Latest / Corie Sheppard Podcast / Teddyson John: Starting Over, Finding His Voice & Life Beyond “Allez”

Transcript

Teddyson John: Starting Over, Finding His Voice & Life Beyond “Allez” · Corie Sheppard Podcast

0:00
SPEAKER_03: I forget to bring my uh Lucent Cup.
0:02
SPEAKER_03: Sorry that I think because we are seen it.
0:05
SPEAKER_03: I didn't tell anybody.
0:06
SPEAKER_03: I didn't tell anybody what we were going to do.
0:08
SPEAKER_03: I knew that the audience and the reach of that is really crazy.
0:13
SPEAKER_03: And I just I was grateful to to to be there.
0:16
SPEAKER_03: I come from Cabaret Performances.
0:20
SPEAKER_03: I was raised on like the French side of the jazz.
0:23
SPEAKER_03: Not the really like not the Kenny G kind of jazz.
0:27
SPEAKER_03: Nah, not that.
0:28
SPEAKER_03: On a Sunday night, the drummer in the church used to allow me to play in the night.
0:33
SPEAKER_03: So I wasn't good to play in the Sunday service.
0:35
SPEAKER_03: I couldn't take people to the Lord on the Sunday in the morning.
0:39
SPEAKER_03: I wanted to introduce people to Little French Woods, you know, or Creole Woods at the time.
0:45
SPEAKER_03: And that could have mixed Ali is go, go, go, go Ali, Ali, Ali, go, go, go, go.
0:49
SPEAKER_03: So for me, I decided to write it from the point of your troubles, your worries tell that Ali.
0:57
SPEAKER_03: It's like your body of work or your experience of what you've done or what you're doing cannot really be respected.
1:04
SPEAKER_03: It's like every year you have to wheel and come again.
1:06
SPEAKER_03: You don't get that in reggae, you don't get that in country, you don't get that in rough, you don't get that in RB, you don't get that in any other genre.
1:14
SPEAKER_03: Nobody can fool me.
1:15
SPEAKER_03: Nobody can fool me with music.
1:16
SPEAKER_03: Well, what making sense, what not.
1:18
SPEAKER_03: I call it all the names, you know.
1:20
SPEAKER_03: You don't can't do me nothing, I big now.
1:24
SPEAKER_03: You know why, step and foreign, step and foreign, step and foreign, top up.
1:31
Corie: Mommy, look at the funny.
1:40
Corie: Hi, before we get started, we wanted to take a moment to ask you to support the channel for free by liking, sharing, and subscribing.
1:49
Corie: Those are the three things that we realize you're not doing as much as you all say you're enjoying the conversation.
1:53
Corie: So please, we appreciate your support.
1:55
Corie: Let's get into today's conversation.
1:57
Corie: Welcome to the Cory Shepherd Podcast.
1:58
Corie: Welcome back to everybody who's been listening.
2:00
Corie: Thank you for all the new people tuning in.
2:02
Corie: I want to welcome to the show today our first guest from St.
2:05
Corie: Lucia, the great Teddy St.
2:07
SPEAKER_02: John brother.
2:09
Corie: History today, like Lucian.
2:11
Corie: You could come and say and rediscover the Cory Shepherd Podcast, you know.
2:14
SPEAKER_03: Yes, yes.
2:15
SPEAKER_03: Congratulations, my brother, on what you do.
2:17
SPEAKER_03: Amazing job.
2:19
SPEAKER_03: I forget to bring my Lucian scarf.
2:21
SPEAKER_03: Sorry, no degree.
2:21
Corie: Well, let me start with that now.
2:22
Corie: I know you as a man do walk with all that.
2:25
Corie: Listen to me.
2:26
Corie: Listen to me.
2:27
SPEAKER_03: But yeah, it was a little rough.
2:30
SPEAKER_03: It was a little rough as well.
2:31
SPEAKER_03: You know how to get the traffic, make sure everything, you know, wasn't working.
2:35
SPEAKER_03: But yeah, I hear.
2:36
Corie: Oh, so you didn't forget home, you forget anymore.
2:38
SPEAKER_03: No, no, yeah, I forget.
2:38
Corie: Yeah, I forget.
2:39
Corie: Yes.
2:40
Corie: Are you watching here?
2:41
Corie: When Kess was here, we were talking about it.
2:42
Corie: I see on the tiny desk.
2:45
Corie: How important it was for you to have that scarf on tiny desk at that time.
2:49
SPEAKER_03: I mean, it it's it's one of the the world's biggest platforms.
2:53
SPEAKER_03: You know, it's a tiny desk, but the audience and the reach of that is is really crazy.
2:58
SPEAKER_03: And I just I was grateful to to be there, you know, in that capacity.
3:03
SPEAKER_03: You want to big up, you know, Kess for that call rehard.
3:07
SPEAKER_03: Um, these are like like like my my musical family, yeah.
3:11
SPEAKER_03: My brothers in in that aspect.
3:13
SPEAKER_03: And yeah, that's like Teddy do, you know, do your vibe, do your thing, and they normally know for me.
3:19
SPEAKER_03: I like to one of my signature um things that I do anytime I'm performing, I see where where I'm from, Teddyson John from the beautiful island of St.
3:29
SPEAKER_03: Lucia.
3:29
SPEAKER_03: So I couldn't say there, but they had to see.
3:31
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, so I had to make sure he represents and we representing inside, then it's just that unification, you know, type of vibe that was there.
3:39
Corie: Yeah, and he spoke about it, the fact that he was conscious of representing the entire career.
3:42
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, when he was yeah, yeah.
3:44
SPEAKER_03: That that is one brother that has never been um afraid to share like his his stage with with with me gave me the um opportunity to be on tour with them, you know, my my full band with them.
3:58
SPEAKER_03: We had like a like imagine a 45 minutes opening, you understand with my.
4:03
SPEAKER_03: For this current time?
4:04
SPEAKER_03: No, not for this store.
4:06
SPEAKER_03: Yes, it was the man with no door.
4:08
SPEAKER_03: I see, yeah, so and and to be able to have um the first ever St.
4:14
SPEAKER_03: Lucian band, you know, doing that on on that kind of level.
4:19
SPEAKER_03: Um, it was just amazing.
4:21
SPEAKER_03: And and the support with them, not just him, but the entire crew, the entire organization.
4:27
SPEAKER_03: Um we've been we've been friends, you understand?
4:31
SPEAKER_03: We've grown to to to a friendship and and the conversations that we have, you know, the encouragement that that he gives me, you understand.
4:40
SPEAKER_03: We we used to talk from the time I had a hairline, you understand.
4:44
Corie: I don't want to ask for long ago.
4:47
SPEAKER_03: You know, but it was that that long we had these conversations and and we remind each other of each other, you know.
4:56
SPEAKER_03: So times when I was feeling uh away in it, it was like Teddy, you stick to you know, dad, give them that.
5:03
SPEAKER_03: How come okay, even while we were on tour, he used to be like Teddy, when you okay, how come you how come you ain't going on the drums and and and get the drums?
5:12
SPEAKER_03: How come you ain't going on the keyboards and showing and and how come you're picking up the bass?
5:16
SPEAKER_03: And you know, he would give that, you really have that kind of vibe in the industry like that.
5:21
SPEAKER_03: You know, this is why keep hearing the work guests.
5:23
SPEAKER_03: A lot of people say that.
5:24
Corie: Not just artists, just no no no no no no no no.
5:25
Corie: Chuck Fafery.
5:26
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, the the the conversations is is is different, the deep conversations, our conversations is is is is is is different.
5:33
SPEAKER_03: Talk about everything, but just just to be able to give the opportunity and the platform to somebody like us, you know, for us to represent where we're from, you know, it it's unheard of like that.
5:45
SPEAKER_03: So I appreciate that, brother.
5:47
Corie: Oh, with you.
5:47
Corie: When I look at what Trinidad and Tobago or how we respond when we see a Marshall Montano or Kess on Tiny Desk, is a monumental thing for us, you know, Caribbean people.
5:56
Corie: Yeah, yeah.
5:56
Corie: You got a response from St.
5:57
Corie: Lucia when you were there?
5:59
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, I did.
6:00
SPEAKER_03: I did.
6:00
SPEAKER_03: People, I think people were shocked because we had seen nothing.
6:03
SPEAKER_03: I didn't tell anybody, I didn't tell anybody what we were going to do.
6:06
SPEAKER_03: Gotcha.
6:07
SPEAKER_03: Um, I I literally said nothing to to nobody.
6:11
SPEAKER_03: I just went out to do it.
6:12
SPEAKER_03: So while people watching, people seeing, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, dietie.
6:19
SPEAKER_03: Nah, you understand the solutions like this like no way, dieted.
6:24
SPEAKER_03: You know, and and and that was something that we really wanted, you know, that element of of of surprise.
6:31
SPEAKER_03: Tiny this is something I that I binge watching that, you know.
6:35
SPEAKER_03: This this is this is one of the places where the music can't lie.
6:38
SPEAKER_03: You you can't lie, you can't act like you know, uh, I'm a full-fledged musician.
6:43
SPEAKER_03: I'm uh, you know, I can't pretend on type.
6:46
Corie: Whether it's vocalists, instrumentalists, you had to be on your point.
6:49
SPEAKER_03: You can't, you know, so be it, and these are conversations that he and myself had a long time.
6:55
SPEAKER_03: So for me to be in there and get introduced to the actual people, and that's not a place where you can get on really easy.
7:03
SPEAKER_03: It's very difficult to get on.
7:05
Corie: And long lead times and all that.
7:06
Corie: Yes.
7:06
Corie: I saw on YouTube a tiny desk, uh, sort of like you did your own.
7:11
Corie: I did, yeah.
7:11
SPEAKER_03: There was a there was uh I I believed in the thing, the thing so much, you know.
7:15
SPEAKER_03: I I call my team, I was like, hey fellas, let me put a little, you know, just do your own audition.
7:19
SPEAKER_03: Let me do our audition thing.
7:21
SPEAKER_03: We made it to we made it to on the the website and stuff.
7:25
SPEAKER_03: But the truth is that there are so many artists that that you know apply for that, you know, year after year, and trying for years to get there.
7:36
SPEAKER_03: Um, but we just did our own to show that hey, we can really do the end of the day.
7:41
SPEAKER_03: It showed, huh?
7:43
Corie: Yeah, it showed.
7:44
Corie: I know that's something important to you in terms of the way you present the music.
7:48
Corie: Because the big band music is a thing where like it let me use a fet as an example.
7:51
Corie: It's so sometimes so loud.
7:54
Corie: Like my father is a guitarist, he was with a band called Song Revolution back in the day.
7:57
Corie: Yeah, and I remember going in their band room, and I couldn't he asked, Well, how I play?
8:02
Corie: So, me and no, I can't hear nothing, it's just so loud.
8:04
SPEAKER_03: But I know part of the when I looked at that audition, you you you take the music down where you have to hear the I I think it's something special when you can literally strip, you know, what you do and and take it down to to what 10 people, 15 people in a room or 100 people.
8:23
SPEAKER_03: You know, it it there's something different there.
8:26
SPEAKER_03: You get away on stage with the the 10,000 crowds or the the the the the 5,000 crowds where you okay, jump and wave, okay.
8:35
SPEAKER_03: What that's not what you drink in.
8:37
SPEAKER_03: You jump in if tried.
8:38
SPEAKER_03: That's not that.
8:39
SPEAKER_03: That's a different intimate type of performance where you can get there.
8:43
SPEAKER_03: And I I I would say I specialize in that.
8:46
SPEAKER_03: I love that you know, aspect of it.
8:48
SPEAKER_03: I just think there's another side to the music that we can explore apart from you know what we normally know around the carnival, the carnival season.
8:58
Corie: So there's a lady to create stripes as an event.
9:00
SPEAKER_03: Yes, it it it it stripped came from I don't know if um the COVID time when we we had COVID, it was really crazy and we didn't really know what to do.
9:10
SPEAKER_03: I think that really confused everybody.
9:13
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, um, and being there that year, that year, I we did my band came from St.
