March 6, 2025 • 55 mins
Grammy-nominated singer-songwriter Aloe Blacc is back with his first album in five years — but it's not your typical album. This one merges the music with philanthropic causes.
Aloe shares how his family's roots have helped shape the sounds of his 6th studio album, the vital role of community, his fascinating take on what the music industry was like in the 90s without social media, and what led to him using his music for positive social transformation!
Aloe Blacc's new album, 'Stand Together' is available now.
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hi everyone, it's Sophia. Welcome to Work in Progress. Hello friends,
welcome back to another week of work in progress. I
am geeked about today's guest because I am such an
(00:24):
enormous fan not only of his art but his activism,
and I cannot wait to pick his brain on all
of it. Today's guest is Alo Black. You know him
as an American singer and rapper. You know him from
A Vichi's Wake Me Up and from his smash hit
I Need a Dollar. What you may not know is
(00:46):
that Alo never planned on being a musician. His life
kind of happened by accident. He thought he would be
an academic and somehow took a left turn, and from
touring around the world and major stages everywhere, he has
managed to solidify his place in the mainstream music scene
(01:09):
while also being an incredible advocate for change. From studying
the methodologies of Nelson Mandela to being mentored by Harry Belafonte,
Alo has been involved in so many charitable causes and
in deep social justice work. He speaks out on the
importance and mental health awareness. He has collaborated with the
(01:31):
Biden administration to promote its national strategy to prevent suicide,
and his latest album, Stand Together, is not only a
beautiful musical journey that I've been waiting for for five years,
but every song on the album has a partnered philanthropic
initiative that fans can learn about. Talk about being a
(01:54):
true artist in every sense of the word and spending
your privilege and your platform for good. Hear Mallow Black,
Where are you today?
Speaker 2 (02:13):
I live in LA I'm Glendale.
Speaker 1 (02:15):
Okay. I grew up in Pasadena. Oh are you there
now or neighbors. No, I'm actually on the East Coast now,
but my folks are still there. And yeah, we were
like Miracle Mile kids. And then eventually my parents moved
to Pasadena and they're still there.
Speaker 2 (02:32):
Oh. Crazy.
Speaker 1 (02:33):
Normally I like to ask people about who they were
as kids, And so often when I'm interviewing parents that
have kids in that kind of stage of developmental age
that I know years are in, they get to kind
of see this mirroring of themselves as children and see
(02:53):
versions of themselves in their own children at the same time. Yeah,
and I wonder if you got to go back and
hang out with yourself as a ten year old kid,
the way you get to hang out with your kids.
Would you see aspects of the man you are today
in that little boy?
Speaker 2 (03:11):
Oh? Probably not. I don't know. I don't know. I was.
Speaker 3 (03:17):
I see my son and there are a lot of
similarities in him as a child compared to who I
was as a child, And I think it's going to
be I think he might be the same. It's going
to be like a night and day flip where the
kind of rambunctious, un bridled energy of youth sort of
(03:42):
meets with this this moment of change where you become
measured and more temperate and decisive, but no, also with
the ability to navigate between both personalities, the extrovert, the introvert.
Speaker 2 (04:05):
The entertainer and the observer.
Speaker 1 (04:08):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (04:09):
I feel like, yeah, he seems like he's probably gonna
flip that switch in the next seven years.
Speaker 2 (04:19):
Probably.
Speaker 1 (04:21):
Wow. And is that all right around when it started
to happen for you?
Speaker 3 (04:25):
No, it happened for me earlier then. I think it
will happen for him. But I think that it's just
different circumstances. You know, I had I had two parents
that worked full time. We were a very kind of
middle class family. And what's different now is that there's
(04:50):
I think a lot more attention that my wife and
I give to the kids, a lot more comfort and
intentional parenting versus fly by the seat of your parts
on the table and make sure the kids get to
school parenting that I grew up with.
Speaker 1 (05:12):
Yeah. I talk to my friends about this all the time,
because we're really the first generation that has been in
this phase of life with all these resources, all the
mental health studies and all the understanding of you know,
communication and the value of therapy and all these things
that our folks didn't really have. And it's it's so
(05:37):
inspiring for me to look at parents in my life
and watch the way they can acknowledge where their own
parents fell short, still love them for it, and be
choosing to create a different pattern in real time. Yeah,
it's pretty incredible.
Speaker 3 (05:57):
It is incredible. There's a lot, like you said, a
lot of resources. We chosen a school that has a
pedagogy that I think helps parents become better parents. One
of the really special things is that before the Surgeon
General's warning on social media, we were already engaged in
(06:20):
a media free campus, media free lifestyle. So you know,
it's very limited the amount of television or TV programming
that the kids would get and they're you know, they're
they're fine with it. They've learned to manage without it,
(06:41):
and there's no pressure coming from the school because the
other kids are on board with the program. So it's
helped us be better parents, but also just more focused
and intentional.
Speaker 1 (06:56):
Yeah, it's an interesting thing I think for people in
our lines of work to analyze relationships to media, and
even when you talk about how the sort of flip
happened in your young self, how as an adult you
have to hold both your performer and your introvert, you know,
(07:17):
I think about that a lot, being the performer, the entertainer,
and also a listener who likes to be quiet. There's
then the layer of how you have to participate in
media on top of it, and when you've pursued a
career in it. I mean, before you became a solo artist,
(07:38):
you were part of a hip hop duo and la
in the nineties, I mean, everything about it was so
incredible and music was so incredible, and there's no way
to be a musician without being in the media, right, So, like,
at least then there was no social there was no
(07:58):
thumb scroll on the iPhone. What was that what was
that era like for.
Speaker 2 (08:02):
It was the best era. I don't know.
Speaker 3 (08:04):
I don't know that we'll ever be able to have
that again. I would love to try to replicate it somehow,
but it would take concerned effort on everybody's part to
recognize that what makes it special is sort of the
exclusivity of the temporal exclusivity, the spatial exclusivity, and the
(08:30):
informational exclusivity. It's that you, if you know, you know,
and once you're there, you get to experience it, and
then it's word of mouth, and and if you weren't there,
then it's like the tail of you know, the fish
that you caught just keeps getting bigger and bigger, and
so the hype gets is real.
Speaker 2 (08:50):
So but.
Speaker 3 (08:54):
Wow, when I was growing up and in the hip
hop scene, we would have access to all of the artists,
the stars nowadays, people that you kind of just look
at like, oh, that's a bonafide you know, superstar, billionaire
artist and hip hop those folks. We would literally go
(09:17):
to clubs and see them for five bucks or ten
bucks in LA and just an awesome time of music
and dance and art and culture. And I know that
it is possible, and I know that we was part
of our mental wellness, right. It was our own modality
(09:40):
for ensuring that we were healthy because we had a
community and a culture that we belonged to, that we
subscribed to.
Speaker 2 (09:48):
Of course, my parents are from Panama.
Speaker 3 (09:49):
There was a whole community and culture from Central America
Latin America that I was part of. And then my
friends that I went to school with, we had our
our own sort of you know, suburban subculture.
Speaker 2 (10:03):
And then there were my hip hop friends and culture.
Speaker 3 (10:07):
So I had the opportunity to choose between uh and
and actually code switch between a lot of different cultures.
Speaker 2 (10:15):
But it's the it was the.
Speaker 3 (10:18):
Beautiful mental well I'm gonna a kinning making it an
association with mental wellness. Now I didn't. I wouldn't have
done it back then, but now I can see that.
The fact that we were in propinquity and proximity with
one another, that we were engaged in physical activity so
it was dance or performance. The fact that we were
(10:42):
free to make mistakes without the repercussion of forever documentation.
All of that combined was I think the best and
most nurturing soil to grow up in.
Speaker 1 (11:06):
I love that that idea that you could be free
not only to make mistakes, but to experiment with your
own art, because sure, if you can make a mistake
in private, you can have a normally sized consequence of sorts.
To do it in public does something to I think
(11:26):
a tiny human brain that it's not meant to experience.
But I worry about this, everyone recording everything all the time.
I worry about what that's costing art because people are
afraid to have something that's mediocre go on the internet.
But you got to rehearse, you got to try things,
(11:48):
You got to see. If you're a comedian, you have
to see how a joke works in a crowd. Comedians
workshop around the country, Artists perform a new song, see
what the vibe is, realize it it's missing a synth
or a drum or whatever, and go back and layer.
And nobody wants to do that anymore. People only want
to give out what is perfect because it might go somewhere.
(12:13):
And I'm scared of the generation of art we're costing
ourselves because everyone's too afraid to take risks.
Speaker 3 (12:19):
Now, yeah, that's a real concern of mine as well.
And I would add in the layer of algorithms and industry.
Industry is so much smarter, and now with algorithms, they're
even more informed about how to sell and market. And
(12:43):
what's unfortunate is that it becomes this recursive loop, a
reductive recursive loop that does not allow for better or
more interesting or productive art. Yes, and I think about
how we can, you know, try to you know, go
(13:07):
back to square one. And I don't want to sound like,
you know, back in my day, but there was something
special about the garage band. Yes, And now that it's
more so, the discovery and engagement is online and it's
(13:29):
more insular, it's more solo than it is the group,
and the groups that exist are all so manicured and
perfect and seen that it begs the question will we
ever be able to see, you know, kids just having
(13:50):
fun for the sake of having fun anymore? Or is
all of their fun for display? And does it have
to be perfectly presented and rehearsed fun?
