Like the Energizer Bunny, you have outlasted various Motown regimes. Have you ever thought about moving to a different label?
Well, I have confidence in the discussions we've had. So if our words are true, if where we're coming from is real, then things will happen on the good tip.
Obviously, the Motown from back in the day can't be duplicated. There won't be another Motown Revue, Marvin Gaye, the Temptations, Supremes or Funk Brothers. Life has a definite thing about it, and that is change. However, I have true pleasure in the fact that I had the honor of meeting and knowing these people and being blessed to be at that space and time in my life.
Is the new album, "A Time 2 Love," still a single CD?
Yes, although in these nine years I've done more than just the songs that will be on the album. And it's going good. In these nine years I've found the songs that feel most comfortable for me. One song, "If the Creek Don't Rise," is something I wrote a while back that I recently revisited. My daughter Aisha is also on the album.
Are you concerned about competing with your artistic legacy?
I don't think about competing against myself. But I am my best critic. "Best" is better than saying "worst," because you can be one's best critic if you're given constructive criticism. Obviously, I can take my criticism better than anyone else's, but I'm open to some feedback. If it feels right, I receive it. If it's a challenge to do something different, I receive that.
I think I'm a perfectionist to the point where it's got to be real but not forced. I've kind of loosened up on myself a little bit, because you've got to keep the naturalness of it in there. As long as you can perfect keeping it natural, that's OK.
You mentioned that you revisited an earlier song. The popular theory is you have a hidden vault of songs from the last 20-30 years that you can pull music out of on a whim.
The vault travels in my head. I have songs in various forms of incompletion and completion.
You have worked with relatively few outside producers. Do your future plans include collaborations with your production contemporaries?
I've thought about it. When I was younger I worked with Clarence Paul, Henry Cosby, Norman Whitfield, and I think Holland-Dozier-Holland did something on me. Then there's Quincy [Jones] on "We Are the World," and Babyface and I did something together. So I've worked with people, though not recently.
There are some young contemporary producers who I think are good.
For example?
Raphael Saadiq is very talented. For a long time, I've talked with Jimmy Jam & Terry Lewis about doing something together. They're exceptionally talented.
You have also only written and/or produced a few acts like Aretha Franklin, the Spinners, Rufus and Minnie Riperton.
You're right, I haven't done a lot of production for other artists. I would like to. But there's a kind of mode you have to be in; you have to have the songs. Probably after I put together the label, I will concentrate more on that. The challenge in producing others, though, is finding different ways to make it sound nothing like Stevie Wonder, to make it sound like that particular artist. That's a challenge I'll welcome, because it will be fun.
Your studio must hold a lot of special memories. Do you spend a lot of time here?
I spend a lot of time here because it's a comfort place where many great things have happened. When I say "great," it hasn't all been happy moments. There have been moments of sorrow. But at the end of the day, there's great energy in this building.
Besides the messages in your lyrics, your album covers from the '70s onward tell their own stories. How do you conceive your cover concepts?
A lot of it really happens just from me talking to people when I come up with the title. "Talking Book" happened between myself and Malcolm Cecil, one of the engineers. We were just talking about the whole deal with him asking me about the different songs. "Innervisions" came from the song "Visions," which was there before the "Innervisions" title was there.
"Fulfillingness" was just me working the word: the idea of fulfilling and fulfilling is like a female. The other part of that title, "the first finale," was sort of referencing an ending of the period after "Music of My Mind" and these three albums.
"Songs in the Key of Life" was like the beginning of another kind of place. Its title came from a dream I had where I was asking, "How many songs are there in the key of life?" Then it became the challenge of starting again and doing it a different way.
What three albums represent the quintessential Stevie Wonder?
You're asking for three, but honestly all of my albums are different versions of me. But to answer the question, I'd say "Songs in the Key of Life," "Journey Through the Secret Life of Plants" and a tossup between "Talking Book" and "Innervisions."
