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Here at Impact 89FM, our staff has the opportunity to interview a lot of bands, artists and other musicians. We're excited to be highlighting those conversations and exclusive live performances.
So just wanna give, like, a quick introduction to, like, who we are and everything, and then we can dive kind of Please. Deep into you. So, like like, as Mary Elizabeth said, thank you so much for coming in to interview with us. Like, genuinely, it is a pleasure. Sure.
Speaker 1:Hate it very much. We're already recording the session, so things are good in that sense. I am Sydney. I am one of the cohosts of the show that we have here at the Impact. Yes.
Speaker 2:You're also the music director.
Speaker 1:I am also the music director as well.
Speaker 2:Let's not just, like, turn you down.
Speaker 3:Like, give all the act all
Speaker 2:the things.
Speaker 1:Yes. Very much let us find it on your own. But, yeah, you can go ahead and
Speaker 3:Great.
Speaker 2:I'm Mary Elizabeth. I'm the digital media director, and then I'm also the cohost of Sound of Color. And then I cohost another show called Torch and Swang, which is just folk country and Americana. So Cool. Nice.
Speaker 2:Excited to Great. Connect with you.
Speaker 1:Yes. %. Okay. Awesome. Thank like I said, thank you for coming in.
Speaker 1:We just have, like, a few questions for you. Nothing too crazy, and it shouldn't take too too long too much time out of your out of your dicks. Because I know you're a busy person. That's cool. So I'll kick us off with the first question.
Speaker 1:So could you give us a little introduction to who you are, as Fimutomol, and just give us just like a little bit of a taste of maybe even one of your favorite projects that you've been that you have worked on or that you maybe currently are working on.
Speaker 3:Oh, cool. Well, my name is Femi Tomoho. I am a an artist, composer, and music producer. And I've been doing this now for quite quite a few number of years. I think I'm in my, like, where am I at?
Speaker 3:Definitely two decades.
Speaker 1:Okay.
Speaker 3:Let's say about twenty years now. Yeah. Just roughly about twenty years now, maybe just a bit under that as a as a professional musician. And yeah, I get to work on, like, a plethora of different types of projects, you know, like, as a as an artist, I tour, and I I write and and perform original music. But also as a composer, I write music for a bunch of different things.
Speaker 3:One of the main ones being, like, theater. I do I write a lot of music for theater as well. And as a producer, I, you know, I write and produce music for other artists. So it's it's it's really a mixed bag of of things. And and it's always difficult to choose what I prefer to do the most.
Speaker 3:I think for me, as long as I am being afforded the opportunity to present an original voice in all of these different areas, I think for me that's the kind of the most important thing. Wow. I feel like I'm not so interested in music projects that don't allow me to at least, at the bare minimum, have a voice, you know, something of of myself or some some original sentiment in there. So, yeah, I think that's that's really the thing. In terms of, like, stuff I'm excited about working on, I think it's it's any it's it's anything, but I've gotten to a point where I find it quite easy to say no to something if I feel like it's not gonna give me that space.
Speaker 3:So a lot of the times, I'm I feel really privileged partly because I know that I've worked really hard for it, but also I'm at a point where I can be like, actually, no, I don't I don't wanna do that because I don't see myself in that, you know. Yeah. So I'm quite excited about all the things that I'm currently doing. You know, I've just come from a rehearsal. It's day one of a new play that I'm writing music for
Speaker 1:That's exciting.
Speaker 3:In a city in England called Bristol
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 3:Which is not I live in London, but I've obviously traveled to Vienna. I'm up here like three, four days a week. And so and it's and it's very exciting because I just get to make original music whilst watching these incredible actors do their thing, you know, and try to underscore the story they're telling. And yesterday, I was playing at the the have you guys heard of the movie Sinners? It's the new Michael b Jordan movie.
Speaker 2:Yes. I didn't know that was the name of it. I saw a trailer.
Speaker 3:Yeah. It's it's it's it it it premiered here in The UK last night, yesterday. I was playing I I was playing in a band that played at the premiere. Oh, wow. Because there's a lot of music in the film.
Speaker 3:Yeah. And I think the the the producers wanted to they wanted the audience at the premiere to get a sense of that live, like some of the and a lot of it is like it's it's basically about a blues musician. The film is about a blues musician.
Speaker 1:Okay.
Speaker 3:And a lot of the music we were playing was like, yeah, you will love it. You will love it. It's amazing. Like, the film is great but the music is like, wow, you know. It's like really, really good.
Speaker 1:It's always fun to hear when there's a good soundtrack to a good movie as well.
Speaker 3:Yeah, right. Exactly. So, you know, so yesterday I was doing that, so it's kinda like, you know, very different things, but I loved it more. So Yeah. It's beautiful.
Speaker 1:Oh, that's some awesome stuff. Like, genuinely, I didn't even know did you have a background in in theater or, like, in, you know, things
Speaker 2:like that?
Speaker 3:Not not specifically. No. Theater, I got into theater twenty nineteen.
Speaker 1:Okay.
Speaker 3:Just kind of I mean, at the time, it seemed like random and by accident. But, you know, with these things, I think nothing ever really is random or by accident. It's kind of it was what it needed to be and and it's been it's been really it's been really good since, you know, since 2019, I think I've averaged about two and a half shows a year, which has been really cool.
Speaker 1:So Awesome.
Speaker 3:Yeah. It's been really good.
Speaker 2:Nice to see you. No. That's awesome. I kinda wanna go back to what you were talking about in the beginning. You have been doing this for so long.
Speaker 2:I'm really interested in hearing, because you did start your career so young, how do you feel that you've grown not only as a musician but as an individual throughout this time?
Speaker 3:Oh, wow. Yeah. That's that's not a regular one. I think, you know, it's it's crazy because when you're a younger musician, you you tend to you tend to you tend to to to think that there is this link between who you are or or or who you are as a musician and how that kind of colors the value of who you are as a human being. And then as you get older, you realize that they aren't the same thing.
Speaker 3:And it's very dangerous to not be able to untie that knot because, you know, like I say to young musicians that I get to work with now, it's like, try not to allow the day you had on the stage to define how you feel about yourself as a human, you know, because it's not they're not the same things. And we tend to do that with anything, don't we, humans? We whatever whether we are musicians or whether we are leaders of countries or whether we are, I don't know, working in a in a coffee shop pulling you know, making coffee, we tend to sometimes well, a lot of the times have this idea that who we are and the value of who we are as humans is synonymous with our output or our productivity in whatever we've chosen to do, and it's and I think that's the one thing I've really learned and tried to hold on to over the years. It's like who I am as a human and and how I grow as a human being doesn't have to be index linked to my my my output as an artist. You know?
Speaker 3:And actually, COVID was played a big part in helping to make the biggest break, you know, in that thinking. But I think but I do think that as an artist, I've grown by embracing the music of my ancestors as as being as valuable as music from anywhere else in the world. And because as a young musician, I remember I mean, although I grew up playing Nigerian music, like, was born in Nigeria, and I grew up playing Nigerian music, I I I didn't see it as being as valuable as say, I don't know, playing jazz or I don't know, playing, you know, even like attempting to learn classical music.
