Corie Sheppard Podcast
Corie Sheppard Podcast
Episode 216 | Sunshine & Wine
In this week's episode we're joined by Zan
Zan is a young veteran in the soca industry and we get into some of his hits over the years, his time working as part of Machel Montano's HD band and his current role as the lead singer of The A Team Band.
We talk about his friendship and working relationship with Tony Chow Lin On, Shal Marshal, Tim Tim & Kernel Roberts and how he managed to stay consistent over the years.
We get into his approach to songwriting and his impact on what we now know as groovy soca and some of his mentors and inspirations in soca.
This is not one you want to miss
Enjoy!!
Well, it's me back again, and I think it's coming fast and furious, as men say. They're coming true, we're coming true. So back to the Corey Shepard Podcast. Welcome, zan.
Speaker 2:How you vibes, man. I feel like I'm waiting for this for a long.
Speaker 1:I'm waiting for this long before. Corey Sheppard Podcast Welcome Zan. I feel like I've been waiting for this long before. You know, I'm waiting for this Everything going. How's the season going?
Speaker 2:The season's going good, man.
Speaker 1:Coming along.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's still one of the most, and you can ask not just me, you can ask any artist on the main stages that this is one of the most confusing seasons, serious where music is concerned why you say so way. I just real, I just real as real could get in a long season like this.
Speaker 1:Usually we don't have a kind of march like that.
Speaker 2:But yeah, but I mean that part would have been good if it wasn't so just weird yeah if men don't say that on your podcast, they're just being political now?
Speaker 1:Well, you are wrong. Long enough to know.
Speaker 2:I'm wrong enough not to care. I just talk my mind.
Speaker 1:I just talk my mind Well you don't want to start right Before we go back. I have a funny past to go with you, but I want to find out about your experience with A-Team so far. But I see a release coming out last year. I think it was saying that you're taking over the headline A-Team Congrats on that?
Speaker 2:How is it?
Speaker 1:going with the band.
Speaker 2:It was an amazing experience, you know, as anything new, you know, join our club. You know you had to make adjustments, you know, and they are a very high-performing band in terms of taking on a lot of jobs, so things was coming real quick. You know, as you know, a-team is also a backing band, so it had other situations where you know the issues would change on you like real quick.
Speaker 2:So, it was a little different to what I'm accustomed to, but I love it. It's a family band. They take really good care of me. My manager, zarin. You know Miguel as well too. They take good care of me in terms of getting more affiliated with everything you know. So what's the?
Speaker 1:biggest difference between you as a solo artist and a lead singer in a band.
Speaker 2:Well, it's the responsibility you know you're representing an entire team now I'm just real grateful that you know I had good friends along the way, like Farman Apitel, who prepared for a more disciplined trajectory in terms of being on time, um, how to say, boy, just really running my business like a business that's what I mean and um, it prepared me for the opportunity I have here now. So I had to say thanks to that, because that is a very major part of um, the establishment timely thing. Practices are timely thing.
Speaker 1:Men coming from real father practice and practice must be long to you in some sessions I always used to talk about. That band era in canada was a special time, right some of these youths now might have never really see it when it was blue ventures, traffic or even back to song rev and them kind of things. And I just admire the lead singer in a band because number one you had to be able to sing yeah you know, I mean because your range had to be real solid.
Speaker 1:So when I see your name I say all right. Well, they really find a man. It's hard to name artists now who could represent a lead singer for a band, so when I see you I find it's a good look yeah, I think the decision was made a lot based on that.
Speaker 2:My singing ability is on the level and also I consider myself to be a team player showman and say, well, it's a good choice so where does singing come from?
Speaker 1:Where do you learn to sing? Where does you recognize yourself as a singer?
Speaker 2:Well, I always used to find it was something that my sister in church nobody was taking me on. You know, I was a small man just there in church. Shout out to your sister. She knows your friends well, she knows my sister, I always kill it, my sister Cheryl Andrews. The f, the first singer in my family.
Speaker 2:Right, that's my sister's name. She represented Diego Martin Pentecost Right as also as part of the choir and also a lead soloist. Mm-hmm and I would I'm guessing them earlier fundamentals that would have been watching her and I'm facing her. Earlier fundamentals that would have been watching her and facing her experience and unknowingly forging mine. But she was singing gospel songs. I was listening to all the other songs on the radio. It's a Pentecostal also, as I would share, with a lot of my cool because I never had a fundamental upbringing, whereas I in the school competitions or anything like that.
Speaker 2:So it's really the church shape yeah it's really R&B and stuff like that Zan come up on. That will show where some of the range come from exactly. So that's the reason why I have songs that you probably know word for word.
Speaker 1:I still learning and finding it phenomenal, almost like I am a foreigner to the country gotcha, but that's the other part of being a lead singer.
Speaker 2:I don't remember real song you don't cover too, but A-Team now, a-team is a Diverse band. A-team is A very diverse band. Yeah, we don't get shows Only in the Soaker Fraternity. You know, like we did Grenada, we did Enchant Down there and that experience was Was like An experience I always wanted To showcase. I would not have gotten that In the Marshall Montana HG band because that band is based on Soca performances and their own songs as well and originals as well, so.
Speaker 2:I did some cover songs that I've been singing for over years and I think it's only newly now people realise my real singing ability because I sing in songs of you know those niches, I guess.
Speaker 1:So people isn't watching if they see that, because some of your earliest what was there is a breakout song in soca breakout in muslims in the in like wide stream acceptance. Like people hear this song, they start to know who is zan.
Speaker 2:Now the, your first big one I, I wouldn't, I wouldn't, I could, I can't watching women stay local. Although I hate in foreign and thing, that's my first song there is as a trinidad. Get to know you that's when trinidad get to my name, zan, and get right saying and you have a different vibe, gotcha right and um. The song that really made me an international presence is Always Be With Patricia. Okay, I got you right.
Speaker 1:Which is the year after oh serious, that was so close together. Yeah, so when you bus, you bus bus.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I was running one time full speed, straight out of camp, straight out, yeah what year is that I submit around that kind of time? Yeah, that is, that is um 05. Oh shit, as early as that, yeah well, that I mean.
Speaker 1:That song with Patrice is a memorable one, but people, people can doubt your singing ability from as early as that, I remember.
Speaker 2:Slip away, is you yeah, slip away, hold you down, yeah in them songs you're singing, singing.
Speaker 1:I always used to feel when I hear the first time, like I remember the time when soka had got real fast. I want to say something like late 90s super blue and them heyday, yeah, the power was really dominating and then everything started song a little bit like jump and wave because of how powerful that was when he sang it right, and then people start to complain about the missing of groovy in the carnival right and then had this bajan invasion.
Speaker 1:When allison hides edwin yearwood and them come in and slip away, in particular when I hear that it's sung like it from a different era, it come on it. It easily take the carnival by some it couldn't move it, that is the um.
Speaker 2:That is the transition. I think I was a contribution in culture, groovy Soaker, you know, and it started from Always Be, because if you listen to that piece of music as a classical keyboard line there, god rest your soul, you know. So when I, when I really watch back at it, that kind of shape a whole sub-genre of folk as well.
Speaker 1:You know, conrad, what do you want to fix? Fix it, all right, good Fix it fix it. You could come in, man, yeah, you're listening short. Yeah, and we ain't cutting that out, neither right, I'll bring the little sips on the side here. Yeah, yeah, yeah, all is better. Yeah, so let me talk about that with you and Patrice. All right, you write the whole song, both parts.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah yeah, although a lot of people don't know this, and I made it my duty to make this known. That introduction, you, baby, you Said, said I love you baby. That was destra garcia. What are you saying? That at the straddy time was mentoring patrice and I, you know, and because I was working with baron morris, which is her husband right, we was green in them days. We wasn't any any shape of where we are now in terms of music and um, she was listening to the song and um, we were just a little confused by because it's something new, yeah, confused how I approach it and a real pro, a real professional, vibing inside her bedroom. She come as hey, what do you know? This thing who rough here and he's starting here. Yeah, you want to sing a little thing like this. And exactly what she regurgitated is exactly what patrice did and said you know which end up a major part of the song along the keyboard exactly exactly.
