 |
 |
VH1: What was that vision?
Gray: I just wanted it to be bigger. Not sales-wise; I just pictured this big thing, like this big monster, and I wanted that to be my album.
VH1: Sounds like you and Daryle were working with a ton of material. Why do you think it was such a prolific time for you?
Gray: Well, you know, a lot has happened to me in the past couple of years and I had other things to talk about, which is a blessing, and I had traveled the world, so I heard a lot of different types of music. Like you go to France and African rhythms are really big over there. Then you go to Germany and you've got German hip-hop. Then you go to the clubs and they've got all kinds of techno and drum 'n' bass and jungle music. They have it in the States, but in Europe it's much bigger and much more mainstream. Just having done that, all of that crept into my subconscious and when I made this album, a lot of that ended up on my album.
[Watch Clip]
VH1: How do you mean specifically?
Gray: It wasn't anything that I forced. It was just around me. Like there's a lot of real wild beats on the album, and I think that any time you travel you go and do your thing during the day and then the first thing you do at night is go out, go to clubs, go check out the nightlife. So I got this song called "Sexual Revolution" and it's just like straight disco. It's like boomp-ta-boomp-ta-boomp, and then I've got this song called "Relating to a Psychopath" and the beat is just like a rock beat mixed with a techno beat mixed with a hip-hop beat and then the bassline is Caribbean. It's crazy and it's the first thing you hear on the album, and the mix is over the top. It's wild. It kind of sets up the album, so you hear that and you think anything can happen and you don't know what to expect.
VH1: That song definitely sets up a tone for the album. What's the first lyric again?
Gray: It goes, "Hot like hot wings with hot chocolate in hell." Like, that's as hot as you can get.
VH1: What are you referring to?
Gray: The weather. Again, that was from me traveling the world and traveling to places like Israel and it's just hot and there's no savior and wherever you go it's just hot. There's no breeze coming your way. It's hot and then you go to places like Norway and it's just cold like in [singing] "my isolation cell in the winter while kissing Mr. Freeze." So it's like one extreme to the other but it's all in the same world. You know what I mean? You dig?
VH1: Who are you addressing in "Sexual Revolution"? Is it an individual or are you actually commenting on people being repressed in general?
Gray: No, I wasn't speaking to the repressed. The key word, the key phrase is just my very own sexual revolution. You grow up and your mom and dad tell you to close your legs, and you're in high school and you can't scream too loud 'cause your mom is downstairs. So you grow up and you have all these limits on sex. You know, you're taught that you don't give head on the first date. When you grow up a little bit you discover that that's OK and that men like you better when you do that, and you know it's just about how as you change, your sex life definitely changes and as your mind opens up, your sex opens up and your legs open up and it's really great revolution.
VH1: "Sweet Baby" is a really tender choice for the first single. Did you see it as a way to lead people who fell in love with you through "I Try" and "Still" into this album? Why did you choose that one as opposed to one of the funkier, more dance-oriented tracks?
Gray: It's a cool little love song. That's a touchy subject for me because I wanted to do another single, but you've got to talk to my label about that... It's about my first real real real real love. I wrote it in that space where that's the way I felt about him. It's like when you get to that level with that person where it's just all about you and him, and what's going on in the outside world is all secondary - that's a good relationship to have with somebody, when it's sincerely about you and that other person. That's nice.
VH1: You've got Erykah Badu on there. How did that come about?
Gray: Erykah's a friend of mine and I went to see her at a show in Vegas and I was hanging at a sound check and I asked if she would come and sing on the album. She wanted to sing on the single; she was real particular about that. So she came in and I didn't know what she was going to do because it's not an Erykah Badu-style song at all. She heard it and she went "doo ba doo ba doo." It sounds like a cartoon song but she hooked it up. It's like the perfect little lacing for that song. She worked all night and came back the next day to perfect it. To make sure it was just right, to layer it a bit more. She worked with Rick Rubin on that part, and it was funny because she didn't know who he was when she came in. He was like, "Hi, I'm Rick," and she was like, "Whatever uh-huh," and she didn't know he was Rick Rubin until the day she left.
VH1: Why did you want to work with Rick? That's a move that people might not expect from either of you.
Gray: Well, we had gotten through probably 75 percent of the album and me and Daryle, we had one song that had like 28 tracks of just backup vocals. One song we did had like 12 reels, which is insane. That's 1,000 tracks, and so Rick just kinda came in and because he's a mentor more than anything else he just says, "That's cool." Because he's Rick you believe him. I got to know him a little bit and I was really flattered that he wanted to be a part of it and that he liked the album. I told him that I wanted to get John Frusciante on the album and he just made one phone call. You know what I mean? And I said I want Billy Preston and it's like room service. He's got access to everything in the music business and everybody respects him and so that's a real cool dude to have in your corner. His opinions have substance.
[Watch Clip]
|
|
| < back next > |
|
 |
|
