TONYA MOSLEY, HOST:
This is FRESH AIR. I'm Tonya Mosley. My guest today is Meshell Ndegeocello. And you might recognize her vocals and bass from this song.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "WILD NIGHT")
MESHELL NDEGEOCELLO: (Singing) And the people passing by just stare with wild wonder, yeah. And inside the jukebox roars just like thunder. And everything looks so complete when you're walking out on the street. And the wind, it catches your feet and sends you flying.
MESHELL NDEGEOCELLO AND JOHN MELLENCAMP: (Singing) Crying. Ooh, ooh-wee. The wild night is calling.
MOSLEY: That's Meshell Ndegeocello with John Mellencamp, covering Van Morrison's "Wild Night" in 1994. By then, Ndegeocello was already making a name for herself with music that defied easy categorization. Her songs could ache with romantic longing while celebrating Black beauty and sensuality and the freedom to define yourself. She once described them as broken-hearted revolutionary love songs.
Over three decades, she's moved between funk, soul, jazz and rock, composed music for television, including Ava DuVernay's "Queen Sugar," and created an acclaimed musical tribute to James Baldwin. Now on her new album, "Synonym," Ndegeocello reimagines familiar duets with an eclectic group of artists from Chaka Khan to Brandi Carlile, creating arrangements that challenge how we hear songs we thought we knew, like this version of The Human League's 1981 hit "Don't You Want Me," which she records with Cat Power.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "DON'T YOU WANT ME")
MESHELL NDEGEOCELLO AND CAT POWER: (Singing) Don't, don't you want me? You know I can't believe it when you say that you don't need me. It's much too late to find. Did you think you'd changed your mind? You'd better change it back, or we'll both be sorry. We'll bpth be sorry. Don't you want me, baby? Don't you want me? Oh.
MOSLEY: Meshell Ndegeocello, welcome to FRESH AIR.
NDEGEOCELLO: Oh, wow. Thanks for having me. Such a pleasure.
MOSLEY: What a groove that song is. And, you know, I was thinking as I've been listening to it that the original version by The Human League, it always sounded to me like a plea to be wanted. And in this version, with Cat Power, nobody is begging. It is such a groovy, kind of island-like feel. What did you hear in the original that you wanted to bring out?
NDEGEOCELLO: Oh, I thought it was this anthem at the time when I first heard it of just such vulnerability. Yet the so-called man in the song is also saying, you know, I made you, and how can you leave me? So it's kind of cheeky and weird in a way. And I think that bassline just speaks for itself. And production-wise, we just - I don't know. I think Lee "Scratch" Perry's ghost came in and was like, do it like this.
MOSLEY: You've said Cat Power during the recording of this kind of taught you something about using your own voice rather than imitating the original. What were you doing differently as a vocalist because of her?
NDEGEOCELLO: Oh, like, I had made a scratch vocal, and I kind of really stuck to the melody. And she totally deconstructed it and heard it how she felt it in her body and mind. And it just made me, once I got her track back, approach it in a totally different way. And I think that's when we also reenvisioned the drums. It's like, yeah, Cat and the ghost of other feelings came in, and I had to remember that's what I enjoy about music. It's unifying. You can get five people in a room, and they're unified through one song. Or you have this great composition, an outline. Now it's time for me to create a different palette and paint it differently. And so she's a great song stylist. And I know we have these differentiations in genres, but to me, she's like a jazz singer. She took a standard and made it her own, you know, and that really opened me up.
MOSLEY: What is so interesting, I mean, about this album is you're really taking us in a different space to think about things outside of the particular voices and relationships with songs that we typically have, especially these classic ones. And the next song I want to play is one that I think almost everybody knows. It's Sonny and Cher's "I Got You Babe"...
NDEGEOCELLO: Yeah.
MOSLEY: ...Which was originally written by Sonny. He composed the song for himself and Cher in 1965. That original version, there's something so sweet and almost defiant about the original. It's like two people who are insisting that they have each other, and that's enough. I want to play your arrangement with British singer-songwriter Anohni. Let's listen.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "I GOT YOU BABE")
MESHELL NDEGEOCELLO AND ANOHNI: (Singing) They say our love won't pay the rent. Won't pay the rent. Before it's earned, our money's all been spent. I guess that's so, we don't have a pot. But at least I'm sure of all the things we got. Baby. Baby. I got you baby. I got you babe. I got flowers in the spring. I got you to wear my ring. And when I'm sad, you're a clown. And I get scared, when you're not around.