Speaker 2:She set it up there and I feel as though you know we didn't give her the credit she deserves. So, every interview, every podcast, anybody asks me about that. I like to tell them that to look to Destra, you go help me get Destra here.
Speaker 1:Yeah, let me tell that side of this they don't they, don't they Once you're available. She'll come through Nice. Well, your writing, that was your writing long before that. And thing when you get your writing Side from if you get the singing from the church.
Speaker 2:Tim Tim boy yeah.
Speaker 1:Hey partner from long time.
Speaker 2:I'm a virgin From long time, tim Tim, tim Tim is as a fundamental Part of me as well.
Speaker 1:Right.
Speaker 2:He's a man. He's a man who really bring me to face my head from this R&B singing to Soka Right. Him and his dad literally had a lot to do with how I could sing. I could always sing, but then when I get professionally trained by somebody and they teach you the physical mechanics of what you're doing and how to do it, there's a whole different ballgame, right. So his dad invested in both of us, alongside a gentleman by the name of Randy Naked. Right Invested in us and they put our group together as a business and they started sending us to missing male albino decoto oh yeah, right yeah, male decoto, she was the person who taught me how to control the volumes, how to control the cadences.
Speaker 2:Different things the sharp from the flat. You know how to create a harmony, you know all those things she taught, she taught me and me and Tim, Tim now you know I had it with this professional standpoint started to, you know, go around more band vibes or whatever. And it changed our world. When we was writing songs, we imagining it bad, Right, and I think the message of what when we was writing songs, we imagining it bad and I think the message of what deceased Kirk Mitchell said stuck to me. We go on in 96, now we're looking for the blight, Say saying well, right, we're going to meet this man. No, this was our one day plan. Right, we're going to meet this man today, and by tomorrow we'll be recording the song and by next week we're gonna be performing. Nice, nice.
Speaker 2:We were planning to perform in Cliff Fires or Dujas nice, nice so when we walk into the 96 now, um, kirk Mitchell sitting down there and he vibing with us and he, just you, you know, you never see somebody watching you. Like what kind of funky thing all that one here. What kind of Because that's the facial expression he wore yeah, let me know, we're here, right? Nothing good here. Man, he gave some truth. He's seeing the potential, right. He's seeing the unity, he's seeing the willingness. He, he gave some truth.
Speaker 1:He see any potential right.
Speaker 2:He see any unity, he see any willingness. He did see all of those things, yeah, yeah. But he see something that stick to me. He see writing a song. It's like having a good conversation. You won't have a impact that make it last forever. You won't have a melody, that unforgettable right that is echoed through eternity. When you say that the whole world changed, it didn't change for Karen in that way, it didn't. I'm being real.
Speaker 2:I could say, if I could say the truth, that I knew it didn't change it clearly hit me as a songwriter, but he went on to becoming one of the more prolific ad writers people might not remember exactly at that time them campaigns what Karen do should be documented yeah, what was his characters again? Well, he had well, he had done Zuki and Tim.
Speaker 1:I remember that right, he had done promotion all different kinds of yeah, unfaithful with the single money yeah, all them things you know well, it must hit him in a different way, because he did I mean karen.
Speaker 2:Karen will forever, always be asuka talent. If you realize, people just woke up the current and gamer song. He sing it. Yeah, right, but I think his the size of his businesses, no, that is just a child dream in the back. I said no whereas it is a passion that wakes me up in the morning and puts me to sleep at night yeah, sure it shows, because you went on to create real, forever music, real, forever music.
Speaker 1:A few songs I want to talk about, but from from doing that song with patricia, already linked to hd at the time, or no, no, I think that song in itself was a nice um invitation to um at the time.
Speaker 2:Now, all right, so let me. Let me just backtrack a little bit how I get to record that song. How I got to record my first song is that I had to receive my payment for the first track I ever get from a major artist who is still predominantly loud Charles Marshall. I wrote his yeah, back in the day you know, charles is still my family Right we worked on a track called Same Band, you remember.
Speaker 1:Same.
Speaker 2:Band Didn't he sing.
Speaker 1:That's a big song, isn't it?
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, right. So there's a project coming out of my camp now that I see was putting for Charles and I knock up the song and Charles now had to pay me, right, that I see was putting for Charles and I knock up the song and Charles now had to pay me. Charles manager at the time, this is general manager which was Chinese Laundry. Okay, okay, chinese Laundry is a lover of soccer Right, a lover of culture. So Charles keep telling him he's a real bad man, just what I tell him also before this, you were writing for people, yeah, so I never sing a song in my life there in this interview of collecting my money, right.
Speaker 2:So two things happened for me that day. Alright, now this is. This is something that I will predominantly talk about, because it just goes to show when is your time? Is your time? I came to collect money, my first set of money. I didn't get a gloat about that money more than the fact that we try this laundry now is saying get back and hang with me. Obviously I get nervous now like chow wanna climb with me. You know, alright, you know the size of Chow. Chow was the, at that point, the king of urban. So I dare sitting in front of him here now and, as Eminem song says, fingers on your palms getting sweaty, right. So he says the reason why I ask you to stay and vibe with me is because Charles was telling me you know you have other songs, he's a decent songwriter. I, you know I'm in the business. You know this is a studio as well. This is Link Up Productions.
Speaker 2:He gave a little history of the people he called in and every single body that man called I getting more nervous, right, because he calling some real, real big stars. You know what I'm telling you, he talking normal, very humble and very normal, but he calling some Corrie, giants, corrie, the man calling Goli, corey Corey, the man calling Goliath, the man calling Goliath and Goliath Jr, yeah, right. So I said I said that, real, you know that. Oh, this, all this, real nice, you know. And he said sing some of these songs. I had no, I had to sing on the spot, but I always knew the hardest thing with your chest is one thing I learned from my big sister sing with your chest, sing hard, you sing, you sing right, fill your room. So I started. I started just knock the table and my vibes in, close my eyes. I never had that kind of confidence. I have now, right that from then right, I was more kind of introverted fella. So at the end I close my eyes and I sing and I sing the song. He make me sing a couple more songs.
Speaker 2:He say sing the first song for me again. And I sing it. He tell me where I get the quotes from. He tell me how I get it. So I don't know. He's a giant. Yeah, he know, right, he know everything but what I. In other words, he trying to tell me I've seen what you've done there. Go downstairs. There's a gentleman by the name of Brian Morris. Tell him, chinese laundry sent you Right Congratulations. Is a gentleman by the name of Brian Morris. Tell him Chinese laundry send you congratulations and put on the demo for your first Suka song. That is what happened.
Speaker 2:I collect my money from Shelsung and get to record in that tea, the same tea, the same because this is several years after me, and Tim Tim, which is the same building, because you remember Cook Mitchell was Link Up Productions okay, gotcha it's just you know time you know, I think my grandfather, the sea egg and potato got boiled in the same pot for two different times boy.
Speaker 1:That is a hell of a story, because from there you take it with two hands you never really turn back from that point. So at the time I do the collab with Patricia, she's not in HD as I did it.
Speaker 2:How we come in HD is that it's not a scenario where no, that's how life is. Again, I'd make strong affiliations over the years. One of these affiliations I'd make that ended up my brother today, like my literal blood, is Colonel Robert Right. Colonel is one of the men that kind of mold my writing to Some things. They will go to him and in the Ramah we used to call him the master, but the grandmaster gone. So he have this wealth of information, yeah right. So me being the senior of all the other younger writers that would have been there at the time, I advocate him the master, yeah right. And you go to the master and the master will say, well, boy, your people is real shit. And he will lie and he's a real honest fella.
Speaker 1:That's good though. Yeah man, You're like good shit right.
Speaker 2:Me. I'm going like this is filthy. You're spilling our size over that motor time. You're spilling our size over that motor time.
