The Questlove Show - QLS Classic: George Johnson

Episode Date: September 25, 2023

George Johnson, guitarist from The Brothers Johnson, talks all things funk, family and his friendship with Sly. Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.comSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

A win is a win. A win is a win. I don't care what I'm saying. Yep, that's me. Clifford Taylor the 4th. You might have seen the skits, my basketball and college football journey, or my career in sports media.

Well, now I'm bringing all of that excitement to my brand new podcast, The Clifers Show. This is a place for raw, unfills of conversations with athletes, creators, and voices that not only deserve to be heard, but celebrated. So let's get to it. Listen to The Clivert Show on the I-Hard Radio app,

Apple Podcast, or wherever you get your podcast. And for more behind the scenes, follow at Clifford and at TikTok Podcast Network on TikTok. This week on the Sports Slice podcast, it's all about the NFL draft. And we've got a special guest. The director of the NFL's East West Shrine Bowl, Eric Galco, joins the Sports Slice podcast to break down what really matters when evaluating draft prospects. From hidden traits teams look for to the biggest mistakes franchises make to the players flying under the radar. This is the insight you won't hear anywhere else. If you want to understand the draft like an insider, you don't want to miss this episode.

Listen to the Sports Slice Podcast on the Iheart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. And for more, follow Timbo Slica Life 12 and TikTok Podcast Network on TikTok. When a group of women discover they've all dated the same prolific con artist, they take matters into their own hands. I vowed. I will be his last target. He is not going to get away with this. He's going to get what he deserves. We always say that trust your girlfriends. Listen to the girlfriends.

Trust me, babe, on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Quest Love Supreme is a production of IHeart Radio. This classic episode was produced by the team at Pandora. Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to QLS Classic. George Lightning Licks Johnson, formerly a legendary Brothers Johnson, funk unit. We talked to him about his days with Billy Preston, pairing up with Quincy Jones, eyewitnessing Slystone make the legendary album There's a Ride Going On. And also his brother in the late Greek Louis Thunderthum Johnson.

From October 24th, 2018, this is the George Johnson episode of Questlove Supreme. Supriva, Supriamma Roll Call. Supriva, Submina, Supriamma, Supriva. Role Call, Suprema, Subima, Subra, Subt, Supraima, Roll Call. Suprema, So, Suprema, Roll Call. This is the show. Yeah. My name's Quest Love.

Yeah. I wanna welcome you. Yeah. To the club. Roll Call. Suprema, Su, Supremia roll call. Suprema Role Call. My name is Fonte.

Yeah. Check out my flow. Yeah. One of my favorite gems? Yeah. Tokyo. Roll call. Suprema,

Subrema, Subra, Roe Call. Suprema, Subrema, Subrema, Role Call. My name is Sugar. Yeah. I get my kicks.

Yeah. From Thunder Thumbs. Yeah. And lightning licks. Oh, God. Supremia, Sub prima, Sub prima roll call. Supremma,

Sub prima roll call. Boss Bill is riding. Yeah. and a new Mercedes. Yeah. Down the highway. Yeah. To the land of ladies.

Roll call. Supremia, sub, sub, sub, suprema roll call. Supremia, sub, sub, sub, sub, subprima, roll call. It's Laeam. Yeah. You know the deal. Yeah. And I want to know, George.

Yeah. Is what you feel really real? Roll call. Suprema, sub, sub, subprima, roll call. Supremea, Suprima, Supriamma, Roe call. My name is Troy. Yeah. Pops is the man.

Yeah. Are y'all ready? Yeah. For a little bit of blam. Roll a call. Suprema, Sucrema, Sucrema, Rold Call. Supremia, Sup, SUPremma Roll Call. This is G.J.

Yeah. I'd like to say. Yeah. Get the funk got my face. Yeah. I'll do it my way. Roll call. A Suprema, SUrima, Sna, Sna, Supremma, Rold Ceprema.

Suprema Subima Roca Supremea Roca Supremma Subra Subra Role Call

Suprema Subra Superma Roll Call Way better That was it Yeah Ladies and gentlemen Many people have asked

But I got to be honest with you We've had our first Roll Call train wreck And I'm now To never ever do A Roll Call twice with a guest but we actually, that was our second take. Maybe at the fate of this episode,

we can play the original train break. This is hilarious because once again, Fonte has drank Steve's milkshake. Milk shake. Wow, man, that's crazy. This is our first father-son edition of Questlove Supreme. This is kind of amazing. We are live at the illustrious Capitol Records Building.

the house that Nat built and the Beatles and the Beach Boys and Frank. Frank. What, the studio that we're in right now, what studios is the Studio A? This is Studio A and Nak and Cole is really the headliner in here. And I guess Frank Sinatra as well.

Okay. All right. So we're in a room with history. I will say that our special guest today, one of our two guests today, is probably one of the most legendary guitarist and funk soul history having contributed to projects for Billy Preston, Lining Lister Smith, Bill Withers,

Quincy Jones, Steve Arrington, that I didn't know, George Duke, David Williams. The legendary guitarist, David Williams. You got to tell me about that. He used to come over my house, I would teach him some things. Oh, it's going to be so good. Renee and Angela. Joyce Kennedy, formerly of Mother's finest, the silvers.

But of course, he's better known by his nom de plume lightning licks, who long with his brother, the late great Louis Johnson. He's one half of the legendary monster duo, the Brothers Johnson. Also, not to be outdone, his offspring is an impressive resume as well. You can name it from J-Lo to Salonge to Lil Smith. Yeah, a bunch of stuff, work with a few people. Yes.

Troy Radio Johnson also, please welcome the legendary George Johnson and Troy Radio Johnson. All right. So, Pustco Supreme. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thanks for having us. Stuntling like my daddy edition.

Yeah. So how are you today? Oh, I'm doing good. You know, I don't. come out to many interviews. I'm actually working on a book and thinking about doing some new music with my son. So when I heard that you came through and wanted to interview, I had to, okay, I'm going to do this. Thank you so much, man. Yeah. Thank you. We're excited about this. We're excited. Okay, so I want to get right into it. Okay. Where were you born? I was born in

Los Angeles, California, 1953. I am currently 65 years old. just turned May 17th. Congratulations. Yeah, still kicking up. I basically have been enjoying the aftermath of where God took me through the whole livelihood of learning music. I started playing at five years old, Bebe King, but he wound up covering one of my songs that I wrote for Billy Preston, a song called I Wonder Why, and I had a chance to meet him. And it's funny because every artist who I met was seen around a meeting from the Beatles, James Brown, you know, through my whole trek in my career.

Really? Slide Stone, Larry Graham. You know, these were people who personally hands-on taught me for everything about funk. But I knew as far as the guitar, well, I was probably about 11. I had a choice whether if I want to play bass or if I want to play guitar, but I was already playing guitar, and I knew with playing guitar, I had six strings, and you could play chords as opposed to notes. I was actually teaching my brother Lewis.

When I play a C chord, you should play a C note. So actually, I knew I could get further in writing and watching the Beatles perform as three guitars and drums, which is the same instrumentation we had as kids. the Johnson 3 plus 1. And, you know, I just loved it, you know, the Motown thing that hit, where you do the things you do,

all the Smokey Robinson. It was the Funk Brothers who I really learned a lot because at one time I thought it was different bands. I didn't think it was one band. Oh, one consistent. Right, exactly. So, you know, these were legends. Unfortunately, they didn't get stock in the company,

but, you know, these were people who are most admired, you know, sixth, seventh grade, I'm going to school, humming hits, and, you know, I can't, I was really creative, so I got good grades, I'm sitting there writing lyrics and history and, you know, or geography, and I pulled that into, I wanted to pull all that into my world through history, I wanted to know, know a lot of things, which is a lot of things I know on the black issue that you guys would never know from Dr. Francis Cresswell Singh to Naknaim Akbar, you know, traveled the world and, you know, dove into being a Christian into Islam at a very early age and had just meet Minnesota Louis Farrakhan and Mustafa Muhammad, who's a very close friend of mine. And kind of balanced the unbalance for me. What kept the focus going and in the right direction was the music. Because the music could teach me the most.

And we had prejudices and all that stuff back in the early 60s and backing up into the 50s. So as kids, we weren't really given the right to have an opinion. It was up to the parents, you know. and they came from old school, like my family came from Mississippi, New Orleans, you know, down south. They were never taught the right things, you know, even as far as we were when we grew up. You know, nuns wouldn't teach us the truth.

We'd go in the church and see all these pictures of white folks, which there were black saints later on after found saints. Peter who supposedly hold the keys to heaven. He's in a mill, he's at the Vatican as a statue, which the Pope gets up, and you have the Quran, I mean the Bible, the Quran, and the Torah. And in front of all that is a black statue of St. Peter, which he gets up at 5 o'clock in the morning, kiss his feet.

Had we had known that, it would inspire us more as youth to feel better about ourselves as far as being, you know, sitting in the back of the classroom, which I always wanted to be first row, second row. I need glasses. I can't see the board. So in my travels, it's like I used all of that, you know,

geography. It's like I want to go everywhere I see on this map. You know, they have the big old picture, you know. And we never went out of L.A. And I wound up traveling the world probably about over. dozen times and I'd get on the plane and read okay Idaho with their famous world potatoes this you know it would really prepare myself to know and ask questions and I went over to Africa in 84 checked into the lobby and this uh African king and a prince which was the son

were there I had no idea so he looked at me and said oh my brother said when you get through could you come over and have a drink with us and I'm like Who in the hell is this? Right. So I went upstairs and came back down, and he told me he was a king, and he had 17 wives and 35 kids. Busy king. I said, how do you do that?

Very slowly. What part of L.A. were you born in? Well, actually, we went to, okay, I went to Catholic school. It was called Transfiguration. and it was right off of Vernon and we lived on Semeran so we grew up street called Semeran and Transfiguration was off of

which is King now it was on King and Fourth Avenue did eight years there learned to speak Latin I was an altar boy sound we yeah I mean I was like all over the place but I figured that it would be

great opportunity to get out of school when I wanted. Okay. So they always would leave the doors open in the front when you come in through the church. Okay, if I'm like, would go over to where the priest were or where they dressed and all that, the rectory, I had reason to be in the area because I was an altar boy. So I'd go creep through the church, go through the front door, and go down to Takedo place. and have lunch and come back through the doors

a couple times I got caught so there was a middle light in the confession so I jumped in that like the priest are doing that and all the moves down so if you step in it they figured the priest was in there so I was hearing confessions and all they they

oh no Your father helped me, my daughter's this, and she's pregnant. You knew all the business. Oh, yeah. I was like, hey, you know, say three our fathers, three hell marries, one-hour acting contrition, and you're good to go. Straight. The original, I'm not sure.

So were your parents into music at all? My mom played keyboard. She wasn't really, you know, she'd learned little music and would play. I never saw her play. If we were ever running a piano, she can just get on it and play a little bit. My dad was a hell of a whistler. He could out whistle Tuts Tillman. Oh, man.

Oh, word? Yes. We get the car, we go on trips. What about to say? Yeah, well, you know, Tuts. Did work with Quincy a lot. Right, right, right. My dad could whistle like that. Wow.

Really? Yeah, so it was, he would whistle melodies. If he couldn't sing, I know all the lyrics, he'd show and hell could whistle it. He'd whistle out a song. cutting the lawn, whatever he's cutting the hair, you know, helping us with the stuff. But we got music from both sides, you know, and we had some aunts and uncles that could play, you know, damn anything they wanted. They just go to the keyboard from gospel music to rock and roll. You know, they can just improvise.

How old were you when you got your first guitar? Well, this is a very good story because this is, okay, I was watching at some. of him and I was watching Elvis Presley. Jell House Rock came out. I probably was about five, six. And we had a couch and I was sitting on the floor between my dad's legs, just watching there about eight other grandkids running around. I'm trying to get them to move out the way.

He saw my interest in this man who was playing this box guitar and shaking his legs and all the girls who were biting their nails and crying, which is the only thing I could not interpretate why they were crying. Okay. But they were just excited. There was an emotion, you know. So he gets up during the commercial,

goes into the kitchen. You know, it's like a half gallon of milk. Pours what was left out, washes it out, cuts a hole in the middle, takes a stick, staple it to it where the pouring part was. He takes four. rubber bands and put the pins at the bottom so he made a simulated guitar by the time

this they came back on he stepped back over me and he waited to him and he just handed me the milk cart yeah simulated guitar that was like the most important thing in my life he saw me actually just focusing in on this person you know more so than any or all the other grandkids so it's like He just knew. He said, I'm going to put this in this boy's hand, and he's going to become dead. And, you know, later on, he and his brother,

because his brother, Buster, my dad's name was Joseph, they're both so creative. And two black men from Mississippi who have the original blueprints for the airplanes landing. When first the parachute would come out, they had a reverse, the reverse or whatever it is it, reverse thrust. That was their idea. What?

Yeah, they have the original blueprint. We should have our own airline. But because, yeah, they had the original blueprints of turning one engine on going this way because they only have one engine going that way. That's why when planes land it kind of makes, you know, and it helps planes land. the next time y'all was going back to New York. The Johnson family helped us out.

Exactly. Those damn Jons, thank you. Another thing a black man did. Oh, yeah, two black men. So those two black men who came up with that built our first guitar. Wow. It's how my dad's brother came over. You got a busted water heater.

I can make that because it was a welder. You know, and he got some sheet metal, Bennett, around. He got all the two. He made that. and that lasted until we moved. Man. So we had great black men in our family, wherever we would look.

Outside of music, somebody knew something about that. Also had an uncle who used to come by and check. His name was Arthur, and he played a 3.35 guitar. And he used to play backup guitar for West Montgomery. Oh, man. Okay. You know. So, and then we have an uncle who actually played saxophone,

and he come over and check on us. How are the boys doing it? We had basically the same story like the Jackson, you know. My mom was, don't buy it. Why are you buying all this? So these boys are going to be bad. Let me just do what I'm going to do. He bought us our instruments.

Oh, we should be paying bills and blood. But, you know, it worked out. I'm thankful he went that way. He had more faith than my mom. She wanted to be scholars like she was and getting master's degrees and all that kind of stuff. That wasn't, I got my master's degree through Quincy. Eight years. It takes four years to get your degree, another four to get your master's.

