Black Music Month QLS Classic: Lady B

Black Music Month continues with a 2021 Questlove Supreme episode that put the spotlight on a woman whose name should be a part of everyone's Hip Hop matriculation. Lady B has put in her work for the culture from being the first DJ to play Rap on FM radio, to being the first female MC to record on wax and not only did she put Philadelphia on to Hip Hop, she made it a top five market for the genre! This is a rare sit down with a true foremother of Hip Hop, the Legendary Lady B.... without a doubt!

 

 

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Questlove Supreme is a production of iHeartRadio.

Speaker 2 (00:05):
What's Up Everybody, It's Sugar Steve from Team Supreme. June
marks Black Music Month. We often speak about it on
Questlove Supreme and we've had some of the legends responsible
for the recognition on the show. Every day this June,
we are running a different episode from the QLs archives
to honor the tradition and a tent of Black Music Month.
This week we are focusing on some of the great

(00:26):
hip hop conversations in the QLs catalog. Our leader Questlove
has a new book out.

Speaker 3 (00:31):
Called hip Hop Is History.

Speaker 2 (00:33):
Check it out at questlove dot com. Today we are
airing an interview with Philadelphia's own Lady B, who is
not only a pioneering force at radio, but is also
one of the first hip hop artists.

Speaker 3 (00:44):
To release a record.

Speaker 4 (01:02):
Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to another episode of quest Love Supreme.
I will say that this is a highly personal episode
for myself in my professional.

Speaker 5 (01:15):
Eddie in our SiO territory right here.

Speaker 6 (01:17):
Yes, no, no, it's not gonna be Edie.

Speaker 4 (01:22):
I will say that in my my thirty plus years
of being in this business, I never thought the day
would occur that my first interview with the person who
literally introduced me to hip hop. Whatever happened on my platform.

(01:44):
I mean, that's that's that's how often I dreamed of
like being on her show. I mean even when I
was listening to her, I didn't have dreams of being
in hip hop. But literally, what what you know, what
Greg Mac means to kd A y in La, what
mister Magic means for New York City.

Speaker 6 (02:07):
I will say that this, this young lady.

Speaker 4 (02:12):
Was not only crucial for the Tri State area, but
in hip hop in general, because I mean, at one point,
Philly was the second largest hip hop market in the
in the first formative years of hip hop being on
Wax between like seventy nine and eighty nine. Yeah, just
any major first, you know, the first time I heard

(02:34):
cutting scratching on Grand Master Flash on the Wheels is Steel,
The first time I heard Pumpkin play a breakbeat on
on Spoony G's Love Rap, the first time I heard
Sucker C's, the first time I heard anything by the
Juice Crew, the first time got the moment I first
heard Rebel without a pause, It's it's this young lady
on our show for are you Roots? Officionados. Of course,

(02:57):
her voice might be familiar to you if if you
hold Our Things Fall apart album Hear and Deers. She's
on the without a doubt.

Speaker 7 (03:06):
That was the best session ever.

Speaker 4 (03:09):
She is the first female to be on WAX as
an MC, A pioneering DJ.

Speaker 6 (03:16):
Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the person who introduced me
to hip hop, Lady B.

Speaker 7 (03:24):
But oh, I feel so touched by that.

Speaker 8 (03:30):
But you know what, as I approach, you know, because
as I approached his fortieth anniversity, I've been doing a
lot of reflecting and just getting in my spirit with
God and just thanking him for being the person who
did what you just said that I did to introduce
a genre of music that little had faith in, a
political crap connected to that to get it on the radio.

Speaker 7 (03:53):
And you're right, I know you say that is the
second no I want. I want. I want to tell
the facts.

Speaker 8 (03:59):
And here's another thing I decide to do for my
fortieth I'm usually very humble.

Speaker 7 (04:04):
No moment, come on, bring it out.

Speaker 8 (04:06):
When people say you're a pioneer, you're an icon, you're this,
you're that, And then I start thinking, just the other day, well,
all here, I swear to God, I was like, you
know what, onw this is the onus because you did it.
And too many times the brothers get all the accolades
and we, as sisters, we don't. So yeah, I'm gonna
putting my fists in the air and I'm gonna say
it with my chest out that it wasn't just as

(04:28):
far as you know, people always say New York was
first and then Philly was the second biggest market. First
of all, all due respect to the only man who
shared my same story, and that is mister Magic in
New York. I missed his brother so much, but he's
the only one that is parallel with my life and
what we did and to fight to get it on

(04:49):
FM radio, And so you have to understand that I
was the first one to play it on FM radio.
But Magic and what we're doing was a college thing.
I kick y'all off on AM and then in Power
ninety nine put us on FM that that made stations
across the country follow suit. Yes, you understand what I'm saying,
Like I started this avalanche of a culture, and I'm

(05:13):
so proud to say that I did that. And when
I think back on just how much freaking fun I
had doing that. I am so full of joy right
about now, like I'm doing a lot of reflecting and
I'm like, wow, I did that. I knew these millionaires
when they were broken, had roaches in their apartment, and
I'm so glad to have helped them follow their dreams

(05:34):
and do what they do.

Speaker 7 (05:37):
It's it's amazing.

Speaker 8 (05:38):
It's it's you have no you have no idea how
many brick walls I came across people.

Speaker 7 (05:45):
Oh my, don't.

Speaker 6 (05:47):
Give it away.

Speaker 9 (05:48):
I'm I got time this Look, this ain't a radio show.

Speaker 7 (05:56):
Let me fall back and calm down. I'm sorry.

Speaker 6 (06:00):
Let me just say.

Speaker 4 (06:01):
Let me just say that, you know you you revealed
how many decades around the sun that you were before
we went on air, and I have to say that
you were still a timeless teenager to me. You you
literally have not like this is when she was nineteen.

(06:21):
As as on air personality, this is the same one,
Like nothing has changed, nothing has changed at all, you know,
this is I feel like this is my first real
conversation with you, like we've seen each other in passing.

Speaker 6 (06:36):
And whatnot we do.

Speaker 7 (06:37):
It is, I think it is.

Speaker 4 (06:39):
But I'm glad to finally get a moment to rapt
you because I have so many questions about my hometown
and what. You know what, I didn't get the experience
that you know, you also helped pave the way.

Speaker 6 (06:51):
Well. First of all, are you from Philadelphia.

Speaker 8 (06:54):
Born and raised Philadelphia or were you born in saying? Well,
I was born my family. My mother owned a bar
on Woodland Avenue in Southwest Your mom owned the alley
Alley's Alley.

Speaker 6 (07:08):
Yes, that's your mom's jorn.

Speaker 7 (07:10):
That was my I grew up in that avenue. That
is correct.

Speaker 8 (07:15):
Alley's Alley is my grandmother's name Ali? Yes, yes, yoh?

Speaker 6 (07:20):
Because I used to catch the thirty six trolleys.

Speaker 8 (07:24):
That's exactly where he wasn't the trolley barnh Yeah?

Speaker 6 (07:28):
Wow?

Speaker 7 (07:29):
It was my mom's bar.

Speaker 8 (07:30):
And then she raised us in Windfield, so I was
literally I literally grew up from kindergarten right two blocks
and where Will and his mom lived.

Speaker 9 (07:39):
And talk about your your people real quick, because you
have an interesting background like ethnically.

Speaker 8 (07:44):
My Malaysian African American connection, yes, we like to call it.
My grandfather is from Malaysia. He's Malaysian born in Singapore.

Speaker 5 (07:55):
Wow.

Speaker 8 (07:56):
And my grandmother was a prevate thing to little mixed
up everything. And they married and had ten children and
they raised them right there on Willing Avenue.

Speaker 7 (08:05):
Because so, yeah, I had yeah my mother.

Speaker 8 (08:09):
My mother had ten siblings, five with Arabic names, five
with Christian names.

Speaker 7 (08:13):
Is very blended, very interesting family.

Speaker 6 (08:17):
So you were always like around forty ninth with Woodland.

Speaker 8 (08:21):
I yeah, I did my homework at that bar because
I watched the glasses.

Speaker 4 (08:25):
Yeah alright, yo, because literally that that little grocery store
next door to Alley's Alley.

Speaker 7 (08:32):
It's the reason I don't have any teeth now. All
that candy.

Speaker 8 (08:35):
Remember that damn candy to mister Luther. I used to
tell them, you want to play my dnnis Bill. I
go in there, I go in my mom's bar. I
get like three dollars and that's penny candy. That's three hundred.

Speaker 7 (08:47):
That's a candy, right, and I would buy.

Speaker 6 (08:50):
It in that store next door.

Speaker 4 (08:54):
Not to mention Jack Myers across the street, this might
turn into our city on Eddie.

Speaker 6 (08:59):
I'm sorry, sorry, y'all.

Speaker 8 (09:03):
Talk y'all shit, man, but rat but yeah, so yeah,
that's that's where I Wentfield West, Philadelphia.

Speaker 4 (09:09):
Girl, my grandmother used to live on forty ninth and
King Sessing.

Speaker 8 (09:14):
So okay, my grandmom lived one block over, so it
was that forty nine forty eighth street. Move probably her
house Yep, right behind right off the Paschal.

Speaker 4 (09:25):
Oh wow, because I know that sister Sledge and their
grandmam lived on.

Speaker 7 (09:32):
Did they can't they? Yeah? Kathy's grandmom and them came
from around the area too.

Speaker 4 (09:35):
Yeah, they were like in the backyard of where my
grandmam lived.

Speaker 6 (09:39):
That's where their grandmam lived.

Speaker 7 (09:42):
My brother took all of them on the Prime.

Speaker 8 (09:43):
Their mom wouldn't allow them to have prime dates, like
he took at least three sister Sledges on their proms.

Speaker 7 (09:49):
Every three year altogether. Ms Blow wouldn't let them go
out on dates.

Speaker 6 (09:55):
You're right now.

Speaker 7 (09:56):
It was like the stand in prime. Dude.

Speaker 4 (09:59):
Dude, everyone has a misflowed story about how strict she
was with their daughters.

Speaker 6 (10:03):
What you had to I guess you had to do
that that back then? You know, of.

Speaker 7 (10:09):
Course she did.

Speaker 8 (10:09):
They were beautiful, talented and if she hadn't there would
they would not be where they are today.

Speaker 4 (10:15):
Okay, So, because your your story is so loaded, I
want to I kind of want to start with the session.
That will start with to the beach. Y'all your twelve
inch single? Okay, So how how did that come to be?

Speaker 8 (10:32):
So I'm the youngest of four, my oldest sister I
learned and did way too much before my time, but
I followed behind her like a little puppy dog, which
landed me in the club scene. Kim Gray's Whispers serendipity.
It was that back then Philly had a club night
every night, like at Tuesdays you went here, Wednesdays, you
went there Friday.

Speaker 7 (10:53):
That was popping. That was kind of.

Speaker 6 (10:55):
The neighborhood clubs or No, these.

Speaker 8 (10:57):
Were all like downtown like Kim Grays was twenty, Nathan Samson,
Sarah Jipas was down there. Club Whispers is like off
a thirteenth and Walnut. So it's kind of like a
simmer City, okay, a downtown type thing. And I befriended
World be Free, the basketball player and Darryl Dawkins, and.

Speaker 7 (11:14):
They hung out with my sisters. They were older than me.

Speaker 8 (11:16):
I was kind of like the little yeah, the little
one that followed behind, just trying to hang out with
the older kids.

Speaker 7 (11:22):
Exactly.

Speaker 6 (11:23):
You said, there's ten of you. You said, there's ten
of you. What's the girl boy ratio of your siblings?