9:21
SPEAKER_03: Lucia.
9:22
SPEAKER_03: Kess again allowed us to open for him in Trinidad.
9:25
SPEAKER_03: That's the first time a a St.
9:27
SPEAKER_03: Lucian band ever comes into Trinidad.
9:29
SPEAKER_03: You understand, to open for Tuesday and the Rocks.
9:31
SPEAKER_03: That's Tuesday and Rocks then.
9:33
SPEAKER_03: So we did that.
9:34
SPEAKER_03: The love from that was so wicked.
9:36
SPEAKER_03: We probably had about a good 15 band shows on the outside from that.
9:42
SPEAKER_03: Right.
9:43
SPEAKER_03: When COVID came, we just noticed everything just canceling.
9:47
SPEAKER_03: Cancelling, canceling, canceling.
9:49
SPEAKER_03: But all other genres, you know, surviving and different who doing albums, who doing more intimate this, who doing so I was like, nah, you so you telling me that's what soccer music is good for, only the festival vibes and the the festival aspect of it.
10:10
SPEAKER_03: That bothered me a lot, a lot, a lot.
10:12
SPEAKER_03: I don't know if you saw uh a clip of me doing uh uh a performance in front of the pitons in St.
10:20
SPEAKER_03: Lucia.
10:21
SPEAKER_03: There's something I did called Caribbean Moscato, which was the album, right?
10:24
SPEAKER_03: Um, and then we did that album live in front of the Peter.
10:27
SPEAKER_03: That project there allowed me to do something that showed the other side of the music.
10:38
SPEAKER_03: So I was like, okay, so you telling me if there are no carnivals, if there are no big, you know, because remember at that time you had to you had to your numbers had to be small.
10:48
SPEAKER_03: You couldn't have big questions.
10:51
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, so you had to have small numbers.
10:54
SPEAKER_03: So I was like you telling me that if there's no carnival, that means we can't survive because everything festival driven.
11:02
SPEAKER_03: So that's why I created that other side of it.
11:05
SPEAKER_03: Right.
11:05
SPEAKER_03: That more intimate thing where this the crowds could have been a little smaller, you understand, and and present that.
11:12
SPEAKER_03: And then it it just started from me calling the band members, like fellas, I have a idea.
11:18
SPEAKER_03: This is come in the studio and vibe.
11:20
SPEAKER_03: We we did an acoustic version of X Games that was originally produced by Private Ryan.
11:26
SPEAKER_03: Right.
11:26
SPEAKER_03: I did an acoustic version of that.
11:28
SPEAKER_03: People started to the traction was like, people like, oh my goodness, nah, this is different.
11:33
SPEAKER_03: I did another one called Creme de la Creme.
11:36
SPEAKER_03: What we got from that, it was amazing.
11:39
SPEAKER_03: I think what pushed me is that we were I was in the States, we're driving to go to the ship for Uber, and then somebody tagged me and they said, listening to the acoustic sounds of Teddy Sunjo.
11:50
SPEAKER_03: When they said that, a bulk come on.
11:53
SPEAKER_03: I say, now you see this, fellas.
11:54
SPEAKER_03: We do an album.
11:55
SPEAKER_03: We're doing something and we creating something that that you can actually see the other side and not just the the run there and hey, pick up something, paint powder is not always that.
12:06
SPEAKER_03: There are people that will not come to that, there are people that like a different aspect of it.
12:10
SPEAKER_03: So that's what caused, that's what buffed.
12:13
SPEAKER_03: I would say Caribbean Moscato, which boofed like strip in terms of what it is.
12:18
Corie: I see.
12:18
Corie: Couple questions about that album.
12:19
Corie: I know that they you so some of these songs on the album were songs that were already out there.
12:23
SPEAKER_03: Some of these songs on the album were songs that are already out there, but I just did like a a completely different version.
12:30
Corie: How was it received when you start doing because you are some favorites, you have things everybody loves?
12:36
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, well, they have they have stuff that, okay, for instance, they have stuff that people from St.
12:41
SPEAKER_03: Lucia would know, and they have stuff that people from Trinidad, you know, would know.
12:45
SPEAKER_03: So I had to get when I came into Trinidad, it's like me getting reintroduced or introduced properly to Trinidad.
12:53
SPEAKER_03: So some people may only know me from Ali in Trinidad, but I've been doing this for a while back home.
13:02
SPEAKER_03: You understand?
13:03
SPEAKER_03: So um, that's what happened.
13:05
SPEAKER_03: So some of the songs was some of the songs that people knew, but I just did a completely different arrangement, a different vibe, created something totally different from it.
13:17
SPEAKER_03: So you hear your favorite song, but you just hear it in a totally different way.
13:24
Corie: And when people like it, so do no other version of it.
13:26
Corie: But what's it like?
13:26
SPEAKER_03: Let me tell you what what we experienced so far with it, people loved that actual, you know, vibe of it.
13:35
SPEAKER_03: Um, some of the songs became my favorite personally.
13:39
SPEAKER_03: I I didn't like the original again after we did after we did the thing.
13:45
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, I didn't I didn't want to hear the original like there's a song that we had it called Kite Sa.
13:50
SPEAKER_03: Kite Sa means leave, you know, leave that day.
13:53
SPEAKER_03: That song, I don't want to hear the original version, and I sang it.
13:56
SPEAKER_03: I don't want to hear that.
13:58
SPEAKER_03: I I prefer the in the acoustic version of it, and then the lyrics cut deeper because when you take out the 808, you take out the noise, whoop whoop, whoop, and you you get to that simplicity of what the music is.
14:12
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, so it was it was very much accepted, you know, in a in a in a great way.
14:18
Corie: Yeah, I could see why tiny does mean a lot to you too, because it's like a it's like a strip-down version of you thing as well.
14:23
SPEAKER_03: It is, it is.
14:24
SPEAKER_03: That's that's that's where that's what created strip.
14:28
SPEAKER_03: Because literally that's what you're doing.
14:29
SPEAKER_03: You're taking out, you're taking out the the noise, you're taking out, and people sometimes don't know the stories of where these songs come from.
14:39
SPEAKER_03: When I did strip in Trinidad for the first time, people thought I was crazy.
14:44
SPEAKER_03: Yes, number one, yeah, yeah, yeah.
14:46
SPEAKER_03: People thought it's any kind of a man called acoustic song.
14:49
SPEAKER_03: Oh my goodness, listen to me, uh bro.
14:51
SPEAKER_03: I almost spion me.
14:52
SPEAKER_03: Listen to me.
14:53
SPEAKER_03: People telling me, Teddy.
14:55
SPEAKER_03: So I'm getting a different type of vibrant.
14:57
SPEAKER_03: I'm getting, and even people on the team at the time, I'm getting Teddy.
15:01
SPEAKER_03: Let me tell you something.
15:02
SPEAKER_03: I mean, Trini's not on that, you know, they go like your vibrant thing, and but hey, uh, and really, and then I and then I get in um on the artist side, boy, boy, that man crazy boy to to be able to come there with that, you know, in the heat of, but I just knew that not everybody wanted to go.
15:24
SPEAKER_03: It's so big over here, there's something for everybody.
15:28
SPEAKER_03: Sure.
15:28
SPEAKER_03: That's what I think.
15:30
SPEAKER_03: So the audience that may not want to go to a paint and powder will want to dress up, you know, nice and come sit down and take in something.
15:38
SPEAKER_03: So it's a good thing.
15:39
Corie: Or the audience we used to go paint and powder.
15:41
Corie: Yeah, yeah.
15:42
Corie: And they can't make a game.
15:44
Corie: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
15:44
Corie: But I'll take you.
15:45
SPEAKER_03: I'll take you.
15:46
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, my girl, I'll take you.
15:49
SPEAKER_03: Don't worry.
15:49
SPEAKER_03: We keep playing this for you, prime time.
15:52
SPEAKER_03: We can I'll have that.
15:54
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
15:56
Corie: Always remember seeing when it was sold, like you saw clips of the show and stuff, and I felt like if the audience, at least judging from social media at the time, was like, we didn't know we needed this.
16:05
SPEAKER_03: Yes, that the you were very right.
16:07
SPEAKER_03: I the people who came, it's either you came, I would say the majority of people that was there is like, let me see what this guy says and do.
16:20
SPEAKER_03: And then when they came and they saw it, they were like, Oh my goodness, it was like a a breath of you know, fresh air, and just getting to see your favorite artists in a different light.
16:33
SPEAKER_03: A lot of them then know stories behind some of lyrical songs or Farm and Happy songs or Nyla or just hear the artists and your your favorite artists in a different in a different way.
16:44
SPEAKER_03: We human at the end of the day, we go through a lot of shit too.
16:47
SPEAKER_03: You know, we go through a lot of stuff.
16:48
SPEAKER_03: So sometimes it's good for people to know what mindset you were in, you know, when you did this or when you did that.
16:58
SPEAKER_03: That's what it was.
16:59
SPEAKER_03: I I was able to do it.
17:00
SPEAKER_03: I was able to do it twice in Trinidad.
17:04
SPEAKER_03: Um, I couldn't do it for a third time in Trinidad and not do it in St.
17:07
SPEAKER_03: Lucia because I would have got my head, oh my goodness.
17:10
SPEAKER_03: So they're like, Teddy, so what happened to you, you know?
17:12
SPEAKER_03: So we have focused.
17:13
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, so we you understand, but I ended up doing it at home in St.
17:16
SPEAKER_03: Lucia for the first time.
17:17
SPEAKER_03: Right.
17:18
SPEAKER_03: One of the reasons why I wanted to do it here, Trinidad is a place that, okay, they'll like you, yeah, you like your vibe, like your vibe.
17:24
SPEAKER_03: But if it's shit, they'll tell you the shit.
17:26
SPEAKER_03: I think so.
17:27
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, they'll tell you, they'll be quick to tell you what it's.
17:30
SPEAKER_03: I believe that okay, if I came here to do it, my back was big enough to say, okay, I'll take that.
17:36
SPEAKER_03: You understand?
17:36
SPEAKER_03: And Napa also, we don't have a Napa in St.
17:39
SPEAKER_03: Lucia.
17:40
SPEAKER_03: We don't have these type of venues, although you know the government gonna, you know, fix that.
17:47
SPEAKER_03: They they they're working on on that.
17:49
SPEAKER_03: But I always wanted to do something at the Napa.
17:53
SPEAKER_03: I used to sneak in and watch.
17:55
SPEAKER_03: I used to security used to let me pass and check the thing and walk inside and just stick pictures on the stage and just watch it and say, like, one day boy, sure.
18:03
SPEAKER_03: I'll be able because to pull it off as a solution in Trinidad was huge for me in terms of being able to come in and have that vibe cultural exchange with Trinidad and how Trinidad accepted me.
18:16
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, we need more of it.
18:18
Corie: Yeah, what is your vision for it?
18:19
Corie: Is it something that you want to do?
18:20
SPEAKER_03: Continue to do here and yes, yes, and and and I think it it's it's one that can really travel.
18:26
SPEAKER_03: It can it can literally go like I I want to do these things, you know, in the House of Blues, the Lincoln Centers, the you understand the blue notes, the the the city wineries, you know.
18:37
SPEAKER_03: I I want to do these things there, theater style.
18:40
SPEAKER_03: Oh why not?
18:41
SPEAKER_03: You know, it it can be presented then it's different too.
18:45
SPEAKER_03: You understand?
18:45
SPEAKER_03: It's different too.
18:47
SPEAKER_03: I think it it it why can't it it you come out to to a nice, you know, dinner with you and your lady a five course meal and you get a nice cabaret, you know, so a cabaret acoustic type of vibe show.
19:01
SPEAKER_03: That's my vibe too.
19:02
Corie: So If you're a business organization or brand looking to reach an engaged and growing audience, the Cory Shepherd Podcast offers opportunities to sponsor, partner, and advertise.
19:14
Corie: You can check out the email address in our YouTube description or via the link in our bio on Instagram.
19:20
Corie: We need the money, like uh Max and House, you remember that?
19:25
Corie: They have a song named Calypso, and a line in the Calypso song say Canegie Hall Grace by the presence of spirit.