I did eight years with Quincy Jones. In your family, is it just as far as your siblings are concerned? No, we have an older brother Tommy who played drums. He was like Buddy Miles. He played drums and sang. His path was to, well, say, when we had our group, we had two guitars,

me and Alex Ware, who wanted to play with talking heads. Wait, Alex, he also played with you guys. That's my cousin. Oh, word? Yes. Okay, okay, okay. He was the plus one.

It was a Johnson three plus one. And, um... Funky four plus one. Exactly. So, um, you know, I was like the Quincy Jones then, back then, being the arranger since

well I knew I had to be brilliant in the school because my parents didn't want us to do anything until after we had good grades and after you do your homework, then you could chill. So I would do my homework by the time school was out. Oh, more time to play at home, yeah. Right, I used to do that too.

And leave to go to, I forgot the name of the record store in L.A. off in Normandy and pick out new singles So, you know, it could have been a four top songs standing in the shadow loves or temptations or smoky. The first thing I do is go home and I might buy five singles out of my pocket because we was doing gigs making about $200 for one set of three hours. And I was only four of us.

So, I mean, from sixth grade on, you know, I had money. I didn't have a bank. I put my money under the mattress. Anybody who need money, go under here and pick it up. Yeah, the mattress or the crown royal. Well, I'd never had a bank account, and I didn't know if I wanted to trust banks.

Okay. Till you give you my money and then what? So. When all your years of plan, did you ever take formal legislation? lessons or was it all just kind of self-talked? Yeah, once I got in the high school and my guitarist teacher got in touch with my parents and told them that they're wasting their money because I'm teaching them Motown shit.

You know, he's teaching us more than we're teaching them, you know, because I'll pick up really quick. They show me the basics of C chord and, you know, minor chord and, you know, 1,35, and then take out the third, and you got a minor, which a lot of stuff and people don't realize, and the sound and rap, and then rappers later got it mixed up, and they added the third with a note that don't match the actual chord, you know, things like that. But I would as a child pick up singles, and I was the only one out of the group who would put on the record.

The first thing I would do is write the lyrics. Oh, okay. I was telling my son Troy this probably about a couple months ago. I would write the lyrics. And then I would pick out the part I was going to play and sing. First of all, I'd pick out the hit I want. So all we played is hits. We had a catalog of about 200 songs that we could play.

And we were from jazz to R&B because we also came from Led Zeppelin, Deep Purple, Three Dog Night, Chicago, you know, a lot of those groups, we would play their music. So we was all over the place musically. That's why Quincy loved the style And where I came from I was going to turn my brother Lewis on the funk With Sly and the Family Stone He later then got me

You watch what I'm gonna do I'll see you Larry You know see what I'm gonna do later You know And it was cool And that's the only problem I would have Because sometimes he would kind of a lie, being honest.

Well, who taught you how to do it? I hadn't had nothing. I was going to taught you how to put the bass in your hand. Hey, Dad, we needed the bass. And he did learn on his own, and James Jamison and all the old times. He picked it up. He was as bad as I was, but he just wouldn't do more than that. Like Quincy said,

he's a hell of a bass player, you know. And he was that. So he didn't have the ability to play guitar, but you could play guitar. No, he could play, but he couldn't play play play guitar. He'd play guitars on some of our records. Okay. His style.

He just played as, you know, and a lot of things that I would play, George, you play bass. You could play bass because I was using his bass upside down when he'd get pissed from writing something too funky. And we go to the studio, and Larry was, I mean. He's a left-handed? He was right-handed bass? Okay.

And Quincy there, play it like George. I'm like, oh, shit, why did you say that? Because on the demo, I'd play the bass, the guitars. I used to layer about seven, eight guitars. like when you first got out, I'll be good to you. That was all guitars, bass,

and the drum machine. I still have the original. Do you still have those demos? Still have the, I'm going to give the trouble on the hair at those. Jesus. I have all of them.

Plus. So Quincy would listen to everything we had and he would pick. So he's like picking all these songs because I was more or less complete mind more so my brother and he'd have like grooves.

So we're like on two different levels but it's like I was saying earlier is I would write and that's something to think about to go with your history annals okay when you have a person who comes up young like I was and I would write lyrics to like B.B. King's Thrillers Young and then notice the difference is not a major chord the third is out as a minor okay so that's that you put that there for every song and lyric I would write whether if it was a Smokey Robinson song, you're actually going through the emotions of that writer.

You're writing the lyrics. And you're reading it, it's like, wow, and he made it to perfection. So I'm writing some finished perfection of how someone felt. And I'm writing over 200-some songs. So it's like I got bits and pieces of everybody from Chicago, Led Zeppelin, to Motown.

You know, it all became the cake with the candles lit. So it was part of your writing DNA and helped you... Yeah, I mean, a lot of people wouldn't look at it because they'd just stay in one area of one song. Right. But if you're writing all these different songs,

including Supremes, you know, all the other Motown acts, David Ruffin's songs, and even I had to find out later, they weren't writing at Smokey Robinson. Smokey Robinson, yeah. So I'm going through a lot of emotions

and, ooh, baby, baby. And it's like some of that stuff would be there and make me cry, is reading it. So that's a good exercise. I never thought that you actually internalize. Yeah. If you write the lyrics and get all the lyrics correct,

then pick out the guitar part, who's going to play this, play the bass. Now I'm getting into James James James James' head. You know what I'm saying? Then you get the drummer's head, and you're listening and giving the parts out. You know what? And you're young.

Here's something that's actually kind of sort of connected to you. this explains that Prince poster. Oh, the Star is Born poster? Yeah, well, no, no, no, the dude. Oh, yeah. For some reason, okay, so in light of Prince's passing, they found a concert poster in which Prince wrote the lyrics to Quincy's, the dude, the rep.

Okay. And for some reason, I was trying to, they gave some back history to it. And I guess, like, that entreat them. And I guess writing it out physically helped what you were explaining. Yeah. Well, you can look up in the archives because Prince was a fan of ours. The first interview he's done ever did was, you know, where did you get to music from? And he mentioned Brothers Johnson and Sly and Family Stone, which I, me and Sly wound up getting very close as far as Larry Graham, too.

After that interview, he never mentioned anything. Everything was Prince. And I went to, I went to Vegas to see him perform, and he called my room, had his guy called the room. And they did there like 2 o'clock in the morning sound check. Have George come down. I had a guest with me. I brought my guest.

I didn't tell her where we were going. We just went in. We had the whole MGM, and we were sitting on the side. Larry Graham was posting. to do a sound check. He bumped Larry off and did his sound check because he wanted to, you know, meet me and see me. He played for us for about two hours straight. It was better than the kind of, you know, it was a sign check. He played songs that wasn't his repertoire. Yeah. Yeah. And he just came over. When he was doing the residency? Yeah. Okay. He used to do that with some of his fan club

members, like in the early 2000s. He would invite them into the sound check. Right. And would just play for them and talking. Then we played Club 54. He asked me to come on stage and I played with him in Larry Graham. But I actually went, played on the wrong songs. They did a whole slide thing. I was still up in the top. When my girl was checking them out, I said, I should be down there for that.

But I guess he thought I'd come down when I heard something I like. So when he called me on stage, they got to this Elvis little groove. I mean, it was cool, but it wasn't what I'd prefer. But, you know, he walked in the club. They were playing, get the funk out of my face, strawberry letter. good to you. I told him, I said, man, they handed me this guitar that are so fucked up

and out of turn. Who did? Who did? Let's go get them. Let's go get on, Joy. And I was like, don't ask me that because my fans are going and getting people. A win is a win.

A win is a win. I don't care what you're saying. Yep, that's me. Clever Taylor the 4th. You might have seen the skits, the reactions, my journey from basketball to college football, or my career in sports media. Well, somewhere along the way,

this platform became bigger than I ever imagined. And now I'm bringing all of that excitement to my brand new podcast, The Clifford Show. This is a place for raw, unfiltered conversations with some of your favorite athletes, creators, and voices that not only deserve to be heard, but celebrated. One week, I'll take you behind the scenes

of the biggest moments in sports and entertainment, and the next we'll talk about life, mental health, purpose, and even music. The Clifford Show isn't just a podcast. It's a space. For honest conversations, stories that don't always get told, and for people who are chasing something bigger. So if you've ever supported me or you're just chasing down a dream,

this is right what you need to be. Listen to The Clifford Show on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. And for more behind the scenes, follow at Clifford and at TikTok Podcast Network on TikTok. This week on the Sports Slice podcast, it's all about the NFL draft. And we've got a special guest, The director of the NFL's East West Shrine Bowl, Eric Galco,

joins the Sports Slice podcast to break down what really matters when evaluating draft prospects. From hidden traits teams look for to the biggest mistakes franchises make to the players flying under the radar. This is the insight you won't hear anywhere else.

If you want to understand the draft like an insider, you don't want to miss this episode. Listen to the Sports Slice podcast on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. And for more, follow Timbo Slica Life 12.

and TikTok Podcast Network on TikTok. There's two golden rules that any man should live by. Rule one, never mess with a country girl. You play stupid games, you get stupid prizes. And rule two, never mess with her friends either. We always say that trust your girlfriends. I'm Anna Sinfield, and in this new season of the girlfriends, oh my God, this is the same man.

A group of women discover they've all dated the same prolific con artist. I felt like I got hit by a truck. I thought, how could this happen to me? The cops didn't seem to care. So they take matters into their own hands. I said, oh, hell no. I vowed.

I will be his last target. He's going to get what he deserves. Listen to the girlfriends. Trust me, babe. On the Iheart radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. What is the age difference between you and your brother Lewis? Two years.

Okay. We were all two years apart. It was Lewis's two years apart from me. He was two years and my older brother. So your first professional gig outside of the Johnson Brothers plus one, or the Johnson 3 plus one? Right. What gig was that?

I got tired of that. We did win a contest and all that in 1968 K. JFJ's concert. We won everything. We won box instruments like the Beatles, Vox guitars. We got a record contract with, I just did a documentary portion with Gina, Gina Ray Moomack, Bobby Womack's daughter. Oh, yeah, yeah, Gina, okay. He produced our first record as a John's 3 plus one, testify. It was sound just like, tighten up with the make it mellow part, but it's like, make it sweeter, make it sweeter.

So make it sweeter. Right. And now they break down? Exactly. So that was the first time we had, you know, met Bobby Womack. What label? Venture Records, this guy named Mickey Stevenson, I think. Are you looking at this up right now?

Yeah, of course. I'm like, are you looking at right now? How much is it going to cost? Mickey Stevens. Well, they only made a thousand records. They sold about nine. That means I'm going to be paying $20,000 for it. I don't think it's around.

I Google didn't know that stuff. But they sold. It was a single or just a complete album? It was just a single? So before that, we did our own demo. We used to go up to Rachel's Enterprise, and we would cut demos, which I met a lot of people,

actually my girl friend now, she used to work for Rachel's Enterprise. And her name is Joy Randall. She also, she works for Disney now. Is this how you started interacting with Billy Preston? Because I know that Billy was born? No, no, no. With Billy Preston, we were looking for a keyboard player.

Oh, okay. And you mentioned earlier, Renee and Angela. Renee was the same class with Lewis, my younger brother. Oh, okay. At the same age. Renee used to come over quite a bit, and I met him, and, you know, he's a hell of a keyboard player, and I thought if we had a keyboard player to the group, he would be the one because he was, you know, two years.

years young. He was bad. And he played me some of the stuff he had written. But where the keyboard was at Billy Preston's duplex he had up off of Olympic. So we took the group and we went over to Billy's house where he had an organ

and a fender roads downstairs at his mother's place. He happened to just come off the road. I think he did some work with the Beatles. He's always hanged with the Beatles or make Jagger, you know. And he came in, and I had on this flag shirt, like I took with my high school picture at Crenshaw High. By the way, they put me at the 50th anniversary of Prince of High, and they put me in the Hall of Fame, October 14th.

Tire your number, all right. Yeah, Jersey and the Ralph. So I walk in, he walks in, you see, Lemo pulls up, and his billy, gets out with this big wig looking like sly. to where I met slide through him too because he used to come over Billy Preston was one of the baddest

motherfucking keyboard players on earth period what is it about this technique because people always speak of but since you played with them

what made him so in demand with all these groups and well number one groups would call him for him to make them

yeah like the Beatles you know went over there well finishing that story I mean, I met the Beatles through Billy. I met Sly and Family Stone through Billy Preston.

You got to tell that slide story. He was connection. Yes, please tell that story. Which one? I was there. When you met Sly. Oh, I was like so goddamn nervous. All right, first of all, what year was this?

This had to be in around 70. Oh, no. Because he did, I was there. You met riot periods. Right, right. I was there when poet went down. Wow. Tell it now.

Tell it now. I was there. But I'll tell this pre-story real quick. Please. Okay. And Billy had asked me to join the group. He walked in and saw a big afro, and I was in my... I was like Jimmy Hendrix and Freddie Stone combined.

Okay. And having Motown things back. So I mean, I was playing some guitar. You would have been Norman Whitfield's best friend, probably. Yeah. Yeah, I would prefer to be Barry Gordy's. Yeah. I'll hear you on that one.

I hear you. I hear you. The original one. So when Billy asked me, it was like I was kind of getting tired of just like we ran our gambit as a John's 3 plus 1. And I kept telling my brother said, you know, it's like somebody got to leave. We got to go to go to do something else. They didn't want me to go, but they wasn't telling me not to go. So I went to audition a keyboard.

player here come Billy and he's gonna pull me out of our group I want you to play with me so that was a decision I had to make should we continue on with this new keyboard for you probably would have been bad it probably could have worked out and uh as he pulled me aside and he asked me well how long been playing he said love the way you play who are some people that you love and i was telling them sly and he just started smiling he knew them that was his best friends I like Freddie Stone, I like Jimmy Hendricks. He needed that ingredient. He did not have me before he asked me.

He did have some other great people. Tony Maiden, Bobby Watson. Tony, what? Yeah, he had Tony, Ruth is. That's right. Wow. I mean, they were before us, and I was also listening to them because we were on the same.

We had played clubs, and we'd, we'd, see Rufus and Shackle Khan, that's how I knew about them. And as far as a lot of other groups too, but they kind of stood out and we wound up having some history later in life touring together. So I decided to myself, I'm going to go out with Billy, so Billy called. He said, man, we're getting ready to do like six months old in Europe. So I said, well, I said, I'll go.

