A Recap of Some of Our Favorite Moments

Join us for a special journey through the highlights of our season. In this episode, we’re revisiting some of the most inspiring interviews, heartfelt stories, and thought-provoking conversations that have made this season unforgettable. From powerful moments of resilience to connections that transcend generations, this is a celebration of the incredible voices and topics we’ve shared together. Thank you for being part of the Across Generations family—stay tuned for even more!

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:06):
Welcome to a cross generations where the voices of Black
women unite. I'm your host, Tiffany Cross. Tiffany Cross, we
gather a season elder myself as the middle generation, and
a vibrant young soul for engaging intergenerational conversations, prepared to
engage or hear perspectives that no one else is happy.

(00:26):
You know how we do. We create magic, create magic.
We have a lot to talk about in miss work.
I'm coming straight to you on this. Well, one thing
I just find so fascinating about you. Obviously, you're a
self made woman. It was your God given talent that
propelled you to the heights that we've seen. And just

(00:49):
with gratitude, we thank you for championing your art and
being such a voice for black women to look up
to before I was even born. So thank you for that.
One interesting thing about your story, you had the love
and support of black men around you, from your father
to Sam Cook to your peers. I wonder what your

(01:09):
thoughts are today about the black men in your life,
including the black men you're raising.

Speaker 2 (01:15):
Well, where we start, Let's start in my two men, yes,
David and Damon. Being a single parent raising them, I
feel gave me the ability to see and to watch

(01:43):
how they reacted to females being in a home with
a female, and how fortunate I was to have that
and still do have several men friends who basically whenever

(02:05):
they came to the house, sit up and play cards,
to do all kinds of things together, mostly laugh. But
the boys had a male sitting at a card table
with two women playing against them, and it was always
fun for them to see when the when mommy won. Oh,

(02:30):
mommy won the game.

Speaker 3 (02:32):
She beat Okay, sudn't and she beat Yeah.

Speaker 4 (02:36):
I sure did?

Speaker 1 (02:38):
What car game were you playing?

Speaker 4 (02:39):
Gan knuckle?

Speaker 2 (02:41):
And still do yeah. But washing them grow uh. They
also knew the value of life that was given to
them from Jump Street from the day they were born.
They knew they were loved, They knew they were protected,
They knew they had with all the wish to do
whatever it was that they wanted to do, and not

(03:04):
because of my position, because of theirs and I left
another day with their own selves. They could never be me,
No I should they want to, And they found out
early in life that that was so true of themselves
that they could think it, they could do it. That
is my match My grandfather gave that to me at

(03:27):
the age of six years old. If you can think it,
you can do it. And I still believe that and
I've been still that in both of them.

Speaker 1 (03:35):
I want to talk a little bit though. You talk
about your grandfather, I am the lessons he instilled in you.
I know your father had a great influence in your
life and how they shaped you.

Speaker 2 (03:46):
My grandfather, I had said on several occasions and will
continue to say, I felt it was one of the
wisest men they ever walked this area, second.

Speaker 3 (03:55):
Me to Jesus.

Speaker 2 (03:56):
Okay. He gave us the spiritual upbringing that was needed
within our family. He was the ministry, a wonderful, kind
man with a fiery spirit, which I think I got

(04:19):
a little bit from him as well as my daddy,
and I loved him so very, very much. Always would
go to Grandpa and ask him anything, and he would
give it to me. He would tell me the absolute truth.
And I remember one of the sayings that he used
to have, which I still have, why tell alive when

(04:42):
the truth is available and asked for that's very I
like that. I'm keeping that one, okay. He said, Oh,
I'll give you a lot of things you're gonna end
up keeping, I said, okay. My daddy was my best friend.
I supposed to be born on his birthday, but I
was born two days earlier. Anyway, he's still but still

(05:06):
it's okay. He was on the road with me, spoiling
your oarting of which I still am. I love every
minute of being spoiled. I took good care of me,
kept me from the pitfalls of life, and I missed

(05:27):
him terribly. I do as I do my mother. My
mother was also on the road with me. Both of
my parents decided they were going to take care of
their baby, which was wonderful to do. I feel that
all of the men.

Speaker 3 (05:44):
That have been.

Speaker 2 (05:47):
And an evolving emotion around my life have always treated
me like I was a baby, which I love, and
you know, they felt a project good nature towards me.
I don't know if I do that or not, because
I'm a very strong woman and I am, as they say, unfiltered,

(06:12):
and that's because of my grandpa. I said, well, I
tell low and the truth is available. I have no
problems for the truth. Be it something that is wonderful,
something that you feel, oh really, and so you take
that and stride and try to correct it if it
needs correcting, or if you feel it needs correcting. I

(06:36):
say all moments when I have said things that I mean,
if you said, well, you be sorry. You can't handle
it because it's too like that of it. You know,
you don't do things that.

Speaker 1 (06:52):
Or I don't fit this way.

Speaker 2 (06:53):
I don't do things that I feel will come and
bite me in the bus. Yeah, I tried to walk
the pet that heavenly thought that it's paid for me
to walk, and so fun. I think I'd been done
a pretty good.

Speaker 1 (07:11):
Yeah, an amazing job, Missus Warwick, an amazing job job.
I'm so fascinated by your structure that black men provided
you so early on. I will tell you my father
passed away, but he was my best friend. I was
almost twelve when he passed away. But we were like this,
We were peas in a pod. My grandfather also had

(07:31):
a very outsized role in my life. They were from
Georgia and he was just, you know, a different kind
of guy. And we used to go apple picking in
the fall and he would pick apples right off the
tree and just bite them. And I said, eh, one
day's a granddad. That is nasty. And he said, oh girl,
a little bird pee never heard anybody else. It was

(07:54):
just that kind of guess when I hear you talk
about your grand I felt the same way. I thought
my grandfather was the wisest person. And so as we
talk about the role that black men have played in
our lives, I'm reminded that there are some people who
did not have that same testimony like you Astley. Yeah,
I'm a little envious. I'm not gonna lie.

Speaker 2 (08:12):
Yeah.

Speaker 5 (08:13):
Unfortunately, my father passed away two days before Christmas, right
before I was born in April, and so I never
got that sense of you know, it just felt like
a piece of me was always missing, and I was
always searching for this ghost of who my father was
and would try to like hang on to stories or
create who this man was. But my mom, she was

(08:36):
a young, she was young, she had three children pregnant
with me. I just admired her strength to be able
to survive the loss of her husband. But also like
I had older brothers that I felt like they should
have or I wish that they would have offered more
of that familiar role and you know, offered that like

(08:57):
guidance and wisdom, But it just wasn't there. And so
when I hear stories and I listen to you ladies
talk about, you know, your grandfather's presence and your father's presence,
I always just longed for that and really missed out,
and you know, kind of had like a grudge or
resentment that I didn't get that you know, protection, or
that care or that guidance or that love that I

(09:18):
think young girls and just women need in their lives.

Speaker 1 (09:21):
Yeah, when the two people in your life who are
supposed to love you the most, your mother and your father,
when those relationships are strained or go awry, it impacts
how we live our entire lives as adults. So, doctor Joy,
I was starting with you, tell me what was the
relationship with your father.