Speaker 1:Yeah. You
Speaker 3:know, but now I realise that actually that that was so stupid to think that way, you know. So in that way, I've grown to to accept, you know, the music of my ancestors and my people as being as valuable in the same way that the language is as valuable. You know? English is not some superior language to Yoruba, for instance, you know. And then as a person, that but but the the crazy thing is, as a person, there is there is definitely an effect of that because you start to be you take more pride in who you are as a person and what you've come from and how those things shape your worldview and and and the the way you hold your head up.
Speaker 3:You know, is is kind of linked to that in a way. So maybe there is a tenuous link between what we are, what we do and who we are, but it's not in the way we think, you
Speaker 2:know. Yeah.
Speaker 3:And I yeah. I think that's how I've grown. I I think I answered it. I'm not sure.
Speaker 2:Well, you, that was a home run of an answer. That's why you've been worried about that. Yeah. That is amazing.
Speaker 3:Tell me if my answers are too long. I I tend to babble a bit, but yeah. You know?
Speaker 2:Oh, you're so personally, you wouldn't know that this type of conversation is exactly what we were
Speaker 3:looking Alright.
Speaker 2:Cool. Awesome.
Speaker 3:Exactly. Awesome.
Speaker 1:And just to go off of what you were talking about about, like, there being a connection between, like, the person and the artist. You know? Like, I mean, you yourself are are an artist, so inherently, you do have to have some kind of ties within within your art. But it's it like you said, it's imperative or it's an important notion to keep in your head to, like, not not make sure that that that your downsides or that your what are they called? That your that your slip ups or anything like that have to do with anything that who you are as a person because then it can cause like beating down on yourself and being down on yourself and everything.
Speaker 1:But the art itself is kind of it's a reflection, you know, of of how you Yes. You take in the world a little bit. So definitely understand where you're coming from for that. Mhmm. So yeah.
Speaker 1:But moving on to a little bit of kind of your inspiration that you've taken from a few different artists within your time. I know that we've looked through an extensive amount of things on you and research and everything, and you said that you take a lot of inspiration from artists like Charlie Parker in West Montgomery. So could you tell us a little bit how you ended up discovering these artists for yourself and then kind of how you take inspiration from them and, like, in what way?
Speaker 3:Yeah. Yeah. Good good question. I like I said, I grew up when I first started playing guitar, I was playing kind of West African kind of music, styles of music like Highlife and circus, these types of I mean, Highlife is a is a kind of originated from Ghana, even though I'm from Nigeria. But we're neighbors, and and it kind of spread across to us.
Speaker 3:And then Sukkos was like a music from, like, Congo, from The Congo, which is now kind of Democratic Republic Of Congo. And their music had a lot of guitar. It still does have a lot of guitar in it, and it's spread all over Africa. It's, you know, it's like I remember when I was coming up, it was it was kinda like it was the in thing. Kinda how Afrobeats is now.
Speaker 3:Yeah. Although Afrobeats has kind of become a lot more global
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 3:Than Sukkos was. Sukkos was that part for the continent, you know? Yeah. Like, everybody loved it. It played at all the parties.
Speaker 3:And and as a musician, it was part of what you learn because it part of the the the the what you the kind of the the music of the day and it was like you needed to know that music if you were going to be a working musician.
Speaker 2:Mhmm.
Speaker 3:So I grew up playing that. And then not long after I started playing guitar, this this this dude at the church that I grew up in, he introduced me to Wes Montgomery and jazz. And then I remember there was another guy at my church who who took me and, my cousin, who's a bass player who lives in New York now. He took us to our first shot, our first gig. And the first live gig I ever went to was we went to see George Benson play at a venue in London called the Royal Festival Hall.
Speaker 3:Sorry, the Royal Albert Hall. It's like a huge, huge venue. And I remember sitting in the audience watching this gig, having no clue what they were really doing. I just knew it sounded and felt amazing.
Speaker 2:Mhmm. Yes.
Speaker 3:And I was like, oh, when we were when we were leaving, was like, can I buy the program? And we bought a copy of the program and in the program, there was an interview with George, where he spoke about his influences and he mentioned Charlie Parker. And I was like, well, if he was influenced by Charlie Parker, that's where I wanna go. And I remember finding a cassette tape. I'm not that old, but there were still cassette tapes at the time.
Speaker 3:I would find the cassette tape of Charlie Parker. It was like a kind of a a greatest hits kind of collection type thing. And I remember picking it up and taking it home and listening to it and just thinking, I haven't got a clue what they're doing. So my next objective was to try and find someone who could decode it for me, know. And the guy at my church who had introduced me to Wes Montgomery, he had tried to kind of teach me a bit about what was going on.
Speaker 3:But then I remember kind of going out and trying to find people, and I met this guitar player called Alan Weeks. He's a British, black British guitar player who who used to run a a music workshop on Wednesday nights in London. And I remember going there once. I saw it in a in a I saw an advert for it. I remember going there and I heard him playing guitar from the entrance.
Speaker 3:I heard it and I was like, that sounds like George Benson sounds. So I was like, this guy knows what it is. He can tell me what it is. And I kinda hung on to him for years, he helped me to find my way through and kinda taught me how to transcribe the music, how to understand it. And I and I kinda learned from there, you know.
Speaker 3:And and I and I've and and I learned that, yeah, in order to speak any musical language, you needed to, like, just learn it from people who were masters of it, you know. And it was like trying to find the influence of your influence and of their influence and work your way back, You know? And it was that that journey that, you know, kinda got me into that music and realizing the connection also between the music of my ancestors in Africa and, you know, the kind of black American music, which is jazz and blues, and what the the kind of the the similarities and the the congruence between those those things also really helped to to feel some sense of ownership, you know, because that's important, think. I think you need to feel a sense of belonging in the music and find yourself in it, like I was saying earlier, to make it real for you. And that helped a lot, you know.
Speaker 3:Not feeling like, oh, yeah, I'm a black guy who lives in The UK, I'm from Africa, so I don't have a tie to these other black men who are making music in in America. Actually, there was a there was there was a direct director and learning the history of that was very helpful. You know?
Speaker 2:Yeah. I was just gonna say, I think it's really beautiful to hear that. I'm not a musician myself, but I've always admired the artistry and the passion that it takes, and it's really beautiful to hear from a musician that, you know, you kind of pass that down through generations of people you meet and the people that you've mentored and people that mentor you and how that kind of shapes modern sound. It's just Yes. Cool to hear a live example of that.
Speaker 2:To kinda talk about one of your albums specifically, Ori and Meta, I was we were doing some research. Did I say that right?
Speaker 3:Ori and Meta. Yeah. It was it was close.