So we're having dinner, and I told him to mention to my mom, I said, well, by the way, I'm leaving in the morning. Just like that. I'm leaving in, that's how it was. I said, I'm leaving in the morning to go to Europe. I'll be going to Germany. You ain't going no damn Germany. You're asking of getting up and going to school because I was in junior high school, I mean junior college.

I mean, West L.A. Junior College. And I had set up all these musical courses and I asked my teacher, he was the only one I respected. So if you had a chance to go out with Billy Preston and go to Europe and, you know, do music. I had like harmony, theory. I had like a handful of different types of music because I wanted to do the, learn the music. And he said, well, George, let me tell you this. You only have one chance to go to Europe. you can always come back to school

so I would clean out your locker so I just went took all my shit up cleaned it up put it in my bag, went home and decided to I was going to Europe so I called my girlfriend I can hear my mom right now

boy you ain't decided no right I'm your decision making so I told her I was going to come get her and go to the airport I was leaving the regards to my low-riding Malibu I had about 65 Malibu orange with G.J. on the side

with white interior and there wasn't dropped I just cut the springs. It had a rock to it. And I left. My mom came down but she had told me, get up, it's time to go to school. All I said was, I told me,

I told you I'm going to Germany. So she didn't believe me. Okay. All right. So I leave and probably was gone for about a good month because I was known for getting up leaving because you know how to girlfriend, but at least I'd call. I didn't call because I didn't want to hear. Right.

Oh, man. So we were in London and decided to call. And this was in 71. So I said, look, I'm in London, England, and we're leaving here, we're going to Paris, and, you know, I'm fine, I'm good, I'm making some good money. It's making, like, probably about 700 per gig, which wasn't bad. That's great for 71. Yeah. And I told her I will send money.

So then she kind of chilled out. Yeah. Then I sent money. And I even had no bills, I just sent money. And she didn't say another, you know, she like knew, and I was the only son who would do anything like that, including when his bass player Grady quit, and Billy, he quit at the airport.

I used to go home and teach Lewis the show. We'd sit on the side of the beds. We had double beds. My guitar, this way, and his guitar. in his guitar that way, easy to follow. So I taught him every song we had done. So my brother Lewis literally knew Billy's show after the first tour. So after a year goes by, we had the airport.

I think there are red devils available, yellow jackets, quailudes, all that shit was out in his bass player. I thought you meant jazz groups. Yellow jacket. He's not about drugs. He mentioned him cosby pills. These are pills. I never really got into them.

I had girls. They come over and they'd bring it to the parties and a whole bag of yellow jackets. I'm like, what the hell are you going to do with this? You know, they were going to sell them, you know. I don't know. To people at the party were there to take one. And, you know, my dad would find, what was this shit?

Oh, no, no. Nobody found out the heartwear. Yeah, exactly. Start dripping. He always would take it and he flush it down in the toilet. Oh, sure. And it was funny. I'm going to tell you this story.

This is kind of my personal business. But, you know, I had sampled some lines of cocaine. I had a friend of mine who always had it. And he kind of outside of other people I knew, I'm not going to mention they were doing it. So he brought it and he had like a little mountain of cocaine out in my bedroom. My dad saw the weed. It was experimenting with weed, cocaine, but not pills. He said, I'll tell you one thing.

You better flush that down the toilet. Talking about the weed. Oh, wait. That was the biggest concern? Yeah. He didn't know what Blow was. He was in Mississippiville. He thought a little baby flower.

Making a big-ass thing of Kool-Aid right now. So, you know, he couldn't, he couldn't say anything about that because he didn't know what it was. So I'm looking at my boy who brought it and we both like, shh, I'm glad he said flushed the weed. I had just got into tooting cocaine and I didn't really know how I was supposed to feel you know and got around a few huge people that they were known for that shit Well, speaking of which, can you tell us how that poet session went?

My mom was born uncertain, that's who you mean. All right, all right, all right, so I get back home from the trip I didn't mean to go off. No, no, we welcome at. We welcome at. Please. That's what rabbit holes are great. Like Troy would say, we talk.

We like to. No, that's what this show's for. Every rabbit hole. Thank you. Just bring me back to reality. Okay, so anyway, I go back to Billy Preston. And it's so ironic. And I don't know if I should mention this, but I probably will.

Sure. I will. A friend of mine who was Billy's engineer took me over to this girl. He was dating. her name was April and her sister happened to be Kathy who was sliced down

married Kathy Silver yeah okay so he goes into the bedroom with with April and he leaves me

with Kathy so we're down since this is the first time I met her and you know I wasn't married everything was cool and thought she was so beautiful and nice and sweet.

But back then, I mean, I had so much experience with a bunch of different, gorgeous women. I had three of them living with me at one time. Three at one. They were all girlfriends, and they never left, so I had to put them to work. All right, you cleaned up the kitchen, you cook, you clean.

All I know is I'm writing good to you. Legend. All right. Ashley, are you listening to this episode? A very special, a very special. I'm going to tell the truth. Like I mentioned,

it's probably been the most truthful interview, and it's going to take you in a lot of different areas. We will. We're ready to go. You're done. Because I'm just being me, a lot of this stuff I'm putting in my book, which is going to be off the chain,

incredible. And it'll be more informative that I can dig into right now. Is that this year or next year? Well, I got it 70% done. So I left off, well, actually 60%, I left off 20% out the back, 20% off the front so nobody could do it. Okay. Okay.

It goes back when I was like a baby. That stuff I remember the first time it rained. Wow. But me hooking out with Kathy, it was like he put me with Kathy because he was with April and then they disappeared and left us in the room. So we laid by the fireplace and, you know, I had no idea that was going to be sliced on the wife. So, you know, the most furthest I went with her, we kissed a little bit. And, you know, it's like, I'm not going to lay out here and let him walk into us if we can't walk into him. Right.

Okay. Oh. So, and we were there for probably for a couple hours. And her older sister, April, wanted us to hook up because Michael and I kind of had a look alike with big afros, light skin, very cool, you know, on chill. So, you know, I never really wanted for anything as far as out of a woman than that my grandmother or mother of arts I could give. So you know, I've been used to that, so I wasn't used to a lot of the benefits of a woman. Just like when I'd have my guitar, I said, this is the only thing you can't come in between

me and my guitar or my guitar or my music. And it kind of rolled from that. That's why the woman who I picked was Troy's mom. You know, she was my soulmate, and nobody comes close to that. She passed in 2000. But, you know, she was the only one I let into my world and inspired me to continue writing.

So, anyway, afterwards, you know, Sly played the Palladium, and I took my wife to be there, and we went backstage. And I saw Kathy and Sly coming down the hall, They're getting ready to go on because I said I want to go You know, see Slice life

I didn't know him yet So I see him walking This is when He was They were doing if you want me to stay It came out Fresh, surgery Yeah

But I had met him before We'll get back to that But I saw her coming And he turned his head And he had on this big hat And his silver outfit And she like looked at me and her And she said

Don't mention it Yeah So I totally got it, I understood it. There's like a lot of sly attitude and personality. It just came into me just from watching, listening, telling stories. Because Troy will tell you, it's not to me people he trusts to this day except for me. And I can truly say that, oh, we'll sit down and, you know, Slide's man. I mean, Troy's man.

You don't send an email. It'll be encrypted, though. They got a special funk language. Emails are encrypted emails? One day, yeah. This is probably about four years ago, and we still took. He'd send me like 85 emails in a day. Sylvester Stewart?

Has a computer? No, he has a laptop, and he'd learn, and when he'd get bored, he would text people that he'd trust, not everybody. So we would, when I wasn't around him and I don't go around him a lot, he'd ever question and say, gee, I got some songs. I got some new song because he would give me songs. He'd come over my house and I was out to Dina when I was living with Patrice. That's why Patrice had come by. Oh, Patrice Western, okay.

Yeah. They all would love to meet him, but he wouldn't let a lot of people meet him, period. Why was he such a recluse? Because I know that once he – Well, that's because he's – certain people that he trusts, then he opens up and he's really. regular and that sort of thing because he's a prophet and a prophet is one who only god is spoken to you know you know then that's the true fact like abraham was a prophet those are who god speaks to

somebody who's been on a journey and who accepts themselves and who can still do what they want to do regardless and he has leadership and all of a sudden he doesn't have any leadership then he has someone he wanted to trust it to. It's like God speaking to Jesus. You know, it gets so deep. He doesn't spread himself out. If you want to know, slide, just listen to all of his songs. You caught me smiling.

You know, all that. Listen, like, Stan, because he, politically in the 60s was like the only Malcolm X that would bring truth and put it in your face. So with poet, like, when you were there for him, what was that? Well, when we, after I met him, and this is the scary part for me because I heard him before I met him, Kathy was in the house with Billy, because Billy's sisters knew her or something, and that's how that hooked up. I'm trying to look at her. This is before we hooked up, checking her out.

Then he said, Slice here. I'm like, what? I looked out the window. I knew he had a mobile home that he record with, and, um, he would he came the billy at wooden stairs so I'm hearing sly's voice like uh-huh he had this walk Sylvester's here so I'm like sitting by the on the seat of the keyboard player right where the doorware is getting ready to see this man for the first time in my life but I knew him like you know and they see him he walks in then they had this thing where they'd like

like stomp and laugh, which you know how to do. They're talking. Right, right. Exactly. And I looked at it, it was like, my mouth dropped. It was like seeing Jimmy Hendrix. Wow. I was concerned.

You know, we got a chance to talk about all that kind of stuff, because we became very close, and Billy pointed at me first. She said, this is George Johnson. This is my new guitarist. And Billy was so proud of me. Sly knew what that meant. He knew exactly what that meant. So Sly out of Billy's whole band,

I was the only one who opened up that he opened up to. And that's how I got to get into Bel Air with a poet. And well, after he visited, he went into the room with Suit Billy. And I'm like sitting in the living room, kind of shaking thinking what I wanted to ask him or if I should ask him anything at all because he had that vibe.

First of all, and he'd get out. He always wore leather. He had this way. He was sly stoned. You have his dog with him? Gun? Yeah. No, he didn't.

He told me shot gun in the head. Oh, okay. I'm sorry. No, he said, this is how that happened. Kathy was at home. He was in the studio. This is right before I started kind of following him to the studios, and he'd let me come in. And same thing like with.

Stephen Wonder and I was there when he did creeping all night oh wow Billy got a call from Kathy and she said said Sylvester you have to come home gun just bit your son yeah yeah wait gun just what bit the baby bit the baby yeah so no just like told me this story him said so what did you do and how did you do it you said man you said I went went home and I went out of outside and sat down because he had a baboon and a pit bull. What?

I didn't know about the baboon. This is Neverland Ranch, 1.0. Yeah, he had a baboon. I can't tell you what the pit did to the baboon. But he'd have him in the cage, and he'd always stick his arm out trying to get the pit. But he said, I went outside, and I looked at gun, and Slah was like this was the personality. He said, I just asked him one time. He said, gun.

Did you bite Little Sylvester? So the dog, he didn't put his head down. And he knew Sly. Sly had him trained really well. And he had his gun for a gun. As tail didn't go down. I said, don't tell me. He said, no, he didn't submit when I asked him that question.

So he took the gun and he just shot him in the head. That told me a whole lot about it. Jesus Christ. Shot the damn dog in the head because he didn't at least, you know. He didn't submit, yeah. He didn't submit to what he did. Is that what happened to Larry? Yeah.

That was Sly Sunt. These are things that I've never really told in public. This is one reason why him and I are, you know, so I can't tell you too, too much about him because. But he wouldn't be listening, though, right? I don't know. It might be somebody. A big bitch in a matrix.

Somebody could somebody say, man, you hear that great story, George Johnson told. Slah, if you're out there listening, my phone number. Right, right, right. We would love that. We would love to have you on the show. I can get him on and just show him on. Jesus. Really?

Man. Oh, that was, that was. Does he still, I had a running with him maybe five, six years ago. Does he still have this, it looks like the speed racer kind of automobile. This is his death bike. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, I heard about that. Yeah, it was like after, after. It looks like the atom.

family. Yes. Like, it was so odd, and it was like, Chappelle and I were headed to the Grammys during the year that the Slide and Family Stone reunite. Yeah, yeah, yeah, right. And, like, just at our feet, Slice stopped, and Dave and I just looked at each other,

and then he just went off, and it was like, it was one of the things like, no one's ever going to believe what just happened. Exactly. Well, I had a lot of those kind of stories. And I just kept to myself. What is that vehicle called? Well, it actually was a tricycle

because they had one wheel in the front. It was like a motorized tricycle. And it was two in the back. But it was built like if somebody tried to build a Harley and extended it and they had the two wheels in the back and they had almost like a seat for two. One of them had a seat for two and one of just a seat for one.

And I would always talk, say, man, don't you scared because I'd call it the death trap. Yeah, like he'd take it on the highway. Like he drove right onto one-on-one. freeway. He had a friend of mine who lived up north, drive it down to him. And he had about two or three of them. But he was, you know,

Sly was so into everything right and left and was in the, who was that group that had the motorcycles, the gang group? Hells Angels. Yeah, he knew them, you know. And I think that's when he started biking back then. But, you know, he'd come over to the house. He came over for two, three years straight. Troy was little.

He used to call the house before cell phones at like three in the morning and me and my sister would be sleep ready to go to school. My mom answered the phone and it was not. It wasn't too pleasant. He was scared about my mom. He was gangster. He was all hell, but he was definitely scared of my mom. I'm like, Slide, you call at the damn house at three in the morning. My kids got school in the morning.

He'd be calling about a song idea. I don't give a fuck about the song I do. It's a slide stone. I don't get a fuck about the song. Then I had my tell him to anything ideas. To anything, ideas he had, just when the answer phone would come on to just put it that way.