Speaker 4 (09:41):
It was interesting in that my mother and father divorced
when I was one, so that's very early. And at
that time, my mother and I moved to California, so
I lived there for several years before my grandmother got sick.
So my relationship with my father wasn't in existence. But

(10:03):
then when I went back to Mobile, then we did
have a relationship. He would come and pick me up
every weekend, something similar to what you had with your father.
But then when I moved back to California, then it
began to be strained again, somewhat impacted by my stepmother.
There were some conflict there. When I would go back

(10:26):
to Mobile for visits, he was ever present, So it
was like if we were in each other's company, there
was a relationship. When I was out of sight, it
was like I was out of mind. That was the
strain that was there.

Speaker 1 (10:40):
Yeah, well, who was responsible for Like did he proactively
call you and see you or as a child?

Speaker 3 (10:47):
Were you adult?

Speaker 1 (10:48):
Eis in a way where you were the one keeping
that relationship alive.

Speaker 4 (10:52):
I would say I was the one that was keeping
that relationship alive while I was living in California.

Speaker 1 (10:58):
I mean, it's hard to kind of comprehend that as
a child. But how did that make you feel that?
I guess did you feel like this relationship was not
viable on its own if you were not the one
keeping it alive? And if so, how did that make
you feel?

Speaker 4 (11:11):
It's very challenging, and the reason why I'm saying is
very challenging. Many times, when people go through a divorce,
one of the parents or both parents often feed a
lot of negativity into the relationship speaking about one parent
versus another. But my mother didn't do that. My mother
was very kind in that whatever your father is, he

(11:35):
will reveal it. And so that was always the message
in the back of my head that I'm going to
see who you are, who I am to you, and
who you are to me. You will demonstrate that. So
building that relationship or continuously making the conversation that was
frustrating because I felt that he should have. However, I

(11:58):
had another savior say, and that was my stepfather. So
he stepped into the role. So I didn't feel abandoned.
I had some issues of abandonment of why not me,
But looking at the dynamics of his relationship with his
wife and my brothers, that was different.

Speaker 6 (12:19):
Yeah. But your question, yes, your stepfather stepped in and
loved you appropriately, like he was present in your life.

Speaker 4 (12:27):
Oh, by far still is today.

Speaker 6 (12:29):
I feel like sometimes his mother is we remarry hoping
that that void gets filled. Did that fell the void
of your father being absent or now? Oh?

Speaker 4 (12:37):
Definitely, because he loved me. I'll give you a.

Speaker 3 (12:41):
Story, and this is very funny.

Speaker 4 (12:44):
I wanted to go to a dance that was taking
place at a club and my mother said definitely, you
can't go. And I said, I know what to do.
I'll go to my stepfather and I'll ask him. And
he told me. He said no, you can't go. And
I was so angry and I was so hurt. I
began to cry and he just held me and said, baby,

(13:05):
that's just not the place for you to go. Yeah,
that's the It's not that I don't trust you, I
don't trust them. So he stepped in in a different manner,
or he stepped in as that father father figure to
secure me of understanding. It wasn't just a no, it
was I'm protecting you for the rest of your life.

Speaker 1 (13:24):
How old were you, oh, fourteen? Fell a teenager. Yeah,
that's why I think it's so important to acknowledge that, yes,
black men are presents in our lives, whether they're biological
father or not. There are fathers who are out there
doing great things. And I hate this narrative of this
like absentee black father, because they do exist. But Eric,

(13:46):
I'm happy that you brought this up because your fatherhood
story is different I think from doctor Joy. So tell
me your relationship with your father and your story.

Speaker 6 (13:57):
Okay, So I have a mother, and and until I
was like twenty six, twenty seven, my understanding of them
being my parents was that they were my parents. I
didn't find out so I was twenty six that was adopted,
So that so.

Speaker 1 (14:15):
Neither of your parents are your biological parent.

Speaker 6 (14:17):
Neither one, neither one of them. Growing up, I did
not know that I was adopted by black people. I
think it'd be different. I was like an Asian household, right,
like everyone was Caucasian.

Speaker 7 (14:28):
They were not.

Speaker 6 (14:29):
Yeah, And I member my grandmother. My mother always said
Jesus makes everyone different. And when you were in a
big black family, there are different shades of black, so
it wasn't uncommon. Some of my cousins have the same
mother and father, and there is one that's lighter skinned
complexion and one that's not. Yeah, So I didn't look
around it and say anything. We were all African American everyone,
so I did not question it. Ever, I wasn't loved wrong.

Speaker 3 (14:51):
I wasn't.

Speaker 6 (14:52):
I didn't spend like the first five years in foster care.
I was adopted from birth, so within forty eight hours
I was there in their custody. So it wasn't until
I got to be twenty six, twenty seven that figured
out that they were not my biological parents.

Speaker 1 (15:10):
How did that feel at twenty seven, twenty six, twenty
seven to have your entire world disrupted? You know, I
kind of felt like the family secret.

Speaker 6 (15:21):
I felt like someone or something along the way thought
that I wasn't capable of understanding that information.

Speaker 1 (15:28):
There's so much conversation about our community, our relationship with
each other, about black men and politics and you know,
their desires, et cetera, et cetera. What is something that
you wish more people understood about black men?

Speaker 8 (15:46):
I think the biggest thing is that black men have feelings.
So so often you hear you don't hear from black men.
There's and that's one of the reasons I do the
podcast because they're just there are men out there that
see the issues that are in the community, and they're
doing extraordinary things, and it needs.

Speaker 3 (16:08):
To be highlighted.

Speaker 8 (16:09):
I mean, for the most part, what are we gonna hear?
We're gonna hear the negative more than likely the negative
stereotypes and even our celebrities, right, I mean, what were
the big things that were going out going on today?
Drake Kendrick, Lamar dis Warse that was I mean that
was huge Diddy and his challenges not not a story

(16:32):
of a black man that wants to transform his community.
You're just not going to hear those things, And those
are the stories that need to be told because I
think the negativetivity and I'm sure we'll get into that
impacts how not just how we view ourselves, but then
how are women view us too?

Speaker 1 (16:50):
So you would say that is that black men have feelings? Yes,
that's what okay, and what about you?

Speaker 9 (16:56):
I was going to go off of that, but to
elaborate on that a little bit, I think that we
don't get enough credit and enough grace, just like black women.
We've all suffered here specifically in America. It's been a
lot of things going on throughout our years and the
generations to carry on. It's a lot of damage in
trauma done. And I feel like for black men specifically,
because it's been labeled that as men we're not allowed

(17:17):
to have feelings and outwardly speak about how we feel.
It leads people to kind of disregard the way we feel. Therefore,
the way we show up is different a lot of
times in spaces where we don't feel comfortable or heard,
So that internalization just turns into more anxiety built up
in black men. So I think that I think people
need to understand that we deserve grace and we want

(17:39):
to be better for our families in our communities. And
I think a lot of times the narrative basically says
that we don't really care. We don't care about our kids,
we don't care about getting jobs, we're not as ambitious
as black women. They pit us against each other. When
I think that that's a lie. I just think that
we might not always verbalize the way we feel because
we don't feel safe. So we deserve those safe spaces

(18:01):
and that comes with being given grace by everybody.

Speaker 1 (18:04):
Do you feel safe with black women? Are you saying
you feel unsafe in society?

Speaker 3 (18:10):
I think anxiety in society in general.

Speaker 9 (18:12):
But a lot of my I'm lucky because I've been
raised by great black women, but a lot of my
brothers have not felt seen or heard in spaces with
black women really, and I think it's just because the feelings.
I think it's just based on some stereotypes of like
how men are supposed to carry themselves even when they're
dealing with hard times. So while they have been supported,

(18:33):
I think sometimes their feelings may have been disregarded guarded.

