QLS Classic: Doug E. Fresh Part 2

Legendary episode alert! Or should we say an episode with a legend alert!?! Both would be true in speaking of Doug E. Fresh and while you may know the music, what do you know about the journey? Class starts now as Quest and Team Supreme attempt to dive into the life of one of the most important figures in music. Take a listen to part 2!

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Questlove Supreme is a production of iHeartRadio.

Speaker 2 (00:07):
This is Part two. Doug describes a journey to becoming
hip hop star and one of the world's greatest entertainers.
I really like this episode and you will too. I
have a question about the Oh my God record. Now.

Speaker 1 (00:26):
I know that we're in a whole different time period now,
So having grown up in Reagan's America, which was heavily Christian, conservative,
more you know, moral majority, all those things, I can
see I had a different opinion of it when I

(00:49):
first heard it, and of course thirty years later, opinions
have changed, and we now live in a time period
where like we believe that you know, in his choice
and whatnot. But you know, even before Common did retrospect
for life, I remember like how big the abortion song

(01:12):
was on your first album. So what was the what
was the what was the because the thing is like
on that on that debut record of yours. The two
things that my two takeaways was definitely you know, play
this only at night really truly could have been given

(01:34):
Moments in Love a run for its money.

Speaker 2 (01:37):
But like the first New.

Speaker 1 (01:38):
Jack kind of you know, slow join right, and I
just at that point I never heard a rapper really
get topical about anything that wasn't just street conditions or
you know, violence on you know, like day to day violence.

(01:59):
Like you just never heard the rapper rapping about abortion?
What what prompted you? What prompted you to even go there?

Speaker 3 (02:08):
Wow?

Speaker 2 (02:09):
You know because back then.

Speaker 4 (02:10):
It was.

Speaker 3 (02:12):
You yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Well well I'm gonna tell
you two things. And that's a beautiful question. I like
how you slipped that, And I like how you did that.
That was so stupid. And I haven't forgot about.

Speaker 5 (02:26):
You know, we get to trust me.

Speaker 3 (02:31):
No, no, no, but look what happened was, as you
know hip hop, the expression is raw.

Speaker 6 (02:37):
All the Way to Happen is the first song ever
dedicated to God.

Speaker 3 (02:41):
That's before Jesus Walk, that's before anybody ever did it.
It was a chance, it was. All the Way to
Heaven was created because we were happy. We were happy
about what God has given to us. So so when
I'm saying, can I.

Speaker 1 (02:58):
Can I just briefly issue if you for one second
and maybe you could double this answer, because I swear
to God I would I would have killed myself if
I didn't ask this question. Speaking of all the Way
to Heaven, can you please. I think I heard you
explain this once on a radio show back in like
eighty six, and I.

Speaker 2 (03:17):
Could not never find this quote.

Speaker 1 (03:19):
Can you explain the the the the the logic you
had with creating the show as far as its spiritual element,
Like I think I heard you say one time where
you like, so no, no, no, you mentioned something about like like,
oh my god, like he purposely chows, oh my god,
sound body with a six six six six minutes thing,

(03:44):
even like is he real?

Speaker 2 (03:46):
Like it's thought I read this. I don't know if
I dreamed or not.

Speaker 3 (03:53):
If you say is it real?

Speaker 6 (03:54):
Fast?

Speaker 3 (03:56):
Right? So that's that's right. That was how and and
oh my god, you know and kind of like you
know a lot of things for me hopping through dreams,
Like even the show came to me in a dream.
It was like I woke up and something told me
to do it, the same way I just did this
new project about Chuck Brown. It's like this is happened

(04:19):
to me, No, but it happens. It's a real interesting
way that artists create. So what I did, oh my
God is a real I told Barer and Will and
they was like, how you're going to have us cut
these two things at the same time.

Speaker 6 (04:32):
I said, trust me, it's going to work.

Speaker 3 (04:34):
And when they started cutting it, it just became that
was I consciously thinking about the creator. I can't really
say I was. It was just something that was making
me do this. Now, a lot of people thought that
when it was saying six minutes, it was worshiping the devil,
but it wasn't none of that. It was just that
it was a kind of a cool thing in a

(04:56):
way where if you listen.

Speaker 6 (04:58):
I'm more of a rhyme style list.

Speaker 3 (05:00):
So when I'm doing something, it's never gonna be what
you believe it should be. I'm not trying to be
the greatest rapp up. I'm trying to convey an idea
and that's my main focus. So six minutes, six minutes,
six minutes, Dougie vers it's it became kind of like

(05:21):
or like no no, no, no, no, no, we didn't no no
no no no no no no. See, like it's not
a rhyme.

Speaker 6 (05:27):
And then and then if you're think about the show
when it's going on and in.

Speaker 3 (05:31):
The back you can hear.

Speaker 1 (05:34):
Right.

Speaker 6 (05:36):
But because because all of these different pieces.

Speaker 3 (05:40):
Kind of like it was more it was changing the
way and a hip hop artists were to approach things.
I was changing what you considered to be hip hop.
I wanted you to expand. I wanted you to think
that you can't. You don't need just one DJ. You
can use two, you can use three. I wanted you

(06:02):
to think about listen to the rom it's all because
put a song in a rock me shall like, let's
do something different, because you gotta be flashed to rock
with and I'm known for the not like, let's let's
play at the end of the song. I'm doing as
you can see most definitely, I'm not rhyming. I'm talking

(06:26):
to you. We are like like it's it's it's changing.

Speaker 1 (06:31):
The spiritual song is like the show hip hop's first
spiritual song or with see.

Speaker 3 (06:40):
I think that in its own way, organically it probably
was without without consciously doing it, okay, And I wouldn't.

Speaker 6 (06:51):
I wouldn't.

Speaker 3 (06:52):
I wouldn't say that I consciously did everything that way.
I just feel like I was driven to do that,
you know, and then all the way to heaven, me
and Rick was going to do together. So when I
made on my guard, I was in a very I
was in a state where I was feeling bad because

(07:14):
of the way I had to keep this thing going,
because I thought me and them together was really good,
and I felt like I was disappointing a lot of
the people who loved the chemistry.

Speaker 6 (07:25):
So I was in a position where I felt like
I had.

Speaker 3 (07:28):
To keep moving, and I know that some people would
would take it a different way.

Speaker 6 (07:34):
But I also felt all the way to Heaven was important.

Speaker 3 (07:39):
Because I felt like, how can I go from this
point forward and not give thanks to the creator for
what was done. I'm a guy that saved up this money,
went in there, made these records. A dude owed me money.
I went to the studio at my friend's house. I

(07:59):
made this up and it exploded, and it's one of
those stories that nobody would ever believe is true.

Speaker 6 (08:06):
So I'm thankful.

Speaker 3 (08:08):
And even though me and Rick got our issues or
things wasn't working out, I'm still thankful. So then I
also felt that a song like abortion, the baby on
that record is being born, and that's Banard's right, that's
Banard writes Son. He went into the room, he was

(08:31):
in the room when his wife had the baby, and
I said recorded, I said recorded, I want that on
my record. He said, I'm coming back with it. He
went in there with the recorder. The baby was crying,
and I put it on the top of the song.
Now why did I do that? I did that because

(08:51):
I felt at that particular time that this is the
most beautiful thing in the world.

Speaker 6 (08:59):
This is my son. You know, I'm here because of this.

Speaker 3 (09:04):
So I felt that that topic and that thought process
was one that I felt very strong about. And then
I had a girlfriend and that happened, and when it happened,
it affected me. And when it affected me, I wrote

(09:24):
about it the same way. I wrote she was that
type of girl. I wrote about it same way. All
the Way to Heaven I wrote about it same way.
Nothing is about people smoking crack and things happening in
the community, I wrote about it.

Speaker 6 (09:37):
Play this only at night was the condition that I
seen Harlem.

Speaker 3 (09:40):
Harlem was like night of the living bass heads on
steroids bro.

Speaker 6 (09:45):
So I wrote about it.

Speaker 3 (09:47):
So the music was was was explaining what was going on,
and I didn't. I didn't think nobody might get it
like I got it, But I felt like I.

Speaker 6 (09:57):
Needed to give it to him, you know what I mean.

Speaker 3 (10:01):
And even with loving every minute, I think that was
my first introduction to seeing Chuck Brown live at the
Capital Center. So I was so influenced by that energy.
I came back and wrote loving every minute of it
with the Go Go track in it. So I was
just once again. But see, it goes back to honesty.

(10:23):
I know that honesty. You know, honesty is not always appreciated,
and it's not always good, and it's not always good
when when the timming is off, sometimes it can cause
I tell people truth out of season can be destructive,
you know what I mean. But then there's a fearlessness

(10:46):
in telling truth. So when I was putting records together,
it was my truth, and it was a fearlessness that
I felt I'm gonna deal with with coming When I
would play the records at the party or something and
they get to that record of Bots, I'm like, man,
I know they hate me for this song. I know
they are, I said, but I said, but you know
what I said, But yoe, man, this is where I'm

(11:08):
not with it.

Speaker 6 (11:09):
This is how I feel.

Speaker 4 (11:11):
I appreciate your honesty.

