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INTERVIEW: John Legend On The Moments That Changed His Career & Why #1s Don't Matter · The Breakfast Club

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: Hold up. Every day I wake up. Wake your ass up.
• 0:04
  Speaker 1: The Breakfast Club. You all finished or you all done?
• 0:08
  Speaker 2: Morning, everybody.
• 0:09
  Speaker 3: It's DJ Envy, Just Hilarious, Charlamagne Tha Guy. We are
• 0:13
  Speaker 3: The Breakfast Club. Law and La Rose is here as well.
• 0:15
  Speaker 3: We got a special guest in the building.
• 0:17
  Speaker 1: Yes, indeed.
• 0:17
  Speaker 3: He's back, ladies and gentlemen, John Legend.
• 0:19
  Speaker 1: Welcome back.
• 0:20
  Speaker 4: Good to be back, John.
• 0:21
  Speaker 5: I feel like you got to introduce John as EGOT
• 0:23
  Speaker 5: winner every time.
• 0:25
  Speaker 1: I feel like if you don't, you're doing him a disservice.
• 0:27
  Speaker 1: How many EGOT winners do we know?
• 0:29
  Speaker 2: You're right, you're right. Let me do that right.
• 0:30
  Speaker 6: Yes, yes.
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  Speaker 7: Three, two, one.
• 0:31
  Speaker 6: All right.
• 0:31
  Speaker 1: Now, we have a special guest in the building. That's right.
• 0:34
  Speaker 2: He's also an EGOT winner.
• 0:35
  Speaker 1: Yes, he is. Ladies and gentlemen, John Legend. All right.
• 0:38
  Speaker 1: That was better.
• 0:38
  Speaker 2: That was better.
• 0:39
  Speaker 1: That was better. That was better.
• 0:40
  Speaker 8: Good morning, John.
• 0:40
  Speaker 1: Good morning. How's everybody? Not how you feel.
• 0:42
  Speaker 5: The reason I say that is because he's the first
• 0:45
  Speaker 5: black man to ever become an EGOT.
• 0:47
  Speaker 1: Yes. So that's black history. I'm still the only black
• 0:50
  Speaker 1: man to be an EGOT. There's several black women. I'm
• 0:53
  Speaker 1: the only black man. Congratulations. Congratulations.
• 0:55
  Speaker 5: Does being an EGOT winner, is it actually good for business?
• 0:58
  Speaker 5: Has it been good for the business.
• 0:59
  Speaker 1: Of John Legend?
• 1:00
  Speaker 4: I mean, it's good for my introductions. You know, I
• 1:05
  Speaker 4: think it just puts an aura of prestige.
• 1:09
  Speaker 1: I'm sure the private gig price was able to go up. See,
• 1:12
  Speaker 1: that's what I wanted to know. Did they change your fee? Yes, yes, yeah.
• 1:16
  Speaker 1: I feel like it just adds, you know, it adds...
• 1:18
  Speaker 1: It adds... To the price. Yesterday's price is not today's price.
• 1:30
  Speaker 3: New album Muse October 23rd. Now is the whole album
• 1:34
  Speaker 3: produced by Pharrell?
• 1:35
  Speaker 4: The entire album. It was his idea. He called me
• 1:39
  Speaker 4: up out of the blue. He lives in Paris. I
• 1:42
  Speaker 4: live in Los Angeles.
• 1:43
  Speaker 1: So he is not always cognizant of the time difference.
• 1:48
  Speaker 4: Between He calls you three in the morning. He calls
• 1:50
  Speaker 4: like four in the morning. And so I call him
• 1:53
  Speaker 4: back when I wake up. And he's like, what are
• 1:56
  Speaker 4: you working on? I hadn't spoken to him in a while.
• 1:58
  Speaker 4: I had just done the hook for the clip song,
• 2:02
  Speaker 4: Birds Don't Sing.
• 2:04
  Speaker 6: By the way, you killed that.
• 2:05
  Speaker 1: Thank you. He produced that and he wrote the hook.
• 2:08
  Speaker 4: And so I think he loved hearing my voice singing
• 2:11
  Speaker 4: what he had written for that track. And he was like, man,
• 2:16
  Speaker 4: we should just do a whole album together. And so
• 2:19
  Speaker 4: he was like, when are you coming to Paris next?
• 2:21
  Speaker 4: And I was planning to possibly come that next month
• 2:23
  Speaker 4: for an event. And so I was like, I'll do
• 2:27
  Speaker 4: the event and I'll come and we'll do a few
• 2:30
  Speaker 4: days in the studio and see what happens. And we
• 2:32
  Speaker 4: started working on the album and I loved what we
• 2:35
  Speaker 4: were making. And I was like, let's make the whole album.
• 2:37
  Speaker 4: And it really came out beautifully. He had a vision
• 2:42
  Speaker 4: for it from the beginning. He talked about making it cinematic,
• 2:47
  Speaker 4: black James Bond.
• 2:49
  Speaker 1: But with 808 drums, we have orchestras, we have credible
• 2:55
  Speaker 1: horn arrangements, but also hip hop beats. And we made
• 3:01
  Speaker 1: something really beautiful. I'm really proud of it.
• 3:02
  Speaker 2: How long did it take?
• 3:04
  Speaker 1: Off and on, you know, a little over a year.
• 3:07
  Speaker 4: And then this year we've been, you know, shooting the videos,
• 3:11
  Speaker 4: doing the photos and all that. And the great thing
• 3:14
  Speaker 4: about working with Pharrell is you're not only getting his
• 3:16
  Speaker 4: music input, but You're getting the visual input. And, you know,
• 3:20
  Speaker 4: he's the creative director of Louis Vuitton. He has such
• 3:22
  Speaker 4: a great creative team around him. They've been helping me
• 3:25
  Speaker 4: with every visual that we've been doing. And it's all
• 3:29
  Speaker 4: coming out just so beautifully.
• 3:30
  Speaker 3: Did y'all record it in the Louis Vuitton store? Because
• 3:33
  Speaker 3: I've seen the clips recorded, parts of theirs in the
• 3:35
  Speaker 3: Louis Vuitton store.
• 3:36
  Speaker 1: In the headquarters. In the headquarters, yes. Yeah, so you
• 3:39
  Speaker 1: go to Paris, you know.