Put it on the answer machine. Yeah, and leave it. And I'll listen to it, you know, later on. But we're going to get back to poet. But anyway, we kind of jumping in front of it and back and in front. But like I was saying, a lot of his personality. And, you know, that's how I wound up going out to him, you know,

because Sly was as brilliant as a motherfucker, period. He could deal with anybody on any level. And if you weren't chosen to be spoken to, you just won't never get it. Wow. That's the kind of person he was, you know. So when he did call, he would call it four or five in the morning, and he thought it was okay. And then he told me, he said, man, you said, I'm scared of Debbie.

your wife. I'd be laying right there. I just left the studio with him, you know, because we worked for like two years straight, just cutting stuff and I've seen what he had. He gave me all of his quarter, half inch, eight-tracked. Reels, which was probably about a dozen,

that he wanted me to go through and pick out what was good and what was not good. Words? Yeah. So, I mean, that was my job for probably, about four years. I'm sorry. That's what I'm saying,

a trust. He would never give nobody that. The last thing he did ask me to do, which was a couple years ago, was to go up to the Friscoe house and go up in the attic and get all of his shit, including songs,

you know, pictures, clothes. And I said, that's kind of a too big of a risk. And I had one guy who would do it, but if you ask anybody, he probably know what was missing. Like you want me to get a you- And then, and then blame you.

Right, exactly. So I wasn't trying to fall for that trap. Getting into that, you know. That's crazy. When we went to his house the first time, after he came up the stairs and I met him and Billy, hey man, we're going to go over Searle's house. Okay, so I knew all the names,

Slide, Sylvester, Seals. You know what I mean? I would adapt to nicknames and stuff like that. I got you. And would never say no, because I knew whatever it was going to be was going to be crazy. Just how I met little Richard one night.

He came in the studio first, and I was scared of death of him because it was like pass gate, but he was big. Big old pass gate. And he looked at Billy, and he's looking like, oh man, I said, what's up with your boy over here?

Billy said, you leave him alone, you will get his ass kick. I had to, I had to, I had the jout Billy in the neck a couple of times, you know, knocking him back, and don't mess with my brother when he get on the set, you know. But how long was your duration of Billy before Quincy comes to the? Well, it was three years. Well, I get to the poet thing real quicker.

This is before. Oh, we stay on poet. Yeah. Yeah. No, so anyway, we get to the Bel Air House. It was like just cold-blooded, sunken stone house, which across street from that was the Beverly Hill, Billy. mansion that they were showing on TV. So I'm like, looking at that, looking at Slice House,

and then next door to him, Doris Date lived, which people thought he dated. He was dating that. Right. So we go into the crib, and we're all sitting, you know, and now this is another time. The first time he did the Palladium out here, and he got into the mobile home.

We beat him there because Billy Nym knew, you know. He traveled in a mobile home? No. Not a regular car? He always had a mobile home because he would have cats like, I'm going to get ready to, move the studio from upstairs into the mobile home so he could drive and keep recording. What?

Or change his mind. He's like, okay, move all the stuff into the mobile home. He had like three guys and they would take everything from up in the studio that's recordable down into the mobile home. And they hook it all up because it took three hours to do. Then one time I was over there and I said, he just told him to do it and then he didn't, never mind, put it all back. That's what I'm saying.

That's work. Exactly. But, you know, when we were there, the second time I saw him and he walked in and he had these little bells on and red leather. So you can hear him coming up to the door. So he came up to the door because he knew Billy was there, people could have been in the house. Like if he just walked offstage. So he was like, you just hit percussion and shit. and boom

that's the kind of stuff he'd say kick the door bloom B-L-O-O-N Oh you would say that Yeah Blume He'd make his own

sound effect like Batman Yeah Blum And then he'd come and look He had a certain thing Because he was in I guess he got your wig on And your leather suit

And you slide stone You know you the king You know ain't nobody as funky as you are, he had an aura, you know, and that's where Prince got his thing from, which Sly had made him tell me where did he get his vibe from. A lot of people don't know,

he got his walk from Bob Dylan. And that's what Sly. Prince did that too. You walked your shoulders side to side, you know, as you walking. Bob Dylan was the coolest white boy, I was a nice look at videotapes. You go back to see videotapes of Bob Dylan,

you know, Slot, and he told me. He told me shit. He wouldn't tell people like that. He said, man, you'd crack up when you find out. So I got there from Bob Dylan. And so, of course, you came up through the same era. And then I noticed, I said, well, Prince got that from you. He didn't like Prince at all.

Prince ain't as funky as you. I was only told him to go to Prince. I said, man, I haven't had to leverage Prince head. George Clinton once said that his favorite slide quote about Prince was and sly i used to tell george that man he should he tastes like spinach when he needs to be tasting like collard greens wow

i'm gonna tell you something and george clinton i have very close George clinton worked with his band and everybody who was involved including burning burning or all the other cats they was like the fungus cats on the planet because they had more funk than anybody had

on stage you know a bob gun and we was out there on tour and live with them so it's like a lot of them

had the equal it was more equal when I was in the Sliding Family Stone of course I loved the drummer

and Greg Erickow of course I loved Larry Graham and Larry Graham and I got very close and then there was a competition or Slide

knew I was hanging with Larry Larry knew I was hanging with slide you know they wanted to they wanted

to see me to make a decision They bring you together to a meet. Was it a meeting? No. No, we just wouldn't hang out. We just, you know, from touring. Larry Graham was like my older brother.

And he taught me a lot about, he taught me more about funk than slide could on bass. Larry didn't. Because Larry could execute that stuff. Slide could execute, but he played with a pick. Yeah, that's what I used to do. Yeah, he used to play with a pick. It was a pick, and there was more melody.

until Rusty Allen came on the scene and turned it out within time. I'm like, then Rusty and I met and we're close. It's like, I had to know everybody who was in the house of funk,

you know, and we all kind of knew. And, you know, a lot of people, that's why even nowadays when you hear rappers or singers, it's like not enough, okay, somebody produced you, somebody wrote the record,

so it's not coming out of you. Somebody helped develop, you know, that kind of thing. But when I was there and I went up, he wouldn't let nobody come up. And I went upstairs and they had eight monitors on the bed for all the rooms in certain areas of the house. So I'm like, what are y'all doing? They were having fun having their little milk and cookies. In quotes. Funk language.

Yeah. Thank you. And I'm like, what are y'all doing? He said, I'll be looking at everybody, but Sly was looking at Billy's girlfriend's breast. And she had this low cut deal with looking at a cleavians. And he just said that, oh, I'm looking at what's the name, you know? He said, you could tell her to come up,

because the way Sly is, if you don't make your way there, you ain't coming up. The whole band was the ability of sitting downstairs. I got tired of waiting. He had this bodyguard named J.R. who had to cut across his, you know, knife cut. And he was, like, looking at all of us, like, beating on this chair. He was just waiting for him, dare you motherfuckers. Sit there.

Now you just can't leave? Yeah. So, I mean, people were stuck. So I decided. I said, look, Billy's upstairs. This is my friend. I'm going to see what's up. He didn't say a word.

He let me go up. And I opened the door, and he had this egg chair. You could sit in and had the music. come through, you could sit on, listen to music. Slide looked over at me, and he remembered Billy said, man, this is George. They're like, don't fuck with him. This is a motherfucker game. Because we have, in our family, to be honest, some insight on some brutal kind of shit

where motherfuckers have been to prison. So we had our own, the mafia thing that runs in the family, and including certain people that came to the system of FOI, who was a fruit of Islam. Yeah, yeah. Who they worked and went and got some of them in an organization. So I never really talked about that. And, you know, we grew up with gangsters living in our block. The leader of the slossons, the leader of the gladiators back then.

They're next door to us and down the street. And we had all to find his babysitters, so they came out to get. So they were trying to get with them, and then they protected us. since we had John Street Puzzle on and played music and went around the high schools and colleges. They let you alone. We brought people together. Man, if it wasn't for you and your group,

me and my wife wouldn't they get, you know, it was like that. So I kind of felt every move of emotions that people would describe. And, you know, I didn't take anything for granted. I just kept my ears open wide, knowing there'd be a great opportunity to jump or go to different places that no one. else could take me. Everywhere I have been, no one else but the next

great person, took me to, like Billy Preston, you know, and when, after I was up in the bedroom and there were, Billy was on the cloud and slide was on the fender roads. Billy had played a lot of the backward stuff, just like in, um, just so do, do, do, do, do do do do do, do, do, do, do, do what? Oh, uh, she caught me.

You know, I think of it. I know it, but I can't play. Billy would hear with Sliver playing, and he just knew where his place would be. And I heard poet, and I'm like, it gets no funky, you know. So can I ask you something? So, because normally I talk to people about their reaction to

there's a ride going on once it's the finished product. but what they're creating is nothing like the the Rarachir leader vibe of what Stan represented or the dance to the music album everyday people

you're totally right like was this not a foreign thing for you to be hearing like this is literally the first funk I was in to the original stuff yeah that you're talking about right and I was all in a political move

So for us to see a black man, just how we had other people knock him like Muhammad Ali, would he have his wig on a long collar looking like a clown? But that was just his look. Okay, but at the same time, he's like, you know, how black can you be, and you're going to go there and disgrace Islam wearing a wig? He was on one David Cavitch show or something like. He talked about it. And I could see Muhammad Ali's point and I could see Slice point.

point. He told me how he made the band. You know, we have different colors, different textures, a whole bunch of colors, and that's where George Clinton got his whole idea from, and, you know, different sounds. And he even was different, but he was the leader of the group. So he said, you have all that, all those colors, all that creativity, you have all that sound, so he didn't admit to. After hearing, dance to the music was the first one that I heard even though we heard. I was down with them when they were in contests with the Chambers Brothers with time. Other than Chambers Brothers too, but in this line that we're going to win.

And all this greatest hits like you had mentioned, even from Don't Call Me Nigger, Whitey, you know, he made statements that were vital for those times. and he spoke his mind. I think he was probably one of ten groups that were just, you know, he wasn't afraid of putting it on record. I'll let the record states that, boom, this is how I feel.

This is where we're coming from. So he was like the warrior, gangster on record. But did it not feel dark or foreign to you, like very unscly-like? It was because he was in his world with the riot album. He didn't have a lot of input with the group And or the fresh out

He might would pull Freddy in or Larry in You know he might would call in Cynthia or Rose Right You know Rose and I became very close Because she was like I told her letting me know If any time there was a problem

So she was watching my watchman And I was telling him everything From what he ate He likes a cup of noodles Is that all? Don't you give him some some proteins some vegetables he liked cheese

which is you know he told me that this is a weird diet if you've got a pack of cheese in the back of your pocket then you got something else you don't need that goes with it

that it clogs you up because of lactose yeah so a lot of stuff like that he I didn't know. He'd just tell me in the studio. You got it now, like, yeah.

Yeah, I'm sorry. You know. Yeah. He told me stories about Hendricks, which he knew. Hendricks was my idol, which I did have a chance to meet Hendricks Sr. His dad. Can I ask a question? Go ahead.

Was Betty Davis around at any part of this period? I never saw her. Damn. I never saw her. But I liked the baseline Larry did with. It's a lot of her stuff. Oh, for, yeah, for a thing. Oh, yeah, that was the shit.

But it was, you know, when you talk about funk, there was really no other person that you can go to outside of when George Clinton came up. His funk was different. Everybody had their little different type of funk, and that's why him and George won. I knew they were going to hook up. First the egos came in,

then once that settled down, they're both together, then Jordan Clank would call me up. This was about 10 years ago. And man, do you hit slides, new stuff he's done? I said, now I really hadn't heard it because, you know, I would be one who would talk about him from his face. Right, right. I said, man, you know, first of all, you ain't going to be doing that shit in my house.

Second of all, maybe I think I'm going to wait after you die to sell more records. His eyes got this, man, and nobody had told me no shit like that. I said, I was just think, well, Jimmy Hendrix died, and his record sales boost, you know. If you want to start acting ignorant, you know,

and you're going through all this music, you're letting me go through, and if you're going to put something together, I just might wait until you're gone and it'll be worth more money. That's love. So he knew. He knew, I was, like, talking to him,

like he himself, talking to himself. I said, do you taught me everything about you that I know? When he first came, he said, man, G.J. He used to call me G. Hey, G, you got more on my records than I have thought existed. And I would cut some stuff, recut it, like sing a simple song and play in my version. And, like, totally tweak it out. That would be stuff Troy would get, you know, add some stuff.

And, you know, he could tell things I was into when they had it. Because I play and learn. to play a lot like Larry Graham, but I also learned a lot in playing bass like Slay. Both of them knew that, and I played the guitars. Like he was on synthesized,

I said, man, you got to get back to these telecaster guitars, tinkling, you know what I'm saying? Like on the slow version of thank you. You know, that was a sound. You're not doing that. You're trying to incorporate and you're putting three things on one track, which you shouldn't

be doing anyway, because, you know, And that's how he would record, play a certain amount of guitar or something out there and it switched to a loud mood bass and make the meters go up. Was he his own engineer? Yeah. Oh, that explains it all. Right. So when I hooked up with him, I was trying to teach him a couple things that I've learned

from Bruce Whelene. So certain things that, you know, minus 3 dB for like a hi-hat or anything really, really, Bright comes back at you how it's laid down. You know, I never would have known that. I learned a lot from Bruce. I just said I forgot that Bruce Houdine actually engineered your records. Yes.

We were the reasons why, this is going to trip you up. Off the wall happened. Thriller. Blueprint. And bad. Michael introduced, I could show you a picture, us at Carnegie Hall. And he was following 79.

And he was following the brothers Johnson down to my little bow tie I had on when he did the cupboard that's right. The cover for... Yeah, I used to work, you know, he was studying studying me and my brother and he loved the sound. He was complaining about whether he should go to Q.

At that time, they had just started working on but he had eight months into it off the wall. And I knew then, you know, it was my job and there was nothing I could do to step back and just let them float as long as it could go. A win is a win. A win is a win.

I don't care what you're saying. Yep, that's me, Clifford Taylor the 4th. You might have seen the skits, the reactions, my journey from basketball to college football, or my career in sports media. Well, somewhere along the way, this platform became bigger than I ever imagined. And now I'm bringing all of that excitement to my brand new podcast, The Clifford Show. This is a place for raw, unfiltered conversations with some of your favorite athletes, creators, and voices that not only deserve to be heard, but celebrated.