Speaker 8 (11:29):
Two and two and it's just me and my brother.
Now I am the youngest, and there are all.

Speaker 7 (11:34):
Three years aparts and eight years later.

Speaker 8 (11:36):
Yeah, my mother went to get her appendix taken out
and they found an embryo here.

Speaker 6 (11:40):
I am wow, oh.

Speaker 7 (11:42):
Definitely definitely not planned. Yeah.

Speaker 8 (11:47):
So anyway, I started hanging out in the club scene,
hanging out with World and them and going up to
New York, you know, and I start here.

Speaker 7 (11:55):
In hip hop. I'm like, this is dope, you know.

Speaker 8 (11:57):
And I was on the courtyards and the jacks, walking
up to pissy elevators and shit like, listening.

Speaker 7 (12:03):
To hip like in the hip hop like. I went
to see what their culture was about.

Speaker 8 (12:07):
And then I was working call myself, getting a little
part time job before I went back to college, before
I went to college in the first place, and did
you go I wanted to go Listen, My plans were
to go to Howard.

Speaker 7 (12:20):
All this got kicked to the curb. Me tell you
the story. That was my plan.

Speaker 8 (12:25):
I wanted to be a lawyer, a corporate lawyer, is
what I wanted to do with my life. This is
before this happened. And being in the club there was
a DJ, Lawrence Levon, and he would break down these
break beats and I would put my trade down.

Speaker 7 (12:41):
I was a cocktail waitress. I put my trade down.

Speaker 8 (12:43):
Had no business being in there. Mind you, I'm not
twenty one yet. Put my put my trade down and go.
You know, do what I heard, world, and I'm doing
busting rods.

Speaker 7 (12:54):
I want a breakway. I was about to say, yeah,
he was a world. No, he took me around people
that did it. You don't see what I'm saying.

Speaker 8 (13:03):
And then I no, seriously, like we I went shopping
for him for his first twelve hundreds and we set
up the tables in the living room like it was
a whole thing with us, like his crew.

Speaker 7 (13:10):
Daryl. You couldn't tell Daryl Dawkins he wasn't a rapper.

Speaker 8 (13:13):
He had the whole, remember Quass, I don't know, Oh,
you might be too young, but he had this whole
I don't He had this whole setup in his crib.

Speaker 7 (13:19):
He was chocolate, thunder W d U n K. Like
they were. If that's how I.

Speaker 8 (13:26):
Got introduced to hip hop. These old these older basketball players,
they were and young at that time to me, they
were eight years my older. And and then so I'm
doing this and this becomes popular and Kim Grays now
they're telling me put the trade down, going in and
do your thing.

Speaker 7 (13:41):
Go go do one of them rhunds.

Speaker 8 (13:43):
So that Perry Johnson, that was the da of doctor
Perry Johnson from w D A S.

Speaker 7 (13:51):
Yes, he's a real doctor now. Actually went and got
a doctor. He's in LA.

Speaker 4 (13:55):
Who hang on a second, you got to slow down.
Second second, we'll get up for our listeners. So doctor
Perry Johnson was probably.

Speaker 7 (14:04):
One of our franky crocker.

Speaker 4 (14:06):
Yes, he was one of the most crucial DJs of Philadelphia.
If you're a fan of Bohannon's Let's start the dance.

Speaker 6 (14:15):
Come on and do it, Come on and do it.

Speaker 4 (14:17):
He's boom, there's there's a special remix with a guy
doing like DJ rapping like shake a boom, boom, shake
a like if you just look up Bohn and let's
start the dance.

Speaker 6 (14:28):
Doctor Perry Johnson.

Speaker 4 (14:29):
Like his his rapping over that song was just as
famous as the original song itself.

Speaker 6 (14:35):
But it's such a he's a real doctor now.

Speaker 7 (14:38):
He's a real doctor now And an author.

Speaker 8 (14:40):
He had a book signing here, maybe not that long
before COVID.

Speaker 6 (14:44):
I got to meet that brother man. I got to
we can make that happen.

Speaker 7 (14:47):
I have his number in my He would be so
to wow. Sh he would be so touched.

Speaker 8 (14:54):
But anyway, he approaches me to do this hip hop
song and I'm remember calling world, like, yo, they want
me to do a record doing what you do, like
what the sugar Hill guys did, and blah blah blah.

Speaker 7 (15:06):
He's like, you're going to do it. I'm like, I
don't want.

Speaker 8 (15:07):
To do that. And long story short, me me brown
another well on DJ and my sister sat up drinking
or doing whatever they were doing, and took these three
by five cards and kept telling me to tell them
all my rhymes, and they put them on cards and
they stuck them on the board. And every next day
I was in the studio and I cut to the beach.
All when people wonder why I hate the song so much,

(15:30):
even though it will go down in history as the
first female on WAX, it was to a direct current
song that they really didn't make any money off of,
so they rather than do a new track, they made
me rap over this black so mad about that. And secondly,
come to find out that the guy who owned the
label didn't even really wanted to really hit. It was

(15:53):
more of a tax write off thing to him. He
was kind of a crook. He didn't pay Frankie Smith
for double Dutch bucks either. Yeah, he was a real
he was a real shyster. And it was a one
take song. Like I was like, but I can do
that part. They were like, no, it's fine print, right.

Speaker 6 (16:09):
But was this on WM O T Records?

Speaker 8 (16:13):
It was before yet mot was Tec Records. It's a
yellow label with black writing. Wowaving yeah, so anyway, but
but here's the bright side of my to the Beach
all Lady B experience. To give you a little hip
hop history. I feel like I'm writing a book and
telling my truth. No, honestly, this is the I've never

(16:34):
told these stories before, but I will say this. I
didn't I got financially taken advantage of with this gentleman,
and I didn't get the money. Would turned around to
the song being the first female and no one knew
that hip hop was gonna be that popular and messed
around to win gold so and Doude wasn't paying me.

Speaker 7 (16:51):
But then mister gangster himself, mister Joe Robinson, owner of
Sugar Hill Records. Step the dude got my master, pressed
it up and paid me for my son.

Speaker 5 (17:02):
Wow O. Stories about Joe.

Speaker 7 (17:06):
Like that, right, they laugh.

Speaker 6 (17:08):
It's a big joke.

Speaker 7 (17:09):
It's a big joke amongst me and God, everybody else
on the label. They was like, Lady B was only
want to get paid. Joe was like a dad to
be not.

Speaker 8 (17:20):
To forget that I'm the one playing all of these
records coming out of his campus.

Speaker 7 (17:26):
I don't think he was pretty stupid. He's very smart
to be friend of me at that time.

Speaker 6 (17:36):
Were you a communications major in college? Like, did you have?

Speaker 7 (17:40):
I was not? So here we go. So I remember
I was going to go to college or whatever.

Speaker 8 (17:44):
And my mother, my my paternal father passed when I
was three years old from a heart attack. My mother
remarried and my stepfather passed when I was about twelve
eleven twelve, So I had you know, when when you're
in the service, both of them were in the Service,
you can go to college for free. It's paid for
it because your dad was in the Service. So now

(18:06):
I'm stuck because I got this record out and I'm
getting shows and I'm going up to Harlem and I'm
staying on stage with a micro. But it's crazy, But
I want to go back to school because I got
free school just sitting there. So I came up with
the great idea. Once I got you know, the record
came out and I go to hat and I get
this job and an office job, and I'm start begging

(18:27):
them to let me play hip hop. I said, well,
you had to have a license to be on the air.
You don't have to anymore, but back then, the FCC
required a license. So I went to broadcasting school while
I was at the station and got it for three years,
and got my license.

Speaker 7 (18:42):
For three years. Damn it a long time broadcast. I
wanted it extra.

Speaker 8 (18:46):
There was different levels of it, and I wanted Yeah,
I wanted to do more than radio. Got a license,
like to do TV here, whatever you do. It's not
like that anymore. The FCC done changed on. They you
could just walk up the street and get a damn
radio show.

Speaker 9 (18:59):
Now.

Speaker 6 (18:59):
Look, yeah I got my radio, Jose.

Speaker 4 (19:05):
Yeah, so for for our listeners, uh listening, She mentioned
h h A T w h A T was an.

Speaker 6 (19:11):
AM radio station. I knew as a kid.

Speaker 4 (19:14):
I knew it because, like my I mean the way
that people always listening to talk radio. Now, we had
a woman by the name of Mary Mason in Philadelphia,
who I owe grand mom, And I mean, I don't
know how typical it was for a black woman to
have her own platform to that of like, uh, I mean,

(19:36):
who's pop.

Speaker 6 (19:41):
In terms of like Alex what's his name?

Speaker 7 (19:43):
Like, let me let me just share one Mary Mason stories.

Speaker 6 (19:47):
Please.

Speaker 8 (19:47):
Yeah, I'm eighteen years old and Nancy Reagan walks into
the lobby the Secret Service with her blah blah blah.

Speaker 7 (19:56):
She just doesn't pop up right stop by to say
how to marry? This is how politically strong she was.
And she told me, and I quote, tell that bitch.
I don't want to tell what I'm trying to get
carter and off.

Speaker 8 (20:17):
Oh here I am, so here, I am, y'all eighteen
Like how do I.

Speaker 7 (20:23):
Oh, she told you to tell that bitch.

Speaker 8 (20:24):
Yes, so I gotta go out here and look this
lady in her face and like, ma'am, I'm so sorry,
but miss Mason, it's a flattered that you stopped by. However,
her schedule, you know, I had to go through the
whole shebang.

Speaker 7 (20:38):
But that's what she told me.

Speaker 8 (20:39):
I've heard her hurst at the mayor and hang up
on them about her Philly's tickets, like she.

Speaker 7 (20:44):
Miss Mason was a be. She is the reason I
have the backbone and that my shoulders are back.

Speaker 8 (20:49):
And I've never let anyone talk to me or or
or try to get over at least not knowing me.
I mean they ended up a couple of times anyway,
but they had to sneak and do it. I've never
allowed anyone to be blatantly disrespectful in my face, if you.

Speaker 4 (21:06):
Will that to mean she was like the original Russe Limbaugh.
Like she's very controversial also like I know she supported
like Frank Brazil or.

Speaker 7 (21:20):
He was a politician on the radio. Is what Mary was.

Speaker 8 (21:23):
And I will have to say that she walked her walk.
She was dedicated to this community of people. She got
on the air and talked about things that other people
wouldn't even touch and called people on it like she
she she may she I witnessed this woman changed lives.

Speaker 6 (21:47):
Yeah, and she was something.

Speaker 9 (21:50):
And then you took some baton and now you do
the same thing well.

Speaker 8 (21:54):
Later, because I mean I didn't take the time from
her then because we take it.

Speaker 7 (21:57):
I mean she when she passed that the time. To me,
I was doing hip hoop. I was crazy. We was
having fun. Y'all was having fun. You just said it.
I was playing all that good stuff with y'all. I
just came. I just came into my Mary Mason vibe.
Right now, That's what it is.

Speaker 6 (22:10):
Yeah, okay.

Speaker 4 (22:13):
So I remember like discovering your show around like late
nineteen eighty early eighty one. You know, every Saturday afternoon whatever,
we my brother and I would just record.

Speaker 8 (22:27):
Like everybody says, I remind them of Paul's record.

Speaker 7 (22:31):
Paul's record. Whenever I see Banie Segull, he goes, Paul's record.

Speaker 4 (22:34):
All right, no oh, you're world famous, fat get your part,
press your pause, press your pause button. But to have
a radio show, and you were on for like two
to three hours, but I'm thinking, like back in eighty one,
was there even two to three hours worth of quality
hip hop to play?

Speaker 7 (22:53):
I like to explain it like this.