19:32
SPEAKER_03: You know what I mean?
19:33
Corie: I find like we're missing some of that.
19:34
Corie: I'm telling you, and I think it's the balance of what it is.
19:38
Corie: I was asking Nadia this when she was here, right?
19:40
Corie: Maybe I asked too much soccer.
19:41
Corie: It's the same question.
19:42
Corie: But I worry sometimes about people who choose soccer as a profession because it's so difficult when you have you have Ali and it expires at the end of Carnival, whenever somebody decides all the carnivals in the world done somewhere around now, September, October, November.
19:58
Corie: Yeah, Daziana, whatever.
20:00
Corie: And then we want to know where you do for carnival 2027.
20:03
Corie: You experienced this before.
20:04
SPEAKER_03: I I think that is one of the biggest things wrong with our genre, and that's why the genre is where the genre is and what it is, and it feels like it's in a like a hamster wheel type of you know, type of vibe.
20:23
SPEAKER_03: Because we're the only genre that you cannot, it's like your body of work or your experience of what you've done or what you're doing cannot really be respected.
20:34
SPEAKER_03: It's like every year you have to wheel and come again.
20:36
SPEAKER_03: You don't get that in reggae, you don't get that in country, you don't get that in rock, you don't get that in RB, you don't get that in any other genre.
20:44
SPEAKER_03: But that's so it's it's difficult to do, and I could understand why artists go through what they go through every year because you're feeling like, oh my god, oh uh like I have friends in the industry, and you know, you see these things, and you you like you you literally get anxiety trying to figure out okay, boy, if that's gonna make sense.
21:05
SPEAKER_03: What does where it's not supposed to be that to me?
21:08
SPEAKER_03: This is your contribution, this is your contribution to the amazing art form of what it is.
21:14
SPEAKER_03: It's not supposed to be anything like that.
21:16
SPEAKER_03: I think competition and thing is the worst thing that could happen.
21:19
SPEAKER_03: You understand?
21:20
SPEAKER_03: We're the only genre that has a competition attached to it, yeah.
21:24
SPEAKER_03: And when yeah, and when you get out on the road and when you go touring and you see certain things, they don't care.
21:29
SPEAKER_03: They don't care about titles, they don't care about you know road matches, they don't care about any of these things.
21:36
SPEAKER_03: They they care about music.
21:38
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, you understand?
21:39
SPEAKER_03: I I I would when we did this stuff with with with with with Kess, there's two couples that came up to me and they were very upset.
21:47
SPEAKER_03: They're like Teddy, but Teddy, you didn't sing my you know favorite song.
21:52
SPEAKER_03: I see.
21:52
SPEAKER_03: And and my favorite song was not their favorite song was not even in the set.
21:56
Corie: Right, sorry.
21:57
SPEAKER_03: You understand?
21:58
SPEAKER_03: It was not even it.
22:00
SPEAKER_03: Not even in the set because I thought it was the more popular ones that you know people know, but just not people didn't care, they they just wanted music, they wanted vibes, they wanted that type of interaction.
22:15
SPEAKER_03: They so that's one of the things.
22:16
SPEAKER_03: If I had to change about you know our genre, I would, you know, and and and again with with strip when I did it, it wasn't depending on who had the hottest song for the the season.
22:28
SPEAKER_03: We didn't care about that.
22:30
SPEAKER_03: We'd the body of work.
22:32
SPEAKER_03: Somebody like Destro, you know, coming somewhere like Hess coming somewhere like Farnapi coming.
22:37
SPEAKER_03: You is their body of their body of work in a in a different way.
22:43
SPEAKER_03: Voice, body of work.
22:45
SPEAKER_03: It doesn't have to be, you know, what you have, you know, this year.
22:50
SPEAKER_03: You understand?
22:51
SPEAKER_03: You want you you give music, you touch people, you give to each his own.
22:55
SPEAKER_03: Everybody picks out what they they really like.
22:58
SPEAKER_03: So that's one of the things I would change.
22:59
Corie: Yeah, we had a promoter here just yesterday, coincidence.
23:01
Corie: We were talking about that.
23:02
Corie: He said his job is to sell a fit, and the fed is sold by was he hype somebody else.
23:08
Corie: And I wonder, yeah, I guess so.
23:09
Corie: But so what you're talking about is creating different spaces, different.
23:15
SPEAKER_03: You understand?
23:15
SPEAKER_03: Not saying you're not supposed to, okay, if you're you're looking for the hot song for the fit, okay, okay.
23:21
SPEAKER_03: But as much as there is that, there's an audience that would accept, you know, that as well.
23:26
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, so I don't mind being that person that would, you know, when you because not every year people have the hot, whatever.
23:33
SPEAKER_03: So I would be that person that probably can create something, you know, for people that just love the music in general, and not necessarily, okay, boy, yeah, boy, this is your boy.
23:44
SPEAKER_03: Oh yeah.
23:45
SPEAKER_03: As soon as the, you know, and when the carnival then boom, reggae start playing, dancers start playing, boom, come back.
23:50
Corie: Not just reggae, dance all reggae, dance all from 10 years ago.
23:53
Corie: All of a sudden, old music could play.
23:55
Corie: Okay, you understand?
23:56
SPEAKER_03: So it it it uh uh perfect example.
23:59
SPEAKER_03: You hire, you hire uh uh okay, let's say you hire like a Barris Hammond.
24:05
SPEAKER_03: You hire Barris Hammond now and pay top dollar because of what Barris Hammond hits through the years.
24:15
Corie: This is TV one's I showed the other day.
24:17
Corie: They city cheap.
24:17
Corie: This thing is$6,600.
24:19
Corie: Okay.
24:19
Corie: If he go there and only singing something from this year, they're stone in it.
24:22
Corie: Okay.
24:24
SPEAKER_03: So why you you catch why coming from?
24:26
SPEAKER_03: So why is that in our genre?
24:29
SPEAKER_03: That's what it is, and is what you have this year and is not what you understand.
24:33
SPEAKER_03: It don't make it don't make sense.
24:34
SPEAKER_03: It's it's your it's your catalogue of of music.
24:37
SPEAKER_03: Somebody like Showen Winchester have an amazing, oh, like that's somebody that I I I look at.
24:44
SPEAKER_03: You understand?
24:45
SPEAKER_03: He he's um he's an amazing performer, an amazing artist.
24:49
SPEAKER_03: You understand?
24:50
SPEAKER_03: It's just it's just different.
24:51
SPEAKER_03: We don't have that admiration, we don't have that vibe.
24:54
SPEAKER_03: It just feels like you have to be in that you know, hustle and you know tussle every year where it's not supposed to be.
25:02
SPEAKER_03: Like just free free yourself and and create what you like, create what you feel.
25:07
Corie: Well, somebody told me recently that um I was looking at Jay-Z going on tour recently, too.
25:11
Corie: I think he does a treat, a tree night.
25:13
Corie: Look at that, and um, somebody was telling me that soccer will get there because they say hip hop was just real young the other day.
25:19
Corie: And they say maybe so young.
25:20
Corie: So we now have where the real soccer artists who start maybe in the 90s, if you want to say what that is when socests come out.
25:27
Corie: Uh we starting to reach that.
25:29
Corie: So hopefully we're gonna see some Rolling Stones type legacy tours and stuff.
25:32
Corie: But I like where you do it strip because I know your background is jazz too.
25:35
Corie: It allows for the musicians to play the music to solo.
25:38
SPEAKER_03: It allows for the the the like I tell this the the stories behind the songs.
25:45
SPEAKER_03: I I come from cabaret performances, I do them kind of things.
25:50
SPEAKER_03: I used to work on a apart from church, that was raised in church, um, I wasn't a pastor or anything, yeah.
25:57
SPEAKER_03: You know, they had put me there, yeah.
25:59
SPEAKER_03: I had backslide a little bit, mommy no dig nothing.
26:02
Corie: But you don't drink?
26:03
SPEAKER_03: No, my mother watching that.
26:04
SPEAKER_03: Mommy do dig nothing Mummy do dig nothing, yeah.
26:08
SPEAKER_03: She, yeah, no dig nothing.
26:10
SPEAKER_03: She big of yourself, mama.
26:12
Corie: Still, she makes it sure.
26:13
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
26:14
SPEAKER_03: She always tell me you in that bangerang.
26:16
SPEAKER_03: You in that bangerang.
26:17
SPEAKER_03: Son, why you in that bangerang?
26:18
SPEAKER_03: Mommy, call out yourself.
26:19
SPEAKER_03: She writes.
26:20
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
26:21
SPEAKER_03: But um, I that's why I started.
26:23
SPEAKER_03: Then I I got into RB, I got into jazz.
26:26
SPEAKER_03: I was raised on like the French side of the jazz, not the really like not the Kenny G kind of jazz type.
26:33
SPEAKER_03: Nah, not that the the Mario Carnages, the Richard Boners, that's different things.
26:39
SPEAKER_03: So I have a the airs is open up for a lot of different things.
26:43
SPEAKER_03: So it allows me to create, it allows me to arrange, it allows me to do all these, you know, different things that I wanted to, you know, put into the music and make sure that it can just be your same song, but it it can just be done or portrayed in a different way, just a different taste, a different palette, and you you will find that people over here really experiencing that and they love that type of vibe too.
27:12
Corie: Well, we don't get it, huh?
27:13
Corie: You don't get it, you don't get the opportunity to have it.
27:15
Corie: Yeah, so churches where you're first exposed to music, yeah.
27:18
Corie: Young age parents, but you grew up in church.
27:20
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, my mother, my mother, my father, nah.
27:23
SPEAKER_03: You know, your father just there because he he you know he had to be there, you know, in terms of you know the music and stuff.
27:30
SPEAKER_03: We couldn't play any other records, you know, outside when only when mommy left and you know we had house chores and things to do, we could have put on any other genre of music.
27:42
SPEAKER_03: But when she home is TBN, Benny, you know them thing on Voice of Life, Benny Hinn, T B Jics, you know, all them kind of things.
27:55
SPEAKER_03: So yeah, they had the cross, add that cross, where I first I tired of them thing, you know, but yeah, that's what we had to take, you know.
28:04
SPEAKER_03: So when she was not there, Daddy would play the other genres.
28:10
SPEAKER_03: Well, you were into the Lionel Richie's, you know.
28:13
SPEAKER_03: My father like like like um air supply.
28:19
SPEAKER_03: Oh see, yeah.
28:20
SPEAKER_03: Um I'm telling you, and then I was in a house where it like my my other brothers, they they were into music too.
28:31
SPEAKER_03: So we had like um the R.
28:33
SPEAKER_03: Kelly's, the RB, like the Jodice's, like I grew up on them thing.
28:38
SPEAKER_03: Gotcha.
28:39
SPEAKER_03: You know, that kind of stuff.
28:40
SPEAKER_03: Hearing them, yeah, groups like SWV.
28:42
SPEAKER_03: Right, yeah.
28:43
SPEAKER_03: Um, so I have a heavy RB influence.
28:46
SPEAKER_03: You can probably hear it in in songs where I do backups and harmonies, and I come from them type of things.
28:54
Corie: You know, she got a comment.
28:55
SPEAKER_03: You're mad.
28:56
SPEAKER_03: So one, what we used to do, we used to live down a hill, so we used to send one on top the hill when we know she coming.
29:06
SPEAKER_03: So when we see when we see they drop her with the groceries by the bottom of the hill.
29:12
SPEAKER_03: She coming, that change had the cross, I had the cross.
29:19
Corie: You know, she listening to this version.
29:20
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
29:21
SPEAKER_03: She had a kind of thing.
29:22
SPEAKER_03: No, mommy don't even know.
29:24
SPEAKER_03: Listen to me.
29:24
SPEAKER_03: My mother feels probably internet and WhatsApp, die the devil thing, so she ain't gonna watch that.
29:29
SPEAKER_03: She ever watched that.
29:30
SPEAKER_03: We can talk.
29:31
SPEAKER_03: We can talk.
29:31
SPEAKER_03: We have a pack.
