Mariah Carey’s “Fantasy” (Bad Boy Remix ft. ODB) with Durand Bernarr

Hey, one song nation, we're off this week, but we wanted to share an episode from our archives where we dive deep into Mariah Carey's fantasy, specifically the Bad Boy Remix. And to help us break down the song, we enlisted Grammy Award-winning singer, songwriter and producer, Durand Bernard, who, since we recorded this episode, has really gone from being, you know, already a legendary background singer on songs by Erika Badu, and Anderson Pock and Katrinata to being wildly widely regarded as a superstar in his own right. If you have any awareness of Durand, you already know this episode is a wild one. We'll be back next week with a brand new episode until then, enjoy our episode on fantasy. In the house, we got Durand in the house, and we got Mariah Carey in the old dirty doggy in the house. And we'll see how this goes. This is one song. Yeah, I'm a little bit country, I'm a little bit rock'n'roll, I'm so soft. Yes. Listen, he started immediately on the one, I was like, no, we're gonna start on the two. He could have helped himself. It was innate. Lessons hot. We gonna work on it. You know, we practice on this for weeks, and I think it shows. Weeks. Now that we've established that everyone is in the house, it's time on one song to talk about a pop masterpiece, a collision of two worlds. You have the pop princess of the 90s, you know. We already know who this person is, but then we put her with Staten Island's grimey assembly, one of the first stars out of the Wutain clan, and we've got a song powered by, you know, one of the greatest hooks in, you know, history, it's like a song that like, if you were a certain age, you heard it on the radio, you seen it on a TV show, I'm gonna stop using hip-hop references, and I'm gonna talk about this song. The song is called Fantasy, the Bad Boy Remix, featuring Mariah Carey and old Dirty Bastard. This is fantasy, and this is one song. It's a sign and style, my sign and style girl. It's room vibe, here we go. I mean, the way her voice comes in, it always reminds me of being a DJ, because as a DJ, in that vocal comes in, like old Dirty always got the party hype, but when her vocal came in all pristine and perfect, it just sounded different coming out of those speakers, it always got the party hype, but I don't want to get ahead of ourselves luxury, tell us what we're talking about. Well, first of all, Zarant, welcome to the show, my friend, and it's nice to see you, I'm glad to have you in particular as a guest for this episode, I think it's a perfect match. I actually got a quick question, you were just humming the intro right there, how many voices, have you ever counted, how many different voices and characters and registers and ranges, Mariah is going a lot of places on this song, like what from the singer's perspective since you are yourself an incredible singer? When you hear it, does it sound complicated? What does it sound like to you? What are your feelings as a fellow singer when you hear this song? That's a big question I know. Yes. It's good to be seen and not viewed right now. Listening now as an adult, Mariah is the female Luther with a whistle register. Wow. When you really listen to their choices and how they approach things, it feels, but it's a lighter texture, you know, his was velvety hers is lighter and so that gives a different contrast to it. Now, I've always appreciated her voice. You're talking about Luther Vandross, obviously, like, there's really only one Luther, we're not. That's the Luther. I like what you're saying because there are a few people, some people have gratuitous runs. We don't need to name it. Come on gratuitous runs, but name of a great album, but she doesn't like, she really feels like she's like feeling everything and I can see, I never thought of it before I can see the connection to Luther. That's, that's, that's. She has also said that she sings her songs the way that she does because she didn't, she didn't want anyone else to sing them. Oh, yeah. It's impossible. Yeah. I've worked with, I will say as a comedy right, I've worked with some singers and it's amazing to me how the degree to which whether they say it or not, they are trying to make every song their own. They're like, oh, I don't want anybody else to be able to say this. I feel like it goes back to Stevie. I feel like, no, but it's hard to cover Stevie. Durand, as our guest, what is it about this song that means so much to you and do you have any sort of stories like the first time you heard it? Like, is there a connection you feel to fantasy? Hmm. Because okay, growing up, my mother didn't play a lot of, you know, secular music, you know, so it was a lot of jazz and gospel and whatnot and a little bit of new age in there. You know, that in you, that you play in the open class, you know, we can listen to that. Um, but there were some artists that I was able to sneak into the house, you know, like Jenna Jackson was contraband with the exhale, that was contraband, you know, but Mariah would get played on the jazz station. So Mariah was actually cool. So I could listen to Mariah and Whitney and Michael Jackson, you know, so I feel like Visions of Love was like a big song for Mariah like early on. See, my was can't let go. I can't speak for Visions of Love. I mean, that's great song. No, I can't let go. Oh, baby. Oh, just, I need AI to do a Luther, which I'm gonna call it, you know, swap on that song. We can hear what it would sound like. I think we're singing him singing don't let him sing it can't let go. You'll be like, ah, that's where it is. I mean, right now that's the sound of everybody who's listening to this doing exactly that. The Luther Mariah connection. So interesting because I heard her somewhere talking about how like Luther actually, I think she got some singing tips either directly or indirectly from his idea that like you should always only ever be in humid environments for your voice, like literally voice saving tips. But is there more to that connection like the like tell us more from a singing stand? Well, I'm so interested in the connection that you're making a few times now between Luther and Dross and Mariah Carey. Yeah, they actually have a song together as well, but it just clicked like there, it's interesting how these vocal titans can also influence each other and get tips from how to care for your voice, how to a placement, you know, like note placement. Like, oh yes, that's so key. I feel like note placement is more effective than the run. That's like where to place the note in time, like where to syncopate, how long to elongate it. There's so many details about singing that like I want to learn from you because it's like I'm a musician producer, but it is my weakness is like I just I can do my thing. And that's it. But you I've heard from from your amazing music and Mariah as we were talking about earlier with her meant with her multiple vocal range and the whistle, all this will get into it. But did you kind of over time have you kind of like gradually conquered maybe each area of singing separately or did it come naturally to you? Did you have a teacher like how did you learn to sing is my question. Uh, so I feel like singing learned me. You know, I didn't get a chance to take music serious, uh, first, it kind of it was there, you know, because both of my parents are musicians, uh, and they both sing as well. And also my cousins, you know, they're, they're musically inclined, you know, to, you know, to do their singing and choir or, you know, chorus or, you know, taking some kind of drama class, you know, so there's, there's all these ways in which we express ourselves through music. So it wasn't until I went on the road with my dad, uh, with earth when it fire when I was 16 and I was able to see like how you were, you were young, right? I was 16. You were 16. Yeah. And you're out there with Vardine. Vardine. And then the kind of Vardine. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I look good. Yeah. I smell good. How you doing? You all right. All right. All right. Yeah. So, you know, I used to see those guys sometimes. Yeah. That's an amazing impression. Mm-hmm. Yes. No, I love him. I love him. Diallo, please set the scene for us if you will. This song is released. It's 1995. Where are you? Where is Diallo Riddle in 1995? I am. And what do you think of Moriah at the time? I'm glad you bring it up. I was in, uh, I just, I was in college and, uh, you know, that's like a time when you're in college. Nobody can tell you anything about music. If you like music, you feel like, you know, just enough of what happened in the past. But you're like, right in the zeitgeist, you know exactly what's going on in the culture. - And you got your identity too. - And you got your identity-- - And I was firmly implanted in hip-hop by this point. You know, growing up, Michael Jackson and the pet shop boys. But like, at this time, I was 100% in hip-hop. And 1995, like, Mariah is cool, you know what I mean? Like, nowadays my wife is like, you know, she's of the perfect age where like Mariah is like her, Michael Jackson, Madonna, just given the age. And so like, she likes, you know some of those Mariah Carey songs and I'm like, you know, like, 'cause to me, that's not what I was trying to hear. Like, I was about Mary, I was about Faith. I was about like, you know, there were, there were R&B, you know, Queens at that time that like, you know, you just were impeachable. And I think the most interesting thing about this song that we're talking about today is that when it came out, it was like, wait a second, she's got a solo, dirty bathroom? Like, it was, you know, I always say Mariah, I'm sorry, Mary and meth with, you're all I need was like, that was like one of the first ones, it won a Grammy. Like, it was like, oh, this, when SWV did the remix of anything with Wu-Tang, like, we were like, yo, anything is possible now. - This is the crossover moment. - This is like when it was like, wait, he even Mariah is an apparently her, you know, her husband at the time, Tom and Batola runs the record label and he's not happy about this. He's like, you're throwing away all of the pop princess, you know, branding, if you will. - He's scared. - Yeah, he's like, there's no way this could work. But it was Mariah's idea. She was like, I wanna do a solo, old, very bastard. In her words, he reminds me of the uncle who's drunk at the, at the barbecue. - We always bring up these drunk uncles. And so she was like, I really want it to be him. So it's interesting also from a, let's get really granular on this. This is a time when, according to Nas, Wu-Tang and Bad Boy have beef because Wu-Tang feel like they represent where East Coast hip hop and New York hip hop is and they feel like Puffy is ruining it with, you know, all the Versacee Shades and talking about the whole thing. - I was curious about that, I hope you'd explain that to me. - Wu-Tang, Stan Nylon, Grimey, and here comes, you know, Puffy, like, I mean, by, you know, 1995 is a similar year. We talked about this on the show before. It's a very important year in terms of hip hop. It's the year that the one more chance remix by Biggie samples to barge. And suddenly, black radio stations that never played hip hop before, they were always R&B in the day and they might play hip hop at night. All of a sudden during the daytime, they're playing baby, one more chance. You know, like, it changes overnight. - That's a sound that wouldn't normally have changed now. - That junior mafia album came out, like, everything is changing, like, really rapidly, you know, during this time. And so 1995, Mariah does the solvo, Oh, Dirty Bastard. And we're gonna get into the shenanigans that take place in both the recording and the music video. But this was big. This was big because it showed how much, not just R&B, but now pop is now going to basically be singing over hip hop. - Yeah. - In ways that it hadn't been before. Now Mariah herself picked this sample. Genius of Love by Tom Tom Club. And let's hear a little bit of it. - Love this song. (upbeat music) - Here's what Mariah said about her use of that sample. I was listening to the radio and heard Genius of Love. And I hadn't heard it in a long time. It reminded me of growing up and listening to the radio and that feeling the song gave me seem to go with the melody and basic idea that I had for fantasy. I initially told Dave about the idea and we did it. We called up the Tom Tom Club 'cause, you know, they were like listed and they were really into it. I was like, the day that she's referring to as her producer, Dave Hall, who worked on records with a lot of artists including Mary J. Blige and Madonna. And here is how that Tom Tom sample, Tom Tom Club sample, sounds in the song. (upbeat music) - Sorry, I just laughed sometimes because there's so much going on there vocally. There's like 50 different ideas, but it works somehow. Like there's, (humming) and then there's like, maybe literally three different lines happening at once in a different way. It just made me laugh in that. - It's very, it's very charged. When you have like the (humming) - At our point. - It's all the different things. The top notes is doing something different from the main note and then they kind of come together at the end to kind of add this lush kind of cascade of different, yes. - But it reminds me of the Stevie Wonder, what we talked about with the Clavinets because like we did an episode about Stevie Wonder's superstition and when you isolate the Clavinets, there's like four different ideas on eight different tracks and they're all doing different things. But they're finding different syncopated pockets and different notes and that's why it works in the mix. And there's kind of an interesting parallel here too because each of those singers is