Mario

On this week's episode of The R&B Money Podcast, Tank and J Valentine welcome the legendary Mario. They discuss Mario's early days winning talent shows in Baltimore and how music took him to New Jersey as a teenager. Mario shares memories of the excitement and nerves he felt meeting Clive Davis. How did a chance encounter lead to Mario's big break? Tune in to find out, as Mario traces his journey to fame, reflects on the pressures of childhood stardom, and explains how he found his way through dark times. With no shortage of funny and unbelievable stories, it's a candid, eye-opening conversation years in the making.

 

Extended Episodes on YouTube:

https://www.youtube.com/RnBMoneyPodcast

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Tank: @therealtank  

J Valentine: @JValentine

Podcast: @RnbMoneyPodcast

 

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:01):
R and B Money.

Speaker 2 (00:05):
We are.

Speaker 1 (00:07):
Thanks take Valanchi. We are the authority on all things
R and B. Ladies and gentlemen, my name is Tank
Valentine and this is the Ry Money Podcast.

Speaker 3 (00:23):
Tell her what come you go here? Okay, you started off.

Speaker 1 (00:31):
All things R and B. Voco, I'm sitting this ship.

Speaker 3 (00:35):
Are you being vocal?

Speaker 1 (00:36):
Are you big? There's a difference between an R and
B artists When a R and B singer.

Speaker 4 (00:43):
Off camera, I want to say, there's a difference between
a hit and a classic.

Speaker 3 (00:47):
Come on, it's starting.

Speaker 1 (00:51):
I'm just saying I'm not gonna say too much else here,
Ladies and gentlemen, Mario, that's it.

Speaker 4 (00:57):
That's it. Yeah, before we start, I noticed your thing.
Before we start, I just want to say congratulations man.
To R and B you understand.

Speaker 3 (01:07):
And and to y'all, I don't have no drink drinkers.

Speaker 4 (01:11):
I got it just in case I wanted to ship
on something. But you know what we've done coming from
the DMV, you got d m V, you got the
Bay Area in here, like what we've done, what we've
sustained you know for this, for for R and B
and the game is it's not an easy feat for sure.
You know what I'm saying. And I want to say
congratulations you, thank you for open doors that you've opened.

(01:31):
You know what I'm saying, my Bay Area brother, and
let's let's do this man, R R and B money,
RMB money.

Speaker 3 (01:38):
Today for R and B money.

Speaker 4 (01:39):
Yeah, yeah, I mean, thank you for having me.

Speaker 1 (01:42):
He walked in looking like R and B money money.

Speaker 4 (01:45):
I appreciate you, man.

Speaker 1 (01:46):
I know we talked. We talked in we talked in Atlanta. Yeah,
and you know, and I said something to you that
you know, even you were able like you were able
to really expound on and articulating and we're gonna go
back to the beginning and all that. But yeah, I said, bro,
you're having You're having a hell of a moment right now.
And it actually has nothing to do with music. It

(02:11):
has everything just to do with him with you.

Speaker 4 (02:13):
Thank you, man, thank you.

Speaker 1 (02:15):
You know what I'm saying, Like your your essence and
your movements and just nigga, you just standing there smiling
whatever it is, putting your trip on there. It's it's
a thing to be talked about and appreciate it. And
that goes to or goes back to all of those
things that we were taught early. Yes, aren't really necessarily

(02:35):
talk anymore. Like the presence of an artist should be
something that means walk in the room. Yeah, they have
to know you and that motherfucker before you say a word.

Speaker 4 (02:47):
Absolutely, And that's I think that it's something that needs
to be protected and taught. And some of you you
can't teach, right, But just the awareness of it, of
what you're saying is so important because when you start
so young in the game, sometimes situations the process will

(03:08):
make you forget who you are, not as a talent,
but as a God given talent. You know what I'm saying,
what God gave you, the light that God gave you, right,
because I do believe that most of us that are
in this game are chosen, you know, and we have
a gift that connects, span and touch millions of people

(03:29):
just what our voice is, just with our presence, and
so we got to remember that always like that comes first, right,
and protect that because the game is ruthless. It's a
lot of sharks, and you kind of have to be
a shark and this ship to a certain degree. Right,
Can I curse on this show?

Speaker 1 (03:44):
Please?

Speaker 3 (03:48):
I'm not I tend to do that. Times, but it's
a passion.

Speaker 4 (03:52):
I just feel like I think that I've just come
to a place now where I've accepted certain things and
I don't let I don't let my past. I don't
carry it as heavy as I used to, both my
personal past and also my past that people know of
in the business, whether it be the ups and downs
of success and quote unquote failures. I don't carry it.
I just I just appreciate where Matt and just the

(04:15):
the gift that God gave me of understanding the awareness
of the energy that I am outside of just music
goes back to what you're saying, and I protect that
as much as I possibly can.

Speaker 3 (04:27):
And that's what I think.

Speaker 4 (04:28):
I think we see and I got you know, Adupe
team and people I work with that are like brothers
to me, and we just you know, we we was
in it. We like it's like we gotta get it.
You know what I'm saying, It's got to happen, and
I know this is a time, it's time. You know.

Speaker 1 (04:43):
Wow, since you said you know so you started so
young for real?

Speaker 4 (04:48):
Yeah, Yeah, let's.

Speaker 1 (04:51):
Go back to when when Mario was on the playground
man and and one of them kids was like, man,
this is Mario be singing like a mother, y'all.

Speaker 3 (05:03):
Do you know it's crazy?

Speaker 1 (05:04):
This nigga can wow?

Speaker 4 (05:07):
You said the playground. It started with my mom. Man,
it started with my mother four years old. My mother
was an outstanding listener and collector of great music. Right,
that's where it R and B hip hop. So my
grandmother was church. My great grandmother was church. So she

(05:29):
did listen to the Marvin Gays and then that King
Coles and all of the.

Speaker 3 (05:32):
Great James Brown.

Speaker 1 (05:33):
Right.

Speaker 4 (05:34):
But my mother is the one that noticed my gift
first and was like, at four years old, she got
me a mic that tuned into the radio, right, remember
those they had, the little cordless mic they turned into.
So one day she was in the best sleep and
I'm in the living room with Mitch Max sos On
and some you know, some dirty diapers, pamp.

Speaker 3 (05:52):
Whatever I had on at that time, and.

Speaker 4 (05:55):
Dirty draws, dirty draws. Because so I'm in the living
room and I was singing to a song on the radio,
and not that I was singing all the words, but
she noticed that I could hold a melody. That she

(06:19):
knows that I was hitting them on key, and I mean,
this is the story that she tells me, and I
can't quite remember that moment, but I do remember the mic.
I remember the mic for whatever reason. And she said
from that point on, she's like she was going to
keep music around me in whichever way that she could
rather be playing music. She played the piano as well,

(06:39):
And so I think that was the beginning of creating
the passion and the awareness of who I am today
for myself because she put that in me early. She
put it around me, and I didn't know it was
a gift. I just love to do it. I didn't
know it was a gift to lie. In elementary school,
did a talent show, which I have another story for that,

(07:00):
seeing kids that hated me, like being a fan.

Speaker 3 (07:03):
You know what I'm saying, Like as a kid, you
don't really know you have a gift. You just know it,
you love to do it. They could even help themselves.
They couldn't help themselves.

Speaker 4 (07:10):
Right, And then my grandmother's in the audience. That was
my superhero. So like I don only sing in church
for her, so to be singing boys to Men song
in front of my grandmother was it was That was
the moment where I realized it. But Before that, it
was my mom.

Speaker 3 (07:24):
Man.

Speaker 4 (07:24):
She she really gave me the confidence.

Speaker 3 (07:26):
You know.

Speaker 4 (07:27):
We went to barbershops. She used to cut my hair
up until the age of like seven or eight. And
the first barber shop I went to, she made me
sing for everybody in the barbershop. I don't want to
sing because I was used to singing at home. I'm like,
I don't want to do it, sing sing, sing this
song right now.

Speaker 2 (07:42):
From and so danceing right God, and so all of
the guys gave me ten dollars a piece.

Speaker 4 (07:53):
I mean, my first hundred come.

Speaker 3 (07:58):
We need, we need the barbershop.

Speaker 4 (08:00):
I made my first one hundred dollars in the barbershop.
And I looked at my mom when we left. I said, Mom,
I can make money doing this. She's like, yeah, you can.
She's like, just don't be ever afraid to sing. Never
be afraid to sing. And so, you know, I took
that with me, and it's the reason why I got signed,
you know what I mean. But yeah, the first talent
show I ever did was in elementary school. Right. So,

(08:22):
when we moved out of Emison Village and we moved
to Pikesville in Baltimore from West Baltimore to the County.
Twenty houses down the street from me lived Monique Monique Medium, Yes, Monique, Monique, Monique,

(08:44):
my babies, her son, little Mark, me and two other
young men. I can't remember their names. I can't remember
who it was. She put us in a group. We
rehearsed in her backyard. It's my first time being broken.
I'm not lying to man. Wow, true story, true story.
We rehearsed in her backyard. She put a group together.