Speaker 7 (11:12):
And also, you know, sometimes as fans we have to
allow our artists to evolve, especially if they started young.

Speaker 4 (11:18):
We did it for common so.

Speaker 1 (11:21):
Right, right, I mean, back back in eighty five. That
was the modus operandi. Wait, I have one more show question,
and again I got it. This the intro to the show. Right,
was your inspiration behind that?

Speaker 3 (11:35):
The whiz?

Speaker 2 (11:37):
The gold, yellow Green?

Speaker 3 (11:39):
Absolutely? I knew, absolutely no question. And when I did it,
I said, I said, I said, but I wanted to
be better. I said, I want to feel that. I said,
but I used to love when Richard prob gold is
the I changed my gold color colored. Now children, when
every time you get received right? And so after I said,

(12:02):
I wanted to be big, you know. And one of
the things that I felt with a lot of hip
hop songs was they never I always felt like and
I guess maybe the influence came from super rapping, but
it was a Friday night everybody like I felt like,
if a song is coming on, it has to make

(12:22):
me feel like like you taking.

Speaker 6 (12:25):
Me someplace, you know what I mean.

Speaker 3 (12:28):
So the show was the first record that I was
able to get out all of my ideas the way
I wanted to. And because I went through so many,
you know, situations with not being able to express my
ideas to the fullest, it was like I'm gonna put
up my own money, and I'm gonna express my ideas
my own way. And that horn in the beginning was

(12:51):
inspired definitely by the waiz Man.

Speaker 1 (12:55):
Okay, so question, here's the fact that I did not know,
because if you're not getting the record, at least in
nineteen eighty eight, if you're not buying the album, this
is before the CD generation, cassettes really aren't giving you
liner notes. So I think maybe he revealed this to

(13:16):
me four years ago. I had no idea that the
Bomb Squad was kind of the production unit behind your
second album, World's Greatest Entertainer on two songs, well even
there period, and if you look at it, keep rising
to the top. Really isn't when you get squad soundy

(13:41):
right because different samples, though it is kind of you know.

Speaker 3 (13:45):
Well, I mean no, I'm gonna tell you the song
once again, the same way I acknowledged Seddi Roley, I
acknowledged the Bomb Squad, and I met Chuck d on
tour and I would and I would help them with
the performance when Public Enemy was performing, because they was
opening up for us, so I would help him with

(14:05):
his performance. I would say, yo, you gotta let the
s one w's move. You gotta get you in flavored.
I to exchange the energy. So we started. He was
just listening to me and he would try it out,
and I said, Griff could do this part. And I
was sitting there and we'd come together. And then he
started telling me how he was a part of this

(14:25):
bomb squad and he said, Yo, you should get with
us and talk with us a little bit. I said,
I got this joint that I want to do, man,
and it's I don't know, it's in hip hop. Nobody's
ever really done a joint like this, I said, but
I think it's going to take it to another place.
And he said, all right, well.

Speaker 6 (14:41):
Why did you hook up with us? So I came
to him.

Speaker 3 (14:44):
I came to Hank Shockley with rising to the top,
and then I said, let me hear some drum sounds
the same way I did at Teddy's house. So I
banged out the beat. So I took the samp and
he had all the right stock sounds because their sounds
was incredible. And then Eric Sidler, when I was I said,

(15:05):
I said, I wanted to hear to Doom to Doom
to Doom to Doom right right, And I wanted that
kind of feeling that that I honestly got to say,
I got inspired by when I heard Nobody beat the Biz.
When I heard Thoomommom Tom Tom Tom, why that came on?

(15:30):
That was crazy? That was crazy, And then I said,
I want to put chords at the end of it.
And then I remember everybody was laughing at me in
the studio. They said, Yo, people are gonna be coming
out with their smoking jackets. Yo.

Speaker 8 (15:47):
Rising to the Top is the first. That's the first
forty five that I bought, like with my own money
for myself. So my grandmother took me to the record store.
I bought Tougher the Leather and the Rising to the
Top forty five, and I ended up because on the
forty five it was Rising to the Top was on

(16:09):
the A and then on the other side it was
the instrumental. Right, And so I without doing I'll just
say I listened to Rising to the Top way more than.

Speaker 5 (16:18):
I listened to.

Speaker 3 (16:21):
That is.

Speaker 5 (16:22):
I love that song, man, I love that record.

Speaker 4 (16:24):
Why do the first time I seen like Dougie do
your dance to that song?

Speaker 7 (16:31):
Right?

Speaker 3 (16:31):
That's yeah, Look, that's when I introduced That's but because
I because I came up with the Dougie and I
didn't call it that. I was just doing it right,
and he was I was just doing Douggie. And then
that was the introduction to the dance that turned into

(16:53):
a whole nother situation which I can't even I mean
out of.

Speaker 2 (16:57):
The field even had the White House to see that dance.
Get to the White House.

Speaker 3 (17:03):
Yo, let me tell you quest. I was up there
taking a picture with the first Lady and I said,
very nice to meet you, first Lady.

Speaker 6 (17:12):
She said, I just want to ask you one question.
Am I doing the Dougie?

Speaker 3 (17:16):
Yes? Because yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, I said, I said,
I said, I never seen it done better. I never
seen it done better.

Speaker 7 (17:28):
And you want to go, You've been to the White
House a few times doing that doing that that era
because I feel like a White House doing Easter. And
I saw Dougie Fresh walking out like I live here.

Speaker 3 (17:39):
I'm right right right because I was doing I got
this foundation called Hip Hop Public Health, so we was
performing and and and then I did the song for
Michelle Obama Let's Move the whole campaign, So I did
the theme song for that, and that our organization team
in with him for we did. We started fighting childhood

(18:02):
o B City high blood fresher, seeing the symptoms of
when a person has a stroke. And we've been doing
this work for the past thirteen to fifteen years, like
teaching people how to eat, you know, trying to give
them some kind of understanding of, you know, watching what
you eat and the effects of it. You if you're

(18:23):
eating stuff that's not right. So you know, Michelle Obama
when she said she was going to do it, hey,
I said, where do I sign up?

Speaker 6 (18:31):
And then I just started to do the song.

Speaker 3 (18:34):
So you know, that's what it's all about, you know
what I mean?

Speaker 7 (18:38):
That made me think when you said you was talking
to Biz about his health, you was really talking to
Biz about his health.

Speaker 3 (18:43):
I went hard on him, meaning just not not hard
in a bad way, but I kept telling them, you know, Biz, yo,
we got to make sure that you know, you watch
what you eat, and you know, these starches turn the
sugar and sugar turns the fact if you get diabetes,
it's gonna be tough. And I say, you know, and

(19:05):
I would take him out and he would be DJing
sometime and he would be right. He would almost pass
out on the set and we would have to catch him.
And then I'd be like, bizz, you gotta stop this,
you gotta get And then he started getting controlled and
I posted something where he lost on stage. He lost
like seventy five eighty pounds, and then after he did that,

(19:25):
I was.

Speaker 6 (19:26):
Like, yeah, non, now this is what I'm talking about.

Speaker 3 (19:29):
And then when the pandemic happened and he sat home
for a while, you know, like most people, they sat
home and they just started to you know, snack here
not then soil he wasn't paying attention right, And then
what he did is he caught a diabetic stroke. He
caught a seizure, and he got a diabetic stroke. And

(19:49):
then when he went to the hospital when he had
the stroke, you know, his stroke is the number one
disabilitating disease in the world. So he wasn't able to
talk or he wasn't able to to move, like he
couldn't move. So we kept trying to send them flyers.
I would get on there, telling them jokes. Me and
his wife would be up there snapping with him and

(20:10):
doing the things that we normally would do to pull
him out of it. And then he would show signs
that he's coming out of it. And then there would
be times when he goes down and and.

Speaker 6 (20:20):
It really bothered me.

Speaker 3 (20:21):
Man, But you know, I'm hoping that what happened to
him is making everybody aware of it can happen to
any one of us, you know what I mean.

Speaker 6 (20:34):
And everybody loved this. This was such a bright spirit,
right personality, you know.

Speaker 3 (20:42):
So to see him leave at such a you know,
a young age, it bothered me.

Speaker 7 (20:47):
That's why I'm glad that these two brothers on this show,
they talk about health all the time, and they held
help each other accountable.

Speaker 3 (20:53):
So I love it. You love it. I love it.
When I heard y'all talk, and I was loving it, bro,
I was loving on some real conversation. I know it's
about me, but it's really about y'all. You know. I
was loving it, and I like. I like how y'all
are supporting each other, because that's where we go wrong.
We believe, we believe that we got to go through

(21:14):
this by ourselves, and we don't. We don't. Sometimes sometimes
you need your man to check you a little bit
or you know, or challenge you and turn it into
a game so it's not so so serious, you know
what I mean? And you know, and looking. Sometimes even
if you fall off on something, you know, if you

(21:35):
got a good team of people around you, you can.

Speaker 6 (21:38):
Get yourself back on it.

Speaker 3 (21:40):
But I just think that diabetes is such a bizarre
disease because you don't really realize when your sugar's up
and you're not checking it, and your sugar could be
an eight hundred and you walking around feeling good and
out of nowhere. Bull it takes you out.

Speaker 2 (21:59):
Where's your number?