• 3:41
  Speaker 4: They have this iconic building that's their headquarters. And in
• 3:45
  Speaker 4: the corner office is a studio.
• 3:47
  Speaker 1: Just for Pharrell? Yeah, they built it for Pharrell.
• 3:52
  Speaker 4: And so you walk in, and they're designing the outfits
• 3:56
  Speaker 4: for the Met Gala, and they're.
• 3:58
  Speaker 1: Designing the next collection.
• 4:00
  Speaker 4: And then in the corner is a music studio with
• 4:04
  Speaker 4: a piano, and we made the record there. Sometimes I
• 4:07
  Speaker 4: would do remote sessions with them. I have my studio
• 4:11
  Speaker 4: in L.A., and we would Zoom. But a lot of
• 4:15
  Speaker 4: the sessions happened in Paris.
• 4:17
  Speaker 1: At that office.
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  Speaker 5: At this point in your career, what could Pharrell hearing
• 4:20
  Speaker 5: you that maybe you couldn't hear in yourself anymore?
• 4:23
  Speaker 4: Um, I think it's great to work with different producers
• 4:26
  Speaker 4: because like you said, uh, they hear different things in you.
• 4:31
  Speaker 4: They bring different things out of you. And, um, it's,
• 4:35
  Speaker 4: it's good. I think, especially at this point in my
• 4:39
  Speaker 4: career to shake things up, to challenge myself and, um,
• 4:44
  Speaker 4: And try a new approach.
• 4:45
  Speaker 1: And that's what this album was.
• 4:49
  Speaker 6: Is it your goal to top the last album all
• 4:51
  Speaker 6: the time? Or do you just go in clean slate?
• 4:53
  Speaker 1: Every time.
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  Speaker 4: I believe that my next album should always be my
• 4:56
  Speaker 4: best album. And that's the mentality that I need to
• 4:59
  Speaker 4: go into every album with. And that means not reveling
• 5:05
  Speaker 4: in the egot of it all. I have 13 Grammys.
• 5:09
  Speaker 1: No.
• 5:09
  Speaker 6: No.
• 5:10
  Speaker 4: Like, I have to prove myself to my audience every
• 5:12
  Speaker 4: time because they can always listen to my old records.
• 5:16
  Speaker 6: Which I do.
• 5:17
  Speaker 4: They can always listen to someone else. So I have
• 5:20
  Speaker 4: to make a case for why this album is worth
• 5:22
  Speaker 4: their attention.
• 5:24
  Speaker 1: And so I'm trying to make that case.
• 5:27
  Speaker 5: Is it harder to make great music because you have
• 5:29
  Speaker 5: less to prove or easier because you're free from proving anything?
• 5:33
  Speaker 1: You know, I was fortunate, I think, at the very
• 5:36
  Speaker 1: beginning of my career that.
• 5:40
  Speaker 4: I came into it with Kanye and he had already
• 5:43
  Speaker 4: succeeded with College Dropout. I got signed right after the
• 5:47
  Speaker 4: success of that album. And so I think and coming
• 5:51
  Speaker 4: into it with the production company, with the team, I
• 5:54
  Speaker 4: think the label just trusted us automatically and they didn't
• 5:59
  Speaker 4: try to micromanage and they just let us make the
• 6:02
  Speaker 4: record we.
• 6:02
  Speaker 1: Wanted to make. And that worked.
• 6:05
  Speaker 4: And so I think it set a trend with the
• 6:08
  Speaker 4: label that they could trust that we were going to
• 6:10
  Speaker 4: figure things out and we didn't need a lot of over-ANRing,
• 6:15
  Speaker 4: over-handling by the label to let us do our thing.
• 6:19
  Speaker 4: And we set that precedent at the beginning, and it's
• 6:23
  Speaker 4: just been the way my career's been throughout that we've
• 6:26
  Speaker 4: had enough success that they let me do my thing
• 6:29
  Speaker 4: and trust that I'm going to make the right decisions
• 6:32
  Speaker 4: for my career.
• 6:33
  Speaker 7: And you usually talk about like the ancestors and all
• 6:35
  Speaker 7: these different things that inspired the work. What is inspiring
• 6:39
  Speaker 7: you particularly in this moment from that ancestral background?
• 6:43
  Speaker 4: Well, I think the artists that I love, some of
• 6:47
  Speaker 4: them are ancestors now, like Nina Simone and Marvin Gaye
• 6:51
  Speaker 4: and Nat King Cole. And we talked about them while
• 6:54
  Speaker 4: we were making the album.
• 6:55
  Speaker 1: And when you.
• 6:56
  Speaker 4: Listen to the album, you hear their influence in the album.
• 7:01
  Speaker 4: And the last song we released, the newest video, is
• 7:06
  Speaker 4: called Fireflies.
• 7:07
  Speaker 1: And we talk about our ancestors.
• 7:09
  Speaker 4: Literally the first line in the song is, Ancestors' blood,
• 7:12
  Speaker 4: there's iron in the clay. We trauma bond, survivors pain.
• 7:16
  Speaker 4: We felt our way through the dark where I was raised.
• 7:19
  Speaker 4: The right moves made you smart where I was raised.
• 7:22
  Speaker 4: And in the bridge, it says, I'm a candle in
• 7:27
  Speaker 4: the dark. And I come from a divine spark. And
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  Speaker 4: I'm my ancestors' thoughts and their wildest dreams. And I
• 7:35
  Speaker 4: finish anything that I start and I hockey stick every chart.
• 7:39
  Speaker 1: And I know it's hard for them to handle that part,
• 7:42
  Speaker 1: but look at me. I'm about to get away.
• 7:44
  Speaker 4: It's about aspiration. It's about having the vision to exceed
• 7:58
  Speaker 4: where your ancestors have gone, but but to also be
• 8:01
  Speaker 4: grounded in what they did and to carry that legacy forward.
• 8:05
  Speaker 7: Have there been points in your career where you've had
• 8:06
  Speaker 7: to stop and be like, I need to ground myself
• 8:08
  Speaker 7: right now?
• 8:10
  Speaker 1: Um, not really.
• 8:11
  Speaker 4: I feel like I've been pretty grounded and I think
• 8:14
  Speaker 4: I never forgot where I came from.