(09:07):
We went to the Taylor, we got suits. Yeah, all right,
our elementary school talent show. Elementary school was right across
the street, by the way, a block and a half
away from where we both lived, and we did this
talent show and it was it was incredible. It was
it was like we could have been a group, we

(09:27):
could have been young like you know. But yeah, man,
all of these things. You know, she was a big
part of that for me. And I never told her
that before. I never told you, Mo, Nique, thank you,
thank you for you know what I mean, making us
rehearse for hours, you know what I'm saying, and showing
us why it's going to take, what's going to take

(09:47):
to get to be great, you know, what I'm saying
at a young age. So the group, no, I don't,
I don't.

Speaker 3 (09:53):
Maybe she does. I gotta. I got to hear what
the name of these groups.

Speaker 4 (09:56):
It was so long ago I was I was an elementary.

Speaker 1 (09:58):
Like the fact that, yeah, that they were putting on suits.

Speaker 2 (10:03):
Yeah we had on we have, but not the suits,
not thee with the with the with the Bruce Lee Collo, yeah, Catholic, Yeah.

Speaker 3 (10:16):
The four man group, four man the man. Yeah, yeah,
I know, y'all didn't lose. It wasn't. It was impossible.

Speaker 4 (10:23):
Honestly, I don't even remember who was going against because
we killed. It's so crazy, like we had the aunties
and a grandma and the kid.

Speaker 3 (10:30):
Everybody was going crazy. Now it's gonna be a nigg
in the comments like, yeah, he don't remember it. You know,
we was, we was on them. We almost. That was
the first.

Speaker 4 (10:38):
Honestly, that was the That was the first talent show
I did in Baltimore. But it wasn't the least. The
next one that was like eleven years old, and it
was this guy by the name of Anthony Jeter, and
he would do these talent shows at copp And State
College in Baltimore. And everybody would come. So the one
that I did, DREI came and it was like.

Speaker 2 (10:57):
Tell me what you want that Drew Hill're the guy, right,
oh guy, what you need?

Speaker 1 (11:05):
Yeah?

Speaker 4 (11:05):
It was it was then, And you know I was nervous.
I was I Actually I wasn't. I wasn't trying to
do it. My mother made me do it. Remember, we
went to the rehearsal for it, and we inside of
this hall. It's a long hallway to lead to Anthony
Jitter's uh you know, audition room. But you can hear everything.
So I'm the youngest, like one of the youngest people in.

(11:27):
I'm hearing people singing. I'm hearing like older guys, older women's.
I'm like, my this is why are we here? Why
are you doing this to me? She knew what she
was doing, right. I had no idea why I needed
to do this talent show. So the line is getting
small and small, were like fifty people in. The line
is getting the smallest. We were there for like two hours.

(11:47):
The line is getting smaller. As we finally get to
the door and I sing famthter. Not only did he
exchange it for with my mom, but he was just like, yo,
this kid is special. He's got it. He's in like
one hundred. So we get to the talent show and
I remember that day she she cut my hair. I
didn't even go to a barber shop today. She cut
my hair. She got me this.

Speaker 1 (12:09):
Before you keep going, how did your mom do? Cutting
your hair?

Speaker 4 (12:11):
Amazing?

Speaker 3 (12:12):
I can show you.

Speaker 4 (12:13):
I'm gonna sow your picture before my.

Speaker 1 (12:14):
Bars bars because I used to cut my kids hair.

Speaker 4 (12:19):
Yeah, it's important. That's a that's a great.

Speaker 3 (12:24):
I did alright during the pandemic. He didn't know. He
didn't know I was cutting something like this.

Speaker 1 (12:29):
He was like, what about my hairline? Dad, don't worry
about that.

Speaker 4 (12:31):
He didn't know, He had no idea.

Speaker 3 (12:34):
My son was already a teenager. He like, yeah, yeah, Dad,
Next time, I got you.

Speaker 1 (12:40):
I got you. I got you.

Speaker 3 (12:41):
Can't we just go to the.

Speaker 2 (12:44):
God.

Speaker 1 (12:45):
It wasn't even pandemic for me, right, it was pandemic
trying coming on. I got you, I see I cut hair,
I got you.

Speaker 3 (12:53):
Got.

Speaker 4 (12:54):
I feel like when you're I don't know, I don't
have kids, but I feel like when you're a parent,
like you, you.

Speaker 3 (12:58):
Your kids make you feel like superhero can do anything.

Speaker 4 (13:01):
From what I see like, up is mine, it's mine anyway.

Speaker 1 (13:08):
So she cut your hair?

Speaker 3 (13:09):
Yeah, she cut my hair. She took me to we
went to this.

Speaker 4 (13:13):
We went to a jeweler. She brought me like my
first silver.

Speaker 3 (13:18):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (13:18):
And I remember I had a turtleneck with a gene
all denim jean outfit.

Speaker 3 (13:26):
Shout and the jeans.

Speaker 1 (13:35):
Nigga watched don't watch stone wash got all.

Speaker 3 (13:40):
Right, so you got to fit, you got you got
your ice on on.

Speaker 1 (13:44):
I felt like a start.

Speaker 4 (13:45):
Yeah, you know, I think she knew what she was doing.
She knew what she was doing. And we get there,
you know, because I think she knew, she knew I was.
I was nervous about the whole experience, and I think
she knew what I was going to face once I
got there.

Speaker 3 (13:59):
We get there, we go.

Speaker 4 (14:01):
You know, in the waiting room or whatever. I was like, ma,
I want to go out in the audience. She's like
you sure. I'm like, yeah, I want to see what
everybody's doing. She's like you sure you want to do
I'm like yeah. So I got in the audience and
I just watch. I'm paying attention to what people aren't doing,
what they are doing at eleven Yeah, wow, And I'm like, okay,
all right, I see how I am ready to go
back now.

Speaker 3 (14:22):
So we go backstage. They introduced me. I go out
and what.

Speaker 4 (14:25):
Did I sing? What did I sing? I sung? I
think I sung on Ben the niece by Boys to
Man killed it one thousand percent killed it.

Speaker 3 (14:38):
Go back to get the you.

Speaker 4 (14:41):
Know the like the when they announced the winner. So
his niece was in the show. So he his niece was.
She was like, she was a young girl and it
was amazing. Other artists like older people doing it was crazy,
but his niece were on the show.

Speaker 3 (14:55):
I was mad. I was pissed. I was mad. I've
got on the back.

Speaker 4 (14:58):
I'm screaming, like crying. I'm mad mad I was you know,
I didn't even know I was that competitive, So I'm crying.
I turned around. Somebody tapped my should like, yo, it's
all good. I was all good at Little Homie It's
all good. And it's jazz from Drew Hill. Wow, Cisco
walk up. Then all the other guys walk up. I'm
just at this point, I'm like, yo, this is crazy.

(15:20):
So yeah, that whole experience they had. Turning to my
mother meeting Troy Patterson, who was Third Street and my
first production signed to That's my manager at the time.
He was there, and so he just kept in touch
with my mom for a few years. And then you know,
Brotom was start getting crazy. My grandmother passed away. I
started getting into things IIN's supposed to get into. She
called Troy, like, yo, I need to get Mario out

(15:42):
of the city. You know what I'm saying. It was
just it was just this dark cloud that was starting
to surround me at this time. And my mom was
going through her own issues at the time, and she
wasn't always around, didn't grow up with my dad. So
it was just like bouncing the family and family house, sometimes,
not going to school. Sometimes I don't even come home,
just being outside right, And you know, that transition changed
my life forever. I moved. I was supposed to go

(16:05):
up for a weekend. She called him, she said, go
to Jersey Jersey. She's like, I need my son to
get out of Baltimore. You know, Can he just come
up there for a week and just to get away
for a minute while I get myself together. He's like, yeah, yes,
and what I go home? I go there and I
never came back to Bottomore until I shot my first video,
which was just a friend.

Speaker 3 (16:25):
How old are you at this point when you go.

Speaker 4 (16:26):
I'm just I'm thirteen.

Speaker 1 (16:29):
I'm about to turn fourteen.

Speaker 4 (16:31):
No, it is, yeah, I'm about to turn fourteen years old.
But before this, I'm like moving from house to house.

Speaker 3 (16:39):
You know.

Speaker 4 (16:40):
There were times where my mom was dating this guy
at the time and we didn't get along. There were
times where I just never came home, you know what
I'm saying, And I was just stay at a friend's
crib or like just just be outside. And at the time,
in my mind, I'm like, I just got to do
what I gotta do. You know, my grandmother was gone,
you know, she died when I was twelve and nineteen

(17:01):
ninety nine, December second, she passed away, and that was
like my safe haven. She was the person that if
something that made sense. Long long as I was with her,
it made sense, life made sense. And when she was gone,
it was just me and God.

Speaker 3 (17:14):
You know.

Speaker 4 (17:15):
On her deathbed, she told me, she slipped.

Speaker 2 (17:16):
Look, what you have is a gift, and your gift
will take you wherever you you know, wherever God wants
you to be.

Speaker 4 (17:25):
She like, just never stop believing in yourself and I'm
always with you. That's what she told me on her deathband.
And I got a tap with my back that says
sole truth that's dedicated to her because it's something that
I live and walk every day. So a lot of
who I am today is because of my grandmother and
of course my mother, but from a spiritual place, is
my grandmother for sure.

Speaker 1 (17:43):
Yeah, so you moved to Jersey, Yeah, and do you
go straight into I don't know what will be considered
a boot campus now.

Speaker 2 (17:56):
It just like this kid, it was life. It was
more so life. So he took you in on some Yeah.