Speaker 7 (22:01):
With your number?

Speaker 4 (22:02):
With your number?

Speaker 3 (22:03):
Steve?

Speaker 7 (22:05):
See he see what? You don't know why you have
this conversation. We got somebody in our collective that has
sugar issues.

Speaker 4 (22:11):
And I'm just saying the two black ones.

Speaker 5 (22:17):
That one surprisingly nah. But Doug, you are the you're
the poster boy for like agent and hip hop.

Speaker 8 (22:29):
Like you are, I mean, like yo, man, like just
watching you over the years and just watching the way
you've taken care of yourself and the wave.

Speaker 5 (22:36):
It yeah yeah man. The regimen or something like what's
your what's your diet? Like, what what's like? What's your
day to day?

Speaker 3 (22:45):
Well, my day to day is I usually try to
run and then and then I got this program where
I run and then I may walk because a lot
of people want to estimate walking. See this is the.

Speaker 2 (22:56):
Problem how here you go?

Speaker 3 (23:00):
Walking is and it's a fascinating exercise because it actually
gives you time to think things through and when you're
looking at them, you know, you start.

Speaker 6 (23:12):
To figure out different things.

Speaker 3 (23:14):
If you're listening to music or whatever way you want
to do it, if you're walking with a friend, you'll
be surprised how much you burn it.

Speaker 6 (23:20):
So what I do is I walk, I run, I
ride the bike, and I do a lot.

Speaker 3 (23:27):
Of making sure I'm not letting nobody stress me out.
And I think we got lost with that one. I
think that's the one that everybody's failing on, or a
lot of people, because we so goal oriented that we
want to be the best. We want this to be
the greatest, we want this, We want that that we
start to put our health behind us instead of keeping

(23:50):
it as number one. And then when you look at health,
it should be in this order. This is my order,
and I study this order. Number one is rest sleep.
If you don't get that you're done, you can't operate,
You make mistakes, you talk crazy, you short fuse everything.

(24:10):
It just turns into something else. When you don't get
no rest, Number two is your nutrition. You gotta eat
to live, not live to eat. You gotta think about
what you eat. And if you got sugar, you gotta
check that sugar. You have to so that you can
gauge your numbers. If you like something that's a a starch,

(24:31):
ain't saying you can't have it, but maybe you gotta
earn it. Maybe you gotta maybe maybe you gotta earn that.
Let's earn it.

Speaker 5 (24:39):
Let's run it right, and then.

Speaker 3 (24:41):
When you do it, maybe maybe you earned half of that,
you know, if that's if that's a game you want
to play, but you can't just have that starch. Don't walk,
don't run, be up all night and then drink sweet
juices or be you setting yourself up for something that
you I have no idea. It's crazy. And then the

(25:02):
third one, it's some exercise. But the exercise don't have
to be that you're working out like you trying to be,
you know, a football player.

Speaker 6 (25:11):
You know what I'm saying.

Speaker 3 (25:12):
It don't have to be that crazy.

Speaker 6 (25:14):
If you're walking, you're getting on a treadmill.

Speaker 3 (25:17):
You want to walk in your body, that's it, that's it.
And then after you do it and you start seeing
how you feel. You're going to be happy to do
it because it's making you happy. And then while you're
doing that, you rest, You're energetic. You know, you got
eight hours sleep or seven hours whatever you need, and

(25:37):
then you ate something that gave you a nice amount
of energy, and then you go out there.

Speaker 6 (25:42):
And work out.

Speaker 3 (25:43):
Yo, you did all of the things that you could
do to survive on this planet a little bit more.
But if you just be reckless.

Speaker 2 (25:53):
Slight confession time, slight confession.

Speaker 3 (25:57):
I love it.

Speaker 2 (25:58):
No, definitely.

Speaker 1 (26:00):
I when it got colder, you know, well, okay, so
so the deal.

Speaker 2 (26:06):
The deal is basically.

Speaker 5 (26:08):
Getting dark at four o'clock.

Speaker 4 (26:09):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (26:10):
When Rick Ruven was on the show, he made me
he was my accountability partner, and you know, I was
doing like ten thousand steps a day every day and
then around mid September I started falling off. Now, when
I hear something five, when I hear from five different
sources the same message, then I'm like, all right, man,

(26:30):
you gotta get so you're officially it started this morning
with my.

Speaker 2 (26:33):
Mom, are you walking like you to me?

Speaker 6 (26:37):
Are you lying to me?

Speaker 5 (26:39):
Grace?

Speaker 2 (26:40):
Same thing?

Speaker 1 (26:41):
Like literally four people got on me about okay, now,
like how you doing. You're still sticking to your plan
or you you've fallen off a little bit in the
in the winter.

Speaker 2 (26:53):
And I was like, you know, I'll.

Speaker 1 (26:55):
Get back on it next week, all right, cool, I
gotta get back my ten thousand steps a day join
because I felt I went from ten thousand util like
four thousand school. I'll just do like ten blocks and
walk back home. So right, I gotta get back on
my join.

Speaker 3 (27:12):
See. And that's how the Creator work because all of
us are saying things to you.

Speaker 6 (27:17):
And I always say this now too, don't get caught
up in the messenger. Just hear the message.

Speaker 3 (27:23):
Message because you may not you if you get caught
up in the messenger, you may not hear that message.
And that message can be coming from a little baby,
It could be coming from a mother. It can be
coming from a person that you don't like, but they
said something that was really important for you to hear.
If you got five different people. Sometimes and we get

(27:44):
caught up on how to.

Speaker 6 (27:45):
Create a community.

Speaker 3 (27:46):
The Creator communicates through us, and he says things to
us to say to somebody that maybe if that person
can bypass who's the person saying it, and just hear
the message. A lot can come out of that, because
what's the odds of me having this conversation with y'all
right now on this and it has nothing to do

(28:11):
for what we're talking about. You see what I'm saying.
But it has everything to do for what we're talking about.
The brother on here with diabetes, or me talking about
how I've seen it with biz, or you watch so
many of us, So many of us lose ourselves or
pass away transition just.

Speaker 6 (28:33):
Because we don't make little, minor adjustments. It don't have
to be extreme.

Speaker 3 (28:38):
It's like I always say, if if a person does
a little, they don't even have to really do a lot.

Speaker 6 (28:44):
But if you just stay consistent at it, and.

Speaker 3 (28:46):
If you just keep this, yeah, man, like nobody ain't
trying to make you. I'm not trying to make you
work out to where you know you pass out. But
you know you know you got it ass your ass.
You gotta move it. You gotta move it.

Speaker 7 (29:03):
Man.

Speaker 1 (29:05):
I do want to get key parts of your career
out before we run out of time, which.

Speaker 5 (29:10):
We gotta talk about. There's a lot we gotta talk about. Wait, wait, wait,
the hammer we're gonna do.

Speaker 1 (29:16):
Yeah, I was gonna say we gotta talk about do
what I Gotta do right right right well.

Speaker 4 (29:22):
All the time right then.

Speaker 6 (29:23):
Yeah, yeah, we're gon, We're going to We're going to it.

Speaker 2 (29:27):
Yeah, what was it?

Speaker 1 (29:28):
What was the decision behind like what the key give
us the atmosphere or or or or what it was
like under the umbrella of Busted Productions with Hammer Beautiful
doing what I Gotta Do great really should have been
way bigger for you.

Speaker 6 (29:47):
But yeah, well another great lesson what happened with that
project is I felt that when I came out with
World's Greatest Entertainer, I felt really good about my album.
I felt that that album was made in a way
where I was trying to show people different dimensions about,
you know, my growth and about hip hop. Like when

(30:08):
I did Africa and when I went to Africa in
eighty seven, hip hop wasn't in Africa. I was the
first dude to run over there, you know what I mean.
I was in Senegal, the car, Gambia, Gory Island. I
wrote the song.

Speaker 3 (30:21):
Over there, Yeah that's what Africa. That last song on
World's Greatest Entertainer called Africa. Heavyd used to love that
song and Rod Kim loved that song. But what happened
is that I felt that the label really at that
point didn't get my vision when I first started with him,
and the thing happened with me and Rick, I think

(30:42):
it took some steam out of him and he started
trying to figure it out. But Rizzo to the top
of such a great record cut that zero. I felt
on this Trump could have done a lot better. I
think people slept on that. A lot of people liked
to guess. So it was a lot of different things
that I didn't feel my label God, which I think
a lot of us felt at points in our career.

(31:04):
So I signed with Dick Scott Management, who was managing
New Kids on the Block, and he would fund me
to go to the studio and make some records. And
while I was doing that, Hammer and his brother heard
I was no longer I was looking to get out
of Reality Records. So, long story short, I got with

(31:28):
his brother, Louis Barrell. Lewis didn't know that reggae was coming.
I was telling him, I said, Yo, reggae is on fire, bro,
But he was feeling like.

Speaker 6 (31:39):
That don't mean nothing, because I'm getting this.

Speaker 3 (31:41):
You can't touch you know, can't touch this money and
Hammer's in the stratosphere, and so there was a beef
between the East and the West coast. So I felt
that if me and Hammer got together and I was
able to bring what I bring to the table and
he keeps doing his thing, this would show a union

(32:03):
between us where this beef between East and West.