Speaker 1:Like you know, wired shit too. Them days Irama was a spot too.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it was a hub for people Because you remember, in the west now it don't really have Much soca man Like in south you know, what I mean. So that was our hub, you know, in the back of the Rama, and we operated On the levels where it had men growing and men regressing, you know, not understanding the things they need to know, or not have any mentality and discipline, right, yeah, but I was soaking up.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, yeah, you're taking in all of it, I'm taking all the punches Harden my jaw.
Speaker 2:Get back up again. Wrong six Wrong 14. I'm telling you all the way down to pull up my hand. You lose again.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, round 14, I'm telling you all the way down to pull up my hand. You lose again. But you didn't get knocked out. But we're 20 years on from that too, so you survived it all them punches.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, definitely. And Colonel now, at the time, if you remember, the fundamentals are Patrice Roberts, Right, colonel, he was the key man. He write Islands the song with her and Bungie, and then now he wrote a song for her to sing with Marshall. She's singing a song with Marshall. Right, chow, come pick me up the next day. Now it was one size of nervousness to me, chow, and now Chow bringing me to a next size of nervousness. He become normal, me and Chow.
Speaker 2:Custom ruling by that point right my buddy, he show me that kind of love as a youth and thing and me and Chow rolling boom. Chow pull up in front of a guy by the name of Vishal, right he working with Sizzler right now, yeah, right and tell me old one right here want to bring somebody. And tell me, hold on, right here, I want to bring somebody here to meet how it comes outside Marshall Montana. Well, I want to feel I tell him here because this is beyond me.
Speaker 1:It's a real now.
Speaker 2:Yeah, get real. Now you know he say hey thing, boy, real short conversation. Yeah, boy, nice to meet you. I like the song thing thing thing they talk, talk and they set up to meet you. I like this song thing thing thing they talk, talk and they set up the studio session. I jump back in the car. I watch Joe, joe watching me. I start to hit up.
Speaker 2:Joe and show the boy Marshall boy, marshall boy, you have a good one. Yeah, that's that. Wait, wait, I'm looking for a line to run and slide down and see. Yeah, I said nah boy, he said thing wherever we set up the song. Fun fact when I record the song, the song this was the same year I record the song with purchase okay so I was basically telling man. So I was basically telling them. Same year I recorded the first song, Watching Woman. I put on the demo for Heart of a man.
Speaker 1:Heart of a man was your original one.
Speaker 2:You had done with Marsha. Yeah, I write Heart of a man in seven minutes with my father. Really.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I get the concept. Three o'clock. I'll never forget that my father drunk like a dog next to me. He now come from foreign and he check all the partners and he drinking, slipping, he slipping away. So before he think it gets just bubbling and bubbling, he wake him up. But that was wake him up anyway. Right, god, tell him to wake him up. I said Daddy, daddy get up. He get up. My heavy head big. I get back up there. I straighten back daddy head with the ideas that I was coming with. When I look in, he blocking my father eye like I looking in yours. Now my father done seen my life change.
Speaker 1:He's a writer too, like I look at yours now, my father done in my life change.
Speaker 2:Is that right? My father is not no writer. My father, my father, is a musician by ear. You listen to music and you can tell him what song going to be good if it's no release.
Speaker 2:You tell you what song one be good, but I go and feed away right. You tell her what song, one big one, but I can't fade away. Right. Right, participated his entire life in carnival as a masquerader. You know not more. No chords or nothing like that. When he hates, you know it. But once he see my father's using my dress orders, when he see quality thing, right, right, that's how he does get on. When he see it he say bingo. As he hit that bingo, he already know he in the game, right, and we watching each other and we already know when I wake up in the morning again, when the sun rise again, it gonna be a different day for me whole song you finished that morning.
Speaker 2:Yeah, because let me show you something, nothing that I ever do that was irreplaceable or unforgettable, take long come to. I watched my, my ex-girlfriend at the time, but at that time now, it didn't have another woman in my eye that could match up to this woman, you know, and the song I write for she, that all them songs same one, and them songs come from somewhere. It didn't take long, it just come out there, it just just come out people just watch them. Things like that masterpiece.
Speaker 1:I have it as one of the most underrated songs in.
Speaker 2:Soka.
Speaker 1:I don't understand the concept behind the song. If people remember it and I'll play it so that people do that idea, you went to it all around the world. Different body parts but the heart of a man got to be at Trinidad. Yeah, that all that just come to you in that, in that moment, because that's something like you're taking along.
Speaker 2:The weird part is I never I never even have a passport yet to my name. When I write a song, I probably didn't have a passport. I've been real, yeah, but I understood. I understood the story of what I was saying.
Speaker 1:I believed in the story of what I was saying yeah, the belief come true in the song too, because a part of that song I always remember spine belly, bam bam waist. I remember hearing it in a fit, because you hear any radio and fit. It's such a different thing hearing that song. I think it's something. This era is missing too, because that was a time where I guess, like we were saying before we started recording, most of the songs still don't play on radio back then either.
Speaker 2:There was less songs.
Speaker 1:But when you go FET, son, you feel the energy of the song. I mean them days, a following the face and the song and them thing. You'll get no social media. You might find out who is that in a fet and I remember liking the song all the time. But in fet, that line spine belly bamba, that just hit me in a fet I said how'd they come up with that boy? Spine belly bamba. Every single creed and race.
Speaker 2:I had an experience that I had to be grateful for. So mankind returns is not my returns. I used to walk in the city on Independence Day and hear different radio stations playing it Different radio stations playing it with a sense of pride Right. I hear men work on trucks that they didn't hear the next year, the year after, I suppose. Right so to hear something that you did with good intention 20 years after.
Speaker 1:And it could be around 20 more years because, for instance, people will talk I'm glad you say independence too, because I always listen to what people will say is a nation building song. You go back to denise plumber or trinity bonus, and not taking away from anything from them, but that song right up there with it in terms of nation building.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so them times you get to do this song, you record it. Marshall was your experience like working with h, because you are one of the few artists to marshall, work with a lot of young artists.
Speaker 1:I think people just forget that sometimes, but, um, he are one of the few artists to. Marshall worked with a lot of young artists. I think people forget that sometimes, but he's one of the few men stay around for a long time. You know, it don't look like it's the best environment like sometimes it looks like an environment where it's it's just where you see it is.
Speaker 2:It's just where you see it is. But agendas is what is what is? Keep you on that ship. You know, I mean, his ship wasn't forged easily as well. I'm sure it have stories that you'll be able to tell you here that you know why he is the way he is and how he's running ship. But if your mentality is to fly and to be a star, you'll be able to. You'll be able to understand half of the experiences that passing in front there. Right, I could tell you it's not training ground that they had to train you. No, it's not a training ground.
Speaker 1:They had to train you.
Speaker 2:You had to have a sense of well. No more than ever from looking at it from afar. No more than ever, I feel sorry for whoever don't know what's going on and go under our wing this way. You know, but that experience is one that really prepared all of us. You know, I mean it damaged parts of us because you're working under a massive umbrella, but that's just what it is. You're blocked from the sun. You know that. He's a giant, you know so. It was a situation where you had to literally be exceedingly well all the time to be even seen as a dot next to him, you know.
Speaker 2:But because of that, now, all of our experiences when I say all, I'm talking about Farman Happy, I'm talking about Patricia Roberts, you know talking about Patricia. But you know all of our experiences now is built on that mentality of succession. You know, if I, if I, if I am probably the only one to say what I am saying now, you know that that had a lot to do with it, because it's not just Michelle, it's his administration, elizabeth Montano, you know she had an operation for management of the artists that was there. That changed how we operate, how we function on a daily basis you know, practicing for practicing for 18 hours, that's what I learned there 18 hours.
Speaker 2:I'll never forget that boy boy 18 hours of vocals. Oh yeah, boy boy. And the magic drum, boy boy. And the magic drum, them practices. And the guru was 18 hours. Yeah, everything you want to eat, everything you want to drink, but you cannot leave.
Speaker 1:I hear many artists say that they say when you don't lock behind you they say don't lock in front of you, Don't be late.
Speaker 2:That's the number one thing I hear. Late is not even in your mind. Late is not even in your mind. With that kind of shit, late is the last thing in your mind. With that kind of shit, late is the last thing in your mind.
