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The Heartbreak That Created Sisqó - Masterminds Podcast EP16 · Masterminds Podcast

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_02: Hi, and welcome to Masterminds Podcast.
• 0:02
  SPEAKER_02: My name is Richie Mantor, and I'm your tour guide on this ever exciting journey to master your one true powerful weapon in your mind.
• 0:12
  SPEAKER_02: So anybody who's watched Masterminds Podcast before knows that I like to talk about discipline, consistency, and especially excellence.
• 0:22
  SPEAKER_02: So this episode is a different kind of episode because when I had the chance to sit down one-on-one and talk to one of the people who shaped the RB industry when I was growing up, you know, I always like to talk about the fact that the music industry when I was growing up to when I entered was very different from what is like from what it's like right now.
• 0:46
  SPEAKER_02: Previously, to be successful in music, you couldn't just have uh the basic talent.
• 0:51
  SPEAKER_02: You needed to be the best singer, the best dancer, the best performer, you need to be good with interviews, you had to be like a complete 360 of an artist to even get noticed, let alone to hit.
• 1:05
  SPEAKER_02: So for this man to start in that era and succeed heavily with his group, which is known as Drew Hill.
• 1:12
  SPEAKER_02: I know the Gen Z probably are wondering what's going on right now, but bear with us.
• 1:17
  SPEAKER_02: Drew Hill had back-to-back hits and dominated the charts, and then when he went solo, he had non-stop monster hits from Thong Song to Incomplete to Unleash the Dragon.
• 1:31
  SPEAKER_02: He had an album that completely robbed the entire RB and hip-hop world.
• 1:37
  SPEAKER_02: Cisco has done amazing things in this industry, and he continues to be a legend by having the same talent and to continue to perform at that same level.
• 1:48
  SPEAKER_02: So when I had a chance to sit down with him after a performance, I said, let's talk so that my viewers, my people who want to learn how to be excellent and hone their skills, can also become like that one day.
• 2:01
  SPEAKER_02: So enjoy this conversation.
• 2:04
  SPEAKER_02: Hi, Cisco.
• 2:05
  SPEAKER_00: What's poppin'?
• 2:06
  SPEAKER_02: I'm awesome like that today.
• 2:08
  SPEAKER_02: How are you feeling?
• 2:09
  SPEAKER_00: I'm I'm excellent.
• 2:10
  SPEAKER_00: I'm excellent.
• 2:10
  SPEAKER_00: It was uh electric crowd, man.
• 2:13
  SPEAKER_02: Electrifying performance, too.
• 2:15
  SPEAKER_00: I appreciate that, man.
• 2:16
  SPEAKER_00: We had some had some technical difficulties where the music stopped.
• 2:20
  SPEAKER_00: Um, so it's a good thing I was singing for real.
• 2:25
  SPEAKER_00: That would have been pretty bad.
• 2:26
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 2:27
  SPEAKER_02: You mentioned something interesting though when you're performing that your biggest song is in Thong Song.
• 2:31
  SPEAKER_02: It's incomplete.
• 2:33
  SPEAKER_00: Yes, yes.
• 2:34
  SPEAKER_00: Um, my uh uh single that went number one on my um debut solo album was Incomplete, written by Mantel Jordan.
• 2:46
  SPEAKER_01: Awesome.
• 2:47
  SPEAKER_00: Um it was some political uh reasons, but it's still the truth.
• 2:53
  SPEAKER_00: It's uh that that uh that song was a song that initially I didn't even want to sing, and then um Def Jams uh at the time Kevin Lyles um asked me, uh asked if he could play me the song.
• 3:09
  SPEAKER_00: And I didn't want to sing it initially because when I did my solo project, I was doing the best that I could to not do any music that sounded like something I would do with Drew Hill.
• 3:18
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 3:19
  SPEAKER_02: Um so you wanted to switch it up completely.
• 3:22
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, if you notice, like my show's like all up tempo, there's only one ballad.
• 3:26
  SPEAKER_00: And um, so then he he takes me in the car, and uh so I finally listened to the song, and when he said the line, got a bank account bigger than the law should allow, I was like, Yeah, I have to sing that song.
• 3:40
  SPEAKER_00: That's I like that.
• 3:42
  SPEAKER_02: You know, Cisco, okay.
• 3:43
  SPEAKER_02: First of all, do you mind if I call you Mark?
