, I would be on the day with that guy's a lot. And he would be like, you're always researching scams. Like, are you the scam goddess? And I was like, bam, that's my Trojan horse. I was like, y'all heard about true crime. Let's talk about true con. So we go through scams because they're inherently funny most of the time.

And we warn people about scams. I'm trying to help y'all keep y'all's, grandpappy and grandmama's retirement so that they don't leave you with nothing when they go on to glory. And like, because y'all not calling them enough. But like, you know, so we warn people about scams. We also talk about just like the biggest true crime

scams and historic hoodwings. Y'all has been on the show multiple times. I'm sure you have to pull up. I don't want to come on. I'm such a fan. And the fact that you have been on three times worries me. Like, what has happened? Why three?

I feel like I don't understand the criminal minds. So every time I go on there, I learn something. new. Because my mind is just like the rules say and I don't do stuff. No, but for real, like I love your show so much. And it's such a pleasure to listen to it. The episode with you in particular, I was enjoying because like I'm so used to, he's my friend in various contexts. And then we have the show together.

But when you hear someone you know, like on someone else's podcast, like you, it's like you're seeing another side to them. So I was just like hearing all these cool aspects of you that I didn't know, especially the part where you get scammed a lot. So that really helped me understand your psychology. Yeah, y'all was big bro. And also, like, we don't punch down on the show. So if you're a victim of a scam or whatever, because I always say, like, look, you can look at a scam and be like, oh, that would never happen to me. I would never do that. But baby, if you catch the right scammer, there's bait.

Maybe that wasn't your bait. But don't find the right fisherman, okay? Because they will get you. I think it's just something that's impervious, it's prevalent. And obviously, it's grown to this bubbling point in the zeitgeist because we know America is a scam. So we don't punch down on the victims. We do laugh at the scammers and it's a good time. It's like a public service too.

Like there really is a lot to be wary of. It's only every day AI, this, that, and the other thing, there's a million things to be wary of. And now there's AI phone calls. So they'll, like, because we all are so online, like, people can copy your voice and then put that in AI. They just outlaw that in theory, but how are you going to stop it? Like, it's illegal, but it's not going to be right. You know your Facebook. Don't tag your family on your Facebook because scammers look at that.

And then they call your grandpa using your voice saying you in jail and they do bail. If you, if it's a weird phone call and you're, and you're, you're, you're, you're, you're, you're you just like, if it's like, you know, possible scam. It was definitely a rare phone call because my grandfather's dead and he called me. If there's a number that says possible scam or whatever it is and you just pick up accidentally, like you're supposed to not even say anything because they can just take a little phone meme and turn that into like a full AI of you saying, give me, put all your money in this bank account, right?

Yeah, but at the same time it's the phone. So it's like you can always hang up. I say those are my two favorite tactics. Hang up or just start screaming. You'd be surprised at just like somebody at the gas station like, hey, can I get $20? And you're just like, ah! That's crazier than crazy. It's very weird and people will leave you alone.

Crazy people are afraid of crazier people. I just be like, do something a little weird and it works. But yeah, no, I mean, that's what we do on the show. And we, I hope that it's a public service. I say we because I try to skirt myself out of, like, legal liability, but it is me. But, yeah, it's a good time. Speaking of legal liability, I learned something on the episode with you. I did not come, I did not put two and two together that Sherman Showcase with the Emmy

and, like, the people associated with Sherman's Showcase, season two, might have some connection to that Emmy. So in theory, I might not also an Emmy winner since I was also a music maker for a season to the show show show show. You can say that you supplied music to the Emmy Award winning Sherwin Show? Luxury Lacey. I feel as though.

We won the award winning. Yeah, no, Lux and Lacey, this feels like a whole other thing. It's a luxury. Paint the Town Red. Makes heavy use of a sample. Talk us through that wonderful sample and how Doja and her producers make it their own. All right. Well, I'm excited to talk about this track because what's cool about it, one of the many things

that's cool about it, is the way that Doja interacts with the sample. So the sample is in the background, but the voice of Dionne Warwick on the track on her famous song Walk On By from 1964 kind of acts, there's a little bit of a call-and-response going on between. So I really love the interaction. It's like a dialogue between 1964 and present day.

Between Doja and Dion, Auntie Dion. It's exactly 60 years ago. To me, it's so weird that like a song that resonated with, like, listeners' ears in 1964, for you think about what the cars look like, how everything smelled like smoke, you know, like how if you wanted to see a movie.

That's right. You had to wait until it was back in theaters. And the use of the sample evokes all of that, right? Yes. Just a little bit of the sonic. 60 years later, it's still resonating with people. It's beautiful.

It's crazy. Those are some of my favorite moments, like, in that time era when, you know, the women's was still smoking and drinking when they was pregnant, okay? You know, the government hadn't warned us yet. Very thin cigarette holder, right? So fancy and long.