singing a different note with a different rhythm, different lyric. Anyway, it's just, and in the mix it works. - I just love the idea of the right. I carry being in a car, listen to the radio, hearing a song she likes, each of you say, oh that's cool, let's call it the Tom Tom. - Okay. - Right. That's called access. - Yeah. - Yeah. - Now we do have a lawyer in the house, Les Aguam. And she was keen to note that Mariah has a songwriting credit on this song. Does Mariah get the props she deserves as a songwriter? I'm asking both of you. - I'd like to hear your opinion. - So she's been writing for a nice little while now. Some of the lyrics might tickle me. (laughs) - Right. - What's a lyric that tickles me? - Those chickens is ashen, I'm lotion. Why are you in my George Foreman? - Oh, that's good. I had to think about that one. - I had to think about that. That's good. - She mentioned something where she was saying Cheetos. I was just like (laughs) - So the answer is no. She's not getting the props she deserves as a songwriter. I mean, like-- - Well, depends on what she's writing. We don't know. - It depends on what she's writing. 'Cause I guess I'm just mentioning things that tickle me. But she's written like, she's had great songs. - No, I mean, yeah. And I think it wouldn't think that's very clear is that fantasy by Mariah Carey, like there are two popular versions of this song. And until we just played that other one, I had totally forgotten that there was one other than the old dirty, because I only really messed around with. - Well, we got to talk about the backstory of how we even came to this episode because we were talking about Mariah and trying to choose what Mariah songs should we do. And fantasy came up pretty quickly for me. 'Cause I love this song. I love the backstory which I'm about to go into with all the samples and interpolations. Like, that's my jam. Like, I can live for that. We're about to go down a really fun rabbit hole about that. But when we were talking about it, like, I did not, I mean, I'm raising my hand. Like, I first to admit, I did not know of the existence of the remix. - That's crazy to me. - I had never heard it. And Diallo. - 'Cause we're, we're. - It's not that he had never heard the original, but it's like, we absolutely had two different worlds there. - But maybe I had roundly avoided it. (laughs) - Wow. - But no, that's one thing I love about 90's hip-hop is that there was always a remix. And a lot of the times, the remix was a completely different song. - A completely different one. - With new vocals. - New vocals. Oh, by the way, I wanna talk about my favorite old dirty bastard song of all time. It is the radio edit of Brooklyn Zoo. Because as opposed to nowadays, when like you just drop out the curse words and even my kids are like, "Man, they're cursing a lot." 'Cause this is essentially like, you know, whole verses go away and stuff like that. In the early to probably mid 90's, there was a lot of just re-recording clean lyrics. So, you know, one of the first, one of the first where I really noticed it, "Oh, you know, sometimes the clean version is better." Is a deep cover. Because Snoop on the dirty version is like, "I got engaged at Uzi and my mother in 22." But on the edit is like, "I got engaged at Uzi and my nickel-plated 22." And I was as a writer, I was like, "Oh, nickel-plated 22?" Like it was more imagery that was forming in my brain. - Yeah. - Yeah. - But old dirty bastard takes the cake. He takes the cake when it comes to coming up with completely different lyrics. I'm gonna play you a snippet. And really, if you get a second, just go on YouTube or wherever you can find Brooklyn Zoo, clean at it. The whole song is like this. If you play the dirty version first and then the clean version, it's a completely different song. Some of the best ad-libs in history, I'm just gonna play a snippet. Here it goes. ♪ Who couldn't figure ♪ ♪ Y'all bought a new ♪ ♪ Who couldn't figure ♪ ♪ Y'all bought a new ♪ ♪ Who couldn't figure ♪ ♪ How to pull a gun trigger ♪ ♪ Get outta here ♪ - That is a sampling. There are so many sound effects. There are so many places where he just changes the lick like that one part. I think he says like without a good gun trigger, you crazy. Instead of that, he goes without pulling a gun trigger. ♪ Get outta here ♪ Like he screams, get outta here. And I just feel like that's some stuff that you would never come up with. - A better choice, frankly. - It's a better song. It was Wily Coyote building in the song. Like he brought Looney to it. He brought the acme. He brought the acme. Yes. Now, Lex, you're going to take us on how we go from Tom Tom Club to fantasy to Lotto. You're going to take us through the hole. You just know I'm going to have a great time with this. And everyone, you're all going to have a great time with this interpolation, interpolation, sampling rabbit hole. It all begins this 1981. And one of my favorite parts about this journey is especially at the top half of it. There's a lot of. We're going to talk in a later episode about the history of remixes and about Jamaica, which I'm so excited for because I'm a big Jamaica and dub buff. But there's a lot of Jamaica in the original song in the original sample. So really quickly, the Tom Tom Club, for those who don't know, this is half of the band talking heads. It's the husband and wife team of Tina Weymouth on bass and Chris friends on drums. And they're on a break. They go down to Bahamas, Compass Studios. And the first Jamaican connection here is that Compass Point is owned by Chris Black. Well, of Island Records, in other words, the guy who made Bob Marley famous. So right off the gate, we've got Slian Robby R in the next rooms, seeking a reggae. They are in the middle of 1981 of a new era of reggae that they kind of pioneer. And Steven Stanley is their producer, a Jamaican man, who's also a co-writer of the song. So they are, they're steeped in what is at the time, kind of a new sound of dub and sort of extended remixes. So on day one, they're thinking Jamaica, they're thinking sampling, they're thinking remix is interestingly baked into this song already when it's made is this idea of like reusing and repurposing other songs and other material. That's the core of Jamaica. Again, big time, big time, deep dive in another episode. If I could just jump in real quick, there's one other part that I think is worth mentioning, which is that, you know, if you think about the first bebop song, you know, like what are the first by Charlie Parker is a song called Coco where he admits like, you know, that is my interpolation, if you will, of Cherokee by Ray Noble, which could come out like 20 years earlier. So I think that in a lot of these, you know, American and African American and Jamaican music forms, there is this tradition of like taking something from about 20 or 30 years back. And then just, you know, revving it up and making it more