Speaker 6 (32:07):
Coast wouldn't even really be there. Because Tim Dogg was making.

Speaker 8 (32:11):
You know, Alas album was right right, and I wasn't
about that.

Speaker 3 (32:18):
So they paid close to maybe like one point two
one point three to get me out of the deal.
So when they got me out of the deal, they say, yo,
I just want to be able to put at least
one or two songs on the album. And I said, okay,
no problem, and they said I was telling them reggae.

Speaker 6 (32:33):
So we was up there working it out.

Speaker 3 (32:35):
And what happened is I went to Jamaica and I
went to go do sun Splash, and I was doing
dance all night. I don't know if y'all know about
sun Splash. Yeah, I forgot him on it right right.

Speaker 6 (32:48):
So I'm so I'm like.

Speaker 3 (32:50):
The first guy to ever perform on dance tall night
in Jamaica, which was unheard of.

Speaker 2 (32:58):
You might want you retimidated.

Speaker 3 (33:00):
No, no, look that audience is tough, yo, that audience
is tougher than Apollo.

Speaker 2 (33:07):
It's how did you again? I know your whole no
fear thing, but yeah, yeah, well.

Speaker 6 (33:14):
I felt I felt like I felt my.

Speaker 3 (33:16):
Energy was stronger than theirs. And then I also had
Papa Son who we was doing records together. I mean no,
we was performing together. So when I'm performing with him
on dance hall. And then the other thing is sometimes
less is more and more is less, you know, because
sometimes you're doing too much. So I felt like, if

(33:39):
I give them little samples of what I do, it'll
make them appreciate it more than me trying to give
them a whole concert. So I got on. They accepted it,
blew up but bloke gunshots all night. After that was over,
I got back on the plane and came back and
I was doing something at how And when I got back,

(34:02):
Hammer's boy edited the video did all of these different
things with it. And then when he did it, it
was the same guy that edit Hammer's video. So when
he let the song out, a lot of people was
looking at the marching band and all of it, at
the Battle of the Band thing and they thought that
it was like we was trying to make a Hammer video.

(34:23):
Oh okay, you see what I'm saying. So I said,
it's the true story too. I said, yo, bro, why
did you edit the video and let it out without
me being able to look at the video acknowledge what
it is because I read alert in there, Curtis blowing there.

Speaker 6 (34:43):
They cut all of the different elements that would give
it the authenticity of the East Coast and showing that love.

Speaker 3 (34:50):
And then when they say they said, man, yo, we
was just doing so I felt like the respect factor
was not as high as my respect was for him
because I guess he was trying to go in there
right when it dropped. Capital dropped him and the label
went bankrupt, so the album never came out. So that

(35:13):
album never came out. The single was coming out, and
I'm thinking now as.

Speaker 5 (35:18):
I'm doing what I got to do album and it
never can't.

Speaker 3 (35:22):
It can't like Capitol was letting it out and then
they shut everything down because yeah, you got the album.

Speaker 5 (35:33):
I had to tape. Uh this was this was my
stepdad before he passed.

Speaker 8 (35:36):
Yeah, he had to tape because my joint on there
I used to run was the if I was your
man joint because you was curious.

Speaker 5 (35:42):
Yeah, so you know what I mean? That was my record?
But uh yeah, man, no that record it came out
like you know, yeah.

Speaker 3 (35:52):
But I'm I'm gonna tell you in regards to when
Capital Capitol dropped Busted Records and when he dropped Busted Records,
whatever bust it had or whatever busted on.

Speaker 6 (36:06):
Busted was cut Busted was cut off.

Speaker 3 (36:12):
Yeah, bust it was busting. And so then I left
and when I and when I left, I had to
you know, I had to rebuild the credibility because people
was feeling like I was trying to sell out. So
that wasn't a problem for me because I built my
career before record. So I went back in the street

(36:33):
and started to kind of see what was going on.
I seen PM doing, PM doing was hanging out at
the club. We were both going to see Prince, so
we went to see I seen him on my way out.
It's funny, I didn't even think about this. I was
seeing him walking out. He said, dumb, Yo, man, I
love yourself. You're doing anything else? I said, yeah, man,
I'm getting ready to come. I got some ideas, he said, Yo, Man,

(36:55):
my label. Man, I think that, you know, maybe I
should introduce you to this gotch you shrinking right? He said,
I think you know him. I think you know him.
So I said, what's his name? He's his name is John.

Speaker 6 (37:04):
He said, really, I said, let me let me see.

Speaker 3 (37:07):
If I know him.

Speaker 6 (37:07):
I went downtown to G Street, right, I'm not.

Speaker 3 (37:10):
I go in there and I walk in. This was
my tour guy in nineteen eighty five when I went
overseas for perform to perform the show on Top of
the Pops. This guy is the guy who took me
all through London, and now he got a deal with
Chris Blackwell. So then after that I sat there. He said, Dougie,

(37:34):
I always wanted to do something with you. Do you
got anything? I said, I got these three ideas, I said,
and I think I'm ready to let him out as
soon as possible because I need to make sure that
people do not misunderstand what happened. So then that's when
I came up with day Right and Free You did Freaks?

Speaker 5 (37:54):
Yes where.

Speaker 2 (37:57):
Years old?

Speaker 3 (37:59):
Like?

Speaker 2 (37:59):
Where is He's.

Speaker 3 (38:01):
Still rock with me? He's still rock with me?

Speaker 5 (38:04):
But does he ever?

Speaker 2 (38:06):
I imagine that he must sound like mad lion right now.

Speaker 4 (38:13):
Now that's funny air, but that's true. Though he can't.

Speaker 3 (38:17):
Say no, no, no no. But but he sounds good.
It sounds like he mature, but it don't sound like
he sounds really good. And he sounds like his energy
is still the same. And when we perform, it's a
serious situation. But that song, that song, that song right
there when I when I came back from Jamaica, that's

(38:40):
when I made that beat because.

Speaker 7 (38:42):
You told you what I'm saying, I feel like reggae
is coming.

Speaker 3 (38:45):
You told him. I tried to tell him.

Speaker 6 (38:48):
I swear I tried to tell him.

Speaker 3 (38:49):
But you know, but look they was living in you know,
they had I can't touch this money, so they wasn't
touching it.

Speaker 2 (38:57):
They wasn't.

Speaker 1 (39:04):
Can you can you talk about your your relationship with
with with Prince? There is Oh my god, Yeah, you
did a long apprenticeship. Uh during that time period at
least three to four the five years, I think almost
like you know, to see a Prince concert, you knew

(39:24):
somewhere you were coming.

Speaker 6 (39:26):
Like so how an apprenticeship quess of ques?

Speaker 3 (39:30):
You know? Man? With Prince.

Speaker 6 (39:33):
The only thing that I can honestly say, man, I
mean this is this.

Speaker 3 (39:39):
This is is one that is a quick one that
I think you'll appreciate. I was doing. I did something
for Sindbad. And by the way, I want to acknowledge
sinn Mad because you know, he had a stroke. So
Sindbad I went out. Do you remember when he had
this thing called so Soul Funk and it was on HBO. Yep, yes, okay,

(40:02):
So Sindbad I went out there to go just to
hang out.

Speaker 6 (40:06):
And then he told me, Dougie, yo, what you doing
out here?

Speaker 3 (40:09):
Yo? I want you to get on man, could you
do something? I was like, yo, I just came out
here to chill. But all right, no problems. And if
you know Sinbad, his energy is crazy. So it was like,
You're going to say yes to me no matter what.
So now I'm in a Ruba trying to find a
studio because I'm thinking, damn, I need to get something,

(40:30):
and I'm looking at a CD that got that got
got to be real on there. I say, yo, man,
let me let me sample this. Pressing it out on
a keyboard studio was real, under budget, not top of
the line. I press out got to be real, so
I loop it. So then I go back on stage
in the night, I go on stage and I say,
he said, you're gonna do something for me. I say yeah.