And also, like, I know we're going to get more into this, but I also feel like the lyrics in Doja's song kind of like, like the sentiment of it is still like, I don't think it's just a sample that they chose because it sounded good. It's also the message, you know, like, if you see me walking down the street and I start to cry, each time we meet, walk on by. And it's like in her song she's like, bitch, I said what I said.

Walk on by. Walk on by because this is what we're doing. Absolutely, the connection, there are connections between the songs. And whether she, like, felt it from just the sample, which my theory would be actually that that's baked in, part of the beauty of sampling is that that sentiment gets kind of baked into the sound. She just got, I'll get into the specifics in a minute, but from the loop, from that two-bar loop, all of that is still there.

Even though the song is three minutes long with many twists and turns and beautiful chord changes and such, without further ado, we're going to get into. Yeah, let's talk about how this sample was made. Let's do it. Today we are talking on one song about Doja Cat, Paint the Town Red, but we're actually talking about two songs. This is a two-song episode of one song, I think. So the second song is the sample source, Walk On By, such a prominent part of what we hear when we hear Paint the Town Red, that it deserves its own little backstory. So let's talk a little bit about Walk On By. This is a song composed by Bert Bacharach and Hal David, two songwriters who are massively important

in American music history. In the 60s, actually they meet in the 50s at the Brill Building, which is a famous building in New York with a lot of song writing teams got together and wrote some of the classic songs of the 50s and 60s. They met there, they formed a bond as Baccarac is the music composer and Hal David is the lyricist. So as a team, they would literally their job

at the Brill Building is to crank out songs every day they would just song, song, song, song, song. Their connection was incredible and they wrote a bunch of hits that we have all heard a million times. I'll just name a few. This is only scratching the surface. They wrote,

raindrops keep falling on my head from Bushcasting the Sundance Kid. Do you know the way the San Jose, what the world needs now is love, which you may know from Austin Powers, where Bert Bachrach actually makes a cameo appearance singing this song. Some other songs are always something there to remind me. You 80s kids would know the naked eyes remake of that song. What's New Pussy Cat, which is Tom Jones's famous song, which I always think of John

Malaney now because he has a joke about What's New Pussy Cat? I could go on and on. Well, you left out one of my favorites, which is you're just too good to be true. I mean, let's name a few more. Which was covered by Lauren Hill famously. You're just to be good to be true. Can't keep my eyes off of you.

That's right. They longed to be close to you, the look of love. So in 1961... Look of love is fantastic. It's so good. There's not a lot of bad songs in this catalog. No.

Oh, wow. Yeah, there you go. Yeah. So in 1961, Backwreck and David meet Dionne Warwick. She is a background singer on a track they're working on. And they, quote, unquote,

discover her, as one would say at the time. They worked together for about 20 years. 12 million records sold in their collaborations and 38 singles that make the charts. 22 are top 40s. Walk on by is one of them. But also, anyone who had a heart, I say a little prayer. I'll never fall in love again.

Do you know the way to San Jose? And Dionne Warwick herself deserves a little bit of shine. She deserves all the shine. That's Twitter on TV. And I love her niece Brittany Warwick. That's who got her on Twitter. And like that became iconic. And then SNO.

So she's, mommy's still relevant to this day. But I also love that the Whitney Houston family, all of them, so many of them were background singers and very famous background singers. Dionne Warwick is the connection to Whitney Houston, their first cousins. Yes. Which is because Dionne Warwick and Whitney Houston's mother, Sissy, were sisters. So they're first cousins right there. Wonderful.

Like, these three musicians are so much wonderful music has come out of this collaboration. Can I just say, it's just a side note, one of my favorite. Dionne Warwick songs of all time is the song You're gonna Need Me, which was famously sampled by Jay Della. Here's just a small piece of that real quick. And listen, shout out to my exes. And I'm not coming back. I mean, I can listen to that song all day.

I can too. Oh my goodness. Yeah. Beautiful stuff. So let's just take a minute. They're a dream team. They capture a sound from the 60s that doesn't always get mentioned when you hear all the Phil Specter talk and all that stuff. But to me, like, this is a part of that, like, just glossy, clean, big sound. I imagine, like, a day of Capitol Records, you know, that iconic building, and, like, you've got these instrumentalists, and you've got, you know, just this amazing voice and these amazing arrangements and lyrics.

Like, they're a dreamt. They all bring such talents to the pool, too. I mean, Bacharach, just to spend one more moment on him because he's such an important iconic composer in American history. What he's bringing into pop music is a lot of jazz, like, chord changes. Yeah. Interesting choices for like bars that kind of he'll add like half a bar or maybe add an entire bar rather than having the four bar, eight bar kind of phrasing and looping.

