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Two longtime music pros (Sensei & Fatboi) go deep on what makes music great. A podcast for music producers, artists, and fans.
Fatboi is a Multi-platinum, Grammy nominated, award winning producer whose credits include: Camoflauge, YoungBoy Never Broke Again, Gucci Mane, Young Jeezy, Rocko, Shawty Redd, Flo Rida, Bow Wow, Bone Thugs-n-Harmony, Juvenile, Yung Joc, Gorilla Zoe, OJ Da Juiceman, 8Ball & MJG, Jeremih, 2 Chainz, Nicki Minaj, Bobby V, Ludacris and Yo Gotti, Monica, Zay Smith, TK Kravitz, Future.
Sensei Hollywood (a.k.a. Dan Marshall) formerly an instructor and chair of the Audio Production program at the Art Institute of Atlanta, is an accomplished musician, producer, engineer who's performed on and engineered multi--platinum records with Big Boi, Outkast, Killer Mike, Chamillionaire, Carlos Santana, Mary J. Blige, Snoop Dogg, Ron Isley, Lil Wayne, Trillville, Monica, and more...
Sensei (01:24)
Okay, what's good? It's levels to this. I am Sensei. I've got my partner Fatboi and our special guest, Tami LaTrell ⁓ songwriter, ⁓ publisher, music publisher, business consultant for music industry. Thank you for being here, Tami.
Tami LaTrell (01:40)
Thank you so much for having me. I'm so excited about doing this with y'all.
Sensei (01:44)
No, we're...
Fatboi (01:45)
Damn,
man, I forgot the sound effects again. I was supposed to go, but.
Sensei (01:50)
Oh,
well, we'll put them in the post. Tami, we were just saying, it's been a minute since we've talked and it was going back to like the Monica sessions for Red.
Tami LaTrell (02:02)
Yeah, that was a minute. That was a while back. It's been a minute. But I still been following y'all and seeing everything y'all have going on, catching a few of the interviews and, you know, y'all been just doing it. The best podcast out there, I'm telling you.
Fatboi (02:15)
Hey!
Sensei (02:16)
Hey,
flatterer gets you everywhere.
Tami LaTrell (02:18)
That's the truth.
Fatboi (02:18)
everywhere you
know absolutely
Tami LaTrell (02:20)
⁓
Sensei (02:23)
So let's start there. We're working on that Monica record. You're doing some songwriting. How'd you get into the songwriting? Hold up. Okay, you got something better.
Fatboi (02:30)
No, no, no, no, no, no. Hold on, hold on, hold on.
No, no. Where are you going? Because I don't even know if you know this, right? Okay, nah, it ain't even drama. This is just, I'm about to give you a window into Tami's greatness, right? Okay, we were working on that record. ⁓
Sensei (02:42)
The drama.
Tami LaTrell (02:45)
Nah, in no trauma, no.
⁓ thank
Sensei (02:52)
Okay, ⁓
okay, here we go.
Fatboi (02:59)
And Tami was the one that brought the whole thing to my attention. So the whole idea came from Tami, right? So ⁓ I started working on the track. There were no changes in the track or nothing. It was just straight bass line track.
Sensei (03:06)
Okay.
Tami LaTrell (03:07)
Yeah.
And it was for a soundtrack or something, right?
Fatboi (03:19)
Yes,
yes. ⁓
Tami LaTrell (03:23)
think it was like the best man holiday. Okay, the best man holiday. Okay.
Fatboi (03:23)
best man holiday soundtrack, best man
holiday soundtrack, which everybody over there loved it. We'll get into that down the line. But there was nothing, nothing. was just raw track, basic chords to the track.
Tami LaTrell (03:32)
Yeah. Yeah.
Fatboi (03:42)
Tami, when Tami got the track, and this is probably like the first day of recording, you hadn't even made it to the studio yet. It was just, I think just me and her in the studio with Cory, Cory or Dee, whoever started tracking. But Tami wrote the changes into the song without the changes being in the music. She helped me out.
Tami LaTrell (03:50)
Mm-mm. ⁓
Sensei (03:56)
Okay.
Mmm.
Fatboi (04:13)
Like I said, I knew it was going to be a pattern, a long path for us working on that record, because it was a big record. And I knew where I wanted it to go. The changes were going to be there and all that, but I didn't have the changes worked out in my head yet. Tami wrote them changes in the record, the B sections. Tami wrote that into the record, but she wrote it on the skeleton track where the changes wasn't there yet.
Tami LaTrell (04:23)
Mm-hmm. ⁓
Yeah.
Sensei (04:35)
Okay.
Yeah.
Tami LaTrell (04:42)
Yeah, there were no changes. It was just a kick and a bass. That's it. Kick, bass, near. Yeah.
Sensei (04:46)
Mm.
Fatboi (04:47)
simple ass skeleton track.
And Tami did that. And then after that, the rest of it was like easy peasy because once she did that, it's like, shit, I know how to finish the rest of this whole record. That's the genius of Miss Tami Luttrell. Before we get started, now I'll let you pick up where you left off, cause I don't know if you knew that.
Sensei (04:52)
So, 10.
Mmm.
Tami LaTrell (05:08)
Thank you, good boy.
Thank you. Stop.
Sensei (05:15)
I don't think I did, because I kind of came in later in the game and just threw a guitar solo on it or something and made a little plinky plinky chords. But yeah, I think the skeleton was already fleshing out by the time I showed up.
Fatboi (05:27)
When you started coming in, I think we had already worked out the changes and all that. But Tami, man, when I'm looking at her do that, she started cutting because ⁓ she wanted to lay a cut skeleton. So she started cutting. And when she did that, she got to the B section and the average person, that's going to be clashing to them.
Tami LaTrell (05:39)
So I think, yeah, yeah.
Fatboi (05:54)
It didn't bother her or nothing. She wrote that change into the record and I'm just watching her like, that's amazing. Like the average person wouldn't be able to hear that without clashing with the skeleton music not changing. Man, she did that, man. That's some hard shit to do, So I gotta give her her flowers for that, man. mean, watching that was...
Tami LaTrell (06:02)
No.
Sensei (06:13)
Thanks.
No, for real.
Tami LaTrell (06:20)
Thank you.
Sensei (06:22)
So, Tim, is that
Tami LaTrell (06:23)
Thank you.
Sensei (06:24)
typical when you're doing a collaboration? Like you're bringing things to the table or do some producers push back about getting a lot of input or what's your experience with that?
Tami LaTrell (06:34)
⁓ Typically, well I'll just say this foundationally, I worked from scratch when I first started songwriting like professionally, right? ⁓ So working with...
E-Poppy, Aero E-Poppy McCalla out in Houston. He produced Dangerously in Love and he produced for Truth Hurts and Missy. ⁓ I can honestly say working with him from scratch, foundationally, when I was working to get a pub deal with Big John, I hadn't even got signed yet. But I just was finally, I finally felt like I was ⁓ collaborating with someone who understood what was going on in my head. You know, so he would literally just had a boom.
whatever. And then I just started doing my thing where the ideas would come and then he'd be like, oh, stay right there, right there, right there. And then he'll play something. So it'll be, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, you know, and then I just do something else. And I just, we learned how to kind of layer on top of each other to where, you know, he would add an instrument. I would add another vocal or another melody or something like that. Um, and then it got to the point where, that's just like freestyling, right? You're just right there standing next to each other.
and just trying to remember what you've done and say, oh, know, that's not like a verse or this sound like a pre hook or whatever. But then it got to the point to where we would just lay it down right there and there. So where I'm in the booth while he's creating the beat, you know? And so that was foundation for me. You know what I'm saying? And I was I think I was 18 at that time. I was I was really, really young. And that was to me the beginning. And then another thing.
Sensei (08:05)
Mmm.
Fatboi (08:08)
you
Tami LaTrell (08:17)
Feb, you know this, the turnaround time with EMI was no joke. didn't have MP3s. We didn't have MP3s. So if you get a call from your publisher in LA, and we're in Texas, okay? And they say that they need a record for whoever.
Fatboi (08:23)
Mm-hmm. no joke at all.
Sensei (08:26)
What are we talking about here? What kind of turnaround time we got?
Fatboi (08:33)
Yeah. Yeah.
Tami LaTrell (08:40)
and they need it within 24 hours. We were trying to beat the 24 hour deadline. We wanted to turn it around in like three to four hours. You know what I'm And then FedEx comes and picks up at six or 7 p.m. from the house. You see what I'm saying? So we're trying to go ahead and lay the melodies and ideas down before FedEx gets there because there's a schedule. They know to come every day at a certain time so they can get the CD, send it straight to LA. That was before MP3s.
Fatboi (08:45)
Yeah.
turn it around. Yep.
Sensei (09:07)
We
were talking with... Yeah. The biggest hit he ever had, he had like mailed the CD to the guy. These kids today don't know how good they got it.
Fatboi (09:08)
We just did an episode with Monte, same thing.
Tami LaTrell (09:11)
Yeah!
Yes. Yes. Yes. I mean, they
Fatboi (09:17)
Yeah, yeah.
Tami LaTrell (09:21)
have
Fatboi (09:21)
To Mike Karen at Atlantic. He had to mail it to Mike. Yeah. These kids, they don't know.
Tami LaTrell (09:21)
no idea. See? See? Yeah. You know, and at that time, they have no idea. That was the only way we could get it to our people. There were no sending files through, you know, MP3s and zip files and zip drives and we transfers. We didn't have none of that. It was like, cut the record, ⁓ do a look, light mix on it, export it.
and mail it out.
Fatboi (09:46)
send it out.
Remember this? When it did, when Gmail and MP3 started becoming the way to deliver records, there was a whole thing with records getting leaked. People was hacking accounts and all that, getting into stuff, stealing records and all that. Everybody went like, how did the record get out? Like we had to literally put a lid on this because, know, it was so new because everything had
Tami LaTrell (10:00)
Wow, that's it.
It was crazy the leap
Fatboi (10:15)
before that had been sent physical copies of the record and all that. To now, okay, we can just email it, email it. Everybody got a Gmail account. Man, records were getting leaked left and right, everywhere.
Tami LaTrell (10:19)
ready.
the left and right. Yeah, yeah. So
Sensei (10:27)
Hmm.
Tami LaTrell (10:29)
then it became where the publishing companies started creating like a little portal where, you know, you got to log in and then upload the track to that and then log back out and confirm with them that, you know, you actually uploaded. It was, it was a lot. But, but yeah, so those are the, those are the, those are the days that I come from. So where I can literally just hear the drum portion of the track.
Fatboi (10:47)
Ahem.
Tami LaTrell (10:54)
and then everything starts just turning in my head from, I can hear the notes, and the concept sometimes is not even there yet. Even if I'm writing about something, like whatever the topic is that's come in top of mind, it doesn't mean that I have a full concept yet, but I'm just kind of flowing with it, just filling it out. And so that was the same thing with Anchor. I heard what he was doing and I knew the type of record. They did give us context on what they wanted it to be about, right?
Fatboi (11:21)
Yep, yep. They did. I think
they said they want a I believe I can fly. I think that was the reference. Yeah.
Tami LaTrell (11:27)
Yep. They wanted to, believe I can fly. So I knew that my
concept had to be big. It couldn't just be, you know, I love you, you love me. This had to be about like something that could sound gospel even. You know, the lyrics were that inspirational to where it could be about love, but it could also be about friendship. It could also be about togetherness and you know, and so that was, yeah.
Fatboi (11:53)
You turned it into that.
You turned it into that because in the beginning, you know, everything that you're talking about is absolutely, you know, that was the direction we knew what we wanted to do. But I didn't have any intent on putting a choir in the record yet.
Tami LaTrell (12:10)
Wow,
now that took it to a whole nother level. I'm telling you, when I came back and heard that, I was like, ⁓ my God, y'all did that. Y'all did that. That bad boy.
Fatboi (12:12)
you
Yo, and the choir is
four black men. That's the choir. ⁓ The choir is me, Atazio, Mike White, and one more guy. And P. Sprite, you know, the piano player, he was conducting us as a choir. So we did each part, each harmony.
Tami LaTrell (12:23)
Wow. And it sound like a full ensemble.
Yeah.
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
Fatboi (12:46)
Four times. So each harmony was four times, but them high notes, listening to it, you would think it's all, you know, it's a combination of men and women. But that was four men doing that. couldn't, you know, you were busy that day, you know, cause it was spur of the moment. Like it's all for you. Like everything that you did, especially when the Tazio started coming, I was like, man, this record turning into a pop.
Tami LaTrell (12:47)
Wow.
Mayday.
⁓ man, it was amazing. It was beautifully done.
Yeah, it would.
Fatboi (13:15)
Gospel record
Tami LaTrell (13:16)
Yeah, yeah, okay. It got real big overnight.
Fatboi (13:19)
It got, it got real
big, you know, and, and, and I was, I remember being disappointed because they loved the record for the soundtrack. They absolutely loved it, but Usher didn't cut it.
Tami LaTrell (13:31)
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
Fatboi (13:40)
Usher and Dan, in case you didn't know that, that's what happened.
Tami LaTrell (13:44)
The song
was originally for him.
Sensei (13:47)
We're gonna do
a whole special on these missed connections in the music industry. I got a few I could go on about, but yeah.
Fatboi (13:49)
Look, and,
Tami LaTrell (13:54)
They called us asking for it. They the ;abel called us and asked for it So it's like we're just okay y'all want a song for us sure it needs to be big like I believe I can fly Okay, cool. We on
Fatboi (13:54)
This? Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes.
Sensei (13:56)
Right.
Fatboi (14:04)
And this
caveat right here, nobody knows this first time we're discussing this about the record. It's the only song in the movie that would, was not a holiday record. Every other record in that movie was a holiday record. This was the song that was going to play. mean, they gave us the whole layout. This was the song that was going to play at her funeral at the end of the movie. It was the only.
Tami LaTrell (14:29)
I think I'm moving.
Sensei (14:29)
Yeah.
Fatboi (14:33)
song that wasn't a Christmas record. That's what this, that's, well, and that's how it went. And because Usher didn't cut the record, I don't know what Usher was dealing with at the time or what he was thinking about how he should do the record or whatever. And Chris Brown was, at the time, was probably a little too young to pull it off. ⁓ And crazy thing,
Tami LaTrell (14:34)
I got chills. ⁓ I got chills. Man, that was a...
Sensei (14:38)
Spoiler
alert! ⁓
Tami LaTrell (14:59)
Yeah, yeah, it was really frustrating.
Fatboi (15:02)
Monica is on art. She was on RCA at the time, but the record she did, she already did a holiday record for it. So Monica, did another record for Monica ⁓ for, who was it? It was, ⁓ man, I can't remember, but that's how it led up into the, you know, I played the record for her and her manager and they were like, we gotta have it.
Tami LaTrell (15:06)
All
Right, right.
Fatboi (15:32)
like boom okay so you know the record didn't go in vain but that's the journey of that record man that that record was like that because it was for best man holiday and tammy was the driving force to that record sounding how it sounded
Tami LaTrell (15:33)
So.