(40:52):
They played the music for me and HBO was not
supposed to tape me performing. So I get on and
I'm performing and the place is going crazy. The crowd
is going crazy. It's moving. They never had a hip
hop and turned into something now. HBO was taping it
without me knowing it because they told him. You know,

(41:13):
this is Dougie just doing something, but that little something
turned into something crazy. So then later HBO said, Yo, man, Yo,
could we show this because this this thing is unbelievable.
Did you see what this guy did? So then HBO
played it and it kept playing it every week like constantly, right,
so Prince seeing it. So when Prince seen it, he said, YO,

(41:39):
called Dougie up and see if he could meet me
in Atlanta two because I want him to come to
my show and perform. So I get to this show.
I'm backstage and he said, yo, jo, I already got
a set going on now, so I'm gonna do my show,
but I want to know could you come with me
to the after party. I said all right, I said, yeah,
I heard you wanted me to come here cool. So

(42:01):
I went to the after party. And this is when
Left Eye was alive. So we go to the after
party and Left Eye meets me and meet Prince and
she's like bugging out, like, yo, I can't even believe
y'all too here at the same time, So I asked Prince.
Prince said, yo, I seen you on HBO. That was unbelievable.
What made you come up with that? I said, Now

(42:21):
it was this free styling. He said, okay. He said, well,
let me ask you. You think you can get on
to night. I said, yeah, no problem, he said, but
I want to. I want to ask you, I said,
before I get on. I just and he wasn't called
prince at the time we called him. You ain't know
what to call him, so you know, you call him
the artist or whatever. I said, I just want to
know when I get on, how far you want me

(42:45):
to go? He said, I want you to turn this
mom out. I said no, I said, but I want
to know how far do you want me to go?
Like I mean, I want to respect what you do.
What you're asking. Because I got on with Dre and
snooping them and them when they came to New York
and Dre pulled me to the side. It was like, Dougie,

(43:08):
I want you to get on, but please don't go
right right right, And when he said that to me,
When he said that to me, I was saying, like,
what do you mean by that? Like don't you want
me to? And then I got on and I felt

(43:29):
I didn't. I listened to him, and I felt bad
that I didn't go all the way. So after that,
I said, I got to ask a person how they
feel so that they don't feel like I'm trying to
upstage their setting. So I learned that. So long story short,
prince sss, I want you to turn and he said

(43:52):
it in my ear. Yeah, So after that, I said yo,
I said okay, Well, if that's what you want me
to do, I said, well, that is what I'm gonna do.
And I got on with him that night.

Speaker 6 (44:11):
When I got on with him that night, I took
him to a place that he ain't never but then
when it comes to this.

Speaker 3 (44:20):
Thing, so this is what he did. So I came
down there this whole thing, and at the time I
was dating, I was when I when I was dating
Miss Jones, I was down there.

Speaker 6 (44:33):
The thing for Sindbad.

Speaker 3 (44:35):
So I went down there and I didn't expect that,
so I did it based on the energy. I did
Sindbad in favor. They taped it. I didn't know they
were gonna tape it. Then they showed it on HBO
and it explodes and everybody and it was fun. And
actually after that, Sheryl Lynn was booked on the Soul

(44:57):
Funk Festival after that because how impactful it was. And
then came Sugarhill Gang and all of the other groups.
So moving into Prince, he's seen it. When he's seen it,
he called up Lindelle McMillan, who was my lawyer. Wow right.
And when he called up lindown line there and said, yo, Doug,

(45:17):
he said, can you come down to Atlanta? So I
went down there and I took Grandmaster Caz. I took
Grandmaster Cast because he loved Prince and he told me that.
He said, Doug, if you ever meet him, I just
want you to do me one favor. Please introduce me
to him. So I was like, okay, I brought him

(45:40):
with me. So I go down there. Left eye is there,
she's in rere form, she's vibing. Energy is good. He
gets in my ear. After I asked him, I said, brother,
I just want to be respectful to your set. You know,
I appreciate you, and I don't want to do anything
that's gonna make you feel that I'm doing that. I'm

(46:01):
trying to be disrespectful. And he was like, look, let
me tell you something. I want you to turn this
out to the he said, he said all the way out.
I turned around, said, no problem, m And after that
I got on and I turned that out to the

(46:24):
point back after it was over, we kept doing encore
after encore because question no artists go we me and him.
They can go for two, two hours three, it doesn't
really even stop.

Speaker 1 (46:37):
Like do you do you have a do you have
a not an itinerary, but do you have a routine
bag that you go through, like when you do your
come again rhyme? Or you're uh, I can't even you
know right right, like I know your go to dougie
isms that can like how many of those do you

(46:59):
have in your head when it's time to just get
on someone set?

Speaker 2 (47:03):
Like do you have like thirty things already thought out?
Like okay, well.

Speaker 3 (47:08):
It goes back to the same thing that I was
telling you, I'm not thinking, I'm feeling, and what I'm
feeling is what I'm doing.

Speaker 6 (47:17):
So there's no there's no ism.

Speaker 3 (47:19):
It is. It just is, and it is at that
moment of now, and no matter what it is, it
will be what I wanted to be and that is
what it is. So and I don't mean that in
an ego way. I mean that from a spiritual perspective
that I'm coming to the table with energy. Like like

(47:42):
when we were switching to this for a second and
going back to the story when y'all did Dave Chappelle
and he just called me, I was just coming to
see this. I just came to see y'all. I didn't
come to get on stage, like I swear, that wasn't
my goal. I was just there to see you him
and all that. I say, yeah, let me see this.

(48:02):
This is gonna be nice. And out of nowhere, somebody,
I think caller or somebody was saying, Dougie, they want
you to come on stage, and then Dave is saying, yo, here, man, yo,
go on do it. So in my mind there's a
switch that just kind of automatically go off, and I'm

(48:24):
going all.

Speaker 6 (48:25):
The way end unless you tell me don't.

Speaker 3 (48:30):
And then if you tell me don't, I might just
say let them do it, and I'm just stand on
the side and watch, because I don't ever want to
feel like I'm making somebody feel funny. And I don't
ever want to feel funny if I don't do what
I naturally feel I want to do. So that night,

(48:51):
he had me in a tough situation and the clock
was ticking and I was looking back at you. You
was frustrated at him about the clock, and I'm like, damn,
I don't want us to be mad at me, I said,
I don't want us to be mad at me. God
keep telling me, go hard, go on. And then Usher
jumped on the stage, Todd t I jumped on the stage,

(49:14):
and you was looking at them. It's a wrap, it's over.

Speaker 1 (49:18):
Let me let me explain to our audience. Okay, So
New York is very old school. In New York is
what we call a union town. Like you cannot step
on the stage in New York City unless you play
exuberant fines. If you go overtime, they're they're antal retentive
with sound checks, with shooting cameras. If you bring a

(49:41):
camera out a Radio City Music Hall that's like twenty
five thousand dollars. Like New York will find a way
to tax you just for simple things. It's a very
old school thing. So what Doug is referencing is whenever
Dave Chappelle does his like long residencies at Radio City
Music Hall, you know he'll do like fifteen twenty shows
or whatever. David's is one of those guys that also

(50:03):
just lives by his heart, and I guess that he
has the deep pockets to you know.

Speaker 2 (50:08):
And as of this speaking, I saw Dave last.

Speaker 1 (50:11):
Night at Madison Square Garden with rock Him Buster Rhymes,
and you know, the Union guys are like usually in
New York, especially at Madison Square Garden, especially at Radio City.
I'll say that for every five minutes you go over,
that's like ten thousand dollars. So the whole goal is

(50:31):
like when it's ten fifty nine, shut the show down,
not at a Dave heel afan. So so at this point,
when Dave is calling everyone on stage, I know we
got like four minutes left, and all I'm thinking about is, Okay,
we're about to lose a lot of money here, and
I don't want to be responsible for that. So at

(50:54):
ten fifty nine, I want the promoters. And you know
I'm the hall monitor of him.

Speaker 2 (51:00):
Pop. Everyone will tell you I'm the hall monitor hip
hop right right right.

Speaker 1 (51:03):
I'm the guy decided like, hey, promoter, I'm I'm following
union rules.

Speaker 2 (51:07):
That's Dave Jabelle, not me, you know, but anyway, continue
right right?

Speaker 3 (51:12):
No, that's crazy, that's crazy. The way you just said that.
The crazy. I never heard nobody say that, yo, yo,
And you know what, I've seen it in your face
when we was doing it, I was like, I said, man, question, Oh,
he's trying to get everybody out of here. I said, well,

(51:33):
Dave just won't stop, and he keeps telling me go harder.
I said, I'm torn between should I listen to the
hall monitor?

Speaker 2 (51:40):
Should I do not?

Speaker 1 (51:45):
Like I don't like using twenty five thousand dollars for
nobody on my watch, Like I'm a guy that start.

Speaker 3 (51:51):
On time, you know, And he didn't even care.

Speaker 2 (51:55):
So he's rich, right, hitch bitch.

Speaker 3 (52:01):
Yo. So so because of that and because of that
kind of energy, I'm always careful because I don't want
nobody to feel like I'm trying to do something to
you or take something. So long story short, I get
on with Pete Prince yo. He's like this, go harder, yeah,

(52:24):
go harder, give me more. So after this over the
band and everybody, we go to the roof. They got
this little roof. We're sitting out there. He's sitting there
looking at me like this. I'm telling you that I
can't make this up. Bro. He looking at me like this,
just sitting here looking at me. And then the band
is standing around him and he goes, how about it? Band?

(52:46):
What do you think? And it was like, oh my god,
you crazy? What do we think? Are you serious? Did
you see what he just did? I and the whole
band is going crazy enough? He turned out. He said,
so what do you want to do? I said, oh, man,
I came out to do what I wanted to do.
I had some fun with you. Man said this Grandma
say cast Cats is sitting there like this, like looking

(53:07):
at him like that, right, So what I'm saying in there,
and I'm like cats cast you know ca? He said,
oh yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah yeah, this is great night,
great night. And then and then first look at me,
he said, so what you want to do? You want
to be down with MPG or what I turn. I
turned about. I'm looking out. I look at Cass right,
and this is real. I look at Cass. I'm like

(53:29):
your cats. Oh, this guy's funny, yoe like in my mind.
I said, yeah, okay, whatever I said, Man, I just
came out, man, I said, I wasn't. I said, I
ain't come out here for no paper. I just came
out to show you love because you deserved that, you know.
And he and I said, I said, and your band
was fun and I enjoyed it. I said, but we're

(53:50):
gonna leave because you know, it was a nice night.
So it's a tree there, right. He takes a leaf
off the tree and he go like this, and he go, what, bro,
I'm telling you you take the leave. We go here
go he go, okay, all right good And then after

(54:12):
I said, I'm looking at him and I was like,
I was supposed to eat a leaf too. I'm like, yo,
where we're going with this one? But I said yo,
but I like your stop. I like what you just
did right there. So after that, I get up and
I leave, and the band and everybody's saying goodbye. I
get back home, kays is blown away. I get a call.