Speaker 1 (18:41):
Let me know if you need anything sounds like something
that makes you feel better, not the person you're saying
it too. It's like, I'm so uncomfortable being confronted with
your grief. Yeah, the first thing I want to do
is say, well, let me know if you need anything,
and then I can feel good about myself because you
get that off your chest. Right is right, so it
never feels sincere when even though they may be sincere,

(19:01):
it just it doesn't feel. It doesn't land in the
way that they may wanted to bree. How are you
you lost a friend, your uncle, and then you miscarried
a child. What was the thing or are you? Let
me rephrase that, are you getting through your day to day?

Speaker 3 (19:19):
And if so, how I feel like.

Speaker 10 (19:21):
As of recently I am, and if I can be honest,
part of it is numbing myself out. Sometimes I feel
like I disassociate from myself, like doing what so.

Speaker 1 (19:37):
I used to say, I just want to run away.

Speaker 3 (19:39):
I just want to run away.

Speaker 10 (19:40):
I would go on vacations by myself and as long
as I'm by the beach, I'll feel fine. Right until
I realized that I'm trying to disassociate from myself because
these past two weeks I was in Saint Thomas filming
a movie which Jackie would have been a part of.
She was a part of Part one, self produced and

(20:01):
started in our own movie myself, Jackie, oo B Simone
and Ernestine Morrison, and we filmed obviously the first one
and released it while Jackie was still alive. But when
we went to Saint Thomas this past two weeks and
we were there filming Part two, I was like, I
felt the same feeling. I said, I just want to

(20:22):
run away once I started to miss her, and I
was like, but you are away, So what are you
really trying to run from? Yeah, like you trying to
just you're I think I I run away from the pain.
I think I'm trying to run away from my feelings.
I don't want to address them, so that's what I
mean when I try to numb them out. Like I

(20:43):
was sad sitting on the beach. I literally was crying
at the end of day one, like, Wow, if Jackie
was here, she would have loved this or this. I'm
glad that we're doing this and we're honoring her with
this film. But it's sad because she deserved to be
here too. And so that's when I realized, like, oh,
by you saying you want to run away, you're really

(21:04):
trying to run away from feeling it, from actually addressing
how you feel. And so through therapy, I feel like
I am giving myself a space to actually and like
being intentional, sitting down and talking about how you feel
and not being judged. Because when I was going through
the thick of it, I would have people come over

(21:25):
and when I would express how I felt, even when
you know, the shame and the guilt I felt of
After Jackie passed and I was like, I.

Speaker 3 (21:32):
Told someone I feel like it should have been me.

Speaker 10 (21:35):
They got angry at me, like why would you say
that this. You don't see how this affected everybody, This
would affect us, And it's like I get that you
want me to value my life, but I feel guilty
now for telling you how I Genie you feel.

Speaker 1 (21:50):
So I started to space. It's not a safe space.

Speaker 10 (21:53):
So I think I started to like not even address
how I feel personally, but going through therapy, and like
I said, being and I'm mindful of it, I'm like, no,
this is how you feel.

Speaker 3 (22:02):
And that's okay.

Speaker 10 (22:03):
Like whatever that feeling is, don't judge it. You don't
have to act on it. You don't have to, but
let's feel it and release it and let it go.
Because I think, I think that's a black woman thing.
I think we just suppressed things and just keep going
because I always say I got shit to do, I can't.

Speaker 3 (22:19):
I felt job.

Speaker 1 (22:20):
It's generational too. I mean when you take it back
to the plantation, even you know, as the enslaved, I
mean we we nursed and took care of white babies
while they ripped our children away from us, and we
didn't have a chance to grieve that. We had to
get right back out there and be raped. Yes, right,

(22:43):
and you got to get out there in the field
tomorrow today, right or even because it wasn't no picnic
in the big house, so you were in the big house.
You had to be subjected to the you know, white
the mistress of the homes and her cruelty. And so
we bottled it up, and we passed that along to
our daughters and told our daughters bottle it up and
in our own unique way, keep going, just be strong, going,

(23:06):
or stop crying, or I'll give you something to cry about. Oh,
but I think what you said is so interesting because
a lot of people don't realize that when you work
for yourself, you have multiple boshes because you have deliverables
to all of those folks. Now, when I grew up,
the idea was get that good government job, or get
that job where you can work for decades and hopefully

(23:28):
you'll get to retirement. I was already a working adult
by the time the gig economy launched, so I certainly
could have taken that route. I didn't. That happened for
me much later in life. And so when I had
a show on MSNBC. When that show got canceled, I
have a bunch of women in media who all had
really interesting takes on it. And I will say, Jamel

(23:49):
Hill is a good friend of mine and said, yeah,
you don't have to work for anybody like you work
with entities. You work with people. And that's where I am.

Speaker 11 (23:58):
Now.

Speaker 1 (23:59):
It makes me a little nervous, you know, Fine, Yes,
it's hard. I'm used to that check hidden on the
first and fifteen and when you got to go out
there and kill what you want to eat. I mean
it's you know, separates the women from the girls, so
to speak. And so I'm really still trying to navigate
that and find my comfort in that. I do find
that it can be more lucrative, but you're like, you

(24:22):
got to be a hustler. I so appreciate the comfort
of security that a job like yours offers, particularly being
on the bench. Like, you know, who is your boss?
Do you have a boss?

Speaker 6 (24:37):
Technically I suppose you do on the bench, but you're
you're essentially the CEO of that courtroom.

Speaker 12 (24:42):
You're in charge of everything, not exactly so what I
do now, I'm an Associate Justice of the Appellate Division,
first Apartment, and I'm just happy to say that there
are twenty one justices on that court, and there's a
presiding Justice and her name is the Honorable Diane t Renwick,

(25:03):
the first woman of color to serve as the presiding
justice of that court, even in the state of New York.
And so when we decide cases, we decided a panel
of five. When I was a trial court judge, I
had my own court room, I issued the orders. Now

(25:24):
it's a panel of five, but certainly I was elected
and appointed, so obviously I have a responsibility to the
people of the State of New York, right.

Speaker 1 (25:37):
And they're your bosses well and in some cases right
so to speak, you know, because.

Speaker 12 (25:43):
I'm exactly exactly and certainly the litigants who come before us,
you know, when they file their appeals, when they argue
their appeals, and we have to issue those decisions.

Speaker 1 (25:55):
Yeah, well, what do you think I mean, because you
have this traditional path and you've been syccessful at it.
I mean, that is like the ultimate goal to land
on the bench, particularly if you work in the legal field.
What do you think when you meet someone like Amiani,
who you know is does that make you nervous when
you say yng nor do you think that is the
way to do it? I wish I could have done.

Speaker 12 (26:16):
Well, you know what, And first of all, I told
her money that she's a rock star.

Speaker 1 (26:20):
I like that, you know.

Speaker 12 (26:21):
And the thing is different generations. My mother eighty two
years young, and so she went to high school. She
worked at American Express. She worked her way up from
an encoder operator to working in the office of the CEO,
where she traveled all across the country and the world,

(26:44):
teaching customer service relations. You cannot do that anymore. There
was a time where you can do that in my generation.
I'm fifty six, right, so, yes, you go to college
or have some of the type of trade. But pretty
much it was college, right, and perhaps an advanced degree.

