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[0:00] Robert Bannon: Are you ready? It's The Roundtable with me, Robert Bannon.

[0:10] Robert Bannon: Listen, she is a friend of mine. She even met my man.

[0:14] Kelly Price: I did.

[0:16] Robert Bannon: You know the song. I got to see Miss Price. I've been in Detroit now for two years. You were the first show I saw here.

[0:24] Robert Bannon: We had a conversation. We talked about the anniversary of your album. If you don't get a ticket whenever Miss Price is in New York, Atlanta, Detroit, LA, around this country, she is giving vocals. Her band is coming to the Aretha. Her singers are superstar singers. You better tell me about this show because you got to get a ticket and be there.

[0:44] Kelly Price: It's a whole new show. I got a new band. I got a lead wall behind me.

[0:53] Kelly Price: We're giving Vegas residency on the road now.

[1:03] Robert Bannon: I'm third row center. I'm going to be ready.

[1:06] Kelly Price: I'm excited. I just played in the Bahamas a couple of weeks ago. It was the first time I presented the show and I didn't have the band. It was a track show, but I still had my lead wall. I had my keyboard player, my sound guy. The show, the flow is amazing.

[1:25] Kelly Price: The first thing I said to Shakira, I said, Shakira, Detroit is going to be a movie. So Detroit is the first city that I'm premiering my new live band show. And what better way to do it than at the Aretha?

[1:45] Kelly Price: It is the Aretha Wednesday night. And let me tell you, that is all the mic is on. Vocals are on. The band is live. The lead wall is lit. The images, the visuals are giving the out. Let me tell you, Miss Price shows up. I peeped you the last show. Her Gucci boots were on fire. The Gucci belt was a match. Everything was tip top, tippity tip tip top shape. So I can't even imagine what you have up your sleeve for this.

[2:19] Kelly Price: So much fun. I had some. I am. Like I said, Detroit is the first city to get this new show with the band. And it's been a long time coming. I've always loved what I do, but it's like I got a fresh wind.

[2:38] Robert Bannon: Are you taking this show on the road then?

[2:41] Kelly Price: We're going to hit the road. Yeah, we're going to hit the road. We're going to hit the road. So I just need to listen. Y'all make sure y'all call. But don't don't. I'm coming with a whole crew. I'm bringing you Vegas residency. So I'm telling you, don't ask me to cut my prices because I'm traveling. You know, we got a band. We got a band traveling. Twelve people. I'm bringing my sound people. I'm bringing the whole wall with the images and the like. It is the show that I've always wanted to play.

[3:10] Robert Bannon: Do you know what I loved about seeing your show? And now I can't even I'm more excited about Wednesday. So we're going to get your tickets to Aretha and follow Miss Kelly Price on Instagram and the Web. All of the information. Listen to the old music, the new music, all the music. What amazes me is so many people, no shade to other singers. They get up there, they do their songs, they reimagine them, they play with them. You get up there and you keep the songs in the keys. You still get up there. I mean, if you're in your car singing "As We Lay" and you think she gets crazy at the end, she does like she gets up there and she is up in heaven singing.

[4:46] Kelly Price: You know, so you're supposed to be at the end of that song. But not everybody can do that. Amen. Thank you, God. You better sing your tea. Good night. What's going on there?

[4:57] Kelly Price: I wouldn't I tell you before you hit play. I am a walking, breathing, living, thankful, grateful. Really understanding and intentional. I am. I am what the goodness of God looks like. And that's not a compliment to me. That's all about him. Because for the things that I've been through. That's not what I should look like. That's not what you know, for the life that I've lived, for the things that I've gone through that I've never spoken in public. I should have aged in dog years.

[5:42] Kelly Price: And people don't understand what coming from New York City. I'm from Jersey. I'm early. I'm an 80s baby. But, you know, when I moved to Detroit, people said, how do you survive here? Well, New York and New Jersey, the attitude and swagger of those cities are the same in all cities. You ain't going to mess with me at a gas station at three o'clock in the morning because I'm going to kick somebody's teeth. Can I tell you, do I even look approachable? Are you serious? Why are you playing with your life right now? No. But as a kid, I knew I couldn't walk around looking scared. I was going to get my behind handed to me. Right.