One week, I'll take you behind the scenes of the biggest moments in sports and entertainment, and the next we'll talk about life, mental health, purpose, and even music. The Clifford Show isn't just a podcast, it's a space for honest conversations, stories that don't always get told, and for people who are chasing something bigger. So, if you've ever supported me, or you're just chasing down a dream, this is right where you need to be. Listen to the Clifford Show on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcast, or wherever you get your podcast. And for more behind the scenes, follow at Clifford and at TikTok

podcast network on TikTok. This week on the Sports Slice podcast, it's all about the NFL draft. And we've got a special guest. The director of the NFL's East West Shrine Bowl, Eric Galco, joins the Sports Slice podcast to break down what really matters when evaluating draft prospects. From hidden traits teams look for to the biggest mistakes franchises make to the players flying under the radar. This is the insight you won't hear anywhere else. If you want to understand the draft like an insider, you don't want to miss this episode. Listen to the Sports

Slice podcast on the Iheart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. And for more, follow Timbo Slica Life 12 and TikTok podcast network on TikTok. There's two golden rules that any man should live by. Rule one, never

mess with a country girl. You play stupid games, you get stupid prizes. And rule two, never mess with her friends either. We always say that trust your girlfriends. I'm Anna Sinfield, and in this new season of the girlfriends, Oh my God, this is the same man. A group of women discover they've all dated the same prolific con artist.

I felt like I got hit by a truck. I thought, how could this happen to me? The cops didn't seem to care, so they take matters into their own hands. I said, oh, hell no. I vowed. I will be his last target. He's going to get what he deserves. Listen to the girlfriends. Trust me, babe.

On the Iheart radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. How did you guys end up getting with Quincy? Well, with Quincy, I had hooked up actually with Stevie Wonder because I was going to join Wonderlove auditioning from me and my brother. Before that. Really? Yeah. And I was auditioned.

With Symbelo or like after? Like what period? This was around right before he recorded the song Creeping because I was in the studio with him all night. It's like this. It's still symbol and Raymond Pounds and Denise Williams. I had been kind of, because we were at the record plant and he was a studio B. Okay. Okay.

And we were in Studio A or Studio C, which is the biggest studio where Quincy was. And I think I was in the jacuzzi hanging out a couple times. There was a jacuzzi in the studio? Yeah, that was back when it used to be the jacuzzi at the record plan. Right when you walk in the hallway, that door to the left. Yeah, the left side. There is a jacuzzi. They turn into a gym.

It's a gym now, I think. They got some exercise equipment. Initially, it was a jacuzzi, which is cool, because if you work in one, just chill out and go on the jacuzzi and get you some food and hang out. Amongst other reasons. I mean, I'm pretty sure. Yeah, I might want to clorox that jacuzzi. Man.

Well, they was keeping it pretty good. clean. It always has been pretty clean. But we was in there and Quincy will tell you this and he mentioned in his interviews too. I took me and Lewis and we were in the studio with Stevie. It's like, okay, this is not, this is my brother. Because I always had the initial hookup. So I hung there without Lewis when I was here and creeping. I don't know if it had a lot because Stevie used to always called me Torrean brother. This is my Torrean brother. I knew when he would record.

My birthday is like 17th. I think his is the 14th or 15th. 13. 13. Yeah. So I would creep into the studio 2, 3 o'clock in the morning and he knew my footsteps.

He knew the rhythm and the pattern of you. He knew my walk. That's George Johnson. That's George Johnson to you. Okay. He was rocking his head. Say, what you doing, man? He pressed the button.

I'm gonna start this new track, finishing one thing, which was, I forgot the last song, he did this song, too. It was so fun here, I'm like, man, he had too much funky things in the can. This is after I met Sly. So it's like now, of a sudden, I'm gravitating, I had Billy Preston in Sly's, I'm gravitating just to keyboard players. Mm-hmm.

Uh-huh, okay. So I spent all night with his mom, and the first time she met Stevie in Creepin' Unfolded from the tambourine, it's the first thing he laid him. That was the first thing he... The first thing on the track was the tambourine. Right. Right.

And then that's all you heard. Then he added everything else. And we were there to about 8 in the morning and the whole damn song was done. And I'm like, you see how bad this motherfucker is? Without a click track? That's crazy. Yeah, without the click.

He just was... Like, because the tambourine would be the last thing I add. Not the first thing. And he did that, you know, probably maybe as a test or, because we're sitting up there. I wonder what he's going to do next. You know, and he did everything to the drums, synthesizes, all the parts, and he put a basic vocal. And that's why we were there from like 2 in the morning to probably about 10.30 in the morning. But a couple of my close friends knew, because I'd be up at A&M in the studio late at night.

Between him and Lionel Richie, and we passed. say, hey, Lino, what's up? He was a night out, too. Some of them don't make a move until after 12. And you can't call him before three in the afternoon. Because they're asleep. Right. So, you know, and they'd call me.

Steve, he would give me a heads up. I'd be at the studio. George, okay, I'll be at the studio. I said, all right, I might come down. Oh, you know, I'll hook up with Lino. And one time I called at 2.30, he says, it's not 3 o'clock yet. I said, all right, all right. Now, but Tommy back, coming back, man, coming back.

And, you know, just they knew who I had hung on going to who I've been hanging out way because after that I went to George Duke. So it was Billy Preston, Stevie Wonder, George Duke. This is the education thing. Yeah, for real. And then I went to George Duke, Bill Withers. This is all this was before. Billy Preston.

I forgot because you're on the back cover of making music, right? Right, yeah. Me and my wife and my dad who was sitting on the ground. So was that a real, like, what was the concept behind? Ray Parker, Jr. Yeah. Was it a real, because he, when Sultan, I'm always bringing up these old train references. Harvey Mason.

He was to the left with his wife. Yeah. It was like, it was a whole, it was on Bill's property in his backyard. We just took, like, it was over there for barbecue and hanging out. just took a musician family picture. Oh, okay. And, you know, it's like the heavy hitters are there. They were on set.

And even back then, somebody like Ray Parker, it's like he just recently hooked up with Sly. A lot of people wanted to. They knew I was there. I could easily invite them to, but I never take anybody over this. The only person I took over his place was Irene Kerr. Oh, man.

Because she lives my neighbor in Patrice Russian And to be honest with you, I think she was a little bit envious. So I know she was with Michael Jackson because she wanted me to be just the only one. She didn't, you know, wasn't too particular about Saida Garrett would come over. Right. You know, and you remember when Saida. So you two were next door neighbors? That next door.

She lived. Like down the street. So that explains kick it to the curb, right? That's not, yeah, we hooked up. Because I always wanted that was the weirdest. Whenever I saw the credits on the album, I'm like, I mean, can't. She was a great writing. She wrote the lyrics. She really had nothing to do with the music.

Back then, I was experimenting with bass lines on keyboards, and it was like a Bobby Brown thing. Don, don, don, down, to don't, don't, you know. That was way before then, though. Were you to kick it to the... 88. Oh, that was 88. 88. Okay.

Irene lived probably like three blocks away. Patrice Russian lived about four blocks away and around the corner So I used to always before Irene moved out To where I am and she moved twice near me You know I guess a lot of people's like if you hang out with somebody Because I always wanted to meet her I saw fame

And my tour manager said I said I want to meet her said you're going to work or there one day And that happened without his help We just gravitated actually the fifth member of Toto who did a lot of movie scores David Pache No

Fifth member total Who's it? Pocaro? Steve, Lucifer? No, they're all members of the group James Newton Howard Oh, James Newton Howard. Oh, James Newton Howard and I

because we was working in the studio and he's the one to introduce me to Irene Do you still speak with her? I was like, I haven't heard from her in a while Yeah, we talk but it's, you know we're still cool. It's like I kind of let things lie where they lie. If you get pissed off about something,

I heard she was very hard to get along with the time. I wasn't like forcing anything. And it's like if you are a true person who you are, you can kind of let things go, but I think it boiled down to all of a sudden. We're together working and you saying, oh, I can't work with you today because I get it's coming over. Attitude.

Or, you know, I can't work, Dick, and I mean, Patrice is coming over. Patrice came over and she heard this one song I did called Eye Fresh and Sly wanted to play on it too. And I didn't let him, but Patrice had some time to pull up, you pull up Eye Fresh and you're going to hear some similarity of Slide Stone, which he was on. They got me playing keyboard. So Patrice came over. That was a favorite.

She used to come over just to hear that. So when Irene Carr would see her. coming up, she said, oh, all shit's gonna get, you know, it's over, because he might be working with Irene, or he might be where it was, it might be, I was working with him. You know, Saida Garrett, we cut a lot of demos together.

And, you know, how did you guys end up signing with like, with A&M and stuff? I was gonna say you gotta tell the record plan story. Well, okay, okay. When we're at the record plant and we was working with Q, I had told him the story, because before and then, I would go up to A&M because I was working with Billy Preston.

He was on A&M. This would be the first good place to go on. I took A&M basically the same kind of song that I took Quincy. Okay. You know, and they basically, you know, didn't pay attention because you had a black door

to go through a white door. And it was funny because we were the only group in the history of A&M who covered all genres of music not just funk, jazz, blues, pop. You know, so Michael was paying attention to back then.

And we started paying most of the bills, you know, from sticks. I was the one who had picked human that was on the charts for 27 weeks. The song, Human, by human nature.

Human League. Human League. What? I'm only human. Yeah, I did a lot of stuff ghost stuff that a lot of people don't realize. Wait. Wait. Wait. I'm sorry.

That's right. Wow. And it brought Jimmy Jam and Terry Lewis on the scene. So how did it? Okay. So how did that happen? Well, John McLean and I are very close and I was like helping him out. John McLean stories again.

Yeah. We don't need John McLean anymore. We just got everybody else. Yeah, well, this is probably before a lot of other things that happened. But, you know, we were just the. about ready to leave A&M and I was doing my job I just kind of got bored and didn't have my parking space there and I told him I said I'll help you out there's with the guards and everybody knew with George Johnson's here he's probably back to helping another motherfucker out

so John McLean had given me first this cassette and told me to listen to it tell me what I thought he was originally working in the mail room think making about 500 bucks a week or something like that. Eddie and him before he came. So he went to the power moves. It's just how I got Sly on Jesse Johnson's record video. You did that?

Yeah. I was the only one. Makes sense. I was the only one, but never did credit. That makes sense. Yeah. Never got credit for a lot of stuff. That's what I was saying.

A lot of truth. Was it crazy? Yeah, crazy. Yeah, crazy. And Sly wasn't interested. You told me, he's, man, I don't want to do this so they can get you some money so you could do what you like to do.

All right, I'll do it. You can do what you like to do. Jesse did our episode, and he explained to us that, yeah, he just sent the two-inch to... Yeah, they never met before they until they did the video. It's like he wasn't interested in meeting him. You said, you're the fun. He's why he wasn't interested in meeting Prince. I said, man, you got to go hang with Prince.

And he did. Prince came out to his place, and he was in the Palisades. And Slide told me, he said, he knocked on the door. He came out to him. What did you do? Just looked at him on a monitor. I didn't let him in. Oh, man.

So now I know why Prince gravitated towards Larry. No, Prince had Larry in focus. He was trying to bring back Slye to him and Slie and Freddie, who decided not to go with Prince. They're the only two that held out. Sly told me, Prince is just trying to be like me. I said, well, let him be like you. And he'd be paid off of it.

He'd the new you. You know, let him, you know, if he got all this money, he could help you. Prince Llewant out there and saw his complex. I think very, you know, could be jealous or a little bitse about it. You know what I mean? But he's been to the right and he's been to the left.

He's been up and down with his financial status. And, you know, when you see another person coming that want to be you, they wouldn't even let him sit at the hard rock, rock and rock hall of fame. Prince S. sit at the table, they wouldn't want, they didn't let him come sit at the table with Sly and the Family Stone.

So I mean, he was trying to be, you know, that's why he was very cordial to me, you know, did me a private show. I could have probably went with them, but I wasn't too into there, you know, I knew he was gonna be Prince, but after that, you know, I wasn't gonna be too much more, you know. The time happened, like I said, when Jimmy Jam and Lewis, because they, did the drum tracks and all that on, Human. And that was bringing them in, but John McClain asked me to listen to this cassette

and tell me what you think. So I'll probably wait till I'm on the way get the lunch with him the next day, and I would listen to it when I leave my house. So I listened to it, turned it all, got the side to, and Human came up. And it's like I had to keep rewinded. I didn't even know it was Jimmy and Terry.

Oh, wow. So I said, okay, got to the, I was going to kept listening to us. I couldn't go no further than that. I said, you know what? A&M, it just goes to show you about these companies. A lot of people ain't got the right ears. I said, this is totally fucked up because they got this hit out of sequence of side two, second song on side two.

It should be on side one, the first record. Oh, man, he said, that's cool. I'm bringing in my boys, Jimmy and Terry. I said, who? Jimmy Jam and Terry. I said, whoever did it. needs to be I didn't even know that they were from the time right okay okay and I said you need next board meaning because I was actually on the board of

governors with the Grammys from the 7th 92 to 94 they wanted me to become a president of Nairus and at that time I chose not to as I said I got this when MC Hammer came up okay oh wow I got bored of the board So there was a lot of things that... Sometimes I'm like, damn, I wish you would have did it. Well, you know, it was cool. I mean, I was on the head of the producer committee because Irene Carroll's husband was well encouraged me to get on the board.

He said, man, yeah, with all the stuff you know and have been through, he said, you need to be signing off on some stuff. And, you know, I was on the producer committee for two years. and picking up. Is it like to be at that level? Because like right now Jimmy Jam is also Yeah. Ivan's on it too.

And Ivan. Really? Yeah, I was on a, he's like one of the heads at a producer committee. Is it? How important is it like what's the end game

to be in that? Well, see, number one was they all thought out out of the plant of Quincy's. Ah. They were scared. So they, and this is after Thriller.

Right. Okay. That was there. That was in 80. I mean, at 84, yeah. So after that, I was there from 92 to 94. So they thought I came with the master map of the plant. Okay.

And it was cool and I just didn't want to be on the board of Greer. I wanted to go to find out, okay, what's the highest position they said producer committee? So I got on that like instantly. I was getting all free music. They'd send me the box and I wouldn't have to pass it on to nobody else. I also kept all the CDs. That was the first time I heard the chronic. Wow.

Oh, so when you're on those committees, you just get everything. Yeah. I mean, while the other ones, you share, except for the producer committee because you got these different categories of music. So you may have two and three people,

okay, after you get through the box and it to sell it. You know, sometimes they may take out a few things, but you have to deliver the whole box. What's the whole purpose of that committee to Well, with that committee, you eventually, before that, if you're just going to be a member of the board, you're going to get your briefcase and have a lot of applications that you sign people on to the Grammys. From September, after September, it's too late.

