Tag Archives: Love In Flying Colors

Tour Dates

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Zo! Tour Dates

FourFront Release Shows

Sunday, April 26, 2020 – NASHVILLE, TN
Zo! + Carmen Rodgers
with Such
City Winery
609 Lafayette St, Nashville, TN 37203
Doors: 6p | Show: 8p
POSTPONED DUE TO COVID-19

FourFront Listening Parties

**These Are Not Performances**

Friday, March 20, 2020 – CINCINNATI, OH
FourFront Listening Party + Meet & Greet/Q&A with Zo!
Artsville Theater
5021 Whetsel Ave, Cincinnati, OH 45227
7-11p
POSTPONED DUE TO COVID-19

Past Listening Parties for FourFront:
Atlanta, GA, Baltimore, MD, Brooklyn, NY, Chicago, IL, Detroit, MI, Jacksonville, FL, Miami, FL, Philadelphia, PA, Pittsburgh, PA, Richmond, VA, St. Louis, MO, Toronto, ON, Washington D.C.

For booking inquiries, please Contact:
Booking Agent || The Empire Agency
Zack Johnson || zack@empireagency.com

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Zo! + Carmen Rodgers “Piano & A Microphone” Dates

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Zo! on Piano. Carmen on vocals. Intimate venues. Playing jams.

Friday, April 10, 2020 – RICHMOND, VA
Zo! + Carmen Rodgers
Southern Kitchen
541 N 2nd St, Richmond, VA 23219
POSTPONED DUE TO COVID-19

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Zo! MasterClass Workshops

TBA

AllMusic.com Review of ‘Tales From The Land Of Milk And Honey’

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AllMusic Review by Andy Kellman

Only two months after Nicolay issued his collaborative City Lights, Vol. 3: Soweto, the producer and instrumentalist, along with singing, songwriting, and arranging partner Phonte, returned with the most varied Foreign Exchange album. It’s also the one that most emphasizes the duo’s extended family of collaborators. The cover of this, their fifth proper full-length, displays Carmen Rodgers and Tamisha Waden — two of their co-lead and background vocalists — as well as Lorenzo “Zo!” Ferguson. The FEnucleus and Zo! go way back and take it to another level here, with Zo! — similar to Nicolay, a studio wiz who typically works in isolation — a co-songwriter and co-producer of every song. Perhaps proximity and a history as performing partners partly explain why so much of this sounds like a party, as free and easy as the group’s shows. FE previously went house with “So What If It Is,” a deep and cleansing track, but when they return to the form here, it’s with the humorous and rhythmically tougher early-’90s throwback “Asking for a Friend,” where Phonte affects a distinguished Englishman accent akin to that of The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air‘s Geoffrey Butler. On first listen, the song sounds merely like an amusing novelty until the stellar Waden-led chorus enters and takes it somewhere else. (No R&B group before them has maintained such a strong balance between female and male voices.) A different stunt is pulled with “Work It to the Top,” bumping boogie that touches on 1979-1981 Slave — just a little bit — down to Phonte‘s spirited Steve Arrington mannerisms. Beyond those two songs and the pair of delighted Brazilian fusion-styled title tracks that begin and end the album, what remains largely refines the sweet and blissful grooves of Love in Flying Colors. That’s not a bad thing, not when the writing is as sharp, with rich harmonies laced through rhythms that bound and wind with unforced finesse and warmth. Even with a disarming ballad on each side, Tales from the Land of Milk and Honey is one of the funnest R&B albums in some time.

READ FULL ARTICLE HERE

Studio Campfire Stories: The Foreign Exchange “Listen To The Rain”

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Last year, I wrapped up everything ManMade around February/March 2013. During that same time, The Foreign Exchange was working on the music for Love In Flying Colors and I hadn’t yet gotten an expected call to work on anything for their album yet. Why is this important? Here’s a small bit of +FE trivia that most don’t know… I have the only outside production credits on the last three +FE albums – Leave It All Behind (“If She Breaks Your Heart”), Authenticity (“Fight For Love”), and Love in Flyi…Well… Just keep reading. Sometime in April or May, Phonte gave me a call telling me that he had a song idea for the new +FE album… I remember telling him, “I’ve been waiting on this call – I’m down.” Since I was scheduled to be in Raleigh, NC at the end of May for a video shoot, we figured that would be the best time to sit down, put our ideas together and see what we could come up with.