[6:16] Kelly Price: I'm I am early 70s. I'm 1973. And I'm proud. Dope. Dope. Decades. Some of the greatest stuff came out of the 70s. I am a heroin era crack era project. Single parent home food stamp. Getting having to leave school twice a year. Take a day off to go for the face to face meeting. So they make sure that you don't kids. That's what I grew up in. Stood in line for hours for powdered milk, powdered eggs, canned tuna, canned chicken, five pound bags of rice. Five pound bag. You understand? That's a 10 pound bag of flour. You know, high, high, high caloric, low nutritional value. Food deserts. No grocery stores. We were eating, but we were not being nutritious. We were getting no nutrition.

[6:59] Kelly Price: So we had I laugh at it when people are like, oh, my God, she's got to be bleaching. No. When you eat better and you do things a different way and you do, you actually see what your complexion is supposed to be. As a little girl, my skin was really dark. I had eczema. I always had breakouts. I was sleeping with roaches. Roaches were crawling in the bed. Roaches were crawling up inside the bed. There were rats. And trust me, ain't nothing like a new New York City sewer rat, baby. I don't go in this country. Ain't nothing like a New York sewer rat to go. You want to sit down at you and they charge.

[7:44] Kelly Price: Yes. You ever see a rat walking down the street? They are not scared of people on the street. Let me tell you something. When all that garbage is sitting outside from the restaurants. Right. I heard Wendy Williams say and I understood exactly what she was talking about. You have to be from New York to get it. She said, let me tell you something. You see a rat or something around a New York restaurant. You don't move. Now, if it's a roach on the wall, that's different. And people were like, what the hell is she talking about? No, I get it. There's nowhere you're going in New York City where there's not a rat. I don't care how many times the exterminator comes out. Now you can keep the roaches out.

You exterminate and just make sure it's really clean. Don't leave no crumbs out. She said, if I see a rat that don't bother me, but if I see a roach crawling in the restaurant, I'm getting up and I'm walking out. I knew people like what I knew exactly what she was talking about.

[8:32] Kelly Price: A New York City rat. If I see it, you see them garbage bags piled out there. Sanitation comes every night in New York City to pick up in the in the boroughs, like in especially in the city in Manhattan, because you have all businesses and the garbage is piled up and it's in the summertime, especially the stench is. Listen, the only thing I can do is take you back to Thriller. What's his name? Price say he said the funk of 40,000. You know, it's funny. I brought my sister in law and my husband to Detroit to New York for Christmas. Yes. And we were driving home from Manhattan. They were in Harlem. We were eating soul food and they said, I want to see the Bronx. I said, OK. So we drive off the Bronx and we're driving down.

That is that's Cardi B. I want to see the Bronx. Were they disappointed when they got there? They said this is the trenches of the earth. Look at this. I said this is what people think other cities like look like. And they said I said this is New York City. You see a picture of what you think it is, but you're growing up in New York, especially in the 80s. Yeah, it's going to kick your it's it's it was tough roads, tough streets.

[9:43] Kelly Price: I was outside. I was Southside, Jamaica. That's where my grandfather's church was. And the projects that I lived in were in Far Rockaway, which we just called it far away. It was at the end of the A train line. If you took the A train, it went from the elevated train at Mott Avenue, which was the last stop on the line. If you rode it all the way to the other end to the last stop on the A train, that was almost a three hour train ride. You would go from being elevated to underground. And Rockaway was so remote. Most people don't even know. I told them I said it. I don't think people realize it. But at one point in the 80s. Far Rockaway, which is maybe 15 miles from beginning to end, it's a peninsula surrounded by water on three sides.