All these little innovations that make the music special because it kind of hesitates or pauses or does something unexpected. And he's putting it in pop music in the 60s. It's so good. And that's how you know that it has longevity. I feel like, you know, interpolation and samples get too much shade. Like Michael Jackson love to interpolate music. Like conscious.

We love that stuff. But, like, I also love the juxtaposition of the sounds in a lot of these songs, especially Dionne Warwick's where you're hearing, like, these, like, thick, bassy, like you want to move your body, kind of like streets. Like, when that beat drops, it's like, b-trops, it's like, it evokes an emotion of feeling in your body. Your body can't help itself, yeah. It's juxtaposed with, like, you know, Dion being in her higher register or, you know, whatever. So it's, like, this lightness to it, too.

So it's like, you can listen over and over again. And then I love hearing it in other music. And I think the real testament is if black people want to step up your music. If we want to sample your music, then, you know what I mean? That's just the way it is. Tupac being like, let me get that country song. Like, you know what I'm saying? That's how you know it's bussing.

Especially 60 years later when it's got something to contribute to the modern day, to the modern conversation, which is what happened in this song. So I'm going to play for a minute. We're going to look at Doja's Paint the Town's use of the sample. But first, a real quick breakdown about the actual. song itself. You can throw ass to this. It's so.

That was what I was thinking. I was like, kind of want to throw some ass to this. Yeah, you know how they took Sam Cuck and it was like, I was born by the river, river, river. I was born by the river. I was shaking that ass, spin it over. My pussy was he was making the cat. Lacey, you're giving it away.

Save this for the studio after we record the episode. I love it. I'm surprised nobody sampled that piano. I mean, I'm sure they have. Right now, I hear the internet firing up. Oh, man. But, you know, I haven't heard a prominent thing. I haven't either, yeah.

There's so many wonderful parts there. Yeah. And by the way, I love a song that can put you in a setting. It's almost like its own time machine. Like, as she's singing, I can see how she's dressed. I can see like a crowded bus in Manhattan in 1964. Like the texture on the clothes. Like, it really plants you firmly in that year.

Yeah, I feel it's so evocative. of exactly what you're describing. It's very cinematic visual. It's a visual about it. So cut to present day, and the story of how that song that we just heard, Walk On By, got incorporated into the Doja Cat song,

Paint the Town Red. I'm going to tell you that story now. It begins with Earl on the Beat, the producer. He's out of Atlanta. He's done a lot of work with quality control. Artists like Lil Yadi, a little baby, some city girls work.

And he basically ran into or met Doja Cat at, I think, a Grammy party, and shot his shot basically, sent her a beat the next day that he'd been working on. So he had just discovered, or he had recently discovered a couple years ago, the Dionne Warwick catalog, and he'd heard it, actually, perfect connection, because he had heard the Usher sample. Which Sample's the song, you're going to want me back. We actually know that song. That's a throwback featuring Jada because it goes like this.

Yeah, I mean, that song just gives you chills. I need the beat drop. How dare you? I know. What a D. You know, we have a thing where we can only play a couple of seconds of every song before we get sued. But this story just perfect. Shout out to Ask Cap.

It's perfectly just, that story just perfectly illustrates, though, like the beauty of sampling and its reuse and the discovery aspect. Because literally Earl on the beat discovered Dionne Warwick because of that song. Yeah. Right? Which meant that that song is Dion Warwick's, you're going to need me. He heard it on the Usher track and decided, and his quote is, that's a good-ass voice. Who is there?

And he went through her discography and just found things to chop. And one of them was Walk On By. And when he met Doja Cat at this Grammy Party, he's like, that's what he sent her the next day. She hopped on the beat. And this is the story of, this is the story of Paint the Town Red comes right from that discovery. Are you ready? You don't have to get ready. And actually, it should be noted, by the way.

We've just talked about Bert Backrack, Hal David, the writers of Walk on By, Ndio, and Warwick, who was a singer. Kind of funny story about how she learned of the Doja Cat use because she is not. technically cut in financially. Oh, man. Unfortunately, to the walk on. Come on. She's not a songwriter on the track, so she only learned about it when her granddaughter told her that the song existed.

She's like, Grandma, I think I heard your voice. Oh, that's hilarious. Yeah. So then that's when she jumped on Twitter? That's what she jumped on Twitter. I love that video. Went on the Kelly Clarkson show and said, you know, I love it. I just love Daugat bringing my song to a new generation.

You know, but the flip side of it is like not having been tried in, like, she just didn't know it existed until someone told her, which is one of the stories that happened in samples that I'm not crazy about, unfortunately, when, like, the performer didn't, I don't know that Dionne Warwick's making a lot of money from this, is my point. Maybe from a few more streams on Spotify, but for the most part, it's the back rack and David Estates that are earning the coin, because they're both dead. That's a sad note to end things, but everyone just got really silent. Yeah, I was like super, I was just like super enthralled. I think Dion's doing okay, but you know what? She's dry. Bird and Hal, relatives. Cut her in. Right.