Speaker 1:Well, listen that show, because I tell you, when Zan messaged me this morning, it was long before I was the man who reached in here late, so that in you.
Speaker 2:But it looked like you know them learnings you take from there, even though it's not training ground it looked like you absorb a lot in and, as I say, you know it has a lot of. From being honest, it has a lot of trauma that came out of it, but it's things that a man could deal with after the fact. But to me, to me, the more important lessons, I have to admit I learned it there, Learned it right there.
Speaker 1:So it's things that you find now helping you in your new journey as a lead singer in A-Team yeah, man, for sure, for sure.
Speaker 2:And, as I say, you know this was a situation where you know I now getting cultivated into A-Team. So even one of the founding members who selected me, he had a band meeting and he said, bro, plain talk, bad manners. This is what I select you for, because I know inside you have a wealth of information and, in other words, you come in here, tiptoe in and do what you tiptoeing where you come straight out and start to operate with this information that you, you know, you have inside of you, right?
Speaker 1:you know yeah so your time with HD it comes to end in a cordial way. What was the end point of it?
Speaker 2:because that's not a place. That too much announcement, but we ain't going to talk about this we ain't finally no cordial way. No, we ain't finally no cordial way. Right, and who will enter? Talk the truth. No, it was no cordial way, but it was necessary.
Speaker 1:Right, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2:Right when I look back at it now as a grown man, I see you can drink it, man. Yeah, you do that. Yeah, I see it was necessary, you know the funny thing here, corey, you follow this thing with, with, with more hennessy, the same amount of when I say it's a white.
Speaker 1:Okay, I go in there with you different. I don't let people know you're recording.
Speaker 2:This was time 10 o'clock in the morning too 10 AM in the morning, this man telling me what you say me drink a cup of tea.
Speaker 1:Breakfast in the car. That's the drink after.
Speaker 2:First drink for the year. Yeah, first drink for the year. That tea going to be cold like a dog. You ain't going to know Mok't go ahead and see how you drink.
Speaker 1:You ain't gonna remember, we'll just see when you go out. Yeah, um, yeah. So yeah, it was necessary right.
Speaker 2:You know, because one thing I teach myself the climber stairs. The concept of climbing stairs is removing one foot and putting it onto the other stairs. So in other words, your mind have to be ready to make the sacrifice to leave that comfort you have to let go it.
Speaker 2:You have to let go of it. Yeah, yeah, yeah, you know, and I think I think a lot of people would have gotten you can't, you can't. As a soccer artist, you can't get more comfortable in terms of so you can't get more comfortable in terms of situations being laid out for you Because that brother thing laid out. So, whereas you know other establishments, you might have hiccups here. Your hotel room ain't ready till the night and all kind of yeah, nothing like that and none like that.
Speaker 2:You get your hotel key, sometimes in the airport, you know. So, when you come, you don't have to talk to nobody, you just roll your suitcase in your room and, yeah, you're functioning right, gotcha, you know. And we have a huge support system, huge fan base where people will, you know, come and carry them all before the interview. They get something to wear, they get a haircut right. Interview they get something to wear, they get a haircut right.
Speaker 1:Well, it's when you, when you, when you're talking artist things, them things is things that not so available for everyone no, no, not much people at all, yeah you're in a well-oiled machine, exactly yeah but what I've seen and you say trauma right in terms of how it ended and so on I've seen many, many artists who spend maybe sometimes not even as much time as you would have spent in that system, come out and struggle to find back the name, to find back inside.
Speaker 2:You see, before he's an artist, corey as a person. Right before he has an art, you turn to artists. You are a person and I'm talking about me. I'm the type of person I will have a business relationship with you and then I will check in with you. As in Corey, what's?
Speaker 2:going on with you you good, and then when you have that type of relationships with your coworkers and things, you realize I break your heart too. I hurt you too, right. But then when I look at it from a bigger perspective, who am I to judge? When I've heard so many different things about Montano's past, he was probably heartbroken as well too. That's after making him a more strict object in how he operates his business, right? A lot of people didn't get that. They didn't get that. They just get. Well, I hurt and I don't like what you're telling me or whatever, right. And all them other interviews where they're talking about Marshall Lash, omi and Mia. Them thing never happened. Them thing never happened. Something never happened, right, you're talking about a man who just took his mind to gain the expression of perfection and that was it. That was it. It never went on to tomorrow and the next day, and that's not the person people describe, you know, I mean.
Speaker 2:I mean that kind of way.
Speaker 1:My little bit of experience. I know Umi a long long time and I was telling you there, I know you coming around when Umber's living in St James them times. That's an old cultural hub too, you know.
Speaker 2:Umber, Charlie, everybody, that was a podcast. You know, if you had recorded them times that was some hell of times that podcast would have been the most expensive one to date.
Speaker 1:It would have been the most humorous, the most immobilizing. People would have laughed, they'd have cried every night and so much people passed through there at the time Promoters chow used to pass through. That was a realm and that was in the heart of the song system. So I remember seeing Sharlon Barry as the man behind Jugglers and now seeing Chyy and them now finding the length which women is now? Yeah, but I too hear all the rumors about marshall hitzan and marshall with umi I was just to tell people.
Speaker 2:I say, boy, you gotta know on that podcast that coming next one.
Speaker 1:Let me just clear it up that never happened well, let me tell you this, right, I wouldn't ask because a little bit I know about you and a little bit I know about umi. Yeah, I'm not sure that I would have go. So people might say that you see, think funny when it's online, but you know somebody in person and when we lie long enough to see all kind of thing happen right in and this is shooting some jams, I don't know if that would have happened.
Speaker 2:I don't know if that would really see boy trying to allow somebody is if they directly come at him. You know what I mean, because he ain't no punk either. Yeah, yeah, you know, if they directly come at him.
Speaker 1:That's what I mean.
Speaker 2:But if he talking, he might know and somebody hear that backstage and they want to embellish the conversation to gain cap with whoever friends that they're trying to impress. They'll probably say them things and them things circle.
Speaker 1:But that's a different time too, because them thing, you could have had rumors and you ain't had. No, it's not like if you could just jump on Instagram Live and clear up a rumor long time.
Speaker 2:Rumors used to live for long, so I'm glad you're here to say that that is not the case. Yeah them thing never happened.
Speaker 1:Them thing, so many people who you might be right in that they just focus on the hurt and their careers seem to you know they fade, they get forgotten, they're not wrong. How you find the strength now, or find it in yourself, to move on from that, to keep a name that still lasts forever.
Speaker 2:I think it all stemmed from the company I had keep. The company I had keep and, as Kirk Mitchell say, that impacted the brand of Zan, make music that last forever. There's not really me standing test. That time is my music, you know. I mean so somebody, somebody might see me walking through a crowd and I'm making my way to the stage and I end up that guy. I said, oh you, yeah, now why not you? Maybe you? I end up that guy. I end up that guy because of the period in where, you know, I fell off of the industry, you know. So having songs hit songs is what actually, and then your personality, have a lot to do with how Soka receive you. I was always that easygoing fella. I hear all kinds of different things about me from people that don't know me and I leave it just like that. I leave it just like that because at the end of the day, it's a thing I hear my young partner, pablo, from the age that he is today too, nobody does pelt, pelt green mango, because when you pelt ripe mango, yeah yeah, yeah, yeah, big stone behind so when I watch it I just I just kind of leave it alone you know,
Speaker 2:I just leave it alone and, um, I just function with a little more love in my heart. So I think those things is why, you know, I had a level of acceptance over the time. You know, other people might have deteriorated based on the same concept, but me I always try to, you know, deal with people straight up and I always try to make good music when I'm coming. So I'll look under the comments when I release songs and see my progression from there. You know a man will let nobody tell him when I release Sunshine and Wine, a man say he don't go nowhere, he's just there.
Speaker 1:Oh, in the comments. Yeah, yes, he's just there. You know, I want to talk about that song, right, because that is back to that relationship with you and colonel. How important colonel is to you in terms of your career and your as a boy.
