EVERY SPOKEN WORD
150 min read · 30,002 words- 0:00 – 2:51
Meeting Lionel Richie & why the memoir couldn’t be “War and Peace”
- LRLionel Richie
(drumbeats) Joe Rogan podcast. Check it out. The Joe Rogan Experience.
- NANarrator
Train by day, Joe Rogan podcast by night. All day. (instrumental music plays)
- JRJoe Rogan
We up?
- LRLionel Richie
How we doing? Good.
- JRJoe Rogan
We're rolling.
- LRLionel Richie
Love it.
- JRJoe Rogan
Pleasure to meet you, sir.
- LRLionel Richie
It's about time.
- JRJoe Rogan
Yes.
- LRLionel Richie
(laughs)
- JRJoe Rogan
Thank you very much for being here. This is an honor.
- LRLionel Richie
It is... Same here, man. Same here.
- JRJoe Rogan
How does a person like you fit your life into a book?
- LRLionel Richie
(laughs)
- JRJoe Rogan
Because you w- w- your career is so wide and so long, you've had so many experiences from the Commodores in the '70s.
- LRLionel Richie
70s. 70s.
- JRJoe Rogan
The '70s.
- LRLionel Richie
70s.
- JRJoe Rogan
Still rocking.
- LRLionel Richie
70s.
- JRJoe Rogan
70s.
- LRLionel Richie
So, Joe, let me tell you something. Uh, it e- it really accounts for... And I'll tell you the joke of the book first.
- JRJoe Rogan
Okay.
- LRLionel Richie
All right? (clears throat) I'm probably the only guy in the world that had a book, had a book with probably a thousand pages in it. I turned a thousand pages (laughs) and they said-
- JRJoe Rogan
(laughs)
- LRLionel Richie
... "What the hell is this?" (laughs) And I said-
- JRJoe Rogan
War and Peace?
- LRLionel Richie
(laughs) War and Peace.
- JRJoe Rogan
(laughs)
- LRLionel Richie
And I said, "And I've got some more stories. I've got some more stories." And so for the first time in the history of Harper's probably, they said, (clears throat) "Mr. Richie, no more stories. We don't need any more stories. In fact, can we take some of the stories out?"
- 2:51 – 8:44
Resilience, punches, and survival in the entertainment business
- LRLionel Richie
Did I learn? Did I, did I learn? Absolutely. It's... If you had said to me, uh, when I first started my life... You know, my dad used to always have this line over and over again. You know, uh, uh, "A great fighter is not determined by how many punches he can throw, it's how many punches he can take." And I realized that I could take punches. Um, I'm the most unlikely person to take a punch 'cause I'm not that guy. Uh, if I can talk my way out of it, I will, but if you understand life itself, number one, that's difficult. And then if you start thinking about the music business, the entertainment business, it's an impossibility. You're going to get punched every day of your life and what's that punch? No, no, no, no. That's the punch. Now, can you get up off the floor and come back? Can you get a bad review and come back? Can they not like you and you come back? Can you find that that's a humorous thing instead of a tragic thing? Can you come back? Can you lose friends along the way? Can you come back? So you don't really realize, you know, this is a business. If you look at it, think about how many people we've lost.
- JRJoe Rogan
Hmm.
- LRLionel Richie
When I started writing this book, I started thinking to myself, "Where's Luther?"
- JRJoe Rogan
Hmm.
- LRLionel Richie
"Where's Michael?" I want to tell you more stories about Prince, but it's not fair because in certain cases, I want him to be here to laugh with the joke too.
- JRJoe Rogan
Right.
- LRLionel Richie
You follow me?
- JRJoe Rogan
Yeah.
- LRLionel Richie
And so then you start realizing, "Damn, this is lucky. This is really blessed time now because I'm in rare survival air," if you will. I'm still here at, at 200 years old talking about my career, but I'm telling the story. Someone else is not telling it for me.
- JRJoe Rogan
That's important.
- LRLionel Richie
That's important, yeah.
- JRJoe Rogan
Right. Because so many times when someone passes and then you get this sort of cobbled together version of their life without their own unique personal perspective, you miss a lot.
- LRLionel Richie
You miss a lot. And especially things that people thought were (clears throat) terrifying or tragic, if you talk to the person themselves, that was a learning experience.
