![\"\"](\"http:\/\/irishexaminerusa.com\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/06\/DSC_9237-copy-300x283.jpg\")
<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
Interview by Brad Balfour<\/p>\n
When the pandemic hit, musicians were blessed and cursed at the same time. On the one hand, it shut down opportunities for live performance before paying audiences. On the other hand, it freed up songwriters, instrumentalists and singers to have more time to create. Carlos Battey is one of those musical creators whose tour was halted but the songwriting never stopped. Now that the lock-down is opening up, he’s releasing three EPs and getting back out there. Titled The Show<\/strong><\/em>, The After-Party<\/strong><\/em> and The Hotel<\/strong><\/em>, the three offer intriguing conceptual possibilities\u2028. That makes him a perfect subject to spotlight in light of this being African American Music Appreciation Month. This annual celebration was initiated as Black Music Month by President Jimmy Carter who, on June 7, 1979, decreed that the month would be the month of Black music. In 2009, the commemoration was given its current name by President Barack Obama.<\/p>\n As Battey explained, “Yes, these three EPs will be connected conceptually. It’s a way of showing fans the evolution of the three stages in a show in musical form. This is my first time doing this. They won\u2019t all come out at once. They\u2019re spread out over the course of a year.<\/p>\n “Eventually there will be vinyl but not at the moment. Due to the pandemic, things are slowly getting back to normal and we are looking to prepare for touring the fourth quarter of 2021 and into first quarter of 2022. Before the pandemic I had sold out shows in Las Vegas and Southern California. Prior to this, the first release of Big Circle Music Group — launched January 2020 — was called ‘Do it Again’ featuring Shawn Stockman<\/strong> from the iconic group Boyz II Men<\/strong>.”<\/p>\n But there’s more to the 30-something than being another singer\/songwriter. Born in Savannah, Georgia, Battey became known as Jackie\u2019s Boy <\/strong>after he formed a group with his brother called Jackie Boyz.<\/strong> He had fallen in love with music at the age of 10 and the boys started performing shortly thereafter on Savannah’s Piers on River Street — much like the buskers found on Dublin’s streets. This Southerner then embarked on his musical journey and went on to write several #1 hit records, has received four Grammy nominations, sold over 18 million albums and won a Grammy in 2011 for Madonna<\/strong>\u2019s best remix recording \u201cRevolver\u201d featuring Lil<\/strong> Wayne<\/strong>.<\/p>\n Q: Describe your origins.<\/p>\n CB: I started out as just a street performer; me and my brother sang together on Savannah’s streets and in Los Angeles. We fought through the thick and thin, had no home and had to sleep in cars. I\u2019ve had some rough moments and managed to achieve some Q: When you write songs about people, do you have real people in mind?<\/p>\n CB: I write a range of songs, starting with experiences I\u2019ve dealt with in my own life. But I tend to look for thoughts that might be a bit unique, off the beaten path. Sometimes another artist hears it and might say, \u201cOh man, I didn\u2019t think of this.\u201d And then my song takes on a life of its own with someone else.<\/p>\n A song I wrote called \u201cDown to Earth\u201d ended up being recorded by Justin Bieber.<\/strong> It was based on my marriage falling apart. I wrote it from the viewpoint of my daughter, being in the middle as she watched her mother and father slowly distance themselves from each other.<\/p>\n \u201cMama, you were always somewhere The chorus goes:<\/p>\n \u201cSo it’s up to you It says that we have to come together for the sake of our child. Thanks to my friends Midi Mafia<\/strong> — a Los Angles-based production team —\u00a0 Bieber\u2019s manager Scooter Braun<\/strong> heard the song and immediately loved it. Scooter told me in a phone call that Justin was going through the same thing with his parents and it would be great to change a few things.<\/p>\n Back then, Justin was about 13 years old and no one had heard of him. I was touched by Scooter\u2019s belief in Justin so I agreed. The result was one of Justin\u2019s most popular early projects.<\/p>\n So that\u2019s an example of writing a song with real people in mind. \u00a0I\u2019ve found that a good song doesn\u2019t stay quiet. It jumps from person to person to person and I\u2019m glad it found its way to Justin.<\/p>\n On the other hand, here\u2019s an example of a song without having someone in mind. I wrote a song for Madonna called \u201cRevolver.\u201d That song came from me wanting to write something sexy and sassy. It came from\u00a0 one of those 3 AM sessions — you know, where you want to go home and you\u2019re really tired — but my dear friend, Brandon Kitchens, <\/strong>who was an\u00a0Atlantic Records junior A&R guy, told me, \u201cHey! Do one more idea.\u201d So I stayed in the studio and that one more idea became \u201cRevolver.\u201d<\/p>\n Q: How were The Jackie Boyz discovered?<\/p>\n CB: We spent four years singing on Hollywood Boulevard before being signed as songwriters by Universal Music Publishing. People would ask us, \u201cWhat were we doing with our music?