Cherokee : MC
June 1999
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Cherokee: (C): Growing up in Brooklyn was really really good. I had a very fun fulfilling childhood. Lot's of friends, I grew up with my mom, and my sisters and my grandmother. We didn't have much because we were poor, but I never realized what I was missing because there was so much love around and my mom always found a way for us to have even though she couldn't really afford it. I really miss that. And the community the way that everything was, back in the day, the way children were growing up on the block growing up.
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C: Right, when I first started to work on the album, I didn't really have a concept for the album because I didn't realize I was going to be doing a solo project. I was just kind of in the studio challenging myself trying to see if I could actually work alone, write and produce because I didn't believe I still had it once I had broken up with my ex-partner, and my manager put me in the studio. I just started writing a slew of songs and one of the first one that came out of that batch was Stepping Stone, and for me I say that song was like therapy because I was just expressing what I had gone through and what I felt and that was my way of getting it out. I didn't write a lyric for that song, I just went in the booth and sang it.
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VV: Do you
write the music too?
C: I
co-produce the music with three producers. Tony Nance who did Stepping
Stone and Fictitiously, Angela Earl who did Blue Bottle Aftershave and
My Own Queen, and Myron McKinley who did the rest of the songs with me.
And all of these cats are new, and I chose to work with new procedures
so I wouldn't become a producers product. We had just hired musicians
and brought them in, I was able to direct them and tell them what I wanted.
I knew what I wanted and I didn't want to work with people with ego problems.
It's hard as a female in the business, you don't get the respect until
you get in the studio and then they're like oh she knows what she's talking
about..
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(C) Yeah - I had made an album prior to this in '92 with my ex-partner. We were signed to Morgan Creek Records, which is actually no longer a label but a film company.
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C: It was a mixture of stuff, I would say it was more R&B pop with a little bit of funk. We we're together for a number of years and broke up about 3 and a half years ago. Ever since then everything have been falling in my lap. I think that when you get rid of all the negative karma that's in your life, everything else is allowed to enter your life. I think that's what happened with me. I was surrounded by a lot of negative karma and very depressed, and now that it's out of my life and I'm happy, everything just flows.
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C: It was directed by Tim Story who also did Tyrese's Sweet Lady. He came up with the concept and we didn't accept a lot of treatments. I thought Tim was and wanted to work with him because he was new as well. For me the video was shot very beautifully. I love the way the video looks and it's helping the song, people remember the video and remember, it connects.
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C: For me it's cool. It's just the first single and that single more was to set me up because that's the most commercial single on the album. Once people get into the album and figure out who I am I think it's gonna be okay. I'm not really worried about it because for me the success is in finding the freedom that I have now and finding my happiness. It's not really about the album getting sold or whatever, I would love for it to reach people and touch peoples lives, but it's not about whether or not it sells.
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C: My belief is in self love. I believe that if you love yourself enough and you believe in yourself and you have self esteem, everything else in life will fall into place. You will have the ability not to allow anyone to come into your life and torment you or hold you back. So self love, believe in yourself first and everything else will fall into place.
Interviewer: Lee Evans
Camera: Takashi Yoshida
Photos & Transcription: Lee Evans
Editor: Catherine Lee
© 1999, 2000 Evans Media Group, Inc.