Black Music Month QLS Classic: Donnie Simpson

Legendary radio DJ and television VJ Donnie "Green Eyes" Simpson spoke about getting into radio at 15, breaking some of the biggest artists and songs of his time and the key to success: being true to yourself.

 

 

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Quest Love Supreme is a production of iHeartRadio. This classic
episode was produced by the team at Pandora.

Speaker 2 (00:09):
What up, y'all, it's unpaid bill Fromquest Love Supreme. As
you may have seen throughout June, we are celebrating black
music model by releasing an episode every day. So every
day you added here especially picked QLs Classic, and on
Wednesdays we are dropping new two part episodes with Wayne
Brady and the legendary James Poyser, both of which were
filmed in studio. Black music is deeply important to me
and has been an influence throughout my entire career.

Speaker 3 (00:29):
It's also something to celebrated here at QLs.

Speaker 2 (00:32):
Back in twenty seventeen, we had Donnie Simpson on QLs,
the Radio Hall of Fame inductee, spoke about his journey,
his impact, and cultivating a personality that emphasized the power
of broadcasting. We are so glad you're tuning in.

Speaker 3 (00:50):
Here we go.

Speaker 4 (00:52):
Supremo, Sun Supremo Row, Suprema Sun Supreme O, Row called
Suprema something something, Supremo roll call some Prema.

Speaker 3 (01:05):
Some some Supreme roll.

Speaker 5 (01:08):
Cool Quest Yeah, Yeah, I Got soul, Yeah, Donnie Simpson
Cool Yeah, Life Goals.

Speaker 4 (01:15):
Cora something Supremo, roll called Suprema something something Supremo roll.

Speaker 3 (01:24):
My name is Fante, Yeah, rocking your world.

Speaker 6 (01:27):
Yeah, when my hair gets dry, Yeah, I use Donny's
Supercurl roll.

Speaker 7 (01:34):
Supremo roll Come, Supremath something Supremo roll call.

Speaker 3 (01:39):
My name is Sugar Yeah like Sugar Ray. Yeah, it's
great to be here with a real DJ. Suprema Son
something Supremo roll paid Bill. Yeah, I ain't got no problems. Yeah.

Speaker 2 (02:00):
Out out to North Korea and Dennis Rodmin.

Speaker 7 (02:04):
Pray Son Supprame A roll call Supreme Son Son Supreme.

Speaker 3 (02:11):
Roll is here. Yeah, not far from Mars. Yeah, shot
for the Moon. Yeah, still among the stars.

Speaker 4 (02:19):
Roll call, Pray something Supreme A roll call suprameer some
something Suprame roll.

Speaker 8 (02:28):
It's like and damn it, I'm hip. Yeah, Simpson in
the place.

Speaker 9 (02:41):
Something something up. Roll call. My name is Donnie.

Speaker 10 (02:45):
Yeah.

Speaker 9 (02:45):
They called me green Eyes.

Speaker 11 (02:47):
Yeah.

Speaker 9 (02:47):
If I could finish this rap, yeah that would be
a surprise.

Speaker 7 (02:52):
So Pray s Sun Up Brave A roll call, so
Pray sup Prame A roll call Supramo, roll Suppramo Son
so Supreme.

Speaker 5 (03:10):
People out, So you quite audible with telling you you're
gonna say Donnie Simpsons year right.

Speaker 8 (03:19):
I'm not said written down?

Speaker 3 (03:21):
Okay, run anyway.

Speaker 5 (03:23):
Anyway, ladies and gentlemen, welcome to another episode of Quest Love.

Speaker 3 (03:29):
I'm your host, chuss Love.

Speaker 9 (03:31):
Uh.

Speaker 3 (03:31):
We have teams Supreme with us. Uh like you in
the place sees love in the house.

Speaker 5 (03:39):
Yeah, Quest Love is always in the house. Sugar Steve
is here. We got fun take alo uh unpaid Bill?

Speaker 9 (03:45):
Yeah, Hey, how you doing.

Speaker 3 (03:47):
I'm happy to be back.

Speaker 5 (03:48):
You've been so quiet that last few and I'm so
glad that you're here.

Speaker 3 (03:52):
And bost Bill's here as well.

Speaker 11 (03:55):
Uh.

Speaker 3 (03:55):
I will say that every culture UH needs a pioneer,
and our guest today is beyond pioneer. For thirty years his.

Speaker 5 (04:06):
Morning show and WPGC the Doninice Simpson Morning Shows trail
Blazed and dumb wonders for the culture of soul and
R and B. And I guess you could say that
he's attained god status in the eyes of all of
us in this room for seventeen years as the host

(04:29):
of Ola La Video Soul norn BT, which practically gave
the world its first view of artists like Whitney, Houston
and Usher. You've done in depth conversations with greats like
Aretha Franklin, anybody from the Purple Camp that I've not

(04:51):
seen on any other networks.

Speaker 3 (04:53):
Jesse Johnson, Yes, Jesse.

Speaker 5 (04:55):
I mean the time, the list goes on and on,
and he's just known for his his his grace, his
his his knowledge of music. I mean, do you imagine
that once upon a time there were hosts of radio
shows and video shows.

Speaker 3 (05:11):
That actually had knowledge of the music. And yeah, that's
who would have thought.

Speaker 5 (05:17):
That's that's a novel that's sadly missed right now. But
more than anything, this this episode will probably be a
masterclass on how to host.

Speaker 3 (05:29):
Such so you can use Yeah, it would sound like
an amateur my favorite. Please welcome Dottie Simpson to ourself.

Speaker 9 (05:39):
Thank you, well, thank you, thank you, quest love appreciate
you bro.

Speaker 3 (05:43):
Yo, he just said name.

Speaker 5 (05:50):
Of of all the episodes, this is probably the one
that I will be the most nervous because I mean,
I we all grew up with his voice and always
a Managine the day that we have an opportunity. I
never thought that my first time sitting with Donnie Simpson
would be on your show, not this show.

Speaker 9 (06:10):
Well, I'm honored to be here man, I really am.
This is awesome. Man. I'm a big fan of yours.

Speaker 3 (06:15):
Bro.

Speaker 5 (06:15):
I yeah, I know it sounds like false honesty whenever
I say like, I can't believe you.

Speaker 3 (06:20):
Know I'm alive, But I mean that's really.

Speaker 9 (06:23):
Oh for really man, mad respect for you, Thank you,
thank you, thank you, and a lot of people in
this room, not all of them, but a lot of
sorry that.

Speaker 3 (06:41):
He shut you down.

Speaker 5 (06:44):
So you're you're actually I know that we're lucky to
have you today because you are going to induct uh
your friends tonight.

Speaker 9 (06:55):
Well I'm not actually inducting them. I'm just there, sport, Yeah,
just there in support.

Speaker 3 (07:00):
It's amazing.

Speaker 5 (07:01):
Yes, I know that no one is a bigger fan
of Jimmy dam and Terry Lewis and the Time Family been.

Speaker 9 (07:06):
Oh no doubt you are.

Speaker 3 (07:08):
Even to this day. I still watch your interviews on
YouTube with those guys.

Speaker 9 (07:11):
And yeah, man, and those are my toughest interviews too.
It's funny because yeah, because they were we were boys.
You know, we're so close. So my toughest interview you
mentioned Sugar Ray Leonard, Sugar Ray Leonard, Jimmy jam and
Terry Lewis and Smoky like those really boys always the
toughest interviews because you know, you know them so well,
and then all of a sudden you're in this formal setting.

(07:34):
You know, you got to ask questions, and they're like,
well you're asking me that. You know that, But it's
just weird to me.

Speaker 5 (07:39):
It's like those are your especially when you when you
did the I think the Pandemonium interview back in like
nineteen ninety.

Speaker 3 (07:47):
One, yeah time.

Speaker 5 (07:48):
Yeah, like that was the first time where you know,
normally there's there's a cool demeanor about you, but then
like I saw you just as the Billy Press into
their beatles, like the Times. Wow, it was just like, oh, well,
Donnie Simpsons just like he's one of the one of
the crew, and he was on the records.

Speaker 9 (08:07):
That's yeah, that's right, the Pandemonium malvel Wow, that's right. Well,
you know, that's very flattering to say that. And I
remember when they got their starring the Hollywood Walk of Fame,
they said, man, all day long, all we kept saying
was just one person missing man, you know, and that
just you know what an honor. I mean, it wasn't me,
it was Billy Preston, but no, but you know, we

(08:31):
we are We're just friends like that. That that day
that we recorded that show, before we recorded it, Uh,
Jimmy and Terry set me down at the board in
the studio and they're playing the album for me, the
Pandemonia malvel So I'm sitting there and the intro comes on,
and you know, I do the intro. I'm doing this
intro and I'm sitting there like, how wait, what wait?

(08:53):
That's my voice? How did I can figure it out?
How they got me to do this introduction that I
didn't record. And what happened was that they had lifted
it from like five or six years prior to that.
I went to present them, just to introduce them at
the Minneapolis Black Musicians Awards shown and uh, and they

(09:16):
lifted it from that and used it as the intro
for the album. Man, I just it was just what
an honor to open up, to open up for the time.

Speaker 5 (09:24):
That's right, because they briefly when Mars did fish Nets.
I guess they briefly reunited as the time for that.
Were you actually introducing them back in eighty seven as
a full unit or were they just going on to
get an a warld.

Speaker 9 (09:38):
Wow in eighty Yeah, that was a full unit. Then, yeah,
that was the time that was everybody before Fishnet. As
a matter of fact, fish Net was a part of
that show that you're talking about. I think that I
think we introduced that then.

Speaker 3 (09:49):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, man.

Speaker 6 (09:50):
There's a video on YouTube of you and the studio
with them and they were playing the track for fish Net.

Speaker 3 (09:55):
Is that right? Yeah, yeah, they were, They were in
the studio together. That that was a few years earlier though.

Speaker 9 (10:00):
The song was so hot. Man.

Speaker 5 (10:03):
So you know you're those that know you well know
of your love affair with music. But yeah, where did
it start? Where did your what was your childhood into you?
As far as your relationship with music.

Speaker 9 (10:17):
I was always around music from the time I was twelve. Well, actually,
I'll say even earlier than that. I remember when we
got our first record player, and the first record we
got was The Drifters Save the Last Dance for Me,
and we would play that thing over. It is the
only record we had, so we played it.

Speaker 12 (10:33):
Over and over.

Speaker 9 (10:34):
Forty five yep, forty five and big was the household?
Oh it was six kids. I had a five boys,
one girl, my mom and dad, and so it was
eight in a little tiny house.

Speaker 8 (10:46):
Man.

