Wide Eyes Open

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Speaker 1: Welcome to jay Dot in a production of My Heart Radio. What's Up Everybody? It is Jill Scott, Las Say Claire and Agia grading Dance. We are here on Ja dot eld podcast. We would come to talk to you. Uh. I hope you've had a great week. I've had. Uh. Y'all. All right, y'all been okay? Good to talk about this thing that's been on your mind? Child, Yeah, because this one been heavy. You have mentioned this I have I want to talk about the evils of the music industry. Oh lord, yeah, I don't have enough time. Hey, we got plenty of time. I'm putting parentheses around this thing. Come on, yes, I'm putting parentheses around it. Let's see what are the evils. Let's let's uh anything with the word perpetuity on it, ma'am. Come on, somebody, ma'am. Anything with three sixty ma'am. Okay, wait a minute now, now, now you're talking mute. Now, Now, now you're talking music artist stuff. Now now perpetuity that that means something different time. Are you familiar with the word enslavement? I am? I am. I heard of that opportunity contracts to be on contracts that you're doing something to so we have fifty of your publishing in perpetuity. Anytime you see perpetuity anywhere ever, you stop what you're doing and walk away right now. Okay, And my mama says, no, three sixty. I'm sorry. If I write a book, there's no reason on this planning that I need to give my music label a piece of my book. He says, I'm not singing word break it down, jail, because this is this is like ten years old, right, the three sixty deals, I feel like they like a little tip. Right, they're older, but they still occur for all your merchandising and all anything anything that you are, you have a commercial, for anything that you do that makes money from you being you and you having your talent is under a sixty degree of all the money that you make, even your touring, even your tool. A label can do that, you say in a label can be in your commercial, but money and your book money that a label can do that if you let them. Yeah, yea, if you left them. That one right there, for me is a big one. I feel like that's not necessarily an evil though. I think it's a fucked up practice by an industry that's just accustomed to being fucked up? Well, isn't it an industry that's derivative off of the alcohol beverage and industry like we I mean, if you get into the histories of the ills of this, the many things that this industry has been involved in. Alcohol is not evil. It's the use of it, right, alcohol business, Right, That's really where I'm at. I don't think that the music industry is evil. I think the use of it is. I think you're in trouble when you come into an industry at all and have a facade, if they've created it for you, or or you put it on yourself to say artists helped create that facide. Of course, I mean artists are complicit in the mess. But at the same time too, it's like you cannot It's like you fault in the starving man for stealing, you know what I'm saying. Like, at the end of the day, they set us up in these situations in which they keep all the doors, and then you have this talent, you have this ability, and you want to live while doing it, and it's just like if you want to get through the door, you gotta do this. I mean, there was a time when artists weren't even reading the contracts. You know, there was a time when and it was just about I just got to get the music heard. I just got to be able to pay my rent. And that has been I won't even say there's a time. That time still exists, and it exists in every facet of the music business. It exists in all of the offshoots of the music business and all the ways in which the artist ends up at the bottom run and the artist for the most part has been black and brown people. That's been the people who have been doing the artistry since the beginning of this business. And so it makes all the things in the world that we end up at the bottom. I mean, come on, it's just right in line with all the other ship and that music. The problem with about listen, this is my thing at the end of the day, right, is that for me, I just can't be mad at artists and in general, but particularly at Blackpoole for just trying to live. I have an issue with the industry itself from making it so hard for us to do that, and that just doesn't make sense to me. And the only way we can do that is be independent. It's just hard to be independent when you're not in a free society, and society doesn't set you up. That's set up for you to fail, set up for you to be in bondage, set up for you to be in servitude. And that's just what it that's what it's set up for. And and I just don't see any way unless we just completely abolish this industry for to not be evil. And I do think it's evil. Anything that wants you to live under those kind of conditions is evil. It is the system. It is. I agree with you, but you can't take out your responsibility in the play. You can't do that. Why is my responsibility not just being faired, eating, taking care of myself? I understand it's always more of a black folks. I don't feel like I understand. I you know, this is gonna be one of those conversations because I just come from a different place. Come on from it. I come from a different place them it. You know, when money