Time travelling with Reggie B
Under the InNatesounds Reggie B takes you time travelling with his soulful sounds. Having met Miles Bonny via Myspace six years ago, Reggie’s musical journey is reflected in his recent release ‘Time Traveler’. He reveals why he describes himself as a “one man band”, how he deals with the music game and his thoughts on whether soulful music will live on in the future. Margaret Tra writes.
Walk us through the moment when Reggie B was born?
I think it was back when I was four years old, banging on my dad's drums and playing black keys on the piano. I don't think I decided any genre I just make what feels good, or feels right with my spirit at any given time. The name Reggie B just comes from my first name being Reggie, and my last name Bradley. My name originally is Howard Reginald Bradley, and my father declared I would be called Reggie and so there it is.
Tell us about your recent release The Travler.
The Travler title came about because I was travelling a lot at the time the album was put together, so seemed fit to name it that. Plus my spiritual journey takes me to different places within my soul constantly, but I have some sort of ADD, and my path changes sometimes but I believe the destination is the same. The album consists of songs from different times in my life that were in my library. Some have been there since as far back as 98, and some were very new and current. But in my mind they were all timeless so no one would ever know that's the case. But the song choices were mad, because I felt these songs told a story when put in the order they were in in some ways.
What is it like working with Miles Bonny? How did you two get together?
Working with Miles is dope because there is never any pressure and he has no boundaries, and he also doesn't care what most people think about what we are creating. He just goes with the flow. But on the other hand he is a hard thinker, sometimes thinks too hard about things but I love him anyway. Believe it or not we met through myspace years ago. (About six to be exact.) It was through a KC Rapper named Reach, cause we found each other on Myspace and Miles thought I was from Europe because he heard the song This Pain from the Traveler. See that song is old.
You describe yourself as a ‘one man band’ what do you mean by that?
Well most of the work I have done is me in the studio by myself except for collaboration albums, but all my solo albums are just me doing everything except for one or two guest. I do the production, play all the instruments, record myself, all the vox, mixing, and mastering all by myself.
Your music pulls its audience in different eras, how do you do this?
I think it’s because I grew up listening to music from all different eras, and it sticks in one's subconscious and it comes out when I am creating I would assume.
You create music that we don’t see anymore, do you think this kind of music will continue to hear in the future?
Yes I do. That particular can't and won't ever die and it will always live inside of a true artist somewhere in the universe. Now whether it will be heard on a bigger platform I don't know, but I hope so!
What’s next for Reggie B?
Well i got some pretty nice collaborations coming from some familiar names out here in the game of music. Not to hype on the idea of making albums with concepts too much anymore, since the current climate of the music game has changed to where you can't hardly even sell an album to people they just buy a few songs, or they can just download everything for free. So, I am just going to make music and make music until I can't do it anymore. Then decide what to do with it, either drop songs for free, put an album together for free, and then one for sale the next week. Who knows? I am just going with the flow of the universe!