Speaker 9 (10:47):
We had two bedroom house. Mom and dad had a bedroom,
my sister had a bedroom. Boys were upstairs. It was
like army bears up there lined up. Man, I'm telling you,
but you know, but my mother decided to open a
record shop when she when I was twelve, and so
I worked in that record shop from the time I

(11:08):
was twelve. So it was always around music, you know.
I knew when music came out, the day it came out,
you know, everything. And then we used to have a
little contest between each other. We go, all right, so
what do you think this is going to do? I said,
you know, I think it'll go number one R and B,
top ten pop, you know. And I would be right
all the time. Man, I would always be able to
predict them, you know. And I this other thing, And

(11:31):
I don't know if it's like I don't maybe it's
not psychic. Maybe it's just from experience of knowing people.
But I could see you coming across the street to
the record shop, and I'd go to the shelf and
pull off, say three songs and guarantee that they would
ask for those three, you know, and not two of
the three, but all three, you know. I would do

(11:53):
it all the time record with that. It was really good,
really good. Really?

Speaker 3 (11:57):
So what city is this? Detroit from you were born?

Speaker 9 (12:02):
So I grew up under Motown? Said wow, so don't
I'm not even can't even give Mama's Record Shop credit
for that. That's going back to the Motown Review, you know,
living there in Detroit under Motown with the temps. Man,
you know, I remember as a kid man, I used
to watch every Cadillac that went by, hoping you're gonna
see David Ruffman one of the Tempts, are some smoky

(12:23):
or one of their cousins would have just been just
just cool anybody man related. Sitting at the Motown Review,
my wife Pam is here with me, and she can
she remembers that so well. We would go down there, man,
I mean five shows a day with the Temptations, four
top supremes, Bobby Taylor to Vancouver's junior Walker, Smokey Robinson.

(12:46):
It was just endless, you know. So to grow up
under that, how could you not have a love for music, man,
you know? And so I was just always in that.
When I was fifteen, this radio station there, WJLB, had
a group that called the WJLB Sol Teen reporters. One

(13:08):
student from each public school came in once a week
recorded a little sixty second spiel about what was going
on at their school. We'd beat Pershing High last week,
fifty four to fifty two, cap and gown measurements of Friday,
the Lovers of the Week ad and the number one
song is you know that kind of thing.

Speaker 3 (13:22):
So I thought it was the upfront. I was like, wow.

Speaker 9 (13:27):
So they had asked me to do that for my school,
and so I kind of wasn't interested at first, but
finally my mother one day had a live broadcast with
a local DJ who came out and did his show
from there from the record store. And man, I went
into that booth and saw him doing his thing, man
and he's sitting here patting his foot to the music

(13:48):
man and grooving, And I was like, man, I could
do that, you know. And that was the very day
I fell in love with radio that I said, I'm
going to do that, And so I went and joined
the reporters, and in the I got so popular from
these little sixty second things that ran once maybe twice
a day, that I was more popular than the DJs

(14:11):
because I was his kid with a heavy voice.

Speaker 3 (14:13):
You know.

Speaker 9 (14:14):
And so they started putting me on on weekends for
three hours on Saturday, and that lasted for about two months.
They fired a guy who did eight to midnight weeknights
and asked me to sit in for him for one
week to give them time to find somebody else. I
sat there for seven and a half.

Speaker 8 (14:31):
Years, a teenager with a radio job.

Speaker 9 (14:35):
Oh yeah, I mean I couldn't even do my whole
show live because I couldn't work past ten thirty, you know.
So I used to go in after school.

Speaker 3 (14:42):
Yeah, so you've had that golden voice since you were
a teenager, since.

Speaker 9 (14:46):
My voice changed between the summer between seventh and eighth grade.
And I remember well because I was in the choir. Man,
I was the only male first soprano, which I love
because I sat with the girls. Next time I come
back and I'm this baritone, you know. But yeah, so,
I mean, so you know, I was really blessed to

(15:07):
have a start like that. Man, it was just it
was just heaven sent.

Speaker 3 (15:12):
So for you, was it always radio aspirations? Did you
have music? Like did you want to maybe be a
singer or.

Speaker 9 (15:18):
I still want to be a singer, but I don't
think I'm gonna make this. Will tell you, she tells
you two things. He ain't no singer, and he ain't
no rocket scientist.

Speaker 3 (15:35):
No no.

Speaker 9 (15:36):
But I mean, you know, I've always felt that anyone
who doesn't sing wants to sing or wants to be
a musician. As a matter of fact, I said, this
is my part of my induction speech when I was
inducted in the Rhythm and Blues Music Hall of Fame,
which was I said, this is just such an honor
for me because I've always felt that musicians always the

(15:59):
cooler people in the room, respect, questlove.

Speaker 3 (16:03):
You know, you're definitely learned from you.

Speaker 9 (16:09):
I offered as advice, I mean, as as proof. Prince
appearing at the Oscars, So you got the biggest stars
in the movie stars forty fifty million dollars a movie
Prince walked on that stage. They were like little girls,
you know, musicians man. And I said, you know, for
one night, y'all, let me in your group, you know,

(16:31):
And I appreciate that, just for one night. I could
never be I just always wanted to be cool enough
to be a musician. I just I just ain't gonna
make it.

Speaker 5 (16:40):
So did you have formal training when you finally started
to do this radio because most people they'll go to
artf programs in their colleges to learn how to you know,
do upfront and be prepared.

Speaker 3 (16:54):
We're going to put you to the test on that back. Yeah,
So you was it a learning curve where you just
had to learn on the spot how to do these things?

Speaker 9 (17:06):
Or well, it's you know, I started so young. I
mean I did go to school eventually. I mean I
was in school or in high school, but I went
to college and studied radio and TV also. But I
was already doing it. I mean, you know, I mean
I was one of the most popular DJs in Detroit
and here I am going to college. It was like

(17:29):
the experience. Nothing beats that, and you know that nothing
beats doing it, and so you know, I think it
was just kind of a natural, god given gift that
I had, and you know, they certainly taught me how
to develop it. Like in school, I learned how to
use my diaphragm, you know, those exercises like singers, you know,

(17:49):
because I remember, yeah, I remember my teacher coming up
to me in college one day. He walked up behind
me and he said, and I didn't know he was there.
He says, So, Donnie, how come you always talk like
this and hall? Because I'm a brother, That's how we
talk in the hall. But he's you know, he taught

(18:10):
me that you have to use your diaphragm, that you
you know, it's like a backhand in tennis. You got
to practice it so much that is second nature, that
that is the way you talk, and that you can
still be cool and talk from here. You don't have
to talk from here to be cool.

Speaker 3 (18:25):
You know. Have you ever interviewed Barry White?

Speaker 9 (18:30):
Oh yeah, Oh my god, I love Barry.

Speaker 5 (18:32):
Anybody ever seen interview Barry White will suddenly find themselves
trying to.

Speaker 9 (18:40):
No, man, I love my little boys too much. I'm
trying to get down there with beer.

Speaker 3 (18:50):
Okay.

Speaker 5 (18:50):
So this is whenever, whenever we have anyone that has
a notable radio experience on the show. Uh huh, we
asked them to front celle or back sell of song.
I'm pretty no, I.

Speaker 3 (19:06):
Don't even want to.

Speaker 9 (19:07):
He'll know he just ang hit it.

Speaker 3 (19:08):
Okay.

Speaker 5 (19:09):
Now see, now I got to pick this the perfect
song with either a short into or long into or
middle intro.

Speaker 3 (19:16):
What should I do? I think a long intro.

Speaker 8 (19:21):
But longs are easy, just so they're easier.

Speaker 3 (19:23):
But no, but what if it's.

Speaker 5 (19:27):
But if it's very wide extasy next, that's a one
minute minute. That's a woman in six Temptations.

Speaker 9 (19:33):
Papa was rolling Stone's to sixteen, so Jock worked for
me to actually hit that post once really to sixteen?

Speaker 3 (19:42):
Like, man, So wait a minute.

Speaker 5 (19:45):
If if there is long space in the front, are
you expected to fill every last ounce in?

Speaker 9 (19:51):
I don't think so. Well. You know that's interesting because
I think most radio people feel that you do.

Speaker 13 (19:57):
Uh.

Speaker 9 (19:57):
But to me, I love music so much that sometimes
the music should you talk all over? Love's Theme by
Barry White and the Love and the Orchestra. No, I mean,
you know, some of the music is so beautiful. It's
vocal in itself, you know what I mean. It's it's
you know, it has a moment where it's the intro

(20:20):
is over, song is started.

Speaker 3 (20:22):
Okay, yeah, are you ready for your I think so listen,
here we go.

Speaker 9 (20:28):
Oh it's magic onetle two point three. You're listening to
Dottie Simpson hanging out with Questlove. Weve got my boys
on the stage now, man, these dudes do it right.
Let's gonna get hot in here not hot enough norse
to sweat. You know, he doesn't sweat, He just kind
of SATs a kiss.

Speaker 3 (20:57):
So does this also mean that you have to study
the song? Yeah, as in you.

Speaker 5 (21:03):
I mean when you went at the at the at
the height of you being immersed inside of your your
your radio days, would you pick a designated day to
just study all the songs?

Speaker 3 (21:15):
Definitely?

Speaker 9 (21:15):
Not, definitely not. No, would never study. It's just knowing it.
It's just appreciating it. I know it because I love it.

Speaker 3 (21:25):
I see. You know.

Speaker 9 (21:26):
No, I've never studied songs. You thought, Wow, sit there
with a stop watch. This is eighteen seconds. You just
feel it, you know, you just know, you know, you
know where the song is.

Speaker 3 (21:34):
My songs usually have like a four bar eight bar
or whatever intro.

Speaker 11 (21:38):
Okay, all right, I see if you write it too,
it's a rhythm thing because that's what you were just doing.

Speaker 8 (21:43):
You were writing it, Yeah, like a musician. So again,
like a musician.

Speaker 3 (21:50):
Oh man, you wanted to make sure. So I will
say that Detroit is also.

Speaker 5 (22:02):
A very unusual town as far as music culture is concerned,
because of their appreciation for other cultures as well. You know,
at one point I knew that, Uh, I forget that
the Jay gile Bands song that that was like number

(22:22):
two on a particular station up there.

Speaker 9 (22:25):
I used to play, used to it was all kinds
of stuff about jailes.

Speaker 3 (22:30):
So what was it that made such a black city
so open to.

Speaker 5 (22:37):
Gary knew the talking heads or fail out or like
just because I would look up old playlists from all
their radio stations up there, and.

Speaker 3 (22:48):
It was endless. There were no boundaries on what was
black music.

Speaker 9 (22:53):
Right. I don't. I can't. I wish I could tell
you why we are that way, But I was always
that way, man, love, you know, and I feel like this,
you know for radio program directors or programmers that you know,
radio people feel that people's ears are a lot narrower
than they are. You know, people like different things, man,

(23:15):
And you know, I mean growing up in Detroit, I
mean I played I played all that stuff on the radio, man,
Without doubt, the biggest moment in my radio career was
breaking Benny and the Jets by Elton John. I've been
sitting around with my boy, man, he's turning me on
to Elton, right, And so I kept this went on

(23:36):
for a week, man, I said, Man, I love this song,
Benny and the Jets, man, And but I was scared
to play it because you know, black folks didn't really
know Elton, you know. And so finally I said, Man, Claude,
I'm playing this song, and I played it.