got tight, really tight, and we didn't have food in the cabinet, food showed up. Food showed up because my grandmother was kind and when she had a lot, she shared with people. So now here we are without much at all and people are sharing with us. I don't know what you're talking about. I I'm in a firm place that God will make a way out of out of out of no way at all, all the time. So when you're telling me that you joined, you got into this industry, and you ended up sleeping with a bunch of people to get to the top, it's it was a poortion of your choice, because that is not my experience. I know I'm just one person, but I am. But what do you tell a person who ain't got no grandma? What you're telling person with no grandma who mothers in jail. I'm saying there's an option. I'm saying that there's there's there's options. I'm not saying there's Well, we're going to anybody who's gonna touch you inappropriately, anybody that wants you to come into a back room and do something for them to pleasure them, and they're in your industry, they're not doing the right thing. They're wrong. It's fuck. You should walk away, run away, get away and try something else, and keep trying something else, and keep trying something else. That is not the people you need to be around. If it's your manager, setting you up to be in a three song. That ship happened, the fun that happened. I forgot about that, but yeah I did, Yeah I did, because ain't ship happened. I got the hell out of there. I was like, wait, a minute, who late? Is funny? A minute? Boyfriend show? I'm setting close to me. What I'm saying that I guess my vibe at the end of the day is fuck the manager. Funk whoever does business with the manager put that ship on blast. We spent a lot of time telling artists, women people what they shouldn't do, but we don't spend enough time telling this industry that we number one, don't need it, and number two that we're not going to allow them to exist under these conditions. I can't get into what's on a woman's mind when she allows her body to be used or sold. I can't get into that because I, like you said, I don't relate. I've never been that desperate before. But to pretend that that kind of desperation is a lack in judgment only is not fair. I'm not saying it's a lack of judgment. I'm saying that you have and option. You always have an option. Hopefully in this moment they listen to Jadi Il or Lisa Auntie or work with in the sense of the I did demolition. Don't tell me that. There's no way I'm a woman with breast doing demolition. My back is still jacked up to this day. I wanted to learn how to act, could not afford school. Found Ozzie Jones, called me and found an apprenticeship. I mouthed them floors, I cleaned them toilets, I sold them tickets, iron nose costumes. I hung nose lights for a hundred and fifty dollars a week. They did happen to give health insurance. Hallelujah. But that's not enough to live off of. Okay, acting lessons, But you think all of that has to do with who you are and the women who brought you up as a woman. In a way like I think that's that's all. I think Asia was saying, in a way everybody doesn't have that. I need you to get it, though, Okay, I need you to get it instead of falling prey to something, I'm trying to let you know what it is. If somebody pull you in the back room and try to get you to do something that you don't want to do. Maybe maybe it's just you don't want to do it tonight. Maybe you would think about doing it later. That's your business, but you don't have to do anything you want to do. And guess what, when you're in a situation like that, you must call it out right then and there, that part right in and there, don't wait till later. Don't be right then. And their parents. I know, you might want your child to sing a song because they can sing a song, praise the Lord, but you can't leave your children with these grown ups that you don't know because they're in the industry, because they have a nice car, and they say, you know, all kinds of things to your kid to hype them up, to get them where you think they need to be. You can't not leave your children alone with them. You don't know that. Let me let me say, let me say, I gotta message all so to some folks that things like this don't happen where people don't know. See, the ignorant is one thing, but the people who know that's something different. So I look at it like this. Don't be in public saying you love black people, and then behind closed doors allowing black people to be used and abused on your watch. Oh that's the music business. I'm sorry, but that's what we're talking about, right me, talking about the fact that, yeah, a person can walk away, walk away, but it's gonna be that person that's so vulnerable that they don't have that strength. And so we have to think about the most vulnerable person. We talked about this on the show all the time. The question is not about the person strong enough. The question is about is the person who's weak, the person who's most vulnerable. Are they protect fide and to the way I look at I mean, and I look at what you're saying is true. Don't get me wrong. A person today, you're going somebody, you wanna save somebody because somebody's gonna hear what you said and they're gonna take key to it. I said, well, I don't wanna. I don't. I