\u201d We never gave writing songs for other people a thought until Brandon told us to come to the studio. We ended up writing our first record \u201cSugar\u201d for an artist called Flo Rida<\/strong>. It was the first record we ever wrote and it went #3 on Hot 100 and sold 1.5 million copies. Right after Flo Rida, we collaborated on that 2009 single \u201cRevolver\u201c and won our first Grammy at the 53rd Annual Grammy Awards<\/p>\n That song ended up being shopped around to different artists. \u00a0Madonna was the one who heard the song and said, \u201cHey, I love this and want to record it.\u201d \u00a0I didn\u2019t get a chance to meet Madonna in person.<\/p>\n Q: What\u2019s the song about?<\/p>\n CB: \u201cRevolver\u201d is sexy. Basically the chorus says, \u201cMy love\u2019s a revolver. My sex is a killer. \u00a0Do you wanna die happy?\u201d<\/p>\n Q: What inspired you to do that?<\/p>\n CB: I saw a John Legend<\/strong> poster called \u201cEvolver\u201d for one of his albums in 2009. I immediately thought, “That\u2019s a really cool title.” It gave me the idea to write a song called \u201cRevolver\u201d. \u00a0My ideas started to flow and I kept the thought in my phone for about a year. Then I wrote the track and the song came out and won a Grammy in 2010. It was a life-changer.<\/p>\n Q: \u00a0How do you know when a song should be uptempo or more balladic?<\/p>\n CB: When the song\u2019s content is deeper with more meaning, I tend to write a ballad. When I have more words to get across, a slower tempo allows me to do that.<\/p>\n When I\u2019m just trying to have fun and not think, the song will be more uptempo. It still needs to be clever and have something that makes people want to listen to it consistently.<\/p>\n But for me, if I know there\u2019s something to say that\u2019s really heartfelt \u2013 and going back to \u201cDown to Earth\u201d — it was a ballad. Because I had a lot to say. And it couldn\u2019t be expressed in just two and a half minutes.<\/p>\n Q: So what\u2019s one of the favorite ballads you\u2019ve ever written?<\/p>\n CB: One of my favorites is one I wrote for Candice Glover<\/strong>. She won \u201cAmerican Idol\u201d in 2013. It\u2019s a song called \u201cForever That Man\u201d and was released in February, 2014. When you find that one person, they\u2019re forever.<\/p>\n As the chorus puts it: That\u2019s probably my favorite ballad. My dear friend Ian Pirie<\/strong> who was working with Atlantic Records, the production company for “American Idol” \u2013\u00a0 was a fan of songs that I\u2019d written and asked if I could sit and meet with the contestants.<\/p>\n I went over to their studios in L.A. and met with each of the top five contestants. It was a chance to learn their personalities and who they were as people, potentially to create songs for them.<\/p>\n Well, Candice won and we wrote this R&B song together. The first one out of the gate was \u201cForever That Man.\u201d I feel like a songwriter\u2019s job is to listen and understand where the artist is in life \u2013 where they want to go and what they\u2019re feeling.<\/p>\n What I got from the interview was her wanting to find love. She was single at the time and wanted someone who could basically change her world. That\u2019s how \u201cForever That Man\u201d came about and was on her first album, \u201cMusic Speaks.\u201d<\/p>\n Q: How much does the arrangement reflect the original intent of a song or is it meant to transform it?<\/p>\n CB: The arrangement, to me, has importance at the beginning of writing a song. Of course, some of the producers I work with may change things around. They might change our instruments, for example. But I feel like the magic is in the first session — the first half-hour or hour. And to me, everything after that is just polishing.<\/p>\n I can play the piano but not as a touring performer. I think my main forte is top-lining the lyrics and melody.<\/p>\n One song of mine where I feel the arrangement matches its intent is one I was part of with Chris Brown<\/strong> called \u201cGraffiti.\u201d It was produced by Cool & Dre<\/strong> — a production duo out of Miami.<\/p>\n When I got asked to come down and work with Chris, it was right after the domestic violence case with Rihanna<\/strong> in 2009. The producer played me this aggressive rock track and immediately I thought about wanting to prove a point, wanting to say something that hadn\u2019t been said. I knew the title of his album was going to be Graffiti<\/strong><\/em>. So I used the opportunity to write \u201cGraffiti\u201d as a title track that basically expresses how remorseful a person like Brown can be with no ability to erase his history from memory in what today we call \u201ccancel culture.\u201d<\/p>\n Chris knew he was growing as a man and becoming a better person. He\u2019s contributed a lot to music and I knew first-hand that he was remorseful about the Rihanna incident. But the song\u2019s is that the graffiti from our past always remains on the wall and cannot be erased:<\/p>\n \u201cBut it’s already written on the wall The intensity of that record meant so much with the lyric and melody. \u00a0I consider that arrangement a great marriage. I always think that the production of a song should be an enhancement to its intent, not a distraction that conveys a different message.<\/p>\n Q: \u00a0What\u2019s the back story to the \u201cJackie\u2019s Boy\u201d name?