Speaker 8 (22:55):
I laugh every time I hear the term digging into crates,
and that's crazy with an nets because when I started
playing hip hop.

Speaker 7 (23:03):
On the radio, there was a crate. One crate was
it full. It was full to the max. I mean
not everything was. I was picky. It was was good
enough to play right.

Speaker 8 (23:17):
You know when when we first started, when we realized
we could take what we were doing in our backyards,
in our neighborhoods and our courtyards and put it on
wax and that you know, this was possible. Everybody tried
to do it, whether they could rap or not, but
I was very I think the thing that Number one,

(23:37):
you have to understand when hip hop started, it was
its purpose was to stop a terrible disease in the
black community that was full of violence and gang war,
and it was it was crazy. It was getting a
little out of hand with it. So hip hop gave
I mean, I'm sure if you spoke to an Africa
band body he would co sign this. But hip hop
gave us away to battle each other and represent our neighborhoods,

(24:02):
not with knives and guns, but with turntables and microphones.
And it became this thing like you had to rep
your neighborhood with your rhymes, and God forbid, if you've
biden anybody else's rhyme, you had to come with your
shit and it had to be real, and it had
to be raw and it had to be authentic, and
everybody couldn't do that. Some people just thought they could
just get out a book of words that rhyme and

(24:23):
put some shit together and hand it to me to
get on the air.

Speaker 7 (24:25):
That happened a lot.

Speaker 8 (24:27):
But if I couldn't understand number one, what you were saying,
like I no disrespect to what people like these kids
like today or whatever, but mumble rat, it just makes
my skin call because for me, a good MC is
very articulate.

Speaker 7 (24:44):
You can hear everywhere. I don't care what if he's
saying something wrong, disrespectful.

Speaker 8 (24:48):
I have to hear what you're saying or why did
you waste that banging ass beat?

Speaker 7 (24:52):
Like why are you here?

Speaker 9 (24:54):
B do you remember like your first show and the
records that you had to play out of the crate,
like all right, it's my first show.

Speaker 7 (25:01):
I gotta get so so well, you have to understand
then we kind of got you know, we did? You know?

Speaker 8 (25:06):
I laugh when I see Jeff and Cash and and
Richard Dean and them casts and U quest and and Biz.
May he rest in peace go deep into this this
DJ thing. But you have to understand when hip hop
start is when we first learned how to cut and
scratch a brake beat. So that took up so much time.
Not only am I gonna just take the train, but
I'm gonna take the train for about good twelve fourteen

(25:27):
damn minutes with a lot of time.

Speaker 6 (25:29):
On the riad.

Speaker 7 (25:31):
You know what I mean.

Speaker 6 (25:32):
Yeah, you're going You're gonna.

Speaker 7 (25:34):
Cut that joint what suck mcs And then you got
the flip side.

Speaker 8 (25:37):
Then you got the instrumental that you could cut in
with that joint, then you got another DJ. At one
time on Power ninety nine, it was so dope, me
and Jeff Mills.

Speaker 7 (25:46):
May he rest in peace.

Speaker 8 (25:47):
Had he got two turns, Yes, he had two turntables
on his side. I had two turning turnative tables, and
we had a reel to reel, so.

Speaker 7 (25:56):
We have six elements coing in. I'm cutting it up
the songs in the minute. People it was blowing people's
my cross my mind.

Speaker 9 (26:03):
I'm gonna just have a real dumb moment because I
know I'm not alone in this. I don't think it
ever crossed my mind as you were literally mixing records
like that.

Speaker 8 (26:10):
I remember run and and Dale coming to my studio
for the first time. They're like, so you're gonna mix
the record and interview us.

Speaker 5 (26:16):
I was like, yeah, right, you were more than just
a personality. It's like I was.

Speaker 8 (26:23):
A big girl on a radio and I still am.

Speaker 6 (26:26):
Yeah, I was gonna say that.

Speaker 4 (26:28):
You also, you guys would at least on like the
like the midpoint or at least the last hour of
the w h A T portion of your show, like
you were also playing like craft work, like what would
become like b boy, you know, like it's time.

Speaker 8 (26:47):
Well, you have to understand, break dancing was a major
element for us in the beginning of this thing, So
if you couldn't break to it, it definitely didn't get played.
And they demanded it because you have to understand, I
am taping the only hip hop y'all gonna have for
the week, and then y'all with Jones until the next week.
Like I was the only one with PEPSI understand, I'm
the only place you can get it. People were driving

(27:10):
you canna ask Chuck d They would drive down to
Philly to take my show. Yes, So it was like that.
It was it was like this thing and everybody had
to have it, and it was just so much freaking
fun doing and it.

Speaker 9 (27:23):
Was so and Mary Mason never said she never pulled
your coat on anything, not a record.

Speaker 7 (27:28):
Nobody ever said listen, I can't be playing that no more.
It was never.

Speaker 6 (27:32):
We won't even mention the discomboblated booblator.

Speaker 7 (27:34):
No, I'd love this combined.

Speaker 6 (27:40):
That anymore.

Speaker 4 (27:46):
That all right, I'll get the nineteen eighty six in
a second. Hang on, we had a small controversy with
mc breeze discoboblated boobulator. But wait before before I go on,
there's two things I gotta ask you. One, how often
did you record your own shows on w h.

Speaker 7 (28:04):
A t he wants them?

Speaker 8 (28:06):
I know so everybody tap Money, every DJ has asked
me this question. So in my possession, I have not
gone through them. I do have some real deriels, but
as far as cassettes, people have been given them to
me over the years, I meet a listener on the
air and sendate they used to take me, and they
still have them. As a matter of fact, I've been
asking people to give them back or I can make

(28:27):
a copy off them of them and give them back
to them. Because I and I didn't even have a
cassette player in the house, but my niece and nephews
brought me one last year, so it's fly little joint.
It looks like a boombox, but his Bluetooth compatible is
so cute. But I have was sitting there here on
my desk. But I now want to get the cassettes
so I can hear them. But I do have, like
I do have some of those real to reels.

Speaker 6 (28:48):
You got to convert those in like I have to.

Speaker 7 (28:51):
I know I'm getting to the point.

Speaker 8 (28:53):
COVID did allow me to do a lot of purging,
so there is a little order to my madness. So
I'm getting it all together. At least I know tapes
are here, rial the reels are here, and now I
just got to dive into them.

Speaker 4 (29:06):
Okay, I gotta ask a question. There's a record you
used to always play, and I thought it was a
Philly record, and I'm just finding out that this guy
is from New York. But do you know the whereabouts
of r c loa Rock aka the mic stro.

Speaker 8 (29:23):
Are you ready hold your hat, hold your hand, because
you're not gonna believe it is right here? Hit me
Sunday night. My show is sold out, by the way,
at the Dell Music Center.

Speaker 7 (29:33):
It's been sold.

Speaker 3 (29:36):
It is.

Speaker 8 (29:38):
It's my fortieth anniversary in radio and hitting the stage
for the very first time at the Dell. We'll see
everybody around the nation because I have to fulfill my
obligation and set you on a gutification.

Speaker 4 (29:59):
But you don't no, no, you found our sealer rock
the mic stroke. Yo.

Speaker 8 (30:07):
He's so hyped about doing this show that me and
Charlie Mack are like, I don't know how old is now?
And I'm like, does anybody told me he's gonna have
to put a track behind him because he's not going
to make her do all the lyrics.

Speaker 7 (30:19):
Like, there's no way.

Speaker 6 (30:20):
Me and Turk will drive down and do the lyrics
for him.

Speaker 3 (30:26):
Yo.

Speaker 7 (30:26):
I was this is nine day.

Speaker 8 (30:28):
I expecting Sunday night at the Dell. B there or
B Square?

Speaker 6 (30:33):
Who else?

Speaker 7 (30:36):
Oh, you don't want to know. You ain't ready. I've
never had EPMD.

Speaker 8 (30:41):
They will be in the building because I've been doing
this for ten years now. I've never had nice and smooth.

Speaker 7 (30:46):
They will be in the building. I have my iconic
Sugarhill game Melo Email and his crew.

Speaker 8 (30:52):
I have I've said shantee, I always try to have
a female every year she's my female. This year EPMD
nice and well CuMo d will be in the and
my headliner is Big Daddy came.

Speaker 4 (31:04):
Oh man, Yo, you know where the mixtro is.

Speaker 7 (31:09):
He's gonna be on my state. You gotta see this video.
I gotta. I'm gonna say, send me your number. I'm
gonna send you this video that he did. He is,
He's He's the mice Trup. That's all I can say.

Speaker 9 (31:20):
Wow.

Speaker 8 (31:21):
You want somebody old lady beatings your bull? Or see
the rock I'm coming down here to rock the joint
or it's like a b The promo videos for everybody
people were doing Oh when you have to do one too.
People are doing happy fortieth anniversary videos. We're trying to
make a last table. Happy fortieth lady be spread the word,

(31:42):
get everybody to do it.

Speaker 7 (31:42):
Let's blow the spot up.

Speaker 8 (31:44):
I will hashtag happy fortieth lady beat Let's go woo
woo wow.

Speaker 4 (31:54):
So I remember when you you came to Power ninety nine.
I believe in eighty four, around fall of eighty four.

Speaker 7 (32:03):
I'm not even around that time.

Speaker 4 (32:05):
I mean I religiously remember this, but there was a
period in which you were off of what between. I
guess like around eighty three or whatever. What happened in
that gap year? Like I didn't hear.

Speaker 6 (32:19):
Like I went from no.

Speaker 8 (32:21):
I went from Hat to Power ninety nine. Then Power
ninety nine fired me and I went up to New York.

Speaker 7 (32:27):
I was on BLS.

Speaker 4 (32:30):
Okay, so your original Sunday afternoon show on Power ninety nine.

Speaker 8 (32:35):
My original radio gig was thirteen forty am. First time
hip hop was ever played on X. Then I was
approached by Das And this is when Power was just born,
and you know it used to be a country station, right,
this is when they decided to make it, you know,
an urban station. They both made an offer, and honestly,

(32:56):
being a Das child and raised by Butter doubably one
of his bonus chill ldren, it was Butter who gave
me the name Lady B.

Speaker 7 (33:02):
By the way, wait, I don't know.

Speaker 6 (33:05):
What your real name is. Do we know what your
real name is?

Speaker 7 (33:09):
I have a government name, my family. Bye. Everybody calls
me bahya. That's what the bee stands for.

Speaker 6 (33:14):
By wow.

Speaker 8 (33:15):
Okay, Yeah, So anyway, they both made an offer, but
ninety nine's offer was more, and I went to Butter
kind of teary because I'm a kid and I really
wanted my dream is to work for Das And he
told me, and I quote and I love him forty
cent Baby, I'm gonna need you to go get that money.

Speaker 7 (33:33):
Oh, good for you. And I was like, but brother,
he was.

Speaker 8 (33:36):
Like, listen here you will shine. Fly fly my child, fly,
go get that money.

Speaker 4 (33:43):
By this point in eighty four eighty five, when we're
going into the second phase of what hip hop is
with the deaf jam era, with the rush era, who
did you mean.

Speaker 7 (33:54):
When Russell finally got the deal with CBS.

Speaker 4 (33:56):
Yes, that the whole what I call the Fresh Best era,
where you're introducing us to the Fat Boys, where you're
introducing us to the Beastie Boys and run DMC and whatnot.

Speaker 6 (34:05):
I do know that New.

Speaker 4 (34:07):
York's resistance to hip hop UH being performed at least
in Manhattan opens the door for Philadelphia UH to become
the second biggest market, because you know, Chuck East always
tell me that the most you know they could they
could play in Long Island at that stadium, but they
could never play Madison Square Gardens.