Speaker 1 (14:01):
And when it works for these young artists, the blow
up is so fast. You know, It's been interesting to
watch Chapel Roone have this big year and everyone's like
good for her, and she's out there being like I'm traumatized,
like the Internet's wild. What people expect of me is
really hard for me to process. A year and a
half ago, nobody knew this kid's name, and I think
(14:23):
about the pressure, you know, we kind of got to
be out there and make a thing and have a
show premiere or drop an album and do the press
tour and then also like go home, go to the
bar with our friends, like not every outing was expected
to be chased and tailed and photographed and packaged. And
(14:48):
I think about things that are so like those moments
that take me back, you know, almost like an old
factory hit when you smell something and suddenly you're to
someone you haven't seen in ages. And when I was
getting ready for today and I was thinking about all
the phases of my own life that your music has
been a part of. I even think about when I
(15:12):
Need a dollar, was, you know, the theme song to
Make It in America. And like my buddy Brian Greenberg
from my first show, One Tree Hill was on that
show and we were like, oh my god, and it
felt like this moment for us, like supporting our friend
and this song that was everwhere on the radio and
it was it was the theme song of the HBO show,
(15:32):
like the possibilities felt so big, and it was it's
like one of my favorite memories as a young artist.
And it wasn't even my show, but it was like
we all had this connection in this way and nobody
was expected to be and like the head to to
look by the stylist and doing the thing. And you know,
(15:53):
now everybody's looking at these retro photos from the nineties
and the early two thousands and being like, God, what
cool style. And it's like people were just wearing they were.
Speaker 2 (16:02):
Just wearing what they were Yeah, what were in closet
or in the drawer? There was and there was none
of this.
Speaker 3 (16:08):
Thank you for mentioning I Need a Dollar because that
was an epic moment for me as well.
Speaker 2 (16:13):
That was exactly what you said.
Speaker 3 (16:15):
I was just making music for the few fans that
I knew I had who would appreciate it. And I
was like, and I'll probably go get another job in
a couple months.
Speaker 1 (16:26):
Yeah, And now for our sponsors, and can I ask
just a technical question for the timeline, how long was
this after you embarked as a solo artist.
Speaker 3 (16:41):
I Need a Dollar hit in two thousand and nine
or so. I had been laid off in two thousand
and three, so six years of kind of solo artistry.
I've always been engaged in art, doing hip hop music.
I released I think two thousand and five maybe the
(17:03):
last the hip hop album with my partner DJ Exile
as Eminon, and then released a solo album in two
thousand and six or something like that.
Speaker 1 (17:17):
So this song hits and it's like, what, yeah, I
mean when that when that beat starts and it just
the loop is so good. I think about walking down
the street in New York and my bee, I don't know,
it's so it's seminole.
Speaker 2 (17:34):
Oh my goodness. You're right.
Speaker 3 (17:35):
It has an essence, a really really powerful emotive sound
to it, and it does.
Speaker 2 (17:45):
It does make me think of like.
Speaker 3 (17:48):
A scene, you know, scene of Staying Alive where johnsha
Volks was just walking down New York. But I was,
you know, I was at a moment where I had
no expectations because I've been doing music for so long
and music really wasn't supposed to be my career.
Speaker 2 (18:07):
It's just the hobby.
Speaker 3 (18:09):
And I knew that I can always go back to
corporate or go back to school and kind of be
a career scholar or something.
Speaker 2 (18:16):
But I was lucky. I was lucky, and I've been
chasing this luck, writing this luck for a little bit.
Speaker 1 (18:26):
Yeah, you said in an article. I suppose I should
say an interview. It was an interview that an article
was written from that you feel like serendipity lives on
your front doorstep.
Speaker 2 (18:39):
Oh my goodness.
Speaker 1 (18:40):
Can you say a little bit more about that as
you talk about riding this wave?
Speaker 2 (18:45):
Yeah, I feel like it's not fair.
Speaker 3 (18:46):
You know, I have a lot of friends where are
struggling artists who are incredibly talented but just haven't had
what I consider the lucky breaks that I've had, and
I wish that I could share, you know, the sprinkles
(19:07):
of serendipity with them. But everywhere I look, there's something
positive happening, and my goal is to just trying to
pay it forward as much as possible with philanthropy and
with message and engagement. But I was signed to an
(19:27):
indie label. First of all, I wasn't signed to any label.
In the very beginning. I was going to work for
a big corporation and they pushed my start date back.
And because they pushed my start date back, the opportunity
to go to go on tour in Europe. Opened up
(19:48):
because one of the members of this hip hop group
decided to stay home. So there was an extra seat
in the bus, an extra bed in the hotel rooms.
And the idea was that I could join the tour
if I paid my way. And I had just received,
you know, just graduated from college, received this like exit
(20:09):
scholarship that I don't even again. Another serendipity, right, money,
money on the way out, Okay, I'll take it. So
I had some money to pay my way on this tour.
Came home and started recording with the artists that I
had toured with, and one of the recordings peaqued the
(20:31):
attention of the record label that that artist was signed to,
so they ended up signing me as a singer and
not an MC. So all this time, this whole tour,
I'd done, I'm a rapper and I'm writing hip hop music,
and I decided to sing on one track, and the
labels considering me a vocalist, and now I'm signed as
(20:51):
a singer. And so I had to really like bootstrap
myself to become a vocalist and a singer, trying so
many different sounds and styles over the years, and then
by the time I started working on my second album,
Good Things, which holds the I Need a Dollar song,
(21:14):
I kind of had figured out where the best place
was to use my voice. So it wasn't in power
and b it wasn't alternative rock. It was in this
kind of folk soul vocal and it ended up being
the mark of my early career.
Speaker 1 (21:31):
Yeah, it's amazing, and I again I think about that thing.
Would you have had the time and space to find
the best use of your voice had that moment in
your early career been happening in this kind of algorithmic
machine we're in now, No.
Speaker 2 (21:51):
I don't think so.
Speaker 3 (21:52):
Yeah, I think because of my attraction to process, I
would be trying to figure out the algorithm how to
be eat it, and it wouldn't It wouldn't give me.
Speaker 2 (22:04):
The opportunity to be my best artistic self.
Speaker 3 (22:07):
I'm so lucky that in high school I had the
chance to put in ten thousand hours of free, expressive
artistic creation. Yeah, without again, without the repercussions of.
Speaker 2 (22:24):
Having to be perfect, because.
Speaker 3 (22:26):
It wasn't going online right, it was being vetted by
my very close associates, and once they approved, then it
made it to you know, mixtapes that we then delivered
to more people.
Speaker 1 (22:39):
I miss the mixtape when you talked earlier about like
if you know, you know, when you finally when you're
not a music maker but you love art, you know,
artist of a different vertical, like to go, oh, now,
now I get the heads up when the mixtapes are coming,
like nothing was cooler, you know, as a young person
(23:02):
finding the way in these creative scenes. I'm like, oh
my god, just to hear you talk about like you
workshop it, then it goes on the mixtape, then it
goes out, then people come to see you in the venue.
It's like, I don't know if we'll get it again,
but I I'd be so thrilled if we could figure
out a way.
Speaker 3 (23:19):
Yeah again, I'm going to try to figure out how
that can be possible.
Speaker 2 (23:26):
I think that there is a.
Speaker 3 (23:29):
Hunger for it, but I want to, you know, try
to My kids are a hop skip and a jump
away from high school and so maybe, you know, I'll
try to work shop it with them the rental venue
where they can go and you know, have parties and
(23:51):
be creative and explore.
Speaker 2 (23:55):
But one rule is that it has to happen offline.
Speaker 1 (24:01):
Yeah, phone free love it. I even think about what
a big deal it was in that era when you'd
hear about something after and then you'd see the you know,
the five photos that came out because some great shooter
was there and and but that was it. It wasn't
(24:21):
you know, six hundred grainy Instagram videos or whatever. And
there's something I think really beautiful about all of that,
and I do think it's why so many young people
crave it. I hear from you know, my friends with teenagers.
We've kind of we've kind of got two camps, like
friends with little kids, like you know, five and under,
(24:43):
and then we've got friends with teenagers. And the teenagers
want to ask questions about my first show because they're like,
everybody has a flip phone. They they all talk to
each other about how they're feeling. No one's texting, and
that kind of blows my mind. These kids are like, wait,
we want that version of high school.
Speaker 2 (25:05):
Yeah. The beauty is the art of story, and so
what is.
Speaker 3 (25:11):
You know, missing, is that with all of this video
and all of these photos available, for every event that happens,
you end also the ability to watch and experience in
real time, you lose the art of story, and so nobody,
nobody tells the story in a way that is compelling.
You're receiving it in real time, and you get to
(25:33):
interpret it at your own level, uh, with with your
with your own you know, intellectual curiosity and your own
ability to really process deeply. And we all have different abilities.
(25:56):
But when you have a storyteller that's coming to you
and dictating really what you should feel and how you feel,
that's a whole different experience. And I think that's what
is missing, is the Yeah, the great narrator.