Okay. So you actually will see a group, and there's a lot of people now. You say, oh, would you like to go for a nomination? A nomination for the Grammy. Say, I got the application, right? You're not going to say no. You know, you fill out the application. have the right to submit your material.

So they went to you to recruit people into it? Right. Okay. So, you know, I mean, I didn't get paid. I brought intellect and experience in what I know about music. Since I hooked up and had all these other people from Billy Preston. You brought opportunity, basically. Right.

I could hear something and know when it's a hit. Just how I picked the song, Human, when I told John McLean, I said, you go up to the board meeting next week. I know it was the second week of every month. And you tell Herbaba and Jerry Morris, because they had sticks out, the thing in Human League. I said, this is the hit. It's on side two.

And I don't think they ever changed it, but then they did try it. And it wound on charts number one for 27 weeks. That was the first time people at AMM news. I think John mentioned it. Well, George told, you know, he said that that was the one. So I was like the ghost. music there.

Picking hits. When did you guys first start recording your first album for A&M with Quincy producing? 75 and that was on his album. Oh, Melamannis. Oh, Melamannis. It's a love that we're missing, wrote four songs, trying to find out about you

what it is listening, listen. And he has those writing sessions. He would, like, a little dictaphone. He would, like, record when he played the songs. Yeah, with Quincy, like, in his apartment. He, like, has all of that stuff. He used to play that stuff for me when I was on the way to school. I was, like, five years old,

listening to these, like, session tapes of them writing these hits. So growing up, like, at what point do you realize, okay, he's not just dead? But he sort of might kind of be a big deal. A big deal. Well, I always knew he was, like, a superhero. He was at the mixing board at two years old. My first word was tape. Tate.

And it's funny, he passed down the same. So it was kind of like how my grandfather gave him the guitar. Hold on. He would also say, ready, cassette, go. Yeah. That's facts. That's fax. Good one.

So, yeah, he did the same thing with me where he, because I was like, I didn't know what capacity I was going to do music. I just was into it. And I was into the technology side of it. And so, like, I love the tape machine because I would see him in his studio. And, you know, he'd be laying down the guitar part. So he'd teach me how to punch him in because he didn't. Yeah. He could, he could punch him in and, like, you know, certain things.

And so I was all, you know, he'd bring me into the studio and I meet all these amazing, great people. Wasn't paying attention to nobody. He's like, hey, this is Quincy Jones. Take. Like, who? Wait a minute. Are you, who is on the cover or the inside of Blam? That's, uh, was that Cody?

Cody. That's my cousin, Cody. Lewis's son. Son. Okay, okay, okay. Yeah. They still hang out. He's trying to do music.

Yeah, that's. None of them I like Troy. Okay. Well. None of them. There's got to be some way to make that sound prettier. Okay, so I have questions about the production techniques of the Brothers Johnson sound. But I have to get this question out the way.

Well, first of all, we look out for number one. Right. Like many other songs done by black artists, of course, that was always my exposure to the Beatles. We'll come together. Yeah, I thought that came together. No, I didn't know. Yeah, I didn't. That was my first time hearing that song too.

Right. And you know, my art teacher trying to tell me like, no, this not, the Beatles did this version. Right. No, we did. But I'm in first grade, so I didn't know. Right. You was the first. Well, yeah, I got that in first grade.

That was a combination of the Funkadelic and Brothers Johnson in Beatles. I see. Don, do, do do do, do, do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do that was your song. No, there wasn't. You know, everything I would approach, it would have to have a signature on it. Okay. A lot of the first album that you were talking about, mostly was one bass, a drum machine and probably

about eight guitars. That's how I learned about arrangement. Quincy would take all the guitar parts and put different. And sign them. Yeah, I mean, our keyboard players would be like George Duke and Herbie Hancock. Harvey Mason on drums.

So our band were people that he could get and come into the studio. Harvey Mason was playing with headphones on, pull out the drum track on songs like trying to find out about you with you, you know, and we'll just go for it. And we, you know. So that was like the only, the first,

the first band outside the little band we had. And these are like you walking in, you see it. Herbie Hancock walking the floor, like playing notes on Tell Me Bedtime Story now. You know, all that kind of stuck in my head that Herbie wrote that they had the... You guys with the rhythm section on sounds and stuff like that? No.

No. No. I played on a few things. They took me out the mix purposely when Michael Jackson hit. hit and Lewis had a lot to do with that. That's when we started. I was like about to chew his head out.

I was going to sort of kind of ask. How come? I was going to get there. Wait, wait, wait, wait. I have one specific question. The devil. That was my jam. Okay, but I just want to know,

did you ever think like a seven-year-old with hear the song and scare the be jeezer. Well, actually, it didn't work because I wrote that song after The Exorcist came up. Oh, wow. Come on, man. It's like, I'd never listen to that song. I would always skip it.

I was with Billy Preston. And by him being Christian and all that and they had the gospel music, a certain one of us would step out the zone and it makes songs like Make the Devil Mad. Okay. You know. So I was like, I got to make me a devil song. Yeah, you did. You did.

And I used the stand, and I took a pencil. That's when it starts. You got it, yeah. Yeah, I got it. And then I use Hendrix. I'm going to get, doodagh, daug, da. Now watch. Hendrix here.

Okay, so this is what I'm telling you. Yeah, as an adult, I see the technique. I see the technique. Let it get to the fork right quick. I knew you. Wait, this ain't the phone. Sly. No, no, no, no.

It's on your case. Wow. That's the soup. I said, don't make hates. It's like my bass line. And was that you singing on, oh, no? That's you singing.

They're going to be more guitars coming. All that counterpoint slide. All right. We're probably getting to the ass-burning part. This is where I run under the covers in my mind. Take you a dime with him. He won't waste new time. He will have your ass burning.

So listen. I think in 1977, I accepted Jesus Christ as my personal savior. Thanks. Like nine weeks in a row. Nine weeks in a row. And you know what? I probably wrote it because I was raised and was an altar boy. They were like, Amir again?

Right. Like that song, that song, that song, it did. It literally, like, I never saw you two the same ever again. And even with y'all leaving the shutter open for the back cover of right on time. I was still thinking like, oh, man, it's the darwis again. I would bury your albums and then like bottom last of my dad's pile I had to do that with my dad's Hayes Records.

Oh, Isaac Hayes' Records. Because the new covers were scary. Yeah, you burying them under. I would give acknowledgement to certain things that kids should know and adults should know to be aware of. The devil was like, I wasn't scared of him. I even ran my vocal thing backwards.

That's how I'd got that sound and I'd used your mother sucks, Cox and hell. Yeah, I finally, I did. That's exactly backwards. Wow. Play it and you hear it.

That'd be a whole other song. It's on the left side. It's on the left side. No, I'm sorry, man. Like, no, man. Yeah, I wouldn't listen to this. That was a little deep, deep. And the thing, but, but aside from that, Blake,

aside from that, Blake, aside from that, from that, I always wanted to know, you guys had a very weird Greek course technique that I can only describe as like this animated Muppet sound. Like free yourself, be yourself. Right, exactly. Or, oh, even right on time. Or even like Barry speeding, Serita's voice on Get the Funk Out of My Face. Like, how come you guys never just did?

That was me on Get the Funk at my face. face with the value. Oh, I see, I always thought there was the reason. No, that was me. But how come none of the vocal techniques, besides your lead vocal, how come they were never just dry and natural? Like, you guys were either... It's very animated time, right?

Like, even with stump. It's like the Muppets were singing. No, it basically came from things that were going on. TV shows. You know, I mean, you're walking in with Q, you got to have, like, various types of, you know. That sounds like characters. Yeah, they were like characters. It's just like the brother who sang the part you sounding like, I can't think of his name right now.

But he got that stuff because they knew it was in the sly. Okay. Okay. I was turning to. Right. Right. Oh, yeah. I get what I get it.

So he was a wonderful person coming in to do that. It's like I wanted to take you higher. Was it Richard Heath or? No, I wasn't Richard. He was one. He did a high vocal too. Why in the hell can I care about to see? That's when you get old.

Alex, not Bobby Rodriguez, no, no. I didn't know that Ricky was playing with you guys. Ricky Lawson. Yeah, I found him in Detroit in a basement. Really? Yep. In Detroit, in a basement that one of my musicians mentioned him.

and said he needed to be looked at so and looked at it. You know, he went from there to the heights, you know. And, you know, that's what it's about. And that's what I loved about Prince because he, a lot of monies he gave away and went to kids who, you know, had to do with music or needed help. You know, he dropped off monies to different schools and different communities. He only would take a certain amount and he'd leave the whole rest of the

of it and want them giving to the mayor, which is someone like, you know, it's kind of the attitude, the ultimate attitude slide would have wanted, you know, I don't need any money, money. A win is a win. A win is a win.

I don't care what I'm saying. Yep, that's me, Cliver Taylor the 4th. You might have seen the skits, the reactions, my journey from basketball to college football, or my career in sports media. Well, somewhere along the way, this platform became bigger than I ever imagined.

And now I'm bringing all of that excitement to my brand new podcast, The Clifford Show. This is a place for raw, unfiltered conversations with some of your favorite athletes, creators, and voices that not only deserve to be heard, but celebrated. One week, I'll take you behind the scenes of the biggest moments in sports and entertainment,

and the next we'll talk about life, mental health, purpose, and even music. The Clifford Show isn't just a podcast. It's a space for honest conversations, stories that don't always get told, and for people who are chasing something bigger. So if you've ever supported me or you're just chasing down a dream,

this is right where you need to be. Listen to the Clifford show on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. And for more behind the scenes, follow at Clifford and at TikTok Podcast Network on TikTok. This week on the Sports Slice podcast, it's all about the NFL draft. And we've got a special guest.

The director of the NFL's East West Shrine Bowl, Eric Galko, joins the Sports Slice podcast to break down what really matters when evaluating draft prospects, from hidden traits teams look for, to the biggest mistakes franchises make, to the players flying under the radar. This is the insight you won't hear anywhere else.

If you want to understand the draft like an insider, you don't want to miss this episode. Listen to the Sports Slice podcast on the Iheart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. And for more, follow Timbo Slica Life 12 and TikTok podcast network on TikTok. There's two golden rules that any man should live by. Rule one, never mess with a country girl. You play stupid games, you get stupid prizes.

And rule two, never mess with her friends either. We always say that trust your girlfriends. I'm Anna Sinfield, and in this new season of the girlfriends, oh my God, this is the same man. A group of women discover they've all dated the same prolific con artist. I felt like I got hit by a truck. I thought, how could this happen to me? The cops didn't seem to be. care. So they take matters into their own hands. I said, oh, hell no. I vowed. I will be his last target. He's going to get what he deserves. Listen to the girlfriends. Trust me, babe. On the Iheart radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. People got in the Shuggy Otis way later in life, but you were there

for round one. Yeah. He was actually a neighbor too. His parents lived around the corner. I used to go visit them before I met him because I remember seeing the Johnny Otis show and threw tons of joy when I was a kid and I met you to my mom and one of my cousins had me meet one of Shuggie's cousins who I almost started to date. I did go over to her house.

I think she passed away. But I saw this album and looked like this Mexican dude on it. And I said, who's that? Oh, this is my cousin. This is Sugar Yolison. Boy, I played that record and ran across Ice Cold Daydream and all that stuff on there, Strawberry Letter. I went straight to Q and told him, this is, we need to cut this song.

And it was never a single. Lewis used it at his wedding, Quince, the original one, Sugar Yelaces. And when he got to that vamp of the guitar and sh-hmm, yeah, yeah. It's like, it's all over. We have to do this song. So it was your idea to cover Strawberry Letter? Yeah. Man.

I brought some shit to the picture. No, no, your version to me is the definitive one. All we did was added, yeah, because you don't do nothing and recreate it. You do something and beef it up. Yeah. Otherwise, it's not worth doing all the time, you know. What do you think that song is about? I know what it's about.

And that song basically, as I asked Shuggy. He almost had that slide like attitude, and he'd have a girlfriend who he'd never really respond to because he was a musician. He kind of reminded me of me too. Don't come between me and my music. Exactly. So she had written these strawberry letter,

scented letters to him. Oh wow, okay. And he never opened one. And he told me he went back, he had a break, and all of a sudden he opened him and still had the scent. You know, I miss you, baby, when you come in home. And it'd be strawberry letter one, strawberry two, all the way to 20.

23. 22, no. Okay. That's why a present from you, Strawberry Letter 22. Oh, yeah, that's right. 22. The music plays,

I set in for a few. So the song is actually 23. Okay. But the people say, why is it 23? And you always say 22. All those letters, A present from you,

Strawberry Letter 22. Right. That's where it ends, and the song begins as 23. 23. The mystery unlocked. Wow. Yeah.

It's difficult at all. Did you ever get his initial reaction to it when he heard it or? Shuggie and I was tight as me and fly. Because Shuggy could sometimes be very hard to get along with and deal with. I knew his parents two years before I even met him. They were met him and then he heard, you know, because Quincy had got him to come into the studio. We were out of town to do. to do the guitar solo,

and he couldn't play it because it was in a different key. It's like, I play it where we're on, and it's a whole different stretch. I didn't actually play on it. He got to Lee Ritz on it. I was going to ask why Lee would play that too. And that's the reason he played is because I wasn't available. I left the road to come home,

did a little mix on it, and then pulled up to two guitar parts that showed my cousin the other part and went back out on the road to Quincy finish it so he and then we could put it up. So a lot of things, I mean, they had my ass so busy. that I should have gotten credit for,

even the way it went down with Michael Jackson because he wanted both of us. And they told Quincy, no, I want George and Lewis. Michael was following the shit, and he was very disappointed. My brother Lewis said, George doesn't write for anybody.

He's working on Brothers Johnson stuff. He doesn't do session. You told my guitar person was in the room. He's the one that told me that Lewis said, I said, what did Quincy do? He said, he kind of looked up. He didn't have too much to say because, and I said, okay, I see the whole scenario because Quincy thought ahead.