Speaker 6 (34:27):
So to them, playing the spectrum was just as important.

Speaker 7 (34:35):
Those are the brick walls.

Speaker 8 (34:37):
I was telling you about quest like people think that, oh, yeah,
you know, we start doing this and everybody, you know,
open their arms and and and and loved on it.

Speaker 7 (34:46):
No, we had to fight for a lot of.

Speaker 8 (34:48):
Stuff that people take for granted. Now, in my opinion,
you have no idea we had politicians. I don't I
remember picketing at radio stations, no more rat advisory. Yeah,
we went through so much. We went through so much.
But you know, God bless Russell forgetting that deal with CBS,

(35:09):
because that's when you know, now we see the monetary
value of it, and we see that. You know, you
got executives at CBS who were saying, damn public enemy,
and the BC boards are selling just as much as
Luther and Michael.

Speaker 7 (35:24):
Wait, wait a minute, let's take a look at this, right,
and those kind of numbers and the masses that a
national distribution deal brought to hip hop made it. It
was combustible. It exploded, if you will. It touched a globe,

(35:46):
something that was created in the burroughs of New York
and by me hanging out with those crazy older people
hadn't been this hanging out with bringing it to phildelp
and and all of us collectively fighting for the time
on the radio. Here's the thing.

Speaker 8 (36:07):
When I was on AM, the woman who owned the
station even know my name. This woman walked by me
every day, never spoke to me, never said anything. I
had these little show for a couple of hours on
a Saturday. It grew to a Sunday. They saw the
numbers started to grow. It grew to a weekly show,
and she started speaking to me more of the story. Hi,

(36:29):
miss Clark, how are you, Miss die How are you?
She didn't care nothing about me, but I started making
her so much money. Like Billboard did this big article.
I broke records on AM ratings. AM had never gotten
ratings like that. So that's what happened to fast forward
to where you're talking about. When you know it's not
an out your trunk, you go to the press and

(36:51):
plan and press up your own type.

Speaker 7 (36:52):
Situation, which is what it was. It was like drugs.

Speaker 8 (36:55):
You know, you didn't bag it up, you pressed it up,
and then you said up to the community.

Speaker 9 (37:01):
So by the time they got to Power ninety nine, though,
where was where was hip hop in this relationship with radio?
Because like, by this time, where there are other cities.

Speaker 8 (37:08):
By the time, you have to understand that power is
where I played Girls of the World.

Speaker 7 (37:13):
Ain't nothing but trouble first, Okay, well, yeah, this is
when Jeff and and and this is when Steady Be
and Will were battling on the radio. I remember that
he had Naked Break. So there's West Coast hip hop
rat some.

Speaker 8 (37:29):
Of the some of the songs, they couldn't even wait
to get it to the press.

Speaker 7 (37:34):
I played a lot of assetates. You know what that is?
Plus you know, right, so I played a lot of those.

Speaker 4 (37:40):
I don't believe the acetates that I still can't find.
It's a whole different mix.

Speaker 8 (37:44):
I have assetates here in my storage that I will
not part with a sentimental value. But I played it
off cassette, you know what I mean. Before they even
got they wanted to heavy up and get it out.

Speaker 4 (37:56):
What what should also be noted is that, I mean
ninety nine wasn't your only platform.

Speaker 6 (38:02):
And what I want to know is.

Speaker 7 (38:05):
Ustlers. I was a little promoted. I did all the
hip hop parties we did after midnight.

Speaker 4 (38:09):
Yeah, I was gonna say after midnight the.

Speaker 8 (38:13):
Mecca, the mecca of that.

Speaker 4 (38:16):
That's Philadelphia's rich. That's Philadelphia's you know, I don't know
what's New York venue. I could compare it to.

Speaker 7 (38:22):
But second Latin Quarter, right Latin Quarter.

Speaker 4 (38:26):
That was quarter that it went down.

Speaker 6 (38:30):
This is what I want to know though.

Speaker 4 (38:32):
Now I was for I was forbidden to go to
after midnight because of course, you know, parents were like too.

Speaker 6 (38:41):
Violent was after night.

Speaker 4 (38:45):
It was after midnight as bad as all the authority
figures in my life told me that it was.

Speaker 7 (38:52):
First of all, God bless the authority figures in your life.
Really not everyone.

Speaker 8 (38:57):
Survived the era after midnight. I will say that it was.
I wish I knew their history. The owner passed away
not too long ago too. But I want to say,
before it was a hip hop club, it was some
kind of seedy underground because it had like a movie
theater in it. I had these obscure to the side. Well, no,

(39:23):
he took and brought the spaghetti warehouse and tried to
make it. But that would it would nothing would ever
be as the undergrounds roll down was. You're going down
these steps into this basement, and once you enter, you're
in a whole different world.

Speaker 6 (39:34):
You know.

Speaker 8 (39:35):
Me and Shante, she brought me to tears where we
were talking about the first time she and Bizz.

Speaker 7 (39:43):
Had performed there, and picture this. This is one of
my favorite nights with business Shante.

Speaker 8 (39:50):
So you know how Philly is with our fans are ignorant.
So Shante's up there with her little squaky voice.

Speaker 7 (39:55):
I'm Shante.

Speaker 8 (39:58):
So this so this is her beatbox. He's beatboxing. There's
no record playing, he's beatboxing for it. And this nigga
and Philly yells out, yo, fucking you suck you at
some something something disrespectful, and she she turned around, she
looked at Bis. She said, give me a good beat, Biz,
and she came off the stage and off the top

(40:19):
of her head tore this boy down. You're a bum
yuro bum yuro bum youurro bum like she just everything
that he was wearing. She talked about. She tore him
up down to his sneakers, how his hair was messed up,
his breathstank. It was And all you see is people
are standing there like, oh snap, like that up and

(40:39):
like no, I will never forget that night, like not ever.

Speaker 7 (40:46):
It was the best.

Speaker 4 (40:48):
It was for the infamous jazz Fresh Big Day came Battle.
I've heard about this but did.

Speaker 7 (40:54):
It listen, you don't even know. I don't know if
do you remember when? What was it called?

Speaker 8 (41:00):
Like, yea, the World Supremacy Contest that Philadelphia DJs kept
winning the DM they had had the Marriott then you
know before that this was a convention. It was the
World Supremacy Contest for the best DJ and.

Speaker 7 (41:17):
Yeah, before your.

Speaker 8 (41:18):
Time, Jeff One missed one and Cash Money one. So
one year I'm I'm judging and Jeff One, I'll never
forget that. That's the year he took the basketball out
and put on the turntable and Will was jumping over
the table and we're freaking out because he won because
this is for all the DJs.

Speaker 7 (41:38):
Around the world.

Speaker 8 (41:39):
And then the next year I'm on the judging panel
again in Cash Money one, and they were like, I
was influencing the judges.

Speaker 7 (41:49):
It's not fair.

Speaker 8 (41:51):
Then he keeps winning because Lady b is you know. No,
they were just saying, like I was yelling at the other,
at the other d the other the judges, like you
can clearly see it's not because I'm from Philly, Like
that was dope, Like they had a little tricks. Yeah,
it was a DJ contest. So the following year, they
said I had to MC the contest. I couldn't be

(42:11):
a judge, so we want to dispel you know that rumor,
and then this one, and then there's one.

Speaker 7 (42:17):
I wasn't even a judge that year. So right, Philly, Philly,
they got the best DJ. That's will.

Speaker 8 (42:24):
We did something and we still we still are the
best when it comes to the cutting and the scratching
and the transforming. I lived and worked up New York
for five years on the radio, and I always whipped
my chest out.

Speaker 7 (42:35):
I'm not scared of you. I'm like, okay, hip hop
was born here. Y'all got some dope mcs. When it
comes to the tables, Philly wins hands down that.

Speaker 8 (42:44):
Train record of a mix that y'all do up there,
and records are not playing them long enough.

Speaker 7 (42:50):
Yes, oh my god.

Speaker 4 (42:57):
Are there any other legendary after midnight stories?

Speaker 6 (43:01):
Like? Is there artists? Who is an icon?

Speaker 7 (43:05):
Now, I'm gonna tell you this is where, this is where.

Speaker 8 (43:09):
This is why your parents didn't want you to come
to after midnight. So we literally checked at the door.
We had the whole the wines with the metal projectors
and whatnot. And I guess this guy got a little
twenty five in in his Timberlain and Chuck b in
flavor on stage is public enemies on stage and we

(43:29):
hear pop, pa pop, and everybody starts to scramble and run.
And that's the day I found out that the s
one w's were really really security. That wasn't a prop.
All I remember is being folded in half. And next
thing I know, I was down the steps in the
dressing room. I don't even know how it got there.
That's how fast they moved me. How often they gently

(43:55):
took my stomach and that didn't happen. That was the
only gun incident, but it was one that I will
always remember because they literally took my stomach and with
their hand, and they put my head down, and then
two brothers had my elbows and the next thing I know,
I was downstairs Jesus proud.

Speaker 4 (44:11):
Yeah, I'll never forget the night that you premier Rebel
without a pause.

Speaker 6 (44:17):
I talk about this in my book Like You and Snow.
First of all, where is Snow?

Speaker 8 (44:24):
I just saw him at a balloon release. And memory
of a friend that we lost, Big Bob.

Speaker 7 (44:28):
Do you remember Big Bob? Yes, that passed away?

Speaker 8 (44:31):
Well, his mom he died during COVID and we really
couldn't do anything special. And the only year anniversary not
too long ago, his mom asked that we.

Speaker 7 (44:39):
All come to the house and release some balloons in
his name, and we did. We all showed up. That
was cool, Big Bob.

Speaker 9 (44:45):
I'm guessing God not talking about the informer. Okay, no,
but you're talking.

Speaker 7 (44:49):
So I wanted to get snow.

Speaker 4 (44:51):
Was this dope ass white boy? He came up with
the term. He used to say dope backwards, So.

Speaker 8 (44:57):
I'm glad to say the word dope on the air.
We couldn't say that was dope. So he made the epod.

Speaker 6 (45:00):
Oh wait, you weren't allowed to say dope.

Speaker 8 (45:03):
Yeah, we got in trouble for saying dope apod, so
hefted and said it was.

Speaker 7 (45:10):
No.

Speaker 8 (45:11):
That was our way of saying it without saying it.
But anyway, let me tell you about public Enemy. I
had a boss who said that I couldn't play public Enemy.

Speaker 7 (45:21):
That's what I wanted to know. Okay, forbid me to
play public Enemy and I quit my job.

Speaker 6 (45:30):
Is this not Harry?

Speaker 7 (45:33):
No, this is before Dave dropped no names. It was
actually the guy before d doesn't even matter he didn't
want me to play public enemy. Oh the black guy.
M okay, okay, okay, No he wasn't the black guy.
But anyway, I quit my job.

Speaker 8 (45:56):
I said, if I can't play them, then I quit,
and uh forced their hand in there. I went back
in the studio when I played him really and I
had to put my foot down.

Speaker 6 (46:05):
Yeah, I was gonna say.

Speaker 4 (46:06):
The night you premiered Rebel without a Plause was like
if you guys are familiar with Orson Wells and the
original War.

Speaker 6 (46:16):
Of the World Original.

Speaker 4 (46:20):
The World's when in nineteen thirty people thought aliens were
invading the United States. I thought they thought it was
a real like news report, and when it was just
like back when they used to listen to radios, you
know that sort of thing. And all I remember was
Chuck d got to Power ninety nine around one in

(46:41):
the morning, and the city I've never heard like it
was the It was the kind of silence like when
someone dies on a sitcom, like all laughing.