29:32
SPEAKER_03: We can talk.
29:34
SPEAKER_03: What area you grew up in Castries?
29:35
SPEAKER_03: Yes, I grew up in in Waterworks Road, Castries, St.
29:40
Corie: Lucia.
29:41
Corie: Waterworks Road.
29:42
Corie: And what primary school and so?
29:44
SPEAKER_03: Um, Boca's Primary School.
29:46
SPEAKER_03: Boca's Primary School.
29:48
SPEAKER_03: Um, I was in a preschool also.
29:50
SPEAKER_03: She told me they put me out of three preschools.
29:53
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
29:53
SPEAKER_03: They said they expel me from being a school.
29:56
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
29:57
SPEAKER_03: Imagine you eight years and they're expelling you from being in the middle.
29:59
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, something right.
30:00
SPEAKER_03: Something wrong.
30:00
SPEAKER_03: Something wrong.
30:01
SPEAKER_03: Something wrong.
30:02
SPEAKER_03: I checked.
30:03
Corie: Something alright.
30:04
Corie: I never hear nobody get it.
30:06
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
30:06
SPEAKER_03: Me too.
30:07
SPEAKER_03: Me too.
30:07
SPEAKER_03: When she told me that.
30:09
SPEAKER_03: When she told me that I was like, mommy, real thing.
30:11
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, she told me, yeah.
30:12
SPEAKER_03: They used to give me injection and thing to fall asleep.
30:16
Corie: So mommy was just energetic.
30:18
Corie: What's going on?
30:20
SPEAKER_03: They used to give me injection to fall asleep.
30:23
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, that's I know.
30:24
SPEAKER_03: I was uh I I wasn't I was just troublesome.
30:29
SPEAKER_03: I wasn't bad.
30:30
SPEAKER_03: I was just troublesome.
30:32
SPEAKER_03: You understand?
30:32
SPEAKER_03: Like, let's say if you if I walk around the house, I see a water tank there, I'll just take a cutlass and just you know, juke it to see how the water will come out.
30:44
Corie: I was saying there's a difference between troublesome and bad, right?
30:47
Corie: But that's just so it's bad.
30:48
SPEAKER_03: You know, I would see that.
30:50
SPEAKER_03: Just yeah, just prick it.
30:51
SPEAKER_03: What's that?
30:51
SPEAKER_03: Just you know, prick it and just see what the water comes out, and then try to paint it in black and put squash tape on it.
30:58
SPEAKER_03: So when my father comes home here, you see it.
31:00
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
31:00
SPEAKER_03: Them kind of thing.
31:01
SPEAKER_03: I didn't even see it.
31:03
SPEAKER_03: I I I am the last.
31:06
SPEAKER_03: I have five brothers and one sister.
31:08
SPEAKER_03: Let's see.
31:09
SPEAKER_03: So I'm the last one.
31:11
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, yeah.
31:11
SPEAKER_03: Mommy wash barely.
31:12
SPEAKER_03: They said that is the trouble selfie.
31:14
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, that kind of vibe.
31:15
SPEAKER_03: But it was it was it was trouble, but not, you know, not bad.
31:20
Corie: You know, I gotta talk to mommy, you know.
31:23
Corie: I'm gonna ask mommy what's a good story.
31:24
SPEAKER_03: You have a point, you have a point.
31:25
Corie: She might say the first one.
31:26
SPEAKER_03: She'll give a story.
31:28
SPEAKER_03: She'll give a story.
31:29
SPEAKER_03: She'll give yeah, they used to call mommy to the school for me.
31:32
SPEAKER_03: You know, I used to.
31:33
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, primary school, you know, trouble girls in the school, you know.
31:36
SPEAKER_03: I used to see, I didn't used to do the schoolwork.
31:38
SPEAKER_03: I used to sing Valentine's writer paper, Will You Be My Valentine's, yes or no?
31:43
Corie: That might kind of so you show so in the church, what's going on in the church?
31:50
Corie: You behaving and sing or cause church is a difficult space for the trend sometimes.
31:54
SPEAKER_03: Listen to me.
31:54
SPEAKER_03: Church, church was um, we had choirs and stuff in church.
31:59
SPEAKER_03: There was a there's a group of us, um, like a quartet, yeah.
32:03
SPEAKER_03: Um, Emily, Charlene, Darwin, and myself.
32:07
SPEAKER_03: So we used to sing together, you know.
32:10
Corie: So you discover your voice since then, you know, you can sing.
32:13
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, from no training, no nothing, didn't go to the school of music, didn't have any, yeah.
32:19
SPEAKER_03: I I became a drummer.
32:21
SPEAKER_03: I started to play drums in church.
32:24
SPEAKER_03: I started to beat drums on buckets at the back of the house with with with the the paint, the empty cans, and the the tin, like nido, the needle tin cover.
32:38
SPEAKER_03: With needle now, no you know needle needle milk and table.
32:42
SPEAKER_03: All right, it's okay.
32:42
SPEAKER_03: We don't need a milk here.
32:44
SPEAKER_03: Of course, you'll have needle, of course.
32:45
SPEAKER_03: I buy a needle uh thing and chili basically.
32:50
SPEAKER_03: All right, so we used to have them kind of things.
32:52
SPEAKER_03: That's what I used to play drums on, and there was an old chair in the back of the house.
32:58
SPEAKER_03: Um, we used to have to beat the dust out of that.
33:01
SPEAKER_03: So that was my time to practice.
33:04
Corie: So this is how you learn to play drums on the streets.
33:07
SPEAKER_03: On my own, break branches and and and play, and then on a Sunday night, the drummer in the church used to allow me to play in the night.
33:17
SPEAKER_03: So I wasn't good to play in the Sunday service.
33:19
SPEAKER_03: I couldn't take people to the Lord on the Sunday in the morning, but it'd allow me to play in the night when they have too much people there.
33:26
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, you understand?
33:27
SPEAKER_03: So I was able to play in the night, and then yeah, I used to play.
33:30
Corie: So when you're probably learning to just play where you're here, trying to replicate where you're here.
33:33
SPEAKER_03: What I hear.
33:34
SPEAKER_03: I would sit down on a keyboard and vibe, and you'd think I would play, but it's just what I hear.
33:39
SPEAKER_03: I'll take a bass and play, you understand, for the entire show.
33:43
SPEAKER_03: I used to play in hotels and that kind of stuff, but I don't know any notes.
33:47
SPEAKER_03: Seriously, I would hear the note, find it, you know.
33:51
SPEAKER_03: So it's a good relative picture.
33:53
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, yeah.
33:54
SPEAKER_03: No, nobody can fool me.
33:55
SPEAKER_03: Nobody can fool me with music, what making sense, what not.
33:59
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, but the band they will mess me up and tell me, tell you um, what's that key again?
34:03
SPEAKER_03: Then I'll curse them because they know, especially, don't tell me about keys.
34:07
SPEAKER_03: Because I ain't know nothing about keys, you know.
34:09
SPEAKER_03: So you try to mess me up with the keys aspect of it.
34:12
SPEAKER_03: You know, I ain't doing them thing you're asking me.
34:14
Corie: Yeah, just started playing or find it.
34:16
SPEAKER_03: Just started to play and I'll I'll I'll find it.
34:18
SPEAKER_03: And I I have a brother, wicked bass player, wicked bass player.
34:23
SPEAKER_03: Same thing.
34:23
SPEAKER_03: Learn the same way, yeah.
34:25
SPEAKER_03: No, no formal training.
34:26
SPEAKER_03: So mommy and daddy could have played music or anything, no?
34:28
SPEAKER_03: Nah.
34:30
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
34:30
SPEAKER_03: My father and his vibe, mommy and her gospel thing, there we ain't know where we get from.
34:34
SPEAKER_03: I mean, it's natural.
34:36
SPEAKER_03: God, we we I I am grateful to God for that.
34:39
SPEAKER_03: I have another brother that um he has his own band on a cruise ship, um, and he plays keyboards.
34:43
SPEAKER_03: So you see, just like they have the Jackson 5, they could have had a John Free.
34:46
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, you understand?
34:48
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, we could have done something.
34:49
Corie: He needed a Joe Jackson, that's what I was missing.
34:51
SPEAKER_03: Nah, nah, nah, nah.
34:52
SPEAKER_03: Boy, that kind of you see the difference between Joe used to use a belt, Caribbean, they go use anything they can do.
34:58
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, wherever they're fine.
34:59
SPEAKER_03: Nah, them same drumstick to the picking up.
35:01
SPEAKER_03: Nah, nah, nah, nah.
35:02
SPEAKER_03: You mad cable wire.
35:04
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, anything, anything, anything they put in on.
35:06
SPEAKER_03: It's still the caribbean.
35:06
SPEAKER_03: Electricity pole wire.
35:08
SPEAKER_03: Nah, we're not doing that.
35:09
SPEAKER_03: That's abuse.
35:10
Corie: You go too far.
35:10
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, we're going too far.
35:12
SPEAKER_03: That's why I got it.
35:13
SPEAKER_03: Gotcha.
35:13
Corie: So the quartet, the first thing you're using is your voice and church, right?
35:16
Corie: So for the quartet, you're singing gospel and just singing gospel music.
35:20
SPEAKER_03: We used to do different shows in the, you know, they have a youth service on a Friday night, you're doing them kind of thing.
35:26
SPEAKER_03: You understand?
35:27
SPEAKER_03: And Sunday, you know, in Pentecostal church, you go in church every day of the week, I have something.
35:32
SPEAKER_03: You understand?
35:33
SPEAKER_03: Every you can't skip that.
35:35
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, Wednesday, all night.
35:36
SPEAKER_03: That's when it's all night prayer.
35:38
SPEAKER_03: Sometimes I used to fake to to be sick for me not to go.
35:44
SPEAKER_03: You understand?
35:45
SPEAKER_03: All night prayer, people praying, praying, praying, praying, praying, praying, and I just had the back there, gobbing, dribbling, slipping on the table.
35:52
SPEAKER_03: God hear my prayers, you know.
35:54
Corie: That's where 10,000 hours come in because yeah, you get you get the practice there.
35:58
Corie: So at that point, you've seen yourself as career musician?
36:01
Corie: You have them ambitions already?
36:03
SPEAKER_03: Not not yet.
36:04
SPEAKER_03: School, when I was in school, um it wasn't career yet.
36:09
SPEAKER_03: Um, in school, I was part of this school choir.
36:12
SPEAKER_03: I used to do assemblies and all that kind of stuff.
36:14
SPEAKER_03: Um I'll I'll share something that that I I never really shared before.
36:20
SPEAKER_03: I left school two weeks before the actual exam for the college, like CXE.
36:29
SPEAKER_03: I dropped out.
36:30
SPEAKER_03: You know?
36:30
SPEAKER_03: Secondary school.
36:31
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, yeah, I did.
36:32
SPEAKER_03: And I think the week before.
36:35
SPEAKER_03: I told here what I told I told the principal.
36:38
SPEAKER_03: I told the principal, now kids stay in school and finish, yeah.
36:41
SPEAKER_03: I tell you, what happened there?
36:42
SPEAKER_03: They hello.
36:43
SPEAKER_03: All right.
36:43
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
36:45
SPEAKER_03: I told the principal what I wanted to do, um, what Christopher Columbus went and do, that had nothing to do with it.
36:57
SPEAKER_03: I told the principal what I wanted to do.
37:01
SPEAKER_03: Cirus clouds into XM clouds and and and stratosphere and obersphere and dis and sphere.
37:07
SPEAKER_03: Nothing.
37:08
SPEAKER_03: That had nothing to do with that.
37:10
SPEAKER_03: I told him T into X and see what Z doing and how you're running behind C and see dung by T what's going on in I.
37:17
SPEAKER_03: That had nothing to do with what I doing.
37:20
SPEAKER_03: So he he was like, that's one teacher.
37:23
SPEAKER_03: They were he was like, Teddy, you're not like the rest of them.
37:27
SPEAKER_03: And anything that you decide to do, you're gonna be great at it.
37:31
SPEAKER_03: My first concert, I have a real respect for my teachers in my school.