Speaker 1 (26:12):
Yes, And what I miss about the great narrator is
that it was being presented, as you said, with someone's
story that also helped to encourage critical thinking and to
question the story.
Speaker 3 (26:26):
To.
Speaker 1 (26:27):
Examine the facts of it, rather than just to look
at one hundred images and decide you already know the story.
The irony that we used to have narrators and that
made us better critical thinkers is not lost on me.
And it it gets to the root of something I've
always really admired about you as a person in my
(26:51):
age peer group, ish like you're one of those people.
I'm like, yeah, we kind of came up together even
though we never really knew each other. And I'm so
happy you're here. But you've done something that I've seen
be so important to so many artists in our generation,
which is use your platform, really spend the privilege of
your platform for others as an advocate, As an activist.
(27:15):
You know, you've focused on mental health, you focused on
criminal justice reform. You have so artfully told other people's
stories to remind people that if we don't have community,
we don't have anything. When did that spark get lit
for you as an artist or was it always part
(27:36):
of who you are as a person and the artistry
he helps let it out right?
Speaker 3 (27:40):
I think there's definitely a moment where it was lit.
And I would say, right after I need a dollar.
I was very very excited to be, you know, kind
of having this moment of visibility after being an obscure
niche artist on an obscure niche record label. And I
(28:02):
was asked to do some endorsements for different products, some
luxury products, and one of them was a liquor brand
that happened to be a gin that was my dad's
favorite gin. I am not a drinker, never was, but
I thought I'll take some photos and hold a martini,
(28:25):
and then I'll have some bottles sent to my dad
and he'll get the posters and it'll be a nice
little father son moment. And the posters ended up being
placed in the inner city across the country. And I
got a phone call from one of my wife's friends
who was an activist out of an organization called Community
Coalition of South LA which was started by now Mayor
(28:50):
Karen Bass, but back she was just a citizen of
her community trying to make it better and she started
a nonprofit organization. The phone call was a reprimand of
my use of my celebrity and influence to sell alcohol
and liquor in a community where this organization was trying
(29:12):
to shut down liquor stores which had become a blight.
Speaker 2 (29:15):
On the community.
Speaker 3 (29:16):
And I had no connection and no idea, and I
was really taken aback. So I use that as an
opportunity to visit the org, learn what they were doing,
and recognize how much my influence was a responsibility that
(29:36):
I had to take seriously. And when I signed with
a major record label after that, I promised that I'll
use my music for positive social transformation. And you try
to turn every music video into a PSA that could
tell a story, to humanize the most vulnerable.
Speaker 1 (29:58):
Yeah, that's beautiful, and you know, from learning lessons, and
I think it's also very vulnerable. If I may say,
to be willing to learn out loud, I think it's
incredibly important to push back against this sort of weird
algorithmic perfectionism, to say, oh, yeah, I did something that
seemed fun and it turned out to have an impact
(30:21):
that was terrible. FYI, this was my lesson. If you're
ever in this position, ask these questions. You know, nobody
gives us a handbook on how to do these things
right and how to pull the thread till you get
to the end of it. And it's so interesting to
hear about that feedback and the way you chose to
(30:44):
receive it, and then to think about what you've done
with all of this since you know, as you said,
the way you use your music, the way that you've
stepped up, and I mean even helped join the president,
you know, join President Biden to talk about him and
Kamala Harris's National Strategy for Suicide Prevention, you know, to
(31:08):
take a crisis for our communities and say, this is
something a lot of people keep hidden out of pain
and shame, and let's go talk about it literally from
the most powerful, you know, stage in America. What was
that like for you? Was that unnerving in any way
(31:32):
or as you've built this sort of series of learnings
and voicings for others, did it just feel like the
next right thing?
Speaker 2 (31:43):
I would say the latter, It feels like the next
right thing.
Speaker 3 (31:45):
I don't feel any real trepidation, and I look to
my mentors and also heroes from the past that have
basically educated me on what's possible. I think about, you know,
was fortunate to meet Quaku and Endaba Mendela. These are
(32:06):
the grandsons of Nelson Mendela, and the stories that I
hear from them, and understanding Nelson Mandela's story and also
Winnie Mendela's story that in the face of the most
tremendous and horrendous adversity, torture, incarceration, that he still was
(32:31):
able to maintain a level of humanity and compassion not
just for himself, but for perceivably his enemies, which you know,
he wouldn't call them his enemies because he didn't punish
them when he came out of prison, he embraced everyone
and moved forward with dignity. And I think about Harry Belafonte,
(32:57):
who was a mentor of mine, someone that I had
chance to sit with and learn from, and how he
used his voice and celebrity in a way to encourage,
you know, transformation that otherwise might not have happened without.
Speaker 2 (33:19):
His very privileged position.
Speaker 3 (33:24):
And there certainly was fear, you know, death threats, physical altercations,
but somebody's got to do the work. And if you're
in that position and you have that access, then the
job is yours and you have to rise to the occasion.
So I don't know, I just think I felt I
(33:45):
feel like I've had the right guides along the way.
Speaker 1 (33:50):
Hmm. That's beautiful. And now a word from our sponsors
that I really enjoy and I think you will too.
It's the you know, the Harry's, the Jane Fondas that
the folks who came before all of us, that when
(34:12):
the pushback comes and the fear kind of sinks in
of like, oh god, what does it mean to say
this out loud and to keep beating this drama and
to refuse to be quiet when you feel in terrible
thing that you know, someone out there does that falls
under the category of threat. I think in moments, especially
(34:34):
like this one, you know this many days into this
new all hands on deck administration, I just think, well,
they did it. They did this work, don't. We don't
get to do less. There is no world in which
we can do less because we for for all the
(34:54):
negative aspects of how interconnected we are, we do have
the ability to do this. You and I can be
in community from different sides of the country. We can
get on a phone and speak to people and remind
people of what's good and true. And yeah, when I
get scared, I try to think about those people are there?
(35:17):
Are there like leaders and mentors or folks you call, Like,
who do you turn to when you get scared?
Speaker 2 (35:23):
It's mostly community, mostly community. You know.
Speaker 3 (35:29):
What reassures me is that Harry Belefonte was in the
middle of all of the civil rights struggle, and many
of his peers were murdered, doctor King, you know, many
were beaten, but he was able to also survive and
(35:51):
for decades and decades later to be able to tell
the story and to tool up and train a whole
new generation of artists. There, but there are there are others.
Speaker 2 (36:03):
You know that in my circle. Who are the folks
that I go to when I'm.
Speaker 3 (36:10):
Trying to think through how we position ourselves for the
for the next four years and and beyond. What are
the what are the strategies, what is the goal you know?
And what are how do we triage what are the
(36:31):
things that are not as important as What are our
highest priorities and how do we make sure we maximize
those highest priorities?
Speaker 2 (36:41):
Yes, and how do we do it in a way
in this very.
Speaker 3 (36:50):
Information sensitive or hyper informat informed society. How do we
do it in a way that is information sensitive mhm
h and in ways that doesn't make our strategy and
concepts vulnerable two.
Speaker 2 (37:09):
To being thwarted. So there yeah, lessons and from.
Speaker 3 (37:18):
The past, there are technologies that exist that didn't exist then,
and we've just.
Speaker 2 (37:24):
Got to be thoughtful about about how we how we manage.
Speaker 3 (37:29):
But really what it comes down to is as well
like making sure that we are using our influence for
the betterment of humanity, all humanity, and we are standing
up for the rights and of indignity of.
Speaker 2 (37:48):
The most vulnerable.
Speaker 1 (37:51):
The waight of it feels very immense and close to
me right now. But I do feel very grateful that
so many of us, in our little worlds that all
kind of vend diagram together in the ways that they do,
are both preparing and slowing down just enough to ask
(38:18):
these kinds of questions. That has been one of the
great lessons for me is that in the immediate, you know,
fury or heartbreak that can come to witnessing injustice, like
I have a spicy Italian lady in me, Like I
can just get out there and start screaming and to
hold that passion, but also take a breath and go
(38:41):
to a friend and say, Okay, what's the plan. How
do I scream effectively? How do I instill the fear
my grandmother knew how to instill in me effectively? And
how do I also enter the spaces that require immense
empathy with that empathy on my sleeve and just be
present to support people. And I wonder if maybe the
(39:07):
root of that willingness to be curious is from the
thing we all share, which is being a storyteller. Yeah.
Speaker 3 (39:17):
I believe that we all have the storytelling capacity, and
we all have to those of us who are recognized
for it have to lead with it, and we've got
to lead with it in a way that's going to
empower others use their storytelling.
Speaker 2 (39:37):
You know.
Speaker 3 (39:38):
Quite often we'll be at some public event and my
wife and I am I kind of retreat because I
feel like, if it's not my show, I don't need
to be on stage, and it's an opportunity for other
people to be seen and on stage. And my wife
always reminds me, just like, but this is people love
your voice, and you know, why would you restrict them
(40:02):
of it? And the part of me is like, well,
they didn't. They haven't asked for it, So I don't
want to impose. But she's right, though, there's you know,
there is always an opportunity with the right intention and
with with humility two quote unquote impose hm hmm, if
(40:29):
you can do something.