Speaker 6 (46:53):
It was like you snow, you know I used to
go to school with Monanka.

Speaker 7 (47:00):
Oh yes, she worked for me.

Speaker 4 (47:02):
I know. So all of y'all were quiet in the
studio and you was like, look, I'm gonna go to
commercial right now, but I need y'all to get your tapes.
I'm gonna play something for you, bet you just I
can't describe what I'm about to play for you.

Speaker 7 (47:17):
I they're my favorites to today.

Speaker 8 (47:20):
But I'll never forget the day being up in death
Jam and New York and Russell saying You're not gonna believe.

Speaker 7 (47:27):
This, this this thing, hank it Hanka Chuck, and I'm like,
let me hear it. I fell in love. I felt
I rapped that. I said all the way back down
and turn bright.

Speaker 6 (47:41):
I feel you.

Speaker 7 (47:43):
It was sope.

Speaker 6 (47:50):
In general. What was the protocol for like hip hop
promotion back then?

Speaker 4 (47:56):
Because I'm besides mister magic, I mean again, like you
are a major portal, so like is it relationships with
Like when someone wants to break a new act open, Like,
how does someone approach about the Fat Boys?

Speaker 8 (48:11):
They had to bring it to me, you know, everybody
had to come to everybody had a record rep that
came and it.

Speaker 7 (48:18):
Was the only gig in town, right b Like literally.

Speaker 8 (48:22):
Club, I'm gonna tell you, I lived in this duplex
apartment and you're right, I was so broke. Wow, it
was my very first apartment, and I remember the lady downstairs.

Speaker 7 (48:34):
She was cool with me.

Speaker 8 (48:35):
She would let me leave the the door that we
shared open because they would just come and stick the
records and leave them in my hallway, right yeah, and
they just leave them there for me. They've got to
know where I live. Like all the promotion men hung
out at my crib. It was like a damn yeah.

Speaker 7 (48:53):
And that was never a problem. Damn Come. When I
was young, it was like no ever, you never felt
in no harm's weight. That's like, that's a beautiful thing.
Is another time. I gotta understand.

Speaker 8 (49:03):
I still got my crazy older sister around me too,
and then there's that I mean, you know, and may
she rest in peace. My sister was a straight gangster,
so I didn't fear too much.

Speaker 4 (49:13):
So what I want to know is, was there an
act that a label or manager tried to push off
on you that you weren't feeling at the time or whatever,
and you were like, all right, boll oh, are you
How honest are you allowed to be when it comes
to like I like that, I don't like this?

Speaker 8 (49:35):
I no, I definitely that was one thing I played
when I wanted to play.

Speaker 7 (49:42):
And when have you been wrong? I was wrong a
couple of times. I was wrong about Hammer.

Speaker 6 (49:48):
Well you never know I played you never played like
I did.

Speaker 8 (49:53):
An honest maker to break it. I've let the listeners vote.
They didn't vote. I broke the damn records. Not my
fault to feel you in like it.

Speaker 6 (50:00):
I forgot about making it or break it.

Speaker 5 (50:02):
And I remember I.

Speaker 8 (50:03):
Would literally crack the record. You could hear all the
vinyl fall on the ground.

Speaker 7 (50:08):
That was a real thing.

Speaker 5 (50:09):
What was the record? What was the Hammer record that.

Speaker 8 (50:12):
Everyone he ever gave us like? And then it went
pop and then it came back around. I remember the
spectrum of Hammer senting security people to come get me,
and he was mad.

Speaker 7 (50:22):
I went and dressing.

Speaker 8 (50:23):
When he's like, while you break my record, I'm like,
it's a contest, dude, I.

Speaker 7 (50:26):
Didn't do it. Philly broke your record. I didn't break it.
I mean, I'm just a messenger.

Speaker 4 (50:32):
In on something. Hammer's biggest fan. In nineteen eighty seven,
Black thoughts Trotter.

Speaker 8 (50:40):
The close cloth he depends, No, it was the way
he went side to side.

Speaker 7 (50:48):
What would explain?

Speaker 8 (50:50):
Because I just just lost so many points with me
just now and I love.

Speaker 6 (50:54):
I'm gonna tell you why don't make me throw it at.

Speaker 8 (50:58):
The wait let me that was I'm gonna say. I
didn't say I didn't like and I'm just it wasn't
very popular.

Speaker 4 (51:06):
No, no, no, I'm gonna tell you loves the Apache break
beat so much that.

Speaker 6 (51:13):
Nobody, nobody's doing any wrong on it.

Speaker 8 (51:15):
Oh so it was the beat that got you because
I'm not.

Speaker 4 (51:20):
Just loved turn his mother out and I think it was.
But literally, like the two acts that Tik forced me
to get onto that I wasn't feeling initially was hammer
and believe it or not in w A because really
I just looked at n w A and just said, oh,

(51:42):
they're gonna be whack, you know.

Speaker 8 (51:45):
Okay, but here's here wait wait, wait, wait, because now
you're blow in my mind because you are my drummer
forever in my head, like I put you synonymous with
the beat.

Speaker 7 (51:56):
So now you're scaring me, so you don't understand way
wait wait wait.

Speaker 8 (52:01):
So there's there's Hank Shakley and Public Enemy, and there's
Rebel and his fight the Power. It's all of that.
It's all that that drummage, all that fly ass beats
which n w A emulated, So how in the hell
with all those banging beats, doesn't questlove not like n

(52:23):
w A. You're gonna explain that ship the me.

Speaker 6 (52:27):
I'm gonna, I'm gonna, I'm gonna bring it back to
the roots.

Speaker 4 (52:29):
That's simply because I looked at n w A without.

Speaker 6 (52:36):
It was the look I saw, I was all right.

Speaker 7 (52:40):
So without saying I get that part, I get that part.

Speaker 6 (52:45):
This happens to us.

Speaker 7 (52:49):
Conceded, I get that part.

Speaker 6 (52:51):
To this day, NAS will deny it.

Speaker 4 (52:53):
But I realized, Okay, we did a show at Radio
City Music Hall once and NAS was like to do
a walk on with us, and we're sound checking, and
like Nas was losing his mind at soundcheck. Now mind you,
this is like two thousand and eight, okay, and you
know I'm I'm in the aire, like I have a

(53:15):
special microphone that all only Roots and Roots staff can
hear me. And I was like, yo, man, that is
really giddy about us, like in a way that I
never expected. And then ten minutes later it just hit me, oh,
this is the very first time that Nas in two
thousand and eight is listening to the Roots because he

(53:40):
was on the phone like with this boy, like, Yo,
they sound just like the record.

Speaker 6 (53:44):
They he could play.

Speaker 4 (53:45):
Break beats and da da da da Da Da da
da and so in my mind, I was like, oh, yeah,
so you were one of them.

Speaker 6 (53:50):
People that looked at us in ninety four ninety.

Speaker 7 (53:53):
Five like that was his very first time seeing you guys.

Speaker 6 (53:57):
It's look, I'm just telling you that.

Speaker 4 (54:02):
In case in point is that freestyle that he did
on fund Master Flex. A lot of it, A lot
of the elation of people looking at Tarik doing that
freestyle was the fact that they just never sat.

Speaker 7 (54:15):
For the point. Now, I got it, I get it,
I get it all right, okay.

Speaker 4 (54:21):
I mean it's like it's like it's like Dame Dash
from the Kanye record, Like, oh ship, it's not whack
like that? What was getting okay on that? So like
I looked at n w A and it was just
like they whack.

Speaker 6 (54:35):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (54:36):
Then Tarik played me side one and straight out Compton.
I was like, wait, they sound like East Coast Like
I didn't know they were real.

Speaker 6 (54:46):
So it's just got to it.

Speaker 8 (54:48):
And I'm going to be honest, I not only did
I think that they were corny and not. I don't know,
I just didn't believe it. I had never been to Compton.
And like I said, I love to beat my sister.
Like I said, she was crazy. She was a gangster.
She I called her Dre until the day she died.
That was her nickname. And she loved n w A
so much. But she blasted and and But then you know,

(55:11):
I went to Compton, I went out west and I
saw it, and then I had a new respect for
n w A after seeing that. Back then, it was
another thing you couldn't do. You couldn't rap about something
that you weren't like. You can't you couldn't front like
you talk and knewing you was a little punk like.
You couldn't do that. That was forbidden for me. You
had to be what you were talking about. And when

(55:33):
I went out there, remember was ice tea?

Speaker 5 (55:37):
Uh.

Speaker 8 (55:37):
I had an artist ice cream tea and it was
her first it was her first trip out west. She
had a couple of gigs lined up and I had
these kids. I had to get their parents to sign
waivers and all this stuff. And I turned around and
he had taken all my kids to Compton.

Speaker 5 (55:52):
Like what.

Speaker 6 (55:54):
I mean, ice cream tea?

Speaker 7 (55:56):
Yeah, that was my artist anything.

Speaker 6 (56:00):
Oh, by the way.

Speaker 4 (56:02):
Yeah, we just did an episode with uh Tracy Ellis
Ross's dad, Bob Ellis, and I know that ice Cream
Tea was also signed on that same level on.

Speaker 6 (56:16):
Mc A City Record with Busy be and whatnot. Yeah.

Speaker 8 (56:20):
Yeah, Bob was a big family Bob Bob Ellis was
one of the nicest men I ever met in my life.
But I had I entered into a business venture. I
made a bad deal with a brother. I won't say
his name, but I started the first hip hop magazine.
It was called Strictly hip Hop.

Speaker 6 (56:39):
I've read Strictly hip Hop.

Speaker 7 (56:40):
Yes, that was my magazine.

Speaker 6 (56:42):
I know that.

Speaker 7 (56:44):
Yeah, that's my name in the back of it.

Speaker 3 (56:47):
Wow.

Speaker 8 (56:48):
But anyway, Bob Ellis, I went to court with my partner.
It turned out to be a disaster, but Bob Ellis
was very helpful and helping me come and come up
with cash for litigators and up.

Speaker 7 (57:00):
I did fight a good fight end up. But yeah,
he was very He was very helpful to me, really
nice guy.

Speaker 9 (57:06):
Bob was like our fifth guest that had a lady
b story. I'm trying to remember some of the other folks,
but he.

Speaker 7 (57:12):
Was cool people. He was he was real cool. I
think it was premiere on some other people.

Speaker 4 (57:17):
But wait, okay, I got to ask though, like I
do know that when we were younger, like you were
like everybody's crush, you literally everyone's crush. How did you
I could only imagine. I mean, if we're now just

(57:37):
dealing with the politically correct correctness, a very toxic male atmosphere,
and you know, especially in the music business, how did
you handle that back then?

Speaker 8 (57:49):
Again, I was just as funny that you asked that,
because I was just we were just having a conversation,
me and Lee Daniels. I grew up across the street
from me, and really, yeah, he's like my brother.

Speaker 6 (58:02):
Yeah.

Speaker 7 (58:04):
Yes, everything about Philly, all of the Damns.

Speaker 8 (58:10):
Are named after us. All the characters are named after
like Cookie. I want to say that Cookie, the character
of Cookie and Expire, Empire, was my sister.

Speaker 7 (58:20):
Oh, sister, you was my sister.

Speaker 8 (58:25):
I mean, I think that he got a lot of
what my sister was and our upbringing out created that character.
Now I don't know, because left, what happened, you know,
what happened to be Emir left and kind of got
a little famous, and so his trips to Philly were like,
so doing that part, you was really superd You was

(58:46):
really getting the dup me.

