Q: Do you feel you got enough credit for your role in creating that song? A: They didn't shout us out when they got the Grammy Award for best rap performance by a duo or group , but we got the check laughs. Q: Do you feel your songs have benefited from being sampled so extensively during the hip-hop era?
A: In so many instances it's like having a second song. In most instances, they use four bars and build another melody and title on it. If it's a strong four bars it'll often send the young listener back to the original song. It's like a musical history lesson. Q: When you and Nick wrote together, would you ever argue? A: Oh, yeah, sure. Sometimes you want a person to read your mind and the other person can't. Nick would say, "Those chords don't have enough purple in them.
But we didn't ever think anything was finished or couldn't be re-approached, or be made better. Even if I can't find that chord today, it might come to me tomorrow. We'd rewrite the same song several times. It's easy to take it personally, but it helps if you know you have more than one idea.
I always knew there'd be another approach. And he was enough of an artist that I would want to make him happy. To me something might be good, but if he's not feeling it, it made me want to work harder to find another way to do it.
Q: You also had quite a bit of success singing jingles in the '60s and '70s. How did you juggle that with your songwriting career? A: In the early part of it I was very active. In fact, it almost became a bone of contention. I was making so much money doing jingles, these and second things, that it drove Nick to work with another producer at Motown for a while.
It made me realize I was going to lose my writing partner if I didn't take my work with Nick more seriously. But it was such easy work and such good money, high six-figure money. I was a good sight reader and I could sing two or three of these jingles a day.
An orchestra would come in for half an hour, and then the singers would come in and knock 'em out, and go on to the next one. I was the voice of Budweiser "When you say Bud, you've said a lot of things nobody else can say" , and Almond Joy "Sometimes you feel like a nut, sometimes you don't". Do I cringe when I hear them now? No, but I realized it was taking away from my dream of wanting to be a respected writer, so I cut back.
Q: You transitioned from being behind the scenes in the '60s and early '70s as songwriters and producers to performing and recording as Ashford and Simpson in Was performing your own material always the goal? A: No, the goal was to be songwriters first. We did a public-television show called "Soul! They got so many letters, which clued us in that maybe we should try this. The timing was right. Our contracts at Motown, which were for seven years, were up around We asked them about being recording artists, and they were going to placate us, string us along, but they wanted us to remain a writing machine for the acts they had.
They weren't taken with us as artists. I had done two solo albums for them, which they didn't do much to sell or promote. So the handwriting was on the wall to go somewhere else and do it. That's when we signed to Warner Bros. Q: You come from an era where you had to write no matter how you felt. How did you keep it from feeling like work? A: We knew we could write decent songs, but then there are inspired songs. There are songs you don't even think you wrote because they're so good.
There is a formula that allows you to write a decent song. I usually just start playing and he'd start singing, his words would fall down on the chords, I'd join in, and we'd find the harmonies, the hook.
You don't talk or fix anything at first. You want to ride that mist as long as you can before you interrupt. Q: You have to play a long time to get to that intuitive place as a musician and artist, I'd imagine. You started playing as a child, right? Simpson takes things a step at a time, with some days being better than others. Being in the company of friends and family has also helped to soften the blow. Women with Will.
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