Speaker 2 (40:30):
Good with it.
Speaker 1 (40:31):
I like that impose for good. Yeah, it feels nice.
Speaker 3 (40:36):
You can use your your fiery Italian voice in some moments. Yeah,
And as long as you're doing it for for good, you.
Speaker 1 (40:49):
Know, Yeah, Yeah, I think it's I think it's crucial,
you know. I know it gets set a lot, but truly,
now more than ever, I want to go back to
something that you said earlier, you know, about how you
begin to realize that even a music video in a
way could be a PSA because the new album, I'm
(41:10):
so excited it's here. We've waited as I'm leaving and
like coming back as a fan, and then I'll show
exit stage left and that your interviewer will be back.
But you know when you wait and you're so excited
as someone who loves someone else's art, like, oh my god,
it's here. And then of course I was like, of
(41:34):
course every song is tied specifically to an action you
can take for positive social change. Of course it is,
and I just think it's so cool. So I'll join
the chorus of people saying bravo. But can you talk
about how you how first of all do you say
(41:56):
this is the album I want to release after you know,
see years noodling and finding this version of this year's voice,
And then how do you kind of layer this larger
mission so that we're not just your listeners, but we're
also we're also becoming a community of folks doing something right.
Speaker 3 (42:22):
Well, I would say that, you know, again the serendipity
on my doorstep. I'm not a bleeding hard artist there's
plenty of tragedy and things in my life to be
sad about, but I have a very optimistic and positive outlook,
and I enjoy this opportunity to create and share with
(42:46):
this megaphone that I have for the whole world. And
I recognize that in the marketplace there's so much darkness,
lots of you know, depression and anxiety and misogyny and
violence and substance abuse, and that's I don't think I
(43:07):
need to contribute to any of that. And I could
tell an album worth of stories about myself and glorify
myself in a way that would probably make me more
popular than I am. But I also I'm not compelled
to do that. I don't feel that it's necessary. I
have to think we have enough self promoting narcissists in.
Speaker 2 (43:31):
The music business. And I feel like, okay, well, what
can I do.
Speaker 3 (43:37):
Let me show up in the way on music, on tape,
on record as I show up in community, and how
is that that is?
Speaker 2 (43:45):
Whenever I get a phone call or.
Speaker 3 (43:50):
I get invited to engage with a nonprofit organization, I
try to find a way. And I thought, well, posting
you or media assets online is certainly helpful. To my
to my fan base that works. Maybe shooting a p
s A for a video, or showing up to the
(44:11):
gala and performing at the galaff you can raise funds.
That I'm sure is very helpful. But if my forte
is storytelling and songwriting, how can I lean in heavily
on my passion and expertise using your messaging and and
(44:32):
work in the community so that two plus two equals five.
And it's not that I came up with this idea.
I know there's been the we Are the worlds of
the past. There's there have been the bono and YouTube
you know one, There's Bob Marley with Redemption songs. There's
(44:57):
so so many artists in the past have done the
message music or the positive social mission. But I thought,
why not really lean in with an album that suggests
to my peers that that era is not over and
that we can continue to do that. And here's an
album full of songs.
Speaker 2 (45:19):
The least you can do is one yes.
Speaker 3 (45:23):
And so each song is inspired by a nonprofit organization
or a positive social mission. One of the songs is
called Breakthrough. It was inspired by a nonprofit organization called
Breakthrough that is helping returning citizens matriculate back into society
with jobs, education, housing to reduce recidivism.
Speaker 2 (45:45):
You know.
Speaker 3 (45:47):
Another song on the album is called Don't Go Alone.
It's written inspired by an African proverb. But really I'm
promoting in Service of the Phoenix, which is an addiction
recovery organization that uses collective activity like exercise or hiking
(46:08):
as a modality to combat substance abuse. This is your
accountability family, your accountability team, and you just find new
friends and new ways to engage to avoid, you know,
going to the bottle or the pill. And so each
song is built around that concept. And I would be
(46:32):
remiss to not mention that my wife was probably the
most inspiring factor in making this decision because we were
the spokes couples for an organization called Peace over Violence
here in Los Angeles that does awareness for domestic abuse,
and there was a campaign every year. There's an annual
(46:55):
campaign called Denim Day, which is messaging around sexual violence
and how.
Speaker 2 (47:05):
It's important for.
Speaker 3 (47:08):
Men just as much as as any anyone to recognize
that our role in sexual violence. My wife wrote a
song after watching The Hunting Grounds I think is the
name of the film about rape on campus called never
(47:29):
Said Yes, because the conversation around you know, sexual violence
is always very directed and pointed at blaming the victim,
saying well, you know, did you say no?
Speaker 2 (47:46):
Did you.
Speaker 3 (47:49):
Lead the perpetrator on? You know, it's never a question
of did you say yes?
Speaker 2 (47:57):
Right? And if you didn't say yes. So she wrote
a song called never Said Yes.
Speaker 3 (48:02):
And I thought it was brilliant and you know, great
idea to take the social mission, put it into a
mantra that can become the language to support that mission
in the absence of, you know, a narrator.
Speaker 2 (48:23):
You know, now you have this.
Speaker 3 (48:25):
This quick, easy SoundBite that helps to tell the story
in a way that people can digest quickly.
Speaker 1 (48:32):
It's really beautiful, And now a word from our wonderful sponsors.
One of the things that strikes me about the opportunity
that you've created here is with an album's worth of songs,
(48:54):
each song having a focus for a cause, you offer
up a board to an audience to say, which of
these things resonates with you the most deeply? Which of
these things will you join the call for? Because you know,
I remember early in my career people would always say
(49:16):
to me, we have to pick something, pick a cause.
I'm like, how is working on a more civil society
going to be accomplished with one thing? That seems ridiculous
to me? And I actually think one of our greatest
strengths is the fact that when we get to speak
to so many people, the more you can teach or
showcase how interconnected these things are, the more likely you
(49:40):
are to inspire each person paying attention to what you're
sharing with the thing that most inspires them. Because not
every fan is going to have the same cause, but
everyone's going to be inspired by something. So what an
amazing What an amazing thing to a layer this creative
(50:01):
process with so many opportunities for real passion and connection.
Speaker 2 (50:10):
Thank you.
Speaker 3 (50:11):
I'm really happy about it. I think it's just the
volume one of many to come, and I'm going to
keep exploiting this this method for the long haul.
Speaker 1 (50:24):
Do you have a favorite song on the album?
Speaker 2 (50:28):
Very hard to say.
Speaker 3 (50:30):
Don't Go Alone is so infectious to me, the message,
you know, being about if you want to go fast,
you can go alone. If you want to go far,
you go together, and that being this African proverb that
really makes so much sense about how society and communities
(50:54):
can can operate, and then deep inside the music is
everything that I grew up with parents coming from Central
America via the Caribbean, so lots of you know, Latin
and Caribbean sounds and then African diaspora African sounds in
the music. But then there's on the other side of
(51:19):
that sonic landscape is this very calm and relaxed kind
of story of father and son, which is Daddy told me,
so the concept of.
Speaker 2 (51:35):
My relationship with my dad and the lessons that I
learned from him.
Speaker 3 (51:38):
And there's I guess there's a favorite moment or reason
for every song on the.
Speaker 2 (51:48):
Project, But yeah, those are two highlights for sure.
Speaker 1 (51:55):
Do you write a whole slew of songs and then
start to narrow them down for the album or are
you a person who finds each sort of concept that
you're processing in song and then you have an album.
Speaker 3 (52:12):
I think that putting an album together is a sculpting activity.
So I build up a whole mountain full of songs,
and then I peel away the layers so that the
remaining songs are the ones that tell the story I
feel is most necessary. And that's that's the general the
(52:36):
general way of writing for me to just keep writing
all the time and piece together, put together the album
based on what the theme overall theme should be.
Speaker 1 (52:51):
So interesting. My last and favorite question to ask everyone,
And I'm curious from where you're sitting and all these
things you're thinking about and this repertoire, this new repertoire
of music you're about to give to us today, what
(53:12):
feels like you're work in progress?
Speaker 2 (53:16):
Ah?
Speaker 3 (53:17):
What comes to mind is yesterday last night, in conversation
with my kids, we did cuddle time just before they
go to bed, thinking about their eagerness to engage in
(53:37):
the art world. And this work in progress is, you know,
building kids that are resilient and thoughtful and full of
heart and intelligent and less artistic and executive. So you know,
(54:10):
just before they went to bed, they spent a few
minutes coming up with some songs that that they might
that might end up being their first their first project together.
Speaker 2 (54:22):
Wow.
Speaker 3 (54:23):
As a brother and sister, that's that's I'd say, that's
my work in progress. It's like these these beautiful lives
that my wife and I have been fortunate enough to
receive and steward.
Speaker 1 (54:39):
M hm, stewardship. That's major to watch your babies creating
in front of you and looking at you like, Dad,
is this good? What a trip that has to be?
I just love that for you. Yeah, M well, thank
you so much, thank you for joining me for this
(54:59):
to I. You know, as I said earlier, it's as
a as a fan for so long. It's such a
joy to be able to talk to you, not just
about the work, but about the way you see the world.