- JRJoe Rogan
Hmm.
- LRLionel Richie
So you keep thinking, "Oh my God, what did you do when that happened," and they go, "No, no, no, no, no. I needed that," 'cause I wouldn't have been to the next person if I had not experienced that because it's, it's like trying to go, you know, to scrimmage before a big game. You're, you're with your team. Well, they hit harder from the other team, so you got to practice hard. Well, the only way to get into the music business, you got to be on the field. Practice is not in the equation.
- JRJoe Rogan
Right.
- LRLionel Richie
You got to get out on the field and it's nasty and it's not designed for you to survive. And I try to say this to the kids on American Idol, I said, "Listen, I love you. You got a great personality, but you better hope like hell you have a sense of humor, 'cause if you don't," (laughs)
- JRJoe Rogan
(laughs)
- LRLionel Richie
"... it's gonna eat you up alive." (laughs)
- JRJoe Rogan
Did you develop this mentality along the way or was this something that you just uniquely had?
- LRLionel Richie
Um, I... This is my, this is my character. I, I, I... I... If you understand something, I was, and I tell this joke all the time, I was, I was, um, too small to play football, too short to play basketball, um, baseball was a projectile coming at me at 300 miles an hour.
- JRJoe Rogan
(laughs)
- LRLionel Richie
I'm not standing in front of that thing. And the only thing I could play was tennis. So, you understand, uh, uh, walking around on a tennis court in the middle of the simer, Civil Rights movement-
- JRJoe Rogan
(laughs) .
- LRLionel Richie
... it would... You know, it... You have to develop a sense of humor (laughs) otherwise-
- JRJoe Rogan
(laughs) .
- LRLionel Richie
... you're gonna die. And so (laughs) , so I, I found also, again, it's funny what your father will say to you, uh, back in... You wonder, "How did he get through all of his life?" 'Cause they went through the struggle of life. And he said, "If you lose your sense of humor, they got you."
- JRJoe Rogan
Mm-hmm.
- LRLionel Richie
And I always remembered the fact that if you can find something funny out of this experience, take that ha ha to the next day. And so I kinda use that as my m- mantra, basically, that, "Okay, um, where am I? I'm at the Grammys. Okay. What am I complaining about? I'm complaining about I don't like my seat. What did they just say? I won. Who cares?" (laughs)
- JRJoe Rogan
(laughs)
- 8:44 – 13:09
The Commodores begin: campus talent shows to touring with the Jackson 5
- JRJoe Rogan
U- Uh, yeah. And do it since 1970. Like, what was The Commodores? '72 did you guys start?
- LRLionel Richie
Well, well, let me tell you. We started in '68.
- JRJoe Rogan
Whoa.
- LRLionel Richie
On the, on the university campus. We were students. Uh, it started out as a group called The Mystics, and we were the talent show. We didn't realize that we were the joke of the seniors, of the juniors. But they have a freshman talent show every year and we wanted to be the band to be the freshman talent show. We came out on stage and killed it. And there was a guy, another group there called The Jays, which was the seniors. They had been there for the last four years and they were the biggest group on campus. They were about to break up and a guy named Michael Gilbert gave us a phone call and said, "I wanna put a group together," and I was looking at you four guys, "Would you like to come and join this band over here?" The answer is that was the beginning of The Commodores.
- JRJoe Rogan
And how old were you at the time you...
- LRLionel Richie
19 years old.
- JRJoe Rogan
Wow.
- LRLionel Richie
Thank you very much.
- JRJoe Rogan
Wow.
- LRLionel Richie
19 years old and, "We're gonna take over the world," (exhales) Joe, you know what I mean?
- JRJoe Rogan
(exhales)
- LRLionel Richie
In other words, you know, there's the... There's James Brown, there's Marvin, and there's The Commodores. We... (laughs) You know?
- JRJoe Rogan
Yeah.
- LRLionel Richie
You know how that works, you know?
- JRJoe Rogan
Yeah.
- LRLionel Richie
And y- what I love about that period of time, eh, we could be, you know, all right, all wrong, but we were all together.
- JRJoe Rogan
Mm-hmm.