I chose "Songs" because its 21 songs represent a complete set. "Secret Life" was an experimental project with me scoring and doing other things I like; challenging myself with all the things that entered my mind from the Venus' flytrap to Earth's creation to coming back as a flower.
With "Talking Book" I had a California thing going on with songs like "Maybe Your Baby" and "Superstition." I was doing different things with backgrounds. Then I like "Innervisions" because of the acoustic feel to it.
Then limiting yourself to three quintessential songs would be more difficult?
That would be really hard. Let me explain my thing about songs. I might have a "Superstition" day, a "You and I" day or a "Visions" day. I might have a jazz day, a blues day; things happen at various times, so I can't really limit myself like that.
Even though "Secret Life" ultimately didn't garner the acclaim of your other albums, is that challenge something you would tackle again?
I will definitely do it again. I love the idea of orchestrating and composing. And technology is making that more accessible to the blind with MIDI and other tools where you can play all the parts. It's exciting to get the proper musicians to play what you wrote. I would like to see "Secret" done as a ballet. I just think if you have a love for music, you cannot limit yourself to any particular kind of music. You've got to be able to be receptive to all the various things out there.
What's exciting about "A Time 2 Love" is we're putting together some great combinations like the combination that happened with "Pastime Paradise." When I first did that track, I started playing drums like Barry White and I began to sing a "shmoo" sound on top of that, but it just didn't feel right. I said, "Hell no. It ain't happening." So I blew that off for a while.
Then I was working on other stuff with some percussionists, and I said, "Let me just try this." When I tried having the percussionist play behind that "shmoo" thing I had done, I then put some acoustic bass in the background. Then I wanted a backbeat. But I didn't want to have a drum backbeat. So I got these little clappers and then strings.
Then I was outside and heard some Hare Krishnas playing. I asked them to come inside the studio because I had this piece that it would be wonderful for them to play and chant on. I also had the West Los Angeles choir sing on the song. So on the song we're talking about people and living in those times again where there's such a lack of tolerance, people having their own differences and "Hey, I don't want to work with you." But you're no different than me; we're created by the same God.
It really worked. It was an amazing experience putting all of that together.
And you're doing some of that on "A Time 2 Love"?
Yes. On one song, "If Your Love Cannot Be Moved," I have myself playing, some symphony musicians from here and Doug E. Fresh doing a little beat-box thing. I also have a female talking-drum player from Nigeria. And we're going to have the West Los Angeles choir sing. I'm going to record the choir at the church.
You were instrumental in using techniques like the Moog synthesizer to enhance your music. Do you think there's too much reliance on machines in contemporary music?
I think we're living in a time where that definitely to some degree has peaked. You're hearing more people playing live instruments, and some soul artists like India.Arie are playing acoustic guitar or playing the piano. So it has become a combination with drummers playing along to some sequenced tracks, along with the live stuff, marrying the two together.
And there's a growing desire to hear live music again. I know that live performers are touring more because there's nothing like hearing a band play live or hearing someone acoustic play live like Norah Jones.
Speaking of touring, I attended one of your shows at House of Blues in Los Angeles, and you were onstage, no break, for more than two hours. How do you keep that energy going?
Syreeta wasn't doing well back then. So I was inspired by thinking about her, doing the songs we did together. I'm motivated by memories of different things. So what I do is relive the experience or memories of a particular song. Then I go forward and do the best performance I can.
There was a time when I was on the road for a while and I started changing the songs around and singing them differently. Then I went to someone else's concert. The person came out and did his songs, but flipped them and changed them around. And I said, "Oh man, this is ridiculous. I don't want to hear this like that. I want to hear the real deal."
Then I flashed back to myself, and I'm thinking, "Wait a minute. If you think like that, what about when you change your stuff around?" That was a wake-up call for me. People want to hear it like the record. There can be slight variations because you're human, not a machine. You can't always do the exact same thing as you did it before or originally.