• 8:17
  Speaker 1: And, um, I've been pretty focused on the art of
• 8:21
  Speaker 1: it all.
• 8:21
  Speaker 4: Like, um, the reason why I'm here is because I'm
• 8:24
  Speaker 4: an artist, because I'm a singer, because I'm a songwriter,
• 8:28
  Speaker 4: I'm a musician. And, as long as I stay focused
• 8:31
  Speaker 4: on that, uh, I think, um, you know, that would
• 8:36
  Speaker 4: keep me grounded, be grounded in the work, be grounded in, um, um,
• 8:42
  Speaker 4: being an artist.
• 8:43
  Speaker 6: Yeah.
• 8:44
  Speaker 5: Do you, do you still know when you've made a
• 8:46
  Speaker 5: hit or has like this new digital world, this screaming
• 8:49
  Speaker 5: world completely changed.
• 8:50
  Speaker 1: What a hit even feels like?
• 8:51
  Speaker 4: It's hard to know. It's hard to know, you know,
• 8:54
  Speaker 4: when it feels great to you. Um, but, There's so
• 8:58
  Speaker 4: many other factors that go into making things hits.
• 9:00
  Speaker 1: Some of it's luck. Some of it's, you know. Timing. Timing, marketing.
• 9:05
  Speaker 4: You know, there's all kinds of other factors that are involved.
• 9:09
  Speaker 4: All you can control is what you do. And we
• 9:12
  Speaker 4: want to make the most beautiful song, the most beautiful video,
• 9:16
  Speaker 4: and give.
• 9:17
  Speaker 1: The record the best chance to succeed.
• 9:20
  Speaker 4: But there's going to be all these other factors that
• 9:22
  Speaker 4: go into whether it's a hit or not. And there's
• 9:25
  Speaker 4: so much out there. There's so much music out there. Um, um,
• 9:30
  Speaker 4: that's the blessing and the curse of this era is
• 9:33
  Speaker 4: that anybody can put out a record. Um, you don't
• 9:36
  Speaker 4: need the label. You don't need the gatekeepers. Um, You
• 9:41
  Speaker 4: can market and promote yourself. You can be independent. All
• 9:43
  Speaker 4: these things. But that just means there's more. There's more
• 9:46
  Speaker 4: of everything. And that means it's harder to break through
• 9:51
  Speaker 4: the noise.
• 9:51
  Speaker 2: It's harder to connect, right?
• 9:53
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 9:53
  Speaker 4: Because people have so much competing for the ear. And
• 9:56
  Speaker 4: you guys are competing for the ear. A podcast is
• 9:59
  Speaker 4: competing for the ear. Them just scrolling down their Instagram
• 10:03
  Speaker 4: feed is competing for their ear. So we're not even
• 10:08
  Speaker 4: just competing with other music. We're competing with every other
• 10:12
  Speaker 4: thing that someone could decide to listen to.
• 10:15
  Speaker 3: Like ordinary people, right? First of all, do you get
• 10:18
  Speaker 3: tired of ever doing that record?
• 10:21
  Speaker 1: I don't get tired of my records. I'm glad to
• 10:23
  Speaker 1: have hits. I'm grateful to have hits.
• 10:27
  Speaker 4: And I love when I sing a song and everybody
• 10:30
  Speaker 4: knows the words.
• 10:31
  Speaker 1: They know the ad-libs.
• 10:32
  Speaker 4: Yeah, yeah. And that makes the experience for me better.
• 10:37
  Speaker 4: So I'm grateful for my hits. I'll never get tired
• 10:40
  Speaker 4: of singing them.
• 10:41
  Speaker 2: I look at those records differently, right? And I'll tell
• 10:43
  Speaker 2: you why. So I'm a dance dad, right?
• 10:44
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 10:45
  Speaker 2: So when you're at those dance conventions, right? I hear
• 10:48
  Speaker 2: Ordinary People.
• 10:49
  Speaker 1: At least 15 times. Oh, wow.
• 10:51
  Speaker 3: Because girls from different areas dance to it. And it
• 10:54
  Speaker 3: makes you like the record more.
• 10:55
  Speaker 7: Oh, wow.
• 10:56
  Speaker 1: You look at it differently.
• 10:57
  Speaker 4: I didn't know that about it. I didn't know that
• 10:58
  Speaker 4: people were using it for a lot of the dance competitions.
• 11:00
  Speaker 1: Abso-freaking-lutely. And they do their ballet to it. And they
• 11:03
  Speaker 1: do their spins.
• 11:04
  Speaker 2: And it makes you look at the record differently. And
• 11:07
  Speaker 2: the ad-libs. And when the girls.
• 11:08
  Speaker 1: It makes.
• 11:09
  Speaker 2: Me look at it differently.
• 11:10
  Speaker 4: Well, that makes me happy to know that that's happening.
• 11:13
  Speaker 4: And then I started working in musical theater lately. And
• 11:17
  Speaker 4: the director and people that do auditions a lot, they're like, man, John,
• 11:21
  Speaker 4: if you only knew how many times we heard Ordinary
• 11:24
  Speaker 4: People as an audition song for these actors that are.
• 11:27
  Speaker 1: Coming in to audition for musical theater.
• 11:30
  Speaker 4: And it makes me happy to know because these are
• 11:33
  Speaker 4: all artists, you know, they're dancers, they're singers, they're performers.
• 11:37
  Speaker 4: And the fact that this song connected with them as artists,
• 11:41
  Speaker 4: that gives me, you know, it makes me grateful.
• 11:46
  Speaker 1: It makes me grateful.
• 11:47
  Speaker 6: John, I've been listening to you. I've been listening to
• 11:49
  Speaker 6: you through many different eras, right? Get Lifted, still one
• 11:52
  Speaker 6: of my favorite.
• 11:52
  Speaker 1: Thank you. Thank you.
• 11:54
  Speaker 6: Now, you said there's no songs that you don't like
• 11:56
  Speaker 6: to perform.
• 11:56
  Speaker 1: You love all your music.
• 11:57
  Speaker 4: Yeah.
• 11:58
  Speaker 6: You had a lot of beef in my house, though.
• 11:59
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 12:00
  Speaker 6: It was this one song.