- LRLionel Richie
It didn't make any difference. So we experienced every possible imaginable part of growing up together. I didn't grow up with brothers. I had one sister. So these became... Forget the band. These were five brothers and we were in every disaster you could probably think about, and we laughed our way in and out of every... Today, we'd all be in jail, okay (laughs) what I mean?
- JRJoe Rogan
(laughs)
- LRLionel Richie
Right? (laughs) I can make that statement. I mean, but back then, uh, it was, ah, it was the best.
- JRJoe Rogan
And at 19 years of age, you're just starting, starting to become a man, and then you're thrust into super stardom-
- LRLionel Richie
Oh.
- JRJoe Rogan
... in a crazy time in human history.
- LRLionel Richie
It was... Well, first of all, it... We didn't really get into recording until '71, '72. We were just the biggest, largest, most dynamic band in our heads-
- JRJoe Rogan
(laughs)
- LRLionel Richie
... (laughs) across the South and until we were the opening act for The Jackson Five, their first tour that they went out on, we were the opening act for them. That was our first look at, "Holy crap, this is, this is huge." And then, I'm, I'm an economics major and accounting minor, and all of a sudden I kept thinking, "I don't know what this business is, but, um, I think I wanna be in it."
- JRJoe Rogan
(laughs)
- LRLionel Richie
(laughs) Because you have to understand something, when you play tennis, what's the number one thing you will never hear ever? A girl screaming. That's not gonna happen. Football, basketball, you hear them all day long. I was going to be an Episcopal priest thinking that's my avenue, and I'm on stage one night at The Jackson Show and all of a sudden some girl said, "Sing it, baby." And I said... Called the minister back on the phone, I said, "I don't think I'm gonna be priest material." (laughs)
- JRJoe Rogan
(laughs)
- LRLionel Richie
... I just want you to understand.
- 13:09 – 18:09
Naïve, lucky, and protected: early road stories and ‘how did I survive?’
- LRLionel Richie
Off to the races, Joe. And I tell you, uh, you know, looking at this book, it's a question I survived or how I survived.
- JRJoe Rogan
Mm.
- LRLionel Richie
But the question to me was, I survived?
- JRJoe Rogan
(laughs)
- LRLionel Richie
(laughs) Because it, it, it's not... it's... I mean, I can tell you stories and it... Well, they're in the book, but I'm just saying there are moments when you just look around and go, "Thank God for just being naive, young, stupid, didn't have any idea of what the heck you were doing, but what a great adventure." I'm in a subway, four o'clock in the morning, my saxophone, and I had this little secret thing that no one knew. I had this s- seath, sh- sesh, seath-
- JRJoe Rogan
Sheath?
- LRLionel Richie
... s- seath-
- JRJoe Rogan
Sheath?
- LRLionel Richie
What are they- Sheath around my neck. Didn't know it had a secret compartment. Of course, everybody in Harlem knew it was a secret compartment. I had all my money in that and I'm walking around going, "No one knows I have my money in there," right?
- JRJoe Rogan
Uh.
- LRLionel Richie
Which is everybody knew I had money in there. (laughs) I would walk up and down the subway. No one would touch us. No one. I don't know. It has to be a sense of divine guidance or big Frank Lucas just told everybody, "Don't touch us."
- JRJoe Rogan
(laughs)
- LRLionel Richie
One or the other. But I mean, it was just one of those-
- JRJoe Rogan
(clears throat)
- LRLionel Richie
... moments in time where, you know, uh, uh, and I've had some people say to me, "You were in Harlem at four o'clock in the morning in the subway alone?" I said, "Yeah."
- JRJoe Rogan
With a saxophone?
- LRLionel Richie
With a saxophone. "God bless you, kid."
- JRJoe Rogan
Wow.
- LRLionel Richie
(laughs) God bless you.
- JRJoe Rogan
It's... It must seem almost surreal looking back, because you've had such an incredible life, such an incredible career. It almost... I mean, I can't imagine what it feels like just reminiscing and going through the stories and, and just, just looking at the actual facts of what you did.
- LRLionel Richie
I'm glad I'm doing the book now, because otherwise I would be, um, let's say when I got to about 98, 99, because I'm planning on a full life, right? There's an old man at the barbershop still telling lies about his life when he was growing up, you know?