(54:36):
Cause said, yo, the artist wants you to come on,
wants you to come out, and he want to know.
Can you meet him tomorrow night in Oklahoma? He said
he got twenty days and he just wanted to know
what do you want? I said, are you serious? And
that was the beginning of me and Prince and it

(54:58):
never stopped after that. And it got so deep that
he used to ask me and he would and he appreciated.
He was sick. So where do you think I should
come out? What songs? What's the order of these songs
you think I should do? And I said, yo, you
gotta come out of the crowd. Like it was me
and him Shaka can Lorry Graham, we had make Ceo,

(55:19):
we had Nasea. He said, so should I come out
the crowd? Right? I said, ye, come out here. I said,
when you come to New York, you gotta do pop life.
He was like, here you think so?

Speaker 6 (55:30):
I said, I know so, and he would listen.

Speaker 3 (55:34):
He would let me, you are the curator, right, He.

Speaker 6 (55:38):
Would let me design the shows. When we did Essen's Festival.

Speaker 3 (55:42):
I had another technique that I was coming up with
as far as different performances. So I started out in
the audience with the turntables because he never wanted to
use turntables. I said, no, we're gonna use turntables, but
you never used them like this, So I would start
what did turntables?

Speaker 6 (56:00):
And I get the audience to the point it was crazy.

Speaker 3 (56:03):
We was at Essence Festival, right, and it was eighty
thousand eighty Yo, it was eighty thousand. And before we
went to the Essence, we did the some bold place
in LA And then later on that night, we're sitting
down and then he says to me, yeah, yeah, yeah, Hollywood, Hollywood,

(56:25):
that's right. He's sitting down with me, and he says,
Essence magazine is in here and they want to interview me.
Could you talk to them? Can you talk to them
for me too? So I start talking to him and
he started telling him how this thing worked. He said,
you see see how you know what I'm saying. I
don't even got to say it because that's how we

(56:46):
locked in. And then afterwards then we were meeting LA
and they said, yo, he wants you to meet him
at this club. I go to the club. He's sitting
in this room on the other side. The party's bouncing
and he's sitting in there by himself with a little
cup with like like some coffee and some honey, and

(57:07):
he's sitting there like this. And he's sitting there like this,
and he said, you know, we're supposed to do the Essence.
So how you think we need to do this? I said,
I said, how you think we need to do this?
He said, I'm going rock, I'm going straight rock. I said,
all I said, all due respect, I don't think that that's.

Speaker 5 (57:30):
I said, I said, and then.

Speaker 6 (57:35):
Anybody. He said, so what you think?

Speaker 3 (57:39):
I said, I think we need to do what we do,
but you need to do the hits. I said, this
is a black audience. And I said, I want to
hear hit after hit after hit. And I said, I said, Well,
before we get to the hits, I said, I'm gonna
take the turntables and I'm gonna set it up in
the middle of the crowd and I'm gonna get this
thing pumped up to the point that is that is ridiculous,

(58:02):
and then I'm going to pass it to you onto
the stage and you're gonna hit him with a hit
after hit after hit.

Speaker 6 (58:09):
He said, Okay, I got it. We went to the essence.

Speaker 3 (58:14):
I went into the crowd, like I said, set it up,
and I had like eighty thousand people doing the wobble.

Speaker 6 (58:21):
The damn building was shaken. Yeah, right that night he
was there.

Speaker 7 (58:25):
Yeah about that stage, No, no, no, the.

Speaker 3 (58:30):
Whole building was shaken. I have never felt nothing like
that other than probably Chuck Brown at Capital Center or
something ridiculous. So after it was over, I mean, after that,
I get it to a certain point. I know it's
crazy because mc light came over to me and said,
do you feel that? Do you feel that? Like that?

(58:51):
So that's when I knew it was serious. So then
I passed it to him on the stage. And when
I passed it to him on the stage, it was crazy.
It just it was crazy, man.

Speaker 7 (59:02):
And then that's one of all times day I think
that was the best.

Speaker 3 (59:07):
They definitely, they definitely say that it was definitely up
there because it was nothing. It was nothing close, But
that was the kind of relationship we had because it
was like hanging out with a dude who was just
as like he didn't care as much as I don't care,

(59:28):
you know what I mean, Like we be riding around
in the night and it'll be like you want to go,
you want to go to the club where I started at.
I said, yeah, let's go in there. And you know
that big guy who plays the drums and used to
play the drums on the Real Yeah, he was sitting
there one night. We're sitting there.

Speaker 6 (59:47):
And he said, do you feel like doing something tonight?

Speaker 3 (59:50):
I said, you feel like doing something tonight? He turned around.
He said yeah. I said, but but but but you
ain't got to do nothing, I said, I said, let me,
I'll do something with him. He said, all right, but
but I go in there and get on with with
Bland and the band that they have in there. Turn
that into something. Jump back in the limo, drive out

(01:00:10):
to his house. We're sitting in a lemo talking and
he and he told me something that was crazy, man.

Speaker 6 (01:00:17):
He said, at one time, he said.

Speaker 3 (01:00:20):
The Time was a band that when he when he
had to get on after them, he was nervous, he said,
because the Time generated so much excitement, so much celebration,
so much energy that he said he felt like when
he got on after it went to such a high.

(01:00:42):
That he's doing all of these different things, but he
can't he can't create that that. You know that jungle love,
know that, he said, then he said to me, he said,
I've seen a lot of performers. He said that I'm
telling you, he said, you are the most unusual and

(01:01:03):
the most shocking that I have ever seen. He said,
I don't know why God brought me and you together,
but he said, you make me feel that same kind
of thing, but on another level that I felt with
the time.

Speaker 6 (01:01:18):
And he said, and I'm glad that.

Speaker 3 (01:01:21):
You whip me.

Speaker 1 (01:01:25):
Yeah, I mean that that is literally you have no fear.
And that's the thing that I want our audience to know,
like you literally have you have zero fear. Wait, before
we go, we got to talk about the Chuck Brown project.
Oh yeah, you know something Okay, when you when you

(01:01:49):
were telling the story of the show, it kind of
it kind of hit me. And you know, I know
that it's never going on record before.

Speaker 2 (01:01:56):
I know that.

Speaker 1 (01:01:56):
The the that the perception is that Go Go really
never got its just due, but it's just we never
New Jack Swing is basically Go Go And I really
didn't truly realize that until wow, like moments ago. But yeah,

(01:02:17):
if you listen to like I mean, the show is
essentially Go Go, it's New Jack Swing.

Speaker 2 (01:02:24):
Also, it's a part of.

Speaker 1 (01:02:25):
It, but teddy, but I think it's electronic. I think
it's electronic go go, and we just never called it that.

Speaker 3 (01:02:31):
So I agree. I agree with you. I agree with
you now. And I never looked at it like that
because see, and this and this is not to take
nothing from nobody.

Speaker 6 (01:02:43):
I'm not that guy. I'm not even built like that.

Speaker 3 (01:02:47):
But that thing about the way to beat plays and
me beat it like I programmed.

Speaker 6 (01:02:54):
I basically he put on a metron.

Speaker 3 (01:02:56):
On and I played it out and I put these things,
and I you know, I needed the guy who was
technically savvy to allow me to get on that drum
machine and do what I do. Because anything I like
when I did Freaks Beef, if I did Rising to
the Top beat, if I do Lotti Doty, I make
the beat. So it's what I do. When I did

(01:03:19):
Original Human Beatbox, I make the beat. So when this
happened and I was making the show that swing, I
never thought about it from go go because you know,
as a kid, I used to play the juke box
in the pool room around my block where we were.
They are games and all that and keep us out

(01:03:39):
of the street, but they had busting loose in the
jukebox and I was hearing it. I said, Charlotte, get it,
y'all say what you like, back to back to back
to back. So I think that that feeling influenced me
when I was in the show, because it's the swing.

(01:04:04):
It's that, it's that, it's the movement of it. And then,
like you said, which I think is really a great observation,
and I never thought about that that this show is
a go go record.

Speaker 2 (01:04:18):
It is.

Speaker 3 (01:04:19):
It is.

Speaker 4 (01:04:20):
But you are the first person in the history, though,
to do something besides a collaboration with the genre, like right, Doug, Like,
technically you're the only person of note that has given
this kind of love to that genre in this way.

Speaker 5 (01:04:35):
Right, in this way Herbie Love Loug used to like
sample lot like yeah, but not in a yeah, he's
not like the way he's doing it.

Speaker 7 (01:04:41):
It was always a collaboration, but not a total like dedication,
love letter and inspiration kind of thing.