Speaker 2:It's good. Yeah. Never I'll never never hesitate to correct. I was doing some research on your albums and just kind of the history behind everything. And Okran Mehta is, I learned was a Yoruba colloquialism that means three men and is often used sarcastically and sometimes sincerely as a panergetic to elevate a man's masculinity.
Speaker 2:And I was just wondering if the connection between your title and that colloquialism.
Speaker 3:Uh-huh. That's so interesting. Yeah. Like, when they would say yeah. Yoruba is such a it's such a a profound language.
Speaker 3:It's such a poetic language. You know. And, yes, when it be like, Ochorumeta, like it's like you're three men in one, you know, like, you know, and and but but Ochorumeta is not directly related to that same concept, but it was more related to the fact that, in Yoruba culture, songs and music play and still play a very pivotal role in day to day life. Maybe in kind of modern city life, you might not find it so much now because the world is becoming a more kind of a homogenous global place, and people are starting to lose a sense of some of those things that are that make us culturally, different, if you like. But maybe in rural places, in more rural places, might still find that, you know, like people will have a they'll have a song they sing when they wake up in the morning, a song they sing while they're cooking food or, you know, there are songs that you sing when people get married, they're like very you know, everybody knows what they are and, you know, songs that you sing if you give birth to twins for instance, you know.
Speaker 3:There are so many different things and think conceptually, I was trying to make an album to celebrate that concept of having a song for things.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 3:And I was working through at that time in my life, I think I was working through the notion of life as a three movement thing, birth, life itself and then death. And what would it be like if you wrote songs for those three things? And Yeah. And, you know, how do how do different people perceive those parts of of the life journey? So ori meta was referring to ori which means song and meta which means three is referring to, you know, which to three songs that would not that I wanted to limit it to three songs.
Speaker 3:It was more like three movements. Like, if you had to write three movements of music to to try to capture or encapsulate my feelings about those three processes of living, what would they be? What would they feel like? What would they sound like? And that was what the concept was for for that for that album.
Speaker 3:Yes. But I running the the the line between the Okuni Mehta kind of youth it's not euphemism, I guess. It's a saying. It's really interesting. No one's ever done that.
Speaker 3:So that's that's really cool. You know? Wow.
Speaker 1:Yeah. No. That was really beautiful to hear you talk about, like, the the different phases of life and how you then, you know, took that and then put that towards different phases of music and things like that. Like, it's it's really it's really beautiful. And I know that you had already previously talked a little bit about your connection between, like, your connection as a black man in The UK, but also as a Nigerian born man and also the connection between the, you know, people who look just like you, you know, in, America and everything like that.
Speaker 1:So I was wondering, you know, as somebody who was born in Nigeria but is living in The UK, how would you say your experiences, you know, in these places have differed or, like, what your, what the black experience is to you or has been for you in The UK, not only as a black man, but also as a black musician and how these kind of are differences or how they are similar in some way.
Speaker 3:Yeah. I guess thinking about that, the first thing that comes to mind is the fact that as a young boy, I I feel like I still remember the day that I became black, as it were. Yeah. Because growing up in Lagos, I wasn't was just a boy. Yeah.
Speaker 3:I wasn't a black boy. Do you know what I mean?
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 3:And I remember moving to The UK and it was like suddenly this became apparent somehow.
Speaker 2:Mhmm.
Speaker 3:And not only was I a black boy, I was a black African boy because there were these differences also that were required between being Caribbean Mhmm. Black Caribbean and being black African or whatever else, you know?
Speaker 1:Yeah. And it
Speaker 3:was like, well, this is this is wild, you know? Like, you know, imagine like you you live in ten your first ten years of your life and just being like, yeah, I'm just a boy running around with other boys in the street and we play and we do whatever. And then arriving in The UK and you, you know, you have like, you know, you have like other white kids saying to you, oh, my dad says you have tails. Where's your tail? You know, like, you know, like, yeah, like wild stuff.
Speaker 3:Yeah. Yeah. Know, like wild things. Mhmm. And then you're like, wait, what?
Speaker 3:How what? And then, you know, then you get like, you know, some Caribbean kids whose parents have maybe somehow gone through some trauma themselves and kind of handed that trauma down. And they they, you know, they will say crazy things like, oh, but yeah, you know, like, in Africa, they don't have enough food, everyone's hungry and blah blah blah. It's like, you know, stuff like And you're like, yeah, but that was never my reality growing up as a child, you know. So at that age, it was and then having to make the transition to the point where because as a kid, the last thing you wanna do is stick out.
Speaker 3:You don't wanna for the wrong reasons, let's say. You don't wanna stand out for for reasons that, you know, didn't bring you, like, any joy or, you know but but it felt like that was what was happening. And I think that that early experience, which I'll go as far as to say, I know that for a fact that for a lot of other African kids, it made them feel like they needed to hide. And, you know, I remember like kids who changed their names or would say their name was something else.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 3:And say, oh, no, my family my family's Jamaican. I'm not we're not Ghanaian, we're not Nigerian or whatever. Just to be able to kind of not have to deal with that. Mhmm. Whereas I was always like, I don't know what you're talking
Speaker 2:about. Yes.
Speaker 3:This is my name and this is who I am and if you believe I have a tail, then sure. Yeah. Go ahead. Why not, you know? And I think also being quite a kind of stubborn minded individual anyway, even as a as a young person, I was always just like, yeah, but I am who I am.
Speaker 3:And I think when I got into music, that fed into that, and I was always very proud to to to showcase, maybe not as proud as I am today, but there was always a a small part of that there to showcase who I am and who, you know, what my history is, what my ancestry is in the music that I made and still make. And and I think as a as a as a black man growing up now in the music industry, it's so and as a black Nigerian growing up in the music industry, it's wild to see like yesterday, I'll give you an example. I was in the car yesterday
Speaker 1:Yes.
Speaker 3:Driving toe kick and I'm listening to like national radio and Burnaby is on national radio
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 3:And he's singing in Yoruba on national radio. Like young me would have never thought that would be a possibility. Yeah. Like I would have never thought that would be a thing. It's so wild to me but also makes me so proud, you know,
Speaker 2:like Yeah.
Speaker 3:Yeah. And why not? Why can't we hear the songs of all people on national radio? Why does it happen? You know what I mean?
Speaker 3:Yeah. Different languages and, you know. Because it it just makes us so much less prone to this divisive way of thinking about culture and art. Yes, we can we can have different cultures but we don't need to then put those differences in a hierarchy. Oh, this one is greater than this one and this one is more interesting than this one.
Speaker 3:Do you know what I mean?
Speaker 2:Exactly. Yeah. You
Speaker 3:know, it's better to celebrate those differences because then through the celebration of those differences, we start to see the similarities, you know? Yeah. And and I think, for me, my experience has been one of trying to find myself again, you know, so that I no longer appear as just a black man in this world. Like, I'm just a man. Right?
Speaker 2:Mhmm. You
Speaker 3:know? That's trying to find trying to get back to that place I was as a child, you know?
Speaker 2:Yeah. Exactly.
Speaker 3:Before it was like, oh, you're different. You know what I mean?