- JRJoe Rogan
(laughs)
- LRLionel Richie
Because they... it has to be a lie, you know? And, and, you know. There was one title I was joking around with, which is, You're Not Going To Believe This Shit.
- JRJoe Rogan
(laughs) That would be a great title.
- LRLionel Richie
That would be the title, you know, and I was thinking that might be the way to go. And then, of course, I kept thinking, "No, but from a philosophical point of view, that's not gonna fly." Right? You know what?
- JRJoe Rogan
Right.
- LRLionel Richie
Okay, we'll pull that back. But the point is, it's almost not believable.
- JRJoe Rogan
Yeah.
- LRLionel Richie
I mean, when you start calling off names, it's almost like name dropping, and you start thinking about who mentored you, who gave the advice, who was there for you exactly at the right time, who came in, who left right on time. You know what I'm saying? There are moments that happen that if I tried to script this thing, if I try to put it down as a complete play, chapter by chapter, you know, act by act, you couldn't make this up. I mean, it just... it reads like a... (laughs) like a book.
- JRJoe Rogan
It... Or like a crazy movie. Like, if your life was a movie, I'd be like-
- 18:09 – 20:41
Blessed timing & listening for the next move (grandmother’s advice)
- JRJoe Rogan
Yeah. Do you feel charmed?
- LRLionel Richie
Yes.
- JRJoe Rogan
Yeah.
- LRLionel Richie
I-
- JRJoe Rogan
Do you feel like, for whatever reason-
- LRLionel Richie
The word I'll... The word I'll use is blessed. Um, um...... it's one of those things where, uh, my grandmother said something to me a while, a while back. I had just finished, um, I had just finished Endless Love. And, uh, I went back to Tuskegee and I'm walking around in the house, pacing back and forth. And she says, "What on earth are you doing?" And I said, "I'm trying to figure out my next move." And she said, "Did you come to school to, uh, join the Commodores?" She said, "No, no, I, I, I met them, I met them on the campus." She said, "Did you plan on being a writer?" "No, no, no, no, I found out I was a writer." She said, "Did you plan on being a lead singer?" I said, "No, no, no, no, I found out when I joined the group that..." She said, "Why don't you just get a good night's sleep and wait for God to give you the next move?"
- JRJoe Rogan
Wow.
- LRLionel Richie
And that's how I started my career. Just-
- JRJoe Rogan
That's an incredible woman.
- LRLionel Richie
You know-
- JRJoe Rogan
That's incredible perspective.
- LRLionel Richie
... "Quit, quit trying to figure this out. Did you figure it out before?" "No." "Then just relax." (laughs)
- JRJoe Rogan
(laughs)
- LRLionel Richie
"Chill out. Can you read or write music?" "No." "Okay, just-" (laughs)
- JRJoe Rogan
(laughs)
- LRLionel Richie
"... chill out."
- JRJoe Rogan
That's so hard to tell a young person though, and have them absorb it, 'cause especially someone going through what you're going through.
- LRLionel Richie
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
- NANarrator
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- 20:41 – 27:24
Failure as training: Motown mentorship, hustle culture, and learning to write
- LRLionel Richie
Yeah. Yeah. It, it's, um, um... I try to tell the kids on American Idol, you know, sometimes you have to look at failure as a great sign. Uh, if they had told the Commodores on the first time we auditioned, "You got it. Ready to go," the answer is, "We weren't ready to go." It took no, and no, and no, and we ended... Signing at Atlantic, no. Signing at Philly International, no. "But we're the greatest band ever." "You're right." What did, uh, they say to us? Um, "You sound just like The Temptations. You sound just like Sly and the Family Stone. What do you sound like?" Wow. What do we sound like? I don't know.
- JRJoe Rogan
Mm.
- LRLionel Richie
So, the only way we have to find out is we have to start not imitating somebody else. Now comes a thing of, "Well, what do we sound like?"
- JRJoe Rogan
Right.