Speaker 3 (27:06):
I did that.

Speaker 12 (27:08):
But I love this generation, you know, the millennials. What
are they doing? I want to be an entrepreneur. I
want to be my own boss. I want to call
the shots. I want to do a trade. So listen,
she has a couple of jobs. I love it, right,
you know that income stream. She's a rapper, she's a podcaster.

Speaker 13 (27:29):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (27:29):
Yeah, it provides a certain amount of freedom. I will say.
I think for me, like I said, it makes me
a little nervous because I think about retirement now, being
you know, a public servant. Sure, your latter years of
life look different financially, it's where you have to create
what that looks like. Have you thought about what life

(27:51):
you're in your twenties? Have you thought about what life
looks like financially in your fifties?

Speaker 14 (27:55):
Yeah?

Speaker 1 (27:56):
Like the retirement plan. Yeah, so you know, y'all say,
rapper and producer, podcast producer.

Speaker 6 (28:00):
I am that.

Speaker 1 (28:01):
But I feel like my my best gig.

Speaker 15 (28:04):
Is the real estate forgot you know, so I bought
a house off hustling, off my gigs, and now I
rent out rooms in my house and I'm saving up
that money so that I can renovate my shit and
turn that into another house eventually by another house, you know.
So that's where I really see this going. Real estate
is where it's really I see a lot of income

(28:26):
for me, and but even that's scary. Me and my
mom were just talking about it. I'm like, well, what
if nobody cook? You know, people times are hard, and
so I had a tenant move out a few months ago.
It took me a few months to get another tenant.
That's the that's the part they don't tell you.

Speaker 1 (28:42):
You know, in those months, you have to spend your
own money, my own money, and pay my mortgage, which
it is what it is, that's my responsibility. But that's
the part they don't tell you.

Speaker 15 (28:51):
Did do real estate, you know, you know, and it's
it's it's not as easy as it looks, but it
is what it is. Is it's what I chose, And
I feel like that's really where I see my path going,
and that's where I see my retirement going going.

Speaker 1 (29:08):
I love what you said about you don't go looking
for the music like you create, you are are discipline
you you let the music come to you. Yeah, is
that how the process was for you?

Speaker 16 (29:18):
I think when you're real creative, you just have to
find your own voice. And a lot of times, if
you're going out and you're looking for other things with
other people, you'll subconsciously even take something from somebody else
without even realizing.

Speaker 1 (29:29):
Yeah.

Speaker 16 (29:30):
Now we're not talking about copyright in frens with that's
another but just being inspired.

Speaker 3 (29:34):
Yeah, being inspired, and yeah, I.

Speaker 16 (29:38):
Would say that a lot of times creatives tend to
get into their own bubbles and create their own stuff
and then sort of that's how you create a sound
that works for you.

Speaker 3 (29:46):
So that's super powerful.

Speaker 1 (29:47):
Yeah, when people ask me like, who do you listen
to me? Yeah, that's not me, that's not me being vain.

Speaker 17 (29:52):
It's just no, I'm just like creating a lot, and
it's like I do I need to listen to it
over and over again and kind of sit with it
and experience it so that I can figure out what
I want to change or you know, yeah, I.

Speaker 1 (30:03):
Just got to sit with it a bit. Yeah, I
you know, I'm talking about how like the industry has
changed and it occurs to me. The industry change for
you because like now I feel like you have to
be a personality, you know, like oh yeah, very much so,
and people see you before they hear you, absolutely, and
you have to have like stage presents all these things.
But it was kind of the same for you because
then it was the era of music videos, yes, and

(30:26):
so you weren't just on stage with a mic like
you had had a fit, you had had a dance
moves down.

Speaker 6 (30:32):
And then you know the same people who were like
this music is trash, like those were like we have
all these music videos.

Speaker 1 (30:39):
You just had one mic and five people right right
jockey exactly exactly. So the industry is always changing. So I,
you know, I don't want to become a curmudgeon. But
as you were talking about those people, I was trying
to think of, like who I listened to. There's an
independent group Tank in the Bangers.

Speaker 3 (30:57):
Yes, I.

Speaker 1 (30:59):
Love them, They're so good. Okay, you like you with
like okay there, yeah, I've heard of Dope. Yeah I
need to.

Speaker 3 (31:07):
I literally happened upon her. She's Dope.

Speaker 16 (31:10):
She's very like in a shy pocket, which is why
to your point, you have to be careful about what
you say. And it's interesting because she did a shy
A cover, so it's kind of like hard to unhear.
You don't want to typecast, you don't want to be
type casted. You want to just represent yourself.

Speaker 15 (31:24):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (31:24):
So yeah, but where do you think the industry is going?
Because we talked about like where it's like, where where
it's been and where we are now. But for a
younger person who's navigating this space, where do you think
it's going. I think we're doing.

Speaker 17 (31:40):
Away with superstars or like stars. Yeah, I don't think
that's going to be much of a thing anymore. I
think it is going to start being more of like
you find the artists that you really appreciate, You kind
of find your niche and you dive into that. I
don't think it's going to be like, oh, you're like
toring all the time, or if you are, it's just

(32:01):
very like small, like more intimate spaces.

Speaker 1 (32:04):
Which I kind of would appreciate honestly, more authentic.

Speaker 3 (32:09):
Yeah.

Speaker 18 (32:09):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (32:10):
How do we feel about award shows like the Grammys?
For instance, Well, you are you are a Grammy winner.

Speaker 16 (32:18):
Grammy nominee, any time two time Grammy nominated artists how
do you feel about the.

Speaker 3 (32:23):
Grammys in general?

Speaker 16 (32:26):
But I feel like award shows in general have become
opportunities for corporate sponsorship and corporate placement, right. I think
it's more based on relationships with labels who have the
money to make sure that this artist is upfront. And
I've been in some of those rooms where we're supposed
to be. I've been invited to be in that circle
of people who are like, hey, this is a really
important record to amplify, and it still ends up being well, yeah,

(32:50):
but this person over here sponsored five commercials, so we're
going to do I think it is disappointing to see
that it has become more of a marketing opportunity for
corporate you know, situations than art.

Speaker 1 (33:04):
Yeah, how about you.

Speaker 17 (33:07):
I think I've always been told to care about that stuff,
but I just naturally didn't.

Speaker 1 (33:12):
Like if I want to gramy, okay, great.

Speaker 17 (33:15):
But I think because of the purpose behind, like why
I chose this path of like pursuing music, what I'm
trying to do with music is far more important than
an award.

Speaker 10 (33:25):
You know.

Speaker 1 (33:26):
Well, I have to tell you as a consumer, I
can't tell you who won out Best Album last year. Yeah,
A year before that year before, It won't influence if
I buy that album or not. You know, I but
I do. I do download and like stream a lot
of music, And I wonder, am I part of the
problem as a consumer? Am I hoping to destroy this
great medium that has meant so much to black folks?

Speaker 3 (33:47):
You know, I don't think so.

Speaker 16 (33:49):
I think again, it's one of those situations where if
that's what you're if that's what we're exposed to, because
that is what the corporations have put the money behind
making sure it's on the head, the front of the
streaming sites or whatever.

Speaker 3 (34:02):
You know, what can you do except to word of mouth?

Speaker 16 (34:05):
Jill Scott is a classic example of I think the
last time a word of mouth project really made a
difference because if you think back and you're familiar obviously
with Jill Scott, Okay, I think her first album was
who was Jill Scott? And the whole campaign was we
didn't know that this was Michael Jordan's label.