Listen, that's the weirdest thing. I mean, like, you saw that with, like, when Renaissance first came out and Kalees was speaking about how, like, when milk shake was interpolated and she wasn't making any money off of it. Right, but then it's also, like, Beyonce just, like, snatched it off.

I was like, here, I'll take it off. She's like, ah, it's not that big a deal. Yeah. But at the same time, I, I, it's interesting because sometimes you have to think of singers as actors where it's like, I don't get points on the back end on movies that I'm in, Like, I didn't write those scripts.

I do a lot of improv and a lot of them. Like, I've been flown out to shoot. I won't say which movies, but just, like, no script. And ended up with lines very much. It's the way it is. But it's the way it is kind of a little bit. Every movie's done a little differently. Every song's crafted a little bit differently.

Absolutely. The number of times on this show, though, that will we go down these deep dives and you really end up touching the edges of, like, okay, we're talking about politics and power and economics. Like, we're trying to be a music show and we're trying to be funny. But, like, it's hard. all these stories kind of end up scraping along the edges of like, okay, there's some bigger

power structure and power dynamics and racial and power, like all of these things come into these stories in ways that are really tricky. The two white guys, their estates make a lot of money and Dionne Warwick, you know, she's on Kelly Clarkson and I don't know how much coin she's actually making from it. Not from this one. That is unfortunate. Again, with the silence and I apologize.

No, no, not at all. It's not even awkward. It's just like, also music is the Wild Wild West. I thank God that we have unions, but like I don't know what they'd be doing over here. They don't have no kind of protection. Absolutely. The songwriters, I mean, like, yeah, it's absolutely. It is the Wild Wild West.

All right, so I'm going to walk you through just a little bit of how the sample was used. It's really interesting because in the first place, I'm going to play for you, Walk on by, the portion of Walk on by, which is sampled. And actually the loop that was used and how it was integrated in Doja Cats, paint the town is really interesting. So just a really quick walk through. Each time we meet, walk on by. What's interesting, though, is that the actual loop is a little bit.

like kind of awkward, like the brackets of the beginning and end of the loop. I'll play it for you. It's kind of in the middle of all of that. So it starts in the middle of one piece and ends in the middle. Here is the actual loop. And here's the... It's like the earlier by. Yeah.

It's noticeable. It's noticeable. And there's also a little thing that they add. And I'm going to play... I'm going to now move from... That was the original Walk On By. Now I'll move to the use of it in the song. So here's the instrumental, the Doja Cat instrumental.

And you can hear that loop. is a little different already. And then the second time around, here's where things get really... Yeah, they double it up a little bit almost to make it fit. Here's where things get really interesting. In this second version,

there's also like a slight variation on that loop. That was the intro that you heard. The second time around and through most of the song, it has a few parts that were added to it. They're very subtle, but I'll play it for you now. You hear it like in the background? Yeah. Sort of back-up trumpets.

So I went through the entire original sample multiple times. That's not in the original. That was baked in by the producer by Earl on the beat to make it sound like it was in the original sample. Really subtle production tricks to kind of EQ it to make it sound like an AM radio. But he was adding, he's adding two parts there. He's adding two little melodic, wah, wah, and there's like a keyboard there. There's really, really cool subtle things. I love it.

This is sampling as an art form, is what I'm saying. This happens a few times throughout the track. I'll play you one more version of that. because yes, there is a loop, but these subtle variations, these subtle enhancements make its running through the whole song what makes the song sort of sing and vibrate and have motion to it, have some emotion to it. Emotion and motion. So that's sort of bridge section. He's added another kind of layer of synths and melodies that are, again, very subtle, but they add a little lift.

Melody that goes up, the scale. Yes, I can hear it. Oh, that's beautiful. Now, again, that is not from the original sample, but it really feels like it is. It feels like he's trying to give it, like, a coating. He's like, this is an old song, y'all. You know how, like, you take a, when you're in grade school,

and they'd be like, make an old-timey project and you put your little paper in the oven and be like, listen, this is going to be old. If I put tea bags all over, it's going to look hell old. You want to make it look like parchment. Yes, you want to make it look like parchment. So I feel like that's him being like, y'all, it's real. It gives it some film grain, right?

Some kind of quality of eight millimeter. Kind of like a black and white like that filter with the like the grainy screen. What was that thing for Instagram? It was called like, oh, God. Oh. You remember that app and it made everything look like sepia tone? Yes, like hella old. I know exactly what you're talking about.