- LRLionel Richie
And I didn't know. I didn't know how to write, so I... "How do you write?" You follow me? And then you get to Motown. I'm signed to Motown. (laughs) I don't know how to read or write music. What the hell am I doing here with this, this band? I'm not the lead singer. I sing some cover songs. And then you walk down the hall and there's Marvin. So, I decided I'm gonna interview Marvin. "Uh, excuse me, Marvin. Um, what music conservatory did you graduate from?" And he said, "What the hell is that?" (laughs)
- JRJoe Rogan
(laughs)
- LRLionel Richie
I said, "Well, I mean, how do you write your music?" He said, "No, no, little brother. Can you hum?" "Yeah." He says, "All that you can't play with three fingers, hum into a tape recorder." And then you go down the hall again, and it's Smokey. And there's Berry Gordy, who built Motown. "Uh, excuse me, Mr. Gordy, what, uh, what university did you graduate from?" He said, "I'm at... I was at a car plant. What are you talking about?" Everything that I grew up with on the campus of Tuskegee as a kid, I grew up on the university campus, that's academia, did not apply in the world of hustle.
- JRJoe Rogan
Mm.
- LRLionel Richie
You understand?
- JRJoe Rogan
Yeah.
- LRLionel Richie
So, I'm now meeting the guys and ladies who found their hustle.
- JRJoe Rogan
They had a PhD in hustle.
- LRLionel Richie
They had a PhD in hustle. And I am telling you, Joe, from that moment on, I was let out of the box. Somebody let me out of the cage, because in academia, there's a logical reason why you know what you know-
- JRJoe Rogan
Right.
- LRLionel Richie
... because you studied it.
- JRJoe Rogan
Right.
- LRLionel Richie
But I was that kid that was sitting in the class going... "Mr. Richie, Mr. Richie, would you like to join the rest of the class?"
- JRJoe Rogan
(laughs)
- LRLionel Richie
I was daydreaming.
- JRJoe Rogan
Right.
- LRLionel Richie
I found, at Motown, the whole damn company was tapping on the table.
- JRJoe Rogan
Ah.
- LRLionel Richie
I found out in New York City, the whole town is tapping on the table and dancing.
- JRJoe Rogan
Right.
- LRLionel Richie
Right? And so from that point on, I joined this creative source, force, fraternity, sorority of crazy, out of control people that gave me permission to dare to listen to myself.
- JRJoe Rogan
That must have been so exciting to learn that, that the structure that you learned in academia-
- LRLionel Richie
No, no, no.
- JRJoe Rogan
... like, no, these wizards-
- LRLionel Richie
No, no, no.
- JRJoe Rogan
... these wizards of music-
- 27:24 – 42:36
‘Receiving’ the song: silence, simplicity, and the 12-note universe
- LRLionel Richie
It was to the point where I was actually trained, you know, this is Grandma Foster, A.M. Foster, uh, th- she courted my grandfather in Booker T. Washington's house. That's where she came from, Tuskegee. My grandfather, they knew Booker T. She knew George Washington Carver.
- JRJoe Rogan
Wow.
- LRLionel Richie
In, in my home in Tuskegee, Alabama, there's a crocheted piece from Mr. Carver, Dr. Carver. "My dear Mrs. Foster, congratulations on your wedding."
- JRJoe Rogan
Wow.
- LRLionel Richie
That's a crocheted piece. The, the deed to my house has the Washington family's name on the deed to my house. It was given to me and, um, not to me, to my-
- JRJoe Rogan
(laughs)
- LRLionel Richie
... grandmother and grandfather by the Washington family and Booker T. So now when you have all that background, it's kind of one of those things where, where do you go with this thing, you know?
- JRJoe Rogan
Right.
- LRLionel Richie
And so, you know, my, my upbringing was pretty, pretty amazing where it had structure, had structure. And now here I am over in this other side where, wait a minute, you mean I don't have to remember anything, I can make up something?
- JRJoe Rogan
Hmm.
- LRLionel Richie
Whoa.
- JRJoe Rogan
And allow the universe to just give you...
- LRLionel Richie
And, whoa. Wait, I can just make up something. But what do you want to make up? I don't know. So then it's a word that we learned called receiving.
- JRJoe Rogan
Ooh.
- LRLionel Richie
I'm just receiving. So now, where does receiving come from?
- JRJoe Rogan
Yeah.
- LRLionel Richie
Receiving comes from the silence. It's not the noise. It's in the silence.
- JRJoe Rogan
Right.