Speaker 11 (23:49):
Man.

Speaker 9 (23:49):
I played it twice that night, and I played it
the second time because the phone was jumping off the
hook from the first time. I'd never seen anything like
it before or since. It was so instant. The next morning,
the morning DJ calls me at home, wakes me up
at seven thirty, Donnie, what is this song you played
last night, Jitny and the Nets or something. Man, you

(24:10):
got to bring that down here. We got to play
it so fast that in two days Elton was on
the phone really from London called wanted to know what's
going on here. Benny and the Jets is breaking black
in Detroit.

Speaker 3 (24:26):
You know.

Speaker 9 (24:26):
He comes to Detroit four or five months later to
present me with a gold record for I mean, and
this is at the height of his career. Man, this
is you know, man, that just turned me out. Man.
It was just it was amazing. Man, It was just
an amazing moment. And always use it, especially now when
I tell that story. It's important because it saddens me

(24:50):
that there are young people in radio now with good
ears that can't express themselves musically. You know, sad to me, man,
you should be able to have a moment like that
to come in. I mean, DJ, I'm supposed to be
turning you on the music so it is understood.

Speaker 11 (25:08):
And then whatever radio station you go to that you
have that some kind of freedom in that way where
you can play what you you.

Speaker 3 (25:15):
Can take out in that way.

Speaker 8 (25:16):
Okay, you have freedom to play whatever.

Speaker 11 (25:20):
Absolutely, that's care because that's amazing because it's.

Speaker 5 (25:25):
The programming director that was ringing the emergency line. Like
I'm certain every radio station has that, the red phone.

Speaker 3 (25:32):
Whatever they do.

Speaker 9 (25:33):
Man, bro, you can get me starting.

Speaker 3 (25:36):
Are you playing Princess Dirty? Like I'm just saying like.

Speaker 9 (25:39):
They don't they know not to bother me with that.
I mean, I just you know, And I don't mean
that to sound vain. I think that I just you know,
they know that that's the only way I can work.
I'm not going to do this if you're going to
tell me how to do me, I can only do
me and uh and if it works. I told in
a negotiation for this return of mine. I said, Look,

(26:02):
it got caught up in a while, and I just
finally said, look, let's make it real simple. I do
what I do. If it doesn't work, you tell me,
I take my records and go home. You don't have
to boun the rest of the contract. Nothing. I'm just gone,
all right, Oh, I mean, you know, I just I
have to have that kind of freedom.

Speaker 3 (26:22):
Man.

Speaker 9 (26:23):
You know, I'm a look out the window kind of guy. Man,
how does the day feel? You know, because it's a
spirit that connects us all man. A computer can't do that.
You can't tell me that this song works today, this
day feels a certain way. I used to get it
when I did the Morning show Man once an hour,
I would get out and walk around the building just

(26:45):
to smell it. I need to smell the day, you know.
And I know it may sound strange to people, you know,
and you gotta have that to me, you know. And
as far as like calling jocks, you know, I programmed
WKYS in Washington for twelve years. I mean, and you

(27:05):
talk about a meteoric rise, I mean, and I didn't
even I kind of bumped into it. I wasn't trying
to program. I never wanted to program. I just wanted
to be a jock. But station was in sixteenth place.
We were losing so badly, and they said, what's wrong
with the station? I told him what I felt about it.
I said, well will you do that?

Speaker 3 (27:23):
Wow?

Speaker 9 (27:25):
Yeah, okay, I mean I felt like I can at
least do better than sixteenth. Man, we went from sixteenth
to number one and nine months, you know, and it
was just with feel, you know. I you know, I
don't have anything against research. Research is cool as long
as you use it. Don't let it use you. You know,
It's just another tool if you want to use it.

(27:46):
But I remember this programmer coming to me once had
done this big research project, payed like sixty five gram
to research all these songs, and he came to me
and he said, man, can do you know what the
number one song tested for us was? Said Marvin Gay,
Let's get it on. How did you know that? I
was like, I'm a brother, I live, this dog ain't

(28:12):
on safari, you know. So, but you know, when I
was programming, I wanted to just bring this up to
because it's you know, and and I certainly don't mean
to come off like I'm like chastising programmers. But you
know when I programmed Man Hotline hot you would it

(28:33):
would never ring. I never once called one of my
jocks during the middle of his show to tell him
something was that was bad. Hell, I know you know what,
you know what you did it. You know it's bad
more than I do. Why would I call you at
that moment? Sacrifice the last two hours of your show
for the first two that just and and then bigger
than that is that. What happens is that then you

(28:56):
start talking to me because you're afraid of me. You're
to that phone ringing. I don't want you talking to me.
I ain't got nothing to do with this. Talk to
the audience. Man, This is about y'all. You know that's
and I gave my jocks freedom, you know, I just
I'm old school like that. Man, bring your records, man,
do you think you know? Just express You'll be amazed

(29:17):
at the performance you get from people when you entrust them,
when you let them do what they do, when their
name is on it instead of just them representing you.

Speaker 3 (29:28):
It's like you hired them for a reason.

Speaker 9 (29:29):
That's what you hired them for, right.

Speaker 11 (29:31):
Let them go, man, because this way of thought is
not very prevalent right now, have you ever I mean,
I know it's another burden, but have you ever considered ownership?

Speaker 9 (29:42):
Yeah? I used to think about it. We had looked
at it a long time ago, and god, radio stations
had gotten so expensive then it was just kind of crazy.
But you know, I don't know that it's a business
that I would be that interested in now.

Speaker 4 (29:54):
You know.

Speaker 9 (29:55):
It's uh, you know, the dollars have dried up to
great degree, as you know, I mean with everything that
is that advertising based model, radio, television, print, those dollars
have gone to the internet, you know. So it's a
different day, you know, and radio and TV are lucky

(30:17):
most of them are just suffering pay cuts, print shutting
their doors, you know. I mean it's a different day.
So you know, No, I don't have that level of
interest in it now.

Speaker 5 (30:31):
No, speaking of the uh you're breaking Elton John and
bending the jets. What were some of the other notable
artists that you had a first thing like, I feel
like this person's the next one.

Speaker 9 (30:49):
Well, I had a I have a gold record at
home that says thank you for being the first to
play Whitney Houston. You give good lack.

Speaker 3 (30:57):
I literally only pulled that out there.

Speaker 9 (31:00):
Oh I thought you knew that.

Speaker 5 (31:01):
No, I was just I was like, oh, I know
you gave Whitney Houston what I saw her very when
she first came to Video Soul.

Speaker 3 (31:09):
Yeah, I remember that interview.

Speaker 9 (31:11):
But remember Shade first interview with Shade, her first interview
I think I know in America, if not on television period,
was with me. You know, So you know I you know,
I certainly don't want to sound like I started all
of these careers.

Speaker 3 (31:28):
This is why you're here. This is a masterclass.

Speaker 14 (31:32):
Seriously, there's a lot of artists that we probably wouldn't
know about if we hadn't seen them on Video Souls.

Speaker 3 (31:37):
You know, you introducing them to us. So you are
a very important part. Well, you know, it's thank you,
and you're allowed to seat your own horn.

Speaker 9 (31:44):
No, and I wont, but it's it's it's so flat.
I had Big Daddy Kane on my radio show yesterday
and he was telling me. He says, man, I just
want to thank you for the first time I was
on Video Soul. Man, he said, I was so nervous. Man,
I couldn't believe it. But he said, what blew me
away was that I came in there, man, and you

(32:05):
treated me like all the other artists. You treated me
with respect, and I thought it would be just like,
you know, all right, we got this rapper in here.
Let's get the rap thing out.

Speaker 3 (32:15):
Of the way, he said.

Speaker 9 (32:16):
And it was just so different, you know, which blew
me away that he thought I would treat him, you know,
as I told him on the area yesterday. I said,
kin man, if President Obama walked through this door right
now or the janitor, they're gonna get the same level
of love and respect for me. Believe that, you know so.

(32:36):
But it's always fascinating to me that so many artists
come up to you and tell you what you meant
to their careers.

Speaker 11 (32:44):
You know.

Speaker 9 (32:45):
I remember going to see New Addition one night. This
is twenty five years ago. No, not new Addition, I'm sorry,
new kids, not that new kids on the block boys.

Speaker 3 (32:55):
Men.

Speaker 9 (33:00):
So I go backstage and they go, oh my god,
Donnie's here, look at it. What's the date? April whatever?
One of nineteen eighty seven. They all knew the date.
They came on Video Soul. It was that significant to them,
you know.

Speaker 3 (33:18):
Oh married, don't you week? Acapella? They were the team
better than me.

Speaker 5 (33:23):
Wait only okay, because I was in the Motown Philly video.
So even me and my parents were like sitting there
with a VCR open, like like the video is going
to come on because this is the first time that
I'm seeing the video, Like, yeah, no, that was And
we all went to high school together, so that that
was like a moment like someone from my homeroom classes
that still it was me two thousand and thirty five cents,

(33:47):
thank you.

Speaker 3 (33:48):
Uh you know is legit like on on Video Soul?

Speaker 9 (33:54):
Yeah, it meant something to sit on that couch, you know,
and uh, that's that's that's flattering. That's really an awesome thing.

Speaker 3 (34:03):
How so, well, I want to ease intwo video sol.

Speaker 5 (34:06):
How did how are you convinced uh to Well, you
didn't totally abandon radio when you did video solo?

Speaker 3 (34:14):
Oh no, you did both. But did you figure that?

Speaker 5 (34:17):
Okay, it's time for the black version of MTV too,
uh to come to fruition and I want to be
a part of history.

Speaker 9 (34:26):
Now, Well, this has not happened. I mean, it wasn't
my creation. I got a call from Bob Johnson asking
me or actually was Jeff Lee his right hand man said,
we're starting this show called Video Soul, and we liked
for you to host it. At the time, I was

(34:47):
still doing radio, of course, but I was also I
just started doing TV locally in DC. For the last
two years, I was a sports anchor George Michael, Yeah
Michael backup for George Michael Sports much Machine. So you know, so, yeah,
it was cool. I mean, I enjoyed that, but I
like music, you know, sports is not what I do.

Speaker 3 (35:09):
So anyway, thank you, go ahead.

Speaker 15 (35:14):
So sports that you're thinking, that's actually how how I
know you. I went to school down in College Park,
Maryland in late eighties, early nineties, so I was watching
the George Michael Sports Oh Wow.

Speaker 3 (35:29):
Cool dream Machine Sports sports Machine sports legend Donnie Simpson. Yeah.