Speaker 1:Mhmm. Yeah. I really do.
Speaker 3:Yeah. That's that's
Speaker 1:yeah. I I really do. Yeah.
Speaker 3:Go ahead.
Speaker 1:I really do agree with you about, like, the celebration of different cultures. And then also just like like how you were saying, like, I love me some Burner Boy. I love me some Wiz Kid. Like, that is something that I I am very down with that. So it's really it's really wonderful to actually just, like, hear you, like, express, like, how how you're oh my goodness.
Speaker 1:How your experience, you know, with that, but also just, like, that, like, whole example of, like, now I I get to hear, you know, a language that I grew up around hearing, you know, on the on national radio. Like, this is this is something Yeah. That's beautiful. It's crazy.
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 2:I was just gonna say it's really interesting to hear your experience too because I know I can speak for a lot of black Americans of know of knowing that it's really e we grew up with that easily categorized type of system of look like because we don't have an origin that we know. Yeah. And so it's just really Right. To hear somebody who's from a who moved from their homeland country to a predominantly white space and
Speaker 1:just kind
Speaker 2:of what that does to also in the mind of a kid's brain, just kinda what that does. It's just really interesting to hear you speak on that. If you could I know you spoke on it a little bit more, but if you could kind of dive into what it was like to kind of start being a musician in a space where you had those sorts of not reservations, but those sides sorts of interactions and, like, man. I'm sorry. Because I had a question
Speaker 3:that hasn't answered it,
Speaker 2:but I'm just trying to ask, like, what was it like for you to start doing jazz and to really get into the genre as a black man,
Speaker 3:but
Speaker 2:also as an African man in a predominantly white place like The UK?
Speaker 3:That's that is that is a great question because lucky for me, a lot of my my mentors when I first started playing jazz were black men. There were other black men who were playing that music. There was a generation or or two generations of black men ahead of me. Most of them would be in their kind of mid to mid fifties now, going to 60, who they I remember they, you know, when I first met some of those guys, they would tell stories of playing jazz in London and not being able to get into any of the spaces, any of the clubs because it was dominated. It was a it was a white dominated space considering that the music is a black American art form.
Speaker 3:Was a white dominated space here in The UK, and they wouldn't allow these people into those spaces. I was actually playing, in the band with one of these people yesterday, and we talked about it again. And and it's interesting because for them, it was like they had to then create their own ecosystem. Mhmm. They had to find venues and clubs where they could create their own shows, make their own nights, which then became a huge thing.
Speaker 3:Yeah. Because you can't you just can't you can't hide, you can't you can't stifle that energy, you know. It's it's just it's God given whatever you want to call it. It's, you know, you can't stifle it and they would create that. And so a lot of the guys that I grew up initially learning from were those people.
Speaker 3:And so I felt like I didn't know it at the time, but looking back on it, I realized that I was quite lucky in that I felt like I had a direct authentic link to the heart of the music rather than the head of the music, if you see what I mean. Yeah. Because jazz is is as much a head music as it is a heart music.
Speaker 2:A hundred.
Speaker 3:But I think the prob the problem is that without being too divisive about it, what I later came to see was that a lot of my white counterparts at the time, I felt like they were dealing with the head side a lot more. Because and I and I wonder if it's because they didn't feel like they had, they didn't feel like they had, permission to deal with the heart of it because the heart of it relates to the cultural elements of the music. Yeah. Do you know what I mean? It was like, you don't have you're not invited to the cookout as you guys would say.
Speaker 1:So how
Speaker 3:dare you? Do you know what I mean? How dare you think you can bring the potato salad, do know what I'm trying to say? You know, which is like the basic thing but you have to get it right, you know what I mean?
Speaker 1:A %.
Speaker 3:So they didn't feel like they had permission to do that. So they would be like, okay, let's get to the head of the music. Yeah. And that's they did that a lot. And then and then I found that they would I found that it became a gate kept kind of premises, you know, where it's like, well, we can do this and you can't do this.
Speaker 3:It's like, no, you're talking nonsense. Of course, we can. We just don't place as much value on it because to us, it's not the entire picture. But you've taken the little that you think you you you you're allowed to have. You've blown it up and tried to make it into the whole thing, which is actually when you zoom out, it's kind of at the risk of getting overly political.
Speaker 3:It's what colonialism is all about, you know. But that's let's let's put that one to the side.
Speaker 1:We'll put a pin on it so we'll put a pin So I was yeah.
Speaker 3:Yeah. Yeah. Do you know what I mean? Because it's a whole thing. But but I was lucky enough to be to be studying with some of these, black men who they themselves had a connection directly to their American counterparts, you know, and we they could see the relationship between the cultures.
Speaker 3:And so there was more of a permission to be like, yeah, your culture is our culture because your forefathers are our forefathers, you know.
Speaker 1:Exactly. And
Speaker 3:so that that helped me very early on to to take ownership of it and go, yeah, I'm I'm as much a part of this. Obviously, I'm not gonna I'm not gonna, like, change my name and put on an American accent because I don't need to, you know, in order to appear like, I don't have to do that. I I just accept that, you know, who knows? Maybe Charlie Parker's great great great great great grandfather was descended from the same, you know, who do you know what mean?
Speaker 1:Who knows?
Speaker 2:Yeah. That's
Speaker 3:that. That's what that is. So so anyway, I think fast forwarding, like, by the time I got to by the time I got to university, I mean, I only went to study music because I come from a Nigerian family and the thought of not doing a a degree in something is like, uh-uh. No, we don't do that. Do know what mean?
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 3:Which is crazy but that's where we were at. So I was like, okay, well, I'm not gonna go do that law degree that you all thought I was gonna go and do. I'm gonna go study music. And when I arrived at, university or what you guys call college, I realized I met most of the people I met there were white because they could afford to be there.
Speaker 2:Yeah. And
Speaker 3:a lot of the black musicians couldn't afford to go study in these places, you know. Or didn't even and a lot didn't even know it it was possible, you know. They didn't even know that there was something you could do. Whereas a lot of the white kids, their parents had paid for their music lessons since they were like five, six, seven years old. So there was always this this trajectory that was open to them, you know.
Speaker 3:So I remember getting there and feeling like, wow, yeah, you were all like, you have the head part of it down and, you know, but there was just a thing here that was that I felt I I couldn't find with them. A lot of them, not all, but a lot. Mhmm. And the ones who I felt had it, they had discovered it because they had somehow found themselves in good company, you know, in the right company. But, yeah, so that was the major difference since for me growing up as a black man playing jazz in The UK was realising And it's starting to It's changed a lot now because I think the times have changed and people have realized, oh, we had it wrong, you know.
Speaker 3:We were trying to colonize this music. You know what I'm saying? Like and that's not what we're supposed to be doing. We're supposed to be, like, trying to assimilate and respect, you know, where it comes from and not try to, like, take over and be like, well, look what we did with it. You know?