MOSLEY: Oh, my gosh. Can I just say? I mean, I just - I love this version. It makes me just want to run and twirl, and, like, I just - it's such a beautiful arrangement. I just want to tell you that first off, give you your flowers with that.
NDEGEOCELLO: Well, I want to share those flowers with Levon Henry, someone who's very, very important to me. And I just knew, like, our souls were aligned in a deep friendship through music. And I've watched him grow. But when I had an idea for the song, I sort of - I gave him my emotional wants and desires and hopes for the track. And he came back with that arrangement for horns. And I just want to talk about the importance of an arranger. And that's what I really hope people notice on the record, is that I just want to show and highlight that that's what I love to do.
And I come from - my dad played in the Army Blues, "Pershing's Own." He played Ford's inauguration, Reagan's, and he played in their big band, and they would have guest arrangers to keep the music fresh. And so I learned that as a young child. Like, that person, you don't know their name, but they're very important to a project.
MOSLEY: You have also said Anohni challenged you as a singer, too.
NDEGEOCELLO: Yeah, definitely.
MOSLEY: What did she bring out in your voice that surprised you? You two together - it's so powerful.
NDEGEOCELLO: Yeah, again, I sung the song. I just sung the melody that was there. And then Anohni sent back her track. And it just was, like, humbling because she also wrote in an email, like, you need to do yours again, and you need to just kind of rethink some things so our phrasing is - you know, she just had ideas and directions. And I have to say, like, when you get a certain place in your career, people make grand assumptions that you don't want to be told what to do or given ideas. And I love when people go, like, why don't you try this and do this? And it just really keeps my mind fresh and open.
MOSLEY: I get that. And I totally get, too, as you get further and further in your career, people are less likely to correct you. And it's such a disservice 'cause it doesn't help you grow as an artist. And from my understanding, it seems like that's what - you're constantly on this journey of trying to grow.
NDEGEOCELLO: Oh, yeah. I realize sometimes I'm the elder, and sometimes I'm the youngest person in the room, and sometimes I'm right in the middle. And I realize we're all on this journey together and we're all doing the best we can. And I'm really OK with what I don't know. And I think I've only gotten this far because I've been able to admit what I don't know.
MOSLEY: Your voice is so husky in this arrangement, and I've heard you say your voice has changed as you've gotten older. Has it changed what you can express as a singer?
NDEGEOCELLO: Oh, no, it just - it's just a different color to paint with. Toshi Reagon says, you know, as you age, you lose those falsetto points (laughter). So, yeah, you lose - I've lost a lot of range and - but I just - this is my natural voice. And I'm a huge fan of Scott Walker, and so it's just a color I have. And plus, I thought it was a nice contrast to Anohni. I try to use my voice in a way that communicates, like, you know, in church, you got call and response, or sometimes vocals can be a grounding. And I - I'm just trying to really approach it that way, as I'm trying to emit something to communicate a story and use my voice and storytelling to aid in that song's, you know, service.
MOSLEY: If you're just joining us, I'm talking with musician and composer Meshell Ndegeocello. She rose to prominence in the 1990s with her groundbreaking blend of funk, soul and hip-hop. Her new album is called "Synonym." More of our conversation after a break. This is FRESH AIR.
(SOUNDBITE OF PRINCE SONG, "ALPHABET ST.")
MOSLEY: This is FRESH AIR. And today I'm talking with Grammy Award-winning musician and composer Meshell Ndegeocello. Her new album is "Synonym."
You know, many of these songs, they began as male-female duets. And you've reimagined them with artists like Anohni. And you called the album an expression of queer liberation, but you have also said you hope gender is one of the last things that listeners notice.
NDEGEOCELLO: Oh, wow. You're really getting me on something that's been - and, you know, last week, Michel Martin asked me about these tunes being sung by people of the same gender, and I told her it was the last thing a person should think about. And that's true in that I want people to hear the music and just feel the feelings it brings, but I realized afterwards what she was asking. And I think I was just nervous. I guess the climate we're in, I can't say I'm not affected.
But, yes, the songs here were intentionally reimagined with people who are same-gendered or similarly gendered or non-gendered in similar ways. And this album is not just about rearranging chords and rhythms, but also about queerness and self-expression, visibility, liberation. And like these songs are synonyms for their originals, that liberation is a synonym for the liberation of Black and brown people, of immigrants, of women, and Jewish people, and Palestinian people and Indigenous people. Because we might be very different, but we all live in these margins, and sharing the struggle for our rights and safety and dreams is extremely meaningful and powerful to me.