It's like flip a gram. I don't know. Yeah, something like that. But like, yeah, it's that. And you can even still use those filters, like the Fuji filter where it makes it look like it's taken from a Polaroid. It's like. that olden time, he put that on the song. So in addition to the sample and the loop

and all those little variations, Earl, Earl on the beat, added a bass and kick that are the same thing. In other words, this is an 808 kick drum that gives it the base content. Anyone who's ever used in 808 knows that there are... One of the best instruments of all times. You can tune the kick drum

and it can be simultaneously fulfilling the goal of what your kick does, boom, boom, but also giving it like a bass note. So that's what we're hearing. It's one thing doing two things. And then he added some snaps as well. That's it. That's all I need.

You could use that combination to create like 95% of your pop hip hop songs. Truly. Like all I heard yeah by Usher. I heard freakleek. Oh, yeah. Well, Freakleek was supposed to be. I know. That was the big news that came out around the time of the Super Bowl.

That was really interesting. That Freakalik by Peti Pablo was actually the original beat for Yeah. And when he took that beat, they somehow made the beat even better for Usher, which is insane. I think it worked out perfectly because someone put, yeah, over Freakalik. And I was like, it's still but. Well, they performed at the Super Bowl. Yeah. When Ludacris first comes out, it's Freakalink.

And that's what a couple of people pointed out. So when you put all that together with the sample, it sounds like this. Actually, let me just back up because I was playing with some new stemming technology. so I was able to separate in the sample the instrument from the vocal. So let's hear that. We're all playing with some new stimming technology. Yeah, me too. We're all doing that.

It's not just there's just Dion isolated. There's the full sample. There's the 808. And here we go with the snaps and hi-hats. So that is the musical track. We've got 1964 in there. We've got 808s from like the history of hip-hop. there, right? Because when you use an 808, you kind of invoke 40, 50 years of 808-based hip-hop.

Yeah. And last but not least, we've got Doja. So let's talk about Doja's vocal on top. Let's talk about those Doja vocals. You know, again, one thing I really liked about the album, Scarlet in general, is it's like, I am putting to rest to anybody's, you know, critique that, oh, she's a pop singer, she's not a rapper. You know, I think that this song, you know, she's got good rhymes in here. I love, I believe it's the second verse in this song, like a lot. Maybe we can hear a little bit of those vocals.

Ugh, ain't no sign I can't smoke hair, ugh, give me the chance, and I'll go there, bitch. I said what I said. I mean, I love that. The ux are such a hook, such a hook. Like, it's just like it brings them out of your body, bitch, I look better with no hair, ugh. And like, I love the leg.

They say, I can't smoke here, ugh, And that's a reference to the Met Gala Where she was vaping And they were like There's nobody's not going to smoke here Ugh, you mad? I love it Everything she says in that little section

Is a lot of it is referencing The controversies The things that we've caught on social media Yeah You're going to catch me sleeping at courtside What about it? And then also with you know Walk on by

It's like walk on by Y'all talking about my bald hair Walk on by girl I don't know here You know one thing I really like about this song. I like how she's duetting with the sample. You know, and you mentioned it earlier. I mean, I love it when she's duetting with Dionne Warwick.

There's the Nicki Minaj song, Everybody, which samples junior seniors, move your feet, which is one of my favorites. I love it when hip-hop. There's the whole songs where Ghostface doesn't even take the lyrics out. It literally sounds like he's rapping while the singer's singing. And it reminds me of this old Fat Joe song that I used to love. There was a great Tony, Tony, Tony song called That's All I Ask of You. Here's just a snippet of it.

That's all I ask of you. Great track. And then Fat Joe came along and he duets with it like this. Microphone check one two, one two. Shouts to the east and the West Coast crew, whatever you do. That's so satisfied. I love that. I love it when people do stuff like that.

And it's evocative. So the first thing that pop up in my head is like the origin of that. like in recorded music being used as a dialogue is Jamaica. You know, I'm going to bring it up almost every episode. But like one of the first instances recorded, because the history of Jamaican, it's done live in the 50s and 60s with the sound systems. And it's not really recorded until the early 70s.

So Uroy, one of the first like rappers basically where it's a recorded backing track and someone talking over the song. One of the first examples of using the recording and something on top of it that's responding to it, which is itself its own recording, which is itself a new song. I love that.

Thank you for taking us to Jamaica on a journey to Jamaica. And I appreciate you guys for taking us on this journey of this song. This song itself, Walk on By has been on a journey. Shout out to the Isaac Hayes version, which is truly amazing and transcendent. In the introduction,

we speculated that Pay the Town Red is going to go down as a classic. It could. Do you think this song will stand the test of time? I do. I think that there's so much, musical technicality in it. It's so fun. And also

when you're sampling a song that has stood the test of time, like from the 60s, like, you know what I mean? It's still bustling. I mean, it's already stood the test of time. You know what I mean? So it's just standing on business. The song is standing on business. And, you know, I'm going to be standing and sometimes bent over twerking to it. You know, what can I say? I said what I said.