• 12:01
  Speaker 1: I had some cheating songs on Get Lifted. Exactly.
• 12:03
  Speaker 6: Because my father used to walk around and tell my mother,
• 12:07
  Speaker 6: you can't say I don't love you just.
• 12:10
  Speaker 1: Because I cheat on you.
• 12:12
  Speaker 6: And for a while, my mother loved you, but she
• 12:14
  Speaker 6: hated the album. That would ring throughout the house. And
• 12:18
  Speaker 6: are those songs, do you still like to perform those songs?
• 12:22
  Speaker 1: I love it.
• 12:22
  Speaker 4: And we did the 20th anniversary of Get Lifted a
• 12:25
  Speaker 4: couple years ago.
• 12:27
  Speaker 1: And I love performing the songs.
• 12:29
  Speaker 4: And You know, I would say in the show, you know,
• 12:32
  Speaker 4: some of y'all hated that I wrote these cheating songs
• 12:36
  Speaker 4: on Get Lifted, but some of y'all loved it.
• 12:38
  Speaker 1: We did, and I didn't even know what I was
• 12:40
  Speaker 1: dancing to. Some of y'all loved it. Those are honest emotions, though. Yeah,
• 12:44
  Speaker 1: and apparently your dad.
• 12:45
  Speaker 4: Those were his honest emotions. My parents were going through
• 12:57
  Speaker 4: their second divorce. So they had divorced each other before
• 13:00
  Speaker 4: when I was a kid and they got back together
• 13:03
  Speaker 4: right after I graduated from college. And then right when
• 13:07
  Speaker 4: I was making get lifted, they were getting divorced for
• 13:10
  Speaker 4: the second time. And so when I was writing like
• 13:12
  Speaker 4: ordinary people and, And these songs about the ups and
• 13:15
  Speaker 4: downs of relationships, we were going through it in our
• 13:18
  Speaker 4: family right at that time.
• 13:20
  Speaker 1: Writing about real life. I love it.
• 13:24
  Speaker 6: I love it.
• 13:24
  Speaker 5: If 25-year-old John Legend entered the music business now, would
• 13:27
  Speaker 5: he become John Legend? Because you know the music business
• 13:29
  Speaker 5: is completely different.
• 13:29
  Speaker 1: You came at a time when albums mattered.
• 13:31
  Speaker 5: Radio could still break R & B.
• 13:34
  Speaker 1: It's hard to know. I truly don't know.
• 13:35
  Speaker 4: Just like I was saying before, it's harder to break
• 13:37
  Speaker 4: through the noise. There's so many things competing for people's ears.
• 13:43
  Speaker 4: the way things are marketed now is just different.
• 13:46
  Speaker 1: I do not know.
• 13:47
  Speaker 4: I'm just grateful that I've already established myself now so
• 13:51
  Speaker 4: that I'm coming from a foundation that I've already created,
• 13:55
  Speaker 4: a relationship that I've already created with my audience. And
• 13:57
  Speaker 4: so it gives me a leg up, but I have
• 14:00
  Speaker 4: no idea. You hope that the music will win regardless.
• 14:04
  Speaker 4: You hope that great songs will win and talented artists
• 14:08
  Speaker 4: will sustain regardless, but It's a different era.
• 14:11
  Speaker 1: He's got a great voice. He can play the piano,
• 14:13
  Speaker 1: but can he go viral? Yeah, exactly. You just don't know.
• 14:16
  Speaker 4: But you see artists that are winning that are true,
• 14:20
  Speaker 4: that are real artists that are going to be around.
• 14:23
  Speaker 1: For a long time. Like, you know... Masego.
• 14:25
  Speaker 4: Yeah, Olivia Deen, Ray. You're seeing artists that are great songwriters,
• 14:33
  Speaker 4: like SZA.
• 14:35
  Speaker 1: People that really....
• 14:39
  Speaker 4: Have a point of view and something to say and
• 14:41
  Speaker 4: they're unique and they're interesting and they're winning.
• 14:45
  Speaker 1: So I feel like it's still possible.
• 14:47
  Speaker 8: Yeah.
• 14:48
  Speaker 5: Yeah.
• 14:48
  Speaker 6: Now, Black James Bond aesthetic. That's how you describe the album.
• 14:52
  Speaker 5: Yeah.
• 14:52
  Speaker 6: Was that intentional?
• 14:53
  Speaker 4: Yeah, that was like when Pharrell called me that first day,
• 14:56
  Speaker 4: he really like laid out a vision and we really executed.
• 15:00
  Speaker 1: On that vision. And that was part of his vision.
• 15:02
  Speaker 1: Why Black James Bond? What the hell you be doing
• 15:04
  Speaker 1: that we don't know about? Yeah.
• 15:07
  Speaker 4: I think it was just like the aura of that,
• 15:10
  Speaker 4: making it cinematic, making it intriguing, making it feel urgent
• 15:17
  Speaker 4: and all of that. I think all of that was
• 15:20
  Speaker 4: part of the aesthetic of making the album.
• 15:22
  Speaker 5: Did you feel like something was missing from your music originally?
• 15:25
  Speaker 4: I always think that there's more room to grow. And
• 15:29
  Speaker 4: like I said before, the next album should be better
• 15:30
  Speaker 4: than anything I've done before. That's the mentality I have
• 15:33
  Speaker 4: to have every time. And that's, you know, I'm like,
• 15:37
  Speaker 4: let's make the best album I've ever made.
• 15:39
  Speaker 8: And you let Pharrell write full songs on this.
• 15:41
  Speaker 4: Yeah, some of the songs were fully written by Pharrell.
• 15:46
  Speaker 4: A lot of them were co-writes between us. And we
• 15:49
  Speaker 4: had a couple other co-writers throughout the album. But yeah,
• 15:53
  Speaker 4: it was cool to like, Allow myself to be produced
• 15:57
  Speaker 4: by someone else. You know what I'm saying? Because I
• 16:00
  Speaker 4: felt like it would create something new and take me
• 16:08
  Speaker 4: out of my comfort zone.
• 16:09
  Speaker 5: I saw you say that it required a level of
• 16:11
  Speaker 5: trust between you and Pharrell. Is it like playing that
• 16:14
  Speaker 5: game where you fall back and somebody catches you?
