I listen to crazy, robust rock music where they sing their faces off, and soul music, which can be similar.
Sometimes with pop music, you have to see it to love it. With soul music, it's sparse. There's nothing that's pretentious or planned. It's just so gutsy.
To me, the Ennio Morricone kind of sound is a derivative of soul music.
Soul lyrics, soul music came at about the same time as the civil rights movement, and it's very possible that one influenced the other.
Soul music is timeless.
Salsa, classic rock, soul music, jazz... all of that was a part of my education in making hip-hop music.
My mom had a produce business in in Oxnard, and we used to take these long trips to talk to farmers and different distributors. She'd take us with her after picking us up from school, and she'd be blasting all this old soul music and R&B. I knew all those O'Jays songs before I knew Snoop or Dre or Tupac.
I think there's a void for some authentic soul music with an edge. I think there's some people who grew up with Motown and Stevie Wonder that still can appreciate Future, Drake, and all these different things, too, but there shouldn't be a void for those people, as well.
If you can't prove it in words, it ain't gospel. Soul music is just an expression of the mind, but your spirit has to be made alive - that's the real part, the part that God speaks to.
Soul music is true to its name. It's music that connects to your soul, your spirit. When music resonates with people's spirit like that, when people can emotionally connect with something or it helps to heal them, transform them, that never goes out of style. People will always need something to relate to.