Speaker 2:I meet and I meet colonel. Colonel was flying high with, with um, with um them times. He was a traffic. He was a traffic. Yeah, he transitioned from traffic. Now, listen, all marshall, take three of us the same time, or really come with me, as in you know this, you burn our talent here. Help him now. Right, he came on the air wing and I was already rolling with catch, and I do have someone for trees all of us at the same.
Speaker 2:And I do have so much for choice All the levels at the same time.
Speaker 1:Got it yeah.
Speaker 2:Right, so that's how Johnny Swing Jumperman Ball is a team, a TOW, yeah, all together, as one Remember that.
Speaker 1:I remember that. Yeah, TOW FET and all that. Tow FET yeah.
Speaker 2:Don't need much, right, and them is the Earlier days of us Working together, and you know, marshall take us under His wing and teach us as much as possible. Yeah, got you, colonel. Colonel now Was Managing me and Patrice when we sang Always Be, I got you, you were only in the show Long ago, yeah. Colonel, literally Drive me and Pat you from show to show. He can tell you how much shows we do, how we A man hire. We From Helicopter back to Bowen Marine. I had a little Michael Jackson earring for like.
Speaker 1:But I I don't remember Colonel was a traffic. I didn't remember that at all. Yeah, colonel was a traffic man, I wonder who was Singing lead with traffic At that point in time? Sean Sean.
Speaker 2:Winchester yeah, gotcha, eddie and Sean Was traffic.
Speaker 1:I don't remember that at all yeah and yeah them days. Trapped me, that band era them was giants.
Speaker 2:They strapped me that band era them and us giants at that point in time but only relationship formed from since then yeah, from well, I'd meet Auntie Val first and Karina she was a mutual friend, his mom and Val was really good, and sister now Emma, sing Happy Birthday. And I didn't realize that when she tell me kitchen eye, well, I in my head I know right that that is exactly the kind of people I need to know. I was like, yeah, yeah. So she tell me, I say so, you living with kuna rubber? Yeah, yeah, come by the house and thing come and meet kitch yeah, show me and you need to.
Speaker 2:She's like yeah, come by the house and thing, come and meet Ketch Ketch I don't know what's that one, but Ketch. Ketch walk out and immediately there's the image of Ketch. I said, nah, I don't have the vibes of this man this man yeah. So he turned around now Like who's you? You know who you are. Yeah, yeah, yeah, what you doing here Kind of humble.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I said you know what To. And so, friend, and he tell me sing my songs, just as anybody would. And I vibes. You know what? He? He singing his songs and I never leave there. I lime the whole day, from morning till night, and the next day I come. I was just obsessed over the music vibes. I feel as though I was in a place where I belong now. Yeah, you know, because where I grew up I never get that initial support of singing. I grew up in a more rugged environment. Where you grew up, I grew up in Gopal Avenue, digamon, oh, digamon. Yeah, Okay gotcha.
Speaker 2:It might seem like a little, but it's all about just no, I live, I live early gone for a little while.
Speaker 1:Yeah, right, yeah, no, yeah, of course, yeah, yeah, you live you live back.
Speaker 2:That, yeah, boy yeah, no, I was at the front side, yeah but I mean the vibes cannot, you know, neutralize back into the filter, you know, but around them times, yeah, it was an environment that really, but around them times. It was an environment that really supported what you had to. In other words, I had to show my family who I was and what I was capable of. But before that, but he stopped that singing that boy.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that was a gruff that place, and grown up gentle people.
Speaker 2:Yeah or they'll tease you or heckle you or whatever. So it was an environment when it was more inviting To sing. You could sing how loud you want, right, you see how big the arena Am I.
Speaker 1:Yeah, sing how loud you want and it's have that Energy Of everything that Happened in the arena, as we'll see that yeah definitely. You just feel it when you walk in. Yeah, I have a story. My father always tell me my father used to play Guitar for Songrev and he said just what? Yeah, just what you say Ken Corby is his name. He used to play kitch in a tent and he used to play Songrev.
Speaker 1:And he said the same thing you say when he went, chuckie Fado is who bring him in the tent, actually. And he said he went in the day he tell him go buy your ammo and play for kitch. He said you, anytime, unless he plays for Kitch. And exactly what you say is what my father told me. He said when he reached Kitch. I said well, who is you? He said well, I'm a guitarist. Roland Gordon sent me to. He said where's your guitar? My father, my father's shy, he's frightened. You know. Yeah, he said well. And he said Pretender was in the gallery and called him, called him to play. He said he'd play. He said he'd never see Kitch again Because Kitch gets vexed when he's in the gallery.
Speaker 2:He said he'd never see Kitch.
Speaker 1:And after he played for Pretender, pretender said don't worry, and he turned on. By the next week he was there.
Speaker 2:So the energy and things like that, you can't miss that the family is a family that really don't pretend too much.
Speaker 1:It's direct. The direct.
Speaker 2:The been direct the been direct. Just saying yeah. So, as I say, he was in standoffish or nothing, but he was direct and I just started singing one time.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2:I learned that lesson from times before.
Speaker 1:I guess, yeah, you had to be prepared. Yeah, don't miss your shot.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, yeah as them boy in New York, they say be ready, so you don't have to get ready.
Speaker 1:Yeah, critical critical yeah but going back to that rhythm with Tilt and Sunshine and Wine, right, because that relationship I know only from around as partners, since back in the day, right outside of the music, man playing basketball, it was a long time and when I heard that rhythm come back up because I didn't hear Colonel for a while and I didn't hear you for a while and my thing is always Calypso and Kyson when I hear how much that rhythm, the feel of it, the song itself, the lyrics both of them come up with resemble the Calypso and Kyson environment.
Speaker 1:A couple of questions I want to ask about that rhythm you doing production on it or you just write this song? Or what's the only process when all the working together?
Speaker 2:well around that time, and um there was a reassembly of the chinese laundry record label and um I was invited on to the capacity where tun Chow say I ain't starting this without Zan, but let I call Zan, call me, I come up the road we started working on the first year. Before that we started working on the nah. We was working on the Joking Boredom. Oh really, it's scrub ito Oria. That was the original.
Speaker 2:It was the first one. That's a bad, bad song. The first thing we dropped as Chinese non-Jew record label Right All the box one time everybody liked the Scrubber Dong. I had a track one year with them called Le we Press Right. I wrote in both right. I remember standing in Colonel Yard and this experience is where I will call in this season, if a season four or five. They'll call this season graduation right, because now I'm writing for the master. Master teach me plenty things, but now the sword is different right the pen is like a sword right.
Speaker 2:so I I hear the original verse nice, not that strong now in my beliefs, of course. So he believe in me. He said where I feel why got it out two o'clock in the morning? We now come from our show? No, we now come from studio. And we forged it right there together, right. And that led into the next year where we did the tilt rhythm Right Right Now. At the point in time we had different operatives. Azaria is part of our operative. Okay, nice, nice. You know, when we do have these writing sessions and it's basically a writing group, you know we have the production, but it's purely based around the written song, because the written song is what we perceive to be the decider of what kind of carnival you're going to have. Manga Po, what beat on your conversation, remember? It boiled down to the conversation.
Speaker 1:Oh yeah, I guess that's your first advice yeah that's a hell of a thing because, before I come back to that, this carnival, as with every other kind of valley, could pull out some good music, right. But um, I like to talk about this thing with forever music, right, and for me the forever music, the melodies on taking calypso, as you say in your first song, plenty melody does be inspired by other songs. It has been borrowed from other songs, melody, it's only, I hate to note in music really you know it's not a whole lot you could do so the thing about it is that the lyrics is such an important part of what is made to connect with you, for a kind of Right.
Speaker 1:So, as you say, you imagine people calling you that, and they say you, and they go on and write the key with the original song too.
Speaker 1:They stick with you for a long time. So when I see the, the, um, the, the last two, I didn't realize joking board was parted. But it does have a feel to me, like when you see well, talking to mr shark in the last episode about the resurgence of calypso and so-called finding a home in Calypso. But them two songs would have been what them songs were back in the 80s, 90s and things, them things competing for a road match.