Speaker 3:It's like, no. It's like, respect the people you met there, respect their traditions. Respect their culture. Respect their language. And, you know, borrow rather than steal and do you know what I mean?
Speaker 2:Yes. But always
Speaker 3:and you know what I mean? And always point back to be like, well, look, I learnt it from this
Speaker 2:guy, you know. Exactly.
Speaker 3:So if you wanna learn it, go to that guy too. Don't be like, yeah, come to me, bypass that guy, pay me.
Speaker 2:Yeah. So
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 3:Yeah. Definitely. All of that. But, yeah, it was those revelations and and seeing that play out not just in the music, but also in the kind of the politics of the world, it's quite mind blowing.
Speaker 1:Yeah. No. It definitely is. And like you said, give credit where credit is due a %. That's something that I will always say.
Speaker 2:So
Speaker 1:this kind of actually led me perfectly into this next, question that we have for you. So I'll give a little bit of context before I give the question. We have this, place here in Lansing where, actually, I just kind of stumbled upon it one day, and apparently all of the, jazz, musicians who study here in at MSU go to this pub, called Moriarty's Pub.
Speaker 3:Wait. Where are you guys? Where whereabouts are you guys? I don't actually even know where in America you are.
Speaker 1:We are in Impact is in MSU, Michigan State University. So Right. You're in the Lansing area in Michigan.
Speaker 3:Right. Okay. Cool.
Speaker 1:Yeah. Sorry. Forgot to, you know
Speaker 3:Michigan. Okay. That's same state that's the same state that Detroit is in.
Speaker 2:Yes. Detroit's in Michigan.
Speaker 1:One hundred percent. Yes. Cool.
Speaker 3:Great.
Speaker 1:In this Lansing the Detroit area does a % have like these different, jazz bars and things like that that people go to. But specifically here in Lansing, the students, from MSU and then also other people will come to this pub too who aren't student or who aren't MSU affiliated, they come there to kind of, you know, together and, you know, jam out. It's really it's a great, place that's open and welcoming to new incoming, artists, but also people who are very much established in their, in their artistry. So, Milky, I'm wondering how you feel, like, what is the importance of having a place, for up and coming artists, jazz artists, or any type of musician to, come in without having an expectation to be the best of the best and come in to have this level. Because improvisation is, like, somewhat of a of a core of, a jazz jam Right?
Speaker 1:So having kind of place to work out their muscle as like a jazz artist, what do you think is the importance of having a place like that for developing artists?
Speaker 3:I think it is the the heart of any scene, music scene, whether it's jazz or blues or rock and roll or whatever. Do know what mean? It's it's the lifeblood. I think without places like that, it's harder to to to kind of to keep the the fire burning, you know. That's that's the it's the it's the meeting place, isn't it?
Speaker 3:It's the Yeah. It's the point of exchange. You know, like everyone who, you know, like a lot of a lot of people you talk to about, say for instance, the great American trumpet player, Roy Hargrove.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 3:You know, he would spend hours into the early, early morning playing at jam sessions in New York. And, you know, famously, you hear a lot of young musicians talk about how I went to a jam session, Roy Hargrove was there, and he was so kind and he was so welcoming and he was, you know, he was he was very was very endearing, but also willing to spend time to speak and educate younger musicians. You know, he's like he's like one of the baddest trumpet players we've ever had. Do you know what I mean? You know?
Speaker 3:And he's famous for that, and I think that is the right attitude. That is the right spirit. I remember growing up as a child in Nigeria, you know, like, some evenings in the week that there would be this moment in the evening, not every evening, but from time to time, maybe a couple times a week, where one of the kind of older kids would gather the younger kids and tell them stories.
Speaker 1:Oh, yeah.
Speaker 3:I remember as a child listening to those stories. And then as you got older, you then had a responsibility to tell kids stories to the younger kids and and oftentimes they would just make up these stories.
Speaker 2:You know,
Speaker 3:it was just invented. There were some like standard kind of stories and there were always kind of what's the what are they called fables, like, where human animals were substituting humans in the stories. You know, the tortoise was very famous
Speaker 2:Mhmm.
Speaker 3:In a lot of these stories for being the kind of, you know, sly canon, you know Mhmm. Creature. And and I remember those, and and to me, there's a there's a there's a kind of a parity between that and the way jazz works as a language. And and I think having a central hub where young and old can meet, or if you wanna see it as new and old, if you like, because you don't have to be old. You don't have to be young to start jazz.
Speaker 3:You can start jazz if you're 60. You know what I mean? So where new and established can meet and exchange ideas, you can learn about the culture and and learn about the language, not just the musical language, but also the, I guess, if you like, emotional language of the music, which I think is important to play in the music. You know, I think it's it's vital actually. It's like it's the heart and I I, you know, I think that word for me is is is the best way to describe it.
Speaker 3:And if that stops moving or being, then the body dies, you know. And I think without that, it's it's very difficult to have a thriving scene anywhere, you know.
Speaker 1:Very true.
Speaker 2:For sure. Kind of moving into the last couple questions for you. Sure. It's been super hard for me to not sit here and kick my feet and scream up and down and do a backflip if I could because I've actually watched you on YouTube and listened to your music, specifically a lot of your earlier stuff with Amy Winehouse since I was, like, four 13, 14 years old.
Speaker 3:Oh, wow.
Speaker 2:That's kind of like the that was my first introduction to jazz, and she is who made me fall in love with jazz. So this is, like, really cyclical circle for me. But I'd love to hear you talk about that is, like, coming at some of the youngest work that I can find of you on the Internet. I'd love to hear you talk about how that time working with her shaped, your musicianship, but also being a producer and a composer and kind of how that launched you into your career that it is today.
Speaker 3:Well, yeah. I mean, it's definitely It was definitely a pivotal time for me. If not if not necessarily as an artist, but but but definitely as an artist and I'll touch on in what aspects a bit later. But I think so much more as a I guess, just as a as a as a musical as a music mind. Because I think the mind of the artist can be different to the mind of the producer, which can be different to the mind of a composer, which can be different to the mind of a session musician or do know what I mean?
Speaker 3:But when you have a what I like to call the music mind, it's more like a bird's eye view of the whole thing, of what the whole thing can be. And my time with Amy was really important in helping me to shape and develop that side or that mind for me because when I met her, she was 19 years old and, you know, she was writing these songs and, you know, there there are some there are some artists who I think I I I tend to refer to them as a voice for their generation. They write in a way that the people of their generation understand mostly. Others can too, but it's it's for the people of their generation. It's a direct translation, And she definitely was one of those.
Speaker 3:And I think watching her and the way she interacted with her music, but in relation to the music that influenced her, which a lot of a lot of which was jazz and hip hop actually, funny enough. Because it's funny because she was one of the first artists that I worked with who was influenced by a style of music that she wasn't actually presenting, like in an obvious way. So she was heavily influenced by hip hop. But she wasn't on stage like rapping, you know, making, you know, out and out and out hip hop music. Yeah.
