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The Sequence were the first female rap group to record a rap record , and the first rap act from the south. Cheryl The Pearl, Angie B and Blondy went gold in 3 weeks with "Funk You Up" the second release on Sugar Hill Records (the first being Rappers Delight). Cheryl wrote and produced for John Travolta's brother Joey , The West Street Mob & The Sugar Hill Gang. Its an honor to tell her story !!! JayQuan
: When did you all meet , and who were your musical influences? Cheryl:
I met Angie through my sister , they all went to school together. In The
4th or 5th grade some girls wanted to fight them,
so they came and got me , 'cus I was the oldest. Gwen (Blondy) I met in high
school , we started hanging out and later Angie started hanging with us. JQ:
You did a lot of writing for the Sugar Hill label. When did you get into
writing? CTP:
I started writing poetry in school. I would write things and put a melody
to them later on. Then in high school we were into cheering, and they
would ask me & Angie to write cheers. We would take popular songs
and re arrange them and make cheers. JQ:
So you were all friends before the music? CTP
: Yes. There was also Karen Lucas and Sharon Moutrie before Angie &
Blondie. Then they couldn’t do it , so me & Angie hooked up and
added two other girls , but it didn’t look right. By Angie hanging with
me during the day and me & Blondy clubbing at night, we all
eventually got together to form the final group. We had only been
together a few weeks before the Gang came to Columbia!! JQ:
Tell me about the night you auditioned for Sylvia.
JQ:
How did your parents feel about you making records? CTP:
My mother was very supportive. I had traveled to East Orange New Jersey
before, so it was no big thing. The only problem was that I was in
college, and I had to stop for a minute. Gwen’s mother didn’t want
her involved at all. She had just turned 20 that day , but her mother
didn’t want her to go. She threatened to put Gwen out , but Gwen left
anyway. She spent the night at my house that night. Angie’s parents
didn’t want her to go because she was only 17. We talked them into
letting her go at the last minute. JQ:
Was Rappers Delight the first time you heard rap? CTP:
We heard King Tim by Fatback and Lady B from Philly first. JQ:
Blondy told me that you had written Funk You Up before even hearing
Rappers Delight. Were the rhymes that became the record the same rhymes
that you wrote back then. CTP:
Mines and Angie’s were. Gwen changed hers up some. She added a lot in
the studio for her part. JQ:
Did Sequence do any singing on the Sugar hill Gangs first lp? CTP:
No we hadn’t gotten there yet. That was Dwayne Mitchell and Craig
Derry. Cindy Mizell who sang with Luther did some singing as well as
Regina Belle. JQ:
I heard that you guys hated Rappers Reprise (Jam Jam). CTP:
We went along with it , but we didn’t like it. It was kinda corny. JQ:
How was Monster Jam with Spoonie G?
JQ:I
used love your voice back in the days. It was very seductive &
feminine. I love to hear females rhyme, but I hate a raspy voice on a
female Emcee. I even heard Kurtis Blow mention your voice as one of his
favorites. Did Sylvia work with you on that, or was that something that
you had already mastered? CTP
: No Sylvia just let me be me. When we were in the studio recording they always wondered when I was breathing,
because you couldn’t ever hear me gasp on a track like you hear most
people. JQ:
What was your favorite Sequence release? CTP:
Funky Sound - Tear The Roof Off. I liked them all, but that was my
favorite. I wrote Gwen’s part, and JQ:
Is it true that you wrote some of the Gangs parts for Showdown? CTP:
No , but a lot of stuff I was just giving people. After Rappers
Delight Sylvia didn’t like a lot of what they were coming to the table
with. I wrote a lot of 8th Wonder also. Master Gee’s whole
part was mine, they just turned it from a female rap to a male rap.
Hanks part was also mine. I was gonna use it on some of our stuff, but
when I heard the 8th Wonder beat I said it to Sylvia and she
liked it. They already had
“ooh haa got you all in check” , that was Wonder Mikes part. Mike was
a clever writer. They already had “if you're ready to party &
you're
ready to jam scream it out and say I am” also. Despite what is written
on the record , the only writers on 8th Wonder are me ,
Master Gee & Wonder Mike. Jennifer Lopez , Master P , The Dr. Dolittle soundtrack all used 8th
Wonder , and there is still some dispute in court over that
record. JQ:
What is the nature of the dispute if I might ask? CTP:
Well Jobete publishing was paying me at one time because some of the
music was lifted from a Commodores song. (There is also a piece of Daisy
Lady by 7th Wonder). During that time we didn’t do the
paper work , the company did all of it. Well when EMI bought Jobete, EMI
started sending me money. At first I wasn’t getting anything, then I
started gettin’ checks from both. I thought that everyone else was
too. I am in another state, im not callin’ around asking people if
they got their checks. So they are tryin’ to say that I got all the
money from 8th Wonder. JQ:
Who is saying that?
