E-mail a friendMaxwell
airdate May 14, 2009
Maxwell helped define the neo-soul movement of the late '90s. His debut project, "Maxwell's Urban Hang Suite," was a romantic concept album that not only received critical and commercial success, but also garnered a Grammy nod. The multi-platinum artist hails from Brooklyn, NY. He was writing his own songs at age 17 and, soon after, began performing on the local club scene. His new release, the long-awaited "Black Summer Nights," is the first in a trilogy of LPs to be released over the next three years.
Singer-songwriter reflects on his time away from the stage and how some people told him that his career was over. (2:37)
Full interview. (13:45)
Maxwell
Tavis: I'm pleased, and I do mean pleased with a capital P, to welcome - bam - Maxwell to this program. Starting July 7th you can pick up a copy of his long-awaited - and I do mean long-awaited - new CD, "Black Summer's Night." The first in a trilogy of CDs.
Before that he kicks off a national tour that begins in Milwaukee on June 20th. From the new long-awaited project, here's some of the video for the single - I love it - "Pretty Wings."
[Clip]
Tavis: Let me just start by saying, first of all, you did just a few dates not long ago to tease your fans (laughter) about this new project, and it was a - you are such a tease. You are such a tease. But I'll just tell you that I was in the audience at the Shrine show.
Maxwell: Yes. You did take all the shine away from me, by the way.
Tavis: Man, you killed it that night.
Maxwell: Thank you.
Tavis: You killed that thing.
Maxwell: I felt a little hoarse, but I have to say L.A. was so encouraging, L.A. was - I felt like I had all these cheerleaders in the house that night. It was amazing.
Tavis: What's it feel like to be gone, by your own choice, off the stage for as long as you decided to - what, eight years, basically?
Maxwell: At this point, yeah, about three months (unintelligible).
Tavis: About seven years (unintelligible). So seven and a half years you're off the scene and you announce that you're coming back, just for a few dates, and the tickets sell out just like that. They sell out in minutes and you get on stage and people go buck-wild crazy to see, you know. That feels like what after being gone that long?
Maxwell: I think it has to do with the bar that's in the - no, I'm just playing. (Laughter) No, you know what? It's exhilarating. I'd be lying if I told you I didn't feel like, wow. At the same time, it's very humbling because it's such a blessing. Careers end and begin - careers have ended and begun, or vice-versa, in my time away, so to even have any interest and any consideration whatsoever is like - it just gives me the sense of security in my work and in the work that I do with my musicians, my band, Hi David (sp), who is, like, just a brilliant collaborator, a long-time collaborator of mine.
So it's just like we all as a team - because it's not just me. I don't want people to believe in any way that - I'm the face of this situation, but there's just a team of people who have been so supportive for so long.
Tavis: Yeah, I was saying to myself, I said, "I hope Maxwell can't see me out here acting a fool," because your concert is really - as a brother, you don't know how to act because you don't want to seem soft.
Maxwell: I just saw you getting all the numbers, that's all I saw.
Tavis: You saw me what?
Maxwell: I saw you getting all these numbers.
Tavis: Get out of here. (Laughter) I wish. Although that's easy to do at a Maxwell concert. If you can't pull at a Maxwell concert, you can't pull. Because the audience is just full of women everywhere, man.
Maxwell: Exactly, and they're ready. They're ready, and they have no problems.
Tavis: No, it was a great show. I must tell you, for all the women who were screaming - and they were screaming everywhere - but I'm surrounded by women in the section where I'm sitting and for those who hadn't seen me in a while when you walked out on stage, you know the first thing that everybody tripped on?
Maxwell: The lack of hair, maybe?
Tavis: Yes, that's it. They went crazy. They said, "Where's the hair?"
Maxwell: I know.
Tavis: Because the hair thing was such a big part of your persona back in the day. You decided to do this when, and?
Maxwell: Three years ago, maybe three, four years ago I just was like - it was getting hot, it was summer or something. I don't know where I was, but I just said, “Eh, let's just let this thing move on.” And again, I've said this many times before - I don't want my music to be about an image; I don't want it to be about a hairstyle.