modern. And I think that's one of the coolest things about this, this particular song is that it just keeps coming back, you know, every, you know, other generational. Yeah, we're about to hear that same snippet, which you've already heard a lot on the show a lot more times. It is one of the most sampled licks of all time that two bars of drums and bass that we keep hearing throughout this episode. So getting back to Tom Tom Club, genius of love in part inspired by a song called more bounce to the ounce by zap, which I'll play a little snippet for you right now. In particular, the beat and the very slowed down funk beat and the big delicious clap, one of my favorite claps. Imagine setting your makeup, then forgetting it's even theirs. Meet new grippy setting mist from Mavily New York. Gel to mist technology locks in your look for up to 24 hours with flexible all day comfy grip. No tightness, no stickiness, no residue, just plump, dewy hydrated skin that still feels like your skin. Try new grippy setting mist from Mavily New York. Maybe it's maybe lane. Oh my god, I can listen to trout man. Black people just be inspired every time. I know, because all I can think, all I hear is zap rock now when I hear, you know, the top box. Yeah, man, I mean, like I just imagine those two fridge guys being like, that's the sound. Yeah, I mean, like that stuff is wonderful. It is deep, it is wonderful. And they love that beat. So they tried to do something with a similar beat. 103 BPM slowed down. And to get that clap talking about Jamaica. I mentioned before when they recorded it, Slian Robbie were in the next room. And they actually get a shout out on the song. This is that song where they mentioned bohanin, bohanin, bohanin, James Brown. That's another thing I wanted to talk to you about with this song is this is an example. They have like 50 different voice ideas in the song Genius of Love, which is why another connection to me with Mariahs, like all of these different ways of presenting vocal material, like all the different ways to do it. It's so interesting. So I want to get your opinion about that before we move on. Like, is this a song that means as much to you as it did to Mariah maybe? Are you a fan of Genius of Love? I do like the song. Yeah. I love it and it wasn't until I started DJing. I was just like, no, I need to add this in there because I might be more prone to play the original than the just to remind people where these songs came from. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. But then you can always go into one of the other songs. Absolutely. Absolutely. I love it. But one of my favorite parts is what you're going to do when you get out of jail. I'm going to have some fun. I love it. I just love just the different conversations. Where's that conversation? Take it by the way. Yeah. I mean, just like, and I'm meeting the lady's room by climax. You know, at the beginning of the song, she's talking about, oh, I need to get myself together. Where's my jury? Oh, can we talk? I need to know. I need to know. You know. Right. I know what that means. I don't seem to studio 54 documentary. So Slian Robby are in the next studio, Tom Tom Club, Chris and Tina are like, come on in here. Come on in here. Contribute to the song. We just gave you a shout out. We love your music. So they come in there. And they record three layers of claps. So the claps you hear on this song are they went through the whole seven minute long version. And just 20 minutes, of course, no clap looping. It's 21 minutes of Slian Robby on claps in this in the mix in there. Wow. Yeah. Which is really amazing. So as I mentioned, this is one of the most ample songs of all time. It's in the canon as a song itself and as a reuse use. So it's been sampled. It's been interpolated. One of the more famous ones. One of the earliest ones is this is Grand Master Flash and the Furious 5. And it's actually not a sample. It's an interpolation. It's nasty. I'm trying to get some rapping. Here you go. Nice to meet you too. You know, I would have loved to be that guy who's auditioning to be a rapper from just like famous rappers back then. You come here like, I got those skills. They're really good. They're like, no, you're doing it wrong. I don't know. There's so much wrong about it. It's not just me, right? I want to see those people audition. Oh god. They all have the same voice. Yeah. Well, and I'd be remiss if I didn't include this one sample out of many return of the max. And it's just the beat. Oh, I was about to say. Okay. Really? That's Slian Robbie on those claps, right? Now we know. Woo. That's a distinctive clap. Come on. Yeah. Yeah. He's like a more. More. More interesting. He's more of a vote, more vocally interesting version of Keith Sweat. Because you know, because Keith Sweat being all about it. Yeah, we got it. But he's like, one of my favorite things about Return of the Mac. And long time, the service I showed others is that it is Chuck E. Booker's. I'm going to say why? Why you want to play? I mean, just that one note. Shout out to Chuck E. Booker. Chuck E. Booker, man. Like that. I got to go well and check on him. I just randomly did a wellness check on Jason James Richter and Le Chat. Uh-oh. They're all doing well. Okay. We was worried. Is this a like a service that you like? Randomly, I was really thinking about what happened to that little boy that was on free willy. Let me just see. Okay. He's late. It was a week ago. All right. You know, check on the chat, you know, but you need some gum. Like some thunder. You know, just how are these people doing? You know, I might be one of those on a big tuck. I'm like, where's it? Yeah, it's still random wellness check and go on Twitter and be like, you all, I was thinking about such and such. And they all right. All right. So that's genius of love. That's Tom Tom Club. And we have the origin. We have samples. We got interpolations all over the place. But it is also the bedrock of Mariah Carey's fantasy, which is the bedrock itself of the song ostensibly we're talking about today, which is the remix. So layers are layering in real time right in front of our very eyes. Let's get into Mariah Carey's fantasy. This is from 1995. We talked a little bit about producer co-writer Dave Jamhall. As I was doing my research, I learned the fact that I did not know. Besides having produced Mary J. Blight is what's the 4011. Do you know who producer Dave Jamhall was married to at the time this record was made? Nope. Tell us. Ms. Wanda Sykes. What? I did not notice. I did not notice. I didn't know that. True fact. Maybe Wanda didn't know that. Oh, okay. Wanda made it in the studio. The day the song was recorded for all I know. We do not know. But he did what's the 4011 for Mary? He did Mary's 4011. What's the 4011? He had a hot hand because I'll tell you, man, these are huge records. It's huge records. It's a huge, huge record. Yeah. The bedrock of fantasy