Speaker 9 (35:39):
So so anyway, they said, wanted me to do this show,
and I'll be very honest with you, my first answer
was no. You know, no, I didn't want to do it.
I've always been very careful about what I get involved
in because all I have to sell is image, you know,

(36:00):
so I'm very protective of that. You know, it's got
to be right. And b e T in its infancy
wasn't a pretty baby. Yeah, right, exactly, exactly right. So
I didn't want to do that, but I thought about
it for two days and then finally the bottom line

(36:22):
became this, that this is our first black television network.
If you have something to offer it, you have to
do that.

Speaker 3 (36:32):
Period.

Speaker 9 (36:33):
Let's go. And so I'm glad I did.

Speaker 11 (36:35):
Man.

Speaker 9 (36:35):
I mean it was, uh, you know, it was amazing.
When we first started, we were in one and a
half million homes. When I left, that number was like
forty five million. You know, now it's like one hundred
or something. I mean, it's just crazy, you know. And uh,
you know, it put me in black houses all across
this country, you know, just.

Speaker 3 (36:56):
Like you know about your radio career.

Speaker 9 (36:58):
I just yeah, most people around the don't get shocked
when they find out how do radio? Yeah, but uh yeah,
but you know it was really something special. Man, it
was uh you know. Uh, Terry Lewis we were talking
about it recently and he was saying how that I
was just telling him about the love and respect that

(37:18):
I get and how it just blows me away, you
know every time, and uh, he says, it's because you
mean something to people. You know, that you represented a
time when music was fun. You know, the videos were
fun and all of that. You know, it was clean, fun,
you know, and you represent that time. It's like, well,
I've never thought about it like that, but you know.

Speaker 3 (37:42):
It's uh.

Speaker 9 (37:44):
I remember one night the VH one did a series
called Black in the eighties, and then he had interviewed
me for it, and so they told me there's coming on.
So I watched it that night. It was an hour
long and the first fifteen minutes they did Brian Gumbele,
the first black to host the early morning national television show.

(38:06):
Then they did or Senil Hall, first black to host
a late night talk show. Then they did Cosby The
Cosby Show, and first black TV show where the mother
and dad were doctor and a lawyer, not a plumber
and a janitor or something, you know. And then they
did Donnie Simpson and Video Soul, and man, I'll never

(38:28):
forget it. When the show ended, all I could think was, well,
how the hell am I supposed to sleep tonight? Seriously?
Because I never had it put in perspective like that,
you know what I mean.

Speaker 3 (38:40):
It's like.

Speaker 9 (38:43):
A line from that I've always loved from Elton John
rocket Love not rocket Love, that's Stevie wonder rocket ma
man right when he says in all the science, I
don't understand. It's just my job five days a week,
you know, I mean, you think this is a rocket
man an astronauts. It's like it's so glorious. You know,
your DJ is a glorious You know, Man, I don't

(39:06):
care who you are or what you do. It's just
what you do.

Speaker 5 (39:12):
So at the time, you weren't thinking that you're doing
a historical service for mankind. That there's a bunch of
eleven year olds watching you and recording this because we
will record the show and watch it over and over again.

Speaker 9 (39:28):
Crazy to me, No, I never thought. I mean I've
had three or four the ESPN anchors come up to
me and tell me you're the reason I do TV
because I used to watch you.

Speaker 3 (39:38):
It's like.

Speaker 9 (39:40):
That, Man, that's mind blowing to me. Of course, I'm
telling you.

Speaker 11 (39:43):
Man.

Speaker 5 (39:44):
Between you and probably probably the only person that could
challenge or even match your cool might be Don Cornelius.

Speaker 3 (39:51):
Like you two are parents. Yea cool one the next.
And that's the thing.

Speaker 5 (40:00):
You always pervade this, this level of intelligence and cool
and knowledge, no matter who the artist was. Like if
I were interviewing like Wild Animal era Vanity, I would

(40:20):
have been sweating profusely. But you gave her the same
level of respect that you would have done for Sergio
Mendez or or Side Garrett or Quincy Jones or I'll
be short, like you know what I mean.

Speaker 3 (40:39):
Like that to me was was even more amazing.

Speaker 5 (40:43):
Like it's one thing to interview someone that you love
and that you're you know that you have history of,
Like I'm sure that you know if a Motown luminary
comes on the show, then you know you're just giddy
about it.

Speaker 3 (40:55):
But how do you prepare yourself.

Speaker 5 (40:59):
For an artist that you might not know of, Like
say about first year Karen White comes on the show,
and you might not know that much about her, but.

Speaker 9 (41:07):
I ask her, ah, like you did. Seriously, that's how
I prepare. There's no herd for like ten years, but
there there's no preparation. I mean, every artist I've ever
had on Video Soul, they would give me a bio
and a list of questions and I would take a
car right sit down on the side. Seriously, I would

(41:29):
never look at it because I felt that there's nothing
wrong with me not knowing you grew up in Tuscaloosa,
that I can ask you that. I mean, this is
an interview, this is getting to know you. What's wrong
with that being the first of where you grow up at?
You know, Oh, I grew up in Philip oh Man.
What happened to the Sixers the other night? That's conversation.

Speaker 3 (41:50):
Okay, you know it, that's just you know.

Speaker 9 (41:54):
I mean, if it's somebody I knew, I'm telling you
this may be the depth of the preparation. I'd go,
all right, Luther's on this show today. I'm riding in
and I go, what is it you want to know
about Luther Man? Why you why does your weight keep
going up and down?

Speaker 3 (42:13):
I said, all right, that's what I'm going to ask him.

Speaker 6 (42:15):
And you know it's but you could ask him that
though I don't think nobody else could get away with.

Speaker 9 (42:20):
But you know, and and that is a blessing for
you to say that you get it. That it's just
like h on with all due respect, I'm going back
to Johnny Carson the Tonight Show that when the conversation
with Johnny was always different from any other host I

(42:42):
ever saw, because they had so much respect for him.
He could ask things that others might not because they
just lose. But Jimmy's like that too, because he's so cool.
You know when when you're cool with people like that man,
and they feel you and it's real, it's not stage questions.
And you know, when you've read the bio, the chances

(43:03):
are I'm gonna ask you a question based on that bio.
It's something that you've been asked a thousand times already before.

Speaker 3 (43:10):
What was your first interview on Do you remember your
very first interview on the show?

Speaker 9 (43:14):
Who was your first My very first interview is with
the Fat Boys? Eighty three or eighty four? God, so
like that, yeah, man, the Fat Boys. Second one was
with Rick James.

Speaker 3 (43:31):
Bitch, Okay, what was that?

Speaker 9 (43:37):
Like?

Speaker 3 (43:37):
Okay, we have yet to have a potential Off the
Chains guests.

Speaker 5 (43:43):
We're kind of entertaining that, like all of our guests
are either like super legend or we've worshiped them. Yeah,
but okay, Rick James a perfect example. If someone has
the potential disorder be off the Chains.

Speaker 3 (43:58):
Oh, how do you reel them? And how do you
how do you maintain how do you drive the car
and not have them drive the car?

Speaker 9 (44:06):
Wow? That's wow, what a great question because.

Speaker 3 (44:08):
You still have to steer and navigate.

Speaker 9 (44:10):
Yeah, you still gotta steer and.

Speaker 11 (44:15):
Right.

Speaker 3 (44:16):
And it was the eighties, so we know that Rick
might have been on that, you know, so you don't
know where the conversation was going to go.

Speaker 9 (44:22):
But I've never had that problem. I never had anybody,
had anybody go rogue on me, just you know, go crazy,
go just it just never happened.

Speaker 8 (44:31):
But a little left, you've had some people maybe go
a little because even.

Speaker 9 (44:33):
That every everybody left, you know, shoot.

Speaker 3 (44:42):
Has an interview going a little weird, and you guys
had to do a lot of editing.

Speaker 9 (44:46):
Magic well back in the day for like what we're
gonna do is like most of the years on Video Soul,
we were live. It was live until the last three
or four years.

Speaker 3 (45:01):
Yeah, yeah, I never do that.

Speaker 9 (45:03):
Yeah yeah, we used to do it live.

Speaker 3 (45:05):
Man's risky.

Speaker 9 (45:06):
Well yeah, but today that's the way I liked it
because that made it like radio for me. I hate tape.
I hate recording. It's just it's a different pressure that
you perform better when it's live. For me, you know,
when it's live and I know you don't get to
back it up and then it's real because for me,
when you're backing it up and editing, then you're trying

(45:29):
to make it perfect. And like I never ever ever
watched video soul. I don't listen to tapes of my
radio show because I feel like then I'm trying to
make myself perfect and I'll never be that. All I
need to be is me. That's it, That's all I
need to be, Donnie Simpson.

Speaker 8 (45:47):
Does that mean a programmer has never pulled you in
aircheck meeting and.

Speaker 9 (45:49):
It said, oh lord, no, since you were a teenager.

Speaker 11 (45:53):
There's never been a boss, because I mean most I
know people know this, but like in radio, usually your
boss will at some point at the end of the week,
pool you in a room and say, let's listen.

Speaker 9 (45:59):
To what you did here. You know what, for one period,
when I first moved to DC in seventy seven, we
did have a program director and oh my goodness, it
was crazy for me. For a year and a half
I did live under that. I've forgotten that because it
was such you know, that's out of how many years
got I started in sixty nine, so you know, one

(46:23):
and a half years of slavery. But you know where
he would walk in with a stopwatch and go. That
was seventeen seconds. You had to come in under fifteen
seconds on anything you said, you know, I mean, it
was just so finally I was gone.

Speaker 3 (46:40):
I was gone.

Speaker 9 (46:41):
I said I can't do this. I'm leaving. And I
had a job offer in LA and so they offered
me the music directorship to keep me. So I stayed
and then I worked under this music director. My music
director was he's a brother, but he had so much
or it was let me be careful.

Speaker 14 (47:00):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (47:02):
We know, wink, we get it.

Speaker 9 (47:04):
Yeah, we need Muller to investigate this one. But he
we would have our record meetings or every week, you know,
the music meetings, and he'd go around the room. I
was the music director under him. He was the program director.
And I had two assistants, and both of them were
political appointees. This is DC. One was David Brinkley's son,

(47:28):
the other was his senator's son. He go around the room.
He play, uh, I'll never forget this. When he played
Beast of Burden, rolling Stones, you know, so he goes, so, John,
what do you think of that? Oh?

Speaker 3 (47:39):
I love it.

Speaker 9 (47:39):
I think it's great. David, what do you I think
it's great? I think Donnie what do you think. I
think it's great. We can't play that ship you, right,
you know, I mean I love it, but it's got
the fit brothers.

Speaker 3 (47:56):
Can I assume that that was the single after Miss You?
Were you guys playing Miss You?

Speaker 9 (48:00):
No? That was that was before Miss You? Because I
Miss You came after, as I recall it, because I
played Miss You as a program director, so I wasn't
programming then. Yeah, we I'm pretty sure we could. We
could check the records. Yeah, I think that's the way
it went because I played Miss You. That works. Beast

(48:23):
Burden does not. Little Riverband reminiscing. We can't play that, man,
you know. Yeah, it's it's.