Speaker 3 (34:22):
We didn't know. We just we hear this music and we're.

Speaker 16 (34:25):
Getting into the music before we even see who the
artist is, right, and then we're like, yeah, she changed
the game. So I think when you have an opportunity
to have authentic marketing where people can really just immerse
themselves in the art and it's not all about the
commercial stuff.

Speaker 3 (34:38):
We get back to that.

Speaker 16 (34:39):
We're good, but right now we're just you know, most
of the people in the audience at the award shows
are corporate.

Speaker 3 (34:44):
Guys and bring their friends to see all the people want.

Speaker 1 (34:48):
It's not real? Does fame have a negative impact on
creating arts? And you have this it's not responsibility to
try to be a good example because it makes you
set the bar higher. Would you like to go to
ward in look like yes everything, Yes, But I do

(35:13):
think that the importance of what you're saying is that
you were classically trained. Do you know, like not only
in your home were you classically trained, but you went
and studied and you know, got a degree and you
were an educator, and I think your ability to teach
directly impact your ability to learn. So it does make
me We'll come back to that because I do want

(35:35):
to talk about that, but it does make me wonder
about you, Amari, And I'm wondering is their contrast and
how Ms Moore got her start versus how you got
into the industry, is.

Speaker 18 (35:44):
There's a contrast.

Speaker 13 (35:45):
But at the same time, from what I was gathering
from your story is the journey you know from even
from the beginning. So I come from an entertainment family.
So we're from Jacksonville, Florida. So both of my parents
were in the arts in different ways. So my dad
was more in production, my mom was in front of

(36:06):
the camera. Her dream is to become a Broadway actress. Yes,
that is like to this day, we're really hoping, we're
praying she don't have that moment.

Speaker 1 (36:14):
I love it.

Speaker 13 (36:15):
But my journey with dance started from my older brother.
He was more of the dancer and I got into
it just to be around him. Twenty four to seven
and around sixteen seventeen, I went to this dance convention
called Monsters of Hip Hop and my family we were
known for bringing choreographers from New York, LA to Jacksonville,

(36:38):
Florida to host master classes because we never nobody thinks
of an amazing dance community when you think of Jacksonville.

Speaker 18 (36:47):
So through there I was getting more insights and getting.

Speaker 13 (36:54):
Just more awareness about what was going on outside of
Jacksonville when it came to the dance industry, and when
I went to Monsters of Hip Hop. It's a big
dance convention that travels the United States and all their
faculty is different choreographers that are choreographing all the pop
artists of that time, and they I got nominated for

(37:16):
the show, and that's when I really realized, like, oh wow,
I can really do this because growing up we did
our local production shows and different things of that nature,
but the dream always was just contained in Jacksonville. There
was nothing really that I saw outside for me, and

(37:37):
just looking at the music videos at that time, there
was no one that truly represented me as well. So
my only hope was seeing someone like Missy Elliott. But
I wasn't trying to be an artist.

Speaker 1 (37:49):
Shout out, yeah, shout out to Missy.

Speaker 13 (37:52):
I Actually, fun fact, I played her double years later
for the VMA's Vanguard Roads.

Speaker 18 (37:57):
Yes, So that was a full circle moment.

Speaker 13 (38:00):
And once I got nominated for Monsters, my parents I
was just finishing high school at this time, and.

Speaker 18 (38:09):
They were like, you got to go to college, you
got to go to college. I did a semester and
I was like, I really cannot.

Speaker 13 (38:15):
I just I love it, but it's not me. I
really want to try and pursue dancing, and so they
were just like, Okay, we'll give you a year to
figure it out. If you make this hip hop show,
we'll let you do it. And I actually made it.
I made The Monsters a hip hop show, and that
really just opened my whole world and just exposed me

(38:38):
to a different side of me. And shortly after, at eighteen,
I had went on my first dance tour to Japan.
So since eighteen, I've been traveling the world and the
actually starting off as a teacher, I wanted to pursue
backup dancing first off, but they were just like no.

(39:00):
The industry, it was a whole bunch of nos from everywhere.
So but I still wanted to dance. I still knew
it was in me. That's how I was going to
share my art to the world was through movement. So
that was just like my starting point on how can
you get from all those nose to a yes from
myth knows from the carter? So, oh, my goodness, that

(39:22):
is a journey in itself. Traveling the world, I was
teaching in La NonStop. I had made the big move
at nineteen with my mom, and over the course of
three years, my whole entire family of six had relocated
to LA for all of us to pursue. I loved
our career in the entertainment industry. It was amazing and

(39:45):
I started I had started getting more opportunities along the way.
My first big yuess was Janet I had I have
worked with Lady Gaga already.

Speaker 18 (39:54):
Jackson, Janet Jackson, Yes, I come on and.

Speaker 3 (40:00):
Janet, did you know me?

Speaker 1 (40:01):
Come on? There's different rules for different clubs, so you
have to know the rules when you go into that club.

Speaker 6 (40:11):
Have you ever worked at a place where they can't touch?
Yea a blaze okay, and they were like grinding. Yeah,
it was a mess. He didn't like and I didn't
like it.

Speaker 1 (40:19):
And what happens behind the curtain anything really depends on
who you're dancing. Girls just going there dance. I've been
in there, but it was strictly just talking. Somebody made
me for my time. Yeah, but I stayed away from
it because I do know what can't what it can
lead to. So are there people paying for sex? Really
that's happening?

Speaker 3 (40:36):
Yeah?

Speaker 1 (40:37):
Was that happening when you.

Speaker 3 (40:37):
Were in Oh definitely?

Speaker 6 (40:39):
Yeah yeah, oh yeah, But but when you were dancing,
they couldn't touch Oh no, they were touching.

Speaker 1 (40:45):
They were.

Speaker 19 (40:46):
So it all depends. So I danced in three different
dawn was they're pretty much.

Speaker 4 (40:52):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (40:52):
So there was a peach show.

Speaker 19 (40:53):
Then there was the burlesque dancing that I danced on
the stage. And then you had the dancing clubs where
it's like the griming and you know, and the touching
and the poor and then the you know, the more
disrespectful than anything. So in New York you had a
bunch of different clubs that you was able to go to.
But no, it was very much touching. Yes, but when

(41:16):
I first started in the club, there was no where
was a peep show. It wasn't really a club so
to speak. And they would drop the money and the
window would go up, and then you know, you would
entice them and dance them dance and there was no
touching with that. But then as time went on, then
the glasses and the plastic windows went away and then
you're able to reach it they hud.

Speaker 20 (41:36):
And so yeah, it was different. Did you ever disrespected
and the lad dancing clubs?

Speaker 3 (41:43):
I did.

Speaker 19 (41:44):
I ventured out with some friends, you know, because they
were like, well, come on, we're gonna go uptown. You
know we're gonna try this this other club. I was like, okay,
let me go up there, and so I went there,
and by time I changed in my clothes and went
from the dressing room to the bar to get at
to get the drink, I was called squeezed.

Speaker 6 (42:03):
I'm like, what is it if I'm downtown you paid
to touch me? I met and felt up and squeezed.
I don't like this plub Yeah, disrespectful and you know
know what it's you know what you're doing, blah blah
blah blah, Like, okay, they were disrespect I don't say

(42:23):
people know how to differentiate, like it's entertainment where they're
to entertain.