A&M didn't want us to do shit. They was trying to keep me, like, locked. Because back then, and even Quincy had done interviews, what is it? Is it Quincy Jones? Is it Michael Jackson? It was all, but at that time when Michael came out with Arthur Wall, stop was number one. So people would have

automatically went to Okay, it's the Brothers Johnson Who's making that shit happen It ain't Quincy And the music, it's the vibe It's, you know So if they left me off They didn't have to put

Brothers Johnson On Sony records Yeah, okay And then they just took Lewis And he became That's crazy though So is that just him On the floor?

No Lewis played bass on Billy Jean Like everything. You play a lot of stuff. Get on the floor is initially... The song he wrote. Okay, I thought it was in by this Johnson's son. No, no, no. I mean, it could have been one that was developed that I didn't even put the guitar on yet

because it wasn't approved by me. Okay. To be totally honest. I see. So, you know, I got left out the mix and, you know, Michael did call me. You took the kids out to Disneyland one day, and I had three messages. It sounded like he was crying or he was... That's when him in Quincy.

he was on the way out to divide. But he knew between me and James Ingram, we were the only two people that ever, you know, went back on Q's face. Because I would look at him like a teacher, and I also would look at him as a dad,

and I also would look at him as a kid. Because I had to teach him. He said, okay, George, I had to hold Lewis's hand, but you're going to be all right. I said, well, don't get too much in acknowledging that Lewis bullshit because he's young. He's on the divide because to be told me honest he you know there's a lot of good things about it there's a lot of

things that he didn't play into correctly he never really uh looked at himself as being a part of brothers johnson because the brothers johnson was me and i he picked nine of eight of my songs out of the 11 they got on the first album get the funk out my face lewis wrote the track I laid the guitar, wrote the lyrics. He did Land of Ladies, and that's it. All the rest of those songs were mine, Quincy just said in a meeting with George, you're going to make all the money. I just said, well, give my brother half without thinking.

So for songs like Love is and... Running for your loving and all that? Running for your loving. It's my signature. Running for your loving, I did that. A lot of songs I would do, and I knew he would get pissed off because Quincy at first didn't know. He had learned Lewis.

He's like, play the actual demo. Who's that on bass? He says, George. Play it like George. I'm like, why in the fuck he said that? Yeah. I mean, and I could put myself in Lewis's shoes, too. So a lot of my songs got favored and picked

and had my signature guitar. That's why I stepped off on purpose on Blam, didn't write nothing in Quintu's calling. I said, man, give me a song. Just give me one song. And I wrote Blam. And that was the title of the album. album, never a single, with all the other stuff.

That's when they brought in... Nick Asher and Simpson. Who wrote in A. We Funkin' Now? That was between me, probably Alex Lewis, you know, a few people in the band, Ricky Heath. Okay. I always wanted to know, why on Treasure, why did Ricky Sing Treasure? Why did Ricky Sing Treasure? Because I needed a break.

I was singing too much. I did. And I like all about the heaven, which is Rattipater. Yes, that's my shit. He wrote both. But it's like, damn, you know, I'm up here. And I was like, I'm the only one working, working, working. Lewis could sit back, play the bass, chill.

You know, I had to, like, make him sing. Because somebody, please sing a song where I could just chill. And this is for the show. And here comes treasure. Right. And I loved that because when he'd sing it, all I had to do is sing background part. So I was like. I just felt that's so odd.

Like, you're singing background in your own. I mean, I didn't sing Lee. I mean, I'm back there saying, you know, I felt like I'm hanging out with Augie Johnson side effect. Oh, man. And the cleaners. Yeah, and the cleaners on Crinsins. We grew up together.

Augie knows so much about me than anybody knew because he was coming to the house and he watched it firsthand. Is that cleaner still Warren Crenstrel? I think it is. Okay, okay. But he's like, this is George's shit. And he would tell a man that he said from a Louis. He was there.

He'd come over to the house. You said, you think that's something. You ought to hit the original raw shit. Quincy polished it and taught me how to do it. But, you know, you go with that white noise on four-track, you can triple it to go eight-track. And, you know, you get all these different type sounds. Textures.

Yeah. It's like, then you record the bass again to keep that fatter. And I'm playing an upside-down bass, left-handed, with a pick and with my thumbs. and, you know, Lewis was good at, he could take any of my stuff. The difference was it would sound like Graham Central Station and me. Okay. Because Larry Graham taught me how to play bass.

Did Lewis actually have the ability to play like James Jamerson, use his two fingers? Yeah, he could play. And he got his come-up in, as they would say, when he was in the studio with Stanley Clark. and the engineer hit record. And Lewis was always like a warrior. That's why he was in Japanese and all this stuff.

And, you know, he would challenge. And, you know, everything was about a challenge. And don't let him get on stage and Larry call you up. He'll come out there and fuck you up. But that's what he ultimately went to and stayed there because he really didn't have a lot of friends, the bass players, like Stanley Cloud. They got stuff on tape with him at George.

Duke, when Stanley would get ready to come out, and then he turned back on, now I ain't going to start that shit, and he'd go back in this spot. But when I first saw them, it's like, I actually liked it because I saw Lewis got his ass whooped so bad. Oh, man, come on. No, I'm going to tell you how and why. Because they were in the studio. There wasn't a lot of people around, but then, you know, after he kind of got established

and, you know, Quincy had called both of them in. Lewis couldn't read as fluent as Stanley. Okay. Lewis couldn't two-finger as fluent as Stanley. Lewis was doing that stuff with the thumping and all that, and then I was standing. You know, I'm like second here. Good.

Somebody showed his ass, you know, without saying nothing. Okay. He needed to be put down, knocked down a few matches, you know. So how did you guys... worked together on the winner's album, which was the first album without Quincy. Like, what was... It was very hard.

I mean, I worked more... It's like, you... From the very first album, I picked the album cover, sequenced the songs, mixed it, took the burn. The cover was dope. And the commercial was dope.

And, I mean, it took a lot to... You know, Quincy was just a producer. Right. We were signed to the label. Lewis didn't want to do anything. A lot of us said, asked George. Ask George.

That's what I'm saying. He never felt it was our group. You know, and even into the Winner's album, he didn't feel cool until he did passage album, which was the Christian album. Right. I had nothing to do with it. And leading up to all that was even with the story with Michael, because he didn't want me to be a part of that because he'd feel like it's all on. That was his thing?

Right. Right. So he could take me out the mix. And since I'm not on it, it saved a lot of questions about was he Quincy? Was he Quincy, Brothers Johnson? Why do you think it was important for him to establish his, or for him to have agency as in this is mine and, as opposed to this is ours? Well, it wasn't.

It wasn't. But, you know, unfortunately, that's the way he grew up. He grew up at home under my mother's apron. Well, if you picture stuff like me and my older brother, and I had to split my time, Lewis would stay home. He would never go out and run and hang. and he almost like get shot at sometime or jump a fence and ride your bikes

and you know he never experienced that he was always a homeboy he was afraid we was hanging out with gangs and all you know not in them but around them right knew him so he was very shielded and that's another reason why him and his first wife split up I'm more than short because she would tell me

George I don't have three kids they get four which is included you know and and when you're like that she would talk to him and we'd be in the airport and I had to tell her to chill on her responses to him when he'd make a comment in his front the whole band it's like she wouldn't you know oh Lewis could acting like a child saying please don't talk to him like that you know he has that you know the same amount respect the band has for me right and you talk to him like that you know it doesn't work for me right so he was a different you know that's why he was so bad a lot of

People who are on the borderline of being a genius, there's something a lot of things they can do and a lot of things they can't relate to. And they're personalized. Right. But they're fucking genius, you know. Yeah, he was a very, like, to himself kind of person in general. Like, you didn't really, like, he wasn't, like, very outgoing, only to certain people. One of the last things I talked to him about on the email, I was working on the project, and I was like, y'all do some. Because I play a little bit, too, a little bit, bass, guitar, keys, a little bit of everything.

And I was like, yo, you know, uncle, I want to, like, do some throwback sound. I want to kind of, like, get your tone. You're like, what, you know, what did you, you know, how did you get that sound? How did you, like in your bass and all that? He was like, oh, yeah, like, you know, I'll tell you. He was like, let me, I was like, so, you know, do I need to go by a vintage music man? I was trying to plant a seed, like, let me have one of your bases. But he, no.

I was like, man, I'm trying to get this sound. How can I, do I need to buy a vintage? He's like, nope, don't buy a vintage music. You need to just get, you know, just buy you a Mexican P bass. What would he use? He used the Music Man Stingray. And what he told, so the whole secret was is when Leo Fender stopped working for Fender and started Music Man.

He kind of, Uncle Lewis was a part in developing the Stingray bass. And so the one that he had was like specifically created for his style of playing. And so they modded the, it was too expensive to mass produce. And that was a part of his sound. So it was like in the, it was in the design of the base to kind of fit his style. And that's why his tone was so specific. And at that time, nobody could get it because it was all, it not only did have to do with his playing, but it was in the actual pickups

and the way that the base was designed. And that's what he told me. He was like, you know, you know, just get a Mexican P-base, you know, cheap and hot rod it. And this is how you do it. And then told me the whole thing. And it was like, don't tell your dad.

Oh, wow. I was like, why? Like, it's like 800 years later. But, you know, people ask me that question a lot, like, about them and the dynamic. And, you know, when I think about it, it's like, yes, it's, you know, everything my pop said, but also you just got to think about it. Like, they're just brothers. Like, if you could just, like, from there, from the beginning, like, they literally had an entire career together as brothers.

Like, you know, I don't know if any of you guys have siblings. Oh, yeah. Yeah, yeah. You know what I'm saying? Like, do a whole career. Not only that, but it's like the whole world is looking at you and y'all, like, you're supposed to just, like, get along. But that's the thing. I never saw it as, like, do you?

George's group and the other guy in the background. Right. The thing is, to me, the Brothers Johnson is, which is weird because I know that, you know, for, I mean, his guitar playing is well documented on those records. But for me, it's like his voice and Lewis's thumb. And to me, like, that thumb and your father's voice are equal partners. No, and also like part of, like, some of the, even though my dad was like, you know, on some, a lot of the records, like writing the parts, guitar parts,

and some of the bass parts even, like we talked about this recently, the reason why it worked and it was such a specific and exclusive sound was because of the two elements coming together. And so even though my dad had an approach and perspective, like he said, like he would bring the Larry Graham element on if he would demo a bass. And even though everybody like, yeah, play it more like that,

you know, my uncle would still take it and do his own thing and make it his own, you know, and used it as a blueprint, but eventually it would just turn into his thing. And it was the combination of all of that that made it do this. It was a balance. It was like this thing that was like, yeah, it was crazy. And I looked at it the same way too. I always thought it was just like, yeah, it's the two of them.

They're part of it. But when I look back, like growing up in it, you know, they were my superheroes. You know, growing up, I looked up to them, obviously. You mind me asking, how old are you? I'm 35. Okay, cool. Yeah. So, you know, I kind of, I was born in 83. So it was like towards the end.

I remember when they were doing the kicking album. I was there for a lot of the sessions and, like, he started a lot of those demos at the house and stuff. And that's when he taught me how to punch in and all that stuff. Okay. But, yeah, like, I, it was crazy to watch it all, like, unfold. And I knew my dad would kind of, like, take, the lead on certain things. But I don't think it was ever, like he said, it wasn't like he just was just so hungry

to take the lead. He just was just like ever since the Johnson 3 plus 1, he just do it because nobody else would want to sit there and write the lyrics out. But they was out playing and shit. Right, someone has to be the alpha. It had to get done somehow, you know, and with my uncle, you know, he was the youngest sibling. So like he said, like he wasn't able to go out and run the streets because he was too young.

He just couldn't do it. And, you know, my dad was like a little bit older, so it was okay for him to be out with the older brother. They getting into trouble and shit. Right. So, you know, I think it was just that, you know, them being brothers. Yeah, that whole thing, you know, that whole thing. And it's interesting because my dad is like the middle sibling. And so there's that.

And then my other uncle, the oldest, he's definitely the big brother. And so they clash a lot of times and bump heads. But I think at the end of the day, they all. still had a mutual respect for each other. And they were bump heads. And even like till right before my uncle passed away, they got together and did the thing with Quincy at the Hollywood Bowl.

And whenever it was, that magic never left. That's the crazy thing about music. It's like once you have that chemistry and that connection, no matter what you go through and how crazy it gets, like every time they would get in the room when they would start, it was just like nothing ever happened. Can I ask a question? Can I ask a question?

No, Amir, you can't. I got to ask a question, man. On street wave, how come the one is really, I always, this feels like a weird, stop laughing at me, Steve, because do, do, do, do, do, do, do. I feel like your brother, your brother emphasizes the two as the one, but you guys are, as the rhythm section, are following the traditional, one, two, three, four. but his, the way he starts, it do, do, do, do, do, do. I always feel like his pickup and his mind was the one.

It's just, because the symbol is emphasizing, it's just like, I feel like it's a dog chasing his tail. Who was the architect of Streetwave? Well, it's basically, you're basically right because there's why people like Harvey Mason would be on the set of John Robinson, and they would use their influence, and they know exactly what to do with Loo.

Louis, drum wise. Okay. You know, because I mean, we've had lots of drummers and a lot of ones that stuck, well, like Harvey Mason, and J.R., who I really loved Harvey Mason. J.R. was cool. He did the trick. Harvey Mason was like one of the cats who was like a drum god to me. because he could pick up, he would play to some of our tracks

and we had the drum machine already in it. We wouldn't be playing with him except for in the headphones. Okay. We would cut it with a drum machine and all of a sudden he'd come in on set and would play it live. Oh, no, for do it.

And I'd just watch him, just how we'd be in the room in this studio reminds me of Studio A and A&M. They have all the big stuff where they do strings and a whole orchestrator stuff. We saw that room, right? We've been there.

That's the We are the world room, I think. Yeah, yeah. And it's so funny, speaking of that, how we got left out of that when we were part of the world. I mean. Ray Charles in sight and Shaka Khan saying, I'll be good to you. Yeah. And that had been me. And it was like four people that should be in the world with Guinness Records.

Quincy Jones, myself, Shakaana, Rachel, all on one song, I'll be good to you, that I wrote. Oh, that's right for Beck on a Block. Like on a Block, yeah, came out. Right. And so I was like, I would look how you look. Well. Well, you still got the publishing. You know.