Speaker 8 (48:33):
Because you also got to consider the area, right, Like,
it's not just the.

Speaker 9 (48:36):
People in the area in d C and go go baby.

Speaker 3 (48:39):
You know it was hard. Yeah, that's my next question.

Speaker 5 (48:43):
Okay, Now, as the the top taste maker of DC
that had the world's ears, how is such a beautiful
subculture like go go, how's it met?

Speaker 3 (48:58):
So men?

Speaker 5 (49:00):
Me obstacles and I feel like the ripple never gets
to expand west west more west than West Virginia or Ohio,
West Virginia or Okay, It's like let's let's just go
back to Virginia.

Speaker 3 (49:20):
Yeah, but it's you've lived in DC for decades. I
assume you still do.

Speaker 9 (49:25):
Oh yeah.

Speaker 5 (49:26):
How is black people's jam bam music not resonated to
the rest of.

Speaker 3 (49:34):
The United States of America at least?

Speaker 9 (49:36):
I have no idea why that is. It's like, I mean,
we thought it was going to break out when we've
had Yeah well.

Speaker 3 (49:45):
And good to that movie came out.

Speaker 9 (49:47):
Chuck was the first bust and Loose was the first
number one go go song in the country. I mean,
it was number one song in the country. That was
Go Go and uh. And then the second was the
Butt by EU with the help of the movie School Days.

Speaker 3 (50:01):
You know.

Speaker 9 (50:02):
So we're thinking, man, this great breakout now, and it
never did. Those are the only two to this day
that ever went number one in the country. You know,
you had people like Grace Jones, some people used it elements, yeah,
used elements. Yeah, but it just never broke out for
some reason. And I don't know, you know, I don't
know why Western world never caught on to drop the

(50:23):
bomb on the White boy.

Speaker 10 (50:25):
You know, I just don't get I.

Speaker 9 (50:35):
Don't know.

Speaker 2 (50:42):
We see no idea how that didn't work out, shocker.

Speaker 5 (50:49):
So on the other side of that coin, though worrying
about someone going rogue, there could be the other side
of that coin of having artists that are signed reclusive. Now,
as as I as obsessed as I am with all
of David Rich's work as a as a writer and

(51:14):
read both of those Aretha books, I know that she
was a frequent guest of yours on the show, and
you go into her house and her plan for you
and she you know, she was rather loquacious. She talked
a lot, which if she didn't know you, you could
tell that. You know, there's a distance there. So how

(51:36):
did you what was a hard interview for you, like
for an artist that wasn't that talkative? Or did you
ever interview Prince ever.

Speaker 3 (51:45):
In your career?

Speaker 9 (51:46):
Yeah? On radio okay with Soul? This was about seven
what years ago?

Speaker 3 (51:55):
Oh you seventy?

Speaker 9 (51:56):
I was like, oh no, no, no, no, no, no no,
because you remember Prinsident He had done that one interview
I think it ran on MTV and he interviewed himself.

Speaker 14 (52:08):
Actually, I was watching a click on on YouTube today
of you introducing that on video Soul.

Speaker 9 (52:13):
Yeah yeah, yeah, so no, and it was Prince and
Michael were the only two artists that I always wanted
to interview, you know, but never got to have them
on Video Soul, you.

Speaker 3 (52:24):
Know, even though we ever get them.

Speaker 9 (52:27):
Yeah, oh yeah, being Prince were friends. And you know,
as a matter of fact, the night you referenced earlier
when we went to UH flight Time for the Pandemonium
album for the time, Uh, we partied at UH at
Paisley Park that night. You love this story. This is

(52:48):
so funny.

Speaker 3 (52:48):
Yes, we bring the story.

Speaker 9 (52:51):
Uh that Wednesday, we're recording Video Soul. I had David
Bowie on the show, and who was so cool and
uh so after the show we were talking and I
was telling him I was going to Minneapolis that Friday
to do this time thing, and he says, I'm playing
Minneapolis Friday. You got to come to the show. I
was all right, cool, I'm there, So get my buddy

(53:13):
to go with me, Sugar, Ray Letter. So we rode
to Minneapolis and we do the thing.

Speaker 11 (53:18):
I don't.

Speaker 9 (53:23):
We that's me and Ray hung every day man, my
boy still to this day. But so anyway, we get
to the show that Friday night and they set like
eight seats at the sound board right so we go
to sit in our seats, and so I'm going by
and I bump this lady in front of me and
I excuse me, ma'am. And Prince turns around. So what

(53:59):
he says, Hey, Donnie, Prince Man, so sorry about that.
And so then he turns back around a minute or
two later, he says, I'm having a party at Paisley
Park tonight, you and Ray are to come. I said,
all right, cool. So we go to the party. Man,
you know, it's like twelve people there.

Speaker 3 (54:19):
Man, he always parties were just yeah, six people.

Speaker 12 (54:23):
I know.

Speaker 9 (54:23):
It's me, Prince, Ray, David Boy and his band members Cat.
He was dancing with him and my boy Jeff Newman,
who produced my show video Soul. And I mean that
was like that was it, you know. But we had
the greatest time. Man. It was just the coolest night.
And he played the Black Album that night. Okay. And

(54:47):
now now this is so years later he tells me,
because you know that album was notorious because it wasn't released.
And so years later Prince told me, he said, you
know you're the reason I didn't release the Black Album.
What And I said, why? What do you mean? He says,
you remember what you said that night at Paisley Park.

(55:08):
I said what he said, you said, this is such
a groove, and I was about so much more. Wow,
And I thought, wow, is he serious or is.

Speaker 11 (55:18):
He just.

Speaker 9 (55:22):
Seriously? That was really deep to me that because that
is what I said. It's like, man, this is such
a groove, you know. But but what Prince needed to
know is that you could be about that much more.
But I can't hear it. I don't hear lyrics. I
hear groove, I hear vibe, I hear feel you know,
I know where it is. But man, it could be

(55:42):
thirty years later and I'd be like, damn, that's what
they were talking about, you know, too close.

Speaker 10 (55:47):
He was, See the thing is, It's like, the thing is,
I know I know that you know a lot of
a lot of his.

Speaker 5 (56:00):
Earlier Nelson George reviews of his post Rise post nineteen
ninety nine, Rise kind of got under his skin and
that he didn't want to be that philosophical and he
just wanted to let y'all know that he was still down.
And I've you know, that was his statement of letting
y'all know, like, yo, I'm still down, and this is

(56:21):
me but and you validated you're still down because that's
such a groove. But maybe there's that itch in his
soul that's just like say the deep statement, and you're.

Speaker 3 (56:33):
Right right, and we're stuck with love sexy.

Speaker 9 (56:40):
I got to tell you this is going back to
something you said earlier. But it's so cool that because
Jimmy and Terry, my boys and my mom introduced me
to the time. That's who told me about the time,
how well I was in DC. Mom still at a
record shop in Detroit. You talked about that diversity. Simpson's
Record out still there years fifty years, man, fifty years. Yes,

(57:06):
I've never been there.

Speaker 5 (57:07):
No, I always shop. I always shop in uh gross
point blank. What's gross point in Michigan? Yeah, points a
place called Melodies and Memories out there that I do
all my digging.

Speaker 3 (57:23):
But Simpson's Record Shop is still there. Yeah.

Speaker 9 (57:26):
Yeah, a mom and pop YEP, mom and pop record store.
When I told you that's where I started my career.
Still there.

Speaker 3 (57:34):
Right now, Stephen doing a week tour of America record stores.

Speaker 9 (57:40):
We have more hot dogs and candy than she does records.

Speaker 15 (57:43):
Now, can I interject the question, Donnie, So, what's your
what's your record collection looking like these days?

Speaker 3 (57:49):
Oh?

Speaker 5 (57:50):
We said, oh wait, there's a frown over there. Are
you in a situation where you had to get rid
of stuff and put it in storage?

Speaker 9 (57:57):
Marriage my records?

Speaker 3 (57:59):
Yeah?

Speaker 9 (58:01):
Are you asking? What am I into?

Speaker 3 (58:04):
Or what? Do you still have your physical like that?

Speaker 9 (58:07):
I still have everything everything, man, I would assume it's
worth some money. Man.

Speaker 3 (58:13):
Okay, fire in the house hypothetical, that's a Knockwood situation. Yeah,
fire in the house. You're saving five records?

Speaker 9 (58:27):
Okay, top five? What albums?

Speaker 3 (58:32):
What's your forty five is into? Okay? Yes? What out?
What five albums are you saving?

Speaker 9 (58:38):
What's going on? Hot Buttered Soul?

Speaker 3 (58:41):
Yes?

Speaker 9 (58:44):
Who off the wall?

Speaker 5 (58:49):
Wait now before you name the last two, I also
mean that I'm certain that you have rare items of
your your action as well.

Speaker 3 (59:00):
Can just save his whole collection? We'll all we'll all
show up at the fire and help him get out.

Speaker 9 (59:11):
Goodbye, Yellow Brick Road. I got one more. That's hard. Well,
look at they all fighting, they trying to get out
the fire. Oh wow, one left? Oh god, I got Marvin.

Speaker 3 (59:28):
Let's see fires.

Speaker 13 (59:30):
Okay, Stevie's anthology. I'm cheating that off here STEVIEE right,
wow one Stevie.

Speaker 9 (59:44):
Oh my goodness, man, you get Sophie's choice, you'll stream,
you can stream the rest on Pandora. I'm just saying that,
ah fulfilling, this first Finaley, that's the Stevie one, Jod,
I don't know.

Speaker 3 (01:00:02):
That was a great cruschetto. I mean, what would you say?

Speaker 5 (01:00:08):
That's what we're talking about, because out of the Genius period,
that's my least favorite Stevie record of the Genius period.

Speaker 3 (01:00:16):
Really, that's the one I know the least songs on.
I know it, but I mean besides my mind.

Speaker 5 (01:00:26):
For me, I don't know why I like Music of
my Mind out of the five of them, because it
was the first of the five. But even then I
was like one, So I mean it was the first
of the five. He was just more raw and that
it was the first of the five, or do you first?

Speaker 3 (01:00:47):
It was the first five? Yes, my first.

Speaker 9 (01:00:49):
The first record I ever bought was by Stevie. It's tight. Really,
that's the first purchase I ever made.

Speaker 3 (01:00:56):
Of music, the first your your very first record.

Speaker 9 (01:00:59):
Yeah, because that's before my mother. I didn't buy records
for law because you open the record shop and then
I got into radio. But yeah, I paid sixty nine
cents for Babe Bit Everything is all right?

Speaker 5 (01:01:12):
So forty five were sixty nine cents back in Well
that came out sixty sixty.

Speaker 9 (01:01:17):
Yeah, sixty six or sixty seven.

Speaker 5 (01:01:24):
Well, I also know that you your you as a
concert spectator, that you've probably seen some of the best
shows of all time.

Speaker 3 (01:01:35):
Now in your radio career. You told us about your
your childhood career.