Speaker 3:But she was heavily influenced by the energy and the spirit of hip hop. Mhmm. And it it was funny because it when we first kinda started working together, I was trying to understand how that manifested in her artistry. And I realized later on, I mean, we didn't spend that. We we probably spent a year and a half, maybe if that working together.
Speaker 3:And in that time, I realized that it was kinda because before I started playing guitar, I I kind of had a a few years way before I discovered guitar where I was really into hip hop, you know. In like around February, '2 thousand and '1, I was like really heavily into
Speaker 1:Good times. Gold good times.
Speaker 3:Is that right? Yeah. Right? Golden age, like, you know, it was like just before The Chronic came out because I feel like when The Chronic came out, hip hop changed.
Speaker 2:Yeah. You
Speaker 3:know? So before that, you know, when like the kind of the golden age of NWA, Ultramagnetic MCs, that that kind of time, you know. And I remember being into it, but I was into the it was kinda like the rock and roll of its time, you know, like it was yes, it was the music that a lot of young people listen to, but but there was a certain kind of empowerment that I think you got from hip hop, and you didn't have to be of hip hop to feel the empowerment of it. Yeah. And you could be anyone.
Speaker 3:That's the crazy thing. And it was that, I think, that Amy was referring to in what how it influenced her. I think she felt empowered by the fact that you could be whoever, but and you could see yourself in this music, you
Speaker 2:know. Yes.
Speaker 3:And I and I understood that later. But so being influenced by a style of music but not necessarily presenting that music in your artistry was interesting because it was like, oh, you can take influences from things, from the different elements of what a thing was. It doesn't have to be the obvious element, you know. So anyway, that influenced then my thinking of, oh, so I can allow my hip hop influence to come through my music without being a rapper or making beats per se in that way. Mhmm.
Speaker 3:And I got that from from talking with her a lot about that, you know. Although she was influenced by, you know, she was influenced by a lot of jazz vocalists, I think I think Diana Washington was like one of her big favorites. I remember one time we were talking and she was like a huge fan of Kimbarelle, the gospel singer. But I was like, oh, but everyone else that I know who's a huge fan of Kimbarelle is trying to sing like Kimbarelle, you know. And it was funny because she would like sometimes shyly and sheepishly try to do some of those things.
Speaker 3:But knowing that she wasn't she wasn't gonna be that kind of singer, she basically just a lot of the things that people adopted, like people who were then trying to sound like Amy, a lot of the stuff that they then adopted as, like, Amy Amy Amyisms were actually the things that Amy was trying to do from some of her influences that she didn't quite get right but stumbled on something else in the process Wow. Which I found hilarious when later on I was, you know, even when I taught and there were all these like young singers who were trying to sound like Amy, I was like, you realise that the things that you're trying to do was the result of in quote unquote her kind of happy accidents, you know. And you kinda have to find your own happy accidents, you know, to to develop your own unique style, you know. So, yeah, so again, watching her grow as a musician and going, oh, yeah, you know, you can take pride in your mistakes because eventually those are the things that become your voice as it were. So, yeah, that that did shape my my kind of trajectory of of of of not allowing, you know, people to tell you who you were and just be like, no.
Speaker 3:I like this, this and this and those ingredients create this in me. Yeah. And that's all there needs that's all there needs to be. And we can all have the same ingredients but be shaped differently by those things, you know, have a different flavor, which is completely welcome. But also, I think being her musical director and having to having to interpret the album that we were we were touring her first album mostly, Frank.
Speaker 3:Having to tour that record with the personnel that I had to work with on stage, which is quite different, was like I mean, I say quite different. I didn't have a keyboard player. I didn't have backing vocalists. I had a three part horn section.
Speaker 2:Yeah. Which
Speaker 3:hardly existed on the album, and I was like, you know, but they taught me to be creative and imaginative as an arranger. And and actually, those were the building blocks of, oh, it doesn't matter what the instruments are, let's make something out of it, you know, that I learned that from from that experience. Yeah. It was it was a great time and it it really it helps me to build my confidence because she would just be like, yeah, Fem, just, you know, just do the arrangements. Let me know and and then and then I'll just sing over the top, you know.
Speaker 3:And I and I I would arrange in the rehearsal room. Like, I didn't write the arrangements at home. I would come in and I'd be like, right, you play this, you play this, you play this, I'll play this, and then we all did it together. And then I'll turn to Amy and be like, what do you think? She'll be like should I ever be like, I love it or I don't like it.
Speaker 3:I'm not into it. You know, there was never any like, yeah. It's like, I love it, femme. Let's go. And she'll sing over the top.
Speaker 3:Or I don't like what you did there. Can we change that? I'll be like, cool. Alright. Let's try this.
Speaker 3:Do you know what I mean? And that's how it worked and it really it it it helps me develop my confidence as a musical voice of my own, you know, because I was allowed to put some of myself. This is what I meant earlier when I was like, any opportunity that affords me the opportunity to put a bit of my own self in, let's go, you know.
Speaker 2:Yeah. That's beautiful.
Speaker 3:And I had that from then, so that was great.
Speaker 1:Yeah. Awesome. Okay. Wow. No.
Speaker 1:I I love what how what you were saying about about how you're talking about hip hop and because we have actually been, like, talking extensively, honestly, about the the the relationship between hip hop and jazz. Like, it feels like because you compared hip hop to being rock and roll, and we literally just came from a jazz performance. And I was like, and why can't jazz be the new party music? Like, I would
Speaker 3:love Exactly.
Speaker 1:I would love to just dance around and, like, you know It's coming. Like, you know, it's
Speaker 3:It's coming back.
Speaker 1:It's coming back. Yes. It needs to. It needs to. And, you know, it's it's amazing how there's so many samples out there also in different hip hop, like, songs or just, like, music and stuff like that where they sample jazz music.
Speaker 1:And I think it's because, like, how you're talking about hip hop music, like, you it's it's not only up here, it's also up it's also in here. And I think it has
Speaker 3:That's right.
Speaker 1:Same like, jazz and hip hop where, like, they're they're not twins. They're siblings. They're definitely siblings, though. You know? Maybe different mama, but, like,
Speaker 2:you know, same daddy.
Speaker 3:Exactly.
Speaker 1:Yes. And I just it it's it's definitely something that we we're gonna keep talking about, but that we have talked about this. So I'm really glad that you brought that up,
Speaker 3:No. Absolutely. I think any if you if you listen to anyone from either world talk who really knows their shit Yeah. No one no one would ever dispute the fact that they're they're siblings. Brothers from other mothers.
Speaker 2:Yes. Yeah.
Speaker 3:Do know what I mean?
Speaker 2:Yeah. Definitely. No
Speaker 3:doubt. You know?
Speaker 1:Well well, I do have a another question kind of about about the music and and developing music, specifically in a collaborative environment. I know you just came from a rehearsal, so you already you're fresh out of that right now. But I wanna know what are some of the challenges, kind of of misinterpretation, I guess, within a team of musicians and creatives trying to collaborate on something together. I know that sometimes it can be a little bit hard to work on things with other creatives and being like, well, my way is the best or your way is the best or, you know, stuff like that. So I wonder, because also you talked about how music is language, you know, and so there is room obviously for misinterpretation when it comes to any language.