don't want to act like that's not the case. But for me, it's like we have to be more cognizant of the fact that the victim, the person who's being abused, is not the own person responsible for their safety. That we have to be have a sense of responsibility for one another. We have to have a sense of responsibility for all because you never know when you're gonna be the vulnerable person. If you're a vulnerable depending on where room you're in. If you put me in a room full of scientists, I don't know ship about what they're talking about. Some of it you know, some of his ages, it don't I'm not. I don't know well. I know a coint I know a six team. Know I'm joking. I don't think that we're we're at all having an argument or or arguing between each other. I think I'm loud. No, I just I think that we're on the same plane. Right. But when we're talking about the evils of the industry, and I hear it so much music businesses as evil as evil. I've been like, I said, you guys, that whole Illuminati ship that I was in the Illuminati, I was like, I don't even know them. I mean, I've never got nothing like I'm not a card like that. I don't get a membership party or something like. I should know this, right, you know, I don't see it. And you're too earthy for the bulet. So that just blew my mind. With this evil I had to set this. I was like, she's too earthy for the buleg that part. I'm under the I'm about to the table, ladies and gentlemen, just a table, And I'm under she has the paper bag test. I'm sorry that she not today, not today. I'm sorry We're about to get in good black trouble for that one weak raw chicken. Bless her hard chicken. Baby. Look, there is no shame to this blackness or me all kinds of things that goes from golden brown, the red, sometimes green. Deal with it or don't. That's the beauty of it. I want to talk about just the whole money factory, Like I want to talk about this. We congratulate a lot of people in the music business for making money and then we elevate them as this show a black excellence, and particularly the music business and in sports, but particularly in the music business. If you make a lot of money in the music business, then you are like a jewel in the crown of black achievement. And it's like for me, I feel like there's something about that that don't settle in my heart because I'm thinking to myself, like I know how people make money in this business. I know how many people are under the foot of that. And we in the history of the black Black History Month, the history of the history of the Black moth more, we're in Black History Month, and it's like, you know, you mess around and see some of these folks being lauded during this time, and it's kind of like, wow, this is where we're at. Just any person who got a lot of money is worthy is our lauding and respect business. It's about her. It's not about your health or your wealthing, or your heart, or your family or your education. It's about month. How do you and not reconcile that? Because I have a hard time and why Asian usually says the supremacy. It is always that's the white supremacy of it. All that bothers me. But in the I'm sorry, you gotta have a story. I would just wanted to say, since we're talking about the money, Okay, musicians, when you come into a studio, make sure you have a split sheet when you walk out that is signed by everybody. That one Now that now that's information, that's the information right there. That producer might sample that one thing that you did and make something out of it over and over again. You never know you have to walk out of the room with a sign split sheet by everybody. Tech. Everybody got to sign. Everybody that's in the room got to sign it. Ship. That's a good lesson. Try right there, I got one, I got one. What's you guys? Stuff? Please Lord, Please Lord? Do not sell your publishing about it. Don't do it. Do not do it? Please now, miss Asia. It sounds really easy. But if somebody offered me like a hundred thousand dollars or more, I mean, I can write something of visually that's new, you know, and it'll be fine. Okay, So let me let me, let me let me put you this way. You want a hundred thousand dollars for your publishing? You just said that, right, Yeah, that's okay. I wrote a song that was never even number one twenty years ago. You understand what I'm saying to you, Okay, I make so. I don't want to say exactly, but I try to figure it out. Let me just say that this is one song. We're talking about this one song, one song, and I've written every song except for three on seven albums come moment. So what I'm saying is that one song I wrote, you know, Okay, I can make that. I can make that money back in a year less than no, not less than less than two years, right, so you can make it back. So the point is, why would I take that up front if I can make that money back in a year or two of one song and that was twenty years ago. Okay, do you understand what I'm saying? My point is, it's never worthy it never the numbers are never worthy. They're never worth it, and they're never worth it in books, they're never worth it. In movies. There are people who have, for example, the whole thing with Star Wars. It's like people who have taken shares of movies when they did a small movie or whatever the case. And being in a blue up, all