That's the point.
Yeah.
Sensei (15:44)
Hey, Tami, you were... I'm sorry, go ahead.
Tami LaTrell (15:52)
Thank you, thank you so much.
Fatboi (15:54)
Yeah, I mean,
it was you. Once you put that change in it, it was over. It was over.
Tami LaTrell (15:58)
It was awesome.
Yeah, and I heard it.
I heard it just like that. I heard it just like that. I mean, you think about I Believe I Can Fly, you know where the B section comes in. So I'm like, OK, I know after I do this verse, it needs to change and go somewhere. So, you know, just being inspired by, know, by the, by I Believe I Can Fly and countless other, you know, amazing ballads, right, that have come out that preceded us. But it definitely, it definitely was a part of the inspiration, you know,
Fatboi (16:07)
yep
Mm-hmm.
Tami LaTrell (16:31)
with with right anchor.
Sensei (16:33)
So Tami, when you're writing, you know, we're talking about like, this track was pretty sparse when you got involved with the anchor. But is that better for you? Like when there's not already a big direction with it, you like it kind of open to your input or how do feel about that?
Tami LaTrell (16:50)
think I've been trained
that way. think I've actually been trained as a, I mean, you you get to a place where you start mastering writing really quickly when you're able to turn things around and you give people exactly what it is that they're looking for. And I think I had actually mastered that a lot. Because you think about all the clients that you have that were major and independent, you know, you got people coming at you left and right telling you, hey, so I got this idea. I'm trying to do something like this, but I can't.
Fatboi (17:19)
Yeah.
Tami LaTrell (17:19)
take
away from that and I needed to sound a little bit like this. So you kind of like pulling pieces from those elements and the magic of it all is that you cannot make it sound plagiarized or it still has to be original. It still has to be authentic. And we all, know, people can say what they want, but we all get inspired by something. You know what I'm You all get inspired by something. So in my mind, I think I've just been trained that way to, you know, to pull.
Sensei (17:30)
Although, I think I'm... Internet connection is messing up here.
Fatboi (17:40)
Something, yeah.
Tami LaTrell (17:49)
you know, elements from different things, but still keep an original flair to where it's my work, you know, or our work, whoever I'm collaborating with.
Fatboi (17:58)
You know, that's funny that you say that. Cause I just found out a little nugget. Are y'all familiar with the song, ⁓ let it whip by the Daz band. That's whip it right. I, I was today years old when I found out the inspiration from that record for that record came from Gilligan's Island.
Tami LaTrell (18:07)
Yeah.
What?
my god, that does sound like that. They just changed the key.
Fatboi (18:29)
So they
changed the keys a little bit. the exact reason what you just said, like, okay, how can we make this sound like it sounds without it being plagiarized, but make it its own thing? And I just saw it pop up. think Pete Rock posted it on his page. Just popped up the other day that that was the inspiration behind Let It Whip. Now you can hear it, right?
Tami LaTrell (18:41)
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
can see that. I can totally hear it.
Yes, I can totally hear it. It reminds me of Stevie Wonder's... I can't remember the words. Okay, so that was the inspiration behind...
Fatboi (19:12)
yeah.
We jammin' and jammin' till the break of dawn. Yep.
Tami LaTrell (19:24)
⁓ So Twinkie actually said that that she got inspired by the Stevie Wonder record and was it Master Jammer? think I may have Yes, Master Jam. Yeah, so
Fatboi (19:36)
Yeah, yeah, Master Jam. Yeah. You
jammin' it? Yeah, Master Blaster or Master Jams. Yeah, yeah.
Tami LaTrell (19:42)
Yeah, massive blast off. But
if you listen to how they both come on and you listen to, you know, how the chords were and how, it was just, you could tell it was inspired by, but I didn't, I didn't hear that at first until she actually talked about it, you know? ⁓ And I was like, wow, you know, they made a gospel version that ended up being a classic as well. You know what I'm saying? Just by being inspired, you know, from an R &B soul jam.
You know, so y'all get inspired, you know.
Fatboi (20:12)
Yeah. You know, ⁓ yeah,
everybody. Inspiration is a big part of what we do. know, so speaking of inspiration, like who were some of your ⁓ inspirations growing up? Who did you look up to? Who were you inspired by to get into music and become a creator, singer, songwriter?
Tami LaTrell (20:21)
Yeah.
So I had a mama who got up on Saturday mornings with cleaning up and the Lysol and the Pine Sol and the Fabulo, well we had Fabulo Sol back then, but you know what I'm saying? Saturday mornings it was clean up time. We also did our hair on Saturday mornings. And so I would hear, I grew up listening to Anita Baker, SOS Band, Earth, and Fire, ⁓ Yolanda Adams. ⁓ Man, that Through the Thorn album was, whew!
Fatboi (20:41)
There it is.
There it is.
That's it.
Mm. Mm.
Mm-hmm.
Mm-hmm.
Tami LaTrell (21:06)
Mama Yolanda, Auntie. So I grew up listening to all of the soul R &B, know, from Zap to Daz Band to the Ohio Players to ⁓ like I was saying, Earth, & Fire, The Whispers. That's all my childhood.
Fatboi (21:08)
Mm-hmm.
Sensei (21:22)
Mmm.
Fatboi (21:28)
⁓
R.I.P. Scotty.
Tami LaTrell (21:32)
R.I.P. Scotty.
was jamming him last two weeks ago in the kitchen cooking. I'm like, aw man, R.I.P. Scotty, man.
Fatboi (21:35)
Yeah. Hey,
Sensei (21:39)
you
Fatboi (21:39)
and whenever, whenever some of these icons pass away, it's like a piece of your childhood just died.
Tami LaTrell (21:48)
I'm telling you. it's like, it's nothing only you, cause you know where you were at that time when you were listening to that music, whether you were at a cookout, whether it was a family reunion or you was in the kitchen cleaning up or, you know, in your house cleaning your room. It's just something that with every song, there is a memory of what you were doing. You know what saying? When you first learned about or heard the song. So I remember when I first heard Computer Love, I was like, what is this? What's it? ⁓
Fatboi (21:49)
It was.
Yeah, absolutely.
Absolutely.
Me too.
Tami LaTrell (22:18)
What sound is this? What am I listening to right now? So that's what I grew up off of. Anita Baker, Phyllis Hyman, ⁓ Evelyn Champagne King. ⁓
Fatboi (22:21)
Me too.
Hey look,
all you doing is naming all my Saturday mornings.
Tami LaTrell (22:40)
I mean, and then, you know, being at my grandmother's house, it would be the Supremes, the Temptations, the Four Tops, you know, cause that was her generation. So I was inspired, you know, everywhere we went, it was music. And then my dad loves Stevie Wonder. So, my God, we were here, Stevie so much, you know, whether we were at his house or in a truck with him in the van, he was always playing Stevie and the commission. He played commission a lot as well on the gospel side.
Fatboi (22:41)
Yeah
There you go. There you go. Yep. Yep. Yep.
Tami LaTrell (23:10)
So I just, you know, I literally grew up just being musically inspired. My father plays the bass guitar. My mom was a singer in high school and she was also a major-ed performer. So, ⁓ you know, I was just around a lot of music. You know, we had an organ in the house. You know, it was that deep. Between the ages of, from the time I can remember, all the way up until probably about five. And then...
Fatboi (23:39)
Mm-hmm.
Tami LaTrell (23:40)
once my mom and dad separated, then that's when it was really mainly about the inspiration that I would experience with her. And then, let me say about...
middle school time, that's when Mary J came out. And it was like, oh, from there, it was like, oh my God, I wanna be like that. Of course, oh, and how could I forget Whitney? Whitney, yes, from my childhood, Whitney. Whitney was like the icon. Whitney was like, oh my God, I'm looking at Whitney, the Jackson 5, Michael Jackson. Michael was in his prime at that time, you know what saying? I think he was getting out of a...
Fatboi (24:02)
Yeah.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Tami LaTrell (24:24)
Like the Billie Jean and thriller era going into like really, really like mainstream, you know, mainstream. Bad, yeah, that was like that was like in the elementary going into middle school.
Fatboi (24:28)
Yeah, ⁓ bad. Yeah.
those Saturday mornings for a certain demographic of creators in an era, those Saturday mornings were important. they, Luther, like come on man. Like those Saturday mornings, my adolescent, that.
Tami LaTrell (24:46)
Yeah, Luther. I just thought about Luther. ⁓ man.
Fatboi (24:58)
That's what I remember most about. And just like you said about, you know, ⁓ when you go out to grandma and granddaddy house, a whole different era of music, know, grandma, you know, my grandmother, she got ⁓ saved again. So, you know, with all that came to James Cleveland. ⁓ It was James Cleveland. was, who else was it?
Tami LaTrell (25:21)
Yes.
Fatboi (25:28)
Andre Crouch and you know.
Tami LaTrell (25:29)
Untrained
Crowds, James Cleveland, Mississippi Mass Choir. Everybody had the Mississippi Mass Choir. It was just so much of that, like, you know, going to grandmother's house, you know, that's what we were here. You know, she would change it up, especially during the holidays. You know, she loved holiday music as well. So we got the best of Motown and the best of gospel, you know.
Fatboi (25:35)
Mississippi Mass, everybody had Mississippi Mass choir.
Thank
Yup, the holiday. Best
of Motown, That Jackson 5 Christmas album. That was every Christmas, my dad's mom, that album was being played. And that's probably how I became such ⁓ a Jackson 5 and Michael Jackson fan. Because you you're playing all this stuff that came out before I was born and stuff like that, but it still resonated. You know what saying?
Tami LaTrell (26:01)
Mm-hmm, all of it.
Mm-hmm.
Yeah.
Fatboi (26:23)
listening
to Michael sing Little Drummer Boy and I saw Mommy kissing Santa Claus and stuff like that. It's like, man, this stuff is just so good.
Tami LaTrell (26:28)
⁓ And then as
their careers progressed and Michael became this mega pop star, then I found myself like, you know, being so enamored with just his showbiz, like the elements of performance and how he was just magical on the stage and just, I had never seen fandom like that before.
Fatboi (26:50)
Yeah. Yes. Yes.
Yeah,
Tami LaTrell (26:58)
know,
Fatboi (26:59)
I don't think we'll ever see it again.
Tami LaTrell (27:01)
yeah, and then Prince emerged from the shadows. It was like, who is this guy? And I had to kind of sneak and listen to him. Cause you know, it was a little bit more controversial, you know, but then I just became, I started to get an affinity for Prince more to the point to where, know, now Prince is on my wall right now. Like I have paintings of him. He is a part of my inspiration with even my company, you know.
Fatboi (27:04)
you
Yeah, he's more controversial. Yeah, yeah.
Thank
Tami LaTrell (27:26)
⁓ because he was just such an advocate for independent creatives and being able to own your rights and have ownership. Same as Michael too, but Prince talked about it more and he protested. Yeah, he protested ⁓ vocally to where everybody was just like, dang, he tripping. He didn't change his name. He got the little face ⁓ marking on his face. ⁓
Fatboi (27:34)
Yeah, yeah. He was more vocal about it.
you
Yep.
⁓
Tami LaTrell (27:51)
So I remember those days where he was
kind of like me and you know he was so edgy and rebellious and that's that is I have a bit of you know that that rebellious nature it is just part of a part of being a creator I believe you know all yeah.
Fatboi (28:04)
Yeah, it
is. Music itself ⁓ is from a rebellion, even with the slaves, you all those hymns, it's rebellion. You know, it's cold, it's cold wording inside them hymns and stuff like that, you know, but it's, you know, uprising and rebellion against the powers that be, know, revolution, stuff like that. yeah, absolutely. When was the moment that
Tami LaTrell (28:13)
Yeah. Yeah.
Follow whatever you do. That's the relationship.
Exactly. ⁓
Fatboi (28:33)
you knew this was what you wanted to do. It's like, yeah, okay. This is it. This what I wanna do. I wanna be involved with music.
Tami LaTrell (28:43)
Hmm You know, I would say I was about 14 maybe 13 I would have to look at the dates and I was at a family reunion and This was like the beginning of bad boy Okay, this is the beginning of bad boy. And even though I had grew up watching Like Whitney on video soul, you know, I was watching all of the black acts, you know Come up and perform and stuff on video soul sitting with Donnie Simpson and talking about their career stardom
I actually grabbed the mic during a talent show segment at our family reunion. And I think I was like 13 or 14. Nobody knew the song, but it was a song I had been listening to every day since it came out. It was Faith Evans song, I Remember. You Used to Love. And I, now what would I know about whatever she was talking about? I didn't know nothing about what she was talking about. But I'm sitting up there, you don't appreciate my-
Fatboi (29:25)
you
Mmm. Mmm.
Tami LaTrell (29:40)
You know? And I'm standing in front of all of my family members singing this song like I was Faith Evans. You know what I'm saying? And I just, I felt like that part of actually grabbing the mic and singing and performing and doing a little dance with it, I felt like that was my moment where I was like, I really want to do this. You know? I had to have been 13 or 14 because
Fatboi (29:41)
Yep.
Thank
Tami LaTrell (30:11)
like that was really in the early bad boy era. That was like the 90s, know? and it was so new, but it was so fresh. We had Mary J, but know, Faith was right behind her too. And so she just brought a little bit more soulful, sultry, gospel-y type sound to her singing. And it was just like, man, and she's singing R &B, you know? So I think that was when I...
Fatboi (30:14)
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
Yep.
Mm-hmm.
Mm-hmm.
Mm-hmm.
Tami LaTrell (30:39)
when I kind of realized that I wanted to pursue music, you know, and sing in front of people and be a performer, not necessarily a songwriter. I hadn't even realized that God had given me the gift of writing until, you know, later on down the line, probably about 17, 18, well probably about 16 when I was in a girl group. And that's the thing too. Once I had sung that song, once I had sung, You Used to Love Me at a Family Reunion,
Fatboi (30:48)
Yeah.
Tami LaTrell (31:07)
It was like after that, it was like, I'm gonna be in a girl group. You know, so this was before our legendary Destiny's Child came out. You know, they probably were somewhere working, you know, and performing in groups as well. Cause they were really, yeah, they were all young. They had a group called Girls Time and things like that. But I just was like, I'm gonna be in a girl group. And so I ended up being in a girl group at 15. It was called BKS, Best Kept Secret.
Fatboi (31:22)
Developing, uh-huh.
Mm-hmm.
What was the name of the group?
⁓ that's a good name.
Tami LaTrell (31:38)
And ⁓
Sensei (31:39)
Yeah.
Tami LaTrell (31:39)
it was a cute name. And so it was me, was Brooke Valentine ⁓ and this other girl named Devin. And we got put together. Matter of fact, that family reunion that I was singing at was when the producer who put us together, he saw me perform that song. And so it was like, man, you know, he's like a relative of my relative. So he was a distant cousin, you know? And so... ⁓
Fatboi (31:57)
Ha ha ha ha.
Okay. Yeah, yeah.