Speaker 1:Calypso Monarch it's deliberate All the writing for the purpose of putting back lyrics into the thing, like what Stalin and them to do with black man feeling to party, or was it your brother?
Speaker 2:um, well, I don't know for the rest, but, zando, go back right. I, I would I like to pay homage to what I you know what was before me, but I know that these great men would I want an energy like mine to produce something that they want, an energy like mine to produce something that they and their families could look at us in. This was all for the right reason. So I try to write songs on those levels. But I'm not going and look at a man's song. You know like how somebody would literally say I want a song like this. Yeah, I have a certain producer partner who is really after that, he's an introverted fella. I ain't gonna call him I want a song like this.
Speaker 2:To me, that in itself is an insecurity of who you are. You know, I think that these songs that I'm talking about these songs are is original object, because when I write Sunshine and Wine, I started writing Sunshine and Wine from a place where I didn't have those things in my head. I don't have those things in my head. The melody is now, as you say, is only so much notes. So the melodies you would come up with now and the way you say it is what makes it original, but I wouldn't consider it a song that was patterned by something. Colonel's song on the Tiltredem now had influences of the past Right, and that was for a different agenda. You know what I mean. But if you listen to the flow of my verse, it will have. That never happened before. It very it's new. No, that never happened before. I basically sing A guitar. Basically right Gotcha, gotcha.
Speaker 1:And.
Speaker 2:The part that seal Everything together Is the monumental line that I get from Chow Today is a good day To have a good day. He was playing With that for a while and Colonel stopped. Colonel was recording my vocals, right, that's the good part. We don't need to outsource. We have everybody right inside and we we had our studio situation and we come there and we get the ideas done. Colonel was the one who stopped and said you know, going on 50, perfect. You remember that. On 50, you're perfect. You remember that thing. When you was singing, you would just be cooking and singing real loud. Yes, I'm good he cooking. Nah, he cook for me almost everyday. Serious, I'm telling you.
Speaker 2:I had to talk the things if. I don't say it, somebody else will say it. Good, he cooking, he make a real dread crispy pork. If you're good.
Speaker 1:I wanted to ask if it's chinese food in the world right, so in the kitchen, and you can't remember it.
Speaker 2:And both are we laughing at here and we sing it in the melody. You know, fighting right, it would right and yeah, that's what happened. So I wouldn't really say you know, it's something that pattern in the no, you gotta be smart and if you're making music, it have it. Have relativity living within of course, the human body right and you want to connect to that. They might pull out a baseline from um, from from another song, so that influence the entire.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, the feel of it nobody, I know where that come from, but there's no subliminal feeling.
Speaker 2:This feeling right, yeah, and that that was the whole approach and I think, I think, um, nobody know where that come from, but there's no subliminal Familiar Feeling, there's feeling Right, yeah, and that was the whole approach and I think, I think I think A lot more than I. I I would say that I don't really like to go too much in the past, but Colonel and Chow now have a huge history of the past.
Speaker 2:They're rooted in it. When it comes together, it's an incredible fusion. You dig? Yeah, because Colonel's song have that kind of influence in it. My song had this kind of influence in it. And don't forget Nadia and Lyrical was on the radio as well also Azaria and Baron. So it had homage to the past Lyrical Also on the radio as well, also Azaria and Baron. So it had how much did it pass? I don't remember the Baron Some minutes at all.
Speaker 3:You see, that's the thing you see, you see, you see. We talk about the infectious.
Speaker 2:I work on the projects. All I know Is that is the melody. Yeah. But the, the, the, the infection. I work on the projects. All I know is that is the melody yeah, da, da, da, da, da, but the infection.
Speaker 4:Mm-hmm. Yeah, it was true, the rhythm of sunshine, when I hear when I sing when I sing that chorus.
Speaker 2:it's what you must answer. Boy me, you're a liar, I know you on fire. Well, let me tell you something again.
Speaker 1:Let me tell you something. You backstage, but let me tell you something again. Let me tell you something you backstage right in Olayin's studio. Let me tell you something, right, because you go pay attention, right when kids do something to me, I had to listen because he, he find a way. And going back to the thing about old music, right, sometimes you just forget and, as always, part of my mission of this podcast, I remember, is to remind people we say, in this whole music nobody had come out, it was new.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it was new, it was innovative, it didn't last, just because, yeah, you understand. So when I say only finding out, is almost like, in the vein of that, that music, not necessarily copying it or anything like that, because when, um, I I hear kitchener come out a year before and he sing, but the joking borders, I tell you I didn't know it was related to this project at all.
Speaker 1:But then when I hear tilt, I always tell people, boy, they ain't paying enough attention to the song. Now I see this song and this vibe and this rhythm. That's how he opened it. Give yourself a chance bad. So it's in a fit because, me, paying attention to what else happened in rhythm, I went on apple music. I looked for kitchen, I listened that over and over, and sometime in our feds I hear your sunshine at another breakfast party too. Yeah, and my thing is who's that boy? I?
Speaker 1:think it was. I think I know this song. I know I'm trying to figure out where and I didn't really match it back until the dj played till two and a six because that song capture as a fetter. It's the same thing that happens to me with Heart of a man. It's in the fet. I hear it and I say who's this singing the sunshine and the wine thing? They run and look back. It's the same thing. I see people say you. I say but where's Zan? I say but where's Zan?
Speaker 2:that's why I just tell men don't study who fight in here, fighting here, those studies and them things. You see my, my Instagram status never changed. Then, mightier than your sword, let the writing. Go over them yeah, yeah, I learned that. I learned a written song. You couldn't have no cell phone, even in the bush, and them promoters couldn't find it.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, they wanted a drone and talked to you through the drone and they know where you come down by the lights. Now, let us see, we'll have a traffic light down here. I'm telling you.
Speaker 1:Yeah, because the audience are fine here. Yeah, yeah, the audience.
Speaker 2:So that's why I focus on I focus on my work ethic and the written song. Yeah, it's the only mix and only master and all them things.
Speaker 1:You'll figure them things out after, yeah, but the written song is why it is and written for you is lyrics and the melody, the feel of the song and all that it's the melody you know like a tattoo, it'll come off your skin, can't get it off. You cannot get sunshine off your skin no, no you understand, it's sticking to you yeah, I always say that about nadia. With the cool effect she have a way of capturing a threat.
Speaker 2:There's a monster. I don't know how she's come up with them thing. Yeah, I know she's um.
Speaker 1:She's a monster of a writer yeah, yeah, yeah, for sure, and I mean her sunshine on mine is it's been the same and if you and if you, and if you really observe yeah, I, I sang Sunshine and Wine.
Speaker 2:She had. You know, she has a podcast herself. Yeah, yeah, look, I watch every episode and if you own that episode. Sue and Mikkel Tijer spoke highly of Sunshine.
Speaker 1:Yeah, listen, it's that undeniable Right and that's just what it is.
Speaker 2:So many be talking about the fight and the politics, and the difference of them things is that when you come correct, nobody does fight.
Speaker 1:I want to get into a team concert you told me about the other day. But let me ask you about this fight thing, because most times you talk to artists, most people you find that the discussion is tend to because as a podcast to myself I start into. If you come here, I want to focus on the greatness that is. That that is my angle who want to talk about back in ireland think them could do that and I good with that. I just want to talk about you and your accomplishments and them thing, right, right. But I've found that on my short journey here the conversation has come back down to a fight down again, squeeze out and again, play on radio and again book in FETS, which I learn now I don't let. A man has to express himself, if you come to talk about that.
Speaker 1:I ain't stopping you, I ain't getting in your way, but you seem to be going on a different road. You ain't spending much time talking about the fight and there's no your thing.
Speaker 2:I grew up with Fidon boy. I grew up but my siblings fighting me down. So that's just Tuesday you talk about when you talk about Fidon, more than how you see, there's a problem with this industry. Everybody focus on the problem and I focus on the solutions. Right, you think I focus on the solution, you, you think I focus on the solution. You talking about Fidong, I get Fidong as 8 o'clock in the morning.