There's the bridge that takes you back into Queens, which you got to go through. Not Rockaway Beach, but like Lefferts Boulevard. I don't remember where the where that man got killed. Howard Beach. Howard Beach. Yes, it was. It made the news. Yes. All over the country. They still had active Klan happening. Yes, Howard Beach. And that was literally just a few miles from, you know, a certain part of Brooklyn, a certain part of the end of Queens. Far Rockaway was the end of Queens. And you had to go. And it was a peninsula. There was one strip of byway that took you to the Rockaways and out of the Rockaways. Any other way that you left, you had to go by a bridge. We were surrounded. There was the bay on one side, the swamps on the other, and the Atlantic Ocean on the other. So coming out of those waters, the sewer rats could be as big as a puppy.

[10:35] Kelly Price: Yeah, truly. So what saved you? Music, God, church. You know what hit you first?

[10:41] Kelly Price: So I tell this story. And now that I am the age that I am and with the understanding that I have about a lot of the things that I've lived through in life and what the purpose was for it to get me to this place in this time, I had no idea, you know, I would be walking around. I'd be walking to school and, you know, my book bag on my back and little things like I felt less than everybody else, because when they said, you know, teachers said you had to put book covers on your books. Well, we didn't have an extra couple of hours to go and get book covers. We made them out of paper bags. We would go and see if we could get paper bags from the bodega on the corner. And we would make book covers, because if you didn't like you would, you know, it knocked off a part of your grade for every day that you came in, like they would give you until like the end of the first week of school to have all of your books with book covers. They did that to preserve them because we didn't get new books. We didn't get new books in those areas.

[11:47] Kelly Price: And so just little things like that. I just remember walking to school and I don't know how I knew to do it because I didn't understand that I was making a declaration over my life. I didn't I didn't understand that I was prophesying to myself, but I would walk to school every day and I would just I would be saying to myself I wasn't humming and singing. I would just be looking around and saying, I live here, but I don't belong here. I live here, but I would say it every day when I was walking. I had like a 15 block walk to school and from school. And I live and I didn't understand that that's what I was doing. But just because I didn't understand it didn't mean that I wasn't practicing the principle of my words, having power and being spirit and having life and life into my life.

I didn't realize that that's what I was doing. I was six years old, but I was just looking around me and I was going, I don't want to be here. I don't want I was grateful to have a roof over my head because we were homeless before then. I was homeless a lot as a kid. And so sleeping in the car until my mother's car got taken. You know, so it was, you know, and speaking of the South Bronx, we were on the wait list for an apartment to come open with New York City Housing Authority. And they had two apartments open up at one time. And we were in Queens. They told my mother, you can go to the South Bronx or you can go to Far Rockaway. Where did we go, Robert? We went to Far Rockaway. And so, yeah, that shaped that that shaped my childhood. I carry a lot of that.

[13:23] Kelly Price: I don't have all bad memories of the project. It was different back then. There was still street justice. You couldn't mess with kids and old women. Somebody come up missing and wasn't nobody going to say anything because that's what's supposed to happen to you when you mess with kids and old women. One time somebody tried to get at me. One time somebody tried to get at my sister. One time we were known as the church girls in the building. They told the boys that ran the block, literally put out there, leave them girls in 2A alone. They're good girls. They don't bother nobody. They're church girls. Leave them alone. If you bother them, you're going to have to answer to me. We didn't even know it. People didn't bother us because the boys that ran the block were our security and we didn't even know we were.

[14:08] Robert Bannon: And you didn't even know. That's the error that a lot of times, I talk about that in my school. A lot of times we got to stand up for one another. We don't need to go there. There's an unspoken rule about how we're supposed to treat people. Women, families, certain people, they're off limits.

[14:25] Gayle Tzemach Lemmon: Yeah, why are you snatching her old pocketbook? Why are you stealing her food stamps? Okay, you're a crackhead and you're going to take the bag because you need the money? Don't hit her. Don't put her on her back. Don't black her eye.

[14:41] Robert Bannon: When you found a job, not your job as a teenager, but when you hit it and you got, when you started booking session gigs, background, if you know the story, it's a late, very legendary story, and then you become, you know, you do the work and you grind and you're singing and the voice and the hustle before the record deal. Is there a moment where, is it divine journey? Is it the talent? Is it hard work? Is it a combination? Like, how do you, coming what you came from, how do you accept that? Is it hard?