Sensei (32:07)
You never know when that's going to connect.
Tami LaTrell (32:07)
He
was... Right, right. So like a couple of weeks after that, I think he had reached out to my aunt or my... Somebody got in touch with my mom and they were like, hey, you know, ⁓ he got a girl group he's trying to put together. He saw you singing, you know, would you like to join? So it was around all of that time. And so I got in the group. ⁓
Yeah, so I was younger than that. Yeah, I'm just thinking about it. was just so much. I can barely even keep up. yeah, by the time it all matriculated, I ended up being in a girl group with them. I was the last to join the group, but I bought so many elements. That's when I knew I was like, I'm a songwriter too, because I was able to songwrite and collaborate with him as the producer.
Fatboi (32:58)
Hmm.
Tami LaTrell (32:59)
and I would literally get picked up from school. I'm in my freshman or sophomore year in high school by this time. So yeah, it had been some time that I'm thinking about it had been some time and I'm being picked up and going straight to the studio and working until my curfew, you know, and my mom knew I was at, you know, she knew where I was. wasn't like, you know, cutting up, doing nothing crazy, but ⁓ that began the journey of like, okay, I'm able to write a full song. They already had the track.
Fatboi (33:14)
Mm.
Yeah, yeah.
Tami LaTrell (33:30)
and I was just kind of putting my lyrics in there. I wouldn't say that I was like, you know, writing a full song, but I definitely was able to, and I've always been like that in school. I was always writing papers and, you know, creative writing and things like that that they teach you in elementary and middle school. So by the time I got to high school, was, I was pretty good with it, you know?
Fatboi (33:43)
Mm-hmm.
Sensei (33:49)
So what about the Girl Group experience made you shift gears into the writing and publishing side of the business, you think?
Fatboi (33:49)
Yeah.
Tami LaTrell (33:57)
⁓ man, so much. I just think girl groups, you know, first of all, when you're not the one that's starting from the beginning and you know, you really just kind of put in, you end up being judged because you're like the last one to join the group. You know what I'm saying? And if somebody's showing favoritism to you or whatever, could cause unnecessary conflicts between the girls. You got some people trying to pit you against each other when it ain't even like that.
Fatboi (34:13)
Yeah. Yeah.
especially when it comes to girls. The caddy, the cat fights.
Tami LaTrell (34:26)
Oh man. you know, we were just, yeah.
And we were, were so, yeah, guys too. But we were so, we were so innocent. And so each of us were naturally talented and beautiful and, you know, young and just really want, wanted to be successful. A portion of that we were taking advantage of, you know what I'm saying? I can honestly say that now that I look back on it, you know, as far as just
Sensei (34:31)
Dudes too.
Tami LaTrell (34:55)
you know, used for whatever type of image this guy was trying to have instead of really trying to cultivate and develop us as artists, you know, it was more so about whatever his agenda was. ⁓ And so, you know.
Fatboi (35:04)
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. You're right.
Sensei (35:11)
So it's like you're getting cast
for a role as opposed to writing the script.
Tami LaTrell (35:15)
Right, right. But in action, you know, just to be fair, because I am an adult now and I know how the music business goes, there was a lot of investment going on too. So they invested in making sure we had our outfits, we had choreographer, we had a manager, we had dance rehearsal, we had we had workout sessions, we had a diet at 14, 15 years old by that time. You know what I'm saying? It was serious and we were in the studio recording the album. I think we did an album in like
We did a full 12 song album in like six weeks or something like that. Never been in the studio. We had never worked with each other. I literally was, like I said, the last one to join and my numbers could be wrong, but we completed a full album in like a very short amount of time. And then BET, they had a record label called Fully Loaded at the time. So we ended up going on some like independent tour. We were working to get a big record deal and all that stuff. So.
Fatboi (35:47)
wow.
Sensei (35:47)
Moving.
Tami LaTrell (36:10)
Those are the things that I was doing at 14, 15 years old. And like I said, I didn't even know that the gift of songwriting would, you you kind of like be the catalyst. Well, I would say this is the catalyst that really got me to songwriting, you know? Yeah.
Fatboi (36:27)
Yeah, that's dope and interesting story. because in them days, we didn't have the aid of, well, just from the equipment standpoint, you know what saying? know, flip it, you know, to me on the production side, laptops and making beats on comp- that didn't-
Tami LaTrell (36:47)
Nah, y'all had them big
DAT tapes. It happened to like, who was running them tapes back?
Fatboi (36:51)
didn't exist, man, and everything cost
like $3,000. So when you 12, 13, 14, where you gonna get $3,000 from to get this piece of equipment that you want?
Tami LaTrell (36:58)
it was so sick.
Mm-mm. Right.
So at that time, I didn't even know just being in a girl group how expensive it was for all the sessions that we had to attend and things like that. I mean, I made the best use of it because I've always been a hard worker, know, very focused, determined, self-motivated, ambitious. You know, that's a part of just having a lineage of entrepreneurs in my family. ⁓ But it really was...
Fatboi (37:16)
Ahem. Ahem.
Tami LaTrell (37:30)
it was a part of like the whole girl group concept was like, man, I don't really know what I'm doing, but I know this is what I want to do and we're going to stick it out and we're going to, I'm going to do whatever I got to do as far as like showing up and being present and learning the dance routines and stuff. And I may not know everything, but I know that I was able to contribute to writing. I know I can sing and I know for sure that I can perform. So I was like, Hey, whatever happens after that, you know.
We should be on our way, but you know, it is what it is. then ⁓ to piggyback on what you were saying and to bring it back to your original question, ⁓ I think that our girl group could have been successful if not for all of the personal things that were kind of getting in between that, like I was saying, pitting us against each other and, you know, just having other motives. You know, we were really a
good unit together. Everybody did their part. It wasn't a competition. We really were friends. When we were around each other, we respected each other and things like that. But we were just young and just kind of let the industry stuff, it affected us. And I was the first to leave. I was like, I'm out. This is not what I signed up for. So I'm that type of person. If I see something is kind of about to derail me into
Sensei (38:39)
Mm.
Fatboi (38:43)
Yep.
Yeah.
Tami LaTrell (38:56)
an area that's just not what I signed up for. Like I will gracefully tap out. I'm cool.
Sensei (39:02)
You know, I guess what I was getting at is like, ⁓ when did you get more interested in like the intellectual property side of the music business as opposed to the performing side?
That's a big one, but I'm just curious. That seems to the crux of the issue, right?
Tami LaTrell (39:24)
Yeah.
All right, so let me bring you up a little bit. I'm gonna speed you up. So after the girl group, I leave. I decide I want to be a solo artist. I don't know how, when, where, what, but I'm like, regardless, I know I can write. I was also rapping too, because I was like a little tomboy. yeah, so I was a girl with kind of like a Southern junior mafia group. We had this group in Houston called the Young Guns.
Fatboi (39:41)
⁓ shit, I didn't know that.
⁓
shit.
Tami LaTrell (39:52)
I know I'm not gangster, So that was the name and it was like five of us. It was me, Indo, Black, ⁓ Will, and it was somebody else. I can't remember his name, but we kind of had it and I was the only girl. So I was like the little Kim of the Junior Mafia. You know what saying? I'm the only Right. But I wasn't, I wasn't right. The Funky 4 Plus One More. There you go.
Fatboi (40:05)
So you was the only girl?
Yep, yep, ⁓ I was just gonna say that, Or the funky four plus one more.
Tami LaTrell (40:19)
I wasn't, I was still a tomboy so I was like cute with it but I wasn't salacious. I wasn't like explicit, right? So I was still a little hood, you know what saying? So just, you know, being from the South Side of Houston, Texas. ⁓ So that was that moment and then I decided, well, yeah, this is a little bit more street.
for my kind, you know what I'm saying? Certain things I just didn't, the environment just wasn't where I wanted to be, but I learned how to structure songs.
Fatboi (40:49)
Yeah, yeah.
Song structure came from that.
Tami LaTrell (40:56)
The structure came from that because now you got five people in the group that got to get on a song and there has to be a hook that I usually have to sing. Plus I got to have a verse and I need to leave a little bit more time. See these back in the days when the songs was about three minutes and 40 seconds, almost four, maybe four minutes, 420, you know what I'm saying? It was okay. It took me have a long song. It wasn't a problem to have a long song. As long as the song, you can follow it, right? It has proper structure.
Fatboi (40:58)
Okay.
Mmm.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah, it wasn't a problem. Yep, yep.
Tami LaTrell (41:25)
and it's jamming, you know what I'm saying? So we jamming, you know? And so, you know, that's where substance came from. Now I'm being challenged because I'm around rappers. So lyrically, you know what I'm saying? I have to like step my P.A. up, you know? So I was a part of that. And then when I left that situation,
Fatboi (41:28)
That's that key word right there, jamming.
Tami LaTrell (41:49)
I was like, okay, I'm a solo artist now. So now I gotta find somebody I'm assigned to. Now I gotta get in the studio. Now I gotta like try to put out my own stuff. at the time, one of the guys that was with Young Guns, he went solo and he was assigned to a label. And so because I had a great, you know, big brother, little sister relationship with him, I was just like, I'm just gonna go over there where he is, you know, cause they were already interested in signing me anyway. So I get over there. I'm in the studio working with the legendary Jerry Muhammad.
Fatboi (42:09)
Thank
Tami LaTrell (42:19)
⁓ Out in Houston, Texas. We completely have a vibe. I mean he is you know, very has a soulful influence He already was a conscious rapper. So he was really just a deep brother plus he was nation Islam so when it came down to like just Principle, you know what I'm saying? He taught me principle. He taught me a studio etiquette. He taught me ⁓
how to look at yourself as a deep creator and how to realize it's a gift from God. You know what saying? He taught me how to look at things from a intellectual level, even when you are approaching it creatively. You know what I'm saying? You know how NOI people, anybody that's with NOI, they gonna teach you things about health, your lifestyle. Like I just, love Nation Islam. You know what saying? And so it was like, ⁓ I felt adopted.
Fatboi (43:11)
Absolutely.
Tami LaTrell (43:16)
into that world of just learning about how to take care of myself mentally, how to eat right, how to really approach songs with substance, just really honing in on my topics. And then he was just such an incredible, he is an incredible musician. So I was even inspired by the stuff he had going on and just, he was really big on structure and ⁓ systems and how things should work. And even with how he played his piano.
Fatboi (43:44)
Yep.
Tami LaTrell (43:46)
and his instrumentation, he had all of it documented so that he knew that if I'm looking for a particular sound, he built his own directory on how to find those sounds. And you know, he was just really, really methodical. That's the best word I could say for him, really methodical. And then, so.
Fatboi (43:46)
.
Wow.
Yeah.
That's a nation of Islam trait. you know, that's, mm-hmm. Yep, discipline. Mm-hmm.
Tami LaTrell (44:07)
Yeah, very methodical, very disciplined, know, all those great traits, right? So
that's the part of my inspiration as well, you know, that was poured into me. And we ended up writing, I did a song called, Why Is It So Hard To Fall In Love? And then I did another song called What You Looking At? And then I had another song called, you know, I just had all these songs I was writing and I was like, man, I'm...
Fatboi (44:35)
you looking at.
Tami LaTrell (44:36)
I'm writing the album. So next thing you know, I got the record deal. I'm at the studio every day. It's right in third ward. You know what saying? ⁓ And I'm in Houston. Yeah, the about T.S.
Fatboi (44:49)
Third Ward is in Houston Dan.
Sensei (44:51)
Okay, yeah, I was
about to say I was like, I was looking blank stare there. Yeah, I'm from Atlanta, so you know, I don't know these things.
Tami LaTrell (44:54)
Yeah, my man. Third Ward is like, it's like, Beyonce
Fatboi (44:54)
the
Tami LaTrell (44:59)
is from Third Ward, but it's a real prominent side of Houston because the universities are there. So you have Texas University, you have University of Houston. It's closer to like, you know, downtown medical center, things like that. So it's just a real prominent area. A lot of black businesses and stuff over there as well. So, but yeah, so.
Fatboi (45:02)
Ahem.
Sensei (45:04)
Okay.
Tami LaTrell (45:17)
I'm like, man, this is gonna be great. I'm putting together a real album. Finally, it's gonna be my chance, my time. You know what I'm saying? And I didn't have background singers. I didn't have a girl group or some guys to kind of piggyback off. It was just all me and the producer. And I ended up leaving the situation. I had walked away from the entire deal because I just didn't like how I was being treated. And I also...
from a management level, from like the label level. I didn't like how I was being treated ⁓ and I was concerned about some illegal things that were going on at the studio. And so I was like, yeah, this is not gonna work. I'm gonna have to walk away from yet another situation. ⁓ But I copyrighted everything. I registered every last song.
Fatboi (46:10)
Thank
Tami LaTrell (46:14)
I had no idea that my freshman year, would be a year later after I terminated the deal, because I registered the copyrights first and then I told them, hey, I no longer want to be an artist on this label. Let me out the contract. Sure, no problem. They terminated my deal, signed off. They didn't know I had registered those copyrights. A year later, I'm a... Library of Congress, not Poor Man Copyright, Library of Congress, okay?
Fatboi (46:36)
Library of Congress registration.
Tami LaTrell (46:43)
A year later, I'm in my freshman dorm at Texas Southern University, literally right up the block from the studio where I was recording a year before. My mom calls me and says, where are you right now? I need you to sit down. And I'm like, what's going on? I'm thinking something happened and somebody passing our family. She said, put it on Magic 102. Whitney Houston is singing your is singing your song.
What you looking at?
So Whitney Houston, V, one and only, Whitney Houston was singing my song line by line, note by note, lyric by lyric. And it was the first single on her album, Just Whitney, that had just hit the airwaves. Now mind you, I'm like freaking out because I'm like, in the world.
Fatboi (47:35)
Whoa.
Tami LaTrell (47:38)
Did my song that was made over here in Third Ward, Texas, get into the hands of the icon, Whitney Houston? It was just like, was confused. I was mad. I was happy, excited. I just had just a rush of all kinds of emotions. I was just like, ⁓ my God, how could this happen? So you know, the first thing I did was I picked up the phone and called a producer, Jerry. Couldn't reach him. Called an A &R.
Fatboi (47:49)
Yes.
Yep, yep, all kind of emotions.
Tami LaTrell (48:08)
⁓ can't remember his name can't remember his name reached out to him phone wasn't working reached out to a few more people that knew the ceo nobody is picking up the phone so now yeah of course okay
Sensei (48:19)
What a coincidence.
Fatboi (48:21)
It's like everybody
coordinating say, look, if this number pop up on your phone, don't answer. Exactly. I know it did. It had to.
Tami LaTrell (48:28)
Don't answer, don't answer. That's exactly how I felt. So here I am. I'm like, I'm like, what
is going on? I'm, I'm 17 years old, you know, at this point. I'm like what? I'm just freaking out and my mom's like.
Fatboi (48:40)
⁓ yeah.