Speaker 2 (01:04:47):
So how did the project come together?

Speaker 3 (01:04:49):
Well, it's interesting, man. I was and I'm telling you
the truth again. I was sleeping and out of nowhere
something said write a song about Chuck Brown. And when
it said write a song about Chuck Brown, I picked
up the pen and I just wrote the song and
I made the beat, and on the beat, some of

(01:05:10):
those drum sounds are me because I couldn't find certain
sounds that I wanted for this effect that I was
looking for with the Go Go. So now what I
do is I'll go in there and I'll do my
own I'll be the high hat with the drum. I'll
be the other snare on top of the snare. I'll
put my low tone.

Speaker 6 (01:05:30):
Based drum under the foot.

Speaker 3 (01:05:33):
So now the way that I do beats is I'm
I'm always intertwining now my own drum sounds on top
of drum sets, because I don't think they have all
of the drum sounds that I can hear anymore, so
I make them up. So I started to build the track,
and when I built the track, I was writing. I

(01:05:54):
was writing a song to it. And then it was
interesting to me because I was like, why am I
doing this? And that I thought about the way I
met Chuck Run from Run DMC was the guy who
told me, because we was on the show together in
Capital Center eighty five. He told me, yo, you ever

(01:06:15):
been you ever seen Chuck Brown? You ever heard Go Go?
I said, nah, I know, Chuck Brown, but what's Go Go?
He said, you ain't seen a Go Go concert? He said, Yo, wait,
GC this not I turned around. I changed my stuff up, bro.
I went up in there to get there early. Chuck
Brown burnt this shit down to the floor to the

(01:06:35):
point that it was madness. I'm talking about you want
to talk about you want to see a spiritual, like
like out of body experience. Play Go Go, Play Go
Go with twenty thousand black people in the spot and
white people that understand play it, and you're going to

(01:06:56):
see a whole, a whole kind of experiences that you
never seen. So then I ran, he got off. I
went backstage, started talking to him. I started telling him
how incredible his performance was. He started telling me how
he loves the show. He loves Lotty Dottie, he thinks
that what I'm doing is really unique. And then we
just became friends from eighty five all the way to

(01:07:20):
when he performed on the Capitol Lawn. He called me up.
I didn't know that would be one of our last performances.
And I got on with him there and he was
such a beautiful spirit, and I looked at him like
I look at myself where I felt like he was
he created something, and sometimes when a person creates something,

(01:07:43):
like you said quest, which was really deep, the person
who's the first person that created may not always be
the one that's acknowledged, you know. And I felt like,
I'm going to make sure that you acknowledged Chuck Brown.
When you hear Beyonce's joint, you know, the first joint

(01:08:05):
that she did with Crazy.

Speaker 4 (01:08:08):
Rich Harrison, he always gonna put that go Go up.

Speaker 3 (01:08:12):
Right right, like I want y'all to know, this is
the guy that did this, and this energy that y'all feeling,
this is the guy.

Speaker 6 (01:08:25):
And I guess spiritually there was something.

Speaker 3 (01:08:28):
And then the other thing is that Prince before he passed,
he was going to produce my next album and he
wanted me to do a live album and he loved
Go Go, so she did right right, So he wanted
me to do something. I think in this kind of
a way that I did it because it's live and

(01:08:50):
at the same time it's go Go, and I didn't
know I was going to be putting it together like this,
but it worked out and let me.

Speaker 4 (01:08:58):
Clear my throat.

Speaker 7 (01:08:58):
Though Doug, like you already out of your relationship with
Go Go is like continue all day. Can you talk
about for a second, because I was just catching up
and watching that video earlier and I was like, Yo, please.

Speaker 4 (01:09:10):
Tell me about this video shoot with you biz DJ
Cool like in this club. I know it's got to
be a story.

Speaker 3 (01:09:16):
And Yo, I tell you the quick Cool told me,
like I'm coming to the video. I pull up. Cool said, hey, dug,
what's going on? No, Like, I don't even know what
he wants? He said, Yo, like I know he want
to do somebody. I mean, I don't really know. He said, Yo, man,
I need a boss from you. Do you got him
write there like like, are you ready to do this now?

(01:09:38):
I said, yeah, okay, Cool, let's do it. He said, okay,
Cool like no notice, no, here's your part where you
put your verse? No no, nothing, no no nothing. So
after that, so he's and then he told me later
he said, well, you know, I'm gonna be honest with you.

(01:09:58):
I told you to do that because I think you
probably one of the only guys that could really do that.

Speaker 6 (01:10:04):
And don't make it seem like you're doing.

Speaker 3 (01:10:07):
That, because I mean it is DC. Yeah, we just
started free styling and then like the Tupac on there.

Speaker 6 (01:10:17):
It was just something spiritually that made me say that.

Speaker 4 (01:10:20):
You know, so that was a live song and video
at the same time. Y'all take the time.

Speaker 3 (01:10:27):
Wow, it was in Philip what that's right?

Speaker 2 (01:10:31):
It was It was at the Bahama Bay and Philipdelia.

Speaker 4 (01:10:36):
He says it.

Speaker 2 (01:10:37):
Yes, he says it, bro crazy crazy.

Speaker 1 (01:10:42):
You know this, this is a legendary, legendary lesson.

Speaker 7 (01:10:47):
And thank you for giving love to to to everybody
and go go in the song to because you didn't
just give love to Chuck.

Speaker 4 (01:10:52):
You gave love to the areas.

Speaker 3 (01:10:54):
You gave love.

Speaker 4 (01:10:55):
To to all the legends. So it was I just
want to I'm sorry, I'm mayor. I didn't mean to
cut you say that.

Speaker 6 (01:11:01):
I appreciate you so.

Speaker 4 (01:11:04):
Thank you man.

Speaker 3 (01:11:05):
Because he used to do play this only at night
and the way he would do it, I don't know,
you know, it's I still feel like I did in
the beginning, that you still got You gotta follow your
spirit and it's not going to always be popular. And
sometimes you're doing things because they just supposed to be done.

(01:11:26):
I remember Prince told me when he wrote Kiss. He said,
when he wrote Kiss, he had to forget how to
make records, meaning he had to simplify everything. So when
you hear it, they kiss like he said, he stripped
it down right right, And when he stripped it down,

(01:11:47):
he said, it's because he had to go into a
space where he had to simplify things. And I feel
as an artist that you go into these spaces for
reasons and it sets you up for something else that
you're supposed to do. But you gotta go there though,
to get there, you know what I mean.

Speaker 6 (01:12:11):
I don't know why.

Speaker 3 (01:12:11):
I don't know what connected me to make this Go
Go album, but I knew I had to make it.
I knew it was important. And the brother who shot
the album cover he called me. And when he called me,
it was a friend of mine who would go and
film me in different places and stuff. And he has
diabetes type too, And he called me and he said, Dougie.

(01:12:34):
His name is Bobby Gunn. He said, Dougie, Yo, man,
I know you into this health thing, man, but I'm
dealing with his diabetes and I'm going to make sure
that I don't do something that's gonna cause me to
How many probably say, yo, you got any suggestions? So
I'm on the phone talking to him about it, going
through the whole diabetic conversation, telling him, don't do this here.

(01:12:55):
You like sodas drinker zvia Zba is a sugar free
soda and it's not an asparteam. It hires stevia and
it is good. And he said, oh, thank you, Doug,
thank you, and I hang up the phone with him.
And he only called me for that and I shared
that one. He said, but Doug, yo, I got some
pictures I took and I want to send them to you.

(01:13:16):
And you know, just some pictures I took a while ago.
He sent me the pictures. All of the pictures was
of me and Chuck Brown. And he didn't even know
I was making this song. He didn't even know I
was making the song. And then I looked at one
of the pictures.

Speaker 6 (01:13:32):
I said, Yo, this is crazy.

Speaker 3 (01:13:33):
This is crazy. I called him. I said, Yo, I
just wrote a song called Chuck Brown. What's the odds
of you sending me this? I said? Can I use
this shot? Could I use this shot? And the shot
that I made the album cover was the shot that
that brother gave to me. So this is what I'm
trying to explain. Sometime I think things just kind of
right right. So yeah, so that's what the album represents

(01:13:58):
to me, and I appreciate y'all having me on here
to talk about it.

Speaker 1 (01:14:03):
And brother, thank you kept y'all on a little long, No,
we kept you man. We love it right, yeah, we
lived for these episodes.

Speaker 7 (01:14:11):
I almost gotta tell folks, and six hours Jimmy jam
you are right, Yeah.

Speaker 2 (01:14:15):
This is all right, this is right up there with it.

Speaker 1 (01:14:18):
No, for real, I want to thank you like your
your your wisdom and your life lessons and your lessons
on fear.

Speaker 2 (01:14:25):
I'm definitely gonna apply that.

Speaker 1 (01:14:27):
This is an awesome world's greatest entertainer Yes, and unpaid
Bill and and Sugar Steve and like, yeah, yeah, this
is yo. I got one last question.

Speaker 8 (01:14:40):
I've asked this if you've got time, okay, And I'm
only asking this because it's you, because I normally hate
when people ask this question.