• 16:17
  Speaker 4: Well, fortunately, he has such a track record. You can
• 16:21
  Speaker 4: trust Pharrell. He's made great records for a long period
• 16:26
  Speaker 4: of time. He has great taste. And then he literally
• 16:30
  Speaker 4: said at the end of our time making the album,
• 16:33
  Speaker 4: thank you for trusting me. And it does require trust
• 16:38
  Speaker 4: to go in on a full album with a producer
• 16:42
  Speaker 4: because in our business, a lot of times we're just
• 16:45
  Speaker 4: taking tracks, you know, get a track from this producer,
• 16:47
  Speaker 4: get a track from that producer, and then.
• 16:49
  Speaker 1: You put the album together.
• 16:50
  Speaker 4: Um, but to go fully in on one vision with
• 16:54
  Speaker 4: one producer does require trust. And, um, I trusted him and, um,
• 17:00
  Speaker 4: I'm glad I did because I think the result is
• 17:02
  Speaker 4: better for it.
• 17:03
  Speaker 3: You ever get nervous, you know, cause I, I see
• 17:05
  Speaker 3: what vets in the industry, um, A lot of times
• 17:06
  Speaker 3: they don't want to put out new projects.
• 17:08
  Speaker 2: Because it's a scale, right? You got streaming.
• 17:11
  Speaker 3: Before you do 150, 200, 300,000 records is easy. Well,
• 17:13
  Speaker 3: I don't say it's easy, but you would see that
• 17:16
  Speaker 3: more often. Now you see a lot of the vets
• 17:17
  Speaker 3: putting up 15,000, 20,000. Everything is monitored.
• 17:21
  Speaker 1: It's different. Did that bother you or.
• 17:24
  Speaker 2: Make you nervous at all?
• 17:25
  Speaker 4: No, I don't get nervous about numbers. My career, like
• 17:29
  Speaker 4: I never had huge first weeks anyway. It was always
• 17:32
  Speaker 4: like a slower burn.
• 17:33
  Speaker 1: Yeah. I never had a number one album. Really?
• 17:39
  Speaker 4: Even my top albums, I had one number one song,
• 17:42
  Speaker 4: All of Me. I've never had a number one album
• 17:44
  Speaker 4: on the U.S.
• 17:45
  Speaker 1: Chart.
• 17:46
  Speaker 6: Love in the Future wasn't number one.
• 17:48
  Speaker 1: No, no, never.
• 17:51
  Speaker 4: And so I guess it never set a standard of like, oh,
• 17:54
  Speaker 4: I have to be number one this week or it's
• 17:58
  Speaker 4: a failure. My albums always took their time to build
• 18:01
  Speaker 4: with people, grew with people, word of mouth. People would
• 18:05
  Speaker 4: listen to the whole album, not just the song. And
• 18:07
  Speaker 4: so I've always had that kind of career. And so
• 18:12
  Speaker 4: the pressure of I got to be number one this
• 18:15
  Speaker 4: week never got to me because I never was.
• 18:17
  Speaker 1: I literally never was.
• 18:18
  Speaker 8: But the music is so good.
• 18:20
  Speaker 1: Thank you.
• 18:21
  Speaker 6: And it's so funny that you say that. I was
• 18:23
  Speaker 6: in a barbershop. I was taking my son to get
• 18:25
  Speaker 6: a haircut one day. And they had Love in the
• 18:27
  Speaker 6: Future playing in the barbershop. And so, like you said,
• 18:30
  Speaker 6: that word of mouth and just hearing other people listen
• 18:32
  Speaker 6: to it. that's how it built up. And even the
• 18:35
  Speaker 6: Sounds of Seasons, the Christmas album, I heard that at
• 18:39
  Speaker 6: my grandfather's. I was being played and that's just how
• 18:41
  Speaker 6: it is. Like people just hear other people listening to it.
• 18:44
  Speaker 1: Yeah. And I want the albums to endure. I want
• 18:46
  Speaker 1: them to be part of people's lives.
• 18:48
  Speaker 4: And, and what all of you guys are telling me
• 18:51
  Speaker 4: is that it's been a part of your life in
• 18:53
  Speaker 4: these different ways. And that's what we want to make
• 18:56
  Speaker 4: is music that lives with people. And that is part
• 19:00
  Speaker 4: of their memories and, and part of their stories, and
• 19:03
  Speaker 4: part of their relationships. And, you know, and I haven't
• 19:07
  Speaker 4: had a number one. Hey, I'm always open to the possibility,
• 19:11
  Speaker 4: and maybe this next one will be.
• 19:12
  Speaker 1: I would have lost that bet. But I know I
• 19:18
  Speaker 1: made an impact, so I'm grateful for that.
• 19:20
  Speaker 8: Ordinary People, it only peaked at number 24.
• 19:22
  Speaker 4: Yeah.
• 19:22
  Speaker 1: That is crazy.
• 19:24
  Speaker 8: Yes, that song is like.
• 19:25
  Speaker 2: I feel like I hear that.
• 19:26
  Speaker 1: I used to hear that all the time. Yeah.
• 19:28
  Speaker 4: Yeah.
• 19:29
  Speaker 1: And.
• 19:30
  Speaker 4: Like I said, like I've never been defined by chart success.
• 19:35
  Speaker 4: And so I just focus on making great music that
• 19:39
  Speaker 4: is enduring and that's part of people's lives forever.
• 19:41
  Speaker 7: Is that the artist in you or is that the humility,
• 19:43
  Speaker 7: like the cloth that you're cut from in you? Because
• 19:46
  Speaker 7: you take a lot of time with your music. You
• 19:48
  Speaker 7: play instruments, you do all these things.
• 19:49
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 19:50
  Speaker 8: Like, I don't even care about the number one.
• 19:52
  Speaker 4: Well, I think part of it's just the nature of
• 19:54
  Speaker 4: the kind of music I make. Like it wasn't like,
• 19:57
  Speaker 4: it was never like the poppiest music. It was never
• 19:59
  Speaker 4: this or that. It was never chasing any particular trend.
• 20:02
  Speaker 4: And I was always unique and I was cool with that,
• 20:06
  Speaker 4: you know? And I knew that I was being building
• 20:09
  Speaker 4: my career for the long term.