You know, speaking of that line, I said, that seems to go directly towards her fan base. And, you know, we're here to give Doger flowers. She deserves them. But I do want to talk about this thing, her relationship with her fans. What do you think, and I'm going to throw this to you, Lacey, what do you think, what do you make of the way, I should say,

about how she kind of comes at her own fan base, like, when they're like, we're going to call ourselves a kittens, and she's like, I didn't come up with the kittens, y'all came up with that. You don't shut your asses. Tod, y'all. I mean, I think that she has entered the realm, which I really try to dance

around. It's a very thin line of, like, when you are an artist and you do have a fan base and you engage with them in a paris social way, you are allowing them to project their fantasies, their image of you, their wants their needs onto you. And as an artist, that can be, it's a double-edged sword. Like, yeah, they'll follow you into hell. But at the same time, like, they feel entitled to you, your photos, your memories,

your relationships, how you purport, how you dress, how you act, because you have made them feel like they are a part of your real life. Now, you did that because you wanted to gain their loyalty and their coins, but then you have to take the negative side of that, too, which is that they have to. have an entitlement over you and everything that you do. And I think that she got very frustrated because she'd be online, online. Online. Online.

Okay? I'm like, when do you sleep? I mean, you forget this is a woman in her mid-20s, like to this day. She might be like 28 or something like that. Like she, you know, like, I always say like if luxury and I should ever happen to have like a huge online file, like we'll just be like, thank you so much. You know what I mean?

But like she's the age of those people who are on. And she's a woman and she's a woman of color. Like there's so much going on. And also as someone who entered a job. that had a very online fan base. It can become very real. Like, when I was working on I Carly, like, I had to move the first time.

And I'm not even joking. Like, my address was on the internet. I was docs. My phone number was out. People would call me breathing at 5 a.m. Wait, wait, wait. Why were they coming up you for being on I Carly? Because I was black and they didn't want me there.

I was just a black person who got a job. But, like, their fan base is so strong and, like, so, like, if you go to my tag photos on any of my profiles, you're just going to see mostly I Carly stuff to this. day. And like I love the fans who are not weird. I love y'all. But, but like when it starts to threaten your physical safety and like, here's the LAPD like celebrity hotline, which I was like, oh, they got a, so this one I'm going to kill me because I'm black, if I call them. Like, but it becomes a serious. Like you have to like kind of limit your interactions of you going to the comments. Exactly. You got to prepare yourself mentally like, okay, I'm ready to see whatever's

there. But if you come up like Doja, I feel like before you're famous, you were already on the internet so heavily in a way that we weren't. I'm a little bit older than her. So I had a little bit more precaution. And even then, I'm not victim blaming. It still happened to me. But, like, I know that I joke about parosocial relationships on scam goddess all the time.

Like, I start the podcast with like, what am I excited? And I know people are saying it back, you know, in their homes or whatever. But I joke about it being a scam because I'm like, not too much. So I feel like she went too far into it and then realized, like, she didn't want it to affect her art because there are some artists. I will not name them because some of them have crazy fan bases. but who have allowed their fans to influence them so much that it's now taking a toll on their art.

So Dojo wants to do what she wants to do and she doesn't want her fans being like, we want this. She's like, you don't, you get what I give you. Yeah, that's actually what I meant. It's sort of like she's of the age where she understands this online back and forth more than someone like me who like made it out of my teens without ever seeing, you know, YouTube, you know,

without ever seeing. It's just a different relationship. You were touching grass, diallo, wow. I said you were touching grass, diallo, wow. What it feel like with the do-on-it and whatnot? I feel like she's playing a dangerous game, and sometimes it feels like she's mastering it, and sometimes I worry for her, again,

with that sort of older brother kind of, like I recognize what she's doing is very fraught. On the screen for that video, for that first single, attention, it says in bright, big, giant letters, love me, right? It's sort of like a theme of what she's going through right now. She recognizes the push-pull. She wants the fame.

She wants the attention. She recognizes as a, like, thoughtful, vulnerable human that she wants, it's love that she is after. But the price of that kind of love, of parisocial relationship love that is, not just, like, human, like, vulnerable, actual flesh and blood relationship love is its own different thing. You are playing with fire. It is a dangerous game. And the edge lordiness of it all, like, when we're starting to teeter into the race of T-shirts and the trolling. That I'm like, I get that you're trying to count, be counterculture and you're very young. causeable deniability about the Nazi stuff

and they're like... Yeah, and I just wish that people understood how much words mean things and how much words become physical and violence and real impacts. She's like on 4chan and 8chan stuff. Like all that stuff is really dangerous. Okay, so we should talk about that because there have been some controversies.