37:36
SPEAKER_03: My first concert, I invited my principal and my teachers to the concert.
37:40
SPEAKER_03: What was the school?
37:41
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, so IRC and secondary school.
37:44
SPEAKER_03: And they they they came and saw, you know, and they would call me to come to the school and speak to the students.
37:51
SPEAKER_03: I see.
37:52
SPEAKER_03: You understand what I'm saying?
37:53
SPEAKER_03: So it was not one of them things where okay, you just drop out and then you're away with.
37:58
SPEAKER_03: Nah, what I wanted to do was a different, it's just a different.
38:01
SPEAKER_03: I just believe they have a different way to get to what you want.
38:04
SPEAKER_03: Everybody at the end of they want to be successful, they want to, you know, have a good job, they want to do this.
38:10
SPEAKER_03: I just figure use your passion to do what you had to do.
38:14
SPEAKER_03: Of course, I did courses along the way to fix up certain things, and yeah, yeah, yeah.
38:18
SPEAKER_03: But the way I think it was driven, like, you know, academic, academic, academic, you know, it that just wasn't really working for you.
38:26
SPEAKER_03: You know?
38:26
Corie: Well, most people go to the principal and tell them that the advice is not going to be that you're gonna be great.
38:31
Corie: No, no, no, no.
38:31
SPEAKER_03: The principal sees me up to a day like what what two days ago I saw my and they will always be proud.
38:38
SPEAKER_03: Just because of of what you know I do or how I I I came out.
38:44
SPEAKER_03: You understand?
38:44
SPEAKER_03: It's never disrespect.
38:46
SPEAKER_03: I see my teachers today and still call them Sir and Miss and Mom.
38:51
SPEAKER_03: There's no type of yeah.
38:53
SPEAKER_03: So that's how I I was there.
38:56
SPEAKER_03: So in school, I had that kind of vibe.
38:59
Corie: And and so I guessing you was doing good in the subject something or not?
39:02
SPEAKER_03: I was doing good in the subjects.
39:03
SPEAKER_03: There's just there are days I I there are times I do and I do in SBAs, I do an exams, I pass in that.
39:08
SPEAKER_03: And there are other days I come in, I go in a studio.
39:11
SPEAKER_03: You know, my mother thinks I in in in class, but I in a studio.
39:14
Corie: So what mommy say about this?
39:16
SPEAKER_03: I mean, you see, them kind of thing, I mean, all of the majority of my family will, I mean, they didn't finish, you know, like college, college, probably one or two of them, and all of them are successful entrepreneurs at what they do in, you know, real estate, you know, clothing, jewelry, they do their thing.
39:37
SPEAKER_03: So everybody always had that um that entrepreneurial spirit in them to get that happening.
39:44
SPEAKER_03: So it was it was pretty cool then.
39:46
SPEAKER_03: So with with with with the school, I used to spend sometimes I doing it and I feel like doing it.
39:52
SPEAKER_03: Sometimes I would go and I sit down there, I I they used to put me out of classes, spend me for beating on the desk.
39:58
SPEAKER_03: So I would, you know, you know, they would beat that, yeah.
40:02
SPEAKER_03: I get suspension enough already.
40:03
SPEAKER_03: That's okay.
40:04
SPEAKER_03: I still love the teachers, you know what I mean?
40:07
SPEAKER_03: So I get that, you know, um, just for music.
40:10
SPEAKER_03: Right, you understand?
40:12
Corie: Um, but at that point, church is your only expression of music.
40:15
SPEAKER_03: Which was my only expression of music.
40:16
SPEAKER_03: I had to watch what I was doing in school because you know, the church people they like to put you on on probation quick.
40:22
SPEAKER_03: You understand, brother J.
40:23
SPEAKER_03: Anyways, that's another show.
40:25
SPEAKER_03: We go talk.
40:25
SPEAKER_03: I just had a moment there.
40:26
SPEAKER_03: Don't dig nothing, brother J.
40:29
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
40:29
SPEAKER_03: I remember what I wanted to go in in the school Calypso competition, and I wasn't allowed to, you understand?
40:38
SPEAKER_03: Because it's is it's church and thing.
40:39
SPEAKER_03: Although one day I tell my mother I'm going on a school tour.
40:42
SPEAKER_03: You understand?
40:43
SPEAKER_03: I went on a school around the island to learn about the Pitons, and then they see me on television in a in a soccer monarch, school soccer monarch.
40:54
Corie: It's getting chaotic.
40:56
SPEAKER_03: They see me running last in a school soccer monarch.
41:01
SPEAKER_03: So my brothers, my brothers, boy, these brothers, my brothers, they show it on news.
41:06
SPEAKER_03: My brothers, they tell me that they know mommy and them waiting for me.
41:09
SPEAKER_03: I coming up the hill, they tell me, so tell you how was it all?
41:11
SPEAKER_03: I was like, oh, listen to me.
41:13
SPEAKER_03: We went to the Pitons, we learned so many different things.
41:16
SPEAKER_03: And the listen to me.
41:18
SPEAKER_03: You holding this up, you the fellas record the part.
41:21
SPEAKER_03: You understand where they had me, you know.
41:24
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
41:26
SPEAKER_03: I tell my mother, and there was another time somebody in the church saw me jumping behind a truck, and they uh they told my mother, my mother as well as when I say I was delivering tracks like Jehovah Witness as giving.
41:40
Corie: You never used to get licks and things only.
41:43
SPEAKER_03: That's regular.
41:43
SPEAKER_03: That's licks was regular for me.
41:45
SPEAKER_03: That's regular.
41:45
SPEAKER_03: Every that's regular.
41:47
SPEAKER_03: That's regular.
41:47
SPEAKER_03: It must be beginning.
41:48
SPEAKER_03: Every three o'clock, something happening.
41:50
SPEAKER_03: Everyone three o'clock.
41:50
SPEAKER_03: Every three o'clock.
41:52
SPEAKER_03: Every three o'clock, something happening, you know.
41:55
SPEAKER_03: But that was regular for me.
41:57
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, that was regular.
41:58
Corie: So I just accepted that.
41:59
Corie: This is what it is.
42:00
Corie: Yeah, it is what it is.
42:01
Corie: It is what it is.
42:01
Corie: But I guess from early days, you know you're passionate, you're following where you want to do it.
42:04
SPEAKER_03: But I I just fall in what I want to do.
42:06
SPEAKER_03: From from school, I went straight into I worked at my brother's.
42:10
SPEAKER_03: There's one that has a jewelry store, and I worked with him in the front customer service.
42:16
SPEAKER_03: Um, then I worked at uh a hotel called La Spot.
42:20
SPEAKER_03: Um with hospitality, that's where my hospitality journey happened.
42:24
SPEAKER_03: So from there, I spent like a good, I would say, five or six years in hospitality.
42:32
SPEAKER_03: Um also with sandals.
42:34
SPEAKER_03: But when you say in hospitality, hospitality, I was in the entertainment department.
42:38
SPEAKER_03: Gotcha.
42:38
SPEAKER_03: You understand?
42:39
SPEAKER_03: So sometimes they have these, you know, your entertainment staff, you take care of guests, you do that kind of stuff.
42:44
SPEAKER_03: And then when the bands used to come to perform in the night, I used to perform.
42:48
SPEAKER_03: Oh, you gain a chance to perform?
42:49
SPEAKER_03: I gain a chance to perform.
42:50
Corie: But what are you doing?
42:51
Corie: You're singing, you're playing, singing.
42:52
SPEAKER_03: There are other bands that gave me an opportunity to play.
42:55
SPEAKER_03: So I used to be like a little Brian McKnight, you know.
42:58
SPEAKER_03: Time I had hair, I used to have hair.
43:00
SPEAKER_03: I just, I just I just say, you know, give up the ghosts.
43:04
SPEAKER_03: And I say, God is good, just cut it ball because what you put in the hairline for, you know.
43:09
SPEAKER_03: Um so I used to on a on a on a on a Wednesday night talent night.
43:14
SPEAKER_03: I used to have my, you know, play, you know, one, you like a dream come true.
43:19
SPEAKER_03: And I play my telling you.
43:20
SPEAKER_03: Oh boy.
43:21
SPEAKER_03: So I soften them, I have them.
43:23
SPEAKER_03: I have them.
43:24
SPEAKER_03: But it, yeah.
43:25
SPEAKER_03: So that's where the the music it started to think in there.
43:30
Corie: So at that point, it's mostly RB covers, that kind of thing you're doing?
43:33
SPEAKER_03: RB covers.
43:34
SPEAKER_03: And then I got an opportunity to go on a cruise ship and work on a cruise ship.
43:38
SPEAKER_03: And then I started to do more other covers on a cruise ship.
43:41
Corie: So when you get hired by the cruise ship, yeah, you had as a single?
43:44
SPEAKER_03: I got hired through a band.
43:45
SPEAKER_03: My brother had his band, and there was an agent here, and he put the band, you know, together.
43:51
SPEAKER_03: So it was myself, Hervin, my brother Penn, which introduced me to Soka in 2007, um, Hildreth.
44:00
SPEAKER_03: Desk bass player, stretch vocalists.
44:02
SPEAKER_03: So I was one of the other vocalists.
44:04
SPEAKER_03: I used to do like the RB hip stuff, and stretch would be more the, you know, the Elvis, Delandel Richie's, the Phil Collins, that kind of vibe.
44:13
SPEAKER_03: So that actually, that period of time opened me up to that genre and that type.
44:20
SPEAKER_03: How long I was?
44:21
SPEAKER_03: How long you on the ship?
44:22
SPEAKER_03: I did.
44:23
SPEAKER_03: Funny enough, I did one year on the ship, which is two contracts.
44:27
SPEAKER_03: Crazy.
44:27
SPEAKER_03: Six months contracts.
44:29
SPEAKER_03: And after that, I in 2007 I came off and I did my first soccer song ever.
44:36
Corie: And then he didn't want to go back on the ship.
44:37
SPEAKER_03: And that's where it happened.
44:39
SPEAKER_03: The two guys that introduced me, one of the guys was the drummer on um the cruise ship with me.
44:47
SPEAKER_03: His name is Penn of Studio 758.
44:50
SPEAKER_03: And Ace.
44:51
SPEAKER_03: These two guys are the guys that was responsible for me doing soca music.
44:57
SPEAKER_03: I wanted, I didn't want to do, I didn't want to come out because all the time church's still there.
45:02
SPEAKER_03: I wanted to put, I wanted to put a mask on my face.
45:05
SPEAKER_03: I didn't want people to see.
45:08
SPEAKER_03: You know, so I did a if they could tolerate it, Brad McNight.
45:11
Corie: They didn't tolerate it, they didn't tolerate that.
45:12
SPEAKER_03: You're mad.
45:13
SPEAKER_03: They putting me out.
45:13
SPEAKER_03: They put in me out.
45:14
SPEAKER_03: Straight, straight, straight, straight, straight.
45:15
SPEAKER_03: No communion, all kinds of things.
45:16
SPEAKER_03: They putting me out.
45:17
SPEAKER_03: So they uh so I was able, the the guys told me, Teddy, just you know, don't dig nothing.
45:22
SPEAKER_03: I know you can do it.
45:23
SPEAKER_03: I like it.
45:23
SPEAKER_03: Pen introduced me to the whole Marshall vibe, Kipleton, all kinds of things.
45:28
SPEAKER_03: I didn't know about them things.
45:29
SPEAKER_03: So they told me, Teddy, um, you can do that, guys.
45:35
SPEAKER_03: So I say, okay, I'll do that.
45:36
SPEAKER_03: I had a little idea, I'll do that, but give it to somebody else.
45:41
SPEAKER_03: So in my mind, I didn't a demo.
45:43
SPEAKER_03: Okay.
45:44
SPEAKER_03: Two shaking a break.
45:45
SPEAKER_03: I hand the demo playing until on radio, pulling up DJs.
45:50
SPEAKER_03: Where does the fan come from?
45:51
SPEAKER_03: This and that.
45:52
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, tune come from.
45:53
SPEAKER_03: I end up in a competition, a Soka Mona competition, a groovy monarch competition, and became the first groovy monarch.