And I'm so thrilled for the new record. And I
will say on behalf of many many people I know
who are amped about it. We all thank you, thank you. Yeah, yeah,
(55:23):
this has been such a joy.
Speaker 2 (55:25):
Likewise,
Hi everyone, it's Sophia. Welcome to Work in Progress. Hello friends,
welcome back to another week of work in progress. I
am geeked about today's guest because I am such an
(00:24):
enormous fan not only of his art but his activism,
and I cannot wait to pick his brain on all
of it. Today's guest is Alo Black. You know him
as an American singer and rapper. You know him from
A Vichi's Wake Me Up and from his smash hit
I Need a Dollar. What you may not know is
(00:46):
that Alo never planned on being a musician. His life
kind of happened by accident. He thought he would be
an academic and somehow took a left turn, and from
touring around the world and major stages everywhere, he has
managed to solidify his place in the mainstream music scene
(01:09):
while also being an incredible advocate for change. From studying
the methodologies of Nelson Mandela to being mentored by Harry Belafonte,
Alo has been involved in so many charitable causes and
in deep social justice work. He speaks out on the
importance and mental health awareness. He has collaborated with the
(01:31):
Biden administration to promote its national strategy to prevent suicide,
and his latest album, Stand Together, is not only a
beautiful musical journey that I've been waiting for for five years,
but every song on the album has a partnered philanthropic
initiative that fans can learn about. Talk about being a
(01:54):
true artist in every sense of the word and spending
your privilege and your platform for good. Hear Mallow Black,
Where are you today?
Speaker 2 (02:13):
I live in LA I'm Glendale.
Speaker 1 (02:15):
Okay. I grew up in Pasadena. Oh are you there
now or neighbors. No, I'm actually on the East Coast now,
but my folks are still there. And yeah, we were
like Miracle Mile kids. And then eventually my parents moved
to Pasadena and they're still there.
Speaker 2 (02:32):
Oh. Crazy.
Speaker 1 (02:33):
Normally I like to ask people about who they were
as kids, And so often when I'm interviewing parents that
have kids in that kind of stage of developmental age
that I know years are in, they get to kind
of see this mirroring of themselves as children and see
(02:53):
versions of themselves in their own children at the same time. Yeah,
and I wonder if you got to go back and
hang out with yourself as a ten year old kid,
the way you get to hang out with your kids.
Would you see aspects of the man you are today
in that little boy?
Speaker 2 (03:11):
Oh? Probably not. I don't know. I don't know. I was.
Speaker 3 (03:17):
I see my son and there are a lot of
similarities in him as a child compared to who I
was as a child, And I think it's going to
be I think he might be the same. It's going
to be like a night and day flip where the
kind of rambunctious, un bridled energy of youth sort of
(03:42):
meets with this this moment of change where you become
measured and more temperate and decisive, but no, also with
the ability to navigate between both personalities, the extrovert, the introvert.
Speaker 2 (04:05):
The entertainer and the observer.
Speaker 1 (04:08):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (04:09):
I feel like, yeah, he seems like he's probably gonna
flip that switch in the next seven years.
Speaker 2 (04:19):
Probably.
Speaker 1 (04:21):
Wow. And is that all right around when it started
to happen for you?
Speaker 3 (04:25):
No, it happened for me earlier then. I think it
will happen for him. But I think that it's just
different circumstances. You know, I had I had two parents
that worked full time. We were a very kind of
middle class family. And what's different now is that there's
(04:50):
I think a lot more attention that my wife and
I give to the kids, a lot more comfort and
intentional parenting versus fly by the seat of your parts
on the table and make sure the kids get to
school parenting that I grew up with.
Speaker 1 (05:12):
Yeah. I talk to my friends about this all the time,
because we're really the first generation that has been in
this phase of life with all these resources, all the
mental health studies and all the understanding of you know,
communication and the value of therapy and all these things
that our folks didn't really have. And it's it's so
(05:37):
inspiring for me to look at parents in my life
and watch the way they can acknowledge where their own
parents fell short, still love them for it, and be
choosing to create a different pattern in real time. Yeah,
it's pretty incredible.
Speaker 3 (05:57):
It is incredible. There's a lot, like you said, a
lot of resources. We chosen a school that has a
pedagogy that I think helps parents become better parents. One
of the really special things is that before the Surgeon
General's warning on social media, we were already engaged in
(06:20):
a media free campus, media free lifestyle. So you know,
it's very limited the amount of television or TV programming
that the kids would get and they're you know, they're
they're fine with it. They've learned to manage without it,
(06:41):
and there's no pressure coming from the school because the
other kids are on board with the program. So it's
helped us be better parents, but also just more focused
and intentional.
Speaker 1 (06:56):
Yeah, it's an interesting thing I think for people in
our lines of work to analyze relationships to media, and
even when you talk about how the sort of flip
happened in your young self, how as an adult you
have to hold both your performer and your introvert, you know,
(07:17):
I think about that a lot, being the performer, the entertainer,
and also a listener who likes to be quiet. There's
then the layer of how you have to participate in
media on top of it, and when you've pursued a
career in it. I mean, before you became a solo artist,
(07:38):
you were part of a hip hop duo and la
in the nineties, I mean, everything about it was so
incredible and music was so incredible, and there's no way
to be a musician without being in the media, right, So, like,
at least then there was no social there was no
(07:58):
thumb scroll on the iPhone. What was that what was
that era like for.
Speaker 2 (08:02):
It was the best era. I don't know.
Speaker 3 (08:04):
I don't know that we'll ever be able to have
that again. I would love to try to replicate it somehow,
but it would take concerned effort on everybody's part to
recognize that what makes it special is sort of the
exclusivity of the temporal exclusivity, the spatial exclusivity, and the
(08:30):
informational exclusivity. It's that you, if you know, you know,
and once you're there, you get to experience it, and
then it's word of mouth, and and if you weren't there,
then it's like the tail of you know, the fish
that you caught just keeps getting bigger and bigger, and
so the hype gets is real.
Speaker 2 (08:50):
So but.
Speaker 3 (08:54):
Wow, when I was growing up and in the hip
hop scene, we would have access to all of the artists,
the stars nowadays, people that you kind of just look
at like, oh, that's a bonafide you know, superstar, billionaire
artist and hip hop those folks. We would literally go
(09:17):
to clubs and see them for five bucks or ten
bucks in LA and just an awesome time of music
and dance and art and culture. And I know that
it is possible, and I know that we was part
of our mental wellness, right. It was our own modality
(09:40):
for ensuring that we were healthy because we had a
community and a culture that we belonged to, that we
subscribed to.
Speaker 2 (09:48):
Of course, my parents are from Panama.
Speaker 3 (09:49):
There was a whole community and culture from Central America
Latin America that I was part of. And then my
friends that I went to school with, we had our
our own sort of you know, suburban subculture.
Speaker 2 (10:03):
And then there were my hip hop friends and culture.
Speaker 3 (10:07):
So I had the opportunity to choose between uh and
and actually code switch between a lot of different cultures.
Speaker 2 (10:15):
But it's the it was the.
Speaker 3 (10:18):
Beautiful mental well I'm gonna a kinning making it an
association with mental wellness. Now I didn't. I wouldn't have
done it back then, but now I can see that.
The fact that we were in propinquity and proximity with
one another, that we were engaged in physical activity so
it was dance or performance. The fact that we were
(10:42):
free to make mistakes without the repercussion of forever documentation.
All of that combined was I think the best and
most nurturing soil to grow up in.
Speaker 1 (11:06):
I love that that idea that you could be free
not only to make mistakes, but to experiment with your
own art, because sure, if you can make a mistake
in private, you can have a normally sized consequence of sorts.
To do it in public does something to I think
(11:26):
a tiny human brain that it's not meant to experience.
But I worry about this, everyone recording everything all the time.
I worry about what that's costing art because people are
afraid to have something that's mediocre go on the internet.
But you got to rehearse, you got to try things,
(11:48):
You got to see. If you're a comedian, you have
to see how a joke works in a crowd. Comedians
workshop around the country, Artists perform a new song, see
what the vibe is, realize it it's missing a synth
or a drum or whatever, and go back and layer.
And nobody wants to do that anymore. People only want
to give out what is perfect because it might go somewhere.
(12:13):
And I'm scared of the generation of art we're costing
ourselves because everyone's too afraid to take risks.
Speaker 3 (12:19):
Now, yeah, that's a real concern of mine as well.
And I would add in the layer of algorithms and industry.
Industry is so much smarter, and now with algorithms, they're
even more informed about how to sell and market. And
(12:43):
what's unfortunate is that it becomes this recursive loop, a
reductive recursive loop that does not allow for better or
more interesting or productive art. Yes, and I think about
how we can, you know, try to you know, go
(13:07):
back to square one. And I don't want to sound like,
you know, back in my day, but there was something
special about the garage band. Yes, And now that it's
more so, the discovery and engagement is online and it's
(13:29):
more insular, it's more solo than it is the group,
and the groups that exist are all so manicured and
perfect and seen that it begs the question will we
ever be able to see, you know, kids just having
(13:50):
fun for the sake of having fun anymore? Or is
all of their fun for display? And does it have
to be perfectly presented and rehearsed fun?