That's what really was so awesome is that you get on stage and it didn't matter what it all looked like. As long as it sounds like what they want it to sound like or what they remembered it sounding like, then that's what matters. I'm always testing the audience on some level.
I want it to have meaning and I want to know that it's about the music and it's not about - because I'm 35, I won't be 35. I'll be 45 one day, I'll be 55, I'll be 75, and hopefully my music and the music that I've done with the many people that I've worked with will stay and will still have its power because of the sound of it and not because of how young I am or how much Botox I'm (unintelligible). Which I'm not using, by the way. (Laughter) I know I need a little.
Tavis: Now you know that's going to be on YouTube in about five minutes, with a rumor - "Maxwell's doing Botox."
Maxwell: No, no, no, I'm scared of needles. (Laughter)
Tavis: When you're on stage and you're used to performing with all the hair and doing all the moves, does it feel different when you're on the stage?
Maxwell: Not at all. I have to say I feel - the one thing about the change in the interim, in the time when I was away, it was great to live a real, like, regular life. Like you go out and you talk to girls and they don't know who you are. It takes people a second. I really learned who was real and who wasn't. There were some people who were, like, "Oh, you cut your hair?" Oh, it's a wrap. Bad move. I got letters from people like, "Yo, you messed up, dog."
Tavis: "Your career is over."
Maxwell: "Your career is over." And I'm just like - and I know as Black folks, hair is very important. (Laughter) But I had no idea.
Tavis: Yeah, seriously.
Maxwell: You can't cut your hair. So it was funny to me, but.
Tavis: The other thing I noticed, you mentioned a moment ago that you're getting older; we all are, which certainly beats the alternative.
Maxwell: Right.
Tavis: You're getting older, but I was watching and I said to - Dr. West was there, Cornel West was at (unintelligible).
Maxwell: Oh, yeah. I know, I saw both of you.
Tavis: You saw his 'fro out in the audience?
Maxwell: Yeah, I saw the - I saw the -
Tavis: He's still got the hair, even though you cut yours, yeah.
Maxwell: I figured he's the one and I should just let him carry on the legacy.
Tavis: Yeah, yeah, yeah. So I'm sitting there and he and I were commenting to each other during the show that even though you're getting older, I think that your dance moves, the way you move on stage now is even better than it was 10 years ago. And I was like, I said, "Maxwell ain't missed a beat where his moves are concerned."
Maxwell: Wow. Well, thank you.
Tavis: You're still getting across that stage beautifully.
Maxwell: Thank you, thank you, I try. Look, I just - in the old tradition of a good show, when I get on stage I'm, like - it's not my ego. There's bravado because you've got to come in there, you've got to be your superhero or whatever you're supposed to be for the people that night.
But there's such gratitude in the fact that people got all dressed up. And I say this a lot - moisturized, lotioned up. (Laughter) They got their babysitters, and now on the last tour I've come to find that women are bringing their children, like their 16-year-olds and their 18-year-olds.
Tavis: It's been 10 years, that's why.
Maxwell: Yeah, it's like, wow. (Laughter) To see that happen, I feel such a great, like, humility and such like thank you so much. So I try to give people what I can, as much as I can give them.
Tavis: Why the new project, then, now? It could have been five years ago, could have been three years ago, six years ago. Why now, and tell me about the trilogy that makes up these -
Maxwell: Yeah, well, 2002 we rapped in terms of just promoting now, and I always felt like I wanted to take a break. It had been 10 years. Everything was released in '96, but I was working on music and shopping demos, and everything really started in '92 - '91, in fact. So it was, like, 10 years of just consistent focus and you're just your work.
And if you are, for me - for others it may not be a problem, but for me I think there's something wrong with just being only what you do. It's not a real person. And then you get into a place where you can't really communicate to people who live 9:00 to 5:00 lives when you're flying here and luxury this and autographs.
So for me it was like how do I get back to that place where I just make music because I hope someone likes it, not because I need to meet the standard of the last record, get on that chart position, win this amount of awards or whatever it is that comes with it.
So I think that the time away kind of helped with that. Like, I literally forgot all of that and I just literally went back to oh yeah, you know what? This beat sounds great and this melody feels good, and yeah, I met this girl last week and she's making me write this. And it's not like - and she doesn't really know who I am.