I was just
about to say you right there freaking out like it's yeah
Tami LaTrell (48:48)
Oh
man. And my mom was like, what you want to do? What should we do? And so I was just like, mom, this is crazy. How could something like this happen? I know this wasn't nothing but the CEO. So I'm just mad. I'm mad. I'm mad. I'm mad. So I started making some other phone calls and then I got a phone call from somebody that will forever remain nameless because he didn't have to call me. He called me. He's a friend of a friend of a friend in the clique.
Fatboi (49:04)
you
Mm-hmm.
Mm-hmm.
Tami LaTrell (49:18)
And he was like, look, I think you are a wonderful human being. I'm probably breaking all kinds of rules by telling you, but the producer couldn't tell you because he is still tied in with the label. You know what saying? And all of that. And I'm like, okay, so what happened? He was like, well, basically they took the song to Miami ⁓ and they were in the studio with Whitney and, you know, taking care of her.
and let her listen to some of the material that was being played, you know, that, she was looking for songs for her album at the time, her and Bobby were there. And so, you know, one thing led to another, she heard the song and because she's going through a real rough time right now with all the controversy, this was when she was, recently performed on stage with Michael and she was really thin. And then it was just, you know, a lot of information about, you know, some drug abuse and things like that.
Fatboi (50:05)
Mm-hmm.
Yeah.
Yeah, rumors
started flying and all that. ⁓
Tami LaTrell (50:16)
And rumors, yeah, yeah, of course, rumors,
At the end of the day, we love Whitney. We weren't, you know, nobody was questioning what was going on. We just knew that the media had kind of taken it to another level and making allegations and you you couldn't go anywhere. You couldn't go to the grocery store without seeing some type of story on her and how Bobby messed up her life. Exactly.
Fatboi (50:21)
Mm-hmm.
Yeah. What's wrong with Whitney? da da. Yeah. Mm-hmm.
Sensei (50:30)
Mm-hmm.
Fatboi (50:35)
What is Bobby do? was just about yeah, what is Bobby
doing to her and you?
Tami LaTrell (50:40)
Exactly.
was during that time. So just imagine that snapshot, that time period. when she listened to my lyrics of the song, because the song was called What You Looking At, and I had wrote the song about being in the club. I was in a teen club and these girls were like eyeing me and my man and just being haters and stuff. And I had wrote the song about that experience. She was able to resonate with the lyrics, you know, because it's like, see, I don't understand.
Sensei (50:44)
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Fatboi (50:55)
you
Tami LaTrell (51:09)
Why you keep peeping me when you don't even like me. You know, so I was like just, you know, writing what I felt and she was able to pick up on being a teenager. So she gravitated to it and was like, I want that song. So Whitney recorded the song line by line, lyric by lyric. ⁓ And she, you know, she put her tone on it. Cause you know, I have a real soft airy tone. She put that.
Fatboi (51:21)
Being a teenager. Yeah, being a teenager.
Mm-hmm.
Tami LaTrell (51:39)
that Whitney tone on it, real full and strong and assertive and dominant, you know what I'm saying? And then I think in the second verse, she changed up like a few lyrics and put her and Bobby's name in it or something like that. But for the most part, she literally kept the entire song. And so they got paid, the producers got paid $40,000, okay? And nobody mentioned Tami at all, okay? And so... ⁓
Fatboi (52:00)
Wow.
Sensei (52:06)
Hmm.
Tami LaTrell (52:07)
They just
thought that they were gonna write and walk away from the situation until they realized that I owned the copyright.
Fatboi (52:14)
Yeah, you owned
the entire record.
Tami LaTrell (52:18)
of the composition. Yes.
Sensei (52:20)
They were
thinking you were gonna get sloppy on the business.
Tami LaTrell (52:26)
Of course.
Fatboi (52:27)
what they didn't they didn't know she was up on business.
Tami LaTrell (52:30)
I had already been in a girl group. I had already been in a rap group. I had already been around that world of knowing how, and you hear that, we heard those countless stories of artists being taken advantage of, just like we still do today. It was still a story circulating around about people, like back in the day in the 70s and 80s having to sell off their catalog and maybe some of them lost their catalog due to drug use and things like that. So I was up on that.
Fatboi (52:36)
Yeah.
Mm-hmm.
Mm-hmm. Yep. Yep.
Tami LaTrell (52:57)
But then I have to give credit to my family. I have to give credit to my grandparents. They owned insurance agency, a real estate agency. ⁓ My mom worked in corporate America at Enron. ⁓ I had, in my family, I had my uncles, they had their own barbecue stand, you know what saying? In the city posted up one over here at the park, another one at the club. Like we were just around.
Fatboi (53:00)
Ahem.
Tami LaTrell (53:25)
paperwork and licenses and registrations and all those things in order to function in business. So when you see that and you're around that, I mean, I used to work at my papa's office during the summertime filing insurance claims and paperwork and stuff when I was like 14, 15 years old. when it came down to paperwork, I knew that I wasn't afraid of that. I wasn't afraid to like fill out some forms and send some stuff in. And so that was just a part of who I am. You know, like my aunt, she,
Fatboi (53:28)
Mm-hmm. Yeah.
Get it done.
Tami LaTrell (53:53)
She's in real estate. My grandmother did real estate. did my aunt, she even now to this day does foreclosures and stuff like that. you know, my whole family was about their business, you know, on both sides, you know, had something going on either way. And so I think that was a lot of inspiration. I didn't recognize it back then, but now that I'm older and I am now an entrepreneur, I'm like, ⁓ I see it. It was already like embedded within my bloodline.
to be independent, to have your own, to have ownership, you know?
Sensei (54:27)
Well, what lessons do you wish you could convey to artists that are maybe just starting out about that whole experience?
Tami LaTrell (54:39)
You know, education is so important. ⁓ This day and age, and I always say this, I feel like I'm repeating myself over and over again, but this day and age, you just cannot afford to just be focused on being a creative and not have any business insight or background into this area of the business of music. Because now with so many outlets of
Usage of where your songs are being used and licensed and played globally You're talking about hundreds of pots of This app over here that app over here this territory that territory This type of royalty that type of royalty, you know ⁓ You got your performance your mechanicals your streaming your digital mechanicals all of that type of stuff. You got your sound recording performance royalty
Fatboi (55:19)
Yeah.
Yeah.
Mm-hmm.
Tami LaTrell (55:37)
You have so many different buckets of revenue streams and so many different royalty sources now because everybody needs music on their apps, in their stores, wherever. And you got live shows. So you need to know how to track all that money. You need to understand where the money is coming from and you need to understand how to collect it. know, even if you can't collect it on your own, which is why my company is in business, you still need to have an idea.
Fatboi (55:48)
Yeah.
Ahem.
Tami LaTrell (56:04)
of what it is that you should be looking for on the publishing side as a composer like if you're writing and producing and or producing your own music and then as the performer if you're independently releasing your music you're now looked at as your own label of the the master you own your master and you're the performer of that master you see what saying so we got two different copyrights here that's working
And most of the independent creators that are out here are doing just that. They're releasing their own music as a record label independently, and they're performing those songs as the artists, and they're also writing their songs or producing and or producing their songs, which means that they should be taking advantage of both copyrights and they should be organized on both sides to be able to at least have baseline foundational structure of like, okay,
I'm not supposed to be getting paid for my distributor. I'm not supposed to be getting paid from sound exchange. I'm not supposed to be getting paid on the composition side for my publishing. You know, I have my societies that I'm registered with to make money on that side. And then I hire an administrator to get the money that I can't get on my own. You know I'm saying? That's just, that's just basic foundational. need to have it if you are trying to survive in this business, because although there are plenty of streams of income now compared to how it was back in the day when we were
you know, you know, physical CDs, you know, our music was being played on physical CDs and we were able to make money that way. Even though you have a lot of money out there now, a lot of royalties out there, the amount is smaller. So now you're cents on a dollar. Fractions of cents, right? Fractions of cents on a dollar.
Fatboi (57:33)
Mm-hmm.
Yeah.
Yeah. Fract fractions of a penny. Yeah. Yep.
Sensei (57:51)
or hundredths of cents.
Tami LaTrell (57:58)
compared to, okay, we know the album is 9.99 a pop, 12.99 a pop. Yeah, 14.99 a Something that you can hold, something that your fans can take home and listen to and become one with. It's their own, they own that. And so, and you got paid for that, right? For them to have the experience of listening to this full body of work. We don't have that anymore. And that means that the amount being paid to writers and producers and record labels is gonna be that much more.
Fatboi (58:02)
Right, exactly. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Something that you could, yeah, something you could grab, yeah.
Sensei (58:02)
was tangible, yeah. You can put it in your hand and hold it.
Fatboi (58:12)
Yep. Yep.
Tami LaTrell (58:28)
cheaper and watered down and that's where we are now is that you know everything has just been watered down the value of music has completely damn disintegrated it's plummeted you know what saying
Fatboi (58:30)
smaller.
Yeah, it's plummeted. Yeah, yeah, it's plummeted.
Sensei (58:40)
Do you think there's too many creators? There's a glut of creators or there's too many ways to get music out? What do you think is devaluing music, if anything?
Tami LaTrell (58:51)
⁓
I just think technology, although I love technology and I'm all for innovation, you know, it definitely was the main catalyst that destroyed ⁓ the value of music. And I just feel like anytime you open up the floodgates and give everybody access to something, you know, it's like, it just loses its value. It's just kind of like, I mean...
Fatboi (58:59)
It's definitely a main catalyst.
Tami LaTrell (59:23)
I'm trying to give an analogy. It's like, know, too much of anything is never good. If you got so many people all of a sudden waking up and saying that they want to become a rapper, you know, a singer, and they're just putting music out, they didn't have to learn about structure. They didn't have to learn about artist development. They didn't have to learn about, you know, any of the things that we were curated and developed to learn.
Fatboi (59:28)
Yeah.
Yeah, the words that you're talking about is supply and demand. Yeah, it's so much of a supply that the demand ain't, you know what mean? Because it's just there. Yeah, economics.
Tami LaTrell (59:55)
Yeah, yeah, the more the the price goes down. Music economics.
Sensei (1:00:03)
Well, so, so, so, so maybe, you know, people talk
about like gatekeepers in the negative sense and you know that there's something to that, right? You know, keeping people out of the industry or whatever, but maybe there's something to having been selected by someone who was curating, who was investing in artists or who had a vision, you know, as opposed to everyone just throwing spaghetti against the wall and seeing what sticks. Yeah.
Tami LaTrell (1:00:31)
Yeah.
Fatboi (1:00:32)
I
have a theory on that right there. Cause I've gotten into some online debates about gatekeepers and all that. And the way I look at that, okay, if you want to call it gatekeeping, music was better when there were so-called gatekeepers because the gatekeepers are only letting the good stuff in. And not only that,
Tami LaTrell (1:00:55)
in
Fatboi (1:00:58)
there was only one of those good things. There's only one Prince, there's only one Michael Jackson, there's only one Whitney, there's only one Luther, you know, and now we have 10,000 futures, 10,000 Migos. And the other thing, know, Tami made a great point about technology and technology became a catalyst for a lot of people that you wouldn't deem.
Tami LaTrell (1:01:06)
I mean, yes. Yes.
Fatboi (1:01:27)
on a level with other talents, but they're out there and the floodgates have been, ⁓ you know, flooded with that. And, you know, my take on a lot of that stuff is, know, cause people looking at radio, like radio is the devil. I'm like, radio is still king. Cause I come from the radio world. It pays the most, the most money I've ever made still comes from radio. And my take on that, it,
Tami LaTrell (1:01:37)
Mm-hmm.
And it's a part of your marketing strategy. It's
a part of the artist's marketing strategy, period. Yeah.
Fatboi (1:01:58)
It's a part of it.
Sensei (1:01:59)
Well,
and the role of the DJ to curate what they're gonna play on the air, right?
Fatboi (1:02:00)
my take, role of the DJ and my role on and me being a DJ, my thinking on that is a lot of people really want to shoot the way that it's going because when it really comes down to it, you ain't making music that's good enough to get on the radio. It's not good enough. The ones that are, they're getting on the radio.
Tami LaTrell (1:02:20)
you.
on a radio. Yeah.
Fatboi (1:02:27)
But the
ones that use this as, yeah, radios are dead. It's not dead. It's an old medium, but it ain't dead. And it pays just about almost $10 a play versus that's one spin versus fractions, points, exactly. So what are your thoughts on the disparity? The disparity.
Sensei (1:02:36)
Mature.
Tami LaTrell (1:02:46)
0.03 cents.
Fatboi (1:02:57)
of the difference between payouts on radio, ⁓ physical mechanicals versus everything in the digital realm and how it's not making sense to the artist.
Sensei (1:03:07)
streaming.
Tami LaTrell (1:03:10)
Yeah, I mean, now that I am working,
you know, fully from an, you know, from the executive role and I'm able to see the numbers every day from royalties that are coming in, you know, let's just put it out there, okay? We know that the master is comprised of about 75, 80 % of the song, of the royalties that are gonna come in. That other 20, 25 % that's allocated.
to publishing is very, very small. So since we're not making money off of CDs anymore, you could imagine how, just how much the price, the royalties have dropped in amount, right? And these days, a lot of the independents who are releasing,
Fatboi (1:03:46)
Ahem.
Tami LaTrell (1:04:06)
their own music are making more money on the distribution side. As long as they have some type of marketing, you know, they, they are working their record and things like that. They're able to get, you know, some consistent revenue coming in on the master side. Whereas the publishing tends to be a little bit slower because you're pulling, we're pulling in from all different territories who pay at different times. And the amounts that they pay out because of the pricing.
is a lot different, you know, compared to what performance royalties pay versus mechanicals and things like that. So on the publishing side, the pot is so much smaller and it has affected us and I'm saying legacy writer producers who come from a day in time where, we were getting $500,000 advances, you know what I'm saying? Where we were getting, you know,
Fatboi (1:04:52)
Thank
Tami LaTrell (1:04:59)
we would go to a studio and everything is laid out because the studio is fully stocked and they got several different assistants coming in and out catering to you as a songwriter and you never had to worry about paying for food. Matter of fact, when you pull up, you got money on the console just for you being here and producing. There was an ⁓ insurgence of revenue on a consistent basis back then.
Fatboi (1:05:02)
Mm-hmm. Yeah.
Yes.
Tami LaTrell (1:05:26)
because the money was better and the labels
Fatboi (1:05:26)
Yes. Yes.
Tami LaTrell (1:05:29)
all were flourishing. And so to me, publishing was just like that mailbox money. It's just like passive income. You know what I'm saying? And then of course, your points, of course songwriters didn't get, well, master points, but we still, you know, were able to, you know, benefit, you know, from songs sometimes with upfront fees and things like that in a book, you know, just for me to come and write at a studio. Like I would come in there, matter of
Fatboi (1:05:31)
Yes.
Yeah.