On May 25, 2013, I made my way down I-95S to shoot the first video from ManMade, which had just been released four days prior. We were to gather the crew in Downtown Raleigh and shoot a playful spin on an old school Sesame Street performance for the song “Count To Five” with director and frequent +FE Music collaborator, Kenneth Price. Come to think of it, this was the first time that Gwen Bunn and I actually met in person… at the damn video shoot for the song we had already worked together on! It’s kinda crazy how routinely that happens now…. Anyway, we shot the video in a few hours and afterward everyone got together to grab some food from a burger spot not too far from our filming location. Some folks went home, the rest of us headed over to Phonte’s spot where the movie ‘Campaign’ was running and jokes were on ten. Once everybody cleared out, Phonte and I hit the studio at about 2:30 in the morning and he told me that he had a melody in his head already with a few words here and there and needed the music to follow. This was no thing… We had utilized the same “sit down at the piano” formula when we worked on the title track from ManMade almost a year prior, “Fight For Love”, and “If I Could Tell You Know” from the SunStorm album. Like “ManMade”, it was the hook that we started with. When I go back and listen to the demo recordings we did of the song on my phone, chronologically we did the hook first (looped it twice), then there’s a recording of the verse, which we also looped twice. I distinctively remember wanting to accentuate that ‘break’ toward the beginning of the verse where he sings, “All alone (*break*) agaaaaaain….” …just to add a bit of personality to the music. The usage of breaks and “white space” is something that you don’t hear too often in many slower tempo songs and the more we worked through the verse, the more distinctive I made the break. The same with the chord climb up during the hook when he sings, “…….down out-siiiiiide…” by playing a different chord for each syllable, adding more of accents in the music. The last thing we worked on was the song’s ending. We wanted to close this one a with descending chord progression, which would set it apart from our previous “written at the piano” joints. The final demo recording starts off with my countdown into Phonte snapping his fingers for tempo while humming the melody of the hook then going right into the ending… And to be honest, I have listened to these demos about 5 times a piece while writing this story. To hear this song again with only piano and a reference melody is really kinda crazy.

By the time I returned home to Maryland the following evening, Phonte had completely finished writing to the song and sent me a text saying, “The title of that jam we did is called, “Listen To The Rain.” Lemme know when you lay THAT…” …No thing at all. The next day, I sat in the studio and recorded a main piano part, layered with a rhodes, and also played the bass live on it …all to a finger snap (that same finger snap can be heard throughout the majority of the first two minutes of the song). I sent the music on through to Phonte along with the, “Check that Gmail” text…… He then hit me the next day with the SAME text. When I checked, he had laid his vocals down and Chris Boerner had recorded a third chord layering by recording his acoustic guitar, which added some nice texture with the subtle fret noises and string plucking. So here we are with the main portion of the song completed just a couple days away from when we started……. But here’s where it gets good. Phonte told me that they had hit up my dude, Detroit’s own Pirahnahead to do string arrangement on it…

*drops phone*

Now, I’ve known Pirahnahead for a good 10-11 years and he was a monster back THEN so I couldn’t have even imagined what some damn strings would sound like over that music. So, when I received the song back a month later……. WITH STRINGS?!?! LOOK man…. I had all TYPES of goosebumps running up my arms. The shit was just beautiful…. I can remember listening to it about 5 or 6 times in a row and THEN listening to the isolated strings track a few times in a row afterward. Maaaaaaan, make you wanna shed that good single “Denzel in ‘Glory‘” thug tear!! Then, I received the final version with Nicolay’s drums on the song that put the song into another gear by taking it from an acoustic singer/songwriter mode to something you could break your neck to… All the way through an extended hook where Phonte calls out “…and my backgrounds sing, and my backgrounds siiiiing…” (that’s Jeanne Jolly assisting him on the background vocals too, by the way) right into that ending that we worked on at the piano. An excellent climax to a dope song.

Studio Campfire Stories: “A Choice Of Weapons” featuring Nicholas Ryan Gant & Carmen Rodgers