You know, Doja has at times, you know, seemingly flirted with the alt-right. You know, there was the chat room video that I think a lot of people have seen. If you haven't seen it, she was in a chat room. She did the song, didn't do nothing, which, you know, she's like, I didn't know that.

that was a thing, you know, in, you know, right-wing channels that sort of minimizes, you know, police brutality that the black communities face. You know, it's also interesting to me because her father was in Serafina. Her father is the South African actor and dancer. I'm going to try not to butcher it. Dumisani Jalamini. He is Zulu. She's never met him. You know, He was on tour in the mid-90s and met her mom, who was a fashion designer in New York. Long story short is that, you know, she is both, you know, mixed and, you know, people,

I guess what I'm trying to say is, you know, is it her responsibility to be, you know, Doja, this black woman or mixed woman or however you want to classify her? Like, and do the politics of an artist, you know, matter? I know that for my purposes, says when I saw some of that early stuff, I was like, oh, this is not for me. You know, like, I'm not trying to go there.

I have a, you know, I was the biggest Kanye fan for about 14 years of my life. And you only get so many 14 year periods in a life. But now I don't really listen to Kanye anymore. I throw the question to you, Lacey. It's a bigger question, but do the politics of an artist matter? I think that it's a two-folded question. one like yes you are entitled to identify however you want and like as a biracial woman dojika can align herself with whatever you know race or identity that she sees fit like I'm not

her mama like you know what I mean like live your life however you know too much is given much is required and if you are given a platform that large you know you have to be responsible with it you can choose not to be but then you are making a very detrimental impact on the world like I always like to bring up that SpongeBob episode where SpongeBob started doing stand-up comedy and he was telling these squirrel jokes about Sandy. And then, like, you know, Sandy was like, I really don't like these squirrel jokes.

Like, this is terrible. Like, please stop. And he was like, they're just jokes. They just jokes. So he gets up. He tries to do a set. He doesn't do the squirrel jokes. And they're like, we want to hear the squirrel jokes.

And he's bombing. So he starts telling the squirrel jokes. And then the next day, Sandy goes to the supermarket. And people are like, oh, get away from that squirrel, baby girl. You don't want to catch her stupid. And it's like, Yeah, art is words, and people like to say words don't mean things, but words mean things.

They influence people, and then they create real life consequences. So I just think if you want to be a good global citizen, then you'll be careful. And there's two ways to do that. You could either be a champion for people who are oppressed and don't have voices, or you can be quiet. That is a choice. You know what I mean? Like, people would be like, why did this celebrity not speak up about this?

And I'm like, look, we don't know what they read. Maybe this is good that they're not talking. You know what I mean? So you've got two choices. You can do right and educate yourself or you can be quiet. And I'm supportive of both of those choices. Now, the other one. But pick one.

Yeah, but pick one of those, the good ones. You know what I mean? For the record, I do think the Doja Cat does see herself as a black woman. And I do hope she does because... I feel like she teeters because right now she back over on the... But she's also trolling. Like, we had to remember she's young. She's doing the, like, emo.

All I was going to say was, you know, like, she sees herself as a black woman. I would hope so because a lot of N-words. A lot of N-words on these records. So if you're going to use the N-word, I did. with us. Listen, she was like, technically I can because look at my Twitter and me, okay? Nika, niki, nike.

But, I don't know. Oh, God, sorry, I don't know. But, yeah, yeah, we would hope so. Listen, we're coming to the end of the show, Lacey. Doja has been through a lot of stages in her career and has tried a lot of things. What would you like to see her do next? Honestly, whatever the hell she wants,

and that's what I love about Doja is, like, she doesn't seem, like, to me, at least an artist who's been tampered by like what people want to see and I feel like that is the death of creativity and in the capitalist machine like I get sucked into it a lot to where I'm like I'm working constantly and I'm like, why am I not

engaged with this? And it's because sometimes art just comes to you. Like I've written a whole TV show based on me leaving boxing class and was like, you know what I mean? So it's like you have to have natural stimulation in real life. It can't just be a machine. So I hope that Doja keeps being weird and doing whatever she wants to do because like all the iterations of Doja I've absolutely loved.

I'm on board with that. Well put, no, perfectly put. I got nothing to contribute. That hasn't already been said more articulate than I could say it. Lacey, thank you so much for coming here today. Where can the one song listeners follow you and find more of your work? Yes, y'all. You can follow me at D-I-V-A-L-C-C-I-D-L-A-D-L-A-C-L-A-C-D on all platforms. And if you want to listen to Scams and my scam comedy, Scam Goddess Pod on everywhere you get your podcast, honey.

I love that. And by the way- Oh, my book, Scam Goddess, you can pre-order right now. Oh, right on. When does that come out? That comes out September of this year. Congratulations. That's a big deal. I understand.