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
you
Tami LaTrell (1:05:56)
started coming to Atlanta, I didn't come for less than 2000, just to write. You know what I'm saying? For certain acts that were in and they knew about me and who I was and all that. I was, a whole session by four or five hours, I was walking out of there with money in hand, whether the song got placed or not, I ain't had nothing to do with it. For my time, right, so for my time, I'm 19, 20, 21 years old, you know, just flew in from college for the weekend.
Fatboi (1:05:59)
Right. Yep.
Yeah. And Tami didn't play. Tami didn't play. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
Tami LaTrell (1:06:23)
and I'm coming back home with a bag, you know what saying? That was pretty substantial for me because we were still in that timeframe of making money off of mechanicals and I had royalties coming in, you know? So I'm looking at checks every quarter that's 80 to a hundred thousand a quarter. You see what I'm saying? So, yeah. So you don't have that, the disparity is now since the streaming has slashed those
Fatboi (1:06:40)
The good old days. The good old days.
Tami LaTrell (1:06:52)
those royalty of, ⁓ you know, prices or amounts, then that means everybody suffered. That's why all the labels started collapsing and closing and studios started shutting down and starting to merge and things like that. And they don't have as much staff anymore. You're not getting no money when you come to the session. No matter how much of a legacy artist producer you are, we ain't got it. So you may get 60,000 for a track cause you a producer, but today you getting 5,000. You know what I'm saying? ⁓
Fatboi (1:07:08)
Yeah.
Yeah, yeah, it's not there.
Sensei (1:07:20)
you
Fatboi (1:07:20)
Yeah,
you and that's yes, that's that's pretty much my fee has dwindled from upwards of 30 to man.
Tami LaTrell (1:07:27)
Oh, I know, I know. 100%.
And I'm friends with a lot of y'all. Like my whole EMI, Sony, Sony ATV family, which is now Sony Music Publishing, my whole family of producers and friends, I mean, these are lifelong friendships that I have forever. So I've received the phone calls of like, man, T, like I gotta go get a job. I gotta go find something else to do because I'm not used to living like this. Like this really is affecting us and...
Fatboi (1:07:43)
Yes, absolutely.
Tami LaTrell (1:07:55)
Now it's such an influx of songwriters and producers now, like I'm not even getting the attention that I used to get. You know, those are the conversations that I would have with my other colleagues.
Fatboi (1:08:05)
Do you know when the first time I felt that was when we were working on Anchor?
Tami LaTrell (1:08:15)
Really?
Fatboi (1:08:16)
I had a time with RCA. RCA didn't pay us for that record. And at that time it was, ⁓ you know, whatever the allotted budget is for, recording budget is for an album, everybody got paid out of that. So, ⁓ okay, I'm on that album, also ⁓ so is Timbaland and Polo.
Tami LaTrell (1:08:18)
Wow.
Next.
Yeah.
Mm-hmm.
Fatboi (1:08:45)
They
ate up the majority of the budget. And then at that time, for any of these young artists out there, during the physical unit era, a label would only pay for 12 records. We were number 13 on that album.
Tami LaTrell (1:09:00)
Mm-hmm.
Number
13, the last song on the album.
Fatboi (1:09:05)
We were number 13, so that justified them not paying. Now, me as the producer, I'm pissed off because, hold on, my people gotta get paid. Like, I ain't even thinking about me. I'm thinking about all my contributors to this great piece of work right here. I gotta go back and tell all my people that, and I got sued.
Sensei (1:09:07)
Lucky 13.
Tami LaTrell (1:09:17)
Yeah.
Yeah.
What?
Fatboi (1:09:33)
RCA sued, Patchwork sued me because RCA didn't even pay for the recording budget.
Tami LaTrell (1:09:37)
recording
costs. ⁓ my god.
Fatboi (1:09:42)
So I ended up getting sued. I ended up having to pay out of pocket.
It was, it was, it totaled like 13 K and we settled that 10. I had to pay 10 K out of pocket because you know, y'all know, y'all remember what the Monica sessions was like? Yeah. Yes. We was in there like that. Not only that, all the stuff that the, the, the, the extra stuff that, Monica wanted to keep her comfortable. The heat I had to buy it. had to, I had to buy a kettle.
Tami LaTrell (1:09:59)
Oh yeah, that was a 10-12 hours.
Sensei (1:10:04)
for a minute yeah
Tami LaTrell (1:10:11)
Right, ⁓
Sensei (1:10:13)
I heard about
the heat.
Tami LaTrell (1:10:16)
Yeah, that was a big much. Yeah.
Fatboi (1:10:17)
I had to
buy a kettle. it was a lot of stuff that I paid for out of pocket for her to be comfortable. I'm thinking the label is going to reimburse me because this is your signed artist. You're supposed to do it. And Curtis, one of the co-owners of Patchwork, Curtis called me. He gave me a courtesy call to say, hey, man. ⁓
Tami LaTrell (1:10:23)
to accommodate her. Yeah. And when the label is supposed to reimburse and take us away. Right, because that's it should be. Yeah.
Okay.
Fatboi (1:10:45)
expect a certified letter coming to the house. And I was suing and when I went to answer that I was like, no, I'm not paying this. And I fought it for as long as I could. I fought it. I'm not paying this because this was a signed artist to this label. They are responsible for her recording costs.
Tami LaTrell (1:10:58)
Yeah.
And you know what pisses me off about it is that Monica is a legend. is, she deserves all her flowers. I'm so happy her and Brandi are getting ready to go on this tour. You know I'm saying? And just kind of really bring back, you know, just all of the goodness that we felt, you know, during the time they were like, at their peaks, right? Their biggest peaks in their career. I'm so proud of both of them. ⁓ But I just feel like...
Fatboi (1:11:14)
Alleged.
Yeah.
Yes. Yes.
And this ain't, they were treating Monica
bad at that time at RCA. Yeah. Yes. Yes. Yeah.
Tami LaTrell (1:11:39)
That's what I'm saying. That's what I was trying to get at. That's what pisses me off is that y'all had this girl
really out here on her own and were not looking out for her. No matter what, if this was her last album, so what? Like make the transition good because at the end of the day, she worked for y'all. She traveled. She sung, recorded. Y'all made so much money off of her. You know what I'm saying?
Fatboi (1:11:48)
Yes. Yes.
Yes, yes.
Tami LaTrell (1:12:07)
Like I said, we know how much the master is worth compared to the publishing. So even me giving her a percentage of publishing, I didn't even want to do that. Big John got in my ass for that. But the fact that I agreed to it to make it work, you know what saying? It was like, y'all got to look out for y'all artists and artists wrong. They did her so wrong. I'm
Fatboi (1:12:11)
Yes.
yeah
You gotta look out for your artists. And for
young people out there, labels will do things like this. There was new, fresh artistry on RCA at the time. ⁓ I can't think of her name. ⁓ You might remember her. She had the one song that Mustard produced and it was going crazy.
Tami LaTrell (1:12:59)
Tinashe? Was it her? Okay, yeah. Yeah, yeah.
Fatboi (1:12:59)
Tinashe, Tinashe. Tinashe
was the new it girl on RCA and they were trying to phase Monica out. what they were doing to Monica at RCA trickled down to all of us.
Tami LaTrell (1:13:09)
Monica, out. Out.
all of us and it affected the, but see that just goes to show you, that goes to show you just how much budget cuts can affect the whole bottom line. Because in all fairness, RCA like, well, hey, we ain't got the budget. We ain't got the money. We got a closed shop. This is the end of a project. You know, the project could have been exhausted because she did hire and had some heavy hitter producers on there as well. So, hey, it is what it is. We washed our hands with it. But at the same time, I just feel like, you know,
Fatboi (1:13:20)
Yeah.
the whole thing.
Yeah. Yeah.
Tami LaTrell (1:13:45)
It was just done poorly. And it's part of the reason why people just ain't rocking with labels no more because they just, they show that they are not, they don't care about the human experience. All they care about is the money. And at the end of the day, it is us as creatives, whether we sing, write, rap, perform, however.
Fatboi (1:13:47)
Yeah, it was.
Yeah. Yeah.
Bottom line.
Tami LaTrell (1:14:09)
produce, compose, whatever it is that we're doing. It is our human experience that you guys are profiting from once it is considered the master. You know what I'm saying? That's humanistic management, magic that had to happen, that had to be cultivated and produced to hand over to you to put out that you own. And this is how you take care of your artists. Really?
Fatboi (1:14:19)
Yeah. Yes.
Yes.
Tami LaTrell (1:14:38)
Really? You know, it's crazy.
Sensei (1:14:39)
Well, hey,
Fatboi (1:14:39)
Right.
Sensei (1:14:41)
hey.
Fatboi (1:14:43)
It's like giving your baby to somebody to babysit and they treat them like trash. This is our baby right here. Y'all gonna treat our baby like this? And jumping off on something that you said then, ⁓ Tami hit it from the composition master side of things, but.
Tami LaTrell (1:14:49)
Yeah. Yeah.
Yeah, yeah. ⁓
Fatboi (1:15:07)
from the creative side of things the value of music went down because the producers that came behind me and shawty red and drummer Zay Toven and all that They started just giving away tracks There's no value on the track No value on the track just free bands
Tami LaTrell (1:15:23)
⁓ my.
Sensei (1:15:26)
Well, we were talking about there
Tami LaTrell (1:15:27)
So.
Sensei (1:15:31)
was only two business strategy. We say this last time, like it's ⁓ I provide value at low or no cost or I'm behind a velvet rope. It really, really comes down to those two things. Some shades of that, right?
Tami LaTrell (1:15:41)
Yeah.
Fatboi (1:15:45)
And
we come from the velvet rope era because we learned it from other velvet ropers. Michael Jackson, Prince, Whitney Houston, James Brown. I mean, you go back to whenever. That velvet rope theory worked all the way back then. We got to these new times to where the velvet rope is just gone and you just blend in with everybody.
Tami LaTrell (1:15:50)
Yeah.
Mm-hmm.
I mean, y'all don't understand, like,
my producers at Mezzo, at my company, will tell you, I will get in their behinds if they come to me telling me they just trying to give the track away because they're that desperate to just get on a project. know, some things, I get it. You you haven't had a placement in a while or whatever, but at least let's negotiate something. Let's put something on you. You worth more than nothing.
Fatboi (1:16:23)
Mm-hmm.
Yes. Yes.
Tami LaTrell (1:16:36)
You know what I'm saying? It may not be exactly
Fatboi (1:16:37)
Yes.
Tami LaTrell (1:16:38)
what you always got or received before previously when I was negotiating on your behalf. But in this particular project, the budget may be smaller because maybe it's a hip hop label compared to a hip hop indie label compared to like a major label. The situations are different for every, it's so many labels out there now. The situations are different for every project. But let's not walk away feeling like
Fatboi (1:16:48)
Yeah.
Tami LaTrell (1:17:06)
They just got down on you. They really just got down and took advantage you. We not doing it. All of my writers and producers at Mezzo have value. they can go to every single last one of them because if that's the case, I wouldn't have signed them. I signed them based off the merit and the work that I know that they have put in, what they have out there that they unfortunately cannot collect on their own. And for me to collect it on their behalf, that's an honor to me.
Fatboi (1:17:08)
Yeah. Right. Yeah.
every single last one of them.
Tami LaTrell (1:17:35)
to know that I was able to find money that you couldn't get because you don't have the databases and these companies don't want to talk to music creators. And the work is antiquated and so confusing at times. And you got to have all these, you know, this data and the language and the, got to know how to talk the language and publishing to be able to really crack the codes. You know I'm saying? So, okay, cool. I can do that. God bless me with that gift. Let me go get it for you and let me show you.
Fatboi (1:17:42)
Mm-hmm.
Tami LaTrell (1:18:05)
how much value you have. And I cannot tell you the countless conversations, just literally one on this last payout. I signed this producer about five months ago and luckily his song splits were very easy to go ahead and put in and register. We didn't have a whole bunch of split issues and all that. So it made it easier for his payments to come in because I'm not fighting two and three different producers and songwriters trying to
Fatboi (1:18:08)
Absolutely.
Thank
Mm-hmm.
Tami LaTrell (1:18:35)
that they own this and that and we don't have no paperwork. In his case, everything was organized. His first check, he had to call me like, hey, did you just say this is right? And this has happened on multiple occasions with different writers and producers like that have been signed to me. They just like, I didn't even know I had this money out there. But now you know why I'm on you about saying, oh yeah, I mean, I do it for 250. No, hell.
Fatboi (1:18:45)
Is this right?
Tami LaTrell (1:19:04)
No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, Let's try to get as high as we can with what they have presented us and we can negotiate something. We can negotiate down. We're not gonna start already down. We don't have no more further to go.
Fatboi (1:19:10)
Negotiate down. Yeah, exactly.
Young people out there, the negotiation tactic that I've been using my entire career, there's a baseline number that I want. I know what my baseline is, but I start here and I negotiate down. A lot of times I settle on the number that, okay, that's my baseline number. That's what I wanted.
Tami LaTrell (1:19:21)
Come on.
Yeah.
Yes.
Right. You're gonna start there. Yeah. Yeah.
Fatboi (1:19:41)
But, ⁓ I'm starting here and negotiate down. And a lot,
and there's also been a lot of times when boom, I shot here and it's like, okay, you know, and, and.
Tami LaTrell (1:19:50)
Mm-hmm. And now,
now when you, when you have that mentality and you see that that formula works, now it's like, Tami, I want you to, yeah, I got another placement coming. Can you, can you, you know, hop on that? Yeah, we want you to win. We want our writers and producers to win. Everything starts with you. Like, I understand the power of what we possess because I am one. I am a creator first.
Fatboi (1:20:03)
negotiate this, get this, get this, get... Absolutely. Absolutely.
Tami LaTrell (1:20:20)
I'm not gonna let you slut yourself out of my language by just taking anything when it was your concept, your idea that came from here to here.
Fatboi (1:20:23)
you
Sensei (1:20:23)
you
Fatboi (1:20:30)
your intellectual property. So.
That's a good segue into the next question. So mezzo.
Tami LaTrell (1:20:41)
Yeah. Mud out. Meas out.
Fatboi (1:20:45)
So
⁓ you've already talked about a lot of stuff that I can now see visually that led to this, but tell the people how did it lead to this? Yeah, what brought on this?
Tami LaTrell (1:20:54)
Yes.
So.
Sensei (1:20:59)
Yeah, what was your inspiration for starting Mezzo Agency?
Tami LaTrell (1:21:03)
Yes, I started
Mezzo ⁓ in 2018. I ⁓ had been working in radio for nine years in corporate America. I worked for Radio One, Interactive One. And I did that to make sure I had some bills coming, I mean, some bills paid, you know what I'm saying? Because royalties had been dwindling since the streaming era had come in. I wasn't really getting as many placements, you know, as I was before a lot of publishing company changes, you know. ⁓
John had left, John had left and I was just so, I'm like, mean to tell me I'm in a publishing deal and I'm still unrecruited and you know, we don't have a, the MDR, we had the old MDRC deal. Thankfully, shout out to Sony. They let me out. I'm so grateful. Shout out to Big John. I just, I'm, I'm, my God, I cannot, my God, I cannot praise and thank him enough. Like, and I praise God for it.