Speaker 5 (01:01:38):
But what what were the experiences like, because I'm certain
that you know you saw the very first Mothership Connection
shows like stuff we take rant it now, like the
ideas of the Jackson's levitating or earth Wind and fire
levit taking all that stuff, like, man, what concert will
stay with you forever?

Speaker 3 (01:01:56):
As far as like.

Speaker 9 (01:01:58):
All the Michael concerts really, I mean he's just the
greatest ever to me, Yeah, without doubt, Michael the fire
you know, see earth Wind and fire Man in their prime,
you know with Maurice, you know, was amazing. The very
first concert ever saw in my life, James, you know

(01:02:19):
where Cobo Arena in Detroit. This had to be sixty seven,
Jesus something like that, maybe sixty eight? Did he do
say it loud? So? No, it was before said Loud,
SOI say it loud. I'm black and I'm proud with
sixty eight, you know. And James was my king, right,

(01:02:40):
you know. And I used to tell them that all
the time. Man, you're my king, I'm your soldier. There
ain't nothing I wouldn't do for you. And I meant that, man,
because he taught me to be proud of who I was.
You know, my skin color man said loud was the
most significant song ever for me. There would never be
a song more important than that for me, you know.

(01:03:02):
And so James gave me all that that sense of prime.

Speaker 3 (01:03:05):
You know.

Speaker 9 (01:03:05):
Me had assists from Curtis Mayfield and you know, but
but it was James. So to see James and concert
was just amazing early on because I remember as a
kid sitting there at twelve years old. So wow, I
was twelve. So that was that was sixty six and
all I can think of. I'm not a musician, so
I don't know why, but I'm like, damn, this dude's

(01:03:28):
got two drummers. He's gonna wear one out.

Speaker 3 (01:03:31):
He knows that ain't gonna make it.

Speaker 9 (01:03:38):
So wow, I saw Sammy Davis Junior. That was amazing
to see Sammy. You know, wow, wow, you'll appreciate this,
and I know shifting gears a little bit, but say
it people that I've had the opportunity to spend time

(01:03:59):
in the studio with Tell Okay, now, of course you
know there are a bunch of them. But before the
just when I think back on my life in my career,
to just blow me away, Marvin Sly Prince, Prince invited
me in the studio one night, and that's rare. He didn't,

(01:04:21):
you know, yeh, didn't have people in the studio. Uh
and Stevie, you know, to spend time in the studio
with Stevie, man, it was just oh my goodness.

Speaker 5 (01:04:32):
You speak of watching Marvin in the studio. Can you
speak of watching Marvin in the studio?

Speaker 9 (01:04:38):
Actually it's kind of cheating because he wasn't He wasn't
doing his album. He was recording the Originals. He was
producing the Originals. Yeah did you know that, you know?

Speaker 3 (01:04:46):
Yes?

Speaker 9 (01:04:50):
Yeah, they yeah, yeah, But uh, Pam was with me.
She was just my girlfriend. Then she's my wife of
forty three years now. But I'm crazy, said she only
forty four. But I remember Pam saying to me like
because Marven was trying to show him how to sing
the song, and she goes, why didn't he just sing

(01:05:12):
you can't nobody do that? Yeah, but you know Marvin,
when he invited me to the studio, how cool is this.
I'm hanging out with ron Banks of the dramatics.

Speaker 3 (01:05:24):
Wow.

Speaker 9 (01:05:24):
Yeah, me and Ronnie. Ronnie was my best friend and
that side of the music, of the business of music.
Ronnie was my best friend, all the dramatics, but Ronnie
in particular. And uh so we're riding down the street
and we see Marvin going in his house, going up
the driveway, and uh so, Ronnie says, it's Marvin. Man,
let's stop and say hello to him. I'm sorry. Cool.

(01:05:45):
So we stopped and uh he introduces He said, yeah, man,
I listen to you every night. Man. I was like,
all right, cool, And he says, you ought to come
in and check me out in the studio. I said,
all right, I'd love to do that. He says, well,
I'm going in tomorrow all night. He says, but here,
let me give you this phone number. Call me tomorrow morning, man,
because I'll get up in the morning and decide to

(01:06:07):
climb Mount Everest and I'll be gone, you know. And
he said it in such a way as like I'm
not trying to act like I'm eccentric or something like that.
I'm just telling you, dog, you need to check because
I do that. Right.

Speaker 3 (01:06:22):
He's known for that, right, he is known for that.

Speaker 5 (01:06:25):
Yeah, man, So how many cats know that Marvin lived
in a bread truck for seven months in Hawaii?

Speaker 3 (01:06:33):
Oh? Yeah?

Speaker 9 (01:06:34):
Is that right?

Speaker 3 (01:06:34):
Right after Dream Lifetime came on, he took his remaining money.
That was right before. I thought it was before a
minute love.

Speaker 5 (01:06:40):
I thought, well, yeah, after dream before he did that,
before he moved to Belgium and lived in the monastery.

Speaker 3 (01:06:46):
And what you call this is round eighty. Yeah.

Speaker 5 (01:06:49):
Yeah, he purchased a bread truck because I add a
good room into it.

Speaker 3 (01:06:53):
Oh you mean our lifetime? Yeah, in our lifetime, I'm sorry,
in our lifetime.

Speaker 9 (01:06:59):
If I had to pick one voice, I mean one artist,
I mean, Marvin's my favorite vocalist ever. I just love Marvin.
But the most intimate is that the right word. Most
emotional moment I ever had with music was with Marvin.
One night, I was sitting there listening to Flying High

(01:07:19):
in a Friendly Sky, and I'd heard the song for
forty years. I told you I don't hear lyrics, right,
so not really. I mean flying I in the Friendly Sky,
all right.

Speaker 3 (01:07:27):
I guess it's.

Speaker 9 (01:07:29):
Commercial for uniting it. I don't know, you know, but
that night I'm sitting there and I'm listening to it, man,
and I heard every word after It had to be
thirty years at that point, and man, you know, I'm
telling you, bruh, I sat there and cried for forty minutes,
and I mean bawling, man, because I saw Marvin's life

(01:07:51):
and his drug addiction. It spells it out so well.
You know, my second oldest brother was classic Vietnam case,
you know, came back from the non decorated war hero
addicted to heroin, you know, and watched that struggle that
he went through and sent my family through. You know,
we you know, we all got touched by that thing.
And you know, I just sat there, man, It just

(01:08:15):
it just took me to a place where nothing but
music could take me to where I went that night,
you know, But you know, I go to the place
where the danger waits me self destructions in my hands.
You know, in the morning, I'll be all right, but
then the pain soon the night comes and the pain.

(01:08:35):
Oh man, it's just I was out running yesterday morning,
and that's I always have my iPod on random, yeah,
on shuffle, and that song came on. I'm running crying.
You saw me, you thought I was sweating.

Speaker 3 (01:08:59):
So can I ask? I mean, it's no secret that.

Speaker 5 (01:09:08):
Where we are now in twenty seventeen is a long
way from where we were in nineteen sixty seven or
sixty nine when you first started. So I know that
it has to be bothersome to not necessarily watch the

(01:09:29):
evolution of where black music and black cultures go, the
evolution or yeah, just the the evolution of it.

Speaker 3 (01:09:37):
Does it worry you that very few.

Speaker 5 (01:09:43):
Members of the next generation aren't necessarily grabbing onto the
baton that the forefathers had and sort of not even
dropping it, but just having a disregard or a sheep
oft shrug like eh okay, yeah, like is it?

Speaker 3 (01:10:01):
Well?

Speaker 5 (01:10:02):
I'm just saying that you seem to be an open
book culturally to everything, like you know in sixty nine, you.

Speaker 3 (01:10:11):
Know, say loud, I'm black. I'm proud changed your life.
I'm certain that.

Speaker 5 (01:10:16):
Prince's arrival with or the the onslaught of dirty Mind
and what he would later unleash was new and shocking,
but you seem to be.

Speaker 3 (01:10:27):
A board of it and what came after.

Speaker 5 (01:10:29):
Yeah, at what point and you don't have to specifically
mention names or whatever, but at what point or at
least the year did you were the seeds of indifference
there for you? Or it's sort of like, man, like,
I guess, I guess this is what this is what
passes for talent, or this is what passes for music

(01:10:51):
or m I guess I'm just getting older.

Speaker 9 (01:10:54):
Yeah, well, you know, well, first of all, I have
to tell you this that I was, I was always
has to. I never wanted to make the statement that
they don't make music like they used to, okay, because
I felt like every generation makes that statement, and they're right,
they don't make it like.

Speaker 3 (01:11:11):
They used to.

Speaker 9 (01:11:12):
They never have, they never will. It's always changing. So
and then I remember when we did the interview with
Quincy Jones from his house to back on the Block album.

Speaker 5 (01:11:24):
I was gonna say you committed him on being open minded,
and that always stuck with me, like I never want
to be the old guy that's like exactly, you know,
I hate this music, right, And you said that and
I was like, oh, okay, that's what I need to be.

Speaker 9 (01:11:36):
Yeah, like Quincy, you know you look, I mean that album.
I go to do this interview with Quincy. I mean
there's Ray Charles and Ella Fitzgerald, Sarah Vaughan, Big Daddy Kane,
iced Tea. You know, let me kick my credentials, young
player bread in South Central LA, Home of the body
Bag You Want to Die had colored rag. I used
to walk in stores in the LA down you finish

(01:11:57):
a inch a ca Spray.

Speaker 3 (01:11:58):
Who Man I just wrapped with He said, you deserve that.

Speaker 9 (01:12:09):
But the first time I heard that, Me and l A.
Reid had this conversation because I was telling him, said, man,
when I first got that album, I was listening to it.
I said, it took me forty minutes to get through
the first song. And he said me too, because you know,
I mean, I know, Gula Matari, Quincy Jones. You know
I'm right. And then I opened up. The first thing
I hear is this gangster rap. But then all through

(01:12:32):
the album was like a lesson to me that you know,
you can embrace it all all right. So now they're
doing the human beat.

Speaker 3 (01:12:40):
Box all right?

Speaker 9 (01:12:41):
So all right, little Let's get Ella Sarah Sarah, Bobby
McFerrin and take six no instruments. All right, well, let's
do that. You know, it was just he could make
it all work, all right, Now get past that, and
I'll have to tell you that in the last five, six,
seven years, you know, it's not like there was any

(01:13:03):
particular moment where I felt like, well, where are we?
Where is R and B? But you know, I look
at the charts. It's like me and Jimmy and Terry
have had this conversation like it's just like it's just
hip hop and pop, you know, like we're not there.

Speaker 3 (01:13:25):
You know.

Speaker 9 (01:13:26):
I miss those days. Man, when the top ten pop songs,
you know, half of them are black, you know, and
I mean black black, you know, right, so the soul charge, right,
you know, I miss that. It seems like it's just
it's changed. And that's very frustrating for me, you know.