MOSLEY: You've said in particular that music is one of the rare times when you feel raceless and genderless, and I want to understand that experience. When you're completely inside the music, what changes in how you experience yourself?
NDEGEOCELLO: Oh, man. You know, I had a certain kind of upbringing, and the music was the only place I could find comfort, you know, or ease or camaraderie.
MOSLEY: Do you remember the first time you felt that?
NDEGEOCELLO: Oh, yeah, definitely. I mean, I played go-go music, and I would play, like, three nights a week for hundreds of people. You know, and I - you could see how the - they were affected by the music, the way they danced and interacted. And I knew I was a part of something that moved people, or a catharsis, or, you know, two hours of fun on the weekend. And I...
MOSLEY: And for those who don't know D.C., go-go is kind of like D.C.'s homegrown answer to funk music.
NDEGEOCELLO: Yeah. And it's, like...
MOSLEY: Yeah.
NDEGEOCELLO: To me, it's punk, it's everything. I mean, it's, like - like, it's - it has so much of the diaspora in it, but at the same time, it's very uniquely Black American music. It's solely unique. The drummer plays for, like, an hour and a half, rarely stopping, for maybe a few bars or so. But it's kind of a steady tempo. It has - you have to be able to grind to it or dance certain movements. It's also what helps me, I think, the arranger that I am because you would take popular songs from the radio and you would make them fit into the go-go genre.
MOSLEY: Go-go music, you mentioned how, like, the crowd is with you. It's a back and forth. It's a call and response. And you're playing with other musicians, so it's a group of you creating the sound together. What do you remember feeling in that moment, though? Did you realize it kind of, like, as a freedom at the time, or did you come to understand it that way later?
NDEGEOCELLO: Freedom, yeah. I mean, I grew up in a very - like - a lot of religious dogma.
MOSLEY: What was your family?
NDEGEOCELLO: Oh, born-again Christians.
MOSLEY: OK, yeah.
NDEGEOCELLO: Yeah.
MOSLEY: Like, Baptist or Protestant or...
NDEGEOCELLO: Yeah, Baptist. They're - my mother's from Kitty Hawk, North Carolina, and my father is from Richmond, Virginia, and my grandparents, you know, from the South as well. I had all those biblical stories. And so I think music to me was all - like, you know, not only something that brings you solace, it's a way to connect to the Creator. I just - I think I've always embodied that. And so, I mean, listening to music was the beginning. I could close my eyes and not be me. I could live in the music, if that makes sense.
My father practiced all the time, so I could watch somebody and listen to someone just play the same thing over and over again like a raga or a mantra. And there's something powerful in that, in the breath. I'm only - this is only in hindsight, but, like, I'd describe my life as - childhood upbringing - of one of chaos and jubilation, you know? Music...
MOSLEY: Those two?
NDEGEOCELLO: Yeah.
MOSLEY: Yeah.
NDEGEOCELLO: Yeah. Music was a transcendent force, especially with the chaos. Yeah.
MOSLEY: Your dad - you tell the stories about - your dad was a saxophonist with an Army band, and you've told these vivid stories in the past of how the two of you would study arrangements by musicians like Duke Ellington and Count Basie and the different ways they could interpret a song. What did your father teach you? What do you remember about those times when you guys were kind of dissecting that music?
NDEGEOCELLO: Oh. Yeah, just - we would talk about tone. We would talk about comping, like when a soloist is taking - having his moment of self-expression. You know, some people love when the accompanying person is coloring out every harmony and chord in the arrangement, or some soloists like where you hint at it and it allows them to be a little freer in their self-expression. We would talk about that. He was also very harsh. He was like, you're the bass players. And I think it's the reason I play the way I do. He was like, you are the foundation of the music. You are not there to, like, have self-expression (laughter). You are the structure of the song. And that - I think that...
MOSLEY: Oh. What does that mean? How does that change your relationship...
NDEGEOCELLO: Oh.
MOSLEY: ...To the entire arrangement when you are seen as that?
NDEGEOCELLO: Oh, that means I have to know the song. Like, the drummer, as long as he's got some idea of the time and the feel, he can kind of play what he wants and kind of guide us rhythmically. I think the bass sets the foundation of the chord, but he - they can still have great freedom. But if I mess up, you feel - you can - if - when the bass departs, you can feel the groove in the song shift and change, or sometimes fall apart in a - and in a good way or a bad way. The falling apart could be good. The redirection could be what you want. But the bass player, to me, is the foundation of the song, of the arrangement. I'm keeping it flowing and moving.