46:02
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, first ever St.
46:02
SPEAKER_03: Lucia.
46:03
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, first ever groovy monarch at St.
46:04
SPEAKER_03: Lucia in 2007, and from there till now, it's been a so wait.
46:12
Corie: What's the song in 2007?
46:13
Corie: Coming down the road.
46:14
SPEAKER_02: Coming down the road with your hands up on the road behind a truck on the road coming down.
46:21
Corie: That was the easily it's gonna be a gospel with your hands up, praise the Lord with a flip it.
46:28
SPEAKER_03: And in the post-corus, just speaking tongues there for this in the postcourse.
46:32
Corie: So, what's the church reaction at this point, isn't it?
46:34
SPEAKER_03: Oh Lord, they put me on probation one time, one time they speaking on them imagine calling Brother James, go for a whole they had a whole board.
46:42
SPEAKER_03: Do you know the government have a whole board of ministers?
46:45
SPEAKER_03: They have a whole board, they put me out, all of them.
46:49
SPEAKER_03: I cannot all the names, you know.
46:50
SPEAKER_03: You don't can't do me nothing, I beg now.
46:52
SPEAKER_03: You can talk to me.
46:53
SPEAKER_03: I beg now.
46:53
SPEAKER_03: You can talk to me.
46:54
Corie: What mommy, what mommy said?
46:56
SPEAKER_03: Boy, mommy just held me up in prayer.
46:59
SPEAKER_03: I think mommy just helped me up in prayer.
47:02
SPEAKER_03: My mother's way for us is that she used to pray and she's still praying today.
47:07
SPEAKER_03: You know, I remember a brother of mine that decided he wanted to enrest her.
47:10
SPEAKER_03: That is stayed for one month.
47:12
SPEAKER_03: You understand?
47:13
SPEAKER_03: That is stay for for one month.
47:15
SPEAKER_03: When she called her her prayer warriors and they start getting you olive oil from all corners, you understand, cooking oil lad from Google Mann.
47:35
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, and then show that you're looking at it.
47:43
SPEAKER_03: Cooking his own food, vomiting his own food, he cooked, and that's that.
47:47
SPEAKER_03: I never see that before.
47:48
SPEAKER_03: And then she thinks I never said my goodness, Pope, John Paul, half.
47:57
Corie: Are they trying to kill Bobby Paul?
48:01
SPEAKER_03: But she prayed us out of them things.
48:03
SPEAKER_03: All right, good.
48:04
SPEAKER_03: And I think she kept us through prayers, but she understood what we do.
48:10
SPEAKER_03: You understand?
48:11
SPEAKER_03: She understood none of her children, brought police in front of the biggest.
48:17
SPEAKER_03: And we are raised on that.
48:18
SPEAKER_03: I can't tell you I know what that kind of life because I wasn't raised on that.
48:22
SPEAKER_03: We just love what we do, and it's music.
48:24
SPEAKER_03: So when that happened in the church, she just accepts what we're doing, and you know, uh dig nothing.
48:30
Corie: If you want to support the show and ensure that we gain the best guests here, telling the best stories and we gain a little bit of back and all out of all of them, you could support for free by liking, sharing, and subscribing on YouTube.
48:41
Corie: But you could also join our Patreon and just file us to ensure that we could continue to get stories that inspire, educate, empower, inform, and all the other in things that these people behind the scenes tell me to say.
48:52
Corie: So go and do it now, and then we could jump back into the episode.
48:56
Corie: Bang.
48:57
Corie: What about you now?
48:58
Corie: Because I know people like, for instance, I they try the best with me and church.
49:01
Corie: And my mother listening, so she tried your best, and she holds me up in prayer all now because it's done hope.
49:06
Corie: But the truth is, like, I went through the whole thing of it being born again and being Christian and thing.
49:10
Corie: I was telling somebody the other day, like, they used to analyze songs in the church.
49:14
Corie: Like when they see Marshall sing Jumbi, the church watching it now, like, look at this, and he thing, and Marshall carrying off people.
49:20
Corie: So I wonder if there was an internal conflict with you.
49:23
SPEAKER_03: Here's how I feel now.
49:26
SPEAKER_03: I feel one thing my mother always said to me, Teddy, keep your eyes on God.
49:34
SPEAKER_03: Keep your eyes, you cannot look at man.
49:38
SPEAKER_03: What I I knew then and what I know now, I have a deeper connection with God now than ever.
49:46
SPEAKER_03: Because he I want you to be perfect.
49:48
SPEAKER_03: I think we we have that thing where we we like to cast, you know, as well as we we like to cast blame, we like to like he who's without sin casts a full stone.
49:59
SPEAKER_03: Everybody, we not perfect.
50:01
SPEAKER_03: So the labels for me, I done with that.
50:04
SPEAKER_03: I I not on that.
50:05
SPEAKER_03: I don't need to be in a in a in a in a in a building, you understand?
50:09
SPEAKER_03: For me, I talk to God every day.
50:12
SPEAKER_03: Talk to God in traffic, I talk to God I before meetings, you understand?
50:17
SPEAKER_03: It's it's that type of personal relationship because the things you know about these guys that used to point fingers at you.
50:24
SPEAKER_03: I suppose.
50:25
SPEAKER_03: You understand?
50:26
SPEAKER_03: It's crazy.
50:28
SPEAKER_03: The things I knew growing up and how people used to make me feel.
50:32
SPEAKER_03: All of y'all know what I'm into.
50:34
SPEAKER_03: Don't mind the Christians, yeah.
50:36
SPEAKER_03: They like to come to my concerts too, you know.
50:38
SPEAKER_03: All right, they'll come, come.
50:40
SPEAKER_03: And you'll find them in the little different things, but they're trying to play all okay, but if that's your vibe, that's yeah, if that's your vibe, that's your vibe, you're a love of music, you like your vibe.
50:48
SPEAKER_03: Obviously, uh, you know, you're not gonna be wilding out, wild out because they are you, but don't make it seem like it's a it's an issue, and okay, you're going to go to hella fire for for you know, nah.
50:59
SPEAKER_03: I don't believe in that.
51:00
SPEAKER_03: I I what I what I grew up on and what I know now and how I feel now, it's much more stronger than what was happening before.
51:11
Corie: Oh, which you I was asking Destra about this because I knew that she's doing gospel.
51:15
Corie: Oh, she's where she comes from, it's similar to your story.
51:18
SPEAKER_03: That was a beautiful concert.
51:19
SPEAKER_03: I told her I would fly in for that, I did.
51:22
SPEAKER_03: I just to support the vibe.
51:23
SPEAKER_03: It was amazing.
51:24
SPEAKER_03: There's nothing wrong with that.
51:26
SPEAKER_03: You understand?
51:27
SPEAKER_03: It's it's it's not a holier than Tao concert, it's it's a gospel concert, you know.
51:32
SPEAKER_03: Destra Destra's voice is oh my god, Destra has the most beautiful voice, you know, in the soccer industry.
51:39
SPEAKER_03: Female, I'm telling you, you know, and so why can she do what she feels you know called to do at the time?
51:46
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, nobody nobody preaching down nobody's throat or or or telling no, it's uh there's songs that you you loved growing up with you gospel songs that you're sure you love growing up with.
51:59
SPEAKER_03: I would sing it today.
52:00
Corie: Yeah, so you don't have seen no conflict in Tony and singing it.
52:03
Corie: You you know you wouldn't.
52:04
SPEAKER_03: I don't see that.
52:05
SPEAKER_03: I don't see that.
52:05
SPEAKER_03: I'm somebody in the middle of a baccana, I'll pray.
52:09
SPEAKER_03: I feel the need to, I felt led to, I'll do that.
52:13
SPEAKER_03: We try to run from that, I can't run from that.
52:15
SPEAKER_03: I can't run from the type of artist that I am, I can't run from the person how I was raised, I I can't run from my upbringings.
52:23
SPEAKER_03: Okay, you understand?
52:25
SPEAKER_03: So I will accept that and and that's to each his own, you know.
52:30
SPEAKER_03: But I know I people's opinions on on that and what it is, I tell them to just you know have your own one and one with God and and stop watching everybody else and and and fix yours and and and have yours, have your eyes there.
52:47
SPEAKER_03: That's one thing mom always thought.
52:49
Corie: Yeah, uh pastor the momentum salvation is not a collective idea, focus on yours, you know.
52:53
SPEAKER_03: Focus on yours because your walk is a different thing, your experience is a different thing.
52:57
SPEAKER_03: I went through a lot growing up.
52:59
SPEAKER_03: I think the church put out the church sent a lot of people out their doors just by the stupid, you know, rules and regulations.
53:08
SPEAKER_03: By telling you, a lot of musicians just didn't even want to play, you understand?
53:13
SPEAKER_03: Because yeah, I'm somebody that they embarrassed me in church already.
53:17
SPEAKER_03: I I did I opened a jazz festival.
53:20
SPEAKER_03: I was doing jazz festival in St.
53:22
SPEAKER_03: Lucia.
53:23
SPEAKER_03: I think I had opened for Patty La Belle or something, and then I was playing bass Sunday morning, playing a little bass, and then one of the guys, the the acclaimed prophets, you know, he said, Hey, tell me your life is not put on the bass, and you're ready, man.
53:40
SPEAKER_03: Embarrass me in church, you know.
53:41
SPEAKER_03: And I leave the bass in church and I walk down the hill crying, you understand, because it was embarrassing to see, like, so you telling me I can't jazz.
53:50
SPEAKER_03: So because you're singing the jazz, because I sing in the jazz, there's situations where in Lucia, uh, uh a pastor, there's there's a Lucia Jazz Festival, which is amazing.
54:01
SPEAKER_03: There's a kingdom night on the night, there are gospel artists on the kingdom night, and the church leaders have a problem with gospel artists being on a kingdom night.
54:13
SPEAKER_03: I don't you have a problem.
54:15
SPEAKER_03: You have a problem.
54:16
SPEAKER_03: No, I never see that one.
54:17
SPEAKER_03: I never see that one.
54:18
SPEAKER_03: You have a problem because it's not organized by a gospel overhead or committee, a kingdom night, gospel night.
54:26
SPEAKER_03: Pastors having a problem with people from their church taking part or leading people to God on a cosplay.
54:33
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, that's a lot.
54:34
SPEAKER_03: Where Donnie McClurkin, of course, Maverick City, you understand Tasha Cops.
54:40
SPEAKER_03: Like, you have a problem with that?
54:41
SPEAKER_03: Something wrong with you.
54:42
Corie: Yeah, but you just have a problem and say it's in bed ready for you.
54:45
SPEAKER_03: So people like that, my tongue ready.
54:46
SPEAKER_03: I read it, yeah.
54:47
SPEAKER_03: I read.
54:48
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, they go call me.
54:50
SPEAKER_03: Then actually one minute, tell me tell you do see nothing do say I know them things I come from that.
54:56
SPEAKER_00: Of course.
54:57
SPEAKER_03: I I know that, but all these little things helped uh shape you to shape me into my first entry into soccer.
55:06
Corie: Well, let me talk about that because you enter in the competition thinking you have a chance to win and think you're going in.
55:10
Corie: You're feeling it.
55:12
SPEAKER_03: Well, St.
55:13
SPEAKER_03: Lucia, it was just that.
55:14
SPEAKER_03: I I just did it when I did it.
55:16
SPEAKER_03: I was performing with with some of the the bigger guns in St.
55:19
SPEAKER_03: Lucia.
55:20
SPEAKER_03: I was a new one.
55:21
SPEAKER_03: So people like Ricky T.
55:22
Corie: Right.
55:22
SPEAKER_03: I I came in, I saw Ricky T.
55:25
SPEAKER_03: People like Ninja Dan, the late Nicole David, um Alpha Cupid.
55:30
SPEAKER_03: These are people that I watched.
55:32
SPEAKER_03: So me coming into it and just in your fight in the game, no.
55:35
Corie: Yeah, yeah.
55:36
SPEAKER_03: But coming in and just and being able to win, you know, I was like, okay, boy.