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I specifically remember composing the foundation of this one on September 26, 2011… I don’t know WHY I remember that date (those who know me will tell you that I’m kind of a “rain man” when it comes to numbers and dates), but I do specifically remember there being a Redskins vs. Cowboys Monday Night Football game that was being tweeted about all night and I didn’t feel like watching it at the time, so I went into the studio clear of ideas… clean slate. Now, it may have been that DAY or within a week or so prior to that time that I saw Jody Watley on Twitter shouting Phonte and I for the song, “Greater Than The Sun” and to say that I was hyped up would be a bit of an understatement. I was a Shalamar fanatic growing up. Between Go For It, Big Fun, and more specifically Three For Love and Friends?! You couldn’t tell me much as a kid about Shalamar, Leon Sylvers III and that “SOLAR Sound” – I was HOOKED. So to have a former member of a group I grew up listening to publicly announce the fact that she’s riding around in her car with MY song playing was a bit inspirational. It was SO inspirational that I decided to use that energy in the studio this particular day by posing the question to myself, “If you were to compose a record for Jody Watley NOW…. What would it sound like?” Well, It would be uptempo and melodic…. But let me give it a change of pace by using some harder drums and I’ll play a hi-hat through the entire song live. Now let me explain something to y’all… The respect I have for drummers is through the roof. The ability to keep time while using your entire body is a TASK. I can’t remember the song’s tempo (BPM) off hand, but the original track for this joint was around 6 minutes long. I can vividly remember how tired my arms were after recording the hi-hat pattern for this… BUT as I prefer with all of my music, I love the “human” feel. This is what makes live music so appealing. If I’m able to capture a live, human elements in the song, I don’t hesitate to record a pass all the way through the entire duration of it.

Once the foundation of this song was recorded (drums, bass, synth pads and chord progression), it was kinda put to the side. I would ride around in the car with it during the creation of ManMade, which did nothing but help it because after months of listening to it, I would start to hear new parts… Suddenly I heard a Moog synth line (which was played over the hook and vamp), a year or so later I heard harmonizing guitar lines at the beginning of the song that when played together had an Earth, Wind & Fire feel to it. This is why making music is not a race, sometimes you have to sit with the stuff you create and allow it to grow. In the end, nobody gives a shit about how quickly you create music… They care about how the final result sounds and how it makes them feel. If you need to live with it while you create, make it happen. There’s nothing better that some slow-cooked, flavorful music anyway.

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Fast forward to December 2012… We were starting to wrap up sessions for ManMade and Carmen Rodgers made the trip to Raleigh, NC to knock out the hook for “Show Me The Way”, The Foreign Exchange’s “If I Knew Then” for their Love In Flying Colors album…. and then she then also took care of the hook for this particular track, which at the time I had titled simply “Therapy”. Phonte who is the KAING of calling that good studio audible sent me the song along with a new title, “A Choice Of Weapons”. Interesting. At first, seeing the title damn near caused me to see red on some ole, “Choice of weapons?? WHO WE GOTTA GO TO WAR WITH??!?!?” But I managed to bring it down a few notches in order to take a listen to the song. I can remember hearing those hooks for the first time and thinking, “That sounds PERFECT… and DAMN Carmen sounds great on this!” Everything fit correctly…That crisp, rapid-fire cadence that came with that chord change had me open. Even the fact that it was 20 degrees outside matched the “wintry” feel of the record (pardon my synesthesia, but the colors I “saw” when hearing the music was always shades of blue and light orange). It was just RIGHT to me. But as right as it was, it just didn’t fit into the sequence of what was finished for the album up to that point so it remained on the back burner for a minute…. Then enter Nicholas Ryan Gant. After absolutely blacking out on our “Let It Go” cover for …just visiting three, Phonte reached back out to him to sing lead. And when we got that final vocal reference… Phonte just hit me with the simple, “GMAIL” text. When I get a text from Tay that simply says…. “GMAIL”?!? …That means something SERIOUS is in my inbox. I opened the attachment, hit “play” and proceeded to hear Nicholas Ryan Gant claim “A Choice Of Weapons” as his OWN. The way he came out of that second verse into the hook?!

“Sheeeeeeeeeeeeiiiiiiiiiiiit” © Clayton Bartholomew Davis…

But what I enjoyed most was… the MESSAGE. I love it when kats feel inspired to write positivity over music that I have done and Nicholas was touching on some of that real. Seems like over the last 15+ years or so R&B has become the breakup, drama, you ain’t shit, I’ma fuck ya friend genre of music all of a sudden. Who wants to hear that when you’re at your job struggling to get through the day BECAUSE of some bullshit. Grown folks need uplifting music, man… we get hit with enough throughout a typical week.

“…daylight’s just ahead of you / Hold on to the joy within… ’cause in the end you can WIN”

That line alone would help me while in the gym steadily thinking of an excuse to cut my time short on the elliptical ……while also critiquing the song, of course. Then to hear Nicholas and Phonte trade off adlibs toward the end during the vamp was DOPE to me. I brought the pre-hook handclaps back on that section for an extra bit of (in my Pootie Tang silent voice) “!!!!!!!!!” on it. The last small piece that was added was Phonte’s background vocals on the second verse, which really added some nice dynamics to it and made it move a little bit better. Once that was in place, we had a successful B-Side……. remember those? I LOVE non-album B-Sides. They’re like wild cards. Some of our favorite songs were B-Sides!!! Prince’s “Erotic City”?? Gang Starr’s “DWYCK”???? Going to the record store to grab a handful of singles or 45’s JUST to get the remix or a B-Side that wasn’t included on an album used to be a mission of mine at one time. Now the mission has become to release them so that you all can relive the same feeling that I used to get in those record stores… Listen and purchase below. Enjoy!