And that's how my father - because my father would play the NCO club, and his bass player - something happened and he couldn't show up. I think I was only 16 and I'd just started playing recently, and he was like, you're going to do this gig tonight. He was like, you just got to know the time and you got to know - you know, just see the chord at the top and stay with the changes and, you know, just stay solid. And that's how he taught me to work with him - like, this is your part in the tribe.
MOSLEY: Was that your first time working together?
NDEGEOCELLO: Oh, yeah, definitely. And then he didn't call the other bass player for the next couple of shows. (Laughter) Yeah, definitely. He was hard, and I - some of that stuff I look back on, I didn't like it. But then I'm so grateful 'cause I - I'm seeing now he was just trying to make me better.
MOSLEY: Our guest today is Grammy Award-winning musician Meshell Ndegeocello. You can keep up with FRESH AIR by subscribing to our podcast on Apple or Spotify. And leave us a review. It helps us a lot. More of my conversation with Meshell after a short break. I'm Tonya Mosley, and this is FRESH AIR.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "GOLDEN RING")
BRANDI CARLILE: (Singing) In a pawn shop in Chicago on a sunny summer day, a couple gazes at the wedding rings there on display.
NDEGEOCELLO: (Singing) I smile and nod my head. I say, honey, that's for you. It's not much, but it's the best that I can do.
MESHELL NDEGEOCELLO AND BRANDI CARLILE: (Singing) Golden ring, golden ring, one tiny little stone waiting there, waiting there, for someone to take it home. By itself, by itself, it's just a cold metallic thing. Only love can make a golden wedding ring
MOSLEY: This is FRESH AIR. I'm Tonya Mosley. My guest today is Grammy-winning musician Meshell Ndegeocello. She rose to fame in the 1990s with music blending funk, soul and hip-hop. Raised in the Washington, D.C., area, she got her start playing go-go, the city's percussion-driven style of funk. In 2024, she released "No More Water: The Gospel Of James Baldwin," inspired by the writer whose work she has said changed how she understood her own family.
I want to actually play a little bit from the album "No More Water: The Gospel Of James Baldwin," which came out in 2024. And this song is called "Love." Let's listen to a little bit.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "LOVE")
JUSTIN HICKS: (Singing) Well, when it's dark, it's hard. Will you seek to solve yourself? Me, I take the darkest corner, whistling to myself. All is as it was, and then you came in. Love's a simple thing to make - you should want to. When it's dark, it's hard.
KENITA MILLER, JUSTIN HICKS AND MESHELL NDEGEOCELLO: (Singing) To live in love is to be uncertain. To live in love is to bear the burden of so many who yearn to know. My life matters. Yearn to know. To live in love is to be uncertain. To live in love...
MOSLEY: That's "Love" from Meshell Ndegeocello's album "No More Water: The Gospel Of James Baldwin." I want to talk a little bit about this James Baldwin tribute album. I don't even know if calling it a tribute album - is that a correct way to say it?
NDEGEOCELLO: No, well, Jason Moran introduced me to the Harlem Stage. And once a year, they dedicate the theater to projects based on the works of James Baldwin. And I chose "The Fire Next Time." And that was in 2014. And I lived with that book for a year in my pocket, reading it over and over again. My mother had a fourth grade education and was a domestic most of my life. And it's a different dynamic when you teach your mother how to read. And so...
MOSLEY: You taught your mom how to read?
NDEGEOCELLO: Yeah. I aided her in just trying to get better at it. And so...
MOSLEY: As a child?
NDEGEOCELLO: Yeah, as a child, reading the Bible. And my father would, like - you know, in the Army, you get the Reader's Digest and, you know, books from Disney. So, I mean, growing up, I definitely could recite, you know, sonnets from Shakespeare. I knew all the Disney stories. You know, I had Reader's Digest. And my father gave me National Geographic and Life magazine. So, you know, and he, too, was like, if you read, life will be OK. He definitely made sure that I could. My brother, not so much, but I could.
So once I got Baldwin, I realized there are huge gaps in my education. And also, my father was, like, a Republican. My father was quite conservative. There was no Black power or any, you know, even though I watched him in the Army constantly be passed by his white counterparts in rank, knowing that he not only was the better musician, but had been there for over 26 years.