Speaker 1:You, fidong is sustaining church. You know, you come and say it, but it's sustaining church, so it's Fidong and Fidong like.
Speaker 2:Pekong because she already you know in them time in the US. Actually, if you hear my sister saying, you know that is Pekong yeah right gotcha, yeah right Pekong. That are the friends but I get fight the beginning of my life. Anybody who know my real life, who grew up with me, who watching this podcast in real, they you know I said right Tuesday, first time, right Tuesday. So when people say, boy, I like how the music is on your mic there, now your mic is low, low, low. It's happened to me a long time.
Speaker 1:I see that happen to you a lot of times.
Speaker 2:I perform already in the middle of our fed, jumping up waving my hand, and nobody is hearing a word coming out of my mouth. And I get in forwards too. I see people waving at me and I feel in the way because, whether with me, they are with me, yeah, but they're in here, but they're feeling my energy.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, right, and I just assure you, if you focus on the right things, you just might pass right? If you sit on whole day and study about who's fighting you down, what would your trajectory be, corey? Think about me having to perform in three shows and my energy is studying how that man is playing my song. And think about somebody who is unaware that they're not playing your song. Yeah they're going in a whole different vibration.
Speaker 2:And then you come in the crowd and start to scream at them and say what are they doing with this? They're doing me that, brother. I now spend $1,700 to come in the CIC.
Speaker 1:Let me tell you something Sing your song. And sing it like a canary.
Speaker 2:You know what I'm telling you I don't care about that. So Fidon is just tuesday as I say just something in your way, something in your way?
Speaker 1:yeah, that's all. I always feel, too, like you have a limited amount of energy and all. Are we getting older?
Speaker 2:exactly so the more energy. You could focus on the positive, the better yeah, because, as I say, I will call things as I see them right, because I know I get the most fight out of my generation and I didn't get the fight like other people. I get the fight because of affiliation. You sing with Marshall Montano. So when I was not singing with Marshall Montano, it had men on the sidelines like ah, you're dumb. Ah, that is the day Now I'm going to take this magnifying glass and pull off all your tentacles.
Speaker 1:Yeah men, waiting to see you fall, yeah men waiting to men.
Speaker 2:You know, even having this opportunity to represent the A-Team band, a lot of different people are like boy sing, saying whatever, and it's funny to me because the men who saying that literally can't sing yeah, but I, I, you know, I'm not gonna go into it yeah
Speaker 2:I know I did say it. I did say it. I'm not apologizing for saying it either. I did say it. But the point I'm making is we live in a time where people don't really consider how much Corey pays his dues. They'll just see you accomplish something and say hey, how can I get that? But they're not paying attention to how much dry, dusty roads you walk on to get here today.
Speaker 1:It seems to be one of them industries where people don't respect the abundance that life have. You know, I remember studying one time. I want to talk to you about your studies too. I remember studying that time and you, we campus them days. You're young yeah and I had a good friend who was one bright, very accomplished today and I had to tell her, asking her for some notes and things, she I said well, you get on like it's one degree. They give it out, like if I get mine, you go okay.
Speaker 2:I get yours.
Speaker 1:I said everybody go cross the stage. It's unlimited sometimes. It's much more abundant, but you're telling me that you spent some time studying the technology behind music too.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I did. I did. You know, that was a great experience. Sean Pullen, martin Riemann All right, this is him. Yeah, these guys taught me things that I always knew that I needed to know right, you know like these things. You have things in your mind like I want to understand what this is, and they have a full syllabus that educates you know the arbitrary man into that bachelor level gotcha. Yeah, though. So this is something you you know the arbitrary man into that bachelor level Bachelor.
Speaker 1:Yeah, though. So this is something you do after you done singing and touring and all them things, or? Yeah, after I what make you go back to school after all that success.
Speaker 2:Well, I, I wanted to be in a position to, to how to say boy, I wanted to be in a position to navigate my music. That's the reason why, well, with my band, we are just into my volumes because coming out of my shell band, my shell band is a loud band, so you know everything I would attack with more. That was my upbringing there and I know what Justin Karen is a real good coach.
Speaker 2:As you know, in football every team have a different style so he, you know, helps me to navigate that and thing, but yeah, but that's Right. So he, you know, helps me to navigate that kind of thing.
Speaker 1:But yeah, but going back to that band experience and where you are, I mean it's admirable to go back to learn the technical side of something you've done already.
Speaker 2:Yeah, because I could tell you it will help you as a writer, as a producer well, not newly a producer, but as a writer. As a producer Well, not newly a producer, but as a writer you want to be able to position a project in a way that other producers could say, ah, this is where you want to go.
Speaker 2:So when the music hits you now, when that person whoever you're passing it off to hears the project, or you want to sell a song to an artist, you can produce the beat and make them feel the song the way you're feeling it. Got you, got you. You understand.
Speaker 1:Congrats on that, congrats on the move. It's something that you're seeing more and more people doing, so getting deeper into something that you're doing already, already it must benefit I was the first one who deserved a party yeah, you know, I work
Speaker 1:hard yeah, I was there out of my team. I was the first one and I hope you're taking your party, you know you're making me a little party first thing in the morning too. One of the things I tell people in prepping for this session too, is I never hear nobody say nothing bad about Zan drink a hot cup of tea.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I mean drinking no tea, the tea in here.
Speaker 1:I never hear nobody say nothing bad about Zan. All wrong on the fringes of the world and that thing, when your name come up, the words that come up, is humbly a cool fellow. I see in some situations we ain't gonna talk about this anymore. I see in some situations I say, nah, boy, zan is really a cool one boy. He cool when he normal, but when things get tight like he, more cool. So he was telling me about 80 him having a show. It had to be the best because we didn't tell him about it. I didn't hear about it at all at the time and you told me Real Artist Pastry. You want to tell me about that show and how it went?
Speaker 2:the February the 2nd yeah, a-class events was something that me and Zarin had discussed earlier the year of my signing the 18 band backing of my signing the 18 band, backing all the friends. So it was coming rapid like a soft clash this thing, this man talking and Rupi come out to all the ladies and this friend was different, chosatai was different, the whole vibe wrong, right.
Speaker 1:But that means again, you support the industry, your colleagues, your co-workers yeah, yeah, yeah, definitely give love to get love.
Speaker 2:You know, that's all yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1:So that experience for you in that setting. You're mostly doing your own songs, or you're doing covers, or what was that that?
Speaker 2:show alright. Well, um, I think, um, I'm a type of honest fella, so if they bring a suggestion of a song, I would say, hey, you sing that song, right got you. Or you sing that song. I feel more comfortable Singing these songs, right, you know. So I never, I never Watch it in that way, because Me singing your song Is still me Singing, yeah. Right, so I don't.
Speaker 2:I don't watch it as in when I sing in your song, your song is still me singing. Yeah, right, so I don't. I don't watch it as in your. When I sing in your song, your song is my song, right, always know that. I'll say that again for the camera when I'm singing your song, your song is now my song. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So I'm not watching it in that kind of right small mind and we are man, my thing, and yeah, yeah I don't I find that missing.
Speaker 1:To be honest, like I miss the days when you used to see, like you say, sean Winchester, for instance, in traffic, or even some of the ones who came before him as lead singers Called Lucas Steve. C them fellas used to sing Men's songs and yeah, that's my energy. People just do it, you know.
Speaker 2:Sometimes Patrice Might be catching her vibes. And just. Yeah, and just sing she just sing, you know and the crowd of a party does appreciate that yeah, people just miss it, people just miss it you know I mean, because at the end of the day, we take this thing way too serious. Music is intended for people to enjoy and have fun, not just you know, I mean yeah but you tell me competitive.
Speaker 1:you know you say the industry competitive, so it's part of why man taking it seriously, Well, I mean, it's a prideful thing too.
Speaker 2:You know, sometimes a man might watch it. How you watch it, as I say, my responsibility is not to think about the problem, my responsibility is to find the solution.
Speaker 1:Right, yeah, I like that.