Speaker 4 (58:49):
Me and Lee been talking on the phone for like
almost a year and a half because I was supposed
to score Billy Holliday. Not once did he ever tell
me he was from philadelph because.

Speaker 7 (59:02):
Hero that you knew.

Speaker 8 (59:03):
But Annie who asked me about what was the question
of me to me too things? So yeah, and explaining
who my sister was again. So me and Lee were
having this conversation and we were just talking about, you know,
some of our friends who had had some difficult times
and and things happened to them or whatever. And I

(59:27):
have to honestly say I didn't have too many meat
definitely no bad ones, but not too many even small
me too stories because people were scared of my.

Speaker 7 (59:37):
Sister that I got more than you, and you came
like I remember, I remember a guy. I thought he
was fine.

Speaker 8 (59:44):
I wanted to go out with this guy so bad
at the biggest question is drug dealer D I hopped
my ask in his car and we went for this
ride and We're pulling up to this CD hotel in
Jersey and I'm like, what are we doing? Why are
we here? You know, just got no bit is being
out or in this man's card, and he said, and
he was like, oh, we're just going to chill here

(01:00:05):
for a minute to go to the movies. I was like, well,
I got to call my sister and tell her.

Speaker 7 (01:00:10):
And said it was your sister. And I told him,
and he put me in the card ross the bridge
and he let me out in front of my house.
I never heard from him. But wait, d everybody, ain't everybody?

Speaker 9 (01:00:23):
Everybody tell me in your career, nobody has trying to
test you.

Speaker 7 (01:00:29):
Oh well, I'm sure they have.

Speaker 8 (01:00:30):
I'm just saying I don't have any moments where I
would have to, uh, you know, take anybody to court
and all this drama.

Speaker 6 (01:00:37):
I said.

Speaker 7 (01:00:38):
And it's funny because we were saying, somebody something to me.
I would if you this.

Speaker 8 (01:00:43):
I laughed the other day and I said this, and
this is a quote. If you bothered, touch me wrong,
or disrespected me. On Tuesday at two o'clock.

Speaker 9 (01:00:50):
By two o five, I was telling like, we not
what that's beautiful if you have somebody to tell because
you was at home what.

Speaker 7 (01:01:00):
Oh yeah, people approached me.

Speaker 8 (01:01:02):
Yeah. I was back into a corner like, oh, I'm
telling my sister better move that's beautiful.

Speaker 9 (01:01:07):
Just you know, it's also rare that radio people never
have to move away from home. So the fact that
you got to stay at home and that you did
nothing but community, that's such a blessing.

Speaker 7 (01:01:16):
Blessing.

Speaker 8 (01:01:17):
And my sister traveled with me. But that was just
the way I was raising then. My brother, you know,
the nerd, the Harvard grad he you know, just by
bullying me all my life and tickling me and wouldn't
you know, sitting on me, wouldn't let me up.

Speaker 7 (01:01:32):
I learned how to fight pretty well, just getting out
of those headlocks and stuff with it.

Speaker 9 (01:01:38):
How do you feel now fast forward that a lot
of like, you know, not for nothing. Some of your
brothers that you came up with and made famous are
now kind of in the spotlight in that way, and
the times are changing the things that weren't acceptable, you know,
kind of.

Speaker 8 (01:01:50):
Like said, but I will say that they say success
can make or break you. I mean, I've seen some
brothers people that I know that little very disappointing and
heart wrenching to see where they ended up, to see
that money and fame.

Speaker 7 (01:02:09):
Maybe I don't know what to blame it on.

Speaker 8 (01:02:10):
I can't tell their story changes for I'm very, I'm very.

Speaker 7 (01:02:20):
I'm proud to be.

Speaker 8 (01:02:23):
Where I'm where I am now and stand in these shoes,
and I like to raise every my nieces and and
all the young women that I can teach to put
those shoulders back and don't let you men treat you.

Speaker 7 (01:02:38):
I remember when the R. Kelly tape came out and.

Speaker 8 (01:02:41):
I walked into the radio station and the guys were
in the conference room looking at it. Yes, and they
were really scrambling looking for the remote to have it
off by the time I hit the door. Oh, and
that said a lot because they were not going to
be watched that in front of me.

Speaker 7 (01:02:56):
That's the respect that I demanded, you.

Speaker 8 (01:02:57):
Know what I'm saying. And I remember, you know, like
Shamar were coming to me. Why don't they talk to
you the way they talked to me? And I was like,
because you allow them. See when you stop somebody in
their tracks and go I have to say it. You know,
I'm a sports girl and I hang out with the guys,
but the conversation a little left.

Speaker 7 (01:03:16):
Excuse me, lady in the room. I see it all
the time. Wait wait, I went too far and I
went too far. Bring it back. You have to demand
that kind of respect.

Speaker 6 (01:03:26):
Was there ever.

Speaker 4 (01:03:28):
A time where you just felt like, okay, this this
might be above my not above my pay perraade, but
just sort of like where you might have gotten exhausted
and not really know like.

Speaker 6 (01:03:42):
Where you were where you stood with hip hop.

Speaker 4 (01:03:46):
I know, I know that people often get to that
place where it's sort of like, okay, what is this?

Speaker 8 (01:03:50):
I remember getting burnt out. I remember being angry that
it got so.

Speaker 6 (01:03:58):
Diluted water?

Speaker 3 (01:04:01):
Which hero was that?

Speaker 8 (01:04:03):
I want to say, most of the time when I
was up there in New York, like nineteen ninety two
three up in that area.

Speaker 6 (01:04:12):
What station in New York were you one?

Speaker 7 (01:04:14):
WBLS?

Speaker 6 (01:04:16):
Wow? Okay, you know I didn't even realize I.

Speaker 8 (01:04:21):
Was there when Frankie Crocker was the program director and yeah.

Speaker 6 (01:04:24):
What was he like?

Speaker 8 (01:04:26):
He was a I'm not not a not a nice guy,
that's a dependent on You're.

Speaker 6 (01:04:31):
The only person I know that actually worked in proximity
of him.

Speaker 7 (01:04:35):
Like there's a story, there's a story. He would call
these staff meetings crazy early in the morning and basically
talk about itself for like the first forty five minutes.

Speaker 5 (01:04:48):
The first five minutes.

Speaker 8 (01:04:50):
The first forty five minutes, na el Roy, I know
so U yeah yeah. And then I remember I'm just
being so or casting and I was just like, you know,
Red Alert has all these contests.

Speaker 7 (01:05:03):
Because I was going up against Red Alert over at
Kiss at the time, and I'm like, y'all don't have
any contests or anything for me to give away. How
am I going to compete?

Speaker 8 (01:05:11):
I'm not from New York, you know, I gotta come here,
and you know, I'm getting my.

Speaker 7 (01:05:15):
Feet wet, but y'all I need some help.

Speaker 8 (01:05:18):
And he said, well, what do you want, Lady B
And I said, well, can you I don't know, can
they win a date with Big Daddy Kane or something?

Speaker 7 (01:05:25):
And he, you know, just showing off.

Speaker 8 (01:05:27):
He picked up the phone. He gets Warner Brothers on
the phone. Of course, he said, that's done deal.

Speaker 7 (01:05:30):
You want anything else? And I'm like, no, that'll be enough.
And it happened. So it happens so Bugsy. So we
do the whole promotion.

Speaker 8 (01:05:41):
Cane goes on a date with the girl, you know,
he do the pictures, blah blah blah, and we come
back and Bugsy is on the air signing on.

Speaker 7 (01:05:53):
He's on He's on serious now and he's still on
kiss I think so. He He'school's crossover with Frankie Clocker,
and Frankie Crocker says.

Speaker 8 (01:06:03):
Yeah, lady Be's jeans are fitting a little too tight today.
I might have to fire her because you can't mess
with company personnel. Wow, And I was so, I was
so insulted. So I immediately started the west the Woolland
Avenue and he came out quass and I'm.

Speaker 6 (01:06:19):
Like, who the.

Speaker 7 (01:06:22):
Kane, Big Daddy Kane saved my job and he put
his hand over my mouth.

Speaker 6 (01:06:28):
Wow, was like, it.

Speaker 7 (01:06:34):
Was that happened?

Speaker 5 (01:06:35):
God, that happened.

Speaker 7 (01:06:39):
She's that happened. So those are some of my stories.
I don't believe I'm sharing these stories in public. It's
mary y'all not gonna tell us how the song came together.

Speaker 5 (01:06:48):
Boop scoop or whatever.

Speaker 7 (01:06:49):
No, but that too, well, I was talking about the
roots Jawn. But yes, that too.

Speaker 8 (01:06:56):
They said, they said that I said it on the
air all the time. They said, I said, I didn't
remember this, but Tyreek and Meir said that I said
something on the air without a doubt all the time.

Speaker 7 (01:07:09):
And then they took school school. He's beat right, Yeah,
And they.

Speaker 8 (01:07:13):
Asked me to come in the studio and I'm like,
come in the studio and do what they said. We
just want you to say what you say on the
radio without a doubt.

Speaker 7 (01:07:20):
I'm like, that's all I gotta say. They were like yeah,
I'm like, all right, what.

Speaker 6 (01:07:24):
Yeah, we had a tape of an old of an
old show of hers.

Speaker 4 (01:07:27):
But you know, back then it was EFN radio and
sometimes static would be I mean, now you know, I
embraced in perfection and mistakes and all those things, so
I would gladly sample someone with e FIN radio static
back then.

Speaker 7 (01:07:42):
I love it. It's coming back to people.

Speaker 6 (01:07:45):
This sounds like a cheap radio. Let's get in to
do it for real.

Speaker 8 (01:07:48):
So and it was the best session. They were blazing.
I was like, we're allowed to do this in here.

Speaker 7 (01:07:53):
This is amazing.

Speaker 6 (01:07:56):
Yeah, I will say that.

Speaker 4 (01:08:00):
Fun fact, the Without a Doubt is the one song
that we made that wasn't recorded directly.

Speaker 6 (01:08:11):
We didn't do a lot of the tracking. We didn't
do that at Sigma.

Speaker 4 (01:08:15):
Initially we had to use the studio on consha Hocken
and when we got to the studio.

Speaker 7 (01:08:23):
But I was in Sigma, but that's where I came
to you.

Speaker 6 (01:08:25):
Did you did?

Speaker 7 (01:08:27):
I did my part.

Speaker 6 (01:08:29):
We did.

Speaker 4 (01:08:30):
We did the tracking in consha Hocken and we did
it on Rick James's knave board that he did for
street songs. And the engineer and the owner of the
studio that purchased James h collected all the cocaine residue

(01:08:51):
that that board had for at least seven years.

Speaker 6 (01:08:56):
And I swear to god it can fit like a garbage.

Speaker 8 (01:09:00):
So let me tell you my Rick James story that
scared me. And I know you're not lying. So when
I was a young girl, another one of my jobs
at the radio station was to get the artists to
do drops. You know, we need to do drug This
is j When I'm in town, I listened to whatever whatever,
so I never forget it. Crazy little rock and roll
white guy was our engineers.

Speaker 7 (01:09:19):
I loved him. Name was Alan. He was like all
over the place. And Rick James walks into the studio
and he just does He just lays.

Speaker 8 (01:09:26):
Down his long line on the console in the radio
stage the radio station, and I'm standing like, oh crap.

Speaker 7 (01:09:35):
I ran back and told my boss.

Speaker 8 (01:09:37):
I was like, y'all do this off the ja like
he's just doing lines right there and then Alan, He's crazy.

Speaker 7 (01:09:43):
He was like, dude, I want some and it was
just a whole thing.

Speaker 8 (01:09:45):
And it was a girl, girl, It was a whole
I was.