is a two-bar loop of genius of love. And on top of it, there's some light synth sprinkled. I'm going to play you a little moment. Here's just from the instrumental backing track. In the mix, you may not even notice this because it's very, very minor. But it does add a little bit of juice. So here is the fantasy instrumental and some of the additional sauce. It is really cool, I've never noticed this before. I'd never notice that little, it's almost like a rose or something like that, but it's really buried. It almost sounds like a vocoder. Oh yeah, cause she up in here. Yeah. Yeah. You don't hear all that. So, you know, but not that's real pretty. It's really pretty. Yeah, it's really basic. And it kind of mirrors sweet, sweet, fancy. Any conversation about Mariah and especially this song would be, I'd be remiss to not mention something that only Mariah can do and that's this. That's called the whistle tone. Oh my God. Can you do the whistle? What is it? Mariah can do? We don't forget about Betty and Minnie. Wow. I was going to get into Minnie in a second. I mean, modern day. Let me reset. You're absolutely right. It's not the only one, but she is certainly known for it in the modern era. Oh yeah. The way she colored her whistle and the approach, yeah, she started that. As a singer, when you hear that, what does it mean to you as a, like, is it something that you've ever tried to do or used? Is it achievable by mortals? What's the story with the whistle? I look at it as this tiny hole in your throat that you can push air out of and if you can get sound out of it, then, and also men are, because we can get lower. If we can access a whistle, we can always have a brighter range than that. Is it true? I'm going to be the dumb layman here. Is it true that women don't have a real falsetto? So men have falsettos. Women have head voices. It's just a term. It's just a term. Yeah. But they're both technically the head voice. Is that right? Yes. It's just that when we're doing our false, it's a false note because that's not our natural, you know what I'm saying? Yeah. I always had a pretty good falsetto. Yeah. That was my sweet spot. Yeah. I love your falsetto. Yeah. I appreciate that. I appreciate that. I should later. What's that? I said I want to hear it later. Okay. But you got some rest, you know? Yeah, because that whistle tone, from what I understand, it's like, we, humans aren't really sure how it's produced because you can't actually get a camera, but I understand, like, in the epiglottis. It's like, it's very, from a medical standpoint, it's beyond what I could understand. But like, there's a little mystery to how it is actually produced. It's one of those things that you just kind of feel and aim and practice until you get, I suppose? It's literally how it was for me, because I found it out, I found out that I had a whistle by laughing. What? Like it would just be this screech, like, oh, there it is. Like, all of that, like, all of that is range, that's range, it's just, and it's a note, you know what I'm saying? But you find it by accident. Yeah. Yeah, it just happened. You're like, oh, I got it right. And then literally a friend was like, you should try that next time you record a song, like, try to access that. Right. And then you just spend time with it and then you learn how to access it sometime. Well, except for, I'm sorry, no, no, no, please, except for when Laila had the way to try to teach me the, the two note thing, I thought I was going to hurt myself. Oh, I'm singing two notes at once. Yeah. A chord. And any, any time that I do, I did hit two notes when I did during Sam's vibe on Tiny Desk. But that wasn't on purpose. Oh, wow. That was not on purpose. I just knew that I, it was there. I just knew the whistle was there. Wow, it was going well, okay. You know, this thing pays a mortgage. You have one of the best voices out there period. It's amazing what you're able to do. And by the way, as a coming right, I'll say you, you do it in very funny ways. Like your sense of humor is still there. I always respect Fountain Coleman as somebody who I have a great deal of respect for. Because he reached out to us on comedy. And it was, you know, and we already knew a little brother, but then it was like, oh man, you know what? Now we think about all of them. A little hilarious. Yeah. So, yeah, I think that comedy and music often go together. And since you mentioned it, I'd be remiss if in the conversation about Mariah Carey and the whistle. If I didn't play a little bit of mini-reportant for you, this is, this is maybe the most famous whistle prior to Mariah. And this is "Love In You" from 1975. It's so great. Shani's and Shante More Cover in this song is amazing. I spit, especially when Shante does it because then she goes, she goes higher. She was just chirping. She was up here chirping, talking to the clouds. It's a magical sound. It's like a Disney movie or something. Of course, a lot of people know this, but if you didn't, that's my Rudolph's mom singing. That's my Rudolph. Absolutely. I didn't, I only found this out when I was researching, but at the very end of the song. Listen to what she sings. Yeah. Sing, "Maya, Maya, Maya, Maya, Maya, Maya, Maya, Maya, Maya, Maya." Sing, "Maya, Maya, Maya." How did I miss that? How did I miss that? We all missed that. Maya didn't miss that. But I've worked with Maya Rudolph on the publications and they talk about it a lot. I got to miss that type of thing. Maya Rudolph was in the room, young baby Maya, and that's what she's singing. I love that. A sweet moment there. All right, so that's Mariah. That's fantasy. That's the original version. We came here today to talk about the remix. The Bad Boy Remix featuring ODB was done by Puff along with his fellow Bad Boy hitman member, machine Myrick. So, do you all break it down for me? What did this remix mean to hip hop? How did it change things? I mean, again, I, you know, I was, I was, I feel like I was immersing the same, both as like a DJ and an active listener. I was buying all the mix tapes. And I do think that, you know, this was one of the times when we realized hip hop wasn't just taking over R&B, it was taking over pop. And I feel like for the next 10 to 15 years, almost all hip hop, I mean, I'm sorry, almost all pop and definitely R&B, it was, it was so heavily in hip hop. Influence that it was hard to figure out where hip hop ended and where R&B began or where pop began. You know what I mean? So, I remember, especially like when everybody really started singing like, you know, like when Drake started like to really do his thing, like by 2009, it was like, man, is it hip hop if they don't rap one verse, you know, if it's just all singing. Right. This even count as hip hop. Yeah. Some of my notice like people were calling, you know, like some of the greats, I'm talking about Lauren Hill, Miss Education, you know, like there's some songs down there where she