Speaker 4 (18:02):
Yeah, it was very much so guardians than act.

Speaker 3 (18:07):
I'm about to just make him a singer. It was like, no,
I gotta raise him fifty to fifty because.

Speaker 4 (18:13):
Like a week or two, maybe a month after I
moved up, then he he brought up another kid actually
from Baltimore. He was trying to make a group out
of us, and then that didn't work out and I
ended up staying. You know, I think in his mind,
obviously he saw talent because he's been around it all
these years, all the years, but he also saw someone
that he's like, yo, I'm not gonna let this young
kid fail in life, you know what I'm saying, So

(18:36):
I do. I learned a lot about discipline through through him.
He was a very disciplined person, you know. And so
that whole chap, that whole era of my life was
about discipline and about being very uncomfortable for a great cause,
you know what I'm saying.

Speaker 3 (18:51):
And it taught me just every God is amazing.

Speaker 4 (18:57):
God is amazing because when your purpose is strong enough,
everything that you go through, even the things that don't
make sense, is preparing you for your future, is preparing
you to have the strength to push through in moments
where you know a regular person or someone else may

(19:19):
give up or you want to give up. Right, So
I think about that and like those uncomfortable moments where
I felt like, what the fuck is going on? My
grandmother's not here, I'm not with my family, I'm with
a new family. I never grew up with it that.
So I don't even know how to take discipline.

Speaker 3 (19:37):
I don't even know how to be like, I don't
even know.

Speaker 4 (19:42):
I don't even know how to do Yeah, I'm like,
I don't even know how to do this. How are
we going to do this?

Speaker 1 (19:47):
You know, we went through somethings.

Speaker 4 (19:51):
We went through some we went through some things, man,
and I was always like I think that I at
that time, I was like closed off. I was introverted.
I was very introverted because I just didn't know what
to trust, not about who what to trust right now,
that makes perfect. Started going to school in Jersey, shout
out to to to Bergen County and went to team

(20:12):
at for a minute, saw my first like like when
I went in Baltimore was all black.

Speaker 2 (20:17):
It was all black. It was kids from all over
the city. Going to school.

Speaker 4 (20:20):
Jersey was like a mixture of everything, was like a
melted pot.

Speaker 3 (20:23):
Right.

Speaker 4 (20:23):
So it was my first time seeing the you know
little Latin shorty is my first time seeing some some
some ship, right, and first time seeing people dress a
little bit. I just I just wore big T shirts and.

Speaker 3 (20:38):
Tims in the bag pants.

Speaker 1 (20:39):
You know what, no no, no loud colors, the motion
you could get some Nike. Everybody had any power dress code.
You have to look like you don't rob somebody.

Speaker 4 (20:58):
So they used to call me country Grammar when I
when I first moved up there, because you know, my
accent not as heavy as used to be. But bottomore accent.

Speaker 1 (21:04):
Heavy is heavy, way different.

Speaker 4 (21:10):
And so my first week moving to Jersey, you know,
getting a fight in school the first week that, you know,
but it was like I'm somebody else house. Yeah, this
man don't deal with like fa you know what I'm saying.
It was like, this is what you're gonna do the
first week, like they you know, And so it was

(21:30):
like I had to get used to just a different
lifestyle man. I want to say, like a year in
he companed me up from school one day when we
go to New York City, right, big Apple. Going to
New York. I got on some sweatpants, a Coolie sweater,
a Nike head wrap, and some earphones and a book

(21:51):
bag and some times we walked into the Marriott Hotel.
Peter Edge had an office. This is Jay Records before
Jay Records brought there and got the building just starting.
Clive had just started Jay. We walked into the office
my first time meeting Peter as I sing for Peter,

(22:11):
I wish by Carl Thomas, and then they walked me
into me Clive, me Peter, Troy Clive in the office,
big beautiful office, beautiful view pictures with bon Jovi and
Clive and Whitney and Clive Michael sat.

Speaker 3 (22:30):
All the great just great. So I'm looking around, imagine.

Speaker 4 (22:33):
Ever reflesh, you can imagine. I had no idea at
the time. I mean, I've heard his name before, but
I had no idea who Clive Davis was, in the
magnitude of the greatness he had been and how much
he had fought for us, you know, in some ways
in the urban music. And I sit down and Clive's like,
you know, I started talking to him. I was asking

(22:54):
him about the like, you know, pianos and all this
stuff in his house. And he asked me to sing
for him the same thing I Wish by Karl Thomas
and I Make Love to You by boys, And he
called in his whole staff. He's like hold on. He
called in his whole staff, mostly women at the time.
Set him on a couch in the room on the
on the left side of the room. His desk is here,
and then it's like the whole view of New York

(23:14):
some crazy at the top of the Maria. And I
sang again, and.

Speaker 2 (23:18):
He asked me right there, how would you like to
be you know, new artists on Jay Records.

Speaker 3 (23:34):
I'm gonna be a hundred keep it a hundred.

Speaker 2 (23:37):
Working with Warren and Harold was like working with like
big cousins.

Speaker 1 (23:41):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (23:42):
Yes, working with the underdogs was like working with It
was more it felt a little more corporate.

Speaker 3 (23:48):
It sound a little more like, yeah, you know what
I'm saying.

Speaker 2 (23:53):
I was like, we're still making great music, but it
felt more mechanical.

Speaker 4 (23:57):
But it was still great, you know what I mean.

Speaker 2 (23:59):
Shot out to those guys, you know what I'm saying,
and what they've contributed to.

Speaker 4 (24:04):
The passion, the pain and the pleasure of R and B.

Speaker 3 (24:07):
Yeah, you know what I say.

Speaker 4 (24:09):
But yeah, man, it was that was you know, this
was like artist development for me. You know, I may
work with all those great people because it's like you're
working with the great. I remember I remember singing Troop
records in middle school, you know what I'm saying. And
working with Little Steve on those records was I didn't
even know at the time, like I'm working with little Steve.
I didn't learn that toil late in two three years later.
It was just like my life. I'm like, this is

(24:31):
it's like a great gaspy This is like a fairy tale,
but it's so real.

Speaker 3 (24:35):
You know what I'm saying it was crazy.

Speaker 2 (24:37):
I think from the outside looking in, when you first
came into the business, I feel like you put niggas
on notice because there was a gap with especially young artists. Yeah, singing,
the way you came out singing, it tripped. It tripped

(24:59):
us out in the industry because by the time, because
you when you crack two thousand and two, two thousand
and two first, by that point, I'm already established a rider.
I'm already in the game. We're doing what we're doing. Shit,
we've already done that. We already started the underdogs. So
we're seeing everything that's coming through, you know what I mean,
because that's the other side of the business, right. Most
artists just look at it like, oh yeah, I'm such

(25:20):
and such. But it's like, you know, I just sell
ten of y'all.

Speaker 4 (25:23):
Right, right, like literally that system, right, it's like yeah.

Speaker 3 (25:28):
Ye, yeah, yeah, you good little nigga but.

Speaker 1 (25:31):
Records.

Speaker 4 (25:31):
But but when.

Speaker 2 (25:32):
We saw you, when we saw you, this is real shit, bro,
When we saw you as like oh shit, wow, they
really signed little niggas that.

Speaker 3 (25:42):
Can really sing?

Speaker 2 (25:43):
Yeah, man, right, like that was that was you know,
I mean, I'm a grownn at this point I'm already
you know. I mean, I'm twenty twenty one, so I'm like, yo,
that little nigga. I was like, okay, I see the
other team that we just did them little privalleged songs
on He's sanging though, thank you, bro right. And I
think that was something that I and I'll say shout

(26:06):
out to Clive and shout out Jay Records for letting
you still be a singer and then held and Warren
finding the space of you making young music.

Speaker 4 (26:18):
That was classic though.

Speaker 3 (26:20):
That was right.

Speaker 2 (26:21):
It was like because that original, that's the thing that
happens when you see the young artists.

Speaker 3 (26:25):
You're like, fuck, okay, what are they gonna sing?

Speaker 4 (26:28):
Right?

Speaker 2 (26:29):
Where are they gonna sing too? I mean, but how
does it not be just popcorn right right, right, facts? Facts?

Speaker 1 (26:35):
But it was.

Speaker 4 (26:35):
It was also though that I was also very authentic
and I had like I had real edge, like there
was and which it was like you didn't have to
make up the soul, you didn't have to make up
the pain, like sometimes it takes pain to really have
that ship. You know what I'm saying. I think that
that was what and that is what makes my voice
special when I'm on the right songs right because I

(26:57):
cut a lot of different records, but the right songs
with the right writers and the right producers.

Speaker 3 (27:01):
Like it's just there's something that cuts through that's more authentic.

Speaker 4 (27:04):
And I feel like that's important for for for labels
today to understand, like where is the artist creating from?
Where are we creating from with this artist? How do
we When we went back and did justin Friend and
I put that fifty two jersey on with ray Lewis,
it was like a real thing for me. It was like, no, this,
I gotta wear this one where I'm from. You know

(27:26):
what I'm saying. I gotta wear this, but it has
to be baggy and I have to have on baggy
pants and I have to have on air force where
we're from. You know what I'm saying. And it was
like I wasn't in And I think that over the
time that's that got lost, you know, with me being signed,
because it was like okay, now it turned more manufacturing. Yeah,
and you know what I'm saying.