Speaker 7 (01:09:52):
Like this like the book.

Speaker 4 (01:09:54):
Sorry, I was going to say, outside of hip hop,
like you also had interactions with, you know, non hip
hop artists as well, and like, at any point during
your first five to ten years of being a radio personality,
did you also do non hip hop radio as well?

Speaker 6 (01:10:16):
Like this is Luther bandrooms.

Speaker 7 (01:10:19):
No no, No, three.

Speaker 6 (01:10:22):
Tour tickets for the Jackson's Like.

Speaker 7 (01:10:24):
I mean, yeah, I had to. We did, We did
that other stuff on the station. Yeah sure, I mean
you know who didn't.

Speaker 8 (01:10:31):
No, I didn't go into regular format for like you,
Like you said at the beginning of this conversation from
you know, seventy nine eighty nine, it was just all
I was.

Speaker 9 (01:10:41):
I understand listening audience, the privilege that you are listening
to not only does she DJ, not only does she speak,
she picked her own records. For ten years as a
radio person it just don't happen.

Speaker 7 (01:10:52):
It just it don't does that doesn't happen anymore. I'm
gonna tell you enough.

Speaker 8 (01:10:55):
Well, sometimes I guess I could tell this because he's
no longer with us, But Mary Mason Son.

Speaker 7 (01:11:00):
Was my job, was my boss.

Speaker 8 (01:11:01):
And I remember he got into an argument with the
guy at uh what was running.

Speaker 7 (01:11:10):
Profile and.

Speaker 5 (01:11:14):
Many many Okay.

Speaker 7 (01:11:18):
I want to say his name is Manny. Anyway, they
got in this big fight and I wasn't allowed to play.

Speaker 8 (01:11:24):
D And I remember taking a marker because he didn't
know one rapper from the other, Like he wasn't into
hip hop, so I blacked out the labels so when
he came in the studio wouldn't get caught.

Speaker 4 (01:11:37):
What I know, you have a billion of these stories, man,
like you know the things that you got that about.

Speaker 7 (01:11:43):
Yeah, I had to do that.

Speaker 8 (01:11:45):
He would kill He would come back to life and
kill me if you knew that, But yeah, I would
black it.

Speaker 7 (01:11:49):
Was I just love sucker m see so much like
it's no way I'm not playing this.

Speaker 9 (01:11:53):
Be you the reason I rebelled. And then you want
to say.

Speaker 7 (01:11:55):
A.

Speaker 4 (01:11:58):
Lady, b can you can you settle this this this
Philadelphia rumor?

Speaker 8 (01:12:05):
Okay, I'll try. I mean I smoke just as much
as the rest of you. My memory could be going,
but go ahead, no.

Speaker 4 (01:12:10):
No, no, I mean this is This is thirteen year
old ninth grade a mirror asking this question.

Speaker 7 (01:12:16):
Oh god, yes, I'm here. What can I do for you?

Speaker 8 (01:12:18):
Dear?

Speaker 4 (01:12:23):
Were you at all engaged to BJ in the morning
from Power ninety nine or was that a rumor?

Speaker 8 (01:12:31):
Okay, so let me tell you how that story started
you what? So, first of all, we had a promotions director,
so listen, we had a promotions director at the radio station,
and I want to say it was the Inquirer. Anyway,
there was an article written and about all the radio

(01:12:52):
stations in Philadelphia and they left us out.

Speaker 7 (01:12:55):
They left out Power ninety nine. We got no mention.

Speaker 8 (01:12:58):
And this promotions director, she's pissed. She's like, how the
hell can they leave us out? Were the number one
urban station? Blah blah blah blah blah. She goes, we
have to come up with a real great gimmick.

Speaker 6 (01:13:09):
Oh no, I felt no.

Speaker 7 (01:13:12):
Listen, listen, patients, my brother patients.

Speaker 8 (01:13:15):
So she says, uh, Felicia Astride was just proposed to
by her husband.

Speaker 6 (01:13:20):
What was his name?

Speaker 8 (01:13:24):
He proposed on the sports show remember right whatever on TV?
Everybody knew I saw, so, uh, she says, you guys
should do some kind of you know, like, gag like
that and act like Bjay's proposing to you.

Speaker 7 (01:13:42):
So he we set it up.

Speaker 8 (01:13:46):
It happens post game of a Sixers game. It goes
up on the screen, the whole nine. We couldn't tell
our co workers. Only the program director knew, and it's
in his and this lady. We had to act like
to really sell it. We had to act like with
our co workers that we were, you know, dating, and

(01:14:07):
they're like, oh, let me see you kids, and not
fake kissm and uh they he proposed to me at
the game.

Speaker 7 (01:14:13):
It goes up on the screen.

Speaker 8 (01:14:15):
The crowd is yelling, say yes, hey, no, the crowd's
going crazy, and I'm laughing so hard, so I grabbed
my girlfriend. I put my head down on her shoulder
as if I'm crying, but I'm really laughing. But I
got to try to play this off so everybody thinks
I was crying and I you know, and I've just
ran off, like you know, I can't give an answer now,

(01:14:37):
blah blah blah. Then we milked it on the air.
BJ proposed to me, Well, she say yes, blah blah blah.
The whole it just got out of it just got
out of hand. So then we're hosting the new Edition
show at the Spectrum and we come out and we
make the announcement. He goes, I want to introduce you
to my new edition. The lady B said yes, we
came out the stage.

Speaker 7 (01:14:58):
He say yes.

Speaker 8 (01:15:00):
But in all of this hanging out and pretending, he
ended up really cracking on me. Oh, and he ended
up really proposing to me what and yeah, he proposed
by putting the diamond ring in an ice tray and
told me to go get him some ice or something.
And we got.

Speaker 7 (01:15:21):
Some ice and he was like, look at the ice,
and he was like, look at that. I was like,
what is this? It was the whole thing. Anyway, it
turned out to be.

Speaker 8 (01:15:27):
A very horrible relationship that I might say, may he
rest in peace too. It turned out to be horrible,
one of the worst relationships in my life. But at
first it was a gag and then it really happened,
and then I really ran away from it.

Speaker 4 (01:15:40):
I just remember the day after I guess the Sixers
thing happened. Just every that's all you know. And this
is before social media.

Speaker 7 (01:15:53):
So right, we were our home solid.

Speaker 4 (01:15:56):
This was a very viral thing that it was the
talking to barbershop.

Speaker 6 (01:16:02):
Yes, exactly, and I always wanted to do that.

Speaker 4 (01:16:05):
Wait, Fante, I gotta explain to you, because I know
we'll skip thiscombobulated boob belated.

Speaker 7 (01:16:12):
He really wants to know that.

Speaker 5 (01:16:14):
I really want what about to talk about?

Speaker 6 (01:16:15):
Yea?

Speaker 5 (01:16:16):
What is that?

Speaker 9 (01:16:16):
You?

Speaker 6 (01:16:17):
You would know him as Joey b Ellis.

Speaker 5 (01:16:19):
All right, the Rocky five Digga, right, But.

Speaker 4 (01:16:24):
Before he was Joey b Ellis, the singing, the original Drake,
the singing rapping.

Speaker 6 (01:16:30):
No, No, that was a big deal.

Speaker 4 (01:16:32):
Like his thing was like I sing and I'm rap,
you know, and you know, people like what about TJ.

Speaker 6 (01:16:39):
Swan He's like, well he can't rap.

Speaker 4 (01:16:40):
Like so that was his little niche right, So in
about like eighty five eighty six, he comes out, you know,
after school, he came out to do PSK and totally
just revolutionized, yeah, fully hip hop.

Speaker 6 (01:16:56):
Right.

Speaker 4 (01:16:57):
Then there came a whole slew of other Philly acts
with their little yellow labels with hand drawn cartoons and
all that stuff.

Speaker 7 (01:17:05):
Design their own labels, made their own clothes.

Speaker 6 (01:17:08):
Right, and that person was he was. He was called
the singing the mc breeze before he was Joey b Ellis, Wow,
and he did.

Speaker 4 (01:17:17):
He did a song that was so popular, but unfortunately,
like the last verse was about a melee that happened
in a Chinese restaurant, and of course you know he's
playing all the stereotypes of Chinese people about that.

Speaker 7 (01:17:33):
He was like, yeah, that was the song was.

Speaker 4 (01:17:38):
Like number instantly, number one, and I remember that Lorraine
Bauer morol.

Speaker 7 (01:17:44):
Oh no with Asian.

Speaker 4 (01:17:47):
Yeah, like Lorraine ba Moore was very offended of the
song and like gave a special news like that's the
first time we heard about like you can't perpetuate stereotypes
and this.

Speaker 7 (01:17:57):
Is very exactly. So he was just like that's hip hop.

Speaker 8 (01:18:04):
School Indeed, why didn't you haven't you asked me about
how much problem I had with Schoolie.

Speaker 4 (01:18:09):
I didn't even get. I didn't even know it was.
You played BSk and all his records so much.

Speaker 8 (01:18:14):
So Schoolly came to me right on, I just got
my job on FM. You can't tell me nothing.

Speaker 7 (01:18:20):
I'm on the radio radio, like this is this is real.
It was just a joke before this is real real.

Speaker 8 (01:18:26):
I got a whole job, right and here comes School
with his record with I don't know at least twenty
five thirty curse words. I'm like, school, what am I
supposed to do with right? And he started crying, you
won't play my record. He's sitting on the curve.

Speaker 7 (01:18:43):
He's so dramatic. I can't ask school. He School. He
will tell you the story.

Speaker 8 (01:18:48):
I believe that I made his ass cry that he
was sitting on the curve and I wouldn't play a song.
So he would bring me like a six minute song
that had about, like I said, a skillion fuck's in it.
And I remember me and Jeff Mills taking it, putting
it on real to reel and doing our own cut

(01:19:09):
tape edit on a real to reel like yep, take
out his curse word tape back up, put the tapes
a lot back on the real and after I took
out the cousin words, school, he song went from like
six minutes to about two point fifty.

Speaker 7 (01:19:25):
And that's the and that's the.

Speaker 8 (01:19:27):
Part I played until the company had to do me
at radio edit.

Speaker 7 (01:19:32):
But at the beginning I had to do my own
radio edit, and thats the way. We didn't have the
equipment and stuff, you know, the technology we have now.

Speaker 4 (01:19:39):
One of my one of my favorite nights of yours
was the the aforementioned uh Steady be versus Will Smith battle.

Speaker 7 (01:19:49):
Yeah, now that's the tape I can't find.

Speaker 4 (01:19:51):
Dude, Okay, So Will Smith will forever, He'll forever have
my respect because he somehow got the call. He freestyled
that Steady Bee was a munchie chi and I just
remember at that point Steady Bee actually wanting to fight
Will and then like.

Speaker 8 (01:20:12):
And I did not help matters any because I thought
it was the funniest is I had ever heard. And
I think the fact that we all laughed made him
really angry.

Speaker 6 (01:20:23):
Yo, we were all laughing.

Speaker 8 (01:20:25):
But that was the era when Shante stepped off that stage.
That was the era when you had to come off
off the top of your head.

Speaker 7 (01:20:31):
And just you just had that. That was actually what
you call free styling. That was freestyling people that environment.

Speaker 4 (01:20:39):
They underestimated Will because they were like, well, you're not
real hip hop, you're suburban, you talk all proper.

Speaker 7 (01:20:45):
First of all, he was a suburban. He lived in
my neighborhood. Exact that he wasn't out there.

Speaker 8 (01:20:50):
Gang banging and talk about it, be grabbing his jawn
and acting.

Speaker 7 (01:20:54):
And you know, we didn't come up in a one
parent household.