JQ:
Well what does he have to do with it? Wouldn’t that be between you,
Master Gee & Wonder Mike? CTP:
His mother (Sylvia Robinson) and Jiggs Chase names are on it. Jiggs was
an arranger. But that’s how they did it. If you wanted to get paid,
that’s how you got down. I never got paid from Busta Rhymes using it,
and I just got paid from J Lo using it. JQ:
Those are checks from Joey Robinson, or EMI? CTP:
Directly from EMI. I never have received a dime from Sugar Hill, or a
royalty statement since we left them. All the Rhino stuff, and
Castle/Sequel stuff overseas that was reissued we don’t see anything
from. When I get my royalty statement I see stuff on us in Africa,
Brazil and all over the world. JQ:
I wanna be fair to the Robinson's. Is
your beef financially that you may get a 40,000 check when it should be
120,000 , or are you saying that you get nothing from them. CTP:
The money that I get has come from EMI , or BMI publishing. If that
money had gone directly to Joey, I don’t think that I would have known
about it. Joey gets a lot of money , but he doesn’t send checks out to
anybody. He acts like he doesn’t know how to find us , but you can go
to BMI to get contact info. JQ:
Right, I found you…… CTP:
See !!......... I really hate the fact that Mrs. Robinson is caught in the middle of all
of this. She was a writer and artist just like us. She got checks just
like us. She was from an era where women didn’t speak up. She would
tell me that if she could change things she would, but she didn’t have
that kind of power over her husband. She was the talent and her husband
was the money man. She was the bait. She was the pleasant sweet person,
and her husband controlled the money. The paper work wasn’t right all
the way back to All Platinum , Stang & Turbo (previous labels run by
the Robinson's). JQ:
Name some of your favorite releases from the Sugar Hill label…. CTP:
Rappers Delight of course , 8th Wonder , Freedom , Its Nasty , Apache ,
White Lines , The Message , Yes We Can Can , That’s The Joint (that
was a bad song!) , On The Radio……in fact Crash Crew had 3 or 4 good
ones. Trouble Funk had some good stuff when they were there. Positive
Force with "We Got The Funk". Positive Force came out right after we
did….they don’t want to give us credit but the three records that
really set it off for this rap thing was Rappers Delight , Funk You Up
and Christmas Rappin’. Those records opened the doors for rap music. JQ:
That label put out some good stuff. I have something by John Travolta's
brother on Sugar Hill… CTP:
Did you see my name on it? JQ:
No, but let me pull it out……it says written and mixed by Cheryl
Cook. You mixed stuff too? CTP:
Yes….. I was there in the studio with him. I used to love Once Is
Enough from that lp. He was the nicest guy to work with. His name was
Joey Travolta. JQ:
Everybody came through that label…. CTP
: Yep! When we did Cold Sweat James Brown came down. We wanted him to do
vocals with us , but Joe didn’t want to pay him. The Whispers , The
Isleys , Tito Puente , George Benson. A lot of people came through there
, and a lot of people wanted to be down with that label. But they really
didn’t sign any new acts after the Funky 4 + 1. Afrika Bambaataa &
The Zulu Nation came through , even L.L. Cool J sent his demo. I was an
A&R person there, but I never saw his stuff. But there were boxes of
stuff that people sent in. JQ:
Why do you think that Sugar Hill records didn’t last any longer than
they did. CTP:
When people saw that they weren’t getting paid they stopped coming
with their best. From the groups to Doug , Skip and Keith Le Blanc
everyone stopped giving their best. When you can't pay your bills you
stop trying to create. By the time that the music changed with Run DMC, we were black
balled. I remember going to Andre Harrell and trying to do something and
he wasn’t trying to hear it. I did a record with Donald D on Spring
Records called “Don’t You Sit Back Down”. I wasn’t happy with
the mix , and they released it without letting me be involved in the mix
, so that was the end of that relationship with them. I also felt like
they were trying to control me , and I didn’t want to be controlled by
anyone anymore.