Speaker 1 (14:01):
And when it works for these young artists, the blow
up is so fast. You know, It's been interesting to
watch Chapel Roone have this big year and everyone's like
good for her, and she's out there being like I'm traumatized,
like the Internet's wild. What people expect of me is
really hard for me to process. A year and a
half ago, nobody knew this kid's name, and I think
(14:23):
about the pressure, you know, we kind of got to
be out there and make a thing and have a
show premiere or drop an album and do the press
tour and then also like go home, go to the
bar with our friends, like not every outing was expected
to be chased and tailed and photographed and packaged. And
(14:48):
I think about things that are so like those moments
that take me back, you know, almost like an old
factory hit when you smell something and suddenly you're to
someone you haven't seen in ages. And when I was
getting ready for today and I was thinking about all
the phases of my own life that your music has
been a part of. I even think about when I
(15:12):
Need a dollar, was, you know, the theme song to
Make It in America. And like my buddy Brian Greenberg
from my first show, One Tree Hill was on that
show and we were like, oh my god, and it
felt like this moment for us, like supporting our friend
and this song that was everwhere on the radio and
it was it was the theme song of the HBO show,
(15:32):
like the possibilities felt so big, and it was it's
like one of my favorite memories as a young artist.
And it wasn't even my show, but it was like
we all had this connection in this way and nobody
was expected to be and like the head to to
look by the stylist and doing the thing. And you know,
(15:53):
now everybody's looking at these retro photos from the nineties
and the early two thousands and being like, God, what
cool style. And it's like people were just wearing they were.
Speaker 2 (16:02):
Just wearing what they were Yeah, what were in closet
or in the drawer? There was and there was none
of this.
Speaker 3 (16:08):
Thank you for mentioning I Need a Dollar because that
was an epic moment for me as well.
Speaker 2 (16:13):
That was exactly what you said.
Speaker 3 (16:15):
I was just making music for the few fans that
I knew I had who would appreciate it. And I
was like, and I'll probably go get another job in
a couple months.
Speaker 1 (16:26):
Yeah, And now for our sponsors, and can I ask
just a technical question for the timeline, how long was
this after you embarked as a solo artist.
Speaker 3 (16:41):
I Need a Dollar hit in two thousand and nine
or so. I had been laid off in two thousand
and three, so six years of kind of solo artistry.
I've always been engaged in art, doing hip hop music.
I released I think two thousand and five maybe the
(17:03):
last the hip hop album with my partner DJ Exile
as Eminon, and then released a solo album in two
thousand and six or something like that.
Speaker 1 (17:17):
So this song hits and it's like, what, yeah, I
mean when that when that beat starts and it just
the loop is so good. I think about walking down
the street in New York and my bee, I don't know,
it's so it's seminole.
Speaker 2 (17:34):
Oh my goodness. You're right.
Speaker 3 (17:35):
It has an essence, a really really powerful emotive sound
to it, and it does.
Speaker 2 (17:45):
It does make me think of like.
Speaker 3 (17:48):
A scene, you know, scene of Staying Alive where johnsha
Volks was just walking down New York. But I was,
you know, I was at a moment where I had
no expectations because I've been doing music for so long
and music really wasn't supposed to be my career.
Speaker 2 (18:07):
It's just the hobby.
Speaker 3 (18:09):
And I knew that I can always go back to
corporate or go back to school and kind of be
a career scholar or something.
Speaker 2 (18:16):
But I was lucky. I was lucky, and I've been
chasing this luck, writing this luck for a little bit.
Speaker 1 (18:26):
Yeah, you said in an article. I suppose I should
say an interview. It was an interview that an article
was written from that you feel like serendipity lives on
your front doorstep.
Speaker 2 (18:39):
Oh my goodness.
Speaker 1 (18:40):
Can you say a little bit more about that as
you talk about riding this wave?
Speaker 2 (18:45):
Yeah, I feel like it's not fair.
Speaker 3 (18:46):
You know, I have a lot of friends where are
struggling artists who are incredibly talented but just haven't had
what I consider the lucky breaks that I've had, and
I wish that I could share, you know, the sprinkles
(19:07):
of serendipity with them. But everywhere I look, there's something
positive happening, and my goal is to just trying to
pay it forward as much as possible with philanthropy and
with message and engagement. But I was signed to an
(19:27):
indie label. First of all, I wasn't signed to any label.
In the very beginning. I was going to work for
a big corporation and they pushed my start date back.
And because they pushed my start date back, the opportunity
to go to go on tour in Europe. Opened up
(19:48):
because one of the members of this hip hop group
decided to stay home. So there was an extra seat
in the bus, an extra bed in the hotel rooms.
And the idea was that I could join the tour
if I paid my way. And I had just received,
you know, just graduated from college, received this like exit
(20:09):
scholarship that I don't even again. Another serendipity, right, money,
money on the way out, Okay, I'll take it. So
I had some money to pay my way on this tour.
Came home and started recording with the artists that I
had toured with, and one of the recordings peaqued the
(20:31):
attention of the record label that that artist was signed to,
so they ended up signing me as a singer and
not an MC. So all this time, this whole tour,
I'd done, I'm a rapper and I'm writing hip hop music,
and I decided to sing on one track, and the
labels considering me a vocalist, and now I'm signed as
(20:51):
a singer. And so I had to really like bootstrap
myself to become a vocalist and a singer, trying so
many different sounds and styles over the years, and then
by the time I started working on my second album,
Good Things, which holds the I Need a Dollar song,
(21:14):
I kind of had figured out where the best place
was to use my voice. So it wasn't in power
and b it wasn't alternative rock. It was in this
kind of folk soul vocal and it ended up being
the mark of my early career.
Speaker 1 (21:31):
Yeah, it's amazing, and I again I think about that thing.
Would you have had the time and space to find
the best use of your voice had that moment in
your early career been happening in this kind of algorithmic
machine we're in now, No.
Speaker 2 (21:51):
I don't think so.
Speaker 3 (21:52):
Yeah, I think because of my attraction to process, I
would be trying to figure out the algorithm how to
be eat it, and it wouldn't It wouldn't give me.
Speaker 2 (22:04):
The opportunity to be my best artistic self.
Speaker 3 (22:07):
I'm so lucky that in high school I had the
chance to put in ten thousand hours of free, expressive
artistic creation. Yeah, without again, without the repercussions of.
Speaker 2 (22:24):
Having to be perfect, because.
Speaker 3 (22:26):
It wasn't going online right, it was being vetted by
my very close associates, and once they approved, then it
made it to you know, mixtapes that we then delivered
to more people.
Speaker 1 (22:39):
I miss the mixtape when you talked earlier about like
if you know, you know, when you finally when you're
not a music maker but you love art, you know,
artist of a different vertical, like to go, oh, now,
now I get the heads up when the mixtapes are coming,
like nothing was cooler, you know, as a young person
(23:02):
finding the way in these creative scenes. I'm like, oh
my god, just to hear you talk about like you
workshop it, then it goes on the mixtape, then it
goes out, then people come to see you in the venue.
It's like, I don't know if we'll get it again,
but I I'd be so thrilled if we could figure
out a way.
Speaker 3 (23:19):
Yeah again, I'm going to try to figure out how
that can be possible.
Speaker 2 (23:26):
I think that there is a.
Speaker 3 (23:29):
Hunger for it, but I want to, you know, try
to My kids are a hop skip and a jump
away from high school and so maybe, you know, I'll
try to work shop it with them the rental venue
where they can go and you know, have parties and
(23:51):
be creative and explore.
Speaker 2 (23:55):
But one rule is that it has to happen offline.
Speaker 1 (24:01):
Yeah, phone free love it. I even think about what
a big deal it was in that era when you'd
hear about something after and then you'd see the you know,
the five photos that came out because some great shooter
was there and and but that was it. It wasn't
(24:21):
you know, six hundred grainy Instagram videos or whatever. And
there's something I think really beautiful about all of that,
and I do think it's why so many young people
crave it. I hear from you know, my friends with teenagers.
We've kind of we've kind of got two camps, like
friends with little kids, like you know, five and under,
(24:43):
and then we've got friends with teenagers. And the teenagers
want to ask questions about my first show because they're like,
everybody has a flip phone. They they all talk to
each other about how they're feeling. No one's texting, and
that kind of blows my mind. These kids are like, wait,
we want that version of high school.
Speaker 2 (25:05):
Yeah. The beauty is the art of story, and so
what is.
Speaker 3 (25:11):
You know, missing, is that with all of this video
and all of these photos available, for every event that happens,
you end also the ability to watch and experience in
real time, you lose the art of story, and so nobody,
nobody tells the story in a way that is compelling.
You're receiving it in real time, and you get to
(25:33):
interpret it at your own level, uh, with with your
with your own you know, intellectual curiosity and your own
ability to really process deeply. And we all have different abilities.
(25:56):
But when you have a storyteller that's coming to you
and dictating really what you should feel and how you feel,
that's a whole different experience. And I think that's what
is missing, is the Yeah, the great narrator.
Speaker 1 (26:12):
Yes, And what I miss about the great narrator is
that it was being presented, as you said, with someone's
story that also helped to encourage critical thinking and to
question the story.
Speaker 3 (26:26):
To.