Speaker 2 (27:46):
We still made hits, We still mad, but it was
like I start feeling myself not feeling like Okay, this
is not me no more.

Speaker 4 (27:51):
It's like it's not. Now it's like, Okay, how do
we dress them for this? How do we It's like, damn,
like that got lost over the course of every album.
Next you started shifting because.

Speaker 2 (28:04):
Coming in as a child star, there's a lot of
questions because a lot of people don't.

Speaker 3 (28:12):
Cross that transition. What they don't cross from from being
a boy perfect right, Like that is it? That is?

Speaker 2 (28:20):
That is that's the That's the greatest way to say it. Yeah,
a lot of people get stuck facts, so trying to
figure out, Okay, well who is this young man? Now
we signed a young boy, got a young boy? Yeah, okay, yeah,
you got your bagg of this, and but you don't
live in Baltimore no more either at this point.

Speaker 3 (28:37):
And now it's like, okay, you've been moving back though
lead you.

Speaker 4 (28:40):
On my second After my second album, I moved back,
Yeah for sure, but it wasn't neat. But it never
left me bro Like, I get what you're saying, you're right,
but I think what happened is that there was a
lot of changes in the building and.

Speaker 3 (28:54):
What it was like.

Speaker 2 (28:57):
After my first album that's like early too, so really
technically it still feels like it's late nineties right to
a certain.

Speaker 3 (29:03):
Degree music they still think nineties are right.

Speaker 4 (29:08):
It's like it's crazy. It's like, nah, nigga, that's not
what's going on right now. But I think that it
was like what is R and B Now? During that time,
we were like, you know, we knew underdogs with R
and B. We knew that, but like it was like
as far as this new, this new world, there was

(29:31):
so much different. There were a lot of sub drummers
being created in the early two j thousands.

Speaker 2 (29:36):
Right, you had Pharrell doing what he was doing. You
had tell me you know what I'm saying.

Speaker 4 (29:42):
You had Scott's storage and that's where Scott came in
at on the project. When we did let Me Love You.
It was like, okay, now like now this this, this
is not this is a sub drummer.

Speaker 3 (29:53):
Was that his first R and B record?

Speaker 4 (29:55):
Nah, it wasn't on a male artist that magnitude at
that time. Okay, but he didn't me myself and I
he had, yeah, shout out to my nigga e s T.

Speaker 3 (30:09):
Listen listen, yes, yes, yes.

Speaker 4 (30:14):
It was one of the first people to actually believe
in me as a writer. It was like nigga, no
I'm gonna write this record with you, Like you know, I.

Speaker 2 (30:21):
Did write where Harold Lily we we. I didn't write
wh him we told. I told stories to him because.

Speaker 1 (30:26):
He was talk Yeah, yeah, you want to know about
come on, We're.

Speaker 3 (30:31):
Gonna get back to Harold.

Speaker 1 (30:32):
That's my nigga.

Speaker 4 (30:33):
That's my nigga. But yeah, that that that second album
Miami we recorded, Like you know, this was like Scott Storch, like.

Speaker 1 (30:42):
You recording in Miami?

Speaker 4 (30:43):
You feel me? Yeah? Yeah, there was so much inspiration was.

Speaker 3 (30:49):
Manson was he had, Scott would have it.

Speaker 1 (30:55):
He had to party famous anyone, party anyone.

Speaker 2 (31:00):
It was like it was crazy, you know what I'm
saying it was it was crazy.

Speaker 4 (31:05):
And we were in Miami recording and you never knew
what the was gonna come out of the day.

Speaker 2 (31:09):
Working with scottis you never knew what absolutely not, because
he could work under within so much.

Speaker 3 (31:17):
It was so much going on, but still so much
greatness happened. At the same time.

Speaker 2 (31:20):
I'm just like five hundred pair of sunglasses. Bro Listen,
I'm like no, no, no, no, because obviously that was his thing, right, sunglasses.
Some random sunglass nigga comes in in the studio, session.
I'm like, okay, I've seen a lot of shit. I've
never seen a sunglass nigga come to the studio and
he was like yeah, and he laid out like twenty
of them at first, right, he just laid them all

(31:41):
eye and he is like he's selling joints five hundred
is he like, I'm here with Scott's stores.

Speaker 4 (31:45):
Oh yeah, you know what, they don't make those those
are one thousand dollars.

Speaker 3 (31:49):
It's like watches sunglasses cars. So the nigga, Scott says.

Speaker 2 (31:53):
Scott just gets frustrated at this point. He's like, yeah,
he tries on about five of them.

Speaker 4 (31:57):
Give me all of them?

Speaker 3 (31:57):
He said, what else do you got?

Speaker 1 (31:59):
He's like a box in the car.

Speaker 2 (32:01):
Yeah, the nigga had five hundred pair of shades. The niggas,
Scott said, give me all all of them.

Speaker 4 (32:08):
Man, got that Scott, That was Scott bro Scott.

Speaker 3 (32:11):
This nigga just spend fifty thousand glasses real quick.

Speaker 1 (32:15):
We had a shoe convention much for your whole table.

Speaker 3 (32:19):
But I was I know, yeah, I know how it
was that.

Speaker 4 (32:22):
I mean it was it was it was fun, you
know what I'm saying. I would say, like we had
we had a lot of fun. You eighteen at this point,
I'm like, yeah, I'm like seventeen. By the turn eighteen,
that's fucking crazy.

Speaker 1 (32:34):
And George Mansion imagine.

Speaker 4 (32:39):
I mean we got hit records already, got hit records already,
so everything was circulating, All the energy was circulated.

Speaker 3 (32:44):
I mean the girls were certainly and less certainly.

Speaker 4 (32:47):
I mean I see all the girls that back then
that you might have thought was like the bat like
the joints, that's like still some of today's they still.

Speaker 3 (32:57):
Yeah, they was in there while we recorded. He's like,
you know, so it's like, you know who has like that?

Speaker 2 (33:07):
And that was I would think that was the first
time me experiencing like rock and roll.

Speaker 4 (33:13):
The industry, like something like this ship is like this,
And but then you had cash money in Miami. It
was a lot of energy in Miami that I was.
I'm like, because I was with Scott, I was seeing
all of it at that time. It was like a
lot going on.

Speaker 3 (33:24):
They were all pulling up. It was crazy.

Speaker 4 (33:27):
So in the midst of all of that, we're creating
great R and B Right were already working for like
a good couple of weeks. Scott flies and Neo. Neil
come in. He had him and like my person, and
he had a little bad joint with him that he brought.
He was on the other side. There was another house
and Nel was recording there like across the street, and

(33:50):
I think Scott sent him a packer went through a
pack of beats, if I can remember correctly, Scott. Don't
he always like you're sucking up the story.

Speaker 3 (33:57):
If I fun up the story, Scott, forgive me. I just.

Speaker 4 (34:01):
But anyway, Yeah, So he's pack of beats and Neo
just does what he does. Man just going over there writing.
You know what I'm saying in his own world. He
brings back let Me Love You track. There's another writer
producer by the name of Cam that was a part
of it at this time. One day will be me
writing with Sts writing, and the other day would be

(34:23):
me just cutting records that you know, people were. Neil
brought in let Me Love You in a couple of heat.
There's another record that I cut. We cut let Me
Love You that night. I didn't think anything of it.
I'm just cutting records. I'm just like, Okay, it's another
great song. I'm just gonna do what I'm great at
it's just like making my own. We cut the record,
we'll come back the next day, and the files for
whatever reason, had completely deleted to that record. So we're like, yo,

(34:48):
we gotta cut this record again again like before we
like play it for label play. We cut it again,
but this time I was already living with it, you know,
took the record. I was in a different space with
the record, right, and I just remember cutting it and
just doing like passes because I'd already you know, got
used to We just it passes and incomptent or whatever,
we go back play the record. I remember sitting at

(35:11):
clive desks and with Clive like, you couldn't just like
play a record. You had to bring the lyric sheet. Yes,
you had to, like you know what I'm saying, You
had to bring the whole So we go in the
studio with him. It's me, Troy, I think Larry Jackson
was there, Peter Clive, and we're playing the record and
everybody's like, yeah, this record is a smash. At the time,

(35:33):
I didn't know. I'm not gonna lie. I didn't know
what it was. I knew it was special, I knew
it felt good. I knew it was original and it
felt new, but I was studying everything else was going on.
I'm like, okay, ill sure it just came out with Yeah,
confessions just came out. I'm like, nah, I need something sexier,
I need something more. But then we were just going
back and forth, but they knew what it was. I

(35:54):
can't even lie. I knew it was special, but I
didn't know it was that hit and put the record up.
Clive had a couple of changes he wanted to make,
but other than that, it was just it was out
of here. It was out of here.

Speaker 3 (36:06):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (36:06):
Yeah, I'm gonna give you all my experience with that record.
So obviously I have the second single on that album.

Speaker 3 (36:16):
Right, we've been told we have the first single.

Speaker 2 (36:21):
Wow, you know I didn't even get Yeah. We'll segue yeah, yeah,
we'll get to the segue with how that how that
all transpired. But you know, the music business from a
writer producer side, you have those conversations with the n
R with the label and they're like yo, yo, So
this record is gonna be visited, and at this point,

(36:42):
the underdogs, we're on fire crazy, So.

Speaker 3 (36:45):
If you're coming there, we're getting the first single.

