Spring Music Preview: Fifty Must-Hear Albums

Q&A: Ne-Yo

EVAN SERPICK

When you came into the project did you have clear-cut idea of what you wanted to showcase or what you wanted to do with it?
Not really. In the beginning it really was just cutting different songs that I had written on everything from toilet tissue to napkins to notebooks to everything. One of the cool things about this album is that it was written all over the place. Some of it was written in London, some of it was written in Japan, all different cities all over the United States because I was on the road, [touring behind] In My Own Words. So I didn't really have the luxury of saying, "Wow, I got an idea for song, let me get to a studio asap," you know? I had to get it in where ever I could. So when I first got to the studio and started recording, it was a little weird because I walked in with this big bag of what looked like crap.

You really have a song written on toilet paper?
Yeah, I do. I really did. [laughs] Not so much a song but I'll have an idea for a line for a song or a melody idea, If I'm in the bathroom and there's nothing else around, I"ll grab a piece of toilet paper and just write it on there and have it.

So what's your actual process like when you sit down and write a song? Is it all lyrics? Is there a melody in mind? What comes first?
The melody almost always comes first. I'll sit down with it and mess around, hum around, trying to figure out what melodies work with what parts of the song, then I'll come up with the actual parts. As far as the lyrics go, its always different -- some times the hook comes first, some time the verse comes first, it really doesn't matter there but the melody is always the very first thing to come.

I want to talk about first the single, "Because of You." Stargate produced that right?
Yes. They brought me the track. I loved it right off top. It actually gave me an idea for what I wanted the rest of the album to be. That song, as if you couldn't hear it already, has a very Michael Jackson-ish edge to it. I did that on purpose. That was actually the song that gave me the idea of, throughout the record I did what I like to call unofficial tributes to the people who are kind of responsible for my sound, you know? That one is an unofficial tribute to Michael Jackson, and another one, "Addicted," is an unofficial tribute to Prince. A good majority of record is Michael Jackson and Prince because Prince is someone I respect for his musical genius and his melody selection and Michael Jackson was somebody that I studied very closely when learning how to sing. You know, I have a very nasally tone to my voice. I hated my voice when I first started singing because I sounded like I was singing through my nose. So when I decided that I really wanted to do this, my mom gave me Stevie Wonder and Michael Jackson to study because they have a similar nasally tone to their singing voice. I took a little bit more from Michael than Stevie in terms of singing, but with Stevie I was influenced by the lyrical content, the way that he would write a song.

The song "Addicted" as I understand was sort of a response to a story about you that ran in Vibe magazine [alleging that you were a sex addict]. That was something you really felt bothered you.
It didn't bother me. It bothered me that everyone was so quick to believe it. You know, my mom called, my friends were like, "See I knew there was something wrong with you." No, there's nothing wrong. And if you read the actual article it doesn't really even say anything about me being addicted to sex. [The writer] just took a bunch of the things that I said and that what she got from it. "Okay Ne-Yo's addicted to sex." When actually I'm not addicted to sex at all. I'm 24, I'm rich, I'm decently cute and I have a healthy sexual appetite, that's all that is. I thought it was something important enough to write a song about, I just thought that it was funny that the first rumor out about me would be that I'm addicted to sex. So okay, let me touch on that.

Well in the grand scheme of things, if you are going to have a rumor, that's not the worst thing to have.
Absolutely not. And that was proven later on, that worse things could be said, the whole Essence magazine thing, questioning my sexuality that was one that really, really buzzed me at first. I don't know how much you heard about it, but apparently there was something on the internet that there was going to be an article in the October issue of Essence magazine where I come out of the closet to the interviewer. When, in actuality, I've never spoken to Essence magazine. I'm not gay so there is no coming out of the closet. It was just a plot, I guess, I don't know, to just bring me down. Things were going so good something bad had to happen.

Do you have any idea where that came from?
I have no clue. When it first came out I was really like, "Okay let me just pick my brain and backtrack and think who I might have did that wrong to where they'd want to start these lies about me." And, honestly, I can't think of anybody I did that wrong. I'm not perfect. I've broken a heart or two in the past, but I don't think I did anything wrong to deserve that.