2013 In Pictures

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With 2013 being the most successful year in my music career, it’s only right that I share the pictures that documented it. Looking back, I released my newest album, ManMade, and had the pleasure of visiting Brooklyn, Baltimore, D.C., Chicago, Richmond, Philly, Pittsburgh, LA, Tucson, Detroit, Vegas, Seattle, Austin, Durham, Atlanta, Charlotte, San Diego, Houston, Dallas, St. Louis, Indianapolis, and Cleveland in support of it – I was even asked to perform on the eight-day Capital Jazz Cruise at the beginning of November. I contributed to the new The Foreign Exchange album Love In Flying Colors with “Listen To The Rain,” and The Reworks with a remix for Phonte’s “Gonna Be A Beautiful Night”. I hung out with Bobbito and Crazy Legs of Rock Steady in NYC, began endorsing Lewitt Audio, released an ode to Sesame Street in the form of the “Count To Five” video, was the subject of my FIRST documentary, and even had a day named after me in Las Vegas.

Things to look out for in 2014…
• Making the music for Black Dynamite – The Animated Series (Season 2) with Fatin “10” Horton
• My very first trip to South Africa with The Foreign Exchange at the end of March + a world tour with +FE
• A brand new single + video from ManMade + more solo dates
• New, original music… Including a collaborative EP with…………………………

…….anyway, thank you, 2013… Here’s to one helluva productive and positive new year in 2014. Cheers!!