Speaker 2 (36:49):
That's kind of how it goes right, but nobody even
knows you're From our standpoint, we don't even know you
have been in Miami doing records with Scott Storage. Wow,
because you know it's it's it's not like, oh, well,
who else, And it's just like, yo, you come in
to get a Underdog record's gonna probably.

Speaker 3 (37:05):
And he's on SIS here after plund and he's.

Speaker 2 (37:08):
On Jay Records, which was Underdog Records for a minute
for sure.

Speaker 3 (37:13):
So I'm in San Francisco. I never forget this ship.

Speaker 2 (37:17):
And Neo isn't like I think, I want to say
he's new at this.

Speaker 3 (37:24):
Point, he's not even and he's just talking about your record.

Speaker 2 (37:29):
Yeah, I hadn't heard it yet. And he's saying, I
wrote Mario's record.

Speaker 3 (37:38):
So one of my No. No.

Speaker 2 (37:39):
One of my niggas, big Vin, big Vin calls me.
He's like, didn't you write Mario's first single? And I'm
like yeah.

Speaker 3 (37:50):
He like, it's some new nigga. Man, he got like
the matrix name. Nigga says name Neo right, because he
don't really.

Speaker 2 (37:56):
Know who he is, and he like and this nigga
saying he wrote the record. I'm like, maybe he wrote
another record. But from my understanding, he was like, yeah,
you write this word call let me love you?

Speaker 3 (38:07):
And I'm like no. He' like that shit is smash crazy.

Speaker 1 (38:13):
I'm like, wait, we don't have.

Speaker 4 (38:14):
The first single.

Speaker 3 (38:16):
That's crazy.

Speaker 2 (38:17):
This is how I find out. I'm at home, Nigga.
I go up to the radio station. They play the records.
I'm like, oh my god, and this is what I
said to I think I might either call Damon or
I called Harvey and I said.

Speaker 3 (38:30):
They might not never get to how could you?

Speaker 1 (38:33):
Wow?

Speaker 2 (38:35):
They was a word I said, Nigga, his first single.
It's about to be playing for the next year. I
don't know when. How could you?

Speaker 3 (38:44):
It's going to go crazy.

Speaker 4 (38:45):
That's crazy.

Speaker 3 (38:46):
That's first time I heard it. One time.

Speaker 2 (38:49):
I'm like, this record, there's nothing wrong with it. Everything's
right vocally, lyrically, the movement of the song.

Speaker 3 (38:58):
I'm like, oh my god, bro, what the fuck? I
was pissed. I was like, that's my dog, and I'm
happy you got another one. He about to get cracking again.

Speaker 2 (39:09):
I'm pissed though, because I also knew what how could
You was, and I wrote it about some personal ship too,
so it's.

Speaker 4 (39:16):
Like, oh man, that's crazy. Honestly speaking, I didn't know
until later that you actually wrote that record.

Speaker 3 (39:23):
I thought back Dawkins wrote.

Speaker 2 (39:25):
It what Eric worded with us, right like, so no, no, no, no,
no, no no, So this is this is okay the backstory
to that record. I mean Eric and myself both told
the story together and separately, and we tell the same
exact story.

Speaker 3 (39:39):
We both had situations that we drew from.

Speaker 2 (39:44):
Mine was literally a very immature high school situation and
his was his grown right, And that's how we merged
the record, and that's where the title came from. And
really the whole ghetto conversation Ship was just me being stupid, right, literally,
like just me being in the studio being stupid. And
at the time, the girl I was dating was really

(40:07):
on some like have you heard about this karma suture stuff?
And it's trying to like, you know, you know, girls
always want to introduce you to something like have you
heard some reading this? And I'm like, some people just
they're just in a lock for eight hours.

Speaker 3 (40:18):
This is what this man, This ship sounds stupid right
right right.

Speaker 2 (40:22):
So but I'm starting to read about it and I'm like, okay,
soon as freaking ship, Okay, let's get into it.

Speaker 4 (40:27):
They always asked me, what is the ghetto karma suture?
I mean, I tell my own story about it. But
here you go from the word get the hood version.

Speaker 3 (40:37):
It is just the hood version.

Speaker 1 (40:38):
It's like just the exactly this.

Speaker 3 (40:41):
Is the beauty of what we do.

Speaker 4 (40:42):
Man, you can be like some people can be a
part of your journey of greatness and you might not
even know. You know what I'm saying. We are like
a part of each other's story growth and and ship.
You know what I'm saying. This crazy is a full
circle moment.

Speaker 1 (40:56):
Man.

Speaker 4 (40:56):
Before we made.

Speaker 3 (40:57):
History, yeah no, absolutely.

Speaker 2 (40:59):
When we his you finally got to the record, it
still became a hit record, let Me Love You.

Speaker 3 (41:03):
It was like let Me Love You was the rocket
ship that stayed in the air.

Speaker 1 (41:09):
Yeah yeah, it was just like still a history, history
making record.

Speaker 3 (41:14):
Shout out to everybody that was a part of that.

Speaker 1 (41:16):
But how could you? How could you? Is the record
that upset me? Yeah yeah, because because the.

Speaker 3 (41:25):
The other part was where were you that you should
I don't know where it was you were supposed to
be a part.

Speaker 1 (41:30):
Of that was all there.

Speaker 2 (41:32):
This is at this point, we're all so named all
under that we were at this point, you got to
the underdogs when we were literally.

Speaker 3 (41:41):
When I came to it was it was a revolver.
It was a machine at this point. Bro.

Speaker 4 (41:46):
When I walked in the studio that day, they had
some just chocolate beautiful girl working and you always had some.

Speaker 1 (41:54):
Vibes over there by.

Speaker 3 (41:55):
You always had theirs.

Speaker 4 (41:56):
I'm gonna tell you, She's one of the reasons why
I saw so good on that record.

Speaker 3 (42:02):
She was older than me.

Speaker 4 (42:04):
She came in the studio while I was singing it
and literally sat in the room the whole time I
sang the fucking record. I know who she is, but
I'm not about to give her that fucking.

Speaker 3 (42:13):
Shout out right now. Fired up.

Speaker 2 (42:15):
I know, I don't know it like that, but I know, yeah,
I know you're talking about it.

Speaker 4 (42:21):
But it was just the energy over there was was
very R and B. You know that definitely was the
difference from working with other people. Is when you walked
into Emmons building and there was another building too, but
that was the one I recorded, and you knew you
was getting some real R and B and everybody in
there was about that, and you knew you had to
deliver because everybody could sing everybody was vocalist and everything

(42:45):
with Harvey vocal producing it. It was just like.

Speaker 1 (42:49):
You delivered on that record, like you delivered like a
grown ass man on that record. Yes, And I felt
like she was. I wasn't out of I was on
the bench, you know what I'm saying at the time,
and I couldn't put no records out. I was just
right at that time. And I felt like I felt
like you were tampering with, you know, with my nuance,

(43:10):
and you was cooking and I was like, this motherfucker's crazy,
And where was I to not get on this at least?
Like that right there substantiated you for me as a
grown man? How could you did that for me? I
thought you could. You should let me love you. It
was a great, great monstrous record, right, not taking anything

(43:33):
from that, but I felt like that edge that is
Mario and lyricism.

Speaker 4 (43:39):
And livery we were talking about it.

Speaker 1 (43:42):
I felt like you was in there singing like this
for sure. I felt like you was. You had to
face on when you were singing that. I said, because a.

Speaker 2 (43:48):
Man, I appreciate you, because I remember even when you
needed that conversation came up.

Speaker 3 (43:54):
It was like, yeah, we gotta play him? How could you? Right?
When when niggas, I was like, because I'm sure you
at least five records to play. But I'm like, is
he grown? This was my thought. I was like, is
he grown enough for that? Because that record was a
very like like I'm.

Speaker 2 (44:07):
Saying, I wrote it from a mental set of time
where I was younger, but I wrote it as a
grown man too, and we were having grown man conversation
in that studio, myself, Damon Harvey in my life.

Speaker 3 (44:25):
Right, little did y'all know my life?

Speaker 4 (44:27):
That's the thing I don't know yet.

Speaker 3 (44:28):
All I know everything was fast forward.

Speaker 2 (44:30):
I know, brave my head, I know, you know what
I'm saying, Like, that's what that's four years prior. Though
a lot can happen in four years walking you're still eighteen,
only twenty two, twenty three.

Speaker 3 (44:41):
Them niggas thirty, right, that's facts.

Speaker 2 (44:44):
They super grown, you know what I'm saying. Niggas got
kids already. I ain't had nothing yet, but like the
whole bill, niggas got kids.

Speaker 3 (44:50):
Niggas got mortgages, right, So it's like, oh, yeah, he cold,
but you think you're gonna pull it off vocally? Right?

Speaker 2 (44:56):
And if you hear, and I'm sure you know it.
Eric Dawkins demo to.

Speaker 3 (45:01):
That record, it's fucking crazy.

Speaker 4 (45:04):
It's crazy.

Speaker 2 (45:05):
But you came after that and saying that record, like
you said, made it your own, which and literally was
the topic of the conversation in that building for a
good week or two before.

Speaker 3 (45:18):
Obviously before the song ever came out with Niggas was like, yo, man,
they broke and that's right, we just did this new
one with this kid. Whatever.