Fatboi (1:21:34)
Big John had left, yep. It was like I was a man without a country at the time. It's just like, man, what's going on?
MDRC.
MDRC, yeah.
Tami LaTrell (1:22:03)
⁓ But what I'm saying is during those days, we did those old, old ancient deals. And so it took forever for us to recoup out of those deals. now my money has slowed up because streaming has hit and everybody's all over the place. There was no MLC. There was no music modernization act that's forcing these streaming companies to pay. So now no really songwriters and producers just not getting paid at all from on the streaming side. We're just in limbo waiting for money. That's why we had the big black box and all that stuff that was discovered later.
And so I'm like, y'all gotta get a job. I got a child now. Like I was married at the time, you know, I was like, I gotta like keep it moving. Like I'm about my bread. I'm not about to just be sitting around and lose everything. So I used my degree from Texas Southern cause I still graduated college ⁓ in journalism and PR with a specialty in advertising. And I took that degree and I started learning how to build websites and mobile apps and all that type of stuff. So I started working at radio one.
Fatboi (1:22:43)
you
Tami LaTrell (1:23:03)
And ⁓ they needed a digital website department, basically. They didn't have websites that promoted entertainment news and gossip. So between 2009 and 2017, I was working at Radio 1 and became the national producer. So I had other markets under me and I hired online editors, but I was working part-time still as a songwriter. And I was teaching.
and people were booking me for workshops on publishing and trying to learn the music. I had spoke at Berkeley. Remember I had a few workshops and stuff when I was touring all over the country speaking and I was kind of like, okay, well this might be my new thing. I'm just going to speak and educate people on the music business. Cause I got the experience. And so I could do that in between working this nine to five and you know, taking care of my family or whatever. So it wasn't until I received a phone call from guess who, fat boy.
Fatboi (1:23:36)
Yeah. Yeah, remember that.
Yeah.
Tami LaTrell (1:23:59)
Hiffey.
Fatboi (1:24:00)
⁓ man, for real.
Tami LaTrell (1:24:02)
Hefe was my first client. He's still my top for this day. Yes.
Fatboi (1:24:05)
Really? He
is talented, talented, talented young guy, Dan. I try to help him out as much as I can, man, with placements. He's gotten two placements with me. Yup.
Tami LaTrell (1:24:10)
in.
When he came to me, think he's gotten two placements.
And it started at the writers retreat that I did. Remember, was do-star. Yup, it's a mezzo retreat.
Fatboi (1:24:19)
It sure did. That's what I met him there. Tami asked me to come out and anytime she
calls, I'm there.
Sensei (1:24:25)
Right on, okay.
Tami LaTrell (1:24:27)
So Hefei reached out to me in 2018. He said that he had saw my videos on Instagram. I mean, I'm sorry, on YouTube, because I was doing all of my videos there before there was a content creator type thing going on. So I was uploading all my videos on split sheets and publishing and everything. And then ⁓ another company, I'm not giving them, you know, I'm not putting their name out there just because like for what.
Fatboi (1:24:39)
Mm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
Tami LaTrell (1:24:54)
but they had reached out to me and asked me to become an ambassador for their company. And they could actually find royalties that were unclaimed. And ⁓ they were like, you we saw your videos. We have saw you teaching the business and we have this great technology software that will allow us to find their royalties for all these independent creatives. And we will pay you for bringing them over.
Fatboi (1:25:07)
you
Tami LaTrell (1:25:24)
So they brought me in as a brand ambassador and Hefe was my first client that I brought in. I started putting all his information in, long story short, I started seeing that what they said they were doing, they were not doing. And within a year, cause when I did his report, it said that we found him $80,000 unclaimed that was owned by Hefe because he produced Queen Najah's
Fatboi (1:25:39)
Mm-hmm.
Sensei (1:25:39)
Hmm.
Fatboi (1:25:49)
Happy?
yeah yeah
Tami LaTrell (1:25:54)
⁓ Butterflies
and Karma and both of those singles went platinum.
And so there was $80,000 left unclaimed because he hadn't claimed anything, no digital streaming at all, nothing. He had only been getting money from BMI. And so, you know, she was popular, but she, she didn't have a lot of strong radio. She had more streaming numbers. So he, he just had money sitting out there. That record did, both of those records did really, really well. So I'm like, $80,000, we found him this money and it started coming in in little batches. And I'm like, something is off.
Fatboi (1:26:02)
Yeah.
Mm-hmm.
Mm-hmm.
Tami LaTrell (1:26:32)
So that's when I discovered that what they said they were doing, they were not all doing. I started kind of doing my calculations because I'm like, if we estimated that this money is out there, then what the hell is going on? It should be coming in on a more consistent basis quarterly.
A year later, I terminated my deal with them. I had already been given Mezzo as my name, so he was signed under my publishing entity. And I went ahead and took my investments. I purchased my software. I did everything I needed to do to move all of those clients that I had brought over to that other company under my wing. I established relationships with all the publishing entities, all the PROs worldwide.
all of the royalty partners and I did it myself and launched Mezzo. And so the name was already there. Like I said, I had already got my LLC. I had already been promoting it, promoting it, but we were signing them and using this company as a third party. But when I'm looking at the numbers, I'm like, something is off. I know publishing. If I don't know anything else, I've been signed to a major publishing deal since I was 18 years old. I got my deal with EMI when I was 18.
Sensei (1:27:24)
Mm.
Fatboi (1:27:36)
Thank
Sensei (1:27:39)
Hmm.
Fatboi (1:27:49)
Mm-hmm.
Tami LaTrell (1:27:49)
So
I know that the numbers are not gonna look like fiscal sales, but I know when something's wrong too. I'm able to kind of tell something's missing. And so that's exactly what I did. Immediately took all of my writers, all of my producers, bought the software, started learning on my own, hired my own team. And by 2021, cause we had a little bit of a transition period.
Fatboi (1:27:56)
Yep.
You can gauge it.
Sensei (1:27:59)
Hmm.
Tami LaTrell (1:28:14)
By 2021, we were fully operating on our own independent of that other company. And when I started doing all the calculations to this day, his song along with a lot of K-Camp songs are still the top streaming songs in our catalog. We have over like 7,500 songs in our catalog now and about 200 and over 250 clients now. know, but, but Hefe
Fatboi (1:28:20)
Mm-hmm.
Okay, growing.
Tami LaTrell (1:28:42)
Hefe's song is still in that top 10, both of them, both of those songs. So we got him his 80,000, okay? We got him what was estimated and made sure that he was compensated and went after everything. Cause I just wasn't dealing with that other company anymore. And I, like I said, it was, it was an experience for me that I had to learn and my intention was well, my intention was to help and serve others. But
Fatboi (1:28:44)
Mm-hmm.
That's crazy.
Tami LaTrell (1:29:10)
Again, we talked about technology. Technology will make companies lazy. And they will focus on the signups instead of focusing on the sound, the quality, the fact that these are creators who have families that need to make money off of their music. And that's what pissed me off about it. It's like, y'all are really missing the point. Y'all are not here to just collect these upfront fees.
Fatboi (1:29:17)
Yeah. Yeah.
Sensei (1:29:24)
you
Fatboi (1:29:34)
you
Tami LaTrell (1:29:40)
and sign these folks. Y'all are here to go get their money so they can take care of their families. I'm about service. Y'all are about signups.
Fatboi (1:29:45)
Yeah. Yeah.
So what other pockets are out there that is just a landfill of unclaimed money? Because me as a veteran producer, even myself, I'm still learning some of these new places. Like I literally just learned about the MLC like two, three months ago. Yes, I started, yes, I started going through looking at all my unclaimed.
Tami LaTrell (1:30:13)
What?
Sensei (1:30:17)
Educate us, Tami, we need help.
Fatboi (1:30:20)
Records, Tami, I got so many, like all my records, well, a good portion of my records, not, cause Sony, EMI, Sony did a great job of, my big ones for sure. ⁓ They're registered in the MLC, but it's a lot, I got a lot of like independent records that still did well, unclaimed like a.
Tami LaTrell (1:30:20)
⁓ my God.
Sensei (1:30:24)
Educate us.
Tami LaTrell (1:30:35)
Mm-hmm.
Right.
Right.
Fatboi (1:30:49)
You know what saying? So, what are
some of these other pockets that you can educate the audience to where they possibly have money just sitting waiting to be claimed?
Tami LaTrell (1:30:59)
Yeah, so let's talk about the MLC first. So the MLC is where all your digital streaming mechanicals are gonna come from. Every writer producer that was previously signed or is currently still in a major publishing deal, they need to hold their publishers accountable and make sure that every song that has ever come out that they've ever released, whether it's independent or major, is claimed by that publishing company. Because if your contract is still valid, they gonna want they money.
Okay, so unless you have another situation where you're going to have your own publishing entity and you're to hire an outside person to handle like myself to handle your catalog on a partial basis. If you have a full exclusive contract and your major publisher is not collecting a lot of your money, you need to hold them accountable because they still got you locked in that deal and all that money that's sitting there that has been unclaimed.
could actually be helping you get out of your deal. But it's unclaimed. So it's their job to go and register that, to claim it, to fight for you, meaning solving your disputes and conflicts. Man, if I was on Zoom right now, I could turn my screen over and show y'all just how many conflicts and ⁓ song conflicts and work disputes that we have to resolve on a consistent basis for our roster because...
You have so many people claiming more than they should. And if it wasn't for our company doing catalog audits on a consistent basis, our writers and producers wouldn't even know that they had songs on hold for six and seven, almost a year, ⁓ eight months to a year, because there was no one actively looking.
Those conflicts and actively seeing hey is this song registered? Okay, cool is registered. Is it actually generating money? Okay. No, it's not generate money. Why is it not generate money? Okay, let me look at the conflict who's claiming more than they should I have a team that works every single day to notify these other publishers major independent Hey, y'all are collecting more than y'all We claim 30 % on behalf of you know, whatever
or whatever the amount it is, it could be 2%, 3%, whatever, we have to go in and make those claims and we have to also resolve the conflicts until we have to continue to stay on it until it gets resolved. So yeah, we got songs in conflict right now, but we also have songs that are getting out of conflict every day too, you know, and that's the benefit of having a publishing admin. And unfortunately, a lot of these publishing companies don't hire admins to do that, but that's why I'm in business because
I have publishing companies who just want to focus on signing writers, giving them advances and helping them get placements and marketing them. And that's not a problem, but you still need somebody who was going to review the catalog, organize the catalog, solve those conflicts, do the audits and go collect the money. You see what I'm saying? And then, so that's MLC, right? And love MLC, shout out to Day and Chris and...
Fatboi (1:34:08)
Mm-hmm.
Mm-hmm.
Tami LaTrell (1:34:14)
All of them, I'm cool with all of them. I've spoken on panels with them. They are just a wonderful group of team. They have excellent customer service. Shout out to them. Now you got YouTube.
YouTube. Man, look.
Fatboi (1:34:25)
Well, how do you collect from YouTube? So
there's a YouTube collection thing?
Tami LaTrell (1:34:31)
What? Like I said, if I could show you, I can't show you, but.
Fatboi (1:34:35)
Cause a lot of, a lot of mine comes through, it comes through Sony, you know, I see YouTube and all that, but there's another, okay.
Tami LaTrell (1:34:42)
I collect directly from No, Mezzo
collects directly from YouTube. Mezzo, we have our own CMS on YouTube's platform. Okay. So I'll just say this. Shout out to K Camp, because he about to drop KISS6. K Camp has been with me since 2020. And upon me getting access and having my own CMS on YouTube's platform, shout out to my team, because they've been holding me down, giving me
Fatboi (1:34:49)
Okay.
Ahem.
Tami LaTrell (1:35:11)
a lot of information that just a lot of independent publishers don't have. I was able to see that one of the companies that he was signed to was collecting and has still been collecting after his deal had expired.
So it's not even about the fact that you're not getting paid from the company. It's the fact that the company has already relinquished your works, but they are still collecting because they don't think you have the access to see it.
Fatboi (1:35:30)
Ahem.
Collecting. Yeah.
Yeah. Yeah. What you don't know won't hurt. Yeah. ⁓
Tami LaTrell (1:35:47)
Won't hurt. So
now they look at me like, who is this mess-up agency up in here checking us, telling us about, we need an adjustment, please. We need an adjustment because this deal was terminated last year and he does not have any retention periods left. There's no space for y'all to keep saying that y'all are claiming up until it's already up. Pay up. We need a settlement.
Sensei (1:35:56)
Hmm.
Fatboi (1:36:03)
Ahem.
Yeah.
Sensei (1:36:11)
Hmm. So you're
Fatboi (1:36:13)
Man,
Sensei (1:36:14)
like a treasure hunter, basically.
Fatboi (1:36:16)
yeah, yeah, she's a treasure. She goes find that treasure.
Tami LaTrell (1:36:19)
I I like that. A treasure hunter. ⁓
Fatboi (1:36:21)
Because Tami, when
Sensei (1:36:22)
Well
Fatboi (1:36:23)
I tell you I had like 30 records unclaimed in the MLC, like 30, and I'm talking about some records that...
Sensei (1:36:34)
Well, see, this is the thing. This is the boring side of the business, isn't it?
Fatboi (1:36:36)
Death.
Tami LaTrell (1:36:39)
nobody
Fatboi (1:36:39)
Yeah.
Tami LaTrell (1:36:39)
wants
to do. This is the part that's not sexy. This is not sexy. This is not sexy business.
Fatboi (1:36:40)
Yeah.
Yes.
Everybody, everybody always focuses on the part where they know, okay, I know the money comes from over here, but they don't understand there's these other pockets that some of these other places, you know, like even with ⁓ our publisher, there's pockets that they don't collect in, you know, the sound exchange, you know, you got sound exchange pockets and all these other pockets. There's all these little micro pockets that collect.
Tami LaTrell (1:37:04)
Bye.
Sensei (1:37:11)
Well, they're
not trying to advertise that they know where the money is, right?
Fatboi (1:37:13)
So.
Well, well, a
Tami LaTrell (1:37:17)
Well, some of them
just don't know, and some of them don't Yeah, and then some of them don't know. the good thing about our company is that we're full service. So I'm collecting on both the master and the publishing side now. I can help you set up your SoundExchange account as long as you have your LODs from your production agreements. We can process those. We have a great partnership with SoundExchange. They move things quick along for us, and we can process your LODs and get you paid off of those sound recording royalties.
Fatboi (1:37:18)
lot of that money just goes unclaimed for years, for years.
Okay, look here, Tami, cause now, cause now we talking about some shit I got beef with for years because a lot of these artists will not sign that for them sound exchange because
Tami LaTrell (1:38:00)
Turn the LOG.
Some of them
have sound exchange accounts. How is your attorney? Okay, let me tell you.
Fatboi (1:38:08)
Okay, we getting this shit out to the world. Speak on this, Tami.
Sensei (1:38:10)
Yeah. I break it down
real basic. LLD. What's it stand for? LOD.