• 20:11
  Speaker 1: I wasn't trying to be a flash in the pan.
• 20:13
  Speaker 4: I was trying to be an artist that would be
• 20:14
  Speaker 4: able to tour forever, make records forever, and be timeless.
• 20:20
  Speaker 1: And that means you may.
• 20:21
  Speaker 4: Not always be the most poppin', most popular thing, but
• 20:26
  Speaker 4: you're in it for the long haul.
• 20:27
  Speaker 8: You were turned down by a lot of labels in
• 20:29
  Speaker 8: the beginning, too.
• 20:29
  Speaker 1: Oh, yeah. But I think everybody is.
• 20:32
  Speaker 7: But I feel like when hearing you in your earlier songs,
• 20:35
  Speaker 7: it's like, I'm not a label executive, but I can
• 20:37
  Speaker 7: hear the artist in you.
• 20:40
  Speaker 1: Yeah. It's easy to say now.
• 20:41
  Speaker 4: I have vivid memories of being turned down by people
• 20:45
  Speaker 4: that I still run into in the industry.
• 20:49
  Speaker 1: We messed up that time.
• 20:50
  Speaker 6: Right.
• 20:51
  Speaker 2: They said to you, they just, my bad, y'all.
• 20:53
  Speaker 1: Yeah. Can you clear this record for me? Right, right.
• 20:57
  Speaker 1: I'm not a person that holds grudges, so I'm like,
• 20:59
  Speaker 1: you know, it's cool.
• 21:01
  Speaker 2: Okay.
• 21:02
  Speaker 1: And God puts you in where you need to be
• 21:04
  Speaker 1: at the right time.
• 21:05
  Speaker 4: And I feel like you just can't let these no's
• 21:11
  Speaker 4: make you feel.
• 21:12
  Speaker 1: First of all, you can't get bitter because of it.
• 21:15
  Speaker 4: And secondly, like the no was meant to be in
• 21:19
  Speaker 4: that moment for you to have the right yes at
• 21:22
  Speaker 4: the right time.
• 21:23
  Speaker 1: And so I felt like everything worked out the way
• 21:25
  Speaker 1: it was supposed to work out. I believe in divine misdirection.
• 21:28
  Speaker 5: Even when you get told no it just leads you
• 21:30
  Speaker 5: over here it's probably where you need to be in that.
• 21:33
  Speaker 4: Moment exactly and you and I was like man I
• 21:36
  Speaker 4: don't know what they're talking about they're wrong they're incorrect
• 21:40
  Speaker 4: they're making a mistake like that's what I'm thinking but
• 21:44
  Speaker 4: I'm also thinking well what can I learn from this
• 21:48
  Speaker 4: and what do I need to do to make a
• 21:50
  Speaker 4: better case for myself and things just we just kept
• 21:55
  Speaker 4: making more records we were like let's keep working on
• 21:58
  Speaker 4: the formula, getting it exactly right. Um, secondly, um, Kanye success,
• 22:04
  Speaker 4: like it just opened more doors because everybody was like, well,
• 22:07
  Speaker 4: what's next from their camp? And then, like I said,
• 22:10
  Speaker 4: it made it easier for me to make my album. Um,
• 22:12
  Speaker 4: because if I would have gotten signed before that, um,
• 22:15
  Speaker 4: I may not have had as much control or as
• 22:18
  Speaker 4: much trust from the label. And so when I finally
• 22:21
  Speaker 4: was signed, um, they were ready.
• 22:24
  Speaker 1: They were excited. They were motivated. I got signed in May.
• 22:27
  Speaker 4: My album came out in December, like, which is unheard of, um,
• 22:31
  Speaker 4: for it to be that quick. Um, because we had
• 22:35
  Speaker 4: already prepared ourselves and the label was, was, was sold.
• 22:40
  Speaker 4: You know, I didn't have to like, cause a lot
• 22:43
  Speaker 4: of times artists will get signed, sit on the shelf
• 22:45
  Speaker 4: for a while. Um, label executives will change and.
• 22:52
  Speaker 1: They're not as passionate about it and.
• 22:56
  Speaker 4: So many things can get derailed even after you get
• 22:58
  Speaker 4: signed so getting signed is.
• 23:02
  Speaker 1: Not the end all be all of the situation.
• 23:04
  Speaker 4: Like you need to be able to put your music
• 23:07
  Speaker 4: out to the world and so I think when I
• 23:10
  Speaker 4: got signed was the perfect time because they were ready
• 23:14
  Speaker 4: and we were ready and they were excited and they
• 23:16
  Speaker 4: trusted us in a way that we weren't getting that
• 23:19
  Speaker 4: trust before.
• 23:20
  Speaker 5: I want to ask you about politics, right? You know,
• 23:23
  Speaker 5: midterms are coming up. And there was a period where
• 23:25
  Speaker 5: it felt like John Legend was one of the loudest artists.
• 23:28
  Speaker 2: Having fundraisers at the house.
• 23:30
  Speaker 1: And we still are. That's the thing. Don't feel as
• 23:33
  Speaker 1: loud anymore, though. I think, honestly, the biggest difference is
• 23:36
  Speaker 1: I'm not on Twitter.
• 23:40
  Speaker 4: And I feel like IG is not really the same
• 23:43
  Speaker 4: kind of medium for that kind of conversation. And when
• 23:47
  Speaker 4: I was on Twitter, I was always saying something, and
• 23:50
  Speaker 4: Chrissy was always saying something. And we just were in
• 23:54
  Speaker 4: conversation with the public more.
• 23:58
  Speaker 1: And we still haven't changed our politics.
• 24:01
  Speaker 4: We still do fundraisers at our house. I'm still going
• 24:04
  Speaker 4: to go out and campaign for candidates in my home
• 24:08
  Speaker 4: state of Ohio. I'm going to go down to Georgia
• 24:12
  Speaker 4: and campaign. And I'm still as passionate about it. But
• 24:20
  Speaker 4: I think it just feels less loud because there's no
• 24:22
  Speaker 4: Twitter for me. And that's where I was getting a
• 24:25
  Speaker 4: lot of my thoughts out.
• 24:26
  Speaker 3: What was the decision to get off Twitter? Was it
• 24:28
  Speaker 3: Elon Musk's purchase? Or was it just a negativity?
