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This is Matt Fyffe, R & B Guru. Today with me is Calvin Richardson, the soulful singer behind the albums Country Boy, 2:35PM and most recently, When Love Comes, which hit stores earlier this year.
Calvin’s been in the game for a long time now, and he’s worked with artists including Chico DeBarge, K-Ci Hailey, Angie Stone and many more.
Calvin, it’s great to have you with us today.
It’s good to be here Matt.
So I thought to start things off, we’d go over your latest album When Love Comes. It came out in May and it’s been doing pretty good. Can you tell us a little more about it.
It’s my latest cd after a five year hiatus. My last album came out in
2003, I was on Hollywood Records then. I took some time off after I left Hollywood Records in 2006. I bought a studio and just started recording stuff, getting my legs up where I wanted to be. I wanted to finally make an album when I didn’t have a label breathing down my neck. When Love Comes is the product of that.
How do you think working as an independent artist has influenced your music?
Basically, it’s just me. I chose the direction. I wrote all the songs. I produced a majority of the songs. For the first time in my career, the world gets to hear Calvin Richardson and me being me.
Looking at it as just you being you, did any themes come out in the songs as you wrote and performed them?
I wanted to stay true to my soulful background. I used some inspiration.
Things like a song from Curtis Mayfield. I listen to a lot of Curtis Mayfield to get in the right mindset. There was no real theme to the album, other than me staying true to soul music. I wanted to have a up-tempo contemporary feel as well, to keep my balance in place. Just talk about real things like I always do. But like a lot of times I’ve experienced in the past, certain songs I would write and want to record, the record label would want to have another producer take a stab at it.
How do you think the album compares to a lot of the music out there today?
To me, there’s no real comparison. It’s just totally different from what’ s out there. There’s some artists out there contributing to real music, but as a whole, I think it’s different from everything out there. I don’t get caught up in trying to make records for the radio. I make records of what I feel and what’s real. If the radios play it, that’s all good. They don’t, that’s even better as long as the fans can connect to it and they get it, I’m cool.
What tracks do you like most on the album?
Man that’s tough. I really love “Sang No More." “Sang No More" was my mind state after I left Hollywood Records. The industry is just so controlled and driven by mainstream. I really didn’t wanna be in the industry anymore.
It wasn’t that I didn’t wanna sang no more, I just didn’t wanna be a part of the industry.
“Make Friends With Love" is another one of my favorites as well. Between those two, it’s hard to pick. It’s a toss up.
You’ve been in the industry for a long time. Has the industry changed while you’ve been in it?
From the label’s standpoint, it’s changed gradually. But as far as the industry’s concerned, I don’t see the change. As far as real music, it is what it is. It’s real commercial. It’s not about real music, it’s about what sells at the time and about who’s the one selling those records. If there’s another artist out there selling records and he’s got a certain sound, then they want you to make a product that sounds similar to that so they can capitalize on those sales.
I’m staying my course. My entry into the game was as such and I’ll stay that way until I get out of the game. Hopefully by that time, there will be enough of us artists making a good enough example to show that you can sustain a career in this game even if you don’t sell out.
You’ve been in the game forever so I thought we could look back on your career. I understand you started in gospel?
Yea, I started singing in the church when I was a kid. I been singing in gospel since I was like 5.
Do you see the influence of gospel in your own work?
Of course, what you listen to, that’s the gospel. That’s my background.
That soulful sound came from church. All the soul singers that everybody would know from way back in the day, Al Green, Betty Wright, Aretha Franklin.
They all came from the church. And so did I.
You met the Hailey Brothers, K-Ci & JoJo while doing gospel?
They had a gospel group back in the day, Lil Cedric and the Hailey Singers. K-Ci was the lead singer. We went to high school together. They moved out from Baltimore, and we started singing in school together. I became a part of that gospel group and just traveled, doing that until they went on to do Jodeci.
Did you ever feel scoffed that they went to Jodeci without you?
Not at all. At that particular time, they decided to make their move.
They called me about it man, but nobody from our area had really made it in that area. So they left without me man. They went on and did their thing. I made a decision and I live with it. I was able to get my own career going. I didn’t sell a million records like they did, but at the same time, I’ve got my own fans out there. I sustain my own life, my own sound, my own identity.
You did work with K-Ci on your 1999 album Country Boy. Have you ever considered working together again since then?
Yea, actually, K-Ci and I did a remix to “Sang No More" that’s out right now. K-Ci and JoJo and myself, we formed a group and we been recording. The name of the group is P.O.C.. We represent the Carolinas. P.O.C. stands for Product of Carolina. We haven’t gotten that far because I been traveling and they been traveling. But when we come together, we get some stuff done. But we probably got about seven or eight tracks done already.
It’s a work in progress. Everybody’s doing what they doing. We’re focusing on getting our lives together. Give it time and we’ll regroup and come back with the P.O.C.
Matt Fyffe is the administrator and chief content provider for the R & B site, R & B Haven, a site which features over 300 bios of 90s-music/artists R & B artists , 3000 music videos, and several interviews. Artists featured on the site include Boyz II Me, Xscape and more.
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