Speaker 3 (42:27):
I'm not there to find love. I'm not there to
make for Like it's entertainment, Yeah it is.

Speaker 1 (42:32):
Do you feel disrespected?

Speaker 6 (42:34):
I have, but I also realized, like, hey, I am
button naked in front of people, but that doesn't give
them the right Tom you know, disrespect me.

Speaker 1 (42:40):
But I shut it down immediately though, so well, it
was an incident where you felt disrespect.

Speaker 6 (42:46):
I had a dance for a guy for probably an
our feet hurting, and he did not pay me, right,
So I was like, you know you owe me money.
You asked me to dance, and he felt like he
didn't owe me that much. I'm not a shy like,
I'm not a shysty person. Like what you owe me
is what you owe me. Yeah, I got people in.

Speaker 1 (43:02):
Their state they will add an extra hundred two hundred.
I don't do that like what you owe me.

Speaker 6 (43:05):
And he didn't just say, Look, we do this either
way or the hard way. Because I don't get security,
they're gonna probably beat you up. Yeah, he stood up,
looked over me like he put his head like. I
was like, oh, you're gonna like you're gonna buck at me, cousin,
don't or a back. I went got security and they
beat him up. They took this man in his pocket
and I got paid. But when he was Bugglan was
he like physically he was in my face like I'm like, oh,

(43:25):
you're really gonna hit Men't worry about it.

Speaker 1 (43:28):
I ain't arguing him up.

Speaker 3 (43:29):
When got security.

Speaker 20 (43:30):
In the end of there, the challenge is walking through
the hallways. In the hallways that I came through, I
never saw people like me. Whether that's behind the camera.
We wasn't even pushing the brooms right I mean we weren't,
you know, because the industry is so incestuous that they're
gonna give your c student cousin an opportunity before you
give the most talented. And so as a black woman

(43:51):
coming up in the media business, I had to really
scrap for a seat at the table. And then I
understood when I got there, I better have a really
damn good question. Yeah, I better be really strategic or
really smart or understood that I earned a seat to
be there, and be really smart about how I navigated.

Speaker 3 (44:06):
And we're going to talk about now how.

Speaker 20 (44:08):
All that's changed and how I made a decision because
I wasn't paid what I was valued because my voice
was big, because.

Speaker 3 (44:15):
I had so much experience, and I was strategic to.

Speaker 20 (44:17):
Work for a network, then work for a digital and
then work for an agency to understand three sixty that
I can.

Speaker 1 (44:22):
Actually just make some money for myself. Yeah.

Speaker 20 (44:24):
So now I sit here as a CEO of Expected Media,
working with black creators so that they can have a voice,
have a place, and actually monetize their intellectual property, which
is themselves instead of giving it away for free on
social media.

Speaker 1 (44:38):
Yeah, which we do a lot. But I love how
you talked about you ventured into the table when the
industry was still flourishing, which I think your generation Sydney
probably doesn't even remember because in the eighties, I remember,
we used to just have like three TV channels and
then when Table came about, it was a big deal.
But the cable providers had to find content to fill up,

(44:58):
you know, twenty four hours of programming. So it has
definitely been a change. So talk to me about your
journey in media.

Speaker 3 (45:06):
How old are you.

Speaker 14 (45:07):
If you don't mind me asking, I'm thirty two years old.
You're thirty two, okay, And so I mean, I feel
really honored to sit here with both of y'all because
I feel like I have so much to learn. I
have many questions with me too.

Speaker 1 (45:16):
You well, I'm thirty two too, so we're the same age.

Speaker 17 (45:21):
Two.

Speaker 14 (45:22):
But I mean like I feel the knowledge like emanating.
So I grew up, I mean, I guess comparatively to
some of y'all in here, like with an embarrassment embarrassment
of riches. I grew up reading my mom's Essence and Ebony. Yeah,
I grew up reading Rolling Stone and Double Xcel, which
is a hip hop magazine that I went on to
work for for a little bit, I read the Source,

(45:43):
I came home and watched TRL and one on six
in park Like that was my media and music.

Speaker 3 (45:49):
Diet growing up.

Speaker 14 (45:50):
And I saw a lot of versions of myself in
those pages and on screen. Now, were those versions sometimes
flatten or codified or manufactured in the vein of somebody
who doesn't have my interest in heart?

Speaker 6 (46:05):
Sometimes?

Speaker 14 (46:06):
Yes, But I never grew up thinking that there wasn't
really a way for me to get in on the
journalistic side. I mean, Dream Hampton wrote so many of
the most pivotal music and culture articles that I ever
read growing up. And it's so funny to see now
that there's actually a documentary out about her early days,

(46:29):
covering hip hop from nineteen ninety three to nineteen ninety five,
and she's in that footage and she's very much still
trying to find her hip hop feminist voice in that
and it's just such a beacon for someone like me
who's also trying to push those narratives and push those
cultural conversations forward, even in hip hop now twenty three
years removed. But yeah, I definitely grew up in the

(46:52):
age of dialog and aim and appointment viewing how we
were talking about are you all were saying before? But
now it's so much more transition. We're in the midst
of what they call the attention economy. And so you
can opt in and subscribe and like and leave your views,
which you should definitely do on all the podcasts you

(47:14):
listened to, because that's Learys right. So you have to
speak on it because that's how you know, like what
the health of the show is to be the longevity
hitting that like button opting in or or choosing to
opt out from something that's going to speak a lot
of volumes. And even now when we have social media
apps like like I mean rip vine, but vine walk

(47:38):
so TikTok and run in a lot of ways and
a lot of uh and a lot.

Speaker 1 (47:42):
Of social circles and social conversations.

Speaker 14 (47:45):
But now you can be what we call content creator
and an influencer, and you can put your voice out
there and you can create an entire platform for yourself.
It's not even like you need to walk in and
like pay your dues at viacom or it's not like
you need to be working in a mailroom at your
favorite magazine to move your way up.

Speaker 1 (48:01):
You can put your point of view and your voice
out there.

Speaker 14 (48:05):
I mean with varying degrees of success, because now everybody
got a voice, everybody get graphones and everybody.

Speaker 1 (48:12):
A lot of people want to just be loud and right. Right.
A lot of times are loud and wrong. As we
talk about our own experiences. There are things that happen
with black women that when they do step up and
say this is the thing that happened to me, it's
not always well received by society. You know, our abuse
is dismissed, our pain is you know, discarded. Really it's

(48:36):
this false perception as it is in the medical industry
and the mental health industry. Like you strong, you could
take it. And so I want to talk about some
specific things that happen in a segment that we like
to do on this show. The streets you're talking, so
you know, what are the streets saying about our pain?
And I'll start with Chassie and Diddy. I heard a
lot of people immediately start to say, oh, was that

(48:58):
a cash grab? We skipped right past all the accusations
of abuse. We skipped right past all of her accusations
about physical abuse, emotional abuse. We skipped right past that
she was nineteen trying to make it in an industry
where this man was a mogul and significantly her senior.

(49:19):
Your take on that, why do we do that?

Speaker 7 (49:21):
It's this phenomenon where it just feels like people want
to discredit black women when we say that things have
happened to us. I mean, I think another example would
be like with Meg the Stallion and that whole situation,
if people were constantly looking for reasons to discredit her
from what she had to say about the shooting incident,
and I don't understand it. It's really disheartening, and I

(49:41):
think it's also disheartening when we see these women who
do have a level of privilege and power and access
be so quickly dismissed or people try so hard to
discredit them. For the everyday person who experiences abuse and
experiences these things probably feel discouraged and like, Okay, well,
if this woman who has this fame or these resources
isn't believed, would I be believed?