Speaker 4 (45:38):
Man, I appreciate the whole journey, you know what I'm saying.
All of that shit is important to me, all of
the knowledge, all every every single step of it, because
it's still a long way to go? Are you thirty seven?

Speaker 3 (45:51):
Wow?

Speaker 2 (45:51):
Young still twenty five years almost in the game?

Speaker 5 (45:55):
Yeah thirty seven, yes, young man, Yes, sir, if I
could be thirty seven, it's.

Speaker 3 (46:10):
Crazy with the hot grease.

Speaker 1 (46:13):
Oh you clown.

Speaker 3 (46:16):
Got at you.

Speaker 4 (46:18):
Take said that you're gonna make some of the best
music we ever made.

Speaker 2 (46:22):
Yeah, oh he said, yeah, he's saying.

Speaker 1 (46:30):
He said, I got ideas for the young Chap. Absolutely, Mario,
you've been doing this for quite sometime. My Brady Moms
Mini moves. You've shared many stages over the decades. Some
of this music that you've been listening to that has

(46:50):
helped shape them. The world that is Mario, the music
that is Mario, the style.

Speaker 4 (46:56):
That is Mario.

Speaker 1 (47:00):
Do people want to get into your money? They want
to know, sorry taking so long with Niche. They want
to know for the Murrios. Top five?

Speaker 3 (47:19):
Yeah, your top five? Come on, come on with f
your top five. I be leasing.

Speaker 1 (47:35):
Worrying me songs. We are not doing it from Aunton
bang got.

Speaker 3 (47:44):
Soul, Go and go to your top.

Speaker 2 (47:51):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (47:53):
Top five is crazy. Okay, my top five, yourself, my

(48:14):
top five I had.

Speaker 4 (48:16):
You know, I've been thinking about this.

Speaker 1 (48:19):
Mario, your top and B singers.

Speaker 3 (48:21):
I'm just right now away from them to get to
number two, number two.

Speaker 1 (48:27):
Top five, Army singers, No Order, No Good or live
you know your world.

Speaker 4 (48:32):
Michael Jackson, Yeah, come on, come on, come to Stevie Wonder. Yeah,
Marvin Gaye, although not one person, the whole group, but
boister men, it's got to be come on now. The
last person I left ambiguous for the day because I
don't it's it's such a a.

Speaker 3 (48:57):
Tough pick, but I'm gonna pick this person.

Speaker 4 (49:04):
Because damn, this is the last one's tough. I'll say
Whitney Houston, Whitney Houston, and I picked the people that
made me feel something very just spiritually through the way

(49:26):
that they, you know, delivered songs and or their presence,
like the presence you were speaking about earlier that doesn't
have anything to do with music. Each one of those people,
I feel like they just they're just special, like just
special beings that just happen to have this gift. So
those are definitely my top five for.

Speaker 1 (49:44):
Sure, solid top five R and B songs.

Speaker 4 (49:53):
Mm hmm alaun B song, Okay Baby Be Mine Michael
Jackson mm hmm on Bended Knee Voice the Man I

(50:19):
have nothing hm hmm with in Houston.

Speaker 1 (50:25):
The songs go down. I get it standards, all.

Speaker 4 (50:30):
The things Joe, Joe and I got one more. But
the reason I say all the things come on a
lot of people be like, yo, man, let me love you.
That's that's a crazy like take your take, your take
your girl's song, take another niggad girl song. Like no
Joe started this ship. He said all the things your
man won't to do, but he did it in a
way that was like so like you can't be mad

(50:53):
at it because we already felt that way before about something.

Speaker 3 (50:55):
He said, why are all the good girls taking? Every time?

Speaker 4 (50:58):
Why are the good girls taking?

Speaker 3 (50:59):
Why do I keep falling in love with someone Else's done?
Talking about Dirty Man Ship Joe. The last song.

Speaker 4 (51:10):
I would have to say my personal favorite one of
them Stevie Wonder Overjoyed Just yeah, Stevie.

Speaker 3 (51:18):
Wonder Castle Blood Yeah.

Speaker 4 (51:22):
The imagination he put into his lyricsism, I feel like
it's a lost art. I think imagination is a lost
art in creativity, like in terms of you know, mainstream music.
We got to get back to that space where we
were seeing things that we never seen before. The missis
rhymes the hearing things, seeing like the whole you know
what I'm saying, Like the whole thing.

Speaker 1 (51:45):
Nobody's eveing close to making no ship like that.

Speaker 3 (51:48):
Nah, it's crazy musically, it's crazy, nigga, But.

Speaker 2 (51:52):
We have we also have to be adventurous enough and
bold enough to do it and you're into and to
let the world decide if they're going to love it
or not, and for us not to feel like, well, damn,
I'm not giving them what they know.

Speaker 3 (52:08):
I'm giving them what I feel like they need.

Speaker 2 (52:11):
Yeah, for sure, because we get caught up in that
and that's the other side of having real power and
real ownership in yourself because you can make those decisions
now because you can't.

Speaker 3 (52:22):
You know, Listen, fifteen twenty years ago, you could have said,
oh well they said I had to right. No, for sure,
we all know.

Speaker 2 (52:31):
But I think I think new citizens, yeah, for sure,
can make them record size he feels to make.

Speaker 4 (52:36):
But I think I think it's a way to do
it and to because part of our job is to
get people excited about being a part of what we're doing,
absolutely creating, and I think there's a way to get
people excited again about making art that you know, every
label wants a artist is going to be performing at

(52:57):
award shows or on artist that's going to be considered
in these because it helps to push the narrative for
it helps the streams, it helps everything.

Speaker 3 (53:04):
Is like.

Speaker 4 (53:06):
Finding a space where you can be authentic is very hard, right,
But I feel like if you do it right and
you have the right creatives involved with you, then I
feel like you can have a good chance at doing
it on a major stage, you know what I'm saying.
And I feel like you also have to have the
talent as well as the catalog to do it. And

(53:28):
I feel like I'm in that space. So that's why
I said the responsibility of being great is you have
to consider all of these things when you're about to release,
you know what I mean, going to a project cycle
and that's like it's one of my main my main
things right now is make sure I stay true to that,
like don't get lost in the oh. Just of course
this record it sounds like a hit, No, like like

(53:49):
create what is going to be the next standard? It's
a responsibility.

Speaker 1 (53:57):
We won't do your Vultron. We're gonna make with R
and B artists. We want to know who you're going
to get the vocal from, the performance style, from the styling,
from the passion of the artist.

Speaker 4 (54:10):
The heart of the artists come from James Brown.

Speaker 1 (54:13):
Okay, you're gonna start to what you're gonna get? You
want to start. Passion comes from James Brown, who's one
of the baddest motherfuckers ever.

Speaker 4 (54:21):
The passion comes from James even.

Speaker 1 (54:23):
The way he talks it sound who feel.

Speaker 3 (54:29):
It's all right? It's all orders, it's all orders. It's
very sergeant.

Speaker 1 (54:34):
Who are you getting the vocal from?

Speaker 4 (54:38):
There's so many ways to go with this because it's
just like you know, it's it's so many amazing ones.
I'm gonna get the vocal from. Can it be a
mixture of two people.

Speaker 1 (54:52):
It has to be submissive, ultra ultimate vocal.

Speaker 3 (54:56):
It's a mixture between Whitney and.

Speaker 4 (55:03):
All right, take it away, sorry Whitney and lovey. Mixture
between Stevie and Michael. Vocal wise, yeah, because with Michael
you get the the Tomming, the texture I'm sorry, the Tomming,
the conviction, the.

Speaker 3 (55:33):
Where he can go with his voice. With Stevie.

Speaker 4 (55:38):
You get the colors, you get everything in between. I
would mix those two.

Speaker 1 (55:43):
I think Stevie is the classic portion of your vocal,
whereas Michael was that early, right, but then Michael graduated
into a stylist that Yeah, that set him that at
any point, if you do anything remotely close to whim,

(56:05):
it's him. Oh you're trying to be.

Speaker 3 (56:07):
Like my signature. I studied Michael.

Speaker 4 (56:10):
I don't lie, I study, but I study. I study.

Speaker 3 (56:12):
So I think my.

Speaker 4 (56:13):
Voice is a mixture between Michael, Stephen, and Marvin. If
I was to put my voice together with three people,
that Joe and.

Speaker 3 (56:19):
There to.

Speaker 1 (56:24):
Joe all of that conversation. Get it.

Speaker 3 (56:29):
Michael Linham too. Hell yeah, Charlie.

Speaker 1 (56:34):
Yeah, I'm gonna say, Joe, Charlie, Wow, that makes sense.
And I gotta find you a false settle. Yeah, who
had a fault? Who had a false?

Speaker 4 (56:49):
Like Maxwell?

Speaker 3 (56:50):
Maxwell had a crazy force.

Speaker 1 (56:52):
I love Max.

Speaker 4 (56:53):
I appreciate you.

Speaker 1 (56:54):
Max has a nice floating false you have. You have
ship in your false like I come from the false world.
That's got a nasty false.

Speaker 4 (57:09):
Yeah clean, He does have a clean fuss.

Speaker 1 (57:15):
I put all three of those together and that's like, now.

Speaker 4 (57:18):
He has a clean fuss.