MOSLEY: What did it mean to be a Republican during that time period...
NDEGEOCELLO: (Laughter).
MOSLEY: ...A Black Republican?
NDEGEOCELLO: I mean, yeah, he just - he espoused some views. And I don't feel comfortable now. You know, I try not to disparage those who are not here to defend themselves. I just think he grew up in a certain way where it was like, he believed you, you know, pull yourself up by your own bootstraps. So I just - I can't say. I won't speak for him. But he just was conservative fiscally. He believed in the American dream. And you couldn't have conversations about systematic racism, even though he experienced it. My parents are both born in the '40s.
MOSLEY: How did you interpret that with him? That he...
NDEGEOCELLO: (Laughter) Oh.
MOSLEY: You could see very clearly that he faced all of this in his own work and life, but he had these views at the same time, these contrasting views to what his real experience was.
NDEGEOCELLO: Oh, I think, as Baldwin illuminated for me - he has a part in the book. And I'm paraphrasing. Forgive me. But it stuck with me. He says, most of our men went off into the military to be ruined, I think, is very close to the quote. And my father had a circumstance where he was given the choice. I don't think he wanted to be drafted, and so he joined voluntarily.
And - but I think it changed my father's life. He went to Germany, had a really good experience there. I was born there. My brother's born there. Some tragedies happened. But my father realized, he was just like - I think what he experienced there made him come back and say, I got to make the best of this. Like, my dad was a man's man in terms of his excesses of philandering and libation consuming. And him and my mother had a very intense relationship with one another.
They both had secrets and traumas. Like I said, these are people of color born in the '40s. Civil rights is only as old as I am, as the child they had. When I was born, 1968, is when things changed in their life on a global scale. That's why I have such empathy and grace and humility to how I was brought up, because I can't imagine my mother being the only Black person in a German hospital giving birth to me, and then having a complication, and they give her a full hysterectomy before they knew you could leave the ovaries.
So my mother basically went into menopause in her 20s. And so my mother was severely depressed. She also lost a child when that child was very young in Germany. That's one of their secrets. They would never talk about how. And my mother's mixed race, and it was clear that that child wasn't my father's. But I look at it now as like, who am I to even begin to judge them? Because again, I cannot imagine what my mother went through having a fourth grade education, hormonally imbalanced, dealing with grief. It's just complicated beyond my grasp, also with religious dogma. And my mother didn't have her own checking account until '84.
And I'm just looking back on those things, and at the same time, you're supposed to big up yourself, have pride for your race, excel economically, try to make it better for the next generation. That's what I'll say. I think my father was like - he would always say, whatever you do, be the best at it. You know, I think he just wanted to - he knew, like, this life was singular, and he tried to make the best of it and find the joys he could. And I think my mother, as well. But like I said, she just was - having children myself, it hurts to know, but then again, I'm like, I just can't imagine what she felt or went through.
MOSLEY: Our guest today is Grammy Award-winning musician Meshell Ndegeocello. We'll be right back. I'm Tonya Mosley, and this is FRESH AIR.
(SOUNDBITE OF NONAME SONG, "BALLOONS")
MOSLEY: This is FRESH AIR. And today, I'm talking with Meshell Ndegeocello. Her new album is called "Synonym." She released her debut album, "Plantation Lullabies," in 1993 to widespread critical acclaim.
I really love learning about early jobs that...
NDEGEOCELLO: (Laughter).
MOSLEY: ...People had that I interview. And I read that through your dad's connections in the military, you actually worked in food services at the Pentagon for a minute when you were...
NDEGEOCELLO: I sure did.
MOSLEY: ...Around 14.
NDEGEOCELLO: Yeah.
MOSLEY: You also said that wasn't a fit for you 'cause you were uncomfortable working in a place where wars were made. But then years later, you considered joining the Army.
NDEGEOCELLO: Yeah. I mean, I was about 16.
MOSLEY: How was you thinking about it back then?
NDEGEOCELLO: Yeah 'cause I got a work permit. DECA school so - wasn't working for me because I know I'd be a really good soldier, sadly. I think I'm constantly - as I look - and this is only in hindsight - for someone to tell me what to do. The rebellion that I had falls apart sometimes, and I could see that I'm like, yeah, I'll do - I'm only as good as what I'm around. And I was a little bit too easily led. And to give an angry young person a weapon, I'd probably be very efficient, and I had a lot of anger at that time. And I look at that. But at the same time, I look at the military 'cause I have a complicated relationship with it.