[15:16] Gayle Tzemach Lemmon: I accepted it graciously because I was homeless and I was pregnant. I was living in my grandparents' home trying to think about how I was going to tell them that I had the nerve after them letting me move in their house to come into their house and bring a baby. I did not.

[15:47] Robert Bannon: And unmarried, we got to remember, this was a different day. Time has progressed so very quickly.

[16:09] Gayle Tzemach Lemmon: Oh, I lost you.

[16:16] Robert Bannon: Did I lose you?

[16:29] Gayle Tzemach Lemmon: Am I back? I'm back.

[16:32] Robert Bannon: Okay, I was going to say, I'm still in here.

[16:35] Gayle Tzemach Lemmon: Yeah, no, you just froze and I was like, okay, I need you to unfreeze because I'm just going to sit here. I'm going to sit here.

[16:48] Robert Bannon: We're here. We're here.

[16:54] Gayle Tzemach Lemmon: Yeah. Yeah. I just, I think, yeah, all of that. And yeah, so the moment it happened, it was absolutely. So, you know, you said the universe, you said God. There's some things that I think are written. I remember the Broadway play Aida by Elton John and Tim Rice. Why do I remember it? Because I was just coming out as an artist, had no idea that Elton John was a fan, right? So he's, he did the cast album, but then he wanted to do an all-star album of the cast album. I was on it. Boyz II Men was on it. Janet Jackson was on it. How did I get on it? I was new girl on the block, right? He called everywhere looking for me. And I still have a snippet of it today. I'll have to have Shakira send it to you.

He did an interview and he said, when I put, I'm getting chills right now. He said, when I put this all-star cast album together, I said, and I'm going to see if I can say it like Elton. He said, I want Kelly Price. I want Kelly. She's an amazing singer. And oh my God, her vocals are just, and she's going to be a huge star. And she's the greatest singer to come since Aretha Franklin is what he said.

[18:11] Kelly Price: Detroit, I'll be there on Wednesday. She won't be there. Band and all. Yes, band and all. Debuting the new live show. The new show. Giving you Vegas residency, my love. I need a Vegas residency with Miss Price. Oh my God. And Written in the Stars, the song from Aida. Oh, the song. That's what made me mention them. Is it written in the, there are some things that are written. There are some things where we can change the course by our actions. But there are some things that are written in the stars that are going to happen no matter what. If you make the wrong turn, you're still going to end up there. You're just going to prolong yourself getting there. But there are some things that are going to happen no matter what.

I believe that this was always going to happen. Back then I wouldn't have known it. But this is where God wanted me to be. It's not where I land though, because the crazy thing about it is, here I go again. I'm just getting in. I did my, you know, I had the deal on the table and I'll never forget. I broke down crying. I was in my kitchen. It's the first house that I had ever bought. Getting a deal did not buy me my first house. I grinded. I worked hard. I spent money on my kids. I did not spend money on myself. I saved every dime. I was proud of myself. I put 30% down on my first house. And I became a homeowner at 22 years old. And I was 18. I was homeless when I was 18. That's a lot of singing and a lot of saving.

[19:42] Kelly Price: A lot of singing and a lot of saving. If it wasn't for the kids, I didn't spend it. I saved and I saved and I saved and I saved. And I was living in a little apartment. We had roaches. We had mice. I said, God, I don't want my kids growing up like this. And I'll never forget. I came home from church one Sunday evening and I heard the Lord say, in my spirit, start packing. I was like, okay, if I only pack one box, I'm going to make sure I start packing. So I drove up to Pathmark. Remember Pathmark? Yeah, I sure do. It was one right in Fort Lee, on Route 46 in New Jersey.