this different stuff. All of this, these moments where we give away our work are all moments that we have to consider as they that are on money that's on the table, and not just money, but just accessibility to the thing that you created. It's not even always about the money, warned, it's being able to do whatever you want with your ship. I can't do anything with my music without permission from s and not because I don't own the publishing, Because I don't own the master recording. Come on, well, boys and men, they said that they wrote that whole first album. That's Michael Bevin's money. Just I just want people to think about that, think about all of the songs. All he did was Shane changed the title. That's Michael Bivins said. He said, you should. That sounds good, but you change that title. Oh, I'm gonna taking some of that money. I'm not talking bad about Michael Benson. This is the this is the music business. That's the funny part. Like, I'm not insulting him, because if you don't, you're not insulting him. What you're what you're bringing light on is that black folks do this to other black That's what I'm saying. Well, what is motown? What is what is still in the national with it? I mean yes? And so this whole conversation, to be honest with y'all, made me go back to what WHI y'all always talk about about, and about our ideas of success and how we still follow like the white man's vision of success in his way of getting there. Oh you gotta that's the system, that's the that's the yeah. Yeah, It's just one of those things that we can't want so badly to to function within it. But the truth of the matter is that if we choose a function within it, these are realities that were great we deal with and unless you just break the whole thing down, and breaking the whole thing down starts getting into a much more difficult, much more why range conversation about who gaykeepers are and you know, and em power and money and you know, all these different things that that eventually become a bigger conversation that are tied into the country we live in, in the world we live in, and the way that it's set up, it's like it has those kind of global implications. It just doesn't have. It's not a simple conversation. And I know sometimes we have this feeling like we can come up with a set of rules and if we follow those rules, then we can navigate this thing and survive it. And the truth is, yeah, we might survive it, but as a whole we're not going to We're gonna continually see many many casualties, many many many casualties, and we will not be the victor. You'll have a few people who get by. Prince said it himself, You're gonna have a few have a few that's going with, but the majority of you will not. It's the nature of the system that is what I'm realizing now. We'll be back after the break. Like Okay, I went on tour two different tours. One of them I did not feel treated very well. I went on another tour and it taught me how to tour. I couldn't tor to that capacity, still haven't been able to, but it taught me how to tour. The one when it was time for me to tour, I did not want to do it like a I wanted to more like be be exactly. Yeah, I'm saying to you that it's very important for you to make decisions. And if somebody is pressing your back against the wall, if you don't sign this, if you don't do this, if you don't do this, you really need to ask for a day. Just ask for a day if you know you feel pressed and you know this is gonna change your life, and it's something that you really need to do, is deep in your soul to be a part of this. Just give yourself some time and consider all the things you have to understand what's in your contract. You cannot blindly it's your life, the one life you got, the one life you got, and you have an opportunity to are your talents. You have to pay and you banish your work. And it's your work that will outlast your life. And that's the thing about the publishing agent, because the work will outlast your life. It's the Yeah, money is great, I get that part, but oh that my my work no longer belongs to me and the the integrity that I have in places or get get put on you know, like we're talking about. But the but the thing is that to to not own your work, that's the basics. That's not even like an extra evil. That's the evil that's woven into the basics. Like you can't sign a deal without signing the way some ownership unless you are doing things like and I will say this right now, you have a lot of joint venture conversation where people do that, or licensing where people do that where they have agreements with people for a time period where it's like I'm able to get to get the full ownership back after that time period of that joint venture is over. So I just I want to be clear with with artists that may not understand some of this language that yes, no matter what you do, signing on with partnership in this business does mean signing over some ownership um, whether it's a joint venture or three sixty. But what we're saying is that the three sixty is on the on the way, on the other end of the spectrum that you want to avoid complete. You want to be able to write your own destiny, have a measure of self determination where you're just not sitting in a room and signing over all of your rights and the opportunity is up to you. Mm