- LRLionel Richie
So here I am between 1:00 and 6:00 in the morning and everyone thinks, "What's Lionel doing? He's just kind of sitting there. What's he doing?" Nothing. But let me, here, let me let you in on a little sound that's terrifying to most people. You ready for this? You hear that, Joe?
- JRJoe Rogan
Silence.
- LRLionel Richie
Right. Now, if you can hear... out of the silence comes the receiving that from the other side.
- JRJoe Rogan
It is a receiving, isn't it?
- LRLionel Richie
Yeah. When you, you know, sometimes you just have to just blank it out. Some people call it meditation.
- JRJoe Rogan
Mm-hmm.
- LRLionel Richie
Some people have all kind of names for it. I just love to listen to silence. By the way, there's only 12 notes, Joe. It's not 145 notes. It's only 12 notes. So everything that has ever happened that you have ever heard on any radio, it's only 12 notes. So how do you turn 12 notes into something that sounds new, different?... that's amazing to me. (laughs)
- NANarrator
Yeah, it is amazing.
- LRLionel Richie
And so in the silence... And all you have to do is learn how to figure out what are the four chords? 'Cause if you got four or five chords, you can write a whole album. (laughs) . But it's the melody that goes on top that you have to be able to hear. And so once I learned that Marvin and, and Smokey and (clears throat) you know, Michael, Quincy, and, you know, these are... Hendrix, I'm, I saw the poster coming in, you know, they, they all made careers. Not only careers, they had their unique sound out of 12 notes.
- NANarrator
Mm.
- LRLionel Richie
Think about that. Now, if you think it's hard enough to get a hit record, how do you become unique unto yourself-
- NANarrator
Right.
- 42:36 – 47:25
Creatives, ADHD, and education: stop boxing kids in
- LRLionel Richie
Y- You know, if there's, there's two types of kids, and I keep trying to tell 'em. There's academics.... they're great. You want them to r-remember, they can remember, they can recite, they do numbers. And then there's the creatives. Okay. The last thing you want to do is put a creative kid in a room full of academics. The grades are not gonna be great.
- JRJoe Rogan
Right.
- LRLionel Richie
And you're gonna worry them to death.
- JRJoe Rogan
Yeah.
- LRLionel Richie
Put them in a creative school where they, they're nurtured into their... Yes, they, they, they're gonna, they're gonna work on math, and yes, they'll work on their science, but don't make that the priority. No one, to this day, has ever asked to see my college degree.
- JRJoe Rogan
(laughs)
- LRLionel Richie
(laughs) No one, to this day, has ever asked me to see my high school diploma. Do you understand me?
- JRJoe Rogan
Right. Yeah.
- LRLionel Richie
So-
- JRJoe Rogan
Yeah.
- LRLionel Richie
So was I an A student, B student, C student? A C student, babes. I mean, I was right there on the borderline of disaster.
- JRJoe Rogan
(laughs)
- LRLionel Richie
(laughs) But I was just happy to be there.
- JRJoe Rogan
Right.
- LRLionel Richie
But the point was, it's not important.
- JRJoe Rogan
Right.
- LRLionel Richie
What did you end up being? Who did you end up discovering? How comfortable are you with yourself?
- JRJoe Rogan
Yeah.
- LRLionel Richie
By the time you get out of elementary schoo- school, going into high school, you're so inundated in, "Let me tell you what's wrong with, uh, Lionel. Lionel has a problem with..." And after you listen to that crap, by the time you're going to college, it's not happening.
- JRJoe Rogan
Right.
- LRLionel Richie
Now, here's the joke. They told my family, my mom and dad, "Ah, truthfully, Lionel is not college material." I mean, in other words, he, he should be creat- You know who they forgot to tell? Me.
- JRJoe Rogan
(laughs)
- LRLionel Richie
(laughs) The best thing they ever did. They didn't tell me about that conversation, which means it was okay. I didn't use that as my crutch.
- JRJoe Rogan
Mm.
- LRLionel Richie
Don't tell somebody they have a handicap. Just leave them alone.
- JRJoe Rogan
Just let them figure out what they actually like to do.
- LRLionel Richie
Because it's not a handicap.
- JRJoe Rogan
Right.