[20:13] Kelly Price: Yes. And I was living in Long Island, in Copay, Long Island at the time. That's where my ex-husband was from. And so we were in this ratty little one-bedroom apartment. Literally ratty. It had mice and roaches, the whole nine. But we had a roof over our head. So my car that I had didn't have any insurance. So the only time I would drive it was at night. I was straggling on it. Driving at night, I was riding dirty, baby. But I had to get papers and formula and all that kind of stuff. I remember I went out in the middle of the night and I went to Pathmark and I was like, would y'all happen to have any boxes that you haven't trashed already? Nothing that came with meat in it because I don't want it to have the smell or whatever.

If you have some boxes left over from what the tissue came in or maybe cleansing products or whatever. And they're like, yeah, we can give you a few. How many do you need? I was like, well, how many can you give me? Give me a bunch of boxes. I couldn't even fit them inside the car. I was so excited. I went home and just start packing everything up. I packed up my entire kitchen that night. I only left out enough pots and pans to get a meal cooked. And I left a plate out for each of us. My kid's father, my ex, one for me. And I left each one of the kids their own little bowl and spoon out. Packed up the rest of the kitchen, left out a frying pan, a rice pot, and a bigger stock pot. Packed up everything else.

And that was my act of faith. I tell people, if you want to show God that you know that he means business about you and you are walking in agreement with the word that he spoke over your life, you're supposed to be his echo. Faith is a verb. It's not a noun. Yes, it's an action. A verb. You have to put action to it. So when he said, okay, start packing, I went to Pathmark riding dirty, got some boxes, and I packed my entire kitchen up. That was my act of faith to show God that I believed that I was moving. I bought my house.

[22:09] Kelly Price: Later that year, I went to start looking for houses. My friend's older brother's wife, I have a friend, we were about a year or two apart, we grew up together. Her older brother's wife was a real estate agent. I said, you think Frances will take me to look at some houses? She said, yeah, what you looking for a house for? I said, because I want to buy one. The story is so true that when I bought my first house, Robert, I was excited about buying a full bedroom set with dresser drawers and that kind of thing. I never had a dresser drawer. We had plastic bags. We pull out what you're wearing for the day. That was what you had.

[22:55] Kelly Price: That's what you wore. So I'll never forget, I was so embarrassed. But this particular friend, whose sister-in-law, showed me the house that I eventually bought. I was embarrassed. I was like, well, what are you going to do? I wanted to do it right. I wanted it to be perfect. I had ordered my furniture. I had my furniture made. I ordered this Italian marble set. It's old school now, but this is when they first started putting the lighting under the bedding, that kind of stuff. Things were automated on the bed. This was 1997. Mine didn't come out until 1998. This was money that I saved from doing sessions and going on the road with Mariah and going on the road with Mr. Isley and going on the road with Puffy, working with my clients for vocal production. As a vocal coach, Mary J. Blige was the client. Brandy was the client. SWV was the client. I had these clients, and I did all of this stuff behind the scenes that people didn't know about. We didn't have social media.

[24:05] Kelly Price: Including writing. I mean, your song, like, Right Turn. Kelly Price is a writer. You sing these songs. She wrote these songs, everybody. Yeah. Total was my favorite client. They're always so surprised when I say that. And they were like, no, we know we gave you a hard time because we had to do things over and over and over again. My favorite clients were Total, because they came in and they came in ready to work. And whatever I told them to do, they did it and they didn't question it. It wasn't in their mind, well, I'm a singer. And there are some singers that I work with that have selective amnesia now. Or maybe they really did forget that when I worked with them and I didn't have a deal, they weren't very nice to me.

I don't let that bother me. There was a casting system. There was a totem pole system. I had been told to my face, because back then, you weren't allowed to be sensitive because nobody cared. Nobody was going to advocate for you. People called me fat to my face. People told me that I would never sell any records to my face. So be happy that people will sing the songs that you write and they let you sing background on their stuff. Because ain't nobody getting ready to buy a record from somebody that looks like you. These are things that people said to my face. I read things about myself and it broke my heart when I read, I don't know if it was Right On or Word Up Magazine, but I was so proud because I had worked with Brat and Jermaine on the remix for Secret Love. And I got tired of people saying big girls can't dance. Now, catch me at the black party and say that.