Speaker 5 (01:14:51):
For you. Who are your favorite season?

Speaker 8 (01:14:55):
Not necessarily your top you ain't got to say the
top five whatever, but who are your face? And the
reason I ask is because you're probably one of the
first like real like vets that we've had on in
terms of being able to work with DJ Hollywood and
you know, I mean, you're from that.

Speaker 5 (01:15:11):
You know that first contrast straight up, so you know
what I mean.

Speaker 8 (01:15:16):
So just to hear it from you from og like you,
who are who do you consider your top MC's.

Speaker 3 (01:15:22):
You know, it's interesting the people that I consider top
MC's is a very interesting topic because I understand the
DNA of where different styles come from. So when I'm
looking at different people that other people like, I know

(01:15:43):
where that style was birthed and why you like it
or or how it evolved to become that. So DJ
Hollywood is a very important piece of the puzzle for me,
because there was no style. He says, say, oh he
wrote that. He said throw your hands in the air

(01:16:05):
and wave him like you just don't kid. He he
was the guy who was who jumped that off because
he was bringing celebration, you see. So that was an
important piece of the puzzle, and in the beginning it
was one of the most important pieces. And Curtis Blow
got it from him and loved bug Starsky told me

(01:16:30):
that when he asked him, I said, yo, Love, who
was the first person you've seen do this? Bro on
that mic? He sat there and said, Hollywood. I turned
around for real he said, Dougie, he said it was.
He said, I was sitting in the car as a kid,
and some dude that had an eight track player in

(01:16:50):
his car, and Hollywood made the first mixtape on an
eight track he said, with your play and play and play,
he said, he said, And I just sat there and
I said, I want to be like that.

Speaker 6 (01:17:06):
I want to do that.

Speaker 3 (01:17:07):
So then you got you got love. You got love.
But then you got busy b crowd Rockey right, and
they from ball with the ball and both of them
doing that. So you got this whole line. So Hollywood
is an important piece. Melle mel is an important piece.
It's an important piece. His style, not just the message,

(01:17:30):
just his whole confidence in the way that he brought
what he did Grandmaster Cas. He brought that clever, slick
thing that you like about King. And when you listen
in the mal you like k r S. And then
you got mo D And when you got Mod, you
listening in the mod, you hear him a rod kill

(01:17:52):
you hearing NOAs So the bloodline I learned directly from
the bloodline directly, and then and then while I learned that,
then then I had to carve out my space and
create this beatbox thing, which is a completely different dimension
from everything. So when people talk about MC's and who

(01:18:16):
is this and who's that, it's a little different from
me because it's the same about Chuck. Because you like
you like rare Essence, then you like Chuck.

Speaker 6 (01:18:27):
You like EU, then you like Chuck.

Speaker 3 (01:18:30):
Like whoever you want to decide that you want to
you better, You're gonna go back to Chuck, you see
what I'm saying. So even when you like like I know,
I knew James Brown, James Brown, and I'm very close
to the family. And James Brown liked me a lot.
And he used to tell me, Son, read your Bible, Son,

(01:18:52):
read your Bible, and always take care of your teeth.
And then he said, and always take care of your feet.

Speaker 1 (01:18:59):
These are that's that's that's a James that's a James
John classic right there.

Speaker 3 (01:19:05):
Take care of your teeth and your feet.

Speaker 2 (01:19:07):
You have the best teeth in hip hop.

Speaker 1 (01:19:14):
Wait a minute, let me let me, let me ask
the opposite of Let me ask the opposite of fante,
Because there's a lot of them.

Speaker 2 (01:19:23):
Who are your top three beat boxers?

Speaker 7 (01:19:26):
Not you?

Speaker 1 (01:19:27):
Who are your top three beat boxers? And there's a
lot to choose from now.

Speaker 3 (01:19:32):
Right, I like rosell I was hoping, I was wondering, Yo.

Speaker 2 (01:19:37):
I forgot Roselle was in my group.

Speaker 4 (01:19:39):
I was just.

Speaker 2 (01:19:45):
I don't even asked that. I didn't even ask that
fishing for a Roselle answer. I just straight forgot.

Speaker 3 (01:19:51):
I know that name.

Speaker 2 (01:19:52):
Sorry, Roselle.

Speaker 3 (01:19:54):
Look, I even did a record for rosel I did
one win him for a d J. Hawston be out
in Japan, and I said, yeah, let's do I think Rozelle.
I think scratch Man was just I mean, I mean
as far as being like like so authentic and real

(01:20:15):
and the way he sound, I just I so much
loved the way he sound. I mean, I was always
so impressed with him, and and just out of a
you know, to me, it's really I mean those two
and Kenny X, I like a lot.

Speaker 2 (01:20:34):
I forgot about Kennedy. Yes, shout out to Kenny X.

Speaker 1 (01:20:37):
Have you ever battled Buffy at all? Like, have you
guys ever been on the stage together and did something?

Speaker 3 (01:20:43):
Or we were supposed to at Brighton High School in
eighty three or eighty four. I'll send you a flyer
and they put us on the flyer. DST was there
red Alert was supposed to be there, and this was
before there was records, and they was calling him just
go three and uh. And I went down there because
I didn't even know that they had to set up

(01:21:05):
for me to do that. So I came in there
and I seen him and I said, y'all want to
do this tonight? And I've got said that. I said,
so I'm I'm aa battle him and then I'm gonna
take y'all two out. And you know, because because because
it was it was fun. It's not like we was fighting.
It was just about you. And then afterwards it never happened.

(01:21:29):
And then we did a couple of shows together and
we never did and I never really had any interest
in doing it anymore because I mean, Buffy was such
a good guy and such a nice person that it
was like, yo, man, I don't feel good about battling

(01:21:51):
this guy, you know what I mean? He has such
a beautiful spirit, and anybody that knew Buffy knew he
was just a nice person. And me and MARKI d
got into a little bit of an argument one time
because when the show came out, he was very he
he was looking at like, you know, like he was

(01:22:12):
the one, he was the voice of the group, and
he looked wanted to challenge me.

Speaker 6 (01:22:17):
And then after a while, you know, he was barking a.

Speaker 3 (01:22:19):
Little bit and going at it, and then I said, yo,
I don't even have to beat box. Do you want
to battle rhyming? Do you want to do that? And
he just didn't want he didn't want to do that.
And so after that, because I come from a battle era,
you know what I mean, from the foundation of battle.
Like I told you, I'm on the side of the

(01:22:40):
stage when Moji and Busy beat Battle.

Speaker 6 (01:22:43):
I'm the only kid that can say I was there.

Speaker 3 (01:22:47):
I was like fourteen, I was I didn't even supposed
to be in there, and I'm on the side of
the stage while that's going down. So I was at
that battle. I was at the battle with Cold Crushed
Battle and Fantastic, you know. So the things that I've
learned from from just being in that area. And then

(01:23:07):
I was in that contest in eighty one in the
amateur contest. So that's the way we came up. You
had to battle, but then as you grow, you evolved,
so it wasn't about battling.

Speaker 6 (01:23:22):
And then me and Marky d became the best of friends.

Speaker 3 (01:23:26):
We would hang out live and then what happened is
when Buffy passed, I did Tom join a cruise and
I wanted boys on there, and I said, we got
to get them on this cruise. So I got them on.
And when I got him on, I said, Yo, let's
do bitter to stick them and let's do it stick. Wow,
that's right, And we did and it was me Kourokski

(01:23:51):
and Prince Marky did and we took pictures together and man,
those are my brothers. Man, it was.

Speaker 4 (01:24:01):
He's gone too sus a lot.

Speaker 1 (01:24:03):
Yeah, okay, brother God, thank you. Look, if you ever
you must open up another restaurant and share that cornbread recipe.
But that's a whole other episode. Doug has the worlds.
When he had his restaurant in Harlem, he had the
world's best corn bread.

Speaker 2 (01:24:21):
He look, this was yeah, this was three five years ago. Anyway, Doug,
I think if you're doing.

Speaker 6 (01:24:26):
This, look and then you yo.

Speaker 3 (01:24:29):
When he said, somebody said, everybody said your man, your man,
quest said your man outside of Lottie, Dottie Shure whatever.
One of the most unbelievable contributions he haven't made the world.

Speaker 1 (01:24:44):
Is this corn bread and look, I was sending interns
from the tonight show. I was sending interns to the
I was sending girl's name, Ashley, the harlor.

Speaker 2 (01:25:01):
Corn bread, Yes, the corn bread.

Speaker 3 (01:25:03):
They call it crack corn bread in the hall.

Speaker 2 (01:25:06):
Ass it's worth breaking your diet for.

Speaker 6 (01:25:12):
Yeah, I may, I may.

Speaker 3 (01:25:14):
We may have to do that one day.

Speaker 6 (01:25:16):
Just be just a little piece hot.

Speaker 1 (01:25:18):
Hot yeah, just one one, one cheat day. Thank you
for doing this episode. All right, this is the It's illiad.
Thank you, We love you.

Speaker 2 (01:25:26):
Do y'all, y'all peace. What's Love Supreme is a production
of iHeart Radio.

Speaker 1 (01:25:48):
More podcasts from iHeart Radio, visit the iHeart Radio app,
Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.