CTP:
The Armory was packed and people were having a good time. We were in the
middle of doing Funky Sound and people started shooting. I know that
someone told you that we were doing a slow song when the shooting
started, but the only ballad we were doing in those days was Love
Changes. We didn’t get a chance to get that far. When we did the big
20,000 seaters we did more ballads because it was a different audience. JQ:
What other stuff did you contribute to as far as writing? CTP
: Apache , actually me & Angie wrote on Apache but I don’t think
they credited her. Also In The Fast Lane, Lets Dance (Make Your Body
Move) by West Street Mob. Me & Angie did the vocals on that, but
neither of us was credited. I never did anything with Flash & them,
only the West Street Mob & The Sugar Hill Gang. JQ:
Clayton Savage told me that you all did some stuff together….. CTP:
Yeah we did some work together. He did Funk It Up ’85. I don’t think
they credited him. They mixed it and took all the credit. JQ:
Ok he didn’t remember the title. He said that he was cutting so much
stuff back then that he didn’t CTP:
Yes! They were like big brothers! There were 4 females on the bus
counting Sha Rock , and they didn’t let anyone even think about
talking to us or anything. JQ:
What was JR Pearl productions? CTP:
That was a thing that Joey Robinson JR put together because we were doin’
so much work together. ……But I liked the underdogs - the guys like
Clayton , Chris Lord Alge and Reggie Griffin. They would just be sittin’
in the lobby doin’ nothin’ , and I would say come on lets go create
something. Chris Lord Alge is a big time producer for all kinds of rock
groups these days , but he wouldn’t have done anything at all if I
didn’t tell him to stop walking around doing nothing! JQ:
What’s your relationship with Angie Stone these days? CTP
: Its been about a year since we spoke. She is out in Cali doin’ her
thing. We are just on different I
have been in their lives all my life. I was out there doing background
for her when she had No More Rain In This Cloud. But when you get with
new companies sometimes they don’t want you around your people. They
want you to break all your old bonds. I know that if I need her I can
call , but I don’t bother her like that, because she is doing her
thing , and im about to do mine. I have written a lot of songs over the
years! JQ:
What do you think of today's music , specifically female rappers? CTP:
When we were doing it we were worried about not embarrassing our
mothers. Some of what's being said , I would not approve of it from my
daughter. Im not knocking what they do , because I don’t know their
background , but it's sad that they have to stoop so low to get their
points across! For myself I have nieces and nephews that I want to
listen to my music. JQ:
Yeah I remember James Brown saying that he wouldn’t make a record that
he couldn’t listen to with his mother. The worst thing he probably had
was Sex Machine. If someone made a Sex Machine in this day it would
leave nothing to the imagination! CTP: Thank you JayQuan.... © 2008 JayQuan Dot Com No Part May Be Used Without Authors Consent
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Ladies
First – The Story Of The Sequence Part 2- Cheryl The Pearl
CTP:
This guy that was supposed to be our manager promised to get us
backstage passes to the Sugar
Hill Gang concert. When we got there there were no tickets at the box
office. We happened to run into someone with Sugar Hill records who
listened to our story, and got us backstage. We met a guy named Nate who
told us where to send a cassette. We explained that we wanted to do our
thing right there. He wasn’t really going for that, and Sylvia (whom
we didn’t know at the time) said I will listen, go ahead and do your
thing. So we did a few songs, but nothing hit her right away. On the way
out either Angie or Gwen said “We didn’t do Funk You Up”. She said
go ahead and do it. We did the hook, and she stopped us and said
“that’s it don’t do anymore” She went and got Doug Wimbish &
Skip Mc Donald. She asked did we rap as well, and we said yes. She told
us to sing again and the musicians started playing along with us. She
was very happy with it, and she told us that she would send for us the
next week. She sent for us, and we flew up and did it. We stayed there
that night, I think it was a Friday. They mixed it Saturday, and it was
on WBLS on Sunday.
CTP:
Spoonie was smooth. He was used to the clubs in New York. When we were
doing 20,000 seaters he couldn’t even look at the crowd. We had to
talk him into going on stage. He would actually close his eyes and do
his rap. He would come off stage a nervous wreck. We were used to the
crowds from performing at talent shows and football games. We were
selling out arenas when it was just us and the Gang , but when they
added The Furious , The Funky , The Treacherous , Crash Crew , Waterbed
Kev, The Mean Machine and Wayne & Charlie we sold out every night.
Angie did hers. I loved Angie on that. When she says “ I rock the
army, air force & the navy too , one nation under funk red white
& blue – see A is for Angie, B is for bad something that you emcees
never had…..
CTP:
Joey Robinson Jr. He sent papers to EMI saying that im not the only
writer on 8th Wonder.
JQ:
What happened at the Armory during the Sugar Hill Revue?
remember……how was it touring with a bunch of guys? Was everyone
respectful.
planes now , but I have nothing bad to
say about her. She is like my little sister , and if she ever needs
anything she knows that I will do it for her. I always knew she could do
it , and I always pushed her to do it! I wish her the best , but I think
that the best is yet to come with her, because she is an incredible
artist. Her daughter is like my niece and her son is like my nephew.