James Poyser

That was a neo soul album.

James Poyser on, they even had the neo soul musicians.

J- D'Angelo, James Poyser.

She rapped a couple times, but so did Erykah Badu on Missed, uh, o- o- on her, uh, on her album, especially on her live.

So it, it had the textures.

Wow.

That's where I saw Jasmine and, and then Questlove and James Poyser, you know?

Oh, James.

I know James.

He's from Philly.

He's a big, he's the backbone to that whole...

James Poyser is like the backbone to that whole neo-soul movement.

Yeah.

Definitely.

Right? But I was able to understand the space and follow the chords, and James Poyser, the keyboard player, would like, you know, call out a bunch of stuff, and I, I was able to get through the gig and, and do really well.

So after that, they respected me as a musician, and I got to play a bunch of times, and things happened for me.

Moral of the story is, uh, take an internship.

And I played great.

Um, and James Poyser was up there and O'Band, and they were calling changes, and I was following everything, and I, like, got...

I got it, so, um, and knew how to play some of their songs.

[clapping] And so after that, they kept letting me play, and then that turned into getting gigs with different musicians, and Biophilis London, people like that.

Yeah.

That- I only put that on there to have something to counter God Has Not Forgot because- Yeah ... eh, why would this be on here, so I gotta put another choir-type sounding something just to- Mm-hmm ... make this make sense, and a reprise, the remix afterwards- Oh ... to give it the... 'Cause I was like, I gotta make hip hop out of this, so I asked James Poyser, [laughs] "Could you please clear this out for me?" He cleared this out for- Yes ...

That's All I Want.

This- Yeah, yeah.

The Brazilian masters, Manfredo Fest, Edson Frederico, Eumir Deodato, José Roberto Bertrami.

More recently, the torchbearers, they continue to come, Toby Smith, Boogie Wesselturf, James Poyser, D'Angelo, Robert Glasper, and many more.

But the final words on my Rhodes tribute goes out to my Incognito boys, Peter Hyams, Don Dube, Matt Cooper, Graeme Harvey, Gary Sanctuary, Ski O'Connell, Jim Watson, Simon Grey, Jim Norton, Tom O'Grady, Carl Hudson, Max Beesley, and all the others.

You know who you are.