hmm, walk in with your eyes open and please no. We we talked a lot about I'm not saying us personally, I'm saying that I hear it so much, the evil of the music industry. Let me just be clear, Oh friends, it's evil everywhere everywhere. It's it's in in medicine for parmaceuticals, it's in your your children's education, it's it's in your church, it's it's I don't know, Jill, some of them facilities got better hr situations in the music industry. I'm gonna just tell you, like just it's different matter that specifically, but it's something we're talking about industry that human beings are running human greedy, They have a tendency to be spiteful, they have tendency to be jealous, a lot of stuff that goes with people, and and if they've been duped once or twice, And I've come across those kinds of artists that have been duped, so in turn they want to dupe other people because they think that that's the that's the system, that's how good. You have a choice. You don't have to do that. Ill last ship, you don't have to do that. You don't have to know. But what I think what happens is that there's there's agreements about accessibility if you want a certain amount of accessibility. It happens in politics, happens everywhere. And this is the problem with representation being being the thing. When we're so pressed to have quote unquote representation, we set people into a room where it's like we allowed you in here, but in order to be a part of this, you have to basically run the same program. We're just asking to be the black face of it, or be the brown face of it, or be the female face of it. And so we gotta continue to just turn back to this idea that the system itself has to be shifted, you know, always just be about the individual. Yeah, the individual can get in there and change a lot of things. Think about Tony Morrison, who we you know, love here on the show and love in real life that you know, she worked for a major publishing company and she brought people in there that would have never gotten book deep radicals people at the time that that governments were afraid of George Jackson and Angela Davis. So, yeah, you can be positioned in a certain place and make a different decision. I believe that. But I think ultimately what we're talking it about is shifting the whole thing, like reorganizing the whole thing, because eventually it's going to get the best of us, because it's set up to do so. I have a label, and I tried once. I tried once with an artist, and I realized, you know, I'm going with all the things that I've learned from being an artist and signing with the record label and distribution and all of that, that I didn't want to treat them the way that I was treated, and I wanted to be cognizant of what they needed and what was fair, and that was a tog of war because it wasn't as it was not as easy as I thought I was expected to present as labels do. And I'm like, but we're coming from a different place. We have to approach it in a different way. And ended up partying ways with the r is because I wasn't slick enough, you know. And I'm not trying to say that in any way, But what I said, I said I wasn't slicking up. I wasn't trying to beat the industry over the head or beat I'm like, I believe that things happened with the sweet start. So I think that things happen organically if you put them in the right hands, and it's a gentle touch, it's not pushy. If it's dope, it's dope. Watch my theory anyway, But it didn't work out. What you're saying speaks to the expectation that artists have and what they see. Yes, they see things happen in a certain way, and they believe that that means that that's good marketing, that's good promotion, that's good such and they have no idea the kind of manipulation, lying, cheating that goes on in order to achieve that look. So when they can't get the look, they believe that they're not being served. But if they were really being served, what they were really be getting is screwed. So I think a lot of times it's about the perception sometimes the artist and their perception of what is quote unquote successful like like he has said, is problematic. But again that goes back to the industry, the smoke and mirrors of it all and how it presents itself. It's you know, it's a it's it's a criminal outfit. Yeah, I'm about the saying it's a criminal outfit. It's literally a show about to come on. You know what's funny, it's literally a show on b et about the criminal outfit. Relation to the music business where they have folks like sir I'm talking about you in a very positive play, Sir Haitian, Jack m Steff, Mircael, Flocker's mama, all these people who were speaking about just their relation to the streets and the music. But we all know that this industry before all was like Agent say, it goes back to that in the first place. It's it's all. It's what I love is that we do have some artists now who liked Uh, yeah, I'm gonna say that. Whereas I think, you know, we came up at a time where it was just very taboo to talk about it. The only people who would talk about it were artists who were older and the crime of their careers, had got their money, right, And so I think that now what we're seeing is artists that are a little braver, right, And maybe they didn't read us the finger too, you know, and so they're kind of like, uh and