Speaker 1 (26:27):
Examine the facts of it, rather than just to look
at one hundred images and decide you already know the story.
The irony that we used to have narrators and that
made us better critical thinkers is not lost on me.
And it it gets to the root of something I've
always really admired about you as a person in my
(26:51):
age peer group, ish like you're one of those people.
I'm like, yeah, we kind of came up together even
though we never really knew each other. And I'm so
happy you're here. But you've done something that I've seen
be so important to so many artists in our generation,
which is use your platform, really spend the privilege of
your platform for others as an advocate, As an activist.
(27:15):
You know, you've focused on mental health, you focused on
criminal justice reform. You have so artfully told other people's
stories to remind people that if we don't have community,
we don't have anything. When did that spark get lit
for you as an artist or was it always part
(27:36):
of who you are as a person and the artistry
he helps let it out right?
Speaker 3 (27:40):
I think there's definitely a moment where it was lit.
And I would say, right after I need a dollar.
I was very very excited to be, you know, kind
of having this moment of visibility after being an obscure
niche artist on an obscure niche record label. And I
(28:02):
was asked to do some endorsements for different products, some
luxury products, and one of them was a liquor brand
that happened to be a gin that was my dad's
favorite gin. I am not a drinker, never was, but
I thought I'll take some photos and hold a martini,
(28:25):
and then I'll have some bottles sent to my dad
and he'll get the posters and it'll be a nice
little father son moment. And the posters ended up being
placed in the inner city across the country. And I
got a phone call from one of my wife's friends
who was an activist out of an organization called Community
Coalition of South LA which was started by now Mayor
(28:50):
Karen Bass, but back she was just a citizen of
her community trying to make it better and she started
a nonprofit organization. The phone call was a reprimand of
my use of my celebrity and influence to sell alcohol
and liquor in a community where this organization was trying
(29:12):
to shut down liquor stores which had become a blight.
Speaker 2 (29:15):
On the community.
Speaker 3 (29:16):
And I had no connection and no idea, and I
was really taken aback. So I use that as an
opportunity to visit the org, learn what they were doing,
and recognize how much my influence was a responsibility that
(29:36):
I had to take seriously. And when I signed with
a major record label after that, I promised that I'll
use my music for positive social transformation. And you try
to turn every music video into a PSA that could
tell a story, to humanize the most vulnerable.
Speaker 1 (29:58):
Yeah, that's beautiful, and you know, from learning lessons, and
I think it's also very vulnerable. If I may say,
to be willing to learn out loud, I think it's
incredibly important to push back against this sort of weird
algorithmic perfectionism, to say, oh, yeah, I did something that
seemed fun and it turned out to have an impact
(30:21):
that was terrible. FYI, this was my lesson. If you're
ever in this position, ask these questions. You know, nobody
gives us a handbook on how to do these things
right and how to pull the thread till you get
to the end of it. And it's so interesting to
hear about that feedback and the way you chose to
(30:44):
receive it, and then to think about what you've done
with all of this since you know, as you said,
the way you use your music, the way that you've
stepped up, and I mean even helped join the president,
you know, join President Biden to talk about him and
Kamala Harris's National Strategy for Suicide Prevention, you know, to
(31:08):
take a crisis for our communities and say, this is
something a lot of people keep hidden out of pain
and shame, and let's go talk about it literally from
the most powerful, you know, stage in America. What was
that like for you? Was that unnerving in any way
(31:32):
or as you've built this sort of series of learnings
and voicings for others, did it just feel like the
next right thing?
Speaker 2 (31:43):
I would say the latter, It feels like the next
right thing.
Speaker 3 (31:45):
I don't feel any real trepidation, and I look to
my mentors and also heroes from the past that have
basically educated me on what's possible. I think about, you know,
was fortunate to meet Quaku and Endaba Mendela. These are
(32:06):
the grandsons of Nelson Mendela, and the stories that I
hear from them, and understanding Nelson Mandela's story and also
Winnie Mendela's story that in the face of the most
tremendous and horrendous adversity, torture, incarceration, that he still was
(32:31):
able to maintain a level of humanity and compassion not
just for himself, but for perceivably his enemies, which you know,
he wouldn't call them his enemies because he didn't punish
them when he came out of prison, he embraced everyone
and moved forward with dignity. And I think about Harry Belafonte,
(32:57):
who was a mentor of mine, someone that I had
chance to sit with and learn from, and how he
used his voice and celebrity in a way to encourage,
you know, transformation that otherwise might not have happened without.
Speaker 2 (33:19):
His very privileged position.
Speaker 3 (33:24):
And there certainly was fear, you know, death threats, physical altercations,
but somebody's got to do the work. And if you're
in that position and you have that access, then the
job is yours and you have to rise to the occasion.
So I don't know, I just think I felt I
(33:45):
feel like I've had the right guides along the way.
Speaker 1 (33:50):
Hmm. That's beautiful. And now a word from our sponsors
that I really enjoy and I think you will too.
It's the you know, the Harry's, the Jane Fondas that
the folks who came before all of us, that when
(34:12):
the pushback comes and the fear kind of sinks in
of like, oh god, what does it mean to say
this out loud and to keep beating this drama and
to refuse to be quiet when you feel in terrible
thing that you know, someone out there does that falls
under the category of threat. I think in moments, especially
(34:34):
like this one, you know this many days into this
new all hands on deck administration, I just think, well,
they did it. They did this work, don't. We don't
get to do less. There is no world in which
we can do less because we for for all the
(34:54):
negative aspects of how interconnected we are, we do have
the ability to do this. You and I can be
in community from different sides of the country. We can
get on a phone and speak to people and remind
people of what's good and true. And yeah, when I
get scared, I try to think about those people are there?
(35:17):
Are there like leaders and mentors or folks you call, Like,
who do you turn to when you get scared?
Speaker 2 (35:23):
It's mostly community, mostly community. You know.
Speaker 3 (35:29):
What reassures me is that Harry Belefonte was in the
middle of all of the civil rights struggle, and many
of his peers were murdered, doctor King, you know, many
were beaten, but he was able to also survive and
(35:51):
for decades and decades later to be able to tell
the story and to tool up and train a whole
new generation of artists. There, but there are there are others.
Speaker 2 (36:03):
You know that in my circle. Who are the folks
that I go to when I'm.
Speaker 3 (36:10):
Trying to think through how we position ourselves for the
for the next four years and and beyond. What are
the what are the strategies, what is the goal you know?
And what are how do we triage what are the
(36:31):
things that are not as important as What are our
highest priorities and how do we make sure we maximize
those highest priorities?
Speaker 2 (36:41):
Yes, and how do we do it in a way
in this very.
Speaker 3 (36:50):
Information sensitive or hyper informat informed society. How do we
do it in a way that is information sensitive mhm
h and in ways that doesn't make our strategy and
concepts vulnerable two.
Speaker 2 (37:09):
To being thwarted. So there yeah, lessons and from.
Speaker 3 (37:18):
The past, there are technologies that exist that didn't exist then,
and we've just.
Speaker 2 (37:24):
Got to be thoughtful about about how we how we manage.
Speaker 3 (37:29):
But really what it comes down to is as well
like making sure that we are using our influence for
the betterment of humanity, all humanity, and we are standing
up for the rights and of indignity of.
Speaker 2 (37:48):
The most vulnerable.
Speaker 1 (37:51):
The waight of it feels very immense and close to
me right now. But I do feel very grateful that
so many of us, in our little worlds that all
kind of vend diagram together in the ways that they do,
are both preparing and slowing down just enough to ask
(38:18):
these kinds of questions. That has been one of the
great lessons for me is that in the immediate, you know,
fury or heartbreak that can come to witnessing injustice, like
I have a spicy Italian lady in me, Like I
can just get out there and start screaming and to
hold that passion, but also take a breath and go
(38:41):
to a friend and say, Okay, what's the plan. How
do I scream effectively? How do I instill the fear
my grandmother knew how to instill in me effectively? And
how do I also enter the spaces that require immense
empathy with that empathy on my sleeve and just be
present to support people. And I wonder if maybe the
(39:07):
root of that willingness to be curious is from the
thing we all share, which is being a storyteller. Yeah.
Speaker 3 (39:17):
I believe that we all have the storytelling capacity, and
we all have to those of us who are recognized
for it have to lead with it, and we've got
to lead with it in a way that's going to
empower others use their storytelling.
Speaker 2 (39:37):
You know.
Speaker 3 (39:38):
Quite often we'll be at some public event and my
wife and I am I kind of retreat because I
feel like, if it's not my show, I don't need
to be on stage, and it's an opportunity for other
people to be seen and on stage. And my wife
always reminds me, just like, but this is people love
your voice, and you know, why would you restrict them
(40:02):
of it? And the part of me is like, well,
they didn't. They haven't asked for it, So I don't
want to impose. But she's right, though, there's you know,
there is always an opportunity with the right intention and
with with humility two quote unquote impose hm hmm, if
(40:29):
you can do something.
Speaker 2 (40:30):
Good with it.
Speaker 1 (40:31):
I like that impose for good. Yeah, it feels nice.
Speaker 3 (40:36):
You can use your your fiery Italian voice in some moments. Yeah,
And as long as you're doing it for for good, you.