<\/p>\n CB: Me and my brother called ourselves the Jackie Boyz because our mother\u2019s name was Jackie. She passed away in 2004 from leukemia. As time went on, I wanted to pursue my own music career as a solo artist. Her name has always rung out to me and will always be with me, no matter what. \u00a0She deserves my recognition because she was always supportive of everything I\u2019ve done.<\/p>\n She had two or three different jobs at once as a single mother. She worked as an attendant for the school bus system. She looked after special needs children on the bus. In the evenings she would clean offices. My mother was not only a hard worker but one of the smartest and strongest women I\u2019ve ever known<\/p>\n She had me when she was 20. She and my father divorced about six years later. He had his own demons to fight. Meanwhile, my mom continued to take great care of her three kids \u2013 myself and my two younger brothers. She always thought about our needs first.<\/p>\n Q: Do you envision your songs as inter-related or as stand-alone creations?<\/p>\n CB: Some are interrelated and others aren\u2019t. I tend to create my EPs that way, like this one coming out this summer \u2013 The Show<\/em><\/strong> \u2013 in which all the songs are interrelated. It\u2019s being launched by my own record label, Big Circle Music Group.<\/p>\n One track is a single released in April called \u201cNo Life Guard.\u201d \u00a0Another one coming out is called \u201cTherapy Session.\u201d \u00a0Each song there connects to the others. It\u2019s not just that they\u2019re all in the R&B genre but each also reflects a truth-telling story about my life and what I\u2019ve experienced.<\/p>\n This particular album was inspired by Jodeci<\/strong>, a powerhouse R&B quartet from North Carolina. They had a project in 1995 called The Show, the After-Party, The Hotel<\/strong><\/em>. I titled my EP The Show<\/em><\/strong> partly as an homage to them but also to let the listener know to expect a certain type of music throughout. \u00a0I\u2019m already planning these other EPs and all the tracks in each will reflect a certain type of music. On the other hand, songs that I write for other individual artists tend to be standalone.<\/p>\n Q: What makes you decide a song should be collaborative?<\/p>\n CB:\u00a0Sometimes another songwriter\u2019s voice inspires me to work with that person or team. At other times, I might conclude on a certain song, that I\u2019ve gone as far as I can and realize I can use another perspective. If I feel I\u2019ve exhausted my creative ideas for a song, I\u2019ll reach out to someone else with a fresh point of view. An example is a song called \u201cFor Real Though.\u201d It\u2019s about a guy approaching a girl to say he\u2019d like to get to know her. I wanted to get a female take on the idea so I turned to songwriter and artist Mickey Shiloh<\/strong>.<\/p>\n Q: How does the process of collaborating go? CB: I\u2019ll give you an example of a song that means a lot to me. The title is \u201cBack to Love\u201d and it came about when Bentley Records connected me to writer Mike Greenly<\/strong> and a production team, MotiVibes. Decades ago, Mike was a corporate guy who realized he\u2019d be happier using his special gift for words as a freelancer with more time for writing lyrics. That\u2019s his passion and Bentley introduced us.<\/p>\n When Mike interviewed me for possible song ideas in my head, I simply started sharing my observations about the world we live in these days. We\u2019re completely polarized as a society, with different sides automatically lined up against each other. That\u2019s not who the United States of America was envisioned to become. It\u2019s not how the world should be for the sake of us all on the planet.<\/p>\n I expressed my wish that we could all get \u201cback to love.\u201d Those were the words that came out of my mouth. Mike quickly said that he heard a song title in them, along with a very important message. The result is our song. We\u2019d like it on the ballot for consideration by Grammy voters as \u201cBest Contemporary Christian\u201d song. But no matter what, I\u2019m proud of what we\u2019ve done together.<\/p>\n It gives me joy when I look ahead in hopes of many more ways and years to keep doing what I love to do. And that is creating songs and performing them for others \u2013 in hopes of being able to make a real contribution to the world.<\/p>\n https:\/\/www.jackiesboylive.com<\/a><\/p>\n![\"\"](\"http:\/\/irishexaminerusa.com\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/06\/DSC_8753-copy-300x183.jpg\")
things.<\/p>\n
\nAnd Daddy, I live out of town
\nSo tell me how could I ever be
\nNormal somehow?\u201d<\/p>\n
\nAnd it’s up to me
\nBetter we meet in the middle
\nOn our way back down to earth\u201d<\/p>\n
\n\u201cThe way that the moon meets the stars at night
\nBaby, it’s something you can’t deny
\nI’m taking that chance
\nGrab you by the hand
\nAnd you’ll be forever
\nForever that man\u201d<\/p>\n
\nYou can’t cover it up, you can’t cover it up (Woah)
\nBut it’s already written on the wall
\nYou can’t cover it up, you can’t cover it up (Yeah, yeah)\u201d<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"http:\/\/irishexaminerusa.com\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/06\/mike-single-300x300.jpg\")
<\/p>\nShare this:<\/h3>