and they got likes and streams, so they don't feel like in a way that I don't need you. I don't need you, right, and us who taught us that master named Perry what's his real name? Why you got me messed up? If you want to ask me, I wouldn't Percy, sir, sir by example, Yeah, yeah, something. I don't said this so much. I feel like I could choke myself. But I'm saying again that it is night in the Pips. You got your Shock, you got your Dyana Ross, you got your Nipsey Hustle, you got listen. I'm not a little sorry. You got your Nina Simone, you got your Billie Holiday. There's varying degrees of a career. There's varying degrees of success. It's it matters what is success to you. My goal has always been longevity. If I like doing this, and as long as I'm enjoying doing this, I hope to be able to do this, whatever this thing is, whatever you know, the job is at hand. I want to be able to do this until I don't want to do it anymore, you know what I mean. I don't know if I see that in a lot of artists these days. I don't know. I feel like a lot of folks to try to get that bag and be out Jill, but something to say, because I feel like, and I'm not an artist, but it feels like art is made in that way as well, like your art is made in that way that you want to be here for a while. I don't know. I don't know. I k Beverly and Maze. I hope that we get to hear the plethora of artists that do think this way. I think there's a lot of them. I think what happens is there's always gonna be people who are at the top top, and that's not always going to be reflective of the mentality that we talk about here, it just isn't. You're gonna have You're always gonna have folks who think differently and who are functioning from a place from their heart and longevity and want to be doing this and they love gigging them doing this, and they're not trying to explain anybody but blah blah. But you know, there's always gonna be the mess. The mess is always gonna be, dear, and you're right Asian, you know what. I want to correct myself because a matter of fact, sometimes I feel like you need one for the other. Even in radio and black radio, where people are complaining that songs was playing, you know, the same ones every every hour. Whatnot nice to be like, yeah, it's some of these songs. It's real easy to hear him a lot, right, but the real good stuff is hard. Right. It's a reason for that, Like you, it's a reason for that. Like no, that know that if somebody is constantly feeding you something that that might not be the best for you. And I used to get in trouble for saying that on the radio, but that's the damn true. Yeah, that speaks to that choice. You were positioned to push back at a thing, and you did that, you know what I mean, and whether and somebody heard it, and many people heard it and appreciated that point of view, and to this day still do. The positioning is always gonna be the way that we win this. I mean that we win as much as we can, but the positioning can. We've been trying that a long time, and we talked about this all the time. It's not like we haven't been trying that. And then truly we're gonna have to shut it down. But I will say this much. The music business has changed so much in the last few years that it got scared that it was gonna go that it was going implode. And and that was one of the most wonderful things to watch to a degree because it was just like, oh, mass so scared. You've seen you've seen that and them coming down the road and you was like, oh, wait a minute, I think the sweet years are up. But one thing about the impression is that he's crafty. So for this new environment, I'm really curious to know what you guys are feeling and telling young people because this this isn't the industry we came up in. We're not experts of this no. So I'm just curious what y'all are telling people, because I know young people are coming to both of y'all like, Yo, what am I supposed to do? How do I you know, outside of these things that we're telling them around, you know, contractual things just about how to move into line from so line from my show. But it hit me, Hazel says. If millennials have ship else, they've got the fucking audacity. Baby, Hi, young people, Hi, sweet baby, Hi. You're doing it different. You're doing it different. You do not have to fall prey to anything. I'm not saying that you won't even with you, which good mind on, but you don't have to do things that will make you stay up at night where you can't look yourself in the mirror. You don't have to do that. There's so many ways to skin a cat. There's you know that's gross, but there's so many ways to do what it is that you want to do, starting with your own voice recorder, because when a motherfucker do you get it on? Take I would you? You got your you got your voicey, you got all these apps that you can do with yourself and unthing and pay attention and you can put out a song or two with a couple of friends, and then you say, I charge you four dollars for this, and they pay it and you say, hey, hey, you know that adds up. It's a It's many ways to get where you want to go on that path. You do not have to sell your soul. You do not have to put yourself in positions that will harm you. You don't have to do it. I'm here to tell you you don't have to do it. I didn't have to suck nobody, no