Speaker 1 (50:02):
I have to say I didn't really follow the Tiana
Taylor divorce situation as closely, but my understanding is she
was trying to protect their privacy and her now ex
husband soon to be ex husband, expose their their their
private divorce proceedings.

Speaker 7 (50:22):
Yeah, details of their divorce were made private, and I
think in the details were just some of the details
about their relationship and about some situations where it it
just seemed like what their relationship was really like wasn't
what met the eye. And for a while, it seemed
like she really tried to keep up appearances even when
announcing their separation. And with that, people also tried to

(50:45):
discredit what was in the divorce filing itself. And I
just don't know if I understand this need to either
in situations like that discredit somebody when they're sharing their
lived experience, or in a situation when we think about
you know, Keiki Palmer make the stallion, this need to
defend abusers. Yeah, I just don't understand it, But it happens.

(51:07):
We see, We've seen it happen in all of those scenarios.

Speaker 1 (51:10):
We saw on you know, Whitney and Bobby Brown. We
treated the two people clearly battling addiction. We treated it
like entertainment. So I mean we go from you know
to it's entertainment. We will tap dance on your misery
because it makes us, you know, laugh or you know,
gives us, you know, fodder to talk about it at

(51:32):
brunch on Sunday to well, you know, Cassie was us
out here trying to you know, get her paper. He's
on a paper chase. I wonder, Tasha, if some of
that is because we have been so abused in society.
We asked young black girls. Maybe not now, but there
was a time period where we asked young black girls

(51:52):
the whole pain. They didn't ever understand the whole you know,
if the ten year old girl was sexually abused by
a family friend or an uncle, we did not always
turn in that uncle because we asked this black girl
to hold that pain. But we understood the white man's
criminal justice system was so cruel that we couldn't imagine

(52:15):
turning one of ours over to that. So we expect
this little girl manage that pain, swallow it, hold on
to it because we know he was wrong. We got
to protect him, and we had to protect you. So
I wonder if there's some sort of callous attitude of well,
my mother survived, or I did this, or this happened
to somebody I know, and we took it on the
chin and kept moving. How dare you put our business

(52:37):
out there in the New York Times? How dare you
come out with this story and talk about this black
man who was this mogul?

Speaker 6 (52:43):
Is there?

Speaker 1 (52:44):
Could that be part of the reason why we do that?

Speaker 3 (52:47):
I think there's a number of things.

Speaker 21 (52:48):
I think all that took what you said, But I
think one, let's be honest, and you know, I keep
bringing up and I don't know why it's coming up.
I keep bringing up this for us to really unpack
capitalism is why we perpetuate pain, pain pains in this country. Right,
there is an exploitation of pain on multiple levels.

Speaker 6 (53:07):
Right.

Speaker 21 (53:08):
If I keep you in pain, then when if I
have something that's gonna make you feel better, you're gonna
buy it from me, right, And so there's kind of
this culture that is constantly exploiting of pain. And we
see how the media that creates, like you look at
the news, ninety nine percent of the news is literally
telling us about all things that are really painful and

(53:29):
harmful and valid. That's happening, right, Like there's this idea
of because we do respond, our mind gets attention, like
we see something at pain, you know, And so there's
something around this exploitation of pain that I think has
been a constant thread in this country. I think it's
been a constant thread that black pain doesn't matter that's
been in this country. And I certainly believe that there

(53:50):
has been a larger context that has been because of sexism.
I believe in patriarchy around women's pain is expected.

Speaker 1 (53:59):
You know, just hearing you say that, I think I
was so stunned if someone slapped me, even if we'd
had an intense argument for you to put slap me
across the face. You know a lot of people say
I wish he would and I will fight back, but
the truth is, in most instances you're not going to
be able to overpower a man. And so when you

(54:20):
say there was a scuffle, was it your instinct to
strike back or did you just try to cover and
protect yourself?

Speaker 3 (54:28):
It was a little of both.

Speaker 11 (54:29):
Because I'm five four hundred and thirty pounds, that was
probably one hundred and twenty back then. He's six to
two hundred and thirty pounds. There's no contest when a
man hits a woman. So you're right, the first thing
was stunned, And I'm like, what the hell you know?
And then all of a sudden, you know, I get up,
you know, and I'm trying to defend myself, you know,
and it just, you know, recreating that kind of thing

(54:50):
is kind of tough too, but it just went from
bad to worse.

Speaker 1 (54:53):
Yeah, Ariel, I imagine this story you can certainly relate
to as best you can.

Speaker 6 (55:00):
You tell me your story. My name is Ariel. I
am thirty three. Like you said, I'm a single mother
of five children. All of my children are not from
my last marriage that ended in domestic violence. So I
went into my marriage with two kids already and then
we had three together. I can really resonate with you

(55:22):
when you said the substance abuse, I don't know. I
just the black men in my family growing up always
had a drink or a brown whiskey glass or a beer,
but they weren't violent. So when I married someone who
did over drink, it didn't strike me as a red
flag because the men in my life did drink, they

(55:46):
just didn't have the anger with it. It ended in
domestic violence, and it did get worse. If I look back,
it progressively got worse the longer I stayed a hitting
got worse.

Speaker 1 (56:01):
Take me back to the first time it got violent
for you. But do you remember, I remember it was
twenty were you married at this point?

Speaker 3 (56:10):
We were dating and it wasn't.

Speaker 1 (56:14):
It was violent, I think if you're looking from the
outside in. But for me, I mean.

Speaker 3 (56:22):
We were young.

Speaker 6 (56:23):
Everyone kind of argued and yelled, or as so I thought,
And maybe I took it too literal. When growing up
people used to say, oh, you fight for the ones
you love. A good marriage is something you fight for.

Speaker 3 (56:34):
It wasn't.

Speaker 6 (56:35):
He didn't physically hit me the first time, but we
did have an argument. He did have a couple of
drinks before that argument started, and the first time that
I thought that maybe he couldn't control his anger. It
was the slammings of the doors, the punching of the walls,
slamming of the kitchen cabinets, so things in the home

(56:55):
got moved around. There were holes in the wall the
next day. But it didn't start with me getting hit first,
but personal items in the home wouldn't be the same
after an argument.

Speaker 1 (57:07):
Raheem wants to know who are you dating? Why are
you asking, Raheem? Did somebody tell you they were dating me?
DM me? Who said that? And I'll tell you if
it's true or not. That's probably all I got to
say on that one I I have done so I
will always be open with you guys, but I probably
will not be dropping names on this podcast about dating.

(57:28):
But I do appreciate the question. If you did read
somewhere about something or somebody told you they were dating me,
I want to know who, and y'all start a rumor
about me dating somebody hot, somebody fine, so then I
could get with that person. Say you know, they keep
saying we dating and we still figure out how we
want to handle this thing. I'll think about who that
person could be. Y'all let me know who would y'all
like to see me day?

Speaker 3 (57:48):
That's what I want to know.

Speaker 1 (57:49):
Okay, Oh this is from It's Soul one. It's so one.
They want to know my top five albums.

Speaker 3 (57:56):
I like that question.