Speaker 1 (57:19):
You're in that space you because you have an honesty.
It's like you said, you have a conviction and an honesty,
and it's sincerity in your voice, which is why, like
those heartfelt records always like you can do anything. Let's
get that out the way. But nigga, when you when

(57:40):
you when you look into a woman's eyes and say
some real ship to her, nigga, she fucking believes you
God for sure. Performance style? Whose performance style?

Speaker 4 (57:54):
Performance style a mixture between Bobby Brown and Michael mm hmm.
You want to hump the stage and moon walk.

Speaker 3 (58:06):
But Michael was clean like Michael Michas Brown CB Yo,
god c B.

Speaker 2 (58:16):
I even got a picture people style of.

Speaker 3 (58:20):
C B, but c B mixed with more uh like
like like yeah c B c B.

Speaker 4 (58:29):
I would say more like more clean mic but not
but see.

Speaker 3 (58:33):
You do that.

Speaker 1 (58:33):
Micha was able to do another thing and dance that
he was able to do infocals created signature that at
this point for un avoidable. Yeah you want to dance,
You're gonna hit something, Mike, It's avoidable.

Speaker 3 (58:52):
Crazy, bro, Yeah, it's crazy.

Speaker 4 (58:54):
Because it was geometry. Michael was geometry. Hell yeah, you
know what I'm saying. It's all gam tree I was.
It's crazy because I was watching this thing.

Speaker 3 (59:05):
The other day. What was it?

Speaker 4 (59:06):
Snake in the grass where.

Speaker 1 (59:08):
It comes from?

Speaker 4 (59:10):
I'm like, yo, this ship is all.

Speaker 3 (59:13):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (59:14):
People don't even.

Speaker 3 (59:19):
Yeah yeah yeah, yeah yeah, all of it, even down
to the outfit.

Speaker 4 (59:26):
And and and the metaphors in his conversation, Yeah yeah
about it. It's like music. Michael was very spiritual in
his music. Music was very mystical.

Speaker 3 (59:37):
Press was also going to be in my top five artists.

Speaker 4 (59:41):
You know what I'm saying, my and my vulture on
because he played every instrument he performed he was unpredictable
for sure. So he's definitely in my vulture for sure.

Speaker 3 (59:52):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (59:52):
I seen that clip when he told uh, he ran
into the homie at the club that he had fell
out with andreamon. He said, they said, how did you
How did you work it out when you see me
say something?

Speaker 4 (01:00:03):
Come get this hit, don't get it? Come get this hit?

Speaker 3 (01:00:07):
He said.

Speaker 4 (01:00:07):
Then he said, wait, you're.

Speaker 3 (01:00:08):
Gonna go tomorrow at twelve. Yeah, And I'm like, this
is fucking Prince Bro, Like, who runs up on you?
Y'all got y'all got full b y'all not with each
other at all, but you know you the magic man. Yeah,
come get this hit. Come holler at me crazy. We
don't like who does that? Now you gotta start running on.

Speaker 1 (01:00:29):
Nobody, but come get this hit.

Speaker 3 (01:00:31):
It's a couple of niggas. Might be still mad at
you about drink champs, but you might have to. He
was honest stuff. Hey, listen, this is a new world.

Speaker 4 (01:00:44):
Everybody can't handle that honesty.

Speaker 3 (01:00:46):
Everybody can handle. Real ship means no harm.

Speaker 1 (01:00:52):
Styling of the artists.

Speaker 4 (01:00:57):
Hmmm, the drip. I think the drip who had crazy Drip?
I'm gonna say, uh, because then you're just thinking about genre.
You think about error, right, because there's so many different errors.

Speaker 3 (01:01:19):
Got this, who's the flies? Flies?

Speaker 1 (01:01:23):
I got close the artists, but naked.

Speaker 3 (01:01:28):
The backstage Right now we're figuring it out.

Speaker 1 (01:01:32):
We got a horse stand by.

Speaker 3 (01:01:35):
There ain't no wardrobe, got putist. You can't just put
my artist in anything. You know, they have to be styled.

Speaker 4 (01:01:42):
I mean I think if someone who takes their wardrobe seriously,
I would say that the mindset of Stalin, of Beyonce,
the mindset yeah yeah. The reason why I say that
is because whether it be a male Voltron or a
female Votron, her her mindset of how she put our
shows together and how serious she takes it.

Speaker 1 (01:02:03):
Yeah, unmatched, so that you're not running to the mall
find those clothes.

Speaker 4 (01:02:08):
Everything is it's custom, custom made, superstart.

Speaker 1 (01:02:15):
What we're doing right now, danswers everybody every day everything
this is. This is not just a sonic experience.

Speaker 3 (01:02:23):
And you see somebody run to it, Oh you look
like right, and everybody dressing.

Speaker 1 (01:02:31):
Everybody I had all shipped with silver on it.

Speaker 4 (01:02:35):
Yeah that's Vigo fashion, man, you gotta love it. It's
like everything needs to be an experience, right, We get
back to that though. We get back to that, by
the way. So yeah, this this, this is this album,
what we're creating right now, you know, this new era
of Mario. I think that my fans deserve it. Music

(01:02:56):
deserves it. I deserve it. The people that I'm working
with deserve it. I mean excited about the conversations we've
been having and just really creating it. We already have
the name of the tour. I already have everything. It's
already happening for me. When I go to sleep at night,
I'm already on stage singing the new songs.

Speaker 1 (01:03:14):
You know that feeling, you know that feeling I drive
in silence doing everything. That's feeling is that it's going
to happen. That's that's exactly what you're talking about, that feeling. Yeah.

Speaker 3 (01:03:27):
Yeah, we've come. Oh we've come.

Speaker 1 (01:03:33):
Yeah, saying no saying no name, saying what you need.

Speaker 2 (01:03:58):
So yeah, yeah, we've come to this day important, specially
going on the show. Hey man, this is you know,
this is serious, ship man serious. So right now we're
at the segment of the show it's called I ain't
saying no names.

Speaker 4 (01:04:12):
I ain't saying no names. I ain't saying that I
ain't saying no name, no no no names, saying we.

Speaker 2 (01:04:18):
Said some names, we shout some people out. But now
it's time to tell your story funny or fucked up?
Are funny and fucked up?

Speaker 3 (01:04:28):
Okay, I got a few of them.

Speaker 2 (01:04:30):
You're doing, you are, Mario, so you can tell us
all of them if you would like. Okay, let's see
so real quick right now, right now.

Speaker 3 (01:04:37):
The only rule to the game. I ain't saying that
you can't do it.

Speaker 1 (01:04:41):
Say no.

Speaker 4 (01:04:42):
I've never been a name dropping I know that about me.

Speaker 3 (01:04:45):
You'll know I ain't the nigga to be.

Speaker 4 (01:04:47):
This ain't it.

Speaker 3 (01:04:47):
I don't even like games like this. You like it?

Speaker 4 (01:04:51):
You like you like if the games is moving silad noah,
But okay, I had it to a it headed to
a private event, private jet.

Speaker 2 (01:05:05):
Like oh the jet too, oh, private event on a
private private event on a private jet.

Speaker 4 (01:05:11):
It's me one of my representations. There's a lady, beautiful lady,
a little bit older than me at the time that
I'm like twenty two. Maybe a couple other people see.
I don't know if I should tell this story, because ladies,
listen when I tell you this story. This ain't no
kissing and telling type shit. This is just like you

(01:05:34):
know what I'm saying, This ain't I don't do this,
but it's funny. It's the first thing that came to
my mind while I think about all this shit to tell.
Were on the jet, anybody going to sleep? Just me
and a young lady up were sipping. But it's like,
you know, it's a bed in the back, everybody else
sleeping on the outside. Man, I passed up on an

(01:05:55):
experience because I was I wasn't like I was shy
ish at the moment, and it was just it was
a lot of people around, but it was sleep and
this young ladies like you were older lady. But the
young lady she's like, yo, let's go to the back.
But I was also a fan, and I'm like, this

(01:06:16):
is not this is really about to happen right now
like this, and so we get you know what I'm saying.
She get up, she goes to the back. She basically
invited me to the back of the plane with jet joint.
I'm like, fucking, I'm about to go. I'm about to
do this. Take a little sip, get to the back,

(01:06:36):
close the door. We start to ride for a minute,
just then fucking crazy turbulentce stuff.

Speaker 3 (01:06:45):
No, I swear God when I tell you, when.

Speaker 4 (01:06:48):
I tell you, the turbulence got everybody woke up, create everybody.

Speaker 3 (01:06:52):
So we're up. And if I tell you who it is,
you're gonna be like, oh.

Speaker 4 (01:06:55):
My, but this is like, this is like when a
thing popping right now and the Lord.

Speaker 2 (01:07:07):
Bro. And it never the moment never really presented, you know,
the moment, it never really presented itself.

Speaker 1 (01:07:14):
Again, We've all been there.

Speaker 4 (01:07:17):
Man.

Speaker 3 (01:07:18):
It was like, damn God, what did I do to
what I did? I did something what I do to
deserve that? It was crazy, it was.

Speaker 4 (01:07:25):
It was about to be crazy. But yeah, you want
to run that back for to run that back, but
it was like already you know it's crazy. God, you
could have run that back.

Speaker 1 (01:07:35):
Gave me one.

Speaker 3 (01:07:36):
Yeah, it was one of them. It was.

Speaker 4 (01:07:41):
It was one of them. You know what I'm saying.

Speaker 3 (01:07:42):
It was it was.