(01:13:49):
And and uh, you're asking me the question, but I
ask you the question. Is it Is it that the
musicians have bailed on it they're just so nonchalant about it,
or is it that the music companies don't I have
thought that ever giving it voice.

Speaker 3 (01:14:05):
I have a theory. No because they're there.

Speaker 5 (01:14:08):
I could name about six or seven people on the
Internet that are like killing that might not get a
shot because they're not easily digestible. But I also feel
as though I don't know where black people are spiritually. Yeah,

(01:14:30):
I don't know where we are spiritually now, as opposed
to fifty years ago where we relied on the church.

Speaker 3 (01:14:36):
As a training ground for singers.

Speaker 9 (01:14:38):
Yeah, now that's true, you know, and musicians. I never
thought about that.

Speaker 5 (01:14:43):
I'm going to be This is probably the most explicitly
honest I've ever been concerning my spirituality on this show.

Speaker 3 (01:14:53):
But just lately, just as far as the the political turmoil.

Speaker 16 (01:15:03):
That we're living in right now, House of Cars season six, Yeah,
pretty much, and what's been going on in the past
three years as far as.

Speaker 5 (01:15:16):
Justice is concerned, as far as the unarmed killings of
black boys and black women. You know, I used to
question on Twitter, like, well, you know, where's the spiritual
center that says that this is wrong? Like if this

(01:15:36):
were if the injustice that was happening in twenty sixteen,
all those unarmed shootings were happening in sixty six, sixty seven,
I would have heard from the church from now and
I'm not saying that, Okay, well, I'm maybe question you know,
because it's so blasphemous for black folks that have been
raising the church to even have thoughts.

Speaker 3 (01:15:56):
Of atheism or whatever.

Speaker 5 (01:15:58):
But you know, just where the idea of Christianity in
twenty sixteen, it seems very tainted to me then it
was when I was a kid growing up in church.
And you know, your grandmam took to U church, you
had to be there for eight hours. So I know
that if I'm sort of questioning that, then I know

(01:16:18):
there's a lot of people that are just like me
that are moving away from that spirituality. I'm not saying that, oh, well,
God doesn't exist if all this injustice is happening, but
I know that, you know, our answer was always primarily
always hang on to the Lord.

Speaker 3 (01:16:36):
The Lord will make it all right.

Speaker 5 (01:16:37):
And just you know, and I don't know if black
people are there now, like even in our singers, like
the hero now is Rihanna, who is about is not
in the church anti She's more the mall or the
you know, like I don't know where, like her home
base is where you think of a reef, it's like,
oh that's the church. Do you know, but the generation

(01:17:00):
that Rihanna's raising isn't spiritual based.

Speaker 3 (01:17:03):
Like Lauren Hill in a way that yeah, that's that's and.

Speaker 9 (01:17:07):
It's not just blank. I mean you look at what
the Christian right just allowed to happen in our last election,
you know, I mean, if you can give him a
pass for talking about grabbing women how he wants to
grab and that's okay, Yeah, we've.

Speaker 3 (01:17:19):
Just lost spirituality, not even religion, but just spirituality. So
I just feel like.

Speaker 5 (01:17:26):
That that reflects in the music and if that's not there,
then we've pretty much lost soul music unless the spirit
of it has just gone to the UK where.

Speaker 3 (01:17:41):
There's still people there, and.

Speaker 11 (01:17:43):
We're also becoming more inclusive as a people as wells
and I think that has a lot to do with
it too. We weren't, you know, we can know, I
mean not watered down for lack of a better term,
but you're talking about the sixties and when music was
made then it definitely was not as inclusive as it
is in twenty seventeen. And then you have to do
with the cultural appropriation and who's making the money off
of this sole means, I just.

Speaker 14 (01:18:02):
Point out a labels not wanting to do more work
than you know, if they can just market one artist
one certain way instead of having to do it a
whole bunch of different ways to target you know, all
these different.

Speaker 11 (01:18:12):
Audisms, and if they can sing soul and not be
black and capture two different audiences.

Speaker 5 (01:18:16):
Who So do you find it ironically weird that some
of the more popular soul artists are not looking like
the person in the mirror when you're listening to it.

Speaker 3 (01:18:31):
Like or is that to you?

Speaker 5 (01:18:33):
Just I'm sorry you no, no, no, I'm saying that
now if you think of soul music, nine times out
of ten, it's sam right right, right.

Speaker 9 (01:18:44):
Right right right? Oh? I know, yeah, it's strange. Yeah,
it's it's strange.

Speaker 3 (01:18:50):
You know.

Speaker 9 (01:18:51):
And I mean I don't fault you for that, you know,
I mean you got sold. I mean the artists that
you just named very soulful and I love their music,
you know, but you know, it reminds me of watching
and gosh, should I call this out in American idol
or you know these shows? And you know, my wife

(01:19:12):
and my daughter gets so mad at me.

Speaker 3 (01:19:15):
Was it?

Speaker 9 (01:19:16):
They finally just stopped watching it with me because I'm
sitting oh god, he's so crazy. It's like what you know,
So you you like, I take you to church this
Sunday and find and just on this Sunday and find
you three four voices better than anything you've heard on
this whole season.

Speaker 11 (01:19:34):
You know.

Speaker 9 (01:19:36):
That's that's how I always.

Speaker 8 (01:19:37):
Felt about Fantasian.

Speaker 9 (01:19:38):
Jennifer Hudson, Well, yeah, there were moments, right right.

Speaker 5 (01:19:41):
The thing that I find problematic about reality shows and
the contest is that, you know, I feel like since
ninety seven we've negated the idea of subculture or an
underground you know, Aretha Franklin wasn't.

Speaker 3 (01:19:56):
Made in thirteen weeks.

Speaker 5 (01:19:57):
Yeah, it was made in seventeen years, started at eight,
you know, and it took slow development in her father's church,
in a subculture, and you know, because of the rush,
because music is more as a means of escape for
poverty for a lot of black folk. You know, it's
it's more or less probably used now as a means

(01:20:21):
to survive as opposed to express your spirituality. So yeah,
I'd find those shows rather dangerous. But that's a whole
another episode, of course.

Speaker 6 (01:20:32):
And those shows aren't really about music, They're about TV,
you know, I mean it's not about that, you know
what I'm saying about who's the greatest. It's about That's
why you get William Hunks out there.

Speaker 9 (01:20:42):
Right right, like try to get you to watch.

Speaker 3 (01:20:52):
So what would you?

Speaker 9 (01:20:53):
By the way, I found a CD at my mother's
record shop of Aretha singing in her church, in her
father's church when she was twelve. How good is that
my ma had that in the record shop. Oh my god,
I haven't she doesn't have anymore.

Speaker 5 (01:21:09):
I was just gonna say, did you guys sell a
Reverend cl Franklin's ceremony?

Speaker 9 (01:21:14):
Yeah?

Speaker 5 (01:21:14):
Yeah, oh yeah, man, we're making a pilgrimage because I
know somewhere in the storage unit.

Speaker 3 (01:21:18):
There's a gym in there.

Speaker 9 (01:21:20):
Yeah yeah, oh yeah, we are going up there. She
more or less specializes in gospel music now anyway. As
a matter of fact, Wow, going back, I remember I
used to send Elton gospel music to London because he
couldn't get it right right. I'd send the stuff, send
him stuff from my mom's record shop. Man.

Speaker 3 (01:21:41):
Yeah, all right, we are coming to Joy.

Speaker 8 (01:21:50):
Is that where? Okay? So it's right because the record
store is still in existence, right.

Speaker 9 (01:21:52):
Yeah, it's still for right now, it's struggling though.

Speaker 8 (01:21:55):
It's tight because it sounded like he might have half
of the records in DC too.

Speaker 9 (01:21:59):
No, yeah, well I got a few.

Speaker 3 (01:22:02):
We'll come and save the store. Don't do no worry.
We wait.

Speaker 5 (01:22:06):
I want to ask one this kind of backwards, to
go back then. But since uh, there's a movie about
Detroit coming out in August about the sixty seven riots,
I want to ask, how was your mom's story, How
was that unscathed from because sixty percent of the city
went up in flames during those riots up there? Like,

(01:22:27):
how are you guys able to protect the store and
not have it affected?

Speaker 9 (01:22:32):
Well, we also had Simpsons patrol service got started first.
Actually my dad had a rent a cops service, so
he actually he protected the store. Plus you know, she
was protected anyway, everybody in the neighborhood knew. They knew. Okay,
oh yeah, she was protected. They weren't, you know, Mama

(01:22:53):
was They.

Speaker 3 (01:22:54):
Weren't going to burn the jams.

Speaker 9 (01:22:55):
No, they weren't going to burn no, none of that. No,
but uh, you know, and mom has always been cool. Man,
like you go over there. My mother has always say
it has the best security force there is, the Winos.
They don't miss no days.

Speaker 3 (01:23:14):
Don't.

Speaker 9 (01:23:16):
Yeah, you know, And they were always so cool with mom.
You know, if they need a cigarette, whatever, man, you know,
Mom's got them. Man, just whatever. MISSI they called Mississippi,
but uh, you know she come to open up. Man,
they'd be standing in front of her store. They stand there,
make sure she's in. Okay, Once she's in, they gone
across the street because they know it's bad for business,

(01:23:38):
you know, but let somebody come in there looking threatening
the enforced Baby.

Speaker 3 (01:23:45):
I'm telling you what side of Detroit? Was it on
east side?

Speaker 9 (01:23:49):
Yeah? Not far east? Yeah? Yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah
right yeah. You start thinking about your pilgrimage.

Speaker 6 (01:23:58):
I was like, I want to ask you, do you
still keep in touch with any of the old crew,
like Sherry Carter.

Speaker 9 (01:24:12):
Madeline, like all those everybody you just named? Yes?

Speaker 8 (01:24:17):
Is it a Facebook group somewhere that y'all have?

Speaker 9 (01:24:21):
Yeah, you'll be going in yeah yeah yeah yeah, no
we still talk?

Speaker 3 (01:24:29):
Yeah? Yeah?

Speaker 9 (01:24:30):
Man?

Speaker 8 (01:24:30):
Did they ever talk on it? I was just a
strength of what you just said.

Speaker 11 (01:24:33):
Is there ever talk of like a full out reunion
on B E T with you everybody?

Speaker 3 (01:24:39):
Okay?

Speaker 9 (01:24:40):
That that was a very quick are you no? You
know for me, you know, when it was done, it
was done, and that's the way I am when i'm you.

Speaker 3 (01:24:51):
Know the end. When When was when the video so
officially in that's a cool question. No, it was hold
on the Planet Grooves.

Speaker 9 (01:24:59):
Wh It was like nineteen ninety seven, I think. I
know because they brought me back to do a special
Millennium show or the Top Videos of the Century, and
so I came back for that. But for the last
two years that I did the show, I'm telling you, man,
it was on New York Avenue, and every night I

(01:25:22):
would drive up New York Avenue and all I could
think was that, God, forty minutes more and you could
be at the Bay having dinner with Pam. That's all
I thought about every night. And that told me that
it was time. Yeah, that it was time. I didn't
want to do it anymore, you know, And it just
changed for me, I think because I started. They started before.