• 3:45
  SPEAKER_02: I love you.
• 3:45
  SPEAKER_02: Oh, don't do that.
• 3:46
  SPEAKER_02: I shouldn't do that.
• 3:47
  SPEAKER_02: Okay.
• 3:47
  SPEAKER_00: That's my mom.
• 3:48
  SPEAKER_00: My mom called me that.
• 3:49
  SPEAKER_02: Oh, interesting.
• 3:50
  SPEAKER_00: You can call me quaesi.
• 3:52
  SPEAKER_02: Quacy?
• 3:52
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, quasi.
• 3:53
  SPEAKER_00: Well, I'm I'm saying it wrong.
• 3:55
  SPEAKER_00: Am I saying it wrong?
• 3:55
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, Quacy.
• 3:56
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, it's actually right.
• 3:58
  SPEAKER_02: So it's it's true that you did check your roots and you are Pakanian.
• 4:02
  SPEAKER_00: Yes, yes.
• 4:03
  SPEAKER_00: So it's it's Quacy.
• 4:04
  SPEAKER_00: It's funny though, we uh in Baltimore we uh pronounce it quaisi, but I guess it's quasi.
• 4:09
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, quasi.
• 4:10
  SPEAKER_00: It sounds like it's quasi and me feel all right, and it's uh all night childhood experience.
• 4:19
  SPEAKER_02: So, one thing we I really like to do here is inspire people who are watching to also build for greatness.
• 4:25
  SPEAKER_02: And you know, coming up, I think your music and your craft has inspired generations of like musicians and people in the industry, and a bunch of people down their hair blind, yeah.
• 4:36
  SPEAKER_00: Exactly.
• 4:38
  SPEAKER_02: And you see, part of the reason is in your era, you had to be excellent to be a musician.
• 4:43
  SPEAKER_02: Because when I look at your craft, from your singing to your dancing to your choreography, everything was excellent.
• 4:48
  SPEAKER_02: So, what kind of like discipline were you able to instill to become that great?
• 4:54
  SPEAKER_00: Um, thank you for asking that question, man.
• 4:56
  SPEAKER_00: That's a good question.
• 4:57
  SPEAKER_00: Um, we were kind of cut from that cloth when we first got into the entertainment industry.
• 5:04
  SPEAKER_00: Our manager, um, our manager impeccable, uh, he got us um he got us uh uh media training.
• 5:14
  SPEAKER_00: Okay um because uh his family owns the first black um newspaper in America, which is the Afro newspaper.
• 5:23
  SPEAKER_00: And so um I I guess you know it was standard for his family to go through media training.
• 5:29
  SPEAKER_00: So we uh went through the same thing.
• 5:32
  SPEAKER_00: We came from an era of artist uh that had me uh uh artist development.
• 5:37
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 5:37
  SPEAKER_00: Um but nowadays, um, you know, since people basically can do what they do um, you know, um by themselves, like online, um, most people are self-taught, which is you know, which is uh good that people express themselves um that way because at the end of the day, what I believe resonates with people is uh the the realness.
• 6:01
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah and um I was saying the other day, I was saying the other day in the in the in um an interview um uh right here at the at the restaurant.
• 6:10
  SPEAKER_00: What's the name of the restaurant?
• 6:13
  SPEAKER_00: Right, what he said.
• 6:15
  SPEAKER_00: I was um I was basically um saying that uh you know the um when you express yourself and um and you and it's really real, I think that's what people resonate with.
• 6:27
  SPEAKER_00: The only thing that's not real about me um is my hair color.
• 6:32
  SPEAKER_02: Wait, but you mentioned somewhere that you actually dyed your hair after a heartbreak.
• 6:36
  SPEAKER_02: How true is that?
• 6:37
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, oh wow, you did your homework.
• 6:40
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, man.
• 6:41
  SPEAKER_00: Um I got my heart broken.
• 6:42
  SPEAKER_00: I was like a I was like a ninth grader and I was I was dating like a um tenth grader.
• 6:50
  SPEAKER_00: And that was unheard of because you know, um usually if uh if a woman is in a higher grade than you, she's not really talking.
• 6:58
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, she's not gonna mind you.
• 6:59
  SPEAKER_00: And um, yeah, man, she broke my heart, and um I didn't want to be Mark no more.
• 7:05
  SPEAKER_00: Uh but my but my mom calls me Mark, so that's but she gave you a brand then, you know.