That changed my father's life. It allowed us to have healthcare. It allowed him to get a mortgage. It gave him discipline in ways that he did show up for us. I mean, I think, at that time, too, when I took the test.
MOSLEY: Oh, you took a test?
NDEGEOCELLO: Oh, yeah. And I...
MOSLEY: OK, you were serious about it. It just wasn't - yeah.
NDEGEOCELLO: Oh, yeah, yeah. And I got into the Army. Yeah.
MOSLEY: Wow.
NDEGEOCELLO: Because I had a kid. I had to figure out what I was going to do. And my mother was totally against music. Even when I made my first record and was making probably more money than her, she would always ask me, when are you going to get a real job?
MOSLEY: When you came on the scene back in the early '90s as yourself with your shaved head and, like, your boldness, it felt like we were watching someone who was telling us, like, this is - it's OK for you to be who you are.
NDEGEOCELLO: Yeah. I think I was faking it till I made it.
MOSLEY: Yeah.
NDEGEOCELLO: I mean, when I look back, I was incredibly naive, which I think is - can be a safety and a blessing, but sometimes it has repercussions. You know, I'm glad I...
MOSLEY: What do you mean?
NDEGEOCELLO: ...Wasn't so savvy, you know, (laughter) about, like, creating some sort of character to sell, you know, some sort of persona. I look back down. I'm like, wow, I'm just really winging it and trying to be myself. But I'm also, as I move through space and time, authenticity can be unsustainable, as well. You have to keep something for yourself.
MOSLEY: When you released "Plantation Lullabies," nobody was calling it neo soul yet. And then came a lot of other artists - D'Angelo and Maxwell, Erykah Badu - and suddenly, there was this whole movement, and people then began calling you its mother. And I've always wondered, what is your thought about that title? Does it fit?
NDEGEOCELLO: No, not at all. I don't think at all. I mean, generalizations are made so that you can sell a product. It's a cool moniker, but, like, ecclesiastes. There's nothing new under the sun. And that's far from true. Yeah. I just think - you know what the common thread between me, D'Angelo, and Erykah Badu is, is an engineer named Bob Power, who's my mentor and someone I love very dearly. Just a life-changing person for me. And I think that sound that people are talking about is that warmth that he brought to mixing and engineering at that time. But I think these are three artists who are grounded in the Black American music diaspora with all these ghosts of Africa. And I think that the common threat there, again, is just people who weren't afraid to have a self, be a self and to...
MOSLEY: So why doesn't it fit? Why doesn't that...
NDEGEOCELLO: Neo? New soul? No, I think we just - I'm just soulful. I mean, I'm just - Phoebe Snow, Roberta Flack. There's nothing new to what I'm doing. Curtis Mayfield - I'm just a child out of Curtis Mayfield. I'm just a child from George Clinton. There's a lot he's given us lyrically about upliftment. I'm a child of James Brown, Dorothy Ashby. I'm a child of Geri Allen. You know, I'm - like, I'm not the mother of anything. You know, if anything, you know, I - the record that most influenced me is a Clifford Brown record my father gave me - "Brown (ph) Eyes." You know, I - like, I know that's in there. And Bobbi Humphreys (ph) and Gil Scott-Heron and Nikki Giovanni. There's - I - or, you know, I didn't know it then, but I think I'm more connected to Nina Simone - someone who didn't sing at first, wanted to just be a musician, and they told her, you know, you got to come back to this gig and sing some songs or you don't keep this gig. And so she sang. Or, you know, George Benson started out just as a singer and then they told him he needed to play an instrument. It wasn't enough. So he picked up the guitar.
You know, like, I'm a child of that. I'm someone - I'm a person of color who would have been a good soldier, who could not be in IT, who could not go to college or be a banker.
MOSLEY: (Laughter).
NDEGEOCELLO: So I had to use what I had (laughter) to bake the best of what I could for the children that I have chosen to take care of. So I'm the mother of nothing. I'm the child of many.
MOSLEY: I'm just wondering, if it had not - 'cause you tell the story many times about how you became a vocalist to start. Some of the stories you tell are that vocalists kept, like, not showing up when you were trying to make a demo tape, or you were asked to sing from someone - by someone else.
NDEGEOCELLO: (Laughter).
MOSLEY: But, like, if none of those things had ever happened, do you think you would have stepped into musicianship as a vocalist or would you have taken another path, maybe with bass or with other instruments?