[25:45] Kelly Price: You know, people don't come to hear me. They don't come to see me dance. They come to hear me sing the words of my song. They're there for the lyrics and for the voice. That is Kelly Price. That is my signature. That is my mark. It was no need for me to try to be someone who I'm not. The moment I start trying to be someone I'm not, I've already failed. I've failed myself. And I've failed my audience because they're not expecting that from me. But I wanted to work with Divine Stevens. He was choreographing everybody. He was the most known to me, I think, choreographer outside of...

[26:28] Robert Bannon: Why am I having a brain fart?

[26:31] Kelly Price: Oh, I know who you're talking about. I'm trying to think because I know in that time...

[26:33] Robert Bannon: What's the name?

[26:34] Kelly Price: Lorianne.

[26:36] Robert Bannon: Yes. Robinson.

[26:39] Kelly Price: Yes. I'm getting old. That was a senior moment.

[26:45] Kelly Price: I said Robinson, it's Gibson. You understand.

[26:48] Robert Bannon: Yeah, if it wasn't Laurieann, that's like, come on, did you know your name, girl? Get over here. If you know, you know. If you know, you know.

[26:59] Kelly Price: But if it wasn't Laurieann who was choreographing, it was Divine Stevens. So when he was working with the dancers, I was like, can I do something with them? And he was like, you want to dance? I said, I don't want to do the whole thing. Like, give me an eight count, give me a 16 count, something like that. I just want to show people that big girls can move. Like, we tear it up at the block party. We tear it up at the house party. We tear, like, you hard-pressed. Your man gonna stop dancing for you to come dance with me while you're, like, at the party. Big girls, we winded, and then that era, come on. Mixed music, all that stuff was everything. We were the original mixtape city, the guys standing out on the block with the incense and the mixtapes.

[27:45] Kelly Price: Listen, when my first album came out, I was walking through Harlem. We were, no, it was weeks before Mirror Mirror came out. I had just left lunch. I left lunch with one of the marketing people, and I think I was with some of my in-laws, because they were uptown. And I had meetings at Island that day. So, it was 2000. Yeah, 2000. So, this was Def Jam at the time. It wasn't Island. Baby, I'm walking down the street, and I ain't never for knocking nobody's hustle, but it was two weeks before the record came out. Oh, no. I shot the video for As We Lay in the Hollywood Hills. Chris Robinson was the director. I'm walking out the restaurant, I'm up in Harlem. He's selling mixtapes, incense, oils, and the Mirror Mirror album.

[28:41] Kelly Price: And it had the photo. This is how you know it was in-house. Ain't nobody gonna ever say that they was doing this stuff in-house and double-dipping, but they weren't. I had just picked the photo that I wanted for the cover of the album less than a week before that, and he had the album with the actual cover. I'll never forget. I was so mad. I was like, yo, you taking money out my kids' pockets? Yo, why you doing this? Come on. You making your money. The record ain't even out yet. It don't come out for another two weeks. What are you doing to me, man? What are you doing to me? I got mad. All my New York came out. I turned the man's tables over. I turned into Jesus. I flipped over the table. I think the incense and the oil man is still on 125th Street.

He's still there. Listen, I used to go back. They don't make Egyptian musk the way they used to. When I go home, I would send you stuff. I wore oils back in the day. I didn't wear perfume. I wore oils. Yes. That stuff got into your skin, and it was all day long, and you was glistening, and smelling, just stepped out of Eden.

[29:47] Kelly Price: When I was listening to you all week, because I'm getting ready for Wednesday, and I was getting ready for the honor to talk to you, you know, I thought of a couple things about you. Firstly, you're a singer-singer, so you just listed all those people. Before Kelly Price became Kelly Price, she was a singer-singer, because singers go to her. They learn her, and if they forget the technique that she teaches them, which is why she's still singing these songs the way she sings them, then you see a vocal decline. She's a singer. When singers get around, they talk about Kelly Price. Elton John's talk about Kelly Price, but you survived an era and a time in this business where a lot of these people out here are not going to the Aretha on Wednesday. They're not debuting new shows. They're not selling out around the world. Music's not being played. You survived this era and this business. How?