• 24:30
  Speaker 1: It was Elon Musk and the Nazi of it all.
• 24:34
  Speaker 4: It was too much. I was like, I don't need
• 24:36
  Speaker 4: this in my life. The energy is really... It got
• 24:40
  Speaker 4: really dark.
• 24:41
  Speaker 1: It got off in 2018. Yeah.
• 24:42
  Speaker 4: I got off right around the same time. I don't
• 24:44
  Speaker 4: remember when he bought it, but I got off Twitter.
• 24:48
  Speaker 4: The energy was too dark, too much Nazi nonsense.
• 24:51
  Speaker 1: And I think my life is better for it.
• 24:56
  Speaker 5: Has the cost of being outspoken changed because you have
• 24:59
  Speaker 5: a president that will target you?
• 25:03
  Speaker 4: I mean, he already knows we hate him. We've been
• 25:07
  Speaker 4: his enemies since, you know, since the first term. And so,
• 25:11
  Speaker 4: you know, I don't feel like there's anything to be
• 25:14
  Speaker 4: gained by us, you know, laying off of him. And
• 25:18
  Speaker 4: when I do talk about politics on Instagram, like, I
• 25:21
  Speaker 4: call him out. I talk shit about him. My wife does. Like,
• 25:26
  Speaker 4: we know who he is. We've seen who he was
• 25:30
  Speaker 4: from the beginning. We saw it, you know, living in
• 25:32
  Speaker 4: New York and knowing he was on some bullshit then.
• 25:36
  Speaker 4: And so, you know, none of that has changed. But
• 25:41
  Speaker 4: I just think where we say it has changed. And
• 25:47
  Speaker 4: I think not being on Twitter just makes it seem
• 25:50
  Speaker 4: like we're less involved in the conversation when in our
• 25:53
  Speaker 4: minds we're not.
• 25:54
  Speaker 5: And it feels like, even though I know your heart
• 25:56
  Speaker 5: is in the right place, celebrity political activism seems less
• 26:00
  Speaker 5: effective because people, for whatever reason, see celebrities as as
• 26:04
  Speaker 5: a part of the same elite establishment.
• 26:05
  Speaker 1: That they're mad at. Yeah, I think there's definitely some
• 26:09
  Speaker 1: of that. There's definitely some of that.
• 26:10
  Speaker 4: I still think my voice matters because people know that
• 26:14
  Speaker 4: I'm coming to it from an authentic place and a
• 26:17
  Speaker 4: truthful place. And I am not like new to this.
• 26:22
  Speaker 4: Like I, I, I study these issues. I pay attention
• 26:26
  Speaker 4: to them. And when I speak out, I do it
• 26:30
  Speaker 4: from an informed perspective. Like, I'm not just saying shit.
• 26:33
  Speaker 4: Like I'm saying it because I've actually like really looked
• 26:36
  Speaker 4: into it. And my activism is very, very intentional. So
• 26:43
  Speaker 4: we're doing things behind the scenes all the time. And
• 26:46
  Speaker 4: sometimes we do them in public. Like we were walking
• 26:49
  Speaker 4: the streets of Philadelphia recently with the mayor because I
• 26:53
  Speaker 4: have an organization called Human Level that is working.
• 26:55
  Speaker 1: In the cities all the time.
• 26:57
  Speaker 4: Like we were funding fellows who are working in, for
• 27:01
  Speaker 4: mayor's offices, promoting equity, promoting affordable housing, promoting equal access
• 27:09
  Speaker 4: to quality health care and groceries and all these things.
• 27:12
  Speaker 4: We're doing that literally all the time. And it may
• 27:16
  Speaker 4: not get the headlines all the time, but these are
• 27:19
  Speaker 4: things that are happening locally all the time. And so
• 27:22
  Speaker 4: what I encourage people to do, especially when we don't
• 27:25
  Speaker 4: have someone in federal office that is is is considering
• 27:32
  Speaker 4: our needs and doing what we need him to do,
• 27:37
  Speaker 4: focus on what you can control, which a lot of
• 27:40
  Speaker 4: times is local and state. And so we've been very
• 27:42
  Speaker 4: involved on that level consistently. And it's a little bit
• 27:47
  Speaker 4: under the radar, but it's happening and it's actually affecting
• 27:50
  Speaker 4: people's lives.
• 27:51
  Speaker 2: Have you seen retaliation because of that?
• 27:53
  Speaker 1: You going at the president?
• 27:55
  Speaker 4: Um, you know, he went after Chrissy, uh, uh, when, uh,
• 28:00
  Speaker 4: she called him a pussy ass bitch.
• 28:03
  Speaker 1: Um, that's crazy. That's crazy. That's definitely Chrissy though. I mean,
• 28:09
  Speaker 1: I mean like, oh, we haven't had any like legal repercussions. No.
• 28:12
  Speaker 2: Um, but I, I think, what was his response when
• 28:15
  Speaker 2: she called him a pussy ass bitch?
• 28:16
  Speaker 1: He, he kind of was a pussy ass bitch about it.
• 28:19
  Speaker 4: Uh, because he, he tried to get it like, uh,
• 28:22
  Speaker 4: he tried to get Twitter to, to, to take it down.
• 28:25
  Speaker 9: She should have said grab him by the pussy. And
• 28:30
  Speaker 9: then he tried to get Twitter to take it down
• 28:33
  Speaker 9: and Twitter censored it as a trending topic because of that.
• 28:38
  Speaker 9: Or maybe the profanity made them censor it. But one
• 28:42
  Speaker 9: way or another, they wanted to squash it because he
• 28:47
  Speaker 9: was really embarrassed that it was trending on Twitter.
• 28:52
  Speaker 1: She called him that.
• 28:54
  Speaker 4: And the wildest thing about that was that was in
• 28:58
  Speaker 4: response to some of the other work that I do,
• 29:00
  Speaker 4: which is on ending mass incarceration. We were literally at
• 29:04
  Speaker 4: a prison in Sing Sing, upstate New York. And we
• 29:11
  Speaker 4: did a special with Lester Holt.
• 29:14
  Speaker 1: And he was... Apparently watching MSNBC on a Sunday night.