NDEGEOCELLO: Yeah, I just - I sung out of necessity. I am a child of hip-hop. Definitely that's a big influence. But, yeah, it's just - I knew I would never be a virtuoso like Jaco Pastorius or Wayne Shorter, but I knew I wanted to create and write pieces of sound that would inspire virtuosos to want to play it. I know once I discovered Caetano Veloso that there was something else deeper to what music could be. You could change the landscape, change the feeling in the room, in society. I also met a young man named Deantoni Parks, and he showed me that it was also this way of tapping into the universe in a different way. And I - yeah, I just feel like I have more faith than I have knowing, and I try to get out of my own way.
MOSLEY: I want to play one of the breakout songs from that album...
NDEGEOCELLO: (Laughter).
MOSLEY: ...Just a little bit.
NDEGEOCELLO: OK.
MOSLEY: "If That's Your Boyfriend (He Wasn't Last Night)." Let's listen.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "IF THAT'S YOUR BOYFRIEND (HE WASN'T LAST NIGHT)")
NDEGEOCELLO: (Rapping) You say that's your boyfriend, you say I'm out of line. Funny, he said I could call him up anytime. You can call me wrong, say that I ain't right, but if that's your boyfriend, he wasn't last night. I'm the kind of woman I'll do almost anything. To get what I want I might play any little game. Call me what you like, but you know it's true. You're just jealous 'cause he wasn't with you. Don't mean no harm, I just like what I see, and ain't my fault if he wants me. Got what I wanted and the feeling was right. If that's your boyfriend, he wasn't last night. Hey, hey. Boyfriend, boyfriend. Yes, I had your boyfriend. If that's your boyfriend, if that's your boyfriend, if that's your boyfriend he wasn't last night.
MOSLEY: All right, that's going to be in my ear for the rest of the day, that earworm.
NDEGEOCELLO: (Laughter).
MOSLEY: That was Meshell Ndegeocello singing "If That's Your Boyfriend."
You know, you've told this story many times about how this song came about. You were involved with a man whose girlfriend confronted you and mocked your appearance because she couldn't imagine that her boyfriend would be attracted to you. And out of that humiliation came this incredibly defiant song. When you listen to it now, what do you hear underneath all of that bravado?
NDEGEOCELLO: (Laughter) Oh, wow. Shame sometimes, and humiliation. Yeah. I mean, it was hard.
MOSLEY: What was hard? Yeah.
NDEGEOCELLO: Just to, like, fight for your place, you know? And I didn't know much about romantic interactions or trying to have a relationship. So it's really - the bravado's just, like, you know, a catharsis. I'm just trying to, like, you know, big up myself, (laughter), that's all. Just like any other MC. (Laughter) I'm just trying to big up myself.
MOSLEY: If you're just joining us, I'm talking with musician and composer Meshell Ndegeocello. She rose to prominence in the 1990s with her groundbreaking blend of funk, soul and hip-hop. Her new album is called "Synonym." More of our conversation after a break. This is FRESH AIR.
(SOUNDBITE OF SAINT SINNA SONG, "REAL FLOW (FEAT. CREEBO LODI)")
MOSLEY: This is FRESH AIR, and today I'm talking with Meshell Ndegeocello. Her new album is called "Synonym."
I want to close with the last song on your new album, "Synonym." It was originally sung by Bob Dylan. It's Bob Dylan's "With God On Our Side." It was written in 1963, and it's a song about how nations justify war and violence by believing God is on their side.
NDEGEOCELLO: (Laughter).
MOSLEY: And your version features Bill Callahan and Chris Thile. And do you sing on this particular song at all?
NDEGEOCELLO: Yeah, I'm at the end. I'm in there, trust me. I try to tell people, especially as a bass player, it's more important that you feel me than hear me. You have to feel the bass as well as, you know, audibly hear it. That's the power of it - the low end. And my voice is definitely in there and you would miss me if I was gone, but I'm in there, existing among others.
MOSLEY: Let's listen.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "WITH GOD ON OUR SIDE")
UNIDENTIFIED SINGER #1: (Singing) Oh, my name, it is nothing. My age, it means less. The country I come from is called the Midwest.
UNIDENTIFIED SINGER #1 AND UNIDENTIFIED SINGER #2: (Singing) I was taught and brought up there, the laws to abide, and that the land that I live in has God on its side.
UNIDENTIFIED SINGER #1: (Singing) Oh, the history books tell it, they tell it so well. The cavalries charged, the Indians fell.