[30:34] Kelly Price: First and foremost, I always respected it as my job, right? If I was working at a bank, or if I was in corporate America, which I always envisioned myself doing, God had another plan. You know, back in the day, again, New Jersey, right? You see the ladies with their little briefcase, and their heels would be in their bag, and they would have on their little sneakers, or you know what I'm saying, their little flats, and maybe even some little pom-pom, short socks, or whatever, just cutesy, and they business suits, and they look real tailored and well put together and stuff. I was like, yeah, I'm going to do that. I'm going to work in corporate America. I'm smart as a whip. I'm going to get me a job making six figures.

I'm going to have a house, and that's how I told myself I was going to get out of poverty. I was going to get an education. I was smart. I was always in the top 1% of my class. I was, you know, valedictorian in the graduating class in elementary school. Ended up, couldn't be, could not be it. I had it taken away from me because I missed too many days out of school. Back then, again, we were not stable.

[31:33] Kelly Price: Weren't stable. So I always, that's the one area, I would always get a certificate at the end of the year for, they would do citizenship, they would do, you know, all of those, whatever. I never got one for attendance because, and my attendance disqualified me. My grades qualified me to be the valedictorian. And they had the teacher, they had to remove me because my attendance, my attendance didn't match. So I had to, I had to, I couldn't even be, I couldn't be the valedictorian or the salutatorian. I missed too many days of school. But the fact that I missed as much school as I did and stayed in the top 1% was an anomaly. It was an anomaly. Then I went to the, then I went to the seventh grade and went from seventh grade to high school. I went straight to the ninth grade. How hard that is in the circumstance.

[32:30] Kelly Price: Yeah. And you couldn't tell anybody because back then you absolutely, now, especially with like, if you were receiving benefits or any of that kind of thing, you had to have a physical address. If you did not have a physical address, you could not attend school. And if you didn't attend school, that was on your parents. It was going to be stuff pulled from them. And so when we were without a place to live, I couldn't tell anybody. I couldn't tell anybody. I had to keep that, you know what I'm saying? I had to keep that a secret because you tell the teacher, well, I don't, you know, I don't, they're going to tell the counselor. The counselor is going to report it.

[33:10] Kelly Price: They're going to report it. So, you know, we walked around, we were the generation that had to learn way too much, too fast. We were expected to be grown. So our parents didn't have to feel guilty about leaving us all the time for whatever, whether it was them doing what they had to do or doing what they wanted to do, whichever the case was. But you were expected to be grown, grown enough to take care of yourself and your siblings and not get your parents in trouble for leaving you for some time, days at a time, no food in the house, figure it out. You better not say anything to anybody. You better not say anything.

[33:59] Kelly Price: So we were grown because we had to be. And then if we showed up too grown to our parents that wanted to go back and read their high school days, then they want to knock your teeth out your mouth or slap you into the middle of next week because they would tell us, you know what I'm saying? So we were confused. Are we supposed to be grown up or are we kids? What am I supposed to do? Because I'm carrying the responsibility, your responsibility. And then if I speak up and say something, I might, I just might end up with a busted lip.

[34:31] Robert Bannon: That's real. How did your extended family feel after you hit it? Like, was it hard for them? Hard for you to create boundaries? Did you get, was everyone?

[34:41] Kelly Price: It wasn't in the beginning. I allow everybody to come to me for everything. I need this. I need that. And I realized that the asks were like ridiculous. Somebody asked me for $6,000 so they could put a fence up around the house. Go get a loan. Come on. Are you serious? $6,000 for a fence? Your house ain't never had a fence. And you're living in a house. One that I couldn't stay in when I was couch surfing with my friends because I didn't have no place to go. Right? These are the same people. You come to me because you want me to buy you a car. I was still, when I moved into my first house, my car was raggedy. When I would go to write at the studios and I had to go do sessions at daddy's house and that kind of thing.