On the Road to NC (Dec. 2013)
Soundchecking in Pittsburgh (June 2013)
On the keys in L.A.
Me and Phonte before the “Count To Five” video shoot
Having fun on stage in Durham (July 2013) • Photo by FroLab
Phonte on stage in Durham • Photo by Meri Hyöky Photography
Ursula Rucker and I in Philly (June 2013)
@LifeOfALibra rockin’ a Zo! shirt
Twin Motif set-up in Tucson (July 2013)
Deborah Bond going IN (July 2013) • Photo by Meri Hyöky Photography
All day… • Photo by Creative Silence
Contributed “Listen To The Rain” on The Foreign Exchange’s ‘Love In Flying Colors’ (Sept. 2013)
“Count To Five” got some love in July on “Numbers Never Lie” (July 2013)
“Count To Five” video (May 2013)
Photo shoot in NC with Creative Silence
Me and my brother, Waajeed in Detroit (june 2013)
Carmen and I after +FE’s Atlanta show (Oct. 2013)
Stevie at NAMM (Jan. 2013)
Live painting of me by Demont “Peekaso” Pinder on the Capital Jazz Cruise (Nov. 2013)
Jarrard Anthony, Me, Jon Bibbs, and AB
Signing a fan’s keytar in Houston (Sept. 2013)
Still can’t believe I have my own day in Vegas. (July 2013)
Lewitt Audio Microphone for the road…
Rocked with Original Blackbyrds member Allan Barnes at my boy Tate McBroom’s wedding in September.
@Ms_Toni with the Zo! Shirt
The Pittsburgh crowd awaits… (June 2013)
Rockin’ out at Fox 5 Vegas in the Gibson Showroom
Eric Roberson, me and my stank face that made a few appearances during the show. (Nov. 2013)
In Detroit (June 2013) • Photo by Norvell Molex
The sun shining on Detroit (June 2013)
Final touch of fatassedness on the Capital Jazz Cruise (Nov. 2013)
Me and Gwen Bunn after shooting the “Count To Five” video in NC (May 2013)
Durand Bernarr and I after the Cleveland shows (Dec. 2013)
@Sophia1922 with de Zo! shirt
Me with Saxappeal, Zach Cutler, Tim Scott Jr., Carmen Rodgers and Darion Alexander after smashing the Las Vegas show (July 2013)
Me and Carmen in Houston, Gary Mayes on drums (Sept. 2013)
@Cocoa_Cheeks_ rockin’ a Zo! shirt
ZoTif, Nord Lead 2X, and the Moog Little Phatty… D.C. set up (May 2013)
Live interview/meet and greet at Moods Music in Atlanta (Aug. 2013)
First single from ManMade… “The Train”
Me and Deborah Bond after rockin’ in Philly (June 2013)
@Eclectic1914 rockin’ the Zo! shirt
Contributed to The Reworks album this year with “Gonna Be A Beautiful Night” Remix
On the bass in the Gibson Showroom – Vegas (July (2013)
Durham Crowd Participation • Photo by Meri Hyöky Photography
Atlanta Skyline (Oct. 2013)
Helluva year for +FE Music
Fall in Michigan (Oct. 2013)
Zo! shirt spotted in these skreets!!
Me and Bobbito at the D.C. showing of his street ball documentary, “Doin’ It In The Park” (May 2013)
Richmond showed up… (June 2013)
Photo by Meri Hyöky Photography
Deborah Bond and I in Durham (July 2013)
Zo! + Carmen Rodgers (Sept. 2013)
On bass at the Detroit Show (June 2013)
Video Shoot in NC (Dec. 2013)
Me + Sy Smith rockin’ twin Motifs at NAMM (Jan. 2013)
Rehearsal in Atlanta (Aug. 2013)
Eric Roberson, Darion Alexander, Phonte, and I on set in NC (Dec. 2013)
Lewitt Audio LCT 540 condenser microphone looking nice in East Wing Studios
One of my FAVORITE spots in Detroit… Bucharest Grill. (June 2013)
Carmen Rodgers and I after our Atlanta Show (Aug. 2013)
At the Gibson Showroom @ Fox 5 Vegas going over the gameplan…
With Sy Smith performing at NAMM (Jan 2013)
On the bass for “We Are On The Move” in Pittsburgh (June 2013)
…just visiting vinyl sold out this year.
Keys • Photo by Creative Silence (July 2013)
Full House in Atlanta for +FE (Oct. 2013)
Zo! shirt sighting!
Rockin’ on the Capital Jazz Cruise (Nov. 2013)
Chantae Cann and I before performing on the Capital Jazz Cruise (Nov. 2013)
ManMade held it’s own on iTunes at #2 on the R&B charts the first couple of days out…
in Seattle (July 2013)
My first visit to Biscuitville in Raleigh, NC (Oct. 2013)
Chicago Show (June 2013)
Me and Larry Graham (Nov. 2013)
Sy Smith and I rockin’ out in Seattle (July 2013)
Dr. Lonnie Smith MURDERING on organ at NAMM (Jan. 2013)
Showing Sy some key parts in Detroit (June 2013)
On keys in Vegas (July 2013)
Chuck Anderson, Richard Williams, Nate Mitchell, Me, and Dennis Garner
Another Zo! shirt sighting!!
Yep, that’s a ManMade cake, bruh. Made by @TheCakeLadyNY
The Island of Curaçao (Nov. 2013)
The L.A. Crowd (June 2013)
Ideeyah, Monica Blaire, Sy Smith, Darius Mitchell, Me, Kristopher Crosby, Brandon Williams, and Saxappeal after a helluva homecoming show in Detroit. (June 2013)
The Zo!Tif in Richmond (June 2013)
The crown…
Looks like I’m singing… But I’m really just talkin’ shit.
+FE Soundcheck in Raleigh, NC (Oct. 2013)
Anthony David, Carmen Rodgers and I after our show in Atlanta (Aug. 2013)
Another one added to the wall…
Made it to CentricTV’s “13 Best Indie R&B Artists of 2013” (Dec 2013)
Gwen Luh De Keeeds (May 2013)
Me with Michael Coylar (Nov. 2013)
Zach Cutler, Deborah Bond and I in NYC (June 2013)
Carmen Rodgers and Phonte going in on a game of Operation (Oct. 2013)
On keys for The Foreign Exchange in Raleigh, NC (Oct. 2013)
Show love after EVERY show. In Dallas (Sept. 2013)
Me and Carmen in St. Louis (Oct. 2013)
After rocking our Charlotte Show (Aug. 2013)
ManMade – Released on May 21st
Setup at Indianapolis’ Jazz Kitchen (Oct. 2013)
In Southfield, MI recording with Collective Peace (Oct. 2013)
Brand new interface in the studio (Oct. 2013)
A view from the keys at the +FE show in Columbia, SC (Oct. 2013)
First stop on the ManMade Tour was…. Brooklyn on its release date.
Autographed pre-orders! (May 2013)
Tucson, AZ (July 2013)
Rockin out in Dallas with Carmen Rodgers, Lock Johnson on the drums (Sept. 2013)
Bobbito, Me and Crazy Legs in NYC (July 2013)
@Hicksont77 rockin’ a Zo! shirt
Me and Carmen rockin’ out in Cleveland (Dec. 2013)