(01:25:43):
We used to do it in the afternoon at one o'clock,
and sometimes for a number of years we did at three,
but always live. And then we started recording it at
seven o'clock at night, and you know, with me doing
my morning radio show, it's just too much. I just
it didn't feel same to me. I didn't. I just
I don't know. And it was fourteen years, you know,

(01:26:05):
and so no, I you know, my it was done.
It was people always go mad. God, don't you miss it?

Speaker 3 (01:26:14):
You know?

Speaker 9 (01:26:15):
I don't. I mean, well, I missed the people. The
show was fun, But I always think about those last
two years, man, where it's just like, no, it was time.
Everything has its time, you know. That's the way I feel, man.
And we had our run and it was cool, it
was great. It served his purpose for that moment, and
we're done with it.

Speaker 8 (01:26:33):
But you did miss TV because you came back with
Donnie have the Dark a little bit?

Speaker 9 (01:26:37):
Yeah, yeah, I decided I wanted to. That was Pam's fault. Really,
she wants you out of the house.

Speaker 3 (01:26:48):
Quest.

Speaker 9 (01:26:48):
Let me tell you how she put it though. She said, Donnie,
everywhere we go, all you hear is how much they
love you and want you to do something else. You know,
God has given you a talent that you should be
sharing with people. That's the way she put it. What
I heard was get out. It's been five and a
half years.

Speaker 3 (01:27:08):
I brought you out of the house records.

Speaker 9 (01:27:13):
Because I didn't do anything for five and a half years. Man,
What was that like?

Speaker 3 (01:27:16):
We're going from just going going going, having years to chill.

Speaker 9 (01:27:20):
It was cool, man, it was great. I tell everybody
I started. I started a shuttle service. Yeah, I would
shuttle grand babies back and forth.

Speaker 3 (01:27:32):
And I was good at it.

Speaker 9 (01:27:33):
And in the summer I became a pool boy, you know,
for my grandkids. Man. So so I loved it, man,
But but I'm happy to be back in the game.

Speaker 11 (01:27:44):
You know.

Speaker 9 (01:27:44):
It's you know, I love music in particular, and I
felt like it was five and a half years of
me not knowing what was going on, you know, and
I don't and I never experienced that before. I've never
been out of loops as the time I was twelve,
you know, I always knew what was happening, you know.

(01:28:04):
So you know, so it's been cool, man. And then
and then the love of the people give you two man.

Speaker 3 (01:28:09):
You know, It's just.

Speaker 9 (01:28:12):
You know, it was almost like me and Ray Leonard
had this conversation because we were talking. He took off
for five years before he came back and fought Hagler,
and he was talking about how it was so much
more intense when you came back because you know people,
you know, they're used to you, and then you're gone
for this and you figured that's it, there's no more,

(01:28:33):
and then all of a sudden you come back and
it's a different level of appreciation, you know, and uh,
you know people just people treat me swell.

Speaker 11 (01:28:42):
But when did you realize that you probably could never
do radio anywhere else but the DMV, Like the DMV
might not let you.

Speaker 8 (01:28:50):
Was there a moment where you realized that you came.

Speaker 9 (01:28:54):
Or that you just wouldn't a dog you got you
painting them straight up gangs now.

Speaker 8 (01:29:00):
Him right like you on Ben's chili bowl wall now
like you can't leave?

Speaker 9 (01:29:10):
You are like, no, I never felt like that, like
they wouldn't let you leave. I mean, you know, I
mean because I was always so you love DC across
the country anyway. I absolutely love d C without doubt.

Speaker 3 (01:29:26):
Because I'm certain that at one point you could write
your own ticket and let me see what it's up
in Chicago.

Speaker 9 (01:29:32):
Or go to l A or But for what I mean,
you know, I mean d Yeah, and I love Detroit.
I mean Detroit, that's you know, that's home. Baby. But
you know, I mean, I'm already. I've been in Chicago.
Be Et video Soul put me in every city in

(01:29:53):
this country. I don't need radio to do that. I've
never felt the need to to leave to go.

Speaker 3 (01:30:00):
You know.

Speaker 9 (01:30:01):
That's another reason why I've never felt pressure to do syndication.
You know, I'm ask you know.

Speaker 3 (01:30:07):
B E.

Speaker 9 (01:30:08):
T put me in more homes, and syndication could ever
put me in from radio, you know it could that
could never be matched with radio what B E.

Speaker 3 (01:30:18):
T did for me.

Speaker 9 (01:30:20):
So that's not that big a deal to me, you know.
And when I've had those conversations and I go, well,
I play some of everything, you know, So what happens
on this station in Detroit kim all the time? What
happens when I play uh Drake or Tupac or whatever,
you know, whatever it is. I'm like, well, you can

(01:30:41):
play them, but you know, and you can talk about them.
But we'll cover the Tupac song with Luthor. Oh no, no,
you won't, you know, because you know, for me, it's
not like I'm not a bit driven show, you know.
I just I play music, we talk about it, and

(01:31:02):
you know that's what I do. So music is such
a big part of what I do. I can't. You
can't take them, you can't cover It's got to be
like a listen line. I mean, you know, you got
to listen to the same thing in Chicago and San
Francisco that they're listening to in DC. You can't cover
my music with something else, right, you know, that's part
of that's the biggest part of the experience to me.

Speaker 5 (01:31:25):
And sometimes it's good to be local, you know. Sometimes
I'm telling you, man, this is one of those cases.

Speaker 3 (01:31:31):
Where be local is to be better.

Speaker 9 (01:31:34):
And you know, I'm old school in that way. I
like that. But again, I'm very blessed in that TV
gave me that thing that most people in radio are
seeking through syndication. I had it in TV already.

Speaker 6 (01:31:50):
One question I ad to you was in regards to
the culture of BT when you talk about the early years,
and you were saying that it wasn't pretty, you know
what I'm saying. I remember those early years, and I
remember it was kind of rough, but it was also
really real. And I mean just from watching your show,
and I remember there was this other show I think
you just come on after the video, so the it

(01:32:11):
was a movie show, and it was this lady had
a segment called Popcorn and pig Feet what. Yes, But
in this this particular episode was notable because they dissed
Graffiti Bridge, like I mean straight up smashed Graffiti Bridge.

Speaker 3 (01:32:31):
And I was like whole, Like, I mean, there was
that segment.

Speaker 6 (01:32:35):
There was another segment where like Dwayne Martin was going
through the record store like holding up records like on
some like Kiss of the disc kind of shit like Yo,
this new Tony Tony Tony album is crazy, Yo, this
is the new t Shir Campel album.

Speaker 3 (01:32:46):
This shit is whack.

Speaker 6 (01:32:47):
Like, I mean, they were just it was ruthless, you
know what I mean, and so and even like on
your show, I mean you would give like I mean,
god man, was.

Speaker 3 (01:32:55):
It like vertical hole. I think that was the first
place seems too much too visually. I remember that interview.

Speaker 6 (01:33:00):
She had had a cold, ye, so like you don't
remember so much so real and it was no PC,
no cut card. It just seemed to be I mean,
as as much as you described those early years as
they were kind of rough and kind of ugly, to me,
that was the charm because I knew I was getting
just uncut.

Speaker 3 (01:33:19):
When did that change?

Speaker 6 (01:33:20):
Do you or do you remember when it kind of
shifted and they were like, all right, maybe we gotta
polish it up, like we can't just you.

Speaker 9 (01:33:25):
Know, be this, and people like I can't play commercial,
you know, No, I don't.

Speaker 14 (01:33:29):
I don't know, I can't play what the rough Side
of the Mountain commercial I found.

Speaker 3 (01:33:36):
Coming up Jesus.

Speaker 9 (01:33:44):
But no, I don't know when that when that changed. Man,
I don't know. You know, I've I've always felt like
you got to keep it real. Like there are times
when I play a song to this day and I'll go,
you know, wow, my boys will kill me, but almost
say it anyway, Cooling the Gang celebration I played that

(01:34:08):
you are talking about that song on the air, is like, God,
I can't take that song anymore, I said, I you know,
I mean, I'm happy for Cooling the Gang that this
every bar, it's for wedding, any celebration you got over
the last thirty five years they played that song, I said,
But when I go down to Jamaica and I hear

(01:34:33):
it's a celebration, it's like.

Speaker 3 (01:34:37):
You can't escape it.

Speaker 9 (01:34:39):
Escaping it, you know, give me some of the other
cooler stuff. That's but you know, I think that people
appreciate that because it's real, and that's just my opinion.
You know that if everything is great, then you can
no longer be believable because everything's not great. You know, Yeah,

(01:35:01):
you should sometimes say yeah, you know that song is
not for me, but I play it. It's popular. People
are crazy, you know.

Speaker 5 (01:35:08):
Well, Donnie uh, we thank you for coming on the
show and this has definitely been a master class in man.

Speaker 9 (01:35:14):
Man, thanks for having me. I wanted to have one
final question.

Speaker 6 (01:35:18):
This is from my mother, who like absolutely loves you.
She wants to know I guess I want to know,
did you have a smoke before you went on the air.

Speaker 12 (01:35:26):
No, Man, definitely not always waited to laughter the show.
How people used to ask me that all the time.

Speaker 9 (01:35:41):
And one show I actually came out I addressed that.
I said, people always ask me that, and but no,
I am not high, I said, but when I smile,
I squeimped my eyes closed. They would try out kind
of make up and stuff trying to get my eyes
to look more open, and it's just that's just.

Speaker 3 (01:35:59):
Who I am.

Speaker 9 (01:35:59):
It just so I explained all that on the air,
and I said, so anyway, so no, I do not
get high, but let's get our show started. We're gonna
play this video and I'm gonna go in the back
smoke a joint. We'll be back in a minute.

Speaker 10 (01:36:15):
Oh god.

Speaker 5 (01:36:17):
I thank you Donnie Simpson for all that you've done
for us. And you know raising, I don't want to
put it like no, he.

Speaker 6 (01:36:26):
Pretty much raised like any any left of center like
black stuff you got put on like it came through video.

Speaker 3 (01:36:32):
So thank you, hey man, thank you very much. We
appreciate you. One more time.

Speaker 9 (01:36:37):
Thank y'all.

Speaker 3 (01:36:39):
I won't be happy to be here.

Speaker 5 (01:36:41):
I won't be happy here, Sugar Steve, Boss, Bill On Bifield,
bron Tickelo.

Speaker 3 (01:36:45):
This is Quest Love. You've been listening to Quest Love
Supreme only on Pandora. We see you on the next program.
Thank you.

Speaker 1 (01:36:52):
Quest Love Supreme is a production of iHeartRadio. This classic
episode was produced by the team at Pandora. For more
podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or
wherever you listen to your favorite shows.