Speaker 1 (58:00):
Five albums Okay, I don't know if I if these
are in any order, but off the top of my head,
Purple Rain, that's the album I listen to. I don't skip.
And then of course you know it's Prince so Purple Rain.
What else? Uh, Carlo want me to embarrass myself and
sing my favorite song off Purple Rain? What is okay?

Speaker 15 (58:25):
Uh?

Speaker 1 (58:27):
Why am I letting her let me embarrass myself? Maybe
I'm just like my mother. She's never said is by
Why do we scream at each other? This is what
it sounds like when does ki don't don't don't, don't,
don't know? Okay, I'm not embarrassing myself anymore.

Speaker 17 (58:49):
Uh?

Speaker 1 (58:49):
Anywhoo, that's one of my favorite song. Obviously, Purple Rain
is my favorite song, but when does Cry is a
close second. So Purple Rain definitely one of my favorite albums.
What's the four to one one? A lot of y'all
Mary lovers like my life, but what's the four one one?

Speaker 6 (59:03):
For me?

Speaker 1 (59:03):
I do not skip when I remember getting that CD.
This back when people went into the store got CDs.
I remember buying albums, but people went and got CDs and.

Speaker 6 (59:13):
I would just let it play like I Love. Real
Love was like so revolutionary to me. So I love
that whole album.

Speaker 1 (59:19):
I know every word to every song on that album.
So yes, Real Love.

Speaker 3 (59:25):
Mary J.

Speaker 1 (59:26):
Blige another one. I don't say anything. Adele like all
of Adele's albums, but her last album, The One was
easy on me. She always names them her aide, So
I think this may have been thirty, but anyway, that album,
it was just this was the album that she did
after she got divorced and was raising her son. I

(59:48):
gotta say, I ain't divorced. I don't have no son,
but she made me feel like I was a single
mom sitting at home after going through a divorce. What
is it about Adele? Why do her melodies just make
us feel everything? And you know another thing it's interesting
about Adele. Ain't nobody mad about her? And who is it?

(01:00:09):
Rich Rich Paul? That's what she said, ain't nobody mad
about Adele? And Rich Paul like sometimes we mad about
stuff that one. I'm like, you know what, I just
want a Dle to be happy. She's giving us so
many ballots like I want Adele to be happy. We
want Mary to be happy too, And I'm happy. I'm
sorry that Mary went through so many things, but from
her pain, she gave us some beautiful music. So okay,

(01:00:30):
I said, Adele, I'm getting sidetracked, Adele Purple Rain, what's
the four? One?

Speaker 17 (01:00:36):
One?

Speaker 1 (01:00:36):
I got two more? I feel like I got to
do some hip hop in there. Y'all know I love outcasts.
Why Carla is off camera, y'all trying to tell me
to sing my favorite song off each of these. I
am not about to embarrass myself. Flow off, what off?

Speaker 17 (01:00:53):
What?

Speaker 1 (01:00:54):
Oh man? If I gotta pick, when I got to
wrap off of? Okay, let me think, let me think. Okay,
this is not my favorite, this is not my favorite album,
but I will tell y'all, this is my One of
my favorite songs. Is when I was first introduced to Tupac. Y'all, y'all,
some of y'all maybe be too young to no. Tupac

(01:01:15):
used to be with Digital Underground and so we all
knew shockg like we all knew them. But then this song,
same song came out and I was like, who is
this rapping on this song? And it was Tupac's verse
and I was hooked from then. If we gonna have
a Biggie Tupac debate, I gotta say I was a
Tupac girl, like I love Biggie. Don't get me wrong,

(01:01:38):
Biggie had like I had to like. It was no
Google back then, I had to like look in the
dictionary as some of the words he was using. He
was a lyricist, but that Tupac verse, So I'll give
y'all this verse, okay, does this sing on? Okay? This
was Tupac's verse, his first time he was rapping on
the song Digital Underground. Same song. I used to clown

(01:02:00):
around when I hang around with the underground girls, used
to clown say I'm down when I come around, gas
me when they passed me. They used to diss me,
harass me. Now they asked me if they can kiss me,
get some fame? People change one of the life high
same song, can't go wrong if I played a nice
guy claim the fame mustach changes. Now that I became strong,
I remained still the same hy too, because it's the
same song that was Tupac's verse. I was so into it.

(01:02:22):
Carlo got me embarrassing myself, dropping my flow, dropping my
Tupac flow.

Speaker 4 (01:02:28):
But it was a short little verse and I was like, damn, this.

Speaker 1 (01:02:30):
Dude is dope and I like them and anyway, I
was into them ever since. So that's one of my favorites.
It's all of his stuff. I was into all of
his stuff Biggie for sure, but I don't know that
I would put that in like my top top albums.
T I like, he's a rapping dude, But then you
know I got the Showle Ladies and Loves when I

(01:02:51):
was young. The first album I ever bought was Hot
Cool Vicious. And this was literally an album Hot Cool Visious.
Who know who's saying this song hot cool vishoues. I'm
waiting a minute before I tell y'all because I want
y'all to drop in the comment. Don't cheat and google
drop in the comments. Y'all think it is high Cool Vicious.
It was three women on the album cover and one
was in like it was like our shaded red, and

(01:03:12):
then one was like purple, and then one was like
blue and they were all together. DoD y'all give up.
I'm gonna just tell you Salt and Papa. It was
Salt and Papa, How Cool Vicious? That was one of
my favorite songs. Tramp what'd you call me?

Speaker 6 (01:03:25):
Then?

Speaker 1 (01:03:28):
Anyway? That was one of my favorites. The next episode
of Across Generations is now right now because you're tuning
into it, But I do want you to know that
we drop every Tuesday. That's when we drop our audio,
and then every Wednesday is when we drop our video,
So please be sure to subscribe to our YouTube channel.
It is at a Cross Gen podcast. Follow us on

(01:03:49):
Instagram at across Gen Podcast. You can follow me at
Tiffany d Cross on Instagram and share and rate and
review the show on Apple Podcasts. You can get this
show anywhere you get your podcasts. And of course you
can watch the video on YouTube. And I know a
lot of you have friends who only listen to the audio,
and so sometimes I say, oh, my gosh, you didn't
watch it on YouTube, and I'll show them a clip

(01:04:10):
on YouTube.

Speaker 3 (01:04:11):
And they're like blown.

Speaker 1 (01:04:12):
They're like, oh, I never thought that guest would look
like that, or oh when I listened to it, I thought,
you know, I pictured somebody who look totally different. So
I appreciate that there are some people who really like
the audio, and then there are other people who are
just loyal to watch in the video. However you watch it,
we hope you continue to consume this content because it
really is made with you and mine. And I am

(01:04:32):
thrilled and blessed and honored and privileged to take any
amount of your time to have these deeper conversations. We'll
be talking about a lot more topics. We have an
endless bucket of topics that we can talk about each
week with an elder a younger in me. So thank
you for taking the time to tune into this very
special episode. We'll see you back here next week with
an all new episode of Across Generations. I'm Your Host

(01:04:54):
Tiffany Krost. Across Generations is brought to you by Will
Packer and Will Packer Media in partnership iHeart Podcast, I'm
Your Host and executive producer Tiffany d. Cross from Idea
to Launch Productions Executive producer Carla wilmeris produced by Mandy
b and Angel Forte, Editing, sound design and mix by
Gaza Forte. Original music by Epidemic Sound. Video editing by

(01:05:18):
Kathon Alexander and Courtney Deane.