55:40
Corie: What's he feeling when they announced it, boy?
55:42
SPEAKER_03: It it's because it was my very first time coming into it, and I just didn't I couldn't turn back again after that.
55:50
SPEAKER_03: And I here was that Trinidad was a place I always wanted to really knock and come into and that kind of even before Soka?
55:57
SPEAKER_03: Or just watching it, just Soka is one of them.
56:00
SPEAKER_03: There are people that uh for me, I would say that's responsible for me wanting to be into the genre.
56:06
SPEAKER_03: People like Kevin Dubois, like heavy respect, heavy, heavy, heavy respect.
56:12
SPEAKER_03: Writer, producer.
56:14
SPEAKER_03: Um he's a genius at what he does.
56:16
SPEAKER_03: I don't think I don't think he gets I don't think he gets the the respect he'll get the admiration he deserves.
56:24
SPEAKER_03: I don't think we understand, you know, that person, you understand, Kes and them blacks together, you know, with the all stars that gave me an opportunity to be in the front juice man, big up yourself.
56:37
SPEAKER_03: There's a lot of people that I used to watch that you know that okay, but if I have to come into this thing, yeah.
56:45
Corie: Yeah, I so where it went from 07 if you're ambitions to get to Trinidad.
56:49
SPEAKER_03: I well, I knocking on Trinidad door for probably a good 10 years before Ali came out.
56:54
Corie: Right.
56:55
SPEAKER_03: But just different experiences, just different.
56:57
Corie: So you're in the zone now where you're putting out a song every year?
56:59
SPEAKER_03: I put I in the zone, I put out a song every year for St.
57:02
SPEAKER_03: St.
57:02
SPEAKER_03: Lucia Carnival and doing that.
57:05
SPEAKER_03: Um there was a time I got into something over here, but it it it that self turned into a back and all which I didn't want it to be.
57:14
SPEAKER_03: I didn't want to come into Trinidad like that.
57:17
SPEAKER_03: There was a song, Big People Party.
57:19
SPEAKER_03: There's a song that I I I did back home a couple of years ago, and that song ended up being redone, you understand, by another artist over here.
57:28
SPEAKER_03: And it was a song that was nappy, yeah.
57:32
SPEAKER_03: It was a song that was done, the chorus of the song was done probably two years prior, yeah.
57:37
SPEAKER_03: You understand, to it.
57:38
SPEAKER_03: So there's a little back and forth here to be.
57:40
Corie: I saw it's maybe a couple of years after it came out.
57:42
Corie: I saw people doing the comparison.
57:44
SPEAKER_03: Yes, yes, yes.
57:44
SPEAKER_03: Well, the hook of the chorus and stuff is it was me, you understand?
57:48
SPEAKER_03: Um, but I didn't want to come into Trinidad like that.
57:51
SPEAKER_03: I wanted to come into Trinidad on my own, you know, two feet.
57:54
SPEAKER_03: Um and that's when Ali came out.
57:56
SPEAKER_03: When Ali came out.
57:57
Corie: So at what point do you start because that first song you didn't write for 2007?
58:00
Corie: You wrote it?
58:01
Corie: No, I wrote the hook.
58:02
Corie: So where did writing skill come in?
58:04
SPEAKER_03: I don't know.
58:06
SPEAKER_03: I don't know, bro.
58:07
SPEAKER_03: I I don't know.
58:08
SPEAKER_03: I hain things, I I hain things.
58:11
SPEAKER_03: You you know, you hang melodies, and I I famous for that.
58:16
SPEAKER_03: Melodies and and and hooks and just different things.
58:19
SPEAKER_03: I never done like a full full song.
58:21
SPEAKER_03: I would give you the hooks of it.
58:24
Corie: But a lot of writers say the hook is here, I just wanted to come up with something.
58:26
SPEAKER_03: No, I ain't that easy.
58:28
SPEAKER_03: For you, yeah.
58:29
SPEAKER_03: I ain't that easy.
58:30
SPEAKER_03: I I sit down there, I would hang.
58:32
SPEAKER_03: I was in a writing session last night, and it's just yeah, I'm I'm hearing these hooks.
58:37
SPEAKER_03: I I like melody, I like sing along, I like different things.
58:40
Corie: So what was the genesis?
58:41
Corie: You're starting from the melody.
58:42
Corie: So when you hear rhythm, you hear that.
58:44
SPEAKER_03: When I hear the music, I I hear melody.
58:48
unknown: Right.
58:48
SPEAKER_03: I hear melody.
58:49
SPEAKER_03: And sometimes the first thing that comes to me is what I I go, what it makes me feel like at the time is what I go with.
58:57
SPEAKER_03: If if we have a uh a thing where we're doing it together, we vibing together.
59:01
SPEAKER_03: I like collaborative writing because there can be somebody else with a third eye that can literally okay, check what you really want to do and how you want to do certain things, you know.
59:12
SPEAKER_03: So I get to do, I get to do these little things.
59:14
Corie: So you ain't gonna write in school, you ain't gonna no school for no instrument, no vocal school.
59:19
SPEAKER_02: Nah, nah.
59:19
Corie: Yeah, you have to check into your background.
59:21
SPEAKER_02: I need to see what's going on there.
59:22
Corie: Yeah, so you just come up, you you you ain't going to any people formal school, you're like, oh the school.
59:27
Corie: Yeah, you're like all the music, school and thing, you hear melodies in the head and it boys.
59:32
SPEAKER_03: I hang melodies, I hang different things, I hang, you know.
59:36
SPEAKER_03: I didn't used to believe in it before, you know, like okay, it makes sense, it can work.
59:41
SPEAKER_03: Right.
59:42
SPEAKER_03: But over the years I started having more confidence in in what I'm able when when Ali came out and then Vent, you know, and then you know Krem de la Krem, there's different things.
59:52
Corie: I started to get more involved in production, in the in the writing, in the Well, I guess so that I mean you're a monarch, so it's not hard for you to get with writers or producers and take home, right?
1:00:01
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
1:00:02
Corie: So Ali, what was it, what was the genesis of it?
1:00:04
Corie: How what how the idea starts?
1:00:06
SPEAKER_03: Well, Ali Ali happened in my band room downstairs my house with my um my keyboard player at the time.
1:00:12
Corie: So wait, at this point they have a band.
1:00:14
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, I had a I I I had a band from 2010.
1:00:19
SPEAKER_03: A band was formed called the TJ Project, you know, and we we got to do um be the opener for for Neo in St.
1:00:29
SPEAKER_03: Lucia.
1:00:30
SPEAKER_03: Um, we had different people that we were opening for.
1:00:34
SPEAKER_03: And what kind of music you're doing as a band?
1:00:35
SPEAKER_03: Covers.
1:00:37
SPEAKER_03: Covers or your own sets?
1:00:38
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, I had my own because from 2007 to 2000, yeah, catalogue big home.
1:00:44
SPEAKER_03: I mean, but again, there's a difference when it big home, and there's a difference when people on the outside knew.
1:00:50
SPEAKER_03: So I had to try to strike that balance.
1:00:53
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, okay.
1:00:54
SPEAKER_03: But people knew me from you know, Senusha from from what I used to do then, but nobody knew like in Trinidad when I when I got here, where he came from.
1:01:04
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, brand new again.
1:01:05
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, brand new again.
1:01:06
SPEAKER_03: So people in Trinidad telling me how to perform and giving me, you know, advice as to how to perform, but they know I really cook.
1:01:14
SPEAKER_03: They know I really cook, but I was just like, I mean, I humble you.
1:01:18
SPEAKER_03: So I just like okay, I understand.
1:01:20
SPEAKER_03: Okay, we can you can but Teddy boy, you know, Trinidad is a different, yeah, boy, you have to.
1:01:26
SPEAKER_03: So I was just like, okay, I understand.
1:01:28
SPEAKER_03: And then when I get on stage, I just used to do what I did and and just, you know, leave.
1:01:34
SPEAKER_03: So the band was from back home.
1:01:36
SPEAKER_03: Got sure.
1:01:37
SPEAKER_03: Um, but all that time, you know, I was just trying to find certain things, trying to find, and there are times people used to send, you know, sometimes people is sending songs for you, right?
1:01:47
SPEAKER_03: You know, okay, boy, tell you how man send it.
1:01:49
SPEAKER_03: You know, this and that, you know, that kind of thing.
1:01:51
SPEAKER_03: And then a man sent a song of a whole bunch of S's.
1:01:54
SPEAKER_03: I find that's disrespectful because you know my tongue tie, you know my mouth can close, but you send in songs, dag up in the game, but yeah, I that's disrespectful.
1:02:04
SPEAKER_03: You know, but yeah, uh Phil is sending songs, Teddy, you know, that yeah, that good boy and who who write for you know, so I figure if somebody write for Marshall, you know they'll write bump to head.
1:02:17
SPEAKER_03: No, it don't work.
1:02:18
SPEAKER_03: So it don't work.
1:02:19
SPEAKER_03: So I had that year between 200 and seven, I would say, to 2000 and um I started working with Precision from Trinidad and to be going with um in 2012.
1:02:34
SPEAKER_03: I see.
1:02:35
SPEAKER_03: Um, that's when I met them through my management, um, Dahlia and Darwin Back Home.
1:02:40
SPEAKER_03: And then they did a song for me called Land of Wine, which was written by Urfan.
1:02:45
SPEAKER_03: I see.
1:02:45
SPEAKER_03: You know, so I got to meet, I started to branch out into you know, working with different producers.
1:02:52
SPEAKER_00: Gotcha.
1:02:52
SPEAKER_03: That song allowed me to win the Green Monarch again in St.
1:02:56
SPEAKER_03: Lucia called Um Land of Wine, and then I dropped out of the competition and I started doing my own concerts in St.
1:03:03
SPEAKER_03: Lucia.
1:03:04
SPEAKER_03: So from 2012 to 2016, I was just trying to find my way in, trying to knock, trying to see how I can because a lot of people that I look up to, you know, I try to see how I can be around them.
1:03:16
SPEAKER_03: Kerwin, I look up Destra, Nadia, Bungie, these are people I watch in.
1:03:21
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, chess, these are people that I watch in on I watching these people watching the different shows they used to do and wanting, okay, one day, you know, I think Ali when I got stamped in Trinidad with Ali is what opened up, you know, different things that other people were able to connect.
1:03:40
Corie: So you've started writing us.
1:03:41
Corie: How do you what was the idea behind Ali initially?
1:03:44
SPEAKER_03: Ali for me was I and you notice Ali the like it's like a French, you know, type of vibe to it.
1:03:50
SPEAKER_03: So very different from anything you were hearing at that time.
1:03:52
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, yeah.
1:03:53
SPEAKER_03: So I wanted to introduce people to little French words, you know, or Creole Woods at the time, and that could have mixed where I came from, you know, with what's happening now.
1:04:04
SPEAKER_03: So I just decided to use it.
1:04:06
SPEAKER_03: You you hear it in one context, but I just decided to do it from a different angle.
1:04:10
SPEAKER_03: Ali, go, go, go, go, Ali, Ali, Ali, go, go, go.
1:04:13
SPEAKER_03: So for me, I decided to write it from the point of your troubles, your your worries tell that Ali.
1:04:21
SPEAKER_03: You understand?
1:04:22
SPEAKER_03: There's this amazing writer that was working with Jeremy Jacobs, amazing, amazing.
1:04:26
SPEAKER_03: He did Ali with me, he did vent with me, he did um X Games with me, Creme de la Creme, a bunch of songs that he did with me.
1:04:33
SPEAKER_03: And we used to have conversations.
1:04:34
SPEAKER_03: We we conversated about different things, and and we were able to put you know Ali together again.
1:04:40
SPEAKER_03: The hook melody is is is yeah, it's me, you know, and then we just had so that just come in your head so yeah, yeah, yeah.
1:04:48
SPEAKER_03: It does come uh no rum, no smoking.
1:04:51
Corie: Or maybe that's why you think I need to stop.
1:04:55
SPEAKER_03: Check that, yeah, check that, yeah, check that, yeah, check that.