doesn't really, you know, rhyme a verse like she sings, you know, the entire song. So I feel like we had already been heading in that direction. But definitely for the next 10 to 15 years, like that's all that we were until pop sort of became kind of where it currently lives, which I always say, like right now, most pop singers like the Dua Lipa, they're singing over what is essentially EDM is singing over like, you know, if you took their vocals off and you put a few more techno flares in there, it would be a straight up dance track. But you know, for quite some time, it leaves from 95 until 2010, you could make the argument that hip hop was for the lack of a better term pop. All, you know, hip hop had all the biggest artists, you know, from ludicrous to TI, Miss Yeliot, we were definitely driving that culture for a long time. And I do feel like as many people have noticed that has changed, you know, like now, you know, a lot of what is hip hop with the exception of ironically of the women, you know, I think that, you know, if you were to ask who are the big male hip hop stars, like they're not the household names the way that they were, you know, now it's, it's mainly about, you know, the parties, the Megan's, you know, Sawidi, Ice Spice. But there was a time when, you know, hip hop was just was running things. And I feel like this was a point where hip hop and pop really merged in a way that it did, you know, now it almost seemed pass A. Like, you know, no heads would turn if, you know, I mean, do it, but literally do the song with the baby. So I mean, like, and nobody cared, you know, they judged it on the merits of the song. Like the time when like you could take a pop princess and put it with a hip hop person. That seems very pass A. I got to ask you real quick, what's your favorite remix of all time? Oh, it's between me and Cianca's new phone, who this, or me and our relantics is remixed to FaceTime. You know, I was got to plug myself. No, I love it. I love it. This is something I know about you. But if we're talking about a remix that like, ain't it funny is a good one that they say, fun. Oh, and the Rex, the Teddy Riley remix to a bumps, no, no, no, that's M. C. Hammel. All I want to do is zoom a zoom, yeah, the remix, the remix, wow, I think we had to play a little bit of that. Oh, oh, oh. But you know what? Hold that. Hold that. Love like this by faith. Hello. Hello. Okay. That song. You got a hundred dollar bill, put your hands up. Okay. You know what? We should talk about that song. - I will say, let me just pull it up. 'Cause that's not the name of it. It's not called that. It's called, um, God, it's Fat Man Scoop. - Is it love like this? - Yeah, love like this. ♪ Never had someone to show me love ♪ ♪ I'm like this before ♪ - What show's Odex on? - Be Faithful is the name of the song. I'm gonna pull the DJ card and say, I knew it. It's called Be Faithful. - Oh yes it is, yes it is. - Yes it is. - And that song. - Yes it is. - Okay. - I did not know that. - When that song came out. This is a DJ story real quick. When that song came out, let me tell you, it drove me nuts because I would say from the time it came out, probably like 2002, somewhere in there, until, like honestly, like 2010. I had to hear that song five times. It was unavoidable. When I was writing an early script, I actually had my character go to five different clubs on one night and every single club he went into was playing that song. And it's like, what show's Odex on? You notice from Save the Last Dance? That's why it really popped off. - Is that what it really did? - It's just like how the Joe Budden song was in one movie. - A fire. - A pump, pump it up. Da, da, da, da, da. I think it's the first step to the streets. - Oh I know that, but his song Fire was in Mean Girls. - Fire is in Mean Girls, you're right. You're right, there were certain movie usages that made these songs ubiquitous. But I will say, you're right. It's an absolutely fantastic use of faith and about two other songs. It's got the engine, engine. - Engine, no, no, no. - No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. You're okay, I said, like, if my dream was all the time, pick it up, pick it up, pick it up, pick it up. - Bass drop! Who's fucking tonight? You know, like you had all that stuff. We have gotten off top it, but we're talking about Big Club hits. And one big club, it was of course, the fantasy remix, featuring ODB after the break. We'll be back with more on this song. And we will talk about her collaborate on this song. I'm talking about Asan Unique, Dirty As Man Alive, Dirty McGurt, DJ Koolie Hot, Jo Bananas, the specialist Dirty Dog, Osiris, Osiris, Dirty McDurch, their big baby Jesus himself, the old Dirty Dog. I had to say it like that 'cause I said it on this song, presumably for radio. He's just two of his friends, old Dirty Bastard. And we're gonna talk about that. - Russell. - Let's do the break. Well, he's Russell Jones to his mom, but that is his ODB and we'll be right back. - Imagine setting your makeup, then forgetting it's even theirs. Meet new grippy setting mist from Mabelie, New York. No tightness, no stickiness, no residue. Just plump, dewy, hydrated skin that still feels like your skin. Try new grippy setting mist from Mabelie, New York. - Maybe it's Mabelie. - Welcome back to one song. Now, I wanna change things up a little bit. Wanna tell a story, the story of how old Dirty Bastard got on this track and how he worked on this track. Now, recording a fantasy. Like we said, record label wasn't happy with it. Tommy Matola, her husband is not happy about it, but Mariah was like, I want to do this song specifically with my drunk uncle, Dirty Bastard. And true to form, they set up some record time and old Dirty Bastard showed up three hours late and apparently had been drinking all day. - Oh gosh, I was gonna ask if he was nebriated for real. - He was not sober. - He instincts were right on me. - He showed up and one of the first things he said was he needed Moette and Newports. And it was apparently, 'cause he was three hours later around midnight, I feel like in New York now you could find Moette and Newports at midnight. But maybe in 1995, that wasn't a thing. So they tell the interns who I guess are all white to go get him Moette and Newport. So it's like, we probably can't find that. He tells them that they were, he said, "You also white devil, y'all don't want black people "and a half." (laughing) So the white devil's went to go get Moette and Newports. They searched for an hour. They came back with Heineken's, he was irate. I got to say, if I'm old Dirty Bastard, I'm kinda team old Dirty Bastard out of that. Like Heineken is not Newport, he apparently took the Newport. I mean, he took the Heineken's. We'll never find out if they found the Newport's. He took the Heineken, he smashed it on the ground. He was like, all right, let's work. (laughing) He records the famous line, Mia