Speaker 8 (01:20:56):
We didn't learn how to respect women and stuff just
because he wasn't raised like that. Wow, not mean he
wasn't a part and just as authentic and true to
hip hop as everybody else. That is what I love
the most about him. That's when Will was the first one,
you know who made me. His lyrics made me smile.
I'm card happy hip hop and.

Speaker 7 (01:21:19):
Everybody else was all bravado.

Speaker 8 (01:21:20):
I got a big back Cadillac, I got just no,
you don't you live in your mama house?

Speaker 6 (01:21:24):
I stopping right?

Speaker 7 (01:21:25):
You know what I mean?

Speaker 6 (01:21:26):
Fact?

Speaker 8 (01:21:27):
But Will was like the first one. I mean, you
know it was. It was It was funny, it was fun,
it made you smile, and then you put a dope
DJ like Jeff with him and it was just the
greatest combination ever.

Speaker 6 (01:21:40):
Wow.

Speaker 4 (01:21:43):
I can I can go on and on nerding out forever.

Speaker 9 (01:21:47):
It's been beautiful seeing your friendship too, and how it's
evolved and stuff you Jeff and Will, and how they
still come out and support you.

Speaker 7 (01:21:53):
That shit is dope.

Speaker 8 (01:21:54):
I just texted the guy that saw the movie set
with him. I'm like, tell well, I need a one
minute video of him congratulate me for my fortieth.

Speaker 7 (01:22:00):
They got text back. He's doing it as soon as
he gets out of such and such and like thank you.

Speaker 6 (01:22:04):
He lives for Instagram posts.

Speaker 8 (01:22:07):
So you know, Jay you missed was my thirties and
he came home to surprise me, Like I didn't even
know he was coming to the show.

Speaker 7 (01:22:14):
Really, he performed with Salt and Pepper. He did what
a man.

Speaker 8 (01:22:18):
He performed with Chuck and flave. He got out there.
He was a whole s one w he did lot
of He stayed on stage all night and wait and
there's more. It rained torrn your rain. It was like
the hip hop woods Stock people did not leave. They
stayed in the rain. Will was shaking me. Are you

(01:22:38):
having as much fun as me?

Speaker 7 (01:22:39):
I'm like, I don't think. Wow, he stayed on stage
all night and surprised me. It was the dopest thing ever.

Speaker 6 (01:22:47):
Well, you deserve all your flowers, you know, eighty one.

Speaker 4 (01:22:51):
You just you literally introduced me to the world that
I get to that I built it in an empire.

Speaker 6 (01:23:00):
Wow, that says a lot. You know.

Speaker 9 (01:23:04):
Forget about your radio mentees around here, because she got
a lot of those in the world too.

Speaker 7 (01:23:09):
Oh yes, I love that one.

Speaker 8 (01:23:11):
That's that's my little mini lady because she only and
does she sit up here and and act like she asked.
But he ain't let nobody say nothing to her either.

Speaker 7 (01:23:19):
She was the only one who was stabbed and he
was to speak up. Yeah, that's right. He watched me.

Speaker 8 (01:23:23):
He watched me one right there, proud of that one
right there, and you watched me get fired to girl.

Speaker 7 (01:23:28):
So it's all good.

Speaker 5 (01:23:32):
You have any you got any children?

Speaker 6 (01:23:34):
Like?

Speaker 7 (01:23:35):
No?

Speaker 8 (01:23:35):
I I tried, but my sister again, I talk about
her so much.

Speaker 7 (01:23:40):
She's been going for two years now.

Speaker 8 (01:23:42):
No, my sister uh gave me kids and then my
old man passed away on me and he left me kids.
So am I a mother and a grandmother? Yes, to
every extent of the word. I have taught him to walk, talk.

Speaker 7 (01:23:55):
Potty trained, school meetings.

Speaker 8 (01:23:58):
I am a mother and a birth and I am
a grandmother and I know I literally you know. I
remember when my sister took ill, she had a stroke,
and I was taking care of her in her latter years,
and the doctor asked her, you know, you don't have
a high blood pressure or anything. You don't do you
worry about anything? It says you have three children and
seven grandchildren. She says, no, I don't do that my sister, and.

Speaker 6 (01:24:20):
She meant it.

Speaker 7 (01:24:22):
I raised her kids. She was She called me her
baby daddy.

Speaker 8 (01:24:25):
She sent me cards on Father's Day. You the dopest
dadd Yeah, but that's dope. Yes, they walked right past
their mother come to me.

Speaker 10 (01:24:36):
Crazy, discombobulated. But I'm not what is this that that title?
What is what was that song?

Speaker 4 (01:24:42):
I don't know, but if you you that was the
that was the I didn't know that was that was
the offensive.

Speaker 5 (01:24:51):
That I didn't know that was the Georgie got it yea,
got it Google.

Speaker 4 (01:24:58):
If you remember the follow up the girls in None
but Trouble, a song called just one of those days,
just right?

Speaker 6 (01:25:06):
When when when answer.

Speaker 7 (01:25:09):
To that too, we did Boys of the World ain't nothing.

Speaker 8 (01:25:11):
Guys of the World ain't the answer.

Speaker 7 (01:25:15):
But that was my song.

Speaker 4 (01:25:17):
Like him, I'm just saying, when Will talks about kicking
the Felix cat, he's giving a reference to yeah brisk Bobla,
where yeah, yeah, verse one, he kills the cat, he
throws it.

Speaker 6 (01:25:29):
On the roof and the.

Speaker 7 (01:25:32):
Roof in the year Yeah, it's it's very.

Speaker 6 (01:25:37):
Nothing exactly exactly.

Speaker 8 (01:25:40):
Charlie Mack asked Breeze opened up my show Sunday, and
I'm like, I don't they don't think we have enough time.

Speaker 7 (01:25:50):
No, I don't mean that disrespectfully. I don't matter. It
sounded like, yeah, no, it's just that we have so
many artists on. I wouldn't mind. He opened up for
the Juice.

Speaker 8 (01:25:59):
Crew bat he still and he did every word of
this Combobie Beauty Don't get It Twisted?

Speaker 6 (01:26:04):
Wow, Yeah I.

Speaker 8 (01:26:06):
Would if I had the time. I literally have seven acts,
and you know they put us out.

Speaker 6 (01:26:09):
Of the Dell. Yeah.

Speaker 8 (01:26:11):
I probably won't even I probably won't even get the MC.
I'll probably be like I'm.

Speaker 4 (01:26:14):
Next, Well, I won I really hope that you seriously
start preserving your archives because you are the history of
hip hop.

Speaker 5 (01:26:27):
So that's why I am man.

Speaker 7 (01:26:29):
I'm going to donate some of them.

Speaker 8 (01:26:30):
I wish you could see my, my, my, she came
down here because.

Speaker 6 (01:26:35):
I have your house in two seconds, I.

Speaker 7 (01:26:37):
Have every gold album.

Speaker 8 (01:26:39):
I'm looking at run DMC, I'm looking at L Jeff
and Will. I'm looking at this is hip hop history
down here on the world.

Speaker 5 (01:26:47):
The ass you beat.

Speaker 10 (01:26:48):
So I'm just thinking, now, what was your relationship with
with the pop art guys like Lawrence Goodman, Like what
was what was that?

Speaker 9 (01:26:55):
Like?

Speaker 6 (01:26:55):
Yeah, can you tell us what Laurence? No one wants
to talk about Lawrence Goodman?

Speaker 7 (01:26:59):
Put the He'll sue you.

Speaker 8 (01:27:00):
I was just gonna saying either, do I because Bill
talked about him and he freaking sued him.

Speaker 7 (01:27:04):
Because I can tell you some ish.

Speaker 8 (01:27:07):
I can tell you, Yeah, coming in my house threatening
me and stuff.

Speaker 7 (01:27:11):
Ye yeah, see these days, is he.

Speaker 8 (01:27:17):
Still I did see him not too long ago.

Speaker 7 (01:27:21):
He's got all this great hair, is really long beard.
I did.

Speaker 8 (01:27:26):
But it's a shame that you can't say things because
people might sue you.

Speaker 6 (01:27:30):
Yeah, man, you never know, people might get super ltis.

Speaker 4 (01:27:33):
So yeah, I've heard many a story about uh the
pop art these but.

Speaker 8 (01:27:40):
Well, just to let you know, like I said, prefra
to my sister again, my sister shafted them and thought
of them as some kind of jokes.

Speaker 7 (01:27:48):
She wasn't scared, So I truly wasn't gonna be scared.

Speaker 9 (01:27:50):
Well, can you just tell Lee Daniels that, yes, we
would watch the movie because I know he's thinking.

Speaker 6 (01:27:57):
He needs to do that.

Speaker 8 (01:27:58):
Yes, yes, funny, yes, who only man keeps asking him
you should.

Speaker 7 (01:28:04):
Do a movie lady b blah blah blah blah blah.
He gonna listen, he gonna listen. You know who's gonna play?

Speaker 6 (01:28:09):
You be?

Speaker 7 (01:28:09):
Who is it?

Speaker 9 (01:28:09):
Who?

Speaker 7 (01:28:10):
What's her name?

Speaker 6 (01:28:10):
Who's gonna be?

Speaker 7 (01:28:11):
We're not We're not, No, We're not.

Speaker 6 (01:28:17):
Okay, that's a good one.

Speaker 7 (01:28:18):
I'm taking it. I'm taking I've told you all enough.
I'm taking the rest of my grave. Oh okay, so
you got it in your mind? You just want to
share it? Ye, okay, Okay, y'are a stupid This is
cool the first time somebody's hanging up with us.

Speaker 3 (01:28:31):
I love it.

Speaker 7 (01:28:32):
A drum lesson. You can try to deny me all
you want, but I want.

Speaker 6 (01:28:38):
Time.

Speaker 7 (01:28:38):
I see you. Don't even say hello.

Speaker 6 (01:28:39):
I see him like drum lessons. Yes, I don't even
say hell.

Speaker 8 (01:28:44):
First, No, I'm grown and what and what? I don't
have any more patience in the house to take care
of the kids are going. I can actually get me
a set and bang out, I say.

Speaker 7 (01:28:58):
This, wake up the name.

Speaker 6 (01:28:59):
I'm gonna have to send a drum set now, Okay, should.

Speaker 7 (01:29:02):
My God, I would die. I would die.

Speaker 4 (01:29:04):
That's that's that's the least I could do for you
for changing my life again. Congratulations on your forty years
as as a pioneer for changing all our lives.

Speaker 6 (01:29:13):
We're all the better for it.

Speaker 4 (01:29:15):
And another forty another four hundred years of your legacy,
may it last.

Speaker 6 (01:29:20):
Thank you for doing our show.

Speaker 7 (01:29:22):
Thank you so much.

Speaker 8 (01:29:22):
This has been so much fun. I felt like I
just had a whole conversation with my homies.

Speaker 6 (01:29:26):
You did, you did?

Speaker 5 (01:29:28):
Did feel like word?

Speaker 6 (01:29:29):
Absolutely well. I'll see you all the next round, y'all.

Speaker 4 (01:29:34):
This is Quest Love on behalf of Lady b fon Sigolot,
Sugar Steve, Today, Bill and Lying.

Speaker 6 (01:29:42):
Yeah, all right next time. Hey, this is Sugar Steve.

Speaker 11 (01:29:50):
Make sure you keep up with us on Instagram at
q LS and let us know what you think you
should be next to sit down with us. Don't forget
to subscribe to our podcast.

Speaker 1 (01:30:07):
What's Love Supreme is a production of iHeartRadio. For more
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wherever you listen to your favorite shows.