Speaker 2:So a man, a man, you know, people tell me that, boy, you real thing, right. And I came to my band and I said yo, I've certain songs from my catalog that this big that in reach reset yet and it's just a timing thing, okay right, so you ain't worried. Well, at first I brought it to them. As I said, I stalked my mind, sure, I brought it to them and I was assured that everything would be all right. You know so I, and I believe so too yeah you know, so in itself, to a man's song.
Speaker 2:I've seen bruno mars and and rihanna sang over yeah um, a popular song just the other day. It's happening and they are massive superstars. So the point I'm making is sometimes people just take themselves a little too serious and I think I spend enough time in this industry to say that yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1:Well, you say you're making forever music to it. But it must be a nice thing to see because I've seen before before you, right, I see several times bands who still remain here, whether it be all stars or any other band that's still around announced and I mean all stars look like they invest into because it was a big thing when they announced you as a lead singer, right, I've seen that before and then not see a whole lot of support come for it from other artists and it must be a good feeling to see so much artists show up for a band like all stars and stuff. But but I want to ask you where artists concern Inspiration for you, when you know coming out or even know who are some of the artists you think that inspire you to be where you are? Today.
Speaker 2:When I come out, you see.
Speaker 1:Yeah, at any point in your career.
Speaker 2:That's a wide that's a wide category. But, you know I've paid a close amount of attention To Marshall Superblue Shadow Growing up. I'd always like the tonality Of Baron Listening to how he sings. He's a singer, singer like me. And Shadow Shadow writing ability phenomenal he writes on any topic.
Speaker 1:I don't think yeah, he.
Speaker 1:What I admire about his style is that he's he's example of out of the box as out of the box as it gets right out of the box, as it possibly can get like I always like that style and then he's of a base influence writer like me. Now, looking at this year or maybe even the last two or three years in marshall, is one of your big inspiration. He's currently the calypso monarch. Country nerds, we're going back to the fanny crown. We're seeing more and more now in the calypso arena because this year you have squeezy, who's a, if you want to say, a dancehall man. You do every genre of music you have but a dancehall man or young brother who is steam and so on.
Speaker 2:Now going into the calypso monarch, that's something you had ever considered, terms of your writing ability, like doing calypso um I kind of always shy away from that because within myself a celebrator size of honesty that educated me that I would have to learn much things about calypso before go into it. Right, and you know the fast track, uh, being on tour of course I wasn't really as wrong as you know, as I should have been.
Speaker 2:But then I realized even from, as they say, this generation. We call them the gen z. They're way more braver than any generation anybody come before you, right because when I I watching young brother do his calypso to a young brother in calypso forever he born in a life before his life, like you yeah, he, he was here before he's a unique, a unique expression of art, right?
Speaker 2:so it make me think, hey, you could have go and sing a calypso song. No, however, before I saw that joining the 18 band gaining another additional support, again, I tell myself when we get back down into recording, because, you know, after Carnival we have you wouldn't know, Corey, but we have a brand new band room to have a studio situation.
Speaker 1:Where is this?
Speaker 2:This is on scott bush street. Right, come in, yeah, come on here. Come on to the vibe. Right, we have a brand new band and the. The setting is, uh, engineered for music, the expression of a cult here. So I had different men coming through there. So I'm not missing the opportunity on working with the men that concern Calypso, because in my legacy I have to have a Calypso song.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it was a selfish question there, because it's so funny that you say barren and tonality, because your tonality is what always here's very much, almost more like a calypso yeah traditional soccer. I never see you on a stage shouting out or belting out your song yeah I always see you stay in the pocket, yeah, yeah, and sing your song, which is a thing that many, many calypsonians there's. There's a competition. I don't know backing track, I know competitions, yeah, well the, you see the, you see scallops.
Speaker 2:So, from what I learned over the years, is a closer expression, uh of um, social commentary is us, is solely that. So it has a lot of soul in Calypso, more than the how to explain it. It's kind of hard for me to explain, but I'll try. It's soulful in the expression of the energy. Soaker is more action or energy right, whereas calypso is more internal energy coming out like that. So people will feel your song and the song, the written song in itself, will influence how people feel about it. Yeah, you had a, in other words, you had a buzz in calypso, right, and so you could have less vibe and it's more vibes.
Speaker 2:Calypso is a more intricate detail of you know lyrics.
Speaker 1:Well, I learned right here on this table.
Speaker 1:I spent a real time in school, but I feel I learned more on this table than I spent in school because man's little mariash, be right, was telling me recently that, um, as you keep talking about your written song and it's you open up my eyes to tell me the judging and all that mr shack was yesterday, you see the same thing. The judging and all them might cloud your vision as to what is a social commentary, because it's hard to tell me that Heart of a man is not a social commentary for a nation building song. You understand. So it's things that you're writing already. You know you pay a lot of attention to the lyrics that go into songs and is there vibration?
Speaker 1:yes, because, boy, when I hear bad and I hear sunshine, something has happened to me. Something has happened to me.
Speaker 2:I tell her, yeah, but that's the whole thing, that's the whole going back from the top of the interview. Now, that's the whole point, what Kirk Mitchell was trying to tell you. He was trying to tell you that there had to be something you can't forget you see something. So every time she says she's like yeah, yeah, you understand, to separate you from everybody else.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, La man, tell me that about music too, as you rap, about telling this, as you say thing that you care, forget right. I remember now learning to play music and thing and rehearsing and thing, and the man tell me they could play. A question, but I'm going to tell my time. One of the most important things I learned in music. You know, accomplished musician, he said the problem is, he said you're practicing until you remember. Yeah, I said what am I going to do at the rehearsal? Until I remember? He said no, rehearsal until you can't forget. You know what I'm saying? Big difference, yeah, and that's, you're already writing music.
Speaker 2:I got now. I got now when I was younger, being a part of the Chinese book show. I forget the name of the book, but he expressed that in the book where he basically is describing himself as not a champion and this is this will. If you hear that, corey, he basically saying I don't train to be a champion, I don't train to win champion, I don't train with the mentality to be number one, I only train to be undefeated, excellent, so that. So all the laws, all the other whatever you want to call me goot, float tote, will come after this fact. But I am training so that my physical body cannot be defeated. And I thought, I thought of, I'd say that's wow, that's something I want to try, that's what?
Speaker 1:that's something I want to try that's what that's what I want to try. Well, you ain't just trying, you're doing it. I want to take a moment to show all the best. I glad to see where they team to, I think the bani, raw music and the missing, yeah, and I was happy when I see it, last year I mean we, we, we gonna grow.
Speaker 2:we gonna grow based on, you know, the initial intention. The initial intention, the initial intention, is to also have the van focus as its own conglomerate, in comparison to backing all the other artists. Yes, we're going to be backing all the other artists, but what we want to do within this year coming here is develop a projection of Zan. A projection of zan, a projection of curls and, as well you know, we have ambitions of creating an inclusive show mentalism.
Speaker 1:We looking forward to seeing that. You know we missed that in the caravan. We're looking forward to see you carrying that to our next level I was appreciative of plenty people you know the first show was.
Speaker 2:That meant a lot to me. Yeah, you know, people do. People would see those things pass and they wouldn't really know how much it means I'm sorry.
Speaker 1:I only know about it after we talk. I didn't realize. My first show. That was my first show.
Speaker 2:I wish I was there well, it actually wasn't my first show, but it was my first major show, right, you know, and that show was a show that I had missed. When I didn't do that show in a minute, yeah, right and um, after doing that show, is where I really saw what we are capable of doing and creating a in an internal environment of these new expressions that are coming with it. I don't even call them songs.
Speaker 1:I call them expressions. We'll be waiting to hear the next episode, especially with the band as they start recording on them. Yeah, yeah for sure. So we're looking forward to that Exciting times.
Speaker 2:My brother thanks very much.
Speaker 1:I appreciate you coming out and whenever that time comes and you release, we can hear what you're saying without saying that the band coming out of that compilation album or piece of work right, yeah, whenever that time come, pass back through yeah, for sure you'll sit down and talk and vibes and nice.
Speaker 2:I appreciate that man, thank you.