Speaker 4 (01:07:43):
It would have been an upper upper echelon. Yeah, it
was crazy. See, I mean yeah, I got a few stories. Okay,
exclusive man, this might owe me publishing on a record
they owed you. They owe me because of an opportunity

(01:08:08):
that was fought for for them. And then they renegged
on the whole ship. I had an agreement, agreement, I'm
gonna do this for you because it seemed like the
right thing to do, but I'm gonna need this. But
to this day, that's always argued that, Nah, that ain't
the way the story went, you know, And sometimes in

(01:08:32):
the game you think like, damn, this is my big bro,
this is this yeah, and it happened, and it's like damn,
you know it was. It was a hard lesson to
learn that I can't really undo because this is already done.
Can't you know what I'm saying, thought about it, argued
about it, you know what I'm saying. But it's like
crazy because it's like it's one of the things where

(01:08:55):
I probably I don't know if I'm gonna work with
the person again because of that, and we could probably
make an amazing music. But it's like that's crazy, you
know what I'm saying. I don't know if y'all been
in that situation before, but it's fucked up. It's a
fucked up feeling when it's like damn, it's like it's
like taking advantage of the opportunity, you know, and it's

(01:09:20):
not even worth it, right, we all getting money.

Speaker 1 (01:09:22):
Like, there's so much of it, it's like a lot.
There's no reason to ruin.

Speaker 2 (01:09:27):
Yeah, you know, I think for me personally, I've always
took the stance of I'll just go ahead second. We
figured that out, you know what I'm saying, Like players
don't keep scoring. I look at life, you know what
I mean. I believe that our gifts mm hmm are
more valuable than anything else.

Speaker 3 (01:09:48):
For sure.

Speaker 2 (01:09:50):
You know that the opportunity to the work again, or
just the opportunity to just feel good in that same
room with somebody like person man, even if even if
I had to be the one to give them the extra,
it's still like, you know what, We're good, brot.

Speaker 3 (01:10:06):
It's all good. So I understand it.

Speaker 1 (01:10:08):
Ladies and gentlemen, get your take split sheets to the sessions.
Yeah for sure you cannot. You can sue based on hearsay,
but it's a very expensive process to win. Yeah, get
the split sits, y'all.

Speaker 3 (01:10:25):
Yeah, that's like it's like a weird thing in the studio.
It depends though.

Speaker 4 (01:10:33):
I think motherfuckers who like really love this ship and
who really like respect the art and really respect what's
going on, Like it's No, there's no real problem with
saying like yo, even if not especially it's text message
group text like yo, you're gonna and if you trust
them then you do that then.

Speaker 1 (01:10:48):
But like, but it's just like what happens is is
that we are just humans, and as humans we are unpredictable.
Our situation and circumstances can become unpredictable and lead all
of us individuals into some different places to where that
conversation that was happening then I felt good. I felt
great about it then.

Speaker 4 (01:11:07):
Or the record and the opportunity itself turns into something
bigger and everybody like.

Speaker 3 (01:11:11):
Oh.

Speaker 1 (01:11:13):
See what I normally get. You know, I don't even
normally really do.

Speaker 2 (01:11:17):
I think the other part too, And this is something
that I would say to all writers. Be honest with
yourself about your participation. And I think a lot of
times people aren't honest that sometimes you were just in
the room.

Speaker 3 (01:11:31):
Sometimes you just put the play together.

Speaker 4 (01:11:34):
Be like I'm gonna need such and such percentage on
this publishing from just putting a play together last minute
or it won't happen type ship. There's so many ways
that people play with this ship. You know what I'm
saying list, and to me, I'm cool with it as
long as it makes sense.

Speaker 1 (01:11:49):
As long as it's articulated.

Speaker 4 (01:11:51):
Yeah, but as long as it makes sense, Bro, he's
not gonna bully me off some ship.

Speaker 1 (01:11:55):
Let's have a conversation, that's yeah for sure. Let's have
a real conversation and really write this ship down.

Speaker 3 (01:12:01):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (01:12:01):
Yeah, man, whatever is agreed upon, it's a great We
don't even have to rehashit it no more. Look at
this paper man that I that I email to my
to all of our lawyers. Yeah, it shouldn't be uncomfortable
handling that type of business. Shouldn't be uncomfortable. It should

(01:12:22):
just be honest. Like us we get in the room,
we just nigga who always in here with us, travel up.
But we also want to make sure that you know
we're official too. Nigga, you run a business.

Speaker 4 (01:12:32):
Man for sure.

Speaker 3 (01:12:33):
It ain't I didn't have them sometimes it's I don't
do sessions like that no more.

Speaker 1 (01:12:38):
Though.

Speaker 4 (01:12:38):
Like it's like, if you're in the room, you're a contributor. Yeah,
I mean, if you the homie, you just popping through something.
But like, I'm so energetically sensitive. My energy is very
sensitive to things. That's why I don't always, you know,
I always so use like Nigga, come to do it.
I'm like, Yo, we're gonna do it at the right timing.
And you know, I'm happy that this is happening right
now because I do think it's the time is person figure.

(01:13:00):
I love this new space that and the energy is
amazing here. We definitely gonna come here and make some shit. Absolutely,
you know, make some hiss, but like you know, everything
is like we had a space now, it's not we
don't have time to waste energy. It's purposeful. It's got
to be that, you know. I take it that serious,
you know what I mean. I love where R and
B is at right now. I love where we are,

(01:13:20):
and I love the platforms we got and I think
people are wanting that again. People are. You said something
in the drink Tramps in an interview. You were like,
it's the love that they're afraid of our love, right,
And that can come in so many different forms, but
typically love is honest, right. It's if it's ugly, it's ugly.

(01:13:41):
If it's beautiful, it's beautiful.

Speaker 3 (01:13:43):
Let the art be what it is.

Speaker 4 (01:13:45):
Every art piece is not the same, but let artists
be the most perfected version of what it is that
they are, and let's give that to the world. If
it wins, it wins, if it doesn't. What you did,
you just gave an artist another reason to keep going great.
When Quincy and Michael was doing do you think they
knew exactly what Thriller was gonna be? I just think

(01:14:06):
they did exactly what the fuck They felt like it
was great to them at the highest level, and the
world was like, oh, ship embraced. We got to get
back to that. That's what New Citizen is. Baby, You're
about to get to.

Speaker 1 (01:14:19):
Look producers, you're gonna get your credits and your publisher.
God Mario, we are, we are, we are shoot man.
We're fans of your brother.

Speaker 4 (01:14:34):
Man, I'm a fan of Thank you, bro, speak one
and we have appreciate.

Speaker 1 (01:14:40):
Nothing but love and admiration for you. We have nothing but.

Speaker 4 (01:14:45):
Support, appreciate you.

Speaker 1 (01:14:46):
You know what I mean, If if if if they
asked us about you to call this nigga live, appreciate
just how we run it.

Speaker 4 (01:14:53):
I'm gonna keep pushing the little man and getting back
in the gym, you know what I'm saying.

Speaker 1 (01:14:57):
And we thank you for being here.

Speaker 3 (01:14:58):
Man. You know you.

Speaker 2 (01:15:00):
You know your time is precious money baby, and people
people are looking for you all here when coming up.

Speaker 3 (01:15:10):
Cool? I like that y'all enjoyed it. Man.

Speaker 4 (01:15:17):
That y'all you know we gave you everything that you're
wanting to hear.

Speaker 3 (01:15:19):
Man.

Speaker 4 (01:15:20):
I know y'all working on some big things for the
Army Money Podcast. He told me some stuff behind the scenes.

Speaker 1 (01:15:25):
I love it. Man.

Speaker 2 (01:15:28):
Listen, bro, you can come and sit in time. Even
if you do an episode where we just kicked the
ship talk music.

Speaker 1 (01:15:34):
For sure for s to do that, be a resident. Yes,
you know what I'm saying.

Speaker 4 (01:15:38):
I appreciate you.

Speaker 3 (01:15:39):
My name is Tank Valentine. You ain't gonna let me
do my ship. I can come on. Hold on, hey man, man,
I'm starting.

Speaker 1 (01:15:47):
Let me start up.

Speaker 2 (01:15:54):
Here.

Speaker 1 (01:15:54):
You go with your ship, went to starting ship.

Speaker 3 (01:16:03):
Gave me a past this, nigga, Just reo my past
that easy. This is the ship. Be niggas be still.

Speaker 1 (01:16:11):
Let them start over.

Speaker 4 (01:16:14):
This Maria.

Speaker 3 (01:16:19):
Because you want to singing ship, I'm selling.

Speaker 1 (01:16:28):
Time. My name is Tan all the time. See your
nigga ship, I can't, Mario.

Speaker 3 (01:16:39):
And then we get it up.

Speaker 1 (01:16:42):
And listen to the Army Money Podcast. The authority of
all things R and B man. And it has been
our loved one, this has been our brother brother, This
is this is this is an R and B mother
fucking sagon man.

Speaker 3 (01:16:52):
Appreciate Yeah Ye money. I.

Speaker 2 (01:17:00):
R and B Money is a production of the Black
Effect podcast Network. For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the
iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your
favorite shows. Don't forget to subscribe to and rate our show,
and you can connect with us on social media at
j Valentine and at the Real Tank. For the extended episode,

(01:17:21):
subscribe to YouTube dot com, forward slash R and B
Money