Speaker 1:So Mhmm. Yeah, I'd love to hear your thoughts on that.
Speaker 3:That's that's actually a really, really cool question because it's something that I know that I there was a long time in my musical journey where I struggled with that, you know. I struggled with either I would be in a room in a in a in a collaborative space, and I would either struggle with being willing to offer up ideas because of the fear of rejection Or or wanting to voice my idea and have it accepted because I was afraid that what someone else might offer up might not like like, how do I how do I express that I I wasn't into something that someone else was suggesting Yeah. Without upsetting or do you know what I mean? Mhmm. Or disrespecting that person.
Speaker 3:And and and it's it's interesting because some years ago, I met, there's a there's an amazing jazz guitar player originally from Republic Of Benin, lived in America for a while, but now lives in Europe by the name of Lionel Louiequet, who, I don't know if you've heard of him. He's he's a phenomenal, artist, plays has his own music out and everything, but currently tours with Herbie Hancock. And I remember when we first met and was kind of developing a friendship, around the second or third time we we hung out at a festival somewhere, we were talking about something like this, you know. Yeah. And he said, you know, when he started his trio, he started he had a trio that he played for with years for year he played with for years.
Speaker 3:They met while they were all studying music together at college, And they were playing a lot of his own music, and a lot of his music is rooted in African rhythmic language. Yeah. And he was like, he would come in with these compositions and teach it to them and they would hear they would hear it in a different place than where it was written. And I thought in in the early days, would frustrate him a little bit, but then he realized, hold on a minute, I'm actually gonna learn I'm gonna learn to hear it where you hear it. So I can understand your perspective because it might make it easier for me to show you my perspective when I understand your perspective.
Speaker 3:And it was that conversation that completely switched my mindset about because I also would write music and bring it to my band and it'd be like, Femi, where's the one? You know? I'd be like, it's here. Can't you hear it? It's here.
Speaker 3:It's like, no. And then I learnt from having that conversation. Okay. Okay. Good question but where do you hear the one?
Speaker 3:Mhmm. And then they will they will play it and I'll be like, oh, okay. And and it was a lesson for me because sometimes when they would play it the way they heard the one, I couldn't hear it that way. So I was like, I need to able to hear it in all the ways. Yeah.
Speaker 3:Because then it it What it does is it serves up a certain type of humility that wasn't about it wasn't about being humble for humble sake, but it allowed you to to understand that actually we're not here to serve ourselves, we're here to serve the music. And so whatever made the music most potent, that's the that's what wins out, you know. Yeah. So in a collaborative space, I you know, for me it's like, let's serve the song. Let's serve the music.
Speaker 3:Which lyric best tells the story? Which chord best evokes the emotion, you know? That's the thing that we wanna get and I think if when everyone is thinking on that wavelength, it's the most beautiful space. But when we're not, when people are operating from a place of usually fear. Yeah.
Speaker 3:Either the fear of of being rejected or having your idea rejected or the fear of not understanding the other person's idea or and not knowing how to voice that. That's when we can't make the space work. So if you can just like put that fear to one side and know that we're here to serve the song or serve the composition, a collaborative space can be the most rewarding space. And it's one of the things I love the most about working in theater because it it requires collaboration almost exclusively in order for it to work. Yeah.
Speaker 3:And when it works, it's one of the most powerful art forms out there for sure, you know. Yeah. So that's for me. That's yeah. It's beautiful.
Speaker 2:Thank you. That's awesome to hear you talk about that collaboration because we both were graduating soon, but we both work in advertising, but the creative side. So it's really interesting to hear the musical side because we know what it's like when everybody has an idea, and then they was like, no. Well, my idea is really good. And it's like, well, my ego is telling me that my better than that.
Speaker 2:So it's just interesting.
Speaker 3:Yeah. Yeah. Right.
Speaker 2:It's interesting to hear how to navigate that differently within music. Kind of
Speaker 3:Right.
Speaker 2:Walking around the same sphere of creativity and kind of staying fluid with the creation of music. On your newest record, Music Is Feeling, you mentioned how you originally didn't you originally wrote the album with just a trio and then that you later can reimagine it with a full orchestra. I'm just interested in knowing what kind of ignited that switch and made you start to see it that way.
Speaker 3:Yeah. Again, yeah, I think it was I think it was the fact that I wanted to I I was curious. I personally, as as a as a as a person and as a musician, was curious to to hear what African music or African influenced music sounds like when performed on these kind of traditionally western orchestral instruments as it were. Because I know what it sounds like on traditional African instruments, you know. And it was like and that was and I was like, well, I've already written all this music which is not it's not exclusively African in its nature, but a lot of the kind of the rhythmic sub elements of it were.
Speaker 3:And I was like, what would happen if I introduced that those as much of those elements as I can to, you know, like trying traditional European orchestral instruments? And that's kind of where it started for me. But also, I have a fascination with with the orchestra, especially with the string section in an orchestra. I I feel like it's it can be one of the most powerful sounds, you know, because it can it it has such a huge range and it can do so many different things. And actually, part of the idea was what does it sound like if I bring, you know, that element and just place it on top of a bunch of guys just playing, like, African drums, you know.
Speaker 3:That was the the original the original thing. But then I was like, that would be that would require a whole another project and I I already had this project, you know, kind of on the on on the table. So I was like, I'm just gonna like combine the elements as much as possible and that's kinda how I ended up there. It was it was trying to, I guess, bring together, you know, my roots as a musician but also stuff that I was learning about orchestration and and all that kind of stuff and trying to kind of bring that together for myself really. But also to showcase, you know, the fact that I was I was into that.
Speaker 3:I was into orchestrating for I'm writing for orchestra and trying to trying to grow and trying to kind of kind of signpost that, hey, guys, look, I can do this too. Do you know what I mean? Yeah. But it's a it's a it's a a it's a grow it's it's a it's a learning curve, know, and you grow and and it's it's funny because sometimes I listen back to that record because that was from back in 2016.
Speaker 2:Mhmm.
Speaker 3:And I wrote a lot of that stuff in 2014, '20 '15. It's ten years now. And and listen back to it and thinking, wow, I've come such a long way, from that, which, you know, I guess everyone wants to be able to say. But but, yeah, it's fascinating. But I still enjoy even listening to it and going and and and trying to trace some of my thought processes while I was doing it and thinking, what was I thinking again when I did that?
Speaker 3:And and cringing at some of it also. Like, oh, I don't know how good that sounds now, but you know, that's life, you know.
Speaker 2:It's really cool to hear you speak about this, because we both have gone through your discography, quite extensively. We've had the time too.
Speaker 3:So That's amazing. Wow.