In fact, she thinks my career is over. (Laughter) And I kid you not. I kid you not. So many people I've had, and I've said this so many times, I've had people, "Didn't you used to be Maxwell?" (Laughter) I've heard so many "Didn't you used to bes" from people.
Tavis: The artist formerly known as Maxwell, yeah.
Maxwell: Yeah, like, it's - and I have to say just in that it was so humbling because it was, like, without having your title, who are you, and it's like it was great to not have that and almost in some ways have this fear that it was over, because then it was, like, when I decided to make this music I was just coming from a place of I like music and if you buy it or not, this is how I feel. So it was good for me in the end.
Tavis: So this first record comes out now, and then you're going to do one for the next two years.
Maxwell: Indeed.
Tavis: So one this year, one in '10.
Maxwell: 2010, and -
Tavis: And then '11.
Maxwell: Exactly.
Tavis: And they're part of a trilogy all called "Black Summer's Night?"
Maxwell: Exactly.
Tavis: But it's "Black," the first word, "Summer," "Night."
Maxwell: Indeed, for three, yeah.
Tavis: That's cool. So have you done all of the music for all three, or are you just -
Maxwell: Yeah, we have all the music.
Tavis: Oh, okay, cool.
Maxwell: What really happened, which I didn't think this would happen, but when I went on the road last year and we had all these songs ready and I would just throw new songs - I didn't want to do too much, I hate when people play just eight new songs straight. It's not cool for the audience at all.
Tavis: Because they want to hear something-something.
Maxwell: Yeah, and they deserve to. They, like, bought their ticket and they got moisturized, as I said before.
Tavis: Exactly, yeah. (Laughter)
Maxwell: So yeah, we just threw out new songs and it was interesting because it really inspired the way we finished the album. Because I could literally pull into my mind the many faces I saw. Because YouTube is an incredible invention in that from the first two shows people had our lyrics. They knew the parts, they knew what was verse two, verse one, and so I'm, like, on week five, I'm like - people are singing along.
Tavis: The new stuff.
Maxwell: Yeah.
Tavis: See, I knew you were going to be okay with the new project when I saw you at the Shrine show. I knew you were okay because obviously those of us who are fans know the new stuff when we hear it, and because you interspersed it throughout the show and it still flowed, it still fit with your - I told Doc, "He's going to be okay."
Maxwell: You know what, and I wasn't going to do that. I felt like in some ways it's been so long, and not that I want to repeat myself, but I felt like I owed the many ears that have been waiting a specific thing.
And also, I'm excited about doing that again. I do get bored fast so it's like you want to kind of change it up, you don't want to look like your formula or you're a conveyor belt, releasing the same kind of records for whatever.
But it was a really, really, really exhilarating is the only way I can say it, just to get this encouragement from the masses.
Tavis: So you ready for the big tour now?
Maxwell: I'm ready.
Tavis: You ready for this?
Maxwell: I'm ready. I'm never as ready as I would like to be, but I just get out there because it's a blessing to do this. Any job, any work at this point for anyone is something that you need to sort of give praise to God for. But I'm very excited about touring for the next 18, 21 months, I think it is, for this new trilogy set.
Tavis: More power to you. (Laughter) You mentioned the word gratitude earlier in this conversation, and that's a perfect word. We are so grateful to you for coming back, for putting a new project out, for coming to see us, and I'm sure you will see me a few stops on the road.
Maxwell: I got you. Please come after the show, don't pretend like you're not as big as you are.
Tavis: Get out of here.
Maxwell: No, you are that dude right now.
Tavis: As long as you're on the stage performing for me, I'm good. (Laughter) Backstage is nice, though. Anyway.
Maxwell: It's about the ladies, that's all it is. He's just trying to get numbers. (Laughter)
Tavis: You're going to get the new CD from Maxwell, "Black Summer's Night," and I ain't got to tell you to see him on the road. I'll see you there. Good to see you, man.
Maxwell: Yo, it's been nine years, right?
Tavis: Congratulations. Been too long. I'm glad you're back, though.
Maxwell: Thank you for having me.
Tavis: Good to see you, man.
Maxwell: Thank you.
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