Tami LaTrell (1:38:15)
LOD. The LOD
Fatboi (1:38:15)
L-L-O-D.
Tami LaTrell (1:38:17)
is a letter of direction and it basically is a part of your production agreement packet. So, ⁓ let's say for instance, know, hey, ⁓ fat boy, you got a song placement that's about to drop. Fat gets his, he gets his attorney involved, the attorney from the label or the artist attorney, they get together and they start negotiating a production agreement. That production agreement needs to have four things. It needs to have the production fee. It needs to have the master point.
It needs to have the publishing share and the credits, and it also needs to have the sound exchange LOD, the letter of direction. That basically allows the sound exchange letter of direction, allows the producer under the AMP Act, which was passed years ago, to be able to get a percentage of the performers royalties on the master, just like they get points off the master.
Fatboi (1:38:53)
Yes.
Now a lot of these, because every record that I've done, especially when sound exchange started really becoming known, every placement that I've had with a major label, just like Tami explained, it's in there. The problem that you have is a lot of these artists won't sign the LOD. it's just, who knows how much money.
Tami LaTrell (1:39:27)
See soon there.
But but but.
Fatboi (1:39:40)
for a lot
of these producers are sitting in these pockets and the artists don't sign.
Tami LaTrell (1:39:42)
The responsibility,
the responsibility, I cannot say it falls completely on the actual artist because half of them don't even know about Sound Exchange. Whoever their manager is, and nobody's telling them, whoever their manager and their attorney is. Do you know how many LODs I got right now that we can't even process because the attorney did the LOD for their artist, but their artist doesn't even have a Sound Exchange account. So.
Fatboi (1:39:53)
Yeah. And nobody is telling them.
Right. That's crazy.
Tami LaTrell (1:40:10)
it's considered an unactionable LOD because you have to have an account to pull from to pay the producer. So, the attorneys, hey, I love y'all. We are partners. I work with a lot of different major big attorneys, you know, in the business, but y'all have to hold your clients accountable because it just looks like y'all are just doing a paperwork and not making sure that the whole process
Fatboi (1:40:17)
Yeah, right.
Tami LaTrell (1:40:40)
you know, it's seamless so that the parties can get paid and we have great relationships, everybody's getting paid, we walk away from the table, everybody all good. What happens is now the producer is pissed off at the artist and nobody told the artist that you need to have a sound exchange account, their management that you need to have a sound exchange account. But then they're like, well, who did the paperwork? The attorney.
Fatboi (1:40:56)
Yeah, because that damn show been getting pissed off.
Tami LaTrell (1:41:04)
So I even spoke, I even went back to Third Good Marshall, the law school on our campus at Texas Southern. I've also spoken at John Hopkins, I think, is that what it is? No, what's the school I hear? I can't remember the law school I hear. But I've spoken, John Marshall, I said John Hopkins. I've spoken at these schools because we have to help each other. I'm not talking down on these industries. I went to law school for two years.
Sensei (1:41:17)
John Marshall? Yeah.
Tami LaTrell (1:41:32)
But I didn't want to compete with the attorneys. I wanted to continue to work and collaborate with them because I don't feel like doing contracts all day and I don't want to be a litigator. But I understand contracts and I understand how and why they're important to have as an instrument to protect our intellectual rights. So I would rather collaborate with attorneys and say, hey, this is what my producer or my songwriter needs.
let's work together to make this a great contract, right? So we all walk away good. You're paid, my clients are paid, I'm paid, everybody's happy. So the attorneys don't really understand that side of the business and they're learning it. They're learning it. Not everybody ⁓ is ignorant to it, but there are some attorneys that have no clue that I'm over here feeling something out and my client don't even have this to pay them.
You see what saying? And so it falls back on the attorney because they're the one who did the actual legal documentation. So now you got clients who no longer retain that attorney anymore, yet the LOD still hasn't been processed. And so now I got to chase down, I had a situation with Dirk. I had to chase down his old attorney to get the new attorney's information, to get the production agreement so that we can finally get the LOD processed so my client can get paid.
Sensei (1:42:25)
Huh.
Tami LaTrell (1:42:54)
You see what I'm saying? But it takes knowing what the procedures and processes are. And so I'm just, I'm hoping that, you know, with me giving my little education every now and then, when I talk to an attorney, I don't want them to feel like I have an ego, cause I don't. Like call me. I would rather you call me and say, hey, look, I know this is your area. I'm in legal, but I don't really understand this.
What are the things that I need to have as an attorney before I start drawing all this up? I would rather them call me than for us to have another unpaid creator out there who cannot take care of their family. Simple and plain, just call me and I will educate you and your staff on what y'all need to have because I'm not expecting you to do admin, but we are expected to provide and our responsibility is to provide avenues and handle the paperwork for
our clients to get paid. That's why they pin you to make sure that this other client don't come back and sue him because you did the contract wrong. You get paid for that. So I just want us to be able to hold each other accountable. Just like when y'all sit, when the, the attorney sent me the contract with the publishing splits in it, what's my responsibility? Take the publishing splits out, make sure it's put in the queue for registration and make sure it get registered so that everybody can eat.
Sensei (1:43:56)
Hmm.
Fatboi (1:44:14)
Mm-hmm.
Mm-hmm.
Tami LaTrell (1:44:17)
and make sure that the LOD is processed so that my client can have, they can eat off their sound exchange. So those are the things that a lot of producers don't have in place. They don't have managers that are educated and then they don't have attorneys that are educated in that area. And I'm not saying all attorneys are like that because I know some pretty prominent ass, bomb ass, on top of the game attorneys who are just as efficient and know all the new
processes and procedures because SoundExchange changes their procedures a lot. And so, but those who don't know, it's imperative that when you're in this business and you're trying to keep a name for yourself, you need to stay on top of being educated with the changes that's happening and the other avenues and ways that our creators can get paid because they help us stay in business. We fail them when we set them up to fail. They will leave us and not come back and then we don't have no clients.
Sensei (1:45:14)
Hmm.
Tami LaTrell (1:45:16)
So that's why it's important. It was important for me not to compete with attorneys. I want to continue to work with attorneys to help them do a better job with their contracts. And then they send it over to admin and then admin registers everything. We collect the money, our clients are paid, their clients are taken care of and free from getting sued.
Fatboi (1:45:17)
.
Sensei (1:45:35)
You know what's
⁓ really interesting and ⁓ pretty awesome actually, Tami, is you seem to have a focus on everybody winning. You know, like that's not the case often in the music business.
Tami LaTrell (1:45:46)
for sure. This is the money I have been working
Fatboi (1:45:49)
Yeah, yeah.
Tami LaTrell (1:45:50)
with. Well, uh-huh, go ahead.
Fatboi (1:45:52)
Tami.
I need to have a conversation, because it's some money I need. I have unclaimed money with SAG, I believe. Yeah, so, and this is something, know, all of a sudden SAG, like a couple of years ago, sent out emails saying SAG is now reaching out to artists, you know, you know, unclaimed royalties you may have from
Sensei (1:46:03)
You
Tami LaTrell (1:46:09)
⁓ yeah. Okay.
Mm-hmm.
Fatboi (1:46:28)
your works that may have been in ⁓ movies, film, TV, know, so stuff like that. And I've tried to claim some of my, some stuff that I was on the list about, but ⁓ I wasn't listed as a composer on the songs because, know, and I've tried to explain to a lot of, to a lot of young producers out there,
Tami LaTrell (1:46:30)
movie.
Fatboi (1:46:56)
Okay, we may be the producer of the record, the producer oversees the entire thing, but individually we're composers. Like I'm playing keys on here, Dan playing guitar or whatever individually. These are made up of composers. And because some of my records that I produced, I'm not listed as a composer on the song.
Tami LaTrell (1:47:02)
Bye.
Mm-hmm.
Mm-hmm.
Fatboi (1:47:23)
Even though
I played everything, every instrument on the song, SAG is not able to release those royalties because I'm not registered as, I'm not listed as a composer. I'm the producer, but I'm not also the composer on these songs. So you find these pockets. We got to have a conversation about that, you know, so.
Tami LaTrell (1:47:39)
Okay. ⁓
Sensei (1:47:45)
Wait, so
you got lost treasure? You need to call Tami LaTrell, treasure hunter, the CEO of Mezzo Agency. Yes. ⁓
Fatboi (1:47:50)
Yeah, if you got lost treasure, call Tami.
Tami LaTrell (1:47:50)
No, no, no!
Call me.
Fatboi (1:47:57)
Tami will find those lost treasures.
Tami LaTrell (1:47:57)
Got a 100 number. You know, I was going to say one more thing. was going say one more thing. YouTube is that other treasure box. And I love the gang over there. They are hard at work building out their publishing division. They have been so helpful with us.
Sensei (1:48:00)
Tami. Yeah, go ahead. I'm sorry. Please.
Tami LaTrell (1:48:22)
being able to get access to royalties. And we even do just one off YouTube deals, like for people who just want us to collect specifically from YouTube. But man, when I tell you I'm so hurt right now, off of discovering the guy who runs my YouTube department, he and I were meeting last week and we were just looking at so many legacy clients that I've de-homed, reached out to, reached out to their attorneys, the emails bounced back.
I'm talking about some legacy artists. Remember the artists we were mentioning earlier in this interview? Some of them. They got so much money out there and it's not being claimed properly. And, ⁓ you know, I'm working diligently trying to help catch them up because a lot of them are still in the mindset of, I'ma just go do a show.
Sensei (1:48:55)
Yes.
some of them.
Tami LaTrell (1:49:21)
You know, I'ma just wait until my BMI or my ass cap. That is not the primary way people are consuming music anymore. They're on these streaming apps and they're on apps like YouTube. And YouTube is big enough now to where they can pay out directly. And it's hard to get in. But once you're in, you're locked in. Like I have a legacy artist right now. We haven't even made an announcement that we signed them yet. Somebody...
incredible like I haven't even made the announcement yet.
He's been with all kinds of major publishers and we discovered through our catalog audit that he had 524 songs that were unregistered.
Yeah, nine albums. Okay. You see what I'm saying? So if we don't as creators, if we don't hold these publishing companies that we're assigned to accountable, I like when my clients reach out and say, hey, Tami, I was checking my statements and I don't see such and such on there. You know, or.
Sensei (1:50:09)
Wow.
Tami LaTrell (1:50:31)
Can you tell me when did you guys register this? Because for whatever reason, it's still not generating money and I don't see it on my statements. We love those calls. Hold us accountable. Hold us accountable. You know I'm saying? And I think we need to do more of that. These independent artists who are signing with these admin companies outside of Mezzo, you need to know what to hold them accountable for. They need to be registering your songs and you need to know that you should have money coming in.
from the MLC, you should have money coming in from HFA, you should have money coming in from your PRO, which is BMIC, CSAC, or ASCAP. You need to make sure you got money coming in from YouTube. You need to make sure you got money coming in from all these other territories. You need to make sure you got money coming in for all your apps like Peloton and Meta, Instagram, TikTok, all of those apps pay money. And you need to know that if you have something that has blown up on TikTok, TikTok better be on your upstatement.
Fatboi (1:51:18)
Mm-hmm.
Tami LaTrell (1:51:26)
It's sure better, you know? ⁓ And so I'm just, I wish I could sign everybody. My formula works. I'm so confident in Mezzo. I have built this company from the ground up, from looking at a situation that I knew, that I thought was one way that ended up being something else. And I have perfected it. I have invested everything I have in this business. I have taken out my retirement for this business to make sure.
Sensei (1:51:34)
You
Tami LaTrell (1:51:54)
that we had the proper tools and the right staff to help us with helping other writers and producers. You know what saying? I have invested everything 100 % on by me, you know? But I really focus on hiring people who understand my passion and they are along for the ride and they feel just as passionate. I'm not expecting you to, you know, understand and know everything about admin, but just understand what we're doing. We're out here.
helping independent creators to identify unclaimed money so that they can continue to thrive in their careers without having to sign their life over and their rights over to a company who wouldn't care about them at all. You know what I'm saying? They just are looking at them as a number. And now, just to see artists like K. Kemp, just to see artists like Kim Burel, who's also signed, Travis Malloy, who's with us, ⁓ you know, just to see clients.
who have produced for, you know, Yagunas and Futures and, ⁓ you know, all of these countless major, major acts to be thriving because they know they have a company that's really actively handling their conflicts and disputes and making sure that they're getting paid on a quarterly basis on time. You know I'm saying? It means so much to me. It means so much to me because...
I just know what it's like to be the underdog when nobody really was checking for you and they was, you know, like, look at what happened to my copyright situation. Had I not had my paperwork registered, I wouldn't have been able to eat off of Whitney to this day. I administer my song, my Whitney Houston placement. I administer them those royalties now. Everything comes in to me. You know what I'm saying? And so, yeah, we just have to, we have to do things different and these independent creators, they have to hold the admins and their team accountable. And that's why I was saying,
Sensei (1:53:25)
Mmm.
Yes.
Fatboi (1:53:39)
Hmm.
Tami LaTrell (1:53:50)
You can't just be a creator anymore. You have to have some business sense about what it is that you should be collecting if you plan on surviving this industry.
Fatboi (1:53:54)
Mm-hmm.
Which is why I always tell up and coming artists and producers to go grab a copy of physical or digital of All You Need to Know about the Music Business by Donald S. Passman.
Tami LaTrell (1:54:20)
you down on past me, yeah.
Fatboi (1:54:22)
That's the first book I ever read before I got into the music business. So I already came into this business kind of knowing.
Tami LaTrell (1:54:28)
Man, ⁓
still buy books. still, I have to educate myself to this day. haven't put my, we just moved into our new home, but I haven't put all of my books up on the book stand. Some of them are still in boxes. But I mean, I have so many publishing books and eBooks and all kinds of stuff just to make sure I stay on top of stuff. And I even have somebody within my team that does that type of research so that we can know what's coming, what laws are being passed, things like that.
Fatboi (1:54:32)
Yes, to this day.
Tami LaTrell (1:54:58)
And then also being a part of the Recording Academy, I'm national trustee now, but before then I was just a member who just attended the advocacy committee meetings and the events. And I learned about all the different laws and I stayed on top of a lot of things that were going on to help us. And then, you know, got into the board and then became the vice president for two seasons. And, and now I'm here.
But that doesn't mean that my work stops from being educated and learning about the business and still studying. You want some longevity, you gotta stay on top of the things that are happening because we talked about technology already and it's moving fast. It's moving fast.
Sensei (1:55:41)
Yes.
Well, Tami, I really appreciate you coming through and I know your time is valuable and thank you for sharing so much with us. ⁓ It's a treasure trove of education from Tami Luttrell, the treasure hunter, ⁓ CEO of Mezzo Agency, multi-platinum songwriter.
Tami LaTrell (1:55:50)
Thank
Fatboi (1:55:52)
my, ⁓ man, yes, yes, yes. Because this is the part that
Tami LaTrell (1:55:59)
my god, really?