1:04:59
SPEAKER_03: No smoking, although they're trying to get me to smoke to it.
1:05:02
SPEAKER_03: But that's oh, they're trying, they're trying, they're trying.
1:05:04
SPEAKER_03: Y'all know yourself, I go tell you nothing.
1:05:07
Corie: So, what's the experience like when you touch down and you see the response?
1:05:10
SPEAKER_03: Because by the time you hear this song, so when I when I touched here and I and I see what was going on, it was just like like a wow feeling for me.
1:05:20
SPEAKER_03: Um, number one, being able to watch these shows that you see on television and being a part of it, I was like, wow boy, I know Bishop's day, or in a CIC there, and you see.
1:05:35
SPEAKER_03: I felt grateful to just be apart from that and being from St.
1:05:39
SPEAKER_03: Lucia in that vibe.
1:05:42
Corie: Yeah, I only say you talk about the importance of that.
1:05:44
Corie: Like, like when you talk about it, I almost get a sense that you're not considering said as John breaking through.
1:05:50
Corie: You see, you see it as St.
1:05:51
Corie: Lucia breaking through.
1:05:52
SPEAKER_03: Because that's where I'm from.
1:05:53
SPEAKER_03: When I when I did it, people didn't think I was they didn't think at the time that type of music would come from.
1:06:00
SPEAKER_03: You know, from there.
1:06:02
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, we're known for the Denry segment, you know, but we also have that groovy aspect of things as well.
1:06:11
SPEAKER_03: There are a lot of Mathan artists home that that do that.
1:06:15
SPEAKER_03: So for me, everywhere I went, there was a time I went on a show and somebody said, Hey, Tennessee and John from Trinidad and Tobago.
1:06:21
SPEAKER_03: I say, hey.
1:06:24
SPEAKER_03: I say, hey.
1:06:27
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
1:06:29
SPEAKER_03: It felt good though, you know.
1:06:31
SPEAKER_03: But I was like, hey, everybody, the Tess and John from the beautiful island of St.
1:06:36
SPEAKER_03: Lucia.
1:06:37
Corie: Yeah, you make it sure you can get your password somebody in children.
1:06:39
Corie: That might be a problem if you don't correct that.
1:06:42
SPEAKER_03: But it but it felt good though to be able to create an audience here and have a vibe.
1:06:49
SPEAKER_03: Here's not one of the places that's easy to break into.
1:06:52
SPEAKER_03: But when they love you and their vibe, they they they love on to it.
1:06:56
SPEAKER_03: They hold on to it.
1:06:59
Corie: You're at star level, superstar level home, and then you're coming into a market where, like you say, seasoned artists now trying to tell you thing where you do it for the last 10 years.
1:07:06
Corie: Yeah.
1:07:07
Corie: You ain't feeling no way about that.
1:07:08
Corie: Like starting over and stuff.
1:07:10
Corie: You cool with it?
1:07:11
SPEAKER_03: I I cool with starting over, you know.
1:07:16
SPEAKER_03: Sometimes you start over and you fix up some the knowledge that you have now, you tend to, you know, fix up certain things along the way.
1:07:23
SPEAKER_03: So I didn't have any issues with with starting over.
1:07:26
SPEAKER_03: I probably just used to surprise people when I was on stage, you know, come mash up, please fatin, say goodnight.
1:07:32
Corie: Because I'll tell you something, right?
1:07:33
Corie: That is usually the issue.
1:07:35
Corie: So people talk about how hard it is in different territories to come into trend and break through.
1:07:39
Corie: But what I've seen a lot is very people who might be even very, very big artists now.
1:07:44
Corie: But the first time they come here with a song that good, and you come on a stage and you can't hold that stage, yeah.
1:07:49
SPEAKER_03: And that the over there there are artists that have big songs, and the big songs carry the artist, and there are artists that have, you know, songs that yeah, it it's a different some people let the the song just ride along and just they have in their mind they have much to do because the song done gone already.
1:08:09
SPEAKER_03: But yeah, but it's a different thing with me.
1:08:11
SPEAKER_03: I I want people to get to know me as an artist and what I do and and that kind of stuff.
1:08:16
SPEAKER_03: So it's a it's a different type of vibe for me, how I see it.
1:08:19
Corie: Yeah, because I remember after that first year, yeah, you knew your name.
1:08:22
Corie: Yeah, people know where you look like people know where you're from.
1:08:25
Corie: Yes, that's lots of complex.
1:08:27
Corie: Exactly.
1:08:27
Corie: So that's in year one.
1:08:29
SPEAKER_03: That's why every time I hit a stage, you know, I would tell them where I'm from.
1:08:34
SPEAKER_03: I still do it today, you know.
1:08:36
SPEAKER_03: One day, Benji tell me, tell if people ain't know where you're from, they'll never know, you know.
1:08:39
SPEAKER_03: I was like, let me tell you this, my brother.
1:08:41
SPEAKER_03: I still listen to me.
1:08:43
SPEAKER_03: I like to do it.
1:08:44
SPEAKER_03: I like to do it.
1:08:45
SPEAKER_03: I I I you introduce because you never know who's seeing you for the first time.
1:08:50
SPEAKER_03: Every time you perform somewhere, you must probably they must probably have people that uh encountering you for the first time.
1:08:57
SPEAKER_03: Of course.
1:08:57
SPEAKER_03: So you never know.
1:08:59
SPEAKER_03: So that's why I like to do it.
1:09:01
Corie: It makes sense.
1:09:02
Corie: So after Ali, you're feeling that pressure to come up with something the next year.
1:09:06
SPEAKER_03: Oh my goodness, I mean I can't sleep.
1:09:08
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, yeah, I can't sleep.
1:09:14
SPEAKER_03: I'm telling you, I you trying, but again, I just how with with with Vent, we would just like Well, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait.
1:09:25
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
1:09:25
SPEAKER_03: It has a song named Vent.
1:09:27
SPEAKER_03: Palais.
1:09:28
SPEAKER_03: Yes, stop.
1:09:29
SPEAKER_03: Okay, okay, sorry, sorry.
1:09:31
SPEAKER_03: Okay.
1:09:31
SPEAKER_03: That's me again trying to do that's me again trying to do the incorporate the Creole, you know, the French kind of vibe in in that as well.
1:09:41
SPEAKER_03: And I the songs that that were huge for me, it was never songs that spoke of carnival.
1:09:47
SPEAKER_03: They spoke of situations and and people and the truth is people don't know you, but they're gonna judge you.
1:09:53
SPEAKER_03: It must be something about you, you know.
1:09:55
SPEAKER_03: Smiling your face, talking you bad, and real stories.
1:09:58
SPEAKER_03: People have seen what you're doing at this podcast and the hard work that you're putting in the app, you know, but they will see your, they want to count your blessings, you know.
1:10:05
SPEAKER_03: You understand?
1:10:06
SPEAKER_03: So, in situations like that, we just started to talk and write about life situations, and we figure it had a longer lifespan than just songs that spoke about a behind the truck and this and that, because I'm sure you you've got to stick to that, you know.
1:10:20
SPEAKER_03: So, what we started to write about was just more life topics in that sense.
1:10:25
Corie: Yeah, another song I'd ask about is you and Skinny Fabulous.
1:10:29
Corie: Two two men two men who meet up there who I don't know, I don't know if the styles could be different or as different as well.
1:10:36
SPEAKER_03: That's a brother, that's another brother of mine.
1:10:39
SPEAKER_03: Skinny is just what I love about Skinny, no matter what he does, you know, he still has time to make sure.
1:10:47
SPEAKER_03: No matter what level of of artist he is, that people business.
1:10:51
SPEAKER_03: There was uh that was produced by Moto.
1:10:54
SPEAKER_03: Oh, is Moto will do it?
1:10:55
SPEAKER_03: Moto produced that.
1:10:57
SPEAKER_03: I was here in that song with a it it didn't have a bass line, and I was in that song with a bass line.
1:11:02
SPEAKER_03: Moto's like, Teddy if you're hearing it, put it in.
1:11:04
SPEAKER_03: So I put in a bass line.
1:11:05
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, I put in a bass line for my song, you know, on that with skinny, and I call skinny and that people business, you know, leave people business alone.
1:11:13
SPEAKER_03: Don't do that, yeah.
1:11:14
SPEAKER_03: You know, sapazafo, that means that's not your business.
1:11:20
Corie: You know, so you're making sure you have that like a little bit.
1:11:22
SPEAKER_03: So I give a little something in there, you know, just to to to you know, give a so when the French hear that, when the French people hear that, it there's something in there for everybody.
1:11:32
SPEAKER_03: I just used to throw in these little words inside, and then Skinny just came.
1:11:36
SPEAKER_03: Around that time when Skinny shot that video, my father passed away.
1:11:42
SPEAKER_03: My father passed away two days after.
1:11:45
SPEAKER_03: I see, yeah.
1:11:47
SPEAKER_03: So I was running up to you know the hospital, making sure, you know, different things, trying to come get my head clear to of course, yeah.
1:11:56
SPEAKER_03: That's not easy, and it it wasn't easy.
1:11:58
SPEAKER_03: And then Skinny, yeah, Skinny came down to just get it done, and and yeah, yeah, only knock that all the time.
1:12:04
SPEAKER_03: It's one of these songs, man.
1:12:05
SPEAKER_03: It's one of these another song that it's probably not even in the repertoire, and it's supposed to be.
1:12:10
SPEAKER_03: Oh, is this I don't I don't really do let me tell you something?
1:12:14
Corie: No, I don't understand why them people was vexed today.
1:12:16
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, no, no, no, no, no, no.
1:12:18
SPEAKER_03: My band, I had a you see my band members home, Daniel, Casey, Zach, they they really give me my business when it's that.
1:12:26
SPEAKER_03: They're like, Teddy, you cannot, you cannot be, you know, killing your own vibes.
1:12:32
SPEAKER_03: Like, you know, you can't you have music.
1:12:35
SPEAKER_03: And why you're not doing it?
1:12:36
Corie: Why is we gonna unlock that code when we go unlock that?
1:12:41
Corie: When we go when we go to Australia in the theatre, when you go to Sydney Opera House.
1:12:45
SPEAKER_03: I'm I tell you, y'all go see it, you know.
1:12:47
SPEAKER_03: But I think I go cry like a little girl, you know, when I see it because that is a dream for me to be able to see that what the music can you see.
1:12:58
SPEAKER_03: We're putting faith in you.
1:12:59
SPEAKER_03: We put new faith in the next one.
1:13:00
SPEAKER_03: I go start with the training and orchestra.
1:13:02
Corie: Well, alright, well, let me go.
1:13:02
Corie: Yeah, they're doing some of it.
1:13:03
Corie: You see, they're doing it now.
1:13:05
Corie: Yeah, I go start with it.
1:13:06
Corie: National Symphony, they're doing some of it already.
1:13:08
Corie: I go start there.
1:13:08
SPEAKER_03: Alright, good.
1:13:09
SPEAKER_03: But I want that.
1:13:10
SPEAKER_03: You see that boy, it's a different vibe than you get.
1:13:13
Corie: Well, good, have a quadruple.
1:13:14
Corie: Come on, play two singles.
1:13:15
Corie: We go, we have rehearsal.
1:13:16
Corie: We have to rehearse you.
1:13:17
Corie: We have to rehearse you.
1:13:18
Corie: You have to rehearse you, Corry.
1:13:22
Corie: Walk on.
1:13:23
Corie: Walk on.
1:13:24
Corie: Well, listen, brother, let me tell you one time.
1:13:26
Corie: You have my support.
1:13:27
Corie: Whenever you're executing it, something let me know.
1:13:30
Corie: We come in, we we we pinch, we turn lights on it because we're doing trip, people talking about it today.
1:13:34
Corie: Here, people talk about it still.
1:13:36
Corie: So I can imagine if you get that kind of experience.
1:13:41
Corie: All right, good.
1:13:41
Corie: Well, listen, thank you very much, my friend.
1:13:45
Corie: Thank you for what whenever you're ready to roll it out.
1:13:48
Corie: We you know we have minute.
1:13:50
Corie: Thank you very much.