Thank you. Lacey, thank you for taking the time out of your busy schedule to come and talk some music with us. I loved it. That was fantastic. show is fun, so fun and funny. So fun and funny. My two favorite funds. You guys are so brilliant. You know so much about music and it wasn't until I like sat down with you

that I was like, oh, wow, like I'm so fascinated by all of this and I was also surprised that I knew anything. You absolutely, we all wrote together. I'll be listening to once in a long. Thank you. Thank you. We listen to your podcast. We're podcast friends. Okay, we're going to get to one more song

in just a second, but first I wanted to point out that Doja's Pate the Town Red was not the first hip-hop song to throw 808 underneath Dionne Warwick's vocals, my man. Right. Well, actually, I don't think this is Dionne Warwick's vocals, but it's her line as interpolated, or should I say interpolation? Oh, beautiful.

There we go. This is Slick Rick and Mona Lisa 1988. Love that track. Huh? Hey, question. Who plays the trumpet? Who plays the trumpet? The trumpet is so big. Yeah, the trumpet is such a big part of the Who played that trumpet?

Well, there's two trumpets credited on Walk On By, and the names of the trumpet players are Erwin Markowitz, who goes by Marky Markowitz, by the original Marky Markowitz. Not sure how many nipples he has, by the way. He didn't go by Erwee Er. He could have, but he chose Marky Marks. He chose Marky Mark. He was the original Marky Mark and Ernie Royale. Irwin and Ernie played the horns.

Burton Ernie, on the horns. Ernie, I don't know what I call him Royale. It's probably just Ernie Royal. That is crazy. Marky Mark and Ernie Royal on trumpets there. Such a great classic soulful song from Irwin and Ernie. All right, it's time for the one more song segment of one song. This is the part of the show where we share a new song with you, the One Song Nation, and with each other.

Luxury, what's your one more song? So Dionne Warwick in 1964, she wrote this song called Walk On By. It's been sampled by Doja Cat and Paint the Town, but it was also covered and a very famous cover by Isaac Hayes, A few years later, 1969, it's actually a 12-minute long extended cover. It's extraordinarily transformed. It's really just the lyrics that are the same. It's not your typical cover

where it keeps melodies and chords and everything. So I'm going to play a little bit of that for you. Isaac Hay's version of the DeYoung Warwick Original, as you can hear, completely transformed. Such a great version. Very popular sample source as well. There's actually 122, at least, at least 122 songs that have sampled this,

among which are the following that you may have heard, including this one by the notorious BIG, 1994. The fuck is this, page of me, your 546 in the morning, crack a dawning,

now I'm yawning. It's just sped up, yeah, right? It's just like, it's got a little more boom and a little boom and a little more Bip is what I'm hearing as well. Some booms, some Bip. We also got Tupacukukuk with Dramasidal.

This is me against the world. And then this is actually the first. place I ever heard it because I was a big like I guess trip hop fan there was this kind of one hit wonderish band called Hoover Phonic and they used it in this track Twikki from 1996 so a lot of people love that sample and it's interesting to hear how like the minimal transformations that were done to it actually just that beat is so sick and that like one chord that just hangs in time people just love to use that and reuse that absolutely what about you D'all what's your one more song this week thanks man for my one more song this week I'm choosing Robert

Glasper's Black Radio. It features Yazine Bay, aka Most Deaf, and it's just a really cool jazz hip-hop fusion of wonderfulness. It just doesn't get any cooler than that. I feel like you listen to a song like that, and you feel like you're hearing an MC, you're hearing

amazing instrumentation, the jazz influences there. And also the bass was really grabbing me. I was really noticing how filtered it is. So it's like just the sub-lowest of the low of the bass. I was really feeling that in my body, you know. No high-end at all, just completely EQ'd at the top. I love that.

Yeah, totally. And I think just think that Robert Glasper, you know, he gets it. Like he's really making exciting music in the jazz space. Living Legend, genius, alive among us. As always, if you have an idea for one more song, you can find us on Twitter, or X, if you really want to call it that, Really, find us on Instagram and TikTok. On Instagram, I'm at Diallo, D-I-A-L-O.

On TikTok, I'm at Diallo-Riddle. Luxury. I am luxury on L-U-X-X-Y, I should say. Those are two X's. That's right. L-U-X-X-Y on Instagram. I'm also on Spotify. I always forget to point this out.

On Spotify, we have a playlist of all the episodes of one song with every song we mentioned, including their samples and interpolations and all that there. And just the wonderful songs that reminded us of the song. That's right. We put everything on these episodes. So go to Spotify, search on Luxury, L-U-X-X-U-R-Y. You'll see it right there. It's one of my playlists.

Or search on one song interpolation. Anyway, that's how you can find me on the internet. Luxury help me in this thing. Well, I've been producer, DJ, musicologist, and songwriter luxury. And I'm actor, writer, director, and sometimes DJ, D'All a Riddell. This is one song, and we will see you next time.