Did you ever think of responding to that, either on the record or...?
Nah. Because when something like that comes out about you, it's kind of like a double-edged sword. If you defend yourself, then it's like, "Well, look how defensive he's getting. It must be true." But then if you don't say anything, its like, "Oh, look he didn't say anything, then it must be true." What do you do? I've been looking at it like this: I've been an open-book since day one. Anything anybody wants to know about me, it's as simple as asking a question. I'm gonna tell you. I don't have anything to hide. So if anybody wants to know my sexual preference, ask the question, I'll tell you. It is what it is.

There's the song "Angel" which is, like you said, sort of a Prince-inspired thing.
Mmm hmm.

And "Do You"? Is that sort of a sequel to "So Sick"?
Kind of. Well "Angel" is a concept record about what it would be like to be in love with a real live angel. You know I hear guys call their girlfriends, they say 'that's my angel' or girls say it about their guy friends, or whatever the case may be, so I got to thinking like what would it be like if you were for real, for real in a relationship with an angel. Like I could imagine that it would be absolute bliss because, well its an angel, but at the same time it would be kind of painful because be all the way in love but you could never claim this person as your own.You couldn't marry an angel because an angel belongs to God so at some point she would have to go back up to heaven. It's like absolute bliss and pain at the same time because she can never be yours.

And "Do You"?
"Do You" kind of picked up where "So Sick" left off but it's a little farther into the future. The picture that it paints is maybe two, three years in the future. The girl from "So Sick" has moved on. She's engaged to be married, she's just had a little baby. So one day she looks down at her door step and she sees a letter, and it's a letter from me basically congratulating her on everything that's going on in her life but asking the question, "Do you ever think of me anymore?" and just still harboring feelings for her. The song is based off the truth but its not an absolutely true story. When "So Sick" was cracking, I couldn't get a hold of the girl that I wrote it about to save my life. Could not get a hold of her and she did not contact me which made me think that she was still harboring negative feelings for me, for the way that we broke up or whatever. Maybe about five or six months ago I get a phone call out of the blue and it's her.

I'm like, 'Hey what's going on with you?' just like out of nowhere. Which leads me to believe she had my number all that time and just didn't want to call. But she explained to me why she hadn't called. She was still holding on to that a little bit because the way that it happened. We were very much in love and I betrayed her trust and that hit her pretty hard, so it was what it was. So we didn't really talk about the past, we talked about what was going on in her life, for example she's about to be married and she just had a little baby girl, so all that stuff is very true. I'm not harboring any feelings for her so talking to her was definitely closure for me on that issue, even more closure than writing a song.

Did you tell her that you were going to write this song?
Yeah, I did. I told her this conversation might very well end up being a song. And she said, "Well, I'd be honored all over again."

And have you spoken to her since?
No. Just because after that I got ridiculously busy but I do have her number, and she has mine and we promised to keep in touch.

You worked with Jennifer Hudson on the track "Leaving Tonight." How was that?
It was a very painless session. She's not at that point where you can't tell her nothing. You know, some artists have been in the business for so long that you try to hit them with some constructive criticism and they don't know how to take it. She's absolutely not that. She was open and willing and follow instruction.

What kind of instruction did you give her?
Well, actually, the crazy thing is I had to tell her to stop holding back. She has this big huge voice so I'm expecting this big huge voice and she's holding back. People don't really know who Jennifer Hudson is. They know Effie from Dreamgirls because that's pretty much all that she's done and those are the songs that she sings. Jennifer Hudson has this big huge voice, but there is more to that voice than that larger than life element. She can definitely tone it down if necessary and the song shows that. She softened up for the beginning of the song and then the parts where that larger than life element was necessary, she brought it out. The crazy thing is we had to tell her to bring it out. On this part you can go, "Are you sure?" "Please, by all means do what you do." So it was cool. It was real, real cool.

Did you guys get along?
Oh yeah. She's regular people, which is the most important thing to me. You know, this whole celebrity thing is cool . But at the end of the day everybody's got to sit down and go to the bathroom, you know what I mean? So she's aware of that and I love that she's on some primadonna,"Oh, I'm sorry, can I get Fiji water instead of this?" She's not that and I pray to God she doesn't become that because that's just really disgusting to me.