Mariah, go back like babies and pacifiers. Which is just an amazing song. It's just an amazing lyric for any song, but he accomplished that line. Should we hear that line from the song? Go for it. All right, here we go. Heine Mariah, go back like babies and pacifiers. And that was it. He recorded that line and he's like, I need to sleep. (laughing) He lays down and goes to sleep apparently for a whole hour. Everybody's just sitting around waiting him for, you know, to wake up and do some more. Old Dirty gets up. He records the next line. Old Dirty Dog, no liar. Keep your fantasy hot life fire. And then went back to sleep for another 45 minutes. At some point in the evening, he tells the engineer, he's like, hey, I hope you got your shit right because I ain't doing it twice. I have a theory about that. I have a theory he wasn't actually talking to the engineer. I think that was his next verse. Make sure you got your shit set right because I ain't doing it twice. It almost rhymes too much. I think he was still right. They should have put it in. Some bars. He goes to sleep again. This time, apparently he kicked off one shoe in the whole studio. It smelled terrible. There was some other stuff that he might have done. I'm not gonna go into it. You can find the story online. I don't want y'all to tune out. But like, it's a mess. And by the way, the whole time, Tommy Metola and Mariah are calling every hour in the hour, asking, how's it going? Like, is it going well? Like, what are you recording? So it took them all night to record that one verse. And if you listen to it, you hear that his voice feels very punched in. Like, it's not like one continuous take. Like, there's a reason why. Like, even some lines, like, I'm a little bit country. I'm a little bit rock and roll. I'm sold a soul. Like, if you listen to that part in particular, like, the lyrics are like, lapped over each other. Not for effect, but just because they just didn't line up. - Just one idea at a time. - Yeah, it was just one idea at a time. - But you know, when you write, me and Mariah go back like, baby, fast, fast. - You take it up. - You listen. - Listen. - Long nap. - He might have known in his brain. You know what? This is good enough to be a part of hip-hop history. - Yeah. - So he leaves the studio. They finally play the track from right into I'm a teller. And this story doesn't go the way you think it's gonna go. They loved it. From the first time they hurt it, they knew they had a hit. So they said, hey, that was really good. Can you get old, very bastard to come back and add more cities? We like when he said New York is in the house. The engineers are like, no, I don't know if you know this, but like he's gonna charge us the same amount all the, like $15,000, which is a lot of money back in 1995. But maybe not that much for a Mariah Carey song. But they're like, no, no, no, we need more cities. We need more towns. Like we love that part. So he gets another 15 grand to come back. Chapter Corey Summers, by the way, the guy who told this story 'cause he was there that night. He came back and he added more cities. That's when he adds Japan. Because if it sounds like he's just throwing out places, well, there's a reason for that. Because he's just in the studio. And by the way, when he came back to record those other places, he was apparently hung over and tired. So he didn't fall to sleep a bunch of times, but you're working with an even more grumpy, old dirty bastard. So that to me is part of the genius of old dirty. You hear about Hank Williams. When you hear about country, you hear about, oh, they had to give Keith Richards a whole new set of blood because his blood was so tainted, like they had to, like these are stories told about other people. But I feel like we don't know all the stories about our friends in hip hop in the same way. And to me, this story is like, I don't know if I want to be there that night, but I'm happy that it happened. I'm happy that a man could be so free as to insult the interns, smash a bottle of beer on the, make people wait while he sleeps, subject them to smells and then take all night to record. One of the shortest verses, I think, on a feature that you're ever gonna come across, but you know what, it worked for him, it worked for old dirty. I mean, like, I don't know. Is there a part of you as an artist who, I'm not, you seem like a very good individual. But is there a part of you that secretly likes to, like, would love to be just unhinged, just unhinged for once? I am unhinged, but I am not unhinged in a way, at least to my experience from myself, 'cause I have to live with myself, but also the people around me, that are not, yes, man. I can be unhinged with my transparency in my honesty, but it's never to, like, truly hurt somebody's feelings. I'm a joke like I'm a jokester you know I can if I can find some areas where we can, we can joke and throw a little read in there like that's, that's cute. You're not hurting anybody. No, no. No, no. No, and I think they listen. The people here at one saw, we do not promote bullies, so to speak, but every now and then it's just something fun. I think I enjoyed this. I think because honestly, this is getting really real. I think because I am just generally such a polite person, that the same way like British humor is always based on people being loud and saying things obnoxious that they would never say because they're also, but I feel like sort of the same way, like it's fun for me to hear these stories about old dirty bastard and Rick James just being unhinged like not. Oh, Rick James at all. Rick James was a whole nother level of unhinged, but James Brown was another one, especially for those people. Absolutely. I mean, I love to me, I just, I love old dirty bastard. I think he was one of the most innovative rappers of all time. We're talking today about fantasy with Mariah Carey, but like we're talking about the same guy that got your money, you know what I'm saying, shimmy, shimmy, y'all, shimmy, shimmy, y'all. I mean, you know, nowadays we look at old dirty and we think, man, maybe, maybe, maybe we needed to be better friends, maybe we needed to help this man, but what do you think about that? I mean, like, what do you think about old dirty's, you know, what made him great and, you know, what's his legacy in hip-hop? I think, in my mind, his legacy just being a human being is how many different dynamics there are. He's different nuances to how our brains process things, the psychology behind things that we've experienced and how we cope with it. I think that's right. Yeah. And also just not having, maybe not having access to therapy, exactly at that time. This is not at a time where black people are unpacking things. Right. Let's unpack that. That's so true. You know, we didn't, you know, so it's the role of, like, you know, where was hip-hop on mental illness? Why? I think that we were definitely weren't