• 7:10
  SPEAKER_02: Does she know this?
• 7:11
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, she knew the story.
• 7:12
  SPEAKER_00: Oh wow.
• 7:13
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, um, and then man, after that, I was I dyed my hair, and um Cisco was born after the drink.
• 7:21
  SPEAKER_00: It's an it's an American drink called Cisco.
• 7:24
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, okay.
• 7:25
  SPEAKER_00: Kids don't drink Cisco.
• 7:27
  SPEAKER_00: It's it's it's bad.
• 7:29
  SPEAKER_00: You're gonna have a bad time.
• 7:30
  SPEAKER_00: It's gonna start off good, but then because it's like it's a very like sweet drink, but um but it's strong.
• 7:38
  SPEAKER_00: It's very, very strong.
• 7:38
  SPEAKER_00: You you had it before?
• 7:40
  SPEAKER_00: No, no, yeah.
• 7:41
  SPEAKER_00: Well, um, hey man, I've been talking to Paul, right?
• 7:44
  SPEAKER_00: And I think uh he said we're gonna have a Cisco drink like right here exclusive.
• 7:50
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, nice club, yep.
• 7:52
  SPEAKER_02: Can't wait to try it.
• 7:53
  SPEAKER_02: Will it have like a blonde top?
• 7:55
  SPEAKER_02: Well, it's it's the color, it's the color of my hair.
• 7:58
  SPEAKER_00: Um, so um, and I've I've I've had the drinks and it was pretty good.
• 8:03
  SPEAKER_00: He said it was it was a palm fruit that he uh that um he bought like the license to or something.
• 8:09
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 8:10
  SPEAKER_00: And he mixed it with like some ginger and yeah, and I I I'm not gonna say all of the ingredients because I, you know, it's don't let it all out yet.
• 8:18
  SPEAKER_00: But uh, but I love ginger and the color of the drink was good and it tasted good.
• 8:22
  SPEAKER_00: So hopefully you guys will see it real soon.
• 8:24
  SPEAKER_02: Let me take you back to Baltimore.
• 8:25
  SPEAKER_02: You know, I want to understand the making of Cisco and the making of Drew Hill because you guys apparently found each other when you were in vocation school.
• 8:35
  SPEAKER_00: Nah, nah, we uh how did we?
• 8:41
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, I remember.
• 8:43
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 8:43
  SPEAKER_00: So so one of the members of the group went to a school up the street from from the school that I went to.
• 8:50
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 8:51
  SPEAKER_00: And I went up there and um we ended up um when I went up there, they already had a group, and it was like seven guys in the group.
• 8:59
  SPEAKER_00: Interesting.
• 9:00
  SPEAKER_00: And um, and then uh when I showed up, they like uh kicked out four of the guys, and and then I was the fourth guy of the of the other three.
• 9:12
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 9:12
  SPEAKER_00: And then um uh then it was a long journey after that.
• 9:16
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, we did the Apollo, we won the Apollo.
• 9:21
  SPEAKER_00: Um we got signed at the same time that Destiny Child got signed back when we were like 14 years old.
• 9:28
  SPEAKER_02: Interesting.
• 9:29
  SPEAKER_02: Um what was that like?
• 9:31
  SPEAKER_02: Because at that age, could you handle all the pressure of the fame and everything that was hitting you?
• 9:35
  SPEAKER_00: No, no, no.
• 9:36
  SPEAKER_00: No, we thought we we thought we were gonna come out, we did not come out.
• 9:39
  SPEAKER_02: Okay.
• 9:39
  SPEAKER_00: Us and Destiny Child got set on the shelf and the label put uh Brandy out instead of us.
• 9:46
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 9:46
  SPEAKER_00: So it took us like two years to get like out of the contract, and then uh by the time um we had another shot at getting a record deal, we went and we sang for Jimmy Ivine, and he played us that song from Tupac and Jodice.
• 10:01
  SPEAKER_00: How do you want it?
• 10:02
  SPEAKER_00: Mm-hmm.
• 10:03
  SPEAKER_00: How do you feel?
• 10:04
  SPEAKER_00: So he played that before any before it even came out, uh, and we sang it back to him, and he wanted us to sign with him.
• 10:12
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 10:12
  SPEAKER_00: So while they were doing that paperwork, um uh uh Impeccable, another friend of ours took us up to um another label, um, and they played the song Tell Me for us.