way, no time I did. I didn't. Actually somebody, I'm married to him, but you know we met. But you had a career before this. This is what we're saying. Oh, you had a deal before you got married. You like to before you started singing. I was just messing with y'all. But but I feel, I feel, I feel where you come from. But I do because I do know for women that it can be. It's always extra tricky. No matter what I tell people, this this tricky for guys to Yeah, yeah, yeah, for God's too. For sure. Absolutely, amen, you're absolutely right. We're gonna take a quick break and then it will be right back. I've said this in different panels or whatever it is. That one thing I feel like it's never gonna go out of style is community. Because your resources are to your left and your right, they always are. The building of community makes your work and your crash stronger. And if you start looking at people. And one of the things I learned over the years, and we're doing kids Resistance stuff, was that will we'll interview somebody who's music we like, and as they start telling their story, oh, they're linked to like five six other people. And I may not even know that, but that those those artists, those producers, those writers were part of their community, and that the strength of the work that they were doing was tied into their friends, were tied into the people they were just hanging out in the studio with the people who were in that space with them during that time. It goes back to Harlem Renaissance, It goes back into what happened in Philly in the early two thousands. Why I mean, but even the perception of Black Lily, but even the thing that was actually real did have a sense of community in it. No matter what, no matter what other drama was happening, that sense of community was there, and people did bounce off of each other, and people did most definitely support one another and root for each other and work together. So and that that mentality in rap music, I mean hip hop music, and soul music and jazz and gospel. You'll find that repeated every single place you see aren't being made. So I don't think that's ever gonna go out of style. I think that thing will stand at tested. I like that you gave a solution or a resource. It's like your community. Your network is your network. I would say, I don't know that it's everybody, but I know when it comes to light here, ain't Claire. My network is definitely my nets work you want because you see these two ladies, they yeah, that was a lot of years and networking and getting drinking and being wonderful and yes, yes, but those relationships and heaven immaculate titties. By the way, I say the same thing all the time. They're beautiful. It's the BRI's jail whose teddies? Whose titties look like this? Because we're talking about all kinds of things there. We're not for the butterfly bro I'm sorry. Go ahead. Well that's the second time, and today somebody to mention that bribe of me. Somebody said, you need to bring that drawing back. I just appears just I agree. I do own the pack again. J Scott, come on, you got to teach and bring the lesson back. She said he should bring them less of that time. VNTO that that's my friend. She's so smart. Sometimes being and I'm just speaking from my position in this industry, sometimes being not the most famous person is a real place of peace of one. I figured that. I think sometimes we might want to normalize not necessarily being an uber famous. I like that I haven't established you know, audience, but I think you do get to a point you can't control it happens who it happens to. But when it doesn't happen, I think there's a place that we have to get to. It's just like, okay, let me let me consider the blessing in this moment, because there is one, and you don't have to be always necessarily fair game for certain evils, certain things that people are coming from people, the wants and the needs to always make money off you, to do this to you, to do that to you, to use you as a come to do the but of proxity tell you about your music while you're getting a PEPs mair. Tell you about your music while you're getting the paps. That has never happened to me. Yeah, yeah, please take that into considerations. Inity is gone. It's gone. Once it's a gone, it's gone. You can't get it back. But I think more people need to see that life. People don't see that life, thought, Jill, I haven't seen you know, Jody widely in a long time, you know, but if she came down the street, my soul I'll be like, oh yeah, that's rabbit hole coming. Come on. However, going back to what you're saying that, I mean, once it happens, it's it's happened. It's happened. It's just funny to me. People need to see like well working artists that can actually do make a living off their art that aren't super duper famous. But that's the dream, that's the right, Like I said, initial goal to be able to make a living and not have to do some other side job and just live right right like and same is the goal for certain people. That's true, But then you start to see what comes with that. Yeah, what's her name? Laky? Laky? Like forty seven. Oh, nobody knows what she looked like. And she's so about oh likeckily Lakilly. It's from Asian Yo. She bit. She can sit. She'll see she's the dope one with the dope flowers. No, she has the mask