talking about it back then, you know what I mean? Like, the idea of a therapist, you know, we were still a little bit away from that. Yeah. Totally. I mean, and, you know, again, I think to a certain extent, you know, I just love a good story. I mean, the idea that this guy was a fugitive, but he was still showing up at concerts. You know, when they dropped the W in 2000, he was already on the run from, he'd, like, literally run out of rehab, like, he was at a rehab in Pasadena, California, and they said we got to take it down to the, to the court, and do just said, I'm not doing that and ran away. And like they said, well, we don't have, you know, this is not a rehab where we, you know, restrain me by, like, you just lay around away. And so for the next couple of months, he was showing up at concerts, showing up at record release albums. He doesn't get caught until he's in Philadelphia, signing autographs at a McDonald's drive-through. And they said that the crowd got so big when people coming up to get signatures from ODB that the cops didn't know who was over there causing a commotion. They just went over there because they're like, who are all these people hanging out McDonald's drive-through when they figured out that he had bench warrants. That was when they took him back in. But I mean, like, to me, this is, this is who Old Dirty Bastard was, like, and his cousin, the Rizsa said, my cousin was a genius. He was like, Old Dirty Bastard was a genius. And until a certain extent, I feel that way. I feel like he was untethered by social norms. And I'm not, obviously, he did some things that, you know, are not excusable or funny. But, you know, just from an artistic point of view, there's a part of me that respects that, sort of, wild man that he was, you know what I mean? So where do we land after all this MRI, Carrie, like, do we, you know, what do you as a performer, you know, take away from this artist and this time? I think she's an artist to definitely study from the, from the ways in which she has honed her skills. Yeah. And not only the singing in the writing as well. So, yeah, and also take a listen to Luther to see where those, where those worlds meet, because there are also other ways in which artists, like I said, influence and inspire each other. I love how you are, you know, not afraid to champion yourself. I actually truly appreciate that because I think sometimes, you know, we weren't credit for being like, you know, humble and not sort of putting our names of the conversation on stuff. But quite frankly, there is so much music, there's so much TV, there's so much culture out there that sometimes if you're not actively out pushing yourself, like, it's really easy to get lost in the mix. Absolutely. That being said, who are, you know, they don't have to be, they could be current, they could be in the past. Who are like the three artists that, you know, you feel, I'm not even going to say inspire you, but, you know, make you like, oh, yeah, you know, like, this is, this is why I'm an artist. I want to make something to make someone feel the way I feel when I listen to blank. Okay. I can actually just give you my Mount Rushmore, and it's of ladies, gentlemen, and then we have the personality and the foundation of which that's those things sit on. So on the lady side, we have Badu, Phyllis Heiming, Lisa Fisher, and Sarah Vaughan. And of course, I got to give our honorable mention to Jill Scott and Layla Hathaway. Then over here on the gentleman side, we have B Slay formerly known as the gospel singer Tony, we have Rick James, we have Nate Dawg, and we have Luther. And then of course, as an honorable mention over there, we have Philip Bailey of Earth, Wind and Fire, and we have Crash Cut. Leave on Bennett. If you don't know who that is, just go ahead and look him up. All right. That's hilarious. It'll make sense. Okay. And then the personality side down here, that those two things sit on. We have Little Richard, Bugs Bunny, Babs Bunny. We have Jim Carey, specifically from Liar, Liar, Ace Ventura, and The Mask. My parents took me to go see The Mask at the movie theater. Who's Babs Bunny? Babs Bunny. Okay. Okay. So that's from Tiny Toons. Yeah. And so you got Buster and Babs Bunny. And so the like the grand children, like of just the new bunnies that are coming up. And Babs is me and I am Babs. Okay. And then of course, we step into this world. Ricky Smiley, Dave Chappelle, Arnez Jay, Monique, Stephen Wright, Bo Burnham, Jamie Fox. There you go. Like these are, I'm also inspired by comedians. I was going to say you have almost as many, if not more, a comedy. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So I grew up on that. You know. So it's, you know, it's funny. There's actually some overlap in your list because when I was talking to Neil Brennan, he said, I knew Dave Chappelle was great because he seemed like Malcolm X and Bugs Bunny had a child. And I was like, yeah, I absolutely see that the whole way through. And I think, look, we talked about Mariah doing sort of pop R&B and then becoming, you know, one of the people who was merging it with hip hop, where R&B goes next. None of us can say for sure, but I can say that this group of people here feel like you absolutely are part of that future. And we want to thank you for coming through today. Absolutely. So much to ran. Where can we find you on the internet? Yes. I'm so glad you asked. Yeah. So you can find me on the TikToks and the Instagrams and the Twitter's. And your mama called your mama named you Twitter and that's what I'm going to call you. So yeah, if you say X, nobody knows. What's the handle? Yep. Durambanar. D-U-R-A-N-D-B-E-R-R-N-A-R-R-R. And that's also my website as well. You can find merch. We also got socks. Make sure you get your little bit. Hey, we got it. Come on. I'm wearing socks. I'm wearing socks with the face right now. I love tubes. Michelle Obama. Yeah. Yes indeed. I will buy some face socks. They're called the little bits. And we got mango butter too far to dry face to the emphasis when I make sure that you know, you stay moisturized. But I want you out here in these streets looking crazy. I feel personally attacked. Listen, listen, listen. But I'm also going to find a solution. Okay. I'm going to state the problem, but in that same breath, we're going to provide the solution. You know, that's what you're going to learn about me. I'll tell a joke, but I never tell you a lie. I got off a plane. Luxury. Help me in this thing. All right. Well, I'm producer DJ and songwriter Luxury. It's L-U-X-X-U-R-Y on the internet. And I'm actor, writer, director and sometimes old dirty DJ, Diallo Riddle. You can find me at Diallo D-I-A-L-L-O on Instagram or Diallo Riddle on TikTok. And this is one song we will see you next time. Yay. Woo. Baby, baby, come on, baby, come on, baby, come on. ♪ Walk by every night ♪ ♪ Talk your street and look inside ♪ ♪ I get kind of thick as a knife ♪