• 10:26
  SPEAKER_01: Okay, tell me.
• 10:27
  SPEAKER_00: Then they stopped playing the song and then we sang it back to them.
• 10:31
  SPEAKER_00: And um, they was like, hey man, you guys like this song?
• 10:34
  SPEAKER_00: We was like, Yeah.
• 10:35
  SPEAKER_00: They was like, Can you see yourself singing it?
• 10:37
  SPEAKER_00: He was like, Hell yeah.
• 10:38
  SPEAKER_00: It was like, okay, cool.
• 10:40
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but uh only if you sign with our label.
• 10:44
  SPEAKER_00: So they gave us, they took like a cocktail napkin and wrote our um your agreement on it right there.
• 10:51
  SPEAKER_00: And and we signed it right there, and uh, we sang the song that night, and um we uh drove home and we smelt like Teen Spirit.
• 11:02
  SPEAKER_00: And by the uh by the next week, tell me was on the radio.
• 11:06
  SPEAKER_00: We didn't even have a song for the group yet.
• 11:08
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, well, before it went, like right before it went to the radio, they was like, hey man, what's that what's that um park that everybody hangs out?
• 11:17
  SPEAKER_00: And we was like Drew Hill, and then they was like, That's your name.
• 11:20
  SPEAKER_00: I didn't think it was gonna work.
• 11:21
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, interesting.
• 11:22
  SPEAKER_01: So that's how the name came out.
• 11:24
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 11:24
  SPEAKER_00: So it was actually Drew It Hill Park, and um, but we called it Drew Hill, and that's how Drew Hill was born.
• 11:31
  SPEAKER_00: That was that was Nokia, by the way.
• 11:33
  SPEAKER_02: One thing I've admired about your career, because I'm big on reinvention, the way you've gone from Drew Hill to Cisco, your solo career, to so many projects that you did after that on the side, like outside of music, like even watching you on The Mask Singer and everything.
• 11:49
  SPEAKER_02: Oh, yeah, that was how how are you able to keep changing levels?
• 11:53
  SPEAKER_00: Oh man.
• 11:54
  SPEAKER_00: Um, well, one thing I learned when we first got in the entertainment industry is that um if you were fortunate enough to have hit records and you're fortunate enough to um uh to have a a a lot of hit records, then most of the time when people are when people are fans of yours, as long as you can do what it is that you did when they first fall in love, fell in love with you, as long as you can like keep that up, then um as you can see, just like when we performed here, man, uh people uh show up because you kind of have that reputation, uh reputation of having um a great show.
• 12:38
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 12:38
  SPEAKER_00: And as an artist, it's just your job to to you know keep all your skills as sharp as possible.
• 12:44
  SPEAKER_00: Um because we learn from the artists that came before us, like artists like Keep Sweat and the Osley Brothers.
• 12:50
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 12:51
  SPEAKER_00: Um they are still performing uh to this day.
• 12:55
  SPEAKER_00: And so we learn from them.
• 12:57
  SPEAKER_00: Um yeah.
• 12:59
  SPEAKER_02: Do this final thing for me, right?
• 13:01
  SPEAKER_02: So there's a young person out there watching you, a young creative, young artist coming up.
• 13:05
  SPEAKER_02: What advice?
• 13:06
  SPEAKER_02: What one thing can you say to give them the right mindset to become a legend of the future?
• 13:10
  SPEAKER_00: Yay! No, let me stop.
• 13:13
  SPEAKER_00: Um you gotta be able to do that on the spot though.
• 13:17
  SPEAKER_00: Um, because a lot of times um, you know, you see artists and you don't even know if they can really sing or not.
• 13:23
  SPEAKER_00: And Impeccable, our manager, he always said, That's the magic.
• 13:28
  SPEAKER_00: So every time I do an interview, whether it's by myself or even with Drew Hill, you always gotta show them um why you're here, why you're sitting in front of the camera.
• 13:39
  SPEAKER_00: Why should you care?
• 13:40
  SPEAKER_00: Um, always give uh if you want to be an artist and you want to uh be in the entertainment industry, always give the audience a reason to keep coming back to see you.
• 13:53
  SPEAKER_01: I like that.
• 13:53
  SPEAKER_01: Thank you so much, Cisco.
• 13:55
  SPEAKER_01: It's been my pleasure, man.