Fatboi (1:56:01)
matters the most right here, young creatives. That's why we had Tami on, so she can ⁓ give you guys insight to where your money is hiding at, because you know.
Tami LaTrell (1:56:04)
I'm you.
Sensei (1:56:17)
No one else, I mean, no one's gonna tell you. You have to go find it.
Fatboi (1:56:20)
No, no, you know,
because a lot of these new, a lot of these new, even, even like when Tami came into the game, when I came into the game, people were still kind of giving you game as you went. And now it's kind of like they're all finding out stuff on their own. It ain't, there's nobody finding out, you know, learning this stuff and they're doing it the hard way. So they're only, they're only thinking there's one way to get their money.
You know what saying? Okay, publishing, boom. The master, know, the master through streaming and all that, boom. But all these other little sub micro pockets where, you know, this right here is, ⁓ even the inside on the publishing side itself, ⁓ the young creatives out there need to know this stuff because, you know, it's a lot of them that...
aren't understanding where, you know, I get questions just from people not in the music business that they can see like, is like, so how do you get paid? You know, they, they asked me that, you know what I mean? So it's a, but it's funny because there's a lot of us in the business that are still on some, how do you get paid? ⁓ here's another thing, Tami. And I've, I've, I've brought this, ⁓ I've brought this up.
Sensei (1:57:40)
It's a moving target.
Fatboi (1:57:48)
to several people in our industry because me, like I said before, I am a DJ and thinking about that, I'm in all these clubs and I'm playing all these hit songs, songs that ain't even hits depending on what time of the night it is. And it's like, you know what? We should all be getting paid from this stuff too in the clubs, because these clubs are supposed to be registered.
They're supposed to be reporting the music that, you know, whenever I hear one of my songs get played at a Falcons game. I know I'm going to see that because they have to report all that stuff. it, it, you, you're going to hear it. You're going to hear it in the stadium, but it may also be heard on TV because they don't always cut away to commercials. So you hear those songs sometimes. So a lot of now, a lot of the high end clubs, like a lot of the clubs out in Vegas,
Tami LaTrell (1:58:28)
Right.
you
Fatboi (1:58:47)
Miami and stuff like that. They'll report because these clubs are so big and they're demographic. It's a whole nother type of demographic. But a lot of these hood clubs, they ain't reporting these records. They're not reporting the songs that's getting played. yet strip clubs, like this has to be mentioned.
Tami LaTrell (1:59:00)
Nope.
This is where the records get broken in the strip club. Y'all break records every day.
Fatboi (1:59:12)
Yes. Yes. And these records
aren't being reported and we're missing so much money.
Tami LaTrell (1:59:20)
They need to have, just like we have a food inspector, they need to have a music inspector. They need to have a music registration inspector. ⁓
Fatboi (1:59:28)
Well, you know,
they used to do that. there's two things that a club ⁓ needs. A club needs, well, three things. Needs to have a kitchen, needs to have their alcohol license, and needs to have a PRO affiliation. So for any record that you play, it's blanket licensed. So. ⁓
Tami LaTrell (1:59:31)
I know they didn't even need to bring it.
affiliate.
and blanket licensing and that should be required.
Fatboi (1:59:56)
It should be required. they would shut clubs down if they didn't have any of these things. But it's just gotten to the point now where the main thing is having the kitchen and the liquor license. They don't get the PRO affiliations. Yeah.
Tami LaTrell (2:00:10)
and the lip.
Another reason why music has been devalued, it just
goes to show music has been devalued yet again, even in that area where songs are actually, this is where people are listening and experiencing the songs for the first time a lot of times. You know what I'm saying?
Fatboi (2:00:31)
I'm bringing
this to you because I know you'll fight for it, Tami!
Sensei (2:00:34)
I send Tami after him.
Tami LaTrell (2:00:34)
I'm
Fatboi (2:00:36)
Tami, Tami gonna fight for this. Cause I've been bringing it up and everybody looking at me like I'm crazy. I'm like, nah, hey, this is money. I want all of it. If it's a nickel, I want my nickel.
Tami LaTrell (2:00:38)
⁓
Nah, that's real. That's how it used to be. used to be. To be quite honest,
Sensei (2:00:47)
Yeah
Tami LaTrell (2:00:50)
respectfully, I love ASCAP and BMI both, but that should be a part of what they should be doing because they're the ones that have to collect the payments. you know, I love them. Shout out to both sides. You know, I have accounts with both of them and, you know, we're registered as pub admins and publishers with them. So,
Fatboi (2:00:56)
Yes. Yes.
Yes.
Tami LaTrell (2:01:09)
You know, I really think the responsibility lies on them. I think that, ⁓ you know, we can continue to have events and promote the artists that are making money on that side, but we still have to retain our clients. And how do we retain our writers and producers? By making sure that we're showing up for them in other areas that are going to continue to get them paid. So, mean, hey.
Fatboi (2:01:33)
I'm trying to start some shit with this, Tami. I'm trying to start some shit with this.
Sensei (2:01:38)
It's on now.
Tami LaTrell (2:01:39)
⁓ Yeah, and it should even with
Fatboi (2:01:39)
I'm trying. That's why I'm glad you here. It's a section that nobody really thinks about. We don't think about it. We don't think about it.
Sensei (2:01:41)
Hey, no, for real.
Tami LaTrell (2:01:51)
the even with the business certifications that give these clubs their I think you have to go to the licensing board and you have to go through I think one of them is called MPU or something like that. I was just watching it online and I saw the process of what it takes to open up a restaurant, a club, a bar.
in Atlanta and there are board members that have to make sure that you have all of your certifications. And so that certification in itself also needs to be a part of it to be approved to make sure that they're registered with the PROs and that their blanket license fees are being paid and that someone in their office, backend of whatever of the restaurant, whoever is handling that business is sending in those registrations. I mean,
registering the songs that have been, or are reporting rather, the songs that are being played.
Fatboi (2:02:43)
As much as I've DJed, I have not once ever reported a song.
Tami LaTrell (2:02:48)
And then from a PRO standpoint, they should be holding these restaurants and these bars accountable because it's not just affecting the writers and producers, but it's affecting their bottom line as well because they eat off of the writers and producers' royalties.
Fatboi (2:02:53)
accountable. Yeah.
Waffle house
can't have a jukebox if they're not PRO affiliated. So we got to look at these clubs as the same way. Every waffle house you go in, there's a jukebox in it.
Tami LaTrell (2:03:07)
Exactly.
100 %
100%. Yep. think the, I think it starts with the licensing boards, whoever is approving these clubs to get, to get approved and have their certifications. They also need to make sure that they have the PRO registrations. And then I think the PROs on a local level need to be assigning inspectors out to make sure that these clubs are actually registered and notify them, Hey, you're in violation right now because you're playing all this music and we have, this is Atlanta. Okay.
Fatboi (2:03:45)
Yes.
Tami LaTrell (2:03:46)
This is
the music maker. So, exactly.
Fatboi (2:03:48)
You know how many club hits I've had? I
come from the club. it's like all these clubs and it's it's unclaimed money. Yeah.
Tami LaTrell (2:03:53)
Thank you.
So that's unclaimed money. That's money that was never paid out because
they've been just getting away with it because there's nobody holding them accountable. So, yeah.
Fatboi (2:04:05)
Nobody's holding them accountable. And,
and you know, you know, lot of, a lot of club owners, Hey, I'm coming for your club owners. don't give a fuck cause you owe us some money, but it's cutting corners. mean, cause you know what you got to pay for the liquor license. You got to have your kitchen up to par. If I can cut corners with this music part, which is the most important part of the club. Cause ain't nobody coming to your club. If it ain't no music.
Tami LaTrell (2:04:13)
Yeah.
Yeah, that's the end of that.
And guess what? The license is not even that expensive compared to what you're going to pay for your liquor license. Your liquor license. Man, come on. You can't even, it's not even a comparison. So it's like, hey, stop, stop with it. Like go ahead and just invest in it because it's the music that keeps your clubs packed. You know, they coming from entertainment.
Fatboi (2:04:35)
Facts exactly. Exactly. Exactly.
And if you,
exactly. And if you get these, if you start getting these blanket licenses, make sure your DJs report. Make sure they report every song they play. And I know Serato, Serato itself is a DJ software that will log every song that you play in your playlist. So, and after that, report it. You...
Tami LaTrell (2:04:59)
Yep.
But you still gotta report. Yeah. Report.
Fatboi (2:05:15)
So you don't physically have to write down every song. You have the playlist that what you played for the night, report it. Send it in. So artists, I need all y'all upset about this, because you missing money too. Some of y'all, a lot of y'all got them club bangers now. You know what saying? ⁓ Across the world, your song is playing in these clubs. You missing a lot of money. We missing a lot
Tami LaTrell (2:05:17)
What?
Yep.
Yep.
Sensei (2:05:39)
You're only getting paid in exposure bucks.
Tami LaTrell (2:05:42)
Right. And then.
Fatboi (2:05:43)
And that
don't feed me. Exactly.
Tami LaTrell (2:05:46)
The live shows too. If ⁓
the independent artists don't know, a lot of them don't know that you can register your set list with your PRO and give them the actual venues that you performed at. They will send the license request over to these venues to get you paid.
Fatboi (2:06:02)
Exactly.
I had to clear wasted for Lil Wayne to perform ⁓ during after an NFL game on Prime ⁓ because he turned in his set list and this is on a major streaming platform.
Tami LaTrell (2:06:10)
Mm-hmm.
to send them.
Yeah.
Fatboi (2:06:32)
So he had to turn that in. I actually had to clear it for him to be able to, whether he performed the song or not, I still had to clear it. know, so same thing, know, like these, you know, performances, all of that stuff, you know, all these places that you go, like it's so much money out there. Sink money, you know, it's so much money. Yeah, exactly. What you're doing. That's why you here. You here for this.
Tami LaTrell (2:06:35)
Yeah.
Yep.
And that's sink money right there. So yeah, yeah, I could go on and on. That in itself is a whole other life. Yes, that's a whole.
Sensei (2:06:56)
Yes.
Thanks, Agoy!
Fatboi (2:07:01)
right here. The education part of this, it's been missing. It's been missing. Like everybody's just kind of figuring things out on their own and they're still leaning up. They're still leaning on the main catalyst of getting paid, which is publishing master. You know, the master is a new thing with more artists owning their masters now. So they're on that, but man.
Tami LaTrell (2:07:03)
Yep.
you.
Fatboi (2:07:30)
It's still leaving out all these other pockets.
Tami LaTrell (2:07:33)
I mean, so many pockets, so many pockets. you know, we, we, all of us, especially, you know, podcasters and content creators, you know, we, we definitely just exactly what y'all are doing, are having people and experts on, your platform to get the word out. It has to, that has to be the focus, just as much as breaking the artist, you know what saying? And trying to...
Sensei (2:07:33)
No.
Hmm.
Tami LaTrell (2:08:01)
get people to
Sensei (2:08:02)
The follow through.
Tami LaTrell (2:08:03)
follow, yeah, because we have to look out for each other. And to your point, Sidney, say when it comes down to making sure everybody is taken care of, you know, I would just rather us all eat, you know what I'm saying? Then for somebody to feel slighted and you never work with that person again.
Sensei (2:08:29)
Well, it's all about relationships and it has to be sustainable, right?
Tami LaTrell (2:08:31)
The relationship,
they cannot be sustained. It messes up the entire music ecosystem when people do bad business and people do not look out for each other. Producers should look out for songwriters, making sure that they have all of their information submitted to get paid. Because if it wasn't for that songwriter putting that melody and those lyrics on your track, y'all wouldn't have the placement.
Songwriters need to look out for producers. If you know for sure you're in position with your producer, make sure that you provide them with everything they need, that, you know, your PRO information, all that, so that when they're submitting the information, they don't have no issues. Say, boy, you hit me up for Hefei stuff, you know? It's not necessarily my songs anymore, because I'm not writing like that, but you still hit me up just to make sure, hey, we got this new placement. Like, send me all the information.
That's me looking out for my writer and you looking out for him as well as a producer. But I'm also looking out for you so that you don't have to worry about unnecessary conflicts and disputes later on down the road because you didn't submit all the information. Everybody get paid. You didn't say it so it all works together. It's all a part of the ecosystem. And that first placement, because it was good, led to the second placement, which is good. So this is all a part of keeping everybody making money.
Fatboi (2:09:31)
Absolutely.
Yeah. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Yep.
Sensei (2:09:41)
Exactly.
Fatboi (2:09:51)
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
Yep. Yep.
Tami LaTrell (2:09:57)
And we
have to take it, we have to like take that serious and take up the responsibility. We plan on being in a non-regulated business. This is it, it's non-regulated. I mean, what we do is what's gonna sustain it. It's about what we do.
Fatboi (2:10:06)
Mm-hmm.
Right.
Absolutely.
Sensei (2:10:13)
Hey, Fat, you got, before we let her go, do you have a level up lightning round for her?
Fatboi (2:10:19)
man, you know what? I was so excited about having Tami on the show, I totally forgot about level up round.
Sensei (2:10:21)
Okay.
Okay, okay, Tami, Tami,
Tami LaTrell (2:10:27)
⁓
Sensei (2:10:28)
don't think, just react. Okay, I'll get it started, but you gotta kinda get a couple after this. all right. So this is just lightning round, yes or no, this or that kind of question. Just a little something we've been doing. Okay, so streaming or radio?
Tami LaTrell (2:10:34)
Okay.
Fatboi (2:10:40)
Thank
Tami LaTrell (2:10:47)
radio.
Sensei (2:10:50)
physical or intangible.
Tami LaTrell (2:10:52)
physical.
Sensei (2:10:54)
ASCAP or BMI? Yeah. All right. Well, let's just take a pass on that one. You don't want to get in middle of that. All right. That. ⁓ OK. I bet ⁓ go.
Tami LaTrell (2:11:04)
love them all, but I'm gonna have to go to ASCAP.
Fatboi (2:11:12)
Michael or Prince?
Tami LaTrell (2:11:14)
Great.
Fatboi (2:11:16)
Woo! Whitney or Shaka?
Tami LaTrell (2:11:20)
Winnie.
Sensei (2:11:23)
Alright, Sensei or Fatboi? Oh, hello! Ahhhh! It killed me. Alright, you finally got one. Tami LaTrell, CEO of Mezzo Agency, Platinum songwriter, Treasure Hunter, thank you so much for being with us today. On... On... Thank you for watching. I'm Sensei, this is my partner Fatboi, Tami LaTrell.
Tami LaTrell (2:11:26)
Come on now we didn't.
Fatboi (2:11:28)
got one! I got
one! I got one! I got one! I got one!
Tami LaTrell (2:11:39)
And we've been great.
Fatboi (2:11:43)
you
Tami LaTrell (2:11:44)
⁓ man.
Fatboi (2:11:46)
It's levels to this.
Tami LaTrell (2:11:52)
Thank you
Sensei (2:11:52)
Thank you so much.
Fatboi (2:11:54)
Absolutely.