- LRLionel Richie
In other words, I, I learned years ago, (clears throat) a race car driver, he sees 200 miles an hour as, "Can I get this to go any faster?" Magic Johnson, the basketball goal looks like the size of the inside of a, of a building. That's how big it is in his head. To me and you, it's a little tiny thing at the other end of the court. You follow me?
- JRJoe Rogan
Yeah.
- 47:25 – 1:03:39
Imposter syndrome, panic attacks, and stepping forward anyway
- LRLionel Richie
I get it. And, and, (laughs) and I, I understand. It, it's, um... And by the way, I mean, the... What I like about the book is everyone... Just to let you know, it, it sounds like, you know, I, I won, I won. No, it was a struggle. I'm the shyest guy in the world. It was painful. Joe, walking on that stage, I said it was a freshman talent show. The curtains open, I went off with the curtains. I... The only reason that I was on that stage, I didn't grow up with the guys in The Mystics. They didn't know that Lionel Richie from Tuskegee, Alabama was the shyest kid in town.
- JRJoe Rogan
Hmm.
- LRLionel Richie
They didn't know that. These are guys that I didn't grow up with.
- JRJoe Rogan
Oh.
- LRLionel Richie
So they said, "Hey, hey man, you brought your horn?" "Yeah." "You want to be in a band?" Now you're talking to a kid who goes, "Okay, we're gonna do a baseball team." What was the answer? "Okay, we'll take Lionel."
- JRJoe Rogan
Ah.
- LRLionel Richie
Which... "Okay, we're... Let's do a basketball game." "Okay, all right, we'll take Lionel." "Let's play football." "Ugh, okay, we'll take Lionel." These guys came along and said, "Hey, you got your horn?" "Yeah, yeah." "You want to be in our band?" "Yeah." Right?
- JRJoe Rogan
Right.
- LRLionel Richie
Bingo.... "You mean you don't know about me?" (laughs)
- JRJoe Rogan
(laughs) You don't have to be defined by other people's ideas of you.
- LRLionel Richie
That's exactly right.
- JRJoe Rogan
Yeah.
- LRLionel Richie
So they said, and they said, "Okay. Here's the part and I... Can you play the saxophone?" "Yeah, man, I play sax?" I didn't tell them I brought the horn to school to learn how to play it.
- JRJoe Rogan
Hmm.
- LRLionel Richie
But I could play by ear. I could play by ear. So unless we're reading music, I sound like I know what I'm talking about.
- JRJoe Rogan
Right.
- LRLionel Richie
So it's... became one of those things. And by the time I got in The Commodores, I didn't tell anybody.
- JRJoe Rogan
(laughs)
- LRLionel Richie
I'm the greatest horn holder that ever lived. Are you kidding me?
- JRJoe Rogan
Wow.
- LRLionel Richie
So just keep that secret and keep on going. But what I'm saying to you, just think about this for a moment. I mean, it didn't start out with confidence. It came out with, uh, sooner or later they're going to know I'm an imposter.
- JRJoe Rogan
(laughs)
- LRLionel Richie
(laughs) And slowly but surely, who worked the hardest? Me. 'Cause sooner or later they're going to find out-
- JRJoe Rogan
You gotta catch up.
- LRLionel Richie
... that I gotta catch up.
- JRJoe Rogan
Yeah.
- LRLionel Richie
So every time we had some time off, I'm interviewing Marvin, I'm interviewing you name it, anybody. "Tell me what you did to get to where you're going." Then I found out, nobody went to school to know what they know. Holy crap. Now we're onto something really serious.
- JRJoe Rogan
Oh.
- LRLionel Richie
'Cause then I had some aha moments. And so if I can't play it, I can hum it, but most of the time I could just play it. "Okay, I can play this." And as you learn, you grow quickly. You have to learn quickly now 'cause we just signed the contract that said we're now on Motown Records. (laughs) I gotta do a fast track here. But it happened in real time. At any moment they could've called up and said, "We're gonna cut the group down to the most significant people in the group. Rich, you're out."
- JRJoe Rogan
Hmm.
- 1:03:39 – 1:16:04
Going solo & the ‘street business’: band tensions, gangster realities, and money lessons
- LRLionel Richie
You, you can't do it. But what was happening behind the scenes, that's the story.
- JRJoe Rogan
Oh.