• 29:24
  Speaker 5: Why?
• 29:24
  Speaker 1: I don't know.
• 29:25
  Speaker 4: But he was so upset that he didn't get enough
• 29:29
  Speaker 4: love and credit because he passed that one criminal justice
• 29:33
  Speaker 4: reform bill. Yeah, the first step back. He was so
• 29:37
  Speaker 4: mad that we didn't talk about him and show him
• 29:39
  Speaker 4: enough love. in that special that he called me out
• 29:45
  Speaker 4: threw Chrissy astray, and she wasn't even on the special.
• 29:50
  Speaker 1: And then Chrissy said, you pussy-ass bitch, why didn't you
• 29:52
  Speaker 1: at me? Damn. Jesus Christ.
• 29:55
  Speaker 2: Damn, bro.
• 29:56
  Speaker 3: So you don't get in an argument with Chrissy at all.
• 29:59
  Speaker 5: Because she'd be throwing all types of words at you.
• 30:03
  Speaker 1: I'm doing that right now.
• 30:04
  Speaker 2: Like, ah, you crazy.
• 30:06
  Speaker 1: Chrissy would be throwing some words at you. And they literally...
• 30:12
  Speaker 1: They literally.
• 30:13
  Speaker 4: Tried to censor it from Twitter because he was so
• 30:15
  Speaker 4: upset that it was trending so bad.
• 30:20
  Speaker 6: This is a fan question. Do you have a favorite album?
• 30:23
  Speaker 1: Of mine?
• 30:23
  Speaker 6: Yes, of your own.
• 30:25
  Speaker 1: I recently... Don't lie, John. I recently decided... I'm not
• 30:31
  Speaker 1: including the new album. No.
• 30:32
  Speaker 4: But I recently decided that I think my favorite is
• 30:36
  Speaker 4: Bigger Love. Now, this is like A little bit controversial
• 30:42
  Speaker 4: because a lot of.
• 30:43
  Speaker 1: People say Get Lifted.
• 30:44
  Speaker 4: A lot of people say, once again, my second album,
• 30:47
  Speaker 4: which I'm in love with both of those albums. But
• 30:50
  Speaker 4: I listened to Bigger Love recently and top to bottom,
• 30:53
  Speaker 4: like production quality, songwriting quality, like unskippability. Like I think
• 31:00
  Speaker 4: Bigger Love is right up there with them. The problem
• 31:03
  Speaker 4: with it, it came out during the pandemic. It came
• 31:05
  Speaker 4: out in 2020. So we couldn't market it the way
• 31:08
  Speaker 4: we wanted to. It did win best R & B
• 31:10
  Speaker 4: album at the Grammy. So it did have some success,
• 31:13
  Speaker 4: but it didn't have the success it deserved. And I
• 31:15
  Speaker 4: think it is right up there with my best albums,
• 31:19
  Speaker 4: if not the best.
• 31:21
  Speaker 6: I thought you were going to say Love in the Future.
• 31:23
  Speaker 1: No? Okay.
• 31:24
  Speaker 8: All right.
• 31:25
  Speaker 6: And do you have a favorite song on this album?
• 31:27
  Speaker 1: This album?
• 31:28
  Speaker 4: I love Fireflies. That's the video that's out now.
• 31:32
  Speaker 1: I think... I think Fireflies is my favorite.
• 31:37
  Speaker 6: So far, mine is Daylight and Get Back.
• 31:39
  Speaker 1: Okay.
• 31:40
  Speaker 8: Fire.
• 31:40
  Speaker 1: Thank you. Thank you. So you've heard more than the singles.
• 31:44
  Speaker 1: I love it. Yeah. What do you want to hear
• 31:45
  Speaker 1: right now? Let's play something. Let's play Fireflies. Okay. Fireflies
• 31:49
  Speaker 1: featuring Pharrell.
• 31:50
  Speaker 2: Well, let's get into it now.
• 31:51
  Speaker 3: And I also got to let you guys know that
• 31:53
  Speaker 3: John Legend is actually going to be at American Dream
• 31:54
  Speaker 3: Mall this weekend. So Thursday, they're doing a listening session
• 31:58
  Speaker 3: and some lucky winners will actually get a chance to
• 32:01
  Speaker 3: meet him.
• 32:01
  Speaker 2: And he's having a pop-up store there as well.
• 32:03
  Speaker 4: Yeah, we're actually, you know, focusing on physical product these days,
• 32:08
  Speaker 4: which is a little bit antiquated. But people are going
• 32:11
  Speaker 4: back to vinyl. People are going back to having something
• 32:14
  Speaker 4: tangible they can hold. And so as we're doing throughout
• 32:19
  Speaker 4: the country, we're going to focus on the physical product,
• 32:22
  Speaker 4: bring people out in real life to get back together.
• 32:25
  Speaker 1: And we're doing some in-stores.
• 32:27
  Speaker 4: It feels very old school, but I love it because
• 32:30
  Speaker 4: people need that connection and they need something tangible. And,
• 32:35
  Speaker 4: you know, I think we've had enough of everything being online,
• 32:39
  Speaker 4: we need in real life interaction.
• 32:42
  Speaker 3: Well, artists got to be willing to do it too.
• 32:43
  Speaker 3: Because a lot of artists feel like they can go
• 32:46
  Speaker 3: online and stream and that's it. But the fact that
• 32:48
  Speaker 3: artists are actually coming out, meeting people, signing autographs.
• 32:51
  Speaker 1: Again, that's the main thing. So make sure you head
• 32:54
  Speaker 1: out there.
• 32:54
  Speaker 3: It's a VIP listening party and some lucky winners will
• 32:57
  Speaker 3: get the album and also get to meet John Legend.
• 33:00
  Speaker 3: So if you haven't got it, definitely get your VIP tickets.
• 33:03
  Speaker 1: Mules will be out October 23rd.
• 33:05
  Speaker 2: Let's get into the joint right now.
• 33:07
  Speaker 1: Which one here? Fireflies. Summertime. Fireflies. It's the Breakfast Club.
• 33:13
  Speaker 2: Good morning.
• 33:14
  Speaker 1: Hold up. Every day I wake up. Wake your ass up.
• 33:18
  Speaker 1: The Breakfast Club. Y'all finished or y'all done?