Speaker 2:It's really feeling like like you're just peeking behind a curtain before a plane to get to know what you're doing because I remember that album, like, I I remember thinking, I've never heard anything like this because you could hear the African influences, but I couldn't pinpoint what it was. It just was it was so cohesive. But I knew that it was something different than the traditional. It's just really cool to hear you talk about that. Yeah.
Speaker 2:It's kinda amazing. Talking on that more, a lot of majority of your album well, all of your albums actually are all instrumental. Or and if they're not instrumental, you are not the one that sings on them. But you have an EP of those PNG sessions where you sing. And I'm really interested to know why you'd why that was the first time that you were recorded singing and what significance that
Speaker 3:I actually I actually sing on Music Is The Feeling.
Speaker 2:Music Is The Feeling off Ori and Meta?
Speaker 3:No. No. No. The yeah. So on Ori and Meta, I didn't I did sing a bit on Ori and Meta, a little bit.
Speaker 3:On the first album, I didn't sing at all. Ah. Except for except for a couple of little things. Because the truth is, I feel more comfortable singing in Europa than I do singing in English. Mhmm.
Speaker 3:Which is kind of a a weird mind thing, but
Speaker 2:It's not weird. It was my It's not weird. That was
Speaker 3:my Well, exactly. Yeah. Yeah. I I feel much more comfortable singing in Yoruba than singing in English because I feel like there's such a long history in out there of people singing phenomenally in English. You know, I feel like there's there's nothing I can add to that, you know.
Speaker 3:Whereas in Yoruba, given that I was I'm trying to write lyrics that aren't kind of what you would hear day to day in Yoruba music, lyrically speaking anyway. So I felt much more comfortable trying to add something there than in English, which is maybe a short answer to your question. But on Orimeta no. So on Orimeta, I didn't sing. I sang little bits here and there, but the actual title track Orimeta is sung by a friend of mine, an amazing singer called Zantine Black, who is also Nigerian origin himself, but, he's a piano player slash singer, amazing artist.
Speaker 3:And then on on by the time I arrived at The Music Is The Feeling, I was way more confident in my singing. So I think on that one, I'm singing all the songs on The Music Is The Feeling.
Speaker 1:Yeah. Wonderful. Wonderful.
Speaker 3:Yeah. So, yeah, it was a bit of a journey, you know.
Speaker 1:Yeah. Yeah. Oh, definitely. Well, we only have one more question for you tonight. Well Sure.
Speaker 1:I don't know. Is it nighttime for you? What time is it?
Speaker 3:We're Yeah. It's pretty it was getting there. It's, like, twenty past seven.
Speaker 2:Oh, okay. 7PM.
Speaker 1:It's around 2PM for us here. So I was, like, nights, day.
Speaker 3:Cool. Yeah. It's still it's not dark yet, though. We're in summertime now.
Speaker 1:It's That's nice. Wonderful. Well, we just have it's a really it's it's not a crazy serious question like how our other ones may have been tonight. But I really just wanted to know. So you have traveled to a bunch of different places.
Speaker 1:Right? Weird music has taken you to a bunch of different places all across the the world.
Speaker 3:Am I
Speaker 1:correct on that? Mhmm. Yeah. So what would you say has been, like, the best meal? Because I know okay.
Speaker 1:You have the okay. Nigerian food is amazing. Right? And
Speaker 3:then Wait. What what what Nigerian food do you guys know, though?
Speaker 1:Like, fufu and egusi. Right? Isn't that is that like Oh.
Speaker 3:Come on. Alright. Alright. Okay. Cool.
Speaker 3:Cool. Cool. Cool. Continue with the question. That's good.
Speaker 3:You passed the test. You passed. You passed. So you have places where you are to eat that stuff. Yeah?
Speaker 1:Yes. Yeah. There's even like I
Speaker 3:mean, because Nigerians are everywhere.
Speaker 1:Yeah. Yeah. I was They're everywhere. Wondering what has kind of been your favorite meal to have when where your favorite place to travel has been and for food. There we go.
Speaker 1:That's the question.
Speaker 3:Wow. For food. Yeah. That's that's a tough question because the thing is I'm a foodie, like like out and out food. I love food.
Speaker 3:Like food is it's it's the soul, you know. So I think the thing is there's nothing more comforting for me than eating Nigerian food like good, like pounded jam with egg yoo c. There's nothing more comforting than that. And I would I would always put it number one, especially when I've been in Nigeria and I've eaten in Nigeria. But let's just pretend that doesn't count.
Speaker 3:Right?
Speaker 1:I would
Speaker 3:say potentially, that's such a that's such a hard question because I feel like food falls into categories.
Speaker 1:It does.
Speaker 3:You know?
Speaker 1:Definitely does.
Speaker 3:Because because I was in Japan last year Oh. And I had some incredible food. Right? But then I've had some like like like really like spiritual moments even in Italy also, you know, in certain places. So but I wouldn't put them in the same category.
Speaker 3:This is the problem.
Speaker 2:Mhmm.
Speaker 3:So it's a really tough what I'm trying to say is it's a really tough question to answer.
Speaker 2:Yeah. But
Speaker 3:if I had to really say one place. Oh my gosh.
Speaker 2:It's a hard one.
Speaker 3:Maybe yeah. It's really, really tough because like having any food that is like that comes from a place, having that food in that place. Because you know, when you live in a big city like London Yeah. You can get food from all over the world. Yeah.
Speaker 3:But having that same food from that place, that's my jam.
Speaker 1:Okay.
Speaker 3:You know?
Speaker 1:That's a good
Speaker 3:So when I've had Japanese food in Japan
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 3:Italian food in Italy, I remember having a kebab in in Turkey, in Istanbul that was just like, wait, what did you say? No. Or when I've had like, I mean, okay, I've not had Mexican food in Mexico, But I thought Mexican food in London was okay until I went to a Mexican restaurant in New York. Oh. And I was like, wait, what is this?
Speaker 2:This is not back home. Yeah.
Speaker 3:Right. You know? And I know that that's not even yet in Mexico. So I'm like, come on, someone asked me for a gig in Mexico, please. So I can go eat there, you know.
Speaker 3:But yeah, like, the food in the place. That's my answer. Okay.
Speaker 2:It's a good one.
Speaker 3:You know what I mean? That's all I can do. It's a good one. Good question.
Speaker 1:Thank you. Well, that's all we have for you today. I wanna thank you so much for, you know, joining
Speaker 3:Thank you, guys. It's been fun.
Speaker 1:And sharing your time with you and sharing your your your just, like, words because with us because, honestly, this feels like it's been such an inspirational, you know, just, like, interview. Just, like, some of the things that you've said, like, I will definitely take those away with me. I just wanna express
Speaker 2:sincere gratitude for your time as well. You like, you'll just never know how much this means to me, how much the conversation meant with being able
Speaker 3:to talk to
Speaker 2:you and just get to know you as a person who's truly a blessing, and I'm just really I just much gratitude for your time.
Speaker 1:Thank you so much. Yes. And you
Speaker 3:Thank you, guys. It's really a pleasure.