I hope you did. Half of it. Half of it. I hope you. Yeah. But you knew you weren't surprised, right? No, I wasn't surprised because I knew how the music industry was and you can't come out. So we were signed to a contract.

That's why I want to believe in A&M that you initially signed. They have no idea who you are, what you're going to be. They were so jealous of Quincy because he, until we came, brought him out of jazz. And all of a sudden you hear his love that we're missing. And that was DJ sound. And brought him. You guys definitely brought him into the modern era, the modern music era. And then, and his closure would be, and work for him as to hit on Michael Jackson and do it because Sony didn't want him to do it.

They figured he was just a jazz artist even though he produced us. And he couldn't do the job. Quincy's like perfect pimp in music. Have you Because if you think about it You get You know Rye Temperton

To write some songs Great songs You got Greg Filling Gains You got all these great musicians And I didn't notice that You know I'm not talking about the brother Anything but every time he would get used

There would get used If anybody's getting used They wouldn't really never get the credit They deserved I'd say Greg Filling Gings put in about the certain amount of work that I have done on projects, which then they go eventually give him an Oscar for something.

But what about all the other shit that you did? That was, you know, even more crucial, Michael Jackson. You know, Michael, and then, I don't know if you notice. We discussed that. Yeah, we had film games on the show earlier this year. When he went on his own, a lot of his stuff wasn't that impressive, you know, when he didn't sell as many records. He was trying to get, he couldn't do that back when he first started without being validated by someone who had ears like Mike Quincy and his crew.

I was doing that alone with me and Quincy. Shaw Lewis played the bass and eat his sushi and go to sleep on the couch. But I was the one who had to finish above Quincy. And he knew, I knew, okay, you're hired, you are the producer. you are my brother, you are my father. I respect you the highest because you could teach me more than anybody has taught me from Slidestone to Billy Preston.

We were just grooving. I was friends with them. They'd just play me shit and look at me and smile. Okay. I'm like, damn, you don't play some art. You know, this lie was like, man, if this ain't funky, I eat concrete. wait a minute

speaking of which damn I forgot to ask what was the situation behind this had to be like how you technically did get to work with Michael Jackson

on one song same background yeah this was a track which is weird because black radio used to pimp like this is the duet

with Michael Jackson and brothers Johnson and they would debut it and play it and then I just hear like one mousy in the background exactly

And that's it. Well, he's doing like the da-da. Well, yeah, I know that now. Which my daughter would love because she knew his voice. Right. Took her around when he was doing thriller, Billy Jean, to the studio. But that song happened. That was a beat track that wasn't even supposed to be included in any of our stuff.

We were out on tour. Michael S. to write, get Quincy. you know, one of our songs, he wanted to write with us, but the way he chose to write, he said, okay, go in and see what they recorded this to not using. I never did like this had to be because it was a scent bass.

Seriously? Dude, do, do, do, do, do, do, do. It's like, that don't even sound like you. I dug it. And it wasn't Lewis, because one time he went on a scent-base and he, you know, playing on stage, just said, man, how could you not play your bass?

You weren't known for keyboard, you know? What was the decision to not have him play that baseline? Well, it was no decision. What happened was, it's like when it got to that point, I didn't give a shit or fuck about nothing. To be honest, it's like, you couldn't hurt me no more and you already hurt me, and I still hadn't knocked you up, bottom line. Now, if Michael got the track, he wrote the lyrics,

it was all about Michael Jackson's. I didn't even play guitar on it. That's a pissed I was, I didn't, there's no guitar on there. Damn. Okay, so it's all simple. So it's like Michael got the leftovers. The only thing I did was sang lead. Okay.

And, you know, I didn't plan for it to be a single, nothing. Because it's like, I wouldn't, at that point, We hadn't used that for an album to be put on an album. So I was like, all right, Michael came in with his stupid ass if he wasn't checked. He would have checked with me on, you know, which tune could I have gave him one of mine or written one. Right. So he, like, took a B tune, wrote on it just because of his name, it went forward. At A&M, I read, did they quote, oh, they're only going to release one, we never got more than two songs a hit off of a,

record. So after stomping the treasure, that's it. That's why Quincy in the road with Thriller, and they got eight off of that. That's kind of one of the teachings, but A&M did not want to recognize truth, even though they were Herbalat and Jerry Moss, and we got sold off to Polygram for $250 million, along with the rest of all the other groups.

You know, we're like, I just want to, went into the office with her, Belmont, I said, look, we are men, I'm done. I walked away from at least 2.3 million on my next album that I could have done as a single, but I said, okay, that'll just be sounding like another Brothers Johnson record, so I didn't want to even acknowledge it.

It wasn't that I needed the money, but that was in my contract. My lawyer said they could have paid you, your 2.3 million, you just walked away from. back in the 80s. So I mean, it was a lot, you know, had to deal with politics that I was very frustrated. I kind of knew whether we were locked in.

That's why I was kind of teaching them, showing them back in what I had, picking singles, Janet Jackson, whatever you've done lately, nasty, you know, the Human League thing. I got Sly for John McLean, and Sly didn't want to do it. I twisted his arm to do it. So it was a lot of things where I was the person that could get the job done, even without Quincy. When Quincy, what was his name?

Over at Warner Brothers had bought Quincy's contract from A&M because he didn't even have a million dollars. More Austin. More Austin. Okay. Austin and he gave Quincy put up two million dollars to get out of the deal with A&M. Okay. Okay. When he left A&M, then they told us that we were going to get sued.

If we talked to Quincy, you know, any of that go down. I called Quincy and said, what the hell is, you know? Fuck A&M. Fuck A&M records, you know, and the damn attorney who I couldn't stand, you know. melt old melt old old old old old olden something like that and you can tell him i said that still and kiss my ass that is a quote for you melt melt olin so at the end of the day with all of these demos and ideas lying around like what this phase of your life like what do you want your legacy to be yeah well it is what it is and when i put out my book which maybe we'll

talk because i might go through you through making an audible thing see what i'm saying and would be with love for you to do to do that as basically a starter for this interview and you know um i could i could split it with you Are we making deals? Exclusive, exclusive. Yes, because you're getting... Let me get Sean G in the room real quick. You're getting stuff that people really want to hear from us because they haven't.

And you are getting it so that actually would cut the chase through me writing, which I was going to do anyway. And since it is audible, you already have it on mic. So I would definitely give you the permission. The Sean G's ears. So, I mean, to make it, we can deal with it. And, you know, I give you my numbers and stuff. Well, yeah, we're family now, man.

Yeah, to make it an audible book. So, Troy, what's next for the down the pike for you? Man, just continuing to create. I've been doing a lot of artist development. One of the recent things I did was this boy band called Why Don't We, who just signed the Atlantic Records last summer, developed them all the last year and just kind of you know I think it's just one of the things I picked up from being around it because it was real like as you you know just heard a lot of

development going on and to kind of create this legacy it wasn't just like you know throwing stuff against the wall seeing with stick it was like real work right yeah yeah I've seen what he could do and heard he shows and share things with me and give him the best advice so of, you know, that I can. And we haven't even begun because I still have some teachings I told him, you know, I want to just layer it on him that I've learned from Quincy and Bruce Surrey. And we haven't begun that. We were going to start that today or tomorrow.

Wow. Like, I just let him grow. And I tell him, you know, we'd work on projects together. Yeah, I actually did a record. This is one of the early records I wrote with Solange. Kelly Rowland's first album on Simply Deep It's joint called Obsession

and my dad came and played guitar on it Oh, wow, that's pretty cool, man It's fun Yeah, but I'll do that and won't do nothing else for somebody else who could be bigger Just because Troy That's your boy That's your boy

It's funny because he's crazy Like he actually, like, it's true Like they got this Especially like with a lot of the old school cats It's just this camaraderie That's just like unrivaled Like I remember when You know, even though I've known

you know, the Knowles and, you know, all of them, like, for some time now and work quite a bit with Salange. Like, I never really, you know, obviously, Beyonce is like a huge star. I remember one time, one morning, like, men are in passing one morning, like, I get this call from his A332 number, and I'm like, what, you know, whatever, before 3 o'clock in the afternoon. So, hello, you know, that whole, just like, hello, I speak to Troy, like, who is this? This is B, who the hell is B? Beyonce. say, oh, hey, what's going? What's going on?

What's going on? Well, you know, and she, it was crazy. She was... That's before you knew we were almost possibly related. Oh, yeah. On my mom's sight. Yeah. So she wanted to...

It was for her first solo album. She needed to clear Shugie. Yeah. Yeah. No one could get in touch with. Like, no one knew where the hell he was. But they knew that, you know... I forgot.

Yeah. And I was like, oh, okay. Cool. It's like, well, is this your number? Can I call you? Can we work? One of them? And the numbers are already changed.

It's my number today. Mission was already accomplished, done. You talked through on the phone. You did more than the most. Wow, that's amazing. Well, we would like to thank y'all for coming on the show. Man, thank you so much. And education.

Giving us the time. Thank you for having. Thank you for coming so much. No, thank you both. Thank you both. So on behalf, oh, wait, I think we should also play the initial debacle. We've come so far, yes. Yes.

Oh, yeah. We might as well go ahead. We're going to fade out on the original debacle roll call for you. Roll call stands out there. Anyway, on behalf of the team Supreme Fantigolo, unpaid bill, boss bill, Sugar Steve of the Sugar Steve Network, CEO, and his own brother. Sugar Steve appears courtesy of the Sugar Steve. And Laia.

Oh, wait, you know what I didn't tell? Wait, can you hold up the cover real quick? Yeah. I always share Quest Love Childhood Punishment. Oh. Oh, yeah. So usually as a kid, each year I pick a designated album cover. We're not on TV.

Right, but I just wanted to show you, all right, ladies and gentlemen, go Google right on time of Brothers Johnson album cover. So each year I would designate an album cover that I would emulate for every picture taken. of me. You know, like I was, in 74, it was all the Chris Jasper poses from Live It Up. That was my thing. Or 78 was me making a Tommy DeBarge face from the Switch album. So 77, I decided, okay, all airborne jumping shots holding various pieces of furniture, because I didn't have a base in 77. And somehow at my father's rehearsal, I saw my father's bass player's bass there. And I thought, I'm going to do what Lewis Johnson does.

So I grabbed the bass. I jumped. And I dropped the bass. Nice. And it was Tito Jackson time. Hey. With Joe Jackson. Anyway, ladies and gentlemen, I'll see you later.

Thank you very much. This has been Questlove Supreme, only on Pandora. We'll see you. Let me add this to it. Oh. out in the desert. And it was around the time where the UFOs start, oh, you know, the UFO era.

For us in the 70s, it was highlighted a lot. And that guitar right now is currently hanging in a glass case in Troy Studio, which is a 1970-1. One. Stelly Fender Stratocaster. Wow. Great.

Now we know who to rob. Yeah, thanks, Matt. Thank you. Appreciate it. If it comes up missing, you know exactly who to call first. Exactly. It is locked, though. Well, see you later, ladies and gentlemen.

We'll see you on the next go round. Suprema, sub, sub, sub, suprema roll call. Supremma, sub, sub, subprima roll call. Supremma, sub, sub, subprima roll call. Supremma, sub, sub, subprima roll call. Get on the ball. Yeah. Get on the case.

Yeah. Get the funk! Yeah. Out my face. I hate you, mirror. Suprema. Hase you. Suprema,

Roca. Suprema, Subrema, Subrema Roll Car. My name is Pronte. Yeah. I'm in the mix. Yeah.

With thunder thumbs. Yeah. And lightning licks. Roll call. Are you kidding? Are you kidding? Are you kidding? Suprema.

Supremea Roll car. Supriva. Supriva. Supriva Roca. What's the best. Yeah. I arrest my case. Yeah.

If you don't agree with Boss Bill, Yeah. Get the funk out my face. Roll call. Supriva. Sma, Supriamo. Slop me seconds. Suprima.

Suprima. Roll call. It's Lai, yeah. Oh yeah, it's true. Yeah. George Johnson's here. Yeah. I'll be good to you.

Roll call. Suprema. Subima. Suprima. Superma. Suprima. Suprima. Suprima.

Suprima. Suprima. Superma. Roll call. It's sugar. Yeah. The reason I write the shit ahead of time. Yeah.

Because I can't improvise. Fuck you again. Fonte today. Suprima roll call. Supriva, Troi. My name is Troy. Yeah. Troy?

Oh, yeah. Yeah. We both like to talk. Yeah. So hit us up tomorrow. Roll call. Suprema. Suprema.

Superma. Superma. Roll call. Suprima. Sub, Supraima roll call. Oh, wait a minute. This is a bird. This is a bird.

This is a bird. We got to redo it. We've never done. We never missed it. What's Love Supreme is a production of Iheart Radio. This classic episode was produced by the team at Pandora. For more podcasts from Iheart Radio, visit the Iheart radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows. A win is a win.

A win is a win. I don't care what you're saying. Yep, that's me, Clifford Taylor the 4th. You might have seen the skits, my basketball and college football journey, or my career in sports media. Well, now I'm bringing all of that excitement to my brand new podcast, The Clifford Show. This is a place for raw, unfilled conversations with athletes, creators, and voices that not only deserve to be heard, but celebrated.

So let's get to it. Listen to The Clifford Show on the IHeard Radio app, Apple Podcast, or wherever you get your podcast. And for more behind the scenes, follow at Clifford and at TikTok podcast. Network on TikTok. This week on the Sports Slice podcast, it's all about the NFL draft, and we've got a special guest. The director of the NFL's East West Shrine Bowl, Eric Galco, joins the Sports Slice podcast to break down what really matters when evaluating draft prospects. From hidden traits teams look for to the biggest mistakes franchises make to the players flying under

the radar, this is the insight you won't hear anywhere else. If you want to understand the draft like an insider, you don't want to miss this episode. Listen to the Sports Slice podcast on the Iheart radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. And for more, follow Timbo Slice of Life 12 and TikTok Podcast Network on TikTok. When a group of women discover they've all dated the same prolific con artist, they take matters into their own hands. I vowed. I will be his last target. He is not going to get away with this. He's going to get what he deserves. We always say that trust your girlfriends.

Listen to the girlfriends. Trust me, babe, on the Iheart radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. This is an IHeart podcast. Guaranteed human.