Speaker 1 (40:49):
Know, Yeah, Yeah, I think it's I think it's crucial,
you know. I know it gets set a lot, but truly,
now more than ever, I want to go back to
something that you said earlier, you know, about how you
begin to realize that even a music video in a
way could be a PSA because the new album, I'm
(41:10):
so excited it's here. We've waited as I'm leaving and
like coming back as a fan, and then I'll show
exit stage left and that your interviewer will be back.
But you know when you wait and you're so excited
as someone who loves someone else's art, like, oh my god,
it's here. And then of course I was like, of
(41:34):
course every song is tied specifically to an action you
can take for positive social change. Of course it is,
and I just think it's so cool. So I'll join
the chorus of people saying bravo. But can you talk
about how you how first of all do you say
(41:56):
this is the album I want to release after you know,
see years noodling and finding this version of this year's voice,
And then how do you kind of layer this larger
mission so that we're not just your listeners, but we're
also we're also becoming a community of folks doing something right.
Speaker 3 (42:22):
Well, I would say that, you know, again the serendipity
on my doorstep. I'm not a bleeding hard artist there's
plenty of tragedy and things in my life to be
sad about, but I have a very optimistic and positive outlook,
and I enjoy this opportunity to create and share with
(42:46):
this megaphone that I have for the whole world. And
I recognize that in the marketplace there's so much darkness,
lots of you know, depression and anxiety and misogyny and
violence and substance abuse, and that's I don't think I
(43:07):
need to contribute to any of that. And I could
tell an album worth of stories about myself and glorify
myself in a way that would probably make me more
popular than I am. But I also I'm not compelled
to do that. I don't feel that it's necessary. I
have to think we have enough self promoting narcissists in.
Speaker 2 (43:31):
The music business. And I feel like, okay, well, what
can I do.
Speaker 3 (43:37):
Let me show up in the way on music, on tape,
on record as I show up in community, and how
is that that is?
Speaker 2 (43:45):
Whenever I get a phone call or.
Speaker 3 (43:50):
I get invited to engage with a nonprofit organization, I
try to find a way. And I thought, well, posting
you or media assets online is certainly helpful. To my
to my fan base that works. Maybe shooting a p
s A for a video, or showing up to the
(44:11):
gala and performing at the galaff you can raise funds.
That I'm sure is very helpful. But if my forte
is storytelling and songwriting, how can I lean in heavily
on my passion and expertise using your messaging and and
(44:32):
work in the community so that two plus two equals five.
And it's not that I came up with this idea.
I know there's been the we Are the worlds of
the past. There's there have been the bono and YouTube
you know one, There's Bob Marley with Redemption songs. There's
(44:57):
so so many artists in the past have done the
message music or the positive social mission. But I thought,
why not really lean in with an album that suggests
to my peers that that era is not over and
that we can continue to do that. And here's an
album full of songs.
Speaker 2 (45:19):
The least you can do is one yes.
Speaker 3 (45:23):
And so each song is inspired by a nonprofit organization
or a positive social mission. One of the songs is
called Breakthrough. It was inspired by a nonprofit organization called
Breakthrough that is helping returning citizens matriculate back into society
with jobs, education, housing to reduce recidivism.
Speaker 2 (45:45):
You know.
Speaker 3 (45:47):
Another song on the album is called Don't Go Alone.
It's written inspired by an African proverb. But really I'm
promoting in Service of the Phoenix, which is an addiction
recovery organization that uses collective activity like exercise or hiking
(46:08):
as a modality to combat substance abuse. This is your
accountability family, your accountability team, and you just find new
friends and new ways to engage to avoid, you know,
going to the bottle or the pill. And so each
song is built around that concept. And I would be
(46:32):
remiss to not mention that my wife was probably the
most inspiring factor in making this decision because we were
the spokes couples for an organization called Peace over Violence
here in Los Angeles that does awareness for domestic abuse,
and there was a campaign every year. There's an annual
(46:55):
campaign called Denim Day, which is messaging around sexual violence
and how.
Speaker 2 (47:05):
It's important for.
Speaker 3 (47:08):
Men just as much as as any anyone to recognize
that our role in sexual violence. My wife wrote a
song after watching The Hunting Grounds I think is the
name of the film about rape on campus called never
(47:29):
Said Yes, because the conversation around you know, sexual violence
is always very directed and pointed at blaming the victim,
saying well, you know, did you say no?
Speaker 2 (47:46):
Did you.
Speaker 3 (47:49):
Lead the perpetrator on? You know, it's never a question
of did you say yes?
Speaker 2 (47:57):
Right? And if you didn't say yes. So she wrote
a song called never Said Yes.
Speaker 3 (48:02):
And I thought it was brilliant and you know, great
idea to take the social mission, put it into a
mantra that can become the language to support that mission
in the absence of, you know, a narrator.
Speaker 2 (48:23):
You know, now you have this.
Speaker 3 (48:25):
This quick, easy SoundBite that helps to tell the story
in a way that people can digest quickly.
Speaker 1 (48:32):
It's really beautiful, And now a word from our wonderful sponsors.
One of the things that strikes me about the opportunity
that you've created here is with an album's worth of songs,
(48:54):
each song having a focus for a cause, you offer
up a board to an audience to say, which of
these things resonates with you the most deeply? Which of
these things will you join the call for? Because you know,
I remember early in my career people would always say
(49:16):
to me, we have to pick something, pick a cause.
I'm like, how is working on a more civil society
going to be accomplished with one thing? That seems ridiculous
to me? And I actually think one of our greatest
strengths is the fact that when we get to speak
to so many people, the more you can teach or
showcase how interconnected these things are, the more likely you
(49:40):
are to inspire each person paying attention to what you're
sharing with the thing that most inspires them. Because not
every fan is going to have the same cause, but
everyone's going to be inspired by something. So what an
amazing What an amazing thing to a layer this creative
(50:01):
process with so many opportunities for real passion and connection.
Speaker 2 (50:10):
Thank you.
Speaker 3 (50:11):
I'm really happy about it. I think it's just the
volume one of many to come, and I'm going to
keep exploiting this this method for the long haul.
Speaker 1 (50:24):
Do you have a favorite song on the album?
Speaker 2 (50:28):
Very hard to say.
Speaker 3 (50:30):
Don't Go Alone is so infectious to me, the message,
you know, being about if you want to go fast,
you can go alone. If you want to go far,
you go together, and that being this African proverb that
really makes so much sense about how society and communities
(50:54):
can can operate, and then deep inside the music is
everything that I grew up with parents coming from Central
America via the Caribbean, so lots of you know, Latin
and Caribbean sounds and then African diaspora African sounds in
the music. But then there's on the other side of
(51:19):
that sonic landscape is this very calm and relaxed kind
of story of father and son, which is Daddy told me,
so the concept of.
Speaker 2 (51:35):
My relationship with my dad and the lessons that I
learned from him.
Speaker 3 (51:38):
And there's I guess there's a favorite moment or reason
for every song on the.
Speaker 2 (51:48):
Project, But yeah, those are two highlights for sure.
Speaker 1 (51:55):
Do you write a whole slew of songs and then
start to narrow them down for the album or are
you a person who finds each sort of concept that
you're processing in song and then you have an album.
Speaker 3 (52:12):
I think that putting an album together is a sculpting activity.
So I build up a whole mountain full of songs,
and then I peel away the layers so that the
remaining songs are the ones that tell the story I
feel is most necessary. And that's that's the general the
(52:36):
general way of writing for me to just keep writing
all the time and piece together, put together the album
based on what the theme overall theme should be.
Speaker 1 (52:51):
So interesting. My last and favorite question to ask everyone,
And I'm curious from where you're sitting and all these
things you're thinking about and this repertoire, this new repertoire
of music you're about to give to us today, what
(53:12):
feels like you're work in progress?
Speaker 2 (53:16):
Ah?
Speaker 3 (53:17):
What comes to mind is yesterday last night, in conversation
with my kids, we did cuddle time just before they
go to bed, thinking about their eagerness to engage in
(53:37):
the art world. And this work in progress is, you know,
building kids that are resilient and thoughtful and full of
heart and intelligent and less artistic and executive. So you know,
(54:10):
just before they went to bed, they spent a few
minutes coming up with some songs that that they might
that might end up being their first their first project together.
Speaker 2 (54:22):
Wow.
Speaker 3 (54:23):
As a brother and sister, that's that's I'd say, that's
my work in progress. It's like these these beautiful lives
that my wife and I have been fortunate enough to
receive and steward.
Speaker 1 (54:39):
M hm, stewardship. That's major to watch your babies creating
in front of you and looking at you like, Dad,
is this good? What a trip that has to be?
I just love that for you. Yeah, M well, thank
you so much, thank you for joining me for this
(54:59):
to I. You know, as I said earlier, it's as
a as a fan for so long. It's such a
joy to be able to talk to you, not just
about the work, but about the way you see the world.
And I'm so thrilled for the new record. And I
will say on behalf of many many people I know
who are amped about it. We all thank you, thank you. Yeah, yeah,
(55:23):
this has been such a joy.
Speaker 2 (55:25):
Likewise,
Host
Sophia Bush
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