- LRLionel Richie
What was happening behind the scenes was... And I understood. I understood, but still I didn't wanna accept it. It's the guys.
- JRJoe Rogan
Yeah.
- LRLionel Richie
Okay. The article read, um, "And then Lionel Richie sat down to the piano and started playing his classic hits." Review: What's a guy like the Commodores... uh, what's a guy like Lionel Richie doing in a funk band like the Commodores? Joe, try to go back to rehearsal after that review.
- JRJoe Rogan
Oh, god.
- LRLionel Richie
You got it?
- JRJoe Rogan
Yeah.
- LRLionel Richie
Or, now we've done Endless Love, now we've done Lady with Kenny Rogers. "Tell us, Lionel, how you started the group?"
- JRJoe Rogan
Oh, no.
- LRLionel Richie
"I, I didn't start the group."
- JRJoe Rogan
Oh, no.
- LRLionel Richie
And now you walk into a group interview, and they knock Clyde over, and they knock, uh, Whack over, the, the trumpet player. Tommy. "Lionel, tell us about the band."
- JRJoe Rogan
Oh, no.
- LRLionel Richie
So what I tried to do was come later.
- JRJoe Rogan
Mm-hmm.
- LRLionel Richie
But by coming later, "Oh, you think you're big enough now where you don't have to be in the group." Well, if I don't-
- JRJoe Rogan
Right.
- LRLionel Richie
... if, if I'm on time, they'll disrespect you.
- JRJoe Rogan
Right.
- LRLionel Richie
I got the feeling. I got their angst.
- JRJoe Rogan
Yeah.
- LRLionel Richie
You follow me?
- JRJoe Rogan
And this is a different time in the world. See, today, you could elevate those folks through social media and bring them up with you.
- LRLionel Richie
Of course, of course, of course, of course, of course.
- JRJoe Rogan
Yeah. That's the beauty of today.
- LRLionel Richie
Of course, of course.
- JRJoe Rogan
If you're working with talented people and they're not getting shined, you go-
- LRLionel Richie
Of course.
- JRJoe Rogan
... "Hey, this is, this guy's great."
- 1:16:04 – 1:30:45
Michael Jackson’s unmanageable fame: protecting the ‘golden goose’ and the ‘Smelly’ story
- JRJoe Rogan
Wow. God, it must've been so exciting. And to be surrounded by so many extraordinary people at that time. What was it like watching Michael Jackson explode?
- LRLionel Richie
(laughs)
- JRJoe Rogan
Because I... You know, I talk about him and I talk about Elvis a lot.
- LRLionel Richie
Yeah.
- JRJoe Rogan
And that if you look at it as a study of fame, that there's a certain level of fame that you achieve that's completely and wholly unmanageable.
- LRLionel Richie
Right.
- JRJoe Rogan
And it's like the Elvis level.
- LRLionel Richie
Yep, yep.
- JRJoe Rogan
And I think he was, like, the first guy to really reach that level.
- LRLionel Richie
Yep.
- JRJoe Rogan
And then it was Michael Jackson who went to a completely different place.
- LRLionel Richie
Yeah.
- JRJoe Rogan
Michael Jackson, he's even surpassed that-
- LRLionel Richie
Yeah.
- JRJoe Rogan
... which seems more insane.
- LRLionel Richie
Oh, yeah. There it is, right. Ah.
- JRJoe Rogan
Look at that photograph. Wow.
- LRLionel Richie
That's at, that's at Studio 54 on Michael's 21st birthday.
- JRJoe Rogan
Wow.
- LRLionel Richie
Yeah.
- JRJoe Rogan
Wow.
- LRLionel Richie
And the mustache was thicker than ever, man. That's what-
- JRJoe Rogan
(laughs) It dripped down a little. Nice.
- LRLionel Richie
It di- Oh, no. I had the little hook over on the side. Come on, man. (laughs)
- JRJoe Rogan
(laughs)
- LRLionel Richie
No... You know...
- JRJoe Rogan
Because he, he never had a n- a normal moment.
- LRLionel Richie
No.
- JRJoe Rogan
He was famous when he was a little boy.
- LRLionel Richie
Yeah.
Episode duration: 2:18:03
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Transcript of episode MiDNZJgnRRQ