UNIDENTIFIED SINGER #1 AND UNIDENTIFIED SINGER #2: (Singing) The cavalries charged, the Indians died. Oh, the country was young with God on its side.
UNIDENTIFIED SINGER #1: (Singing) Oh, the Spanish-American War had its day.
UNIDENTIFIED SINGER #1 AND UNIDENTIFIED SINGER #2: (Singing) And the Civil War, too, was soon laid away. And the names of the heroes I was made to memorize, with guns in their hands and God on their side.
MOSLEY: Oh, Meshell, you have said that you listened to Dylan's original. And when you listen to it, you heard more aggression in the lyrics than what the folk arrangement kind of allowed. And this arrangement, I mean, every single word is, like, on full display. What were you hearing in these words that you felt the music wasn't fully expressing or that you could express in this particular arrangement?
NDEGEOCELLO: Ah, well, I got to say, I'm new to Dylan, too. He's another human being who's, like, just changed my consciousness. My friend, Chris Bruce, gave me "Chronicles," which I read when he gave it to me in, like, 2011, I think. I'm not sure. But, yeah, and then it hit me. And it hurt my feelings because I used to think he was kind of trolling us. Like, why does he sing like that? Is he making fun of Black people? Or I don't know what he's doing. I couldn't get it.
MOSLEY: Oh, that's interesting.
NDEGEOCELLO: Yeah. And then we would be on - we'd go on tour. And we would play music for each other. And they would play me these incredible songs by Bob Dylan. And then I read the book again, and it was like another tone to shift my consciousness to see life as this performance, and you have to choose how you want - what clown you want to be in this circus. And then to know his spiritual insights. And then I just started looking at the words. And I can't imagine his effect on people in the '60s. They must've thought he was, like, straight from heaven, you know (laughter), just what he was able to vocalize.
MOSLEY: Expressing.
NDEGEOCELLO: Yeah, what he was expressing. So it just rang so true for me. And I wanted that to be the forefront of the song.
MOSLEY: Meshell Ndegeocello, this has been such a pleasure to talk with you. Thank you so much.
NDEGEOCELLO: You, too. I'm so grateful for your time and kindness. Thank you so much.
MOSLEY: Meshell Ndegeocello's new album is called "Synonym."
(SOUNDBITE OF CYNTHIA ERIVO AND MESHELL NDEGEOCELLO SONG, "I KNEW YOU WERE WAITING (FOR ME)")
MOSLEY: Tomorrow on FRESH AIR, writer David Treuer's Ojibwe mother saw America as a country that tried to destroy her people. His father, a Jewish refugee, saw it as the country that saved his life. In his new book, "The Savage Mind," Treuer explores how that violent history still lives inside of us. I hope you can join us.
To keep up with what's on the show and get highlights of our interviews, follow us on Instagram at @nprfreshair.
FRESH AIR's executive producer is Sam Briger. Our technical director and engineer is Audrey Bentham. Our interviews and reviews are produced and edited by Phyllis Myers, Ann Marie Baldonado, Lauren Krenzel, Therese Madden, Monique Nazareth, Thea Chaloner, Susan Nyakundi, Anna Bauman and Nico Gonzalez-Wisler. Our digital media producer is Molly Seavy-Nesper. Roberta Shorrock directs the show. With Terry Gross, I'm Tonya Mosley.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "I KNEW YOU WERE WAITING (FOR ME)")
MESHELL NDEGEOCELLO AND CYNTHIA ERIVO: (Singing) When the river was deep, I didn't falter. When the mountain was high, I still believed. When the valley was low, it didn't stop me. I knew you were waiting, knew you were waiting for me.
CYNTHIA ERIVO: (Singing) With an endless desire, I kept on searching.
NDEGEOCELLO: Searching.
ERIVO: (Singing) Sure, in time, our eyes would meet.
NDEGEOCELLO: For you.
ERIVO: (Singing) And like bridge that's no fire, the hurt is over. One touch and you set me free.
NDEGEOCELLO AND ERIVO: (Singing) I don't regret a single moment.
NDEGEOCELLO: (Singing) No, I don't.
ERIVO: (Singing) I know you don't, I know you don't.
NDEGEOCELLO: (Singing) When I think of all the disappointments, I got to laugh.
(SOUNDBITE OF PAUL SIMON SONG, "ONE MAN'S CEILING IS ANOTHER MAN'S FLOOR") Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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