on made out of a bandana. She is ill. I wouldn't know her said, is the smartest thing she could have ever done. I would. I wanted her to stay in her anonymity, you know, um for her sake. But she's very smart and she'll be just fine. Sia is out here, you don't know. She might be it behind you at the gas station. And her anonymity, she can go and do concerts. Some people doom had his nobody knew you know what I mean. If you can find a way to keep that, it's so precious. It's so precious as an artist to just be sitting apart and have a moment. You know, I always go to the park, that's my ship. But to sit in a moment and just I don't know, watch life happened. That's where the a lot of inspiration comes from. Just watching the world. People are interesting. You can see romance, butting, you can see a fight about about to start, you know, argument of something. It's also interesting Fatina and I used to go on the restaurants and try to guess how long the couples have been together by how they was acting at the table. It is. I just want to say that everybody listening, like say, I mean we laugh a joke or whatever, but this is a really great opportunity to get two different ideas of what this music business is and not too different, but still you guys went in different directions and in a lot of ways. So I just think it's it's a nice time to just take advantage of this education because the whole education. It's the whole education. Thank you, Asian and Jill. I'm acting like I'm a listening. Hey, y'all a pleasure you've been in too. Yeah, you got gonna say girl stop yeah, already in your ground and you ask questions and you bucked against the system again and again and again. So this is why we ended up being together after all of these years. You know what I'm saying, Like we've all we just starts shooting going different directions still every now and then to get a phone call, how you doing, girl, what you're doing? What you read what it's like, don't say that, you know what I mean, having those moments and then all of these years coming back together. It's it's about the decisions that you made and the ones that you didn't. Yeah, yeah, I think overall, I'm glad that the one thing I didn't listen to was that the way that that my career had to look a certain way. You know, I'm really glad listen to that, you know what I mean? And and I know Jill can relate to this as well, because you know, I had a kid, and I had another kid right before our first album came out, and then we're on the cover of the album. I was very pregnant, and just all of those things like, oh, you won't ever be able to make it in this industry like that. Nobody wants to hear married couple, Nobody wants to hear by love all the time, Nobody wants to all the things nobody quote unquote wanted to hear. So I'm just glad that I didn't let that we didn't And here we are in where somebody has build a Black love empire. Shoutout to Tommy Oliver and Cody Lane. I'm just yeah, we just spoke with them recently. I just I'm just that's crazy. I'm sorry. Yeah, yeah, this conversation can absolutely go on forever. Really, it really good good because years and years of experience inside of something that has been both there's moments of detriment and there's moments of sheer brilliance. Remember what to be grateful for. That's all of it, Darling, the whole thing. Don't forget to be grateful. In the mysterie how Do You Eat an Elephant? One by it Tide? Hey, what's up everybody? It's producer Eves back again to share the resources for this episode. Other than the tips that the ladies gave in the show, they also recommend a book, The Music Business Toolbox, Actionable Business Guidance for Musicians From Recording to Royalties by Brian Calhoun with Kristen Thompson. You should also check out the book Everything You'd Better Know About the Record Industry for artists, songwriters, producers, musicians, and music entrepreneurs. Both of them are useful guides for avoiding mistakes where you can and setting yourself up for success in the music industry. You can find links to these books in the episode description. Hi if you have comments on something you said in this episode called eight six six. Hey, Jill, if you want to add to this conversation, that's eight six six four three nine five four five bick. Don't forget to tell us your name and the episode you're referring to. You might just hear your message on a future episode. Thank you for listening to Jill Scott Presents Jay dot Il the podcast. This podcast is hosted by Jill Scott, Layah st Clair, and Aga Graden Danceler. It's executive producers are Jill Scott, Shawn g and Brian Calhoun's produced by La Saint Clair and me Eve Jeff Cope. The editing and sound design for this episode we're done by Christina Larenger. Yeah. Do you remember the last point we made about was that making a bad decision can hurt that part. You gotta think about what it is that you doing when you're walking tell of thame. Uh. You gotta think about what's best for you? What what do you need? It's your one. You don't want to suck it up but not thinking. Hi, Hi, these are my thoughts here I'm sharing with you. J dot Ill is a production of I heart Radio. For more podcasts from I heart Radio, visit the I heart Radio app, Apple podcast, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.