One of my doors was off the hinges and I had to, it was like wired. I would have to wire it to shut it. I would park my car. I would park my, I was driving a Jeep Cherokee at the time. It was used. It was old. I would park it around the corner from the studio so nobody would see me getting in and out of the car before I went to the studio. But I went home to a house.

[35:54] Kelly Price: And your family was living with you in this house. You provided that house. I provided a house for my children. I provided a house for my children. It was unheard of. I lived on an acre in Nassau County. Oh yeah. That's not, that's not, that's some money. That took some effort and sacrifice. Yes. I told you if the kids didn't need it, I saved it. You saved it. I didn't put any money on myself. I was the queen of doing my own perms. I could do a blunt cut like nobody's business because I had to do our hair. I was so glad when I started working, like I was glad for the summer times when I could work full-time hours as a teenager because I would treat myself to go to the beautician and I'll never forget.

I wanted the Halle Berry cut so bad. My hair was full and thick. My hair looked like Oprah's back in the eighties. Got it. That's how my hair was. I literally, I could curl it or roller set it at the top of the week and not have to do it for the rest of the week. Tie it down, get up in the morning, do this. And I had the feather here and it was just full and it was everywhere.

[37:09] Kelly Price: Then I went from the short to the long and then I did it all. I was a seventies baby growing up in the eighties and the nineties. I couldn't afford real bamboo earrings so I went to the little Chinese store and got one and just took them out before I turned my ears green. It was 99 cents. The big ones are $1.99. So I was proud. I spent my summertime checks when I worked full-time. I went and bought glasses that were nice because the welfare glasses, you had three different ones. The brown, doodle brown ones with the clear, the blue ones with the clear, and the cutest ones were the pink ones with the clear. They were always at the end of the cabinet where you looked at the glasses. You didn't even have to ask. You already knew. Who's your insurance provider? We have Medicaid. The glasses are down there. It's the last three pairs down in the end. Go pick which one you want.

[37:55] Kelly Price: I told myself when I get to buy my own glasses, now I couldn't afford gazelles, but I got the gazellies. You know what I'm saying? You know what I'm saying? I went and got me some gazellies and I put my prescriptions in them. You couldn't tell me nothing. I had that the top of my glasses. I had my little with the and the little sideburns cut in and my hair like right here in the back. It was giving. It was giving. It was giving.

[38:27] Kelly Price: Listen, I watch power and I'm like, dang. That's my neighborhood. That's up the street from my grandfather's church. You owe me a check, my nigga. You go up the block from my grandfather's church. I do appreciate the fact that back in the day, though, they wouldn't sell it right where the church was. My grandfather was very respected in the neighborhood when the people would drove by and they system.

[39:04] Kelly Price: Yeah. Yeah. When they pull up in front of the church, they turn it down, turn it down. And I like that no more. No, but these are what makes you who you are. And then you bring that to your childhood and the way you've been in this industry. That's what I bring to the stage. That's the bring it to the and it's real and live and honest. And you know what I love about you? And as somebody who the past year I've got to speak to you, you're really sweet and kind and generous.

[39:20] Robert Bannon: I promise I'm not a dad. Y'all got me wrong, but it's OK. Why does it hurt your feelings? I see things and I'm like, Miss Price is misunderstood or Miss Price is not like that. Or, you know, people have agendas and you speak on certain and they have influencers and social media. They're not they're not always fair to people who have given their life to entertain and give us joy.

[39:49] Kelly Price: Well, it's intentional. And, you know, as one person put it, how dare I have the nerve to be fat and black and have an attitude? I remember reading that one day and I was like, because I deserve to have a bad day, just like everybody else. And whether I'm fat and dark skinned has absolutely.

[40:07] Kelly Price: Nothing to do with that. Do you ask that question to your mama and your grandmama and your aunties and your sisters? It's bad enough. As Black women, they think we are Black and angry. You know what? I'm not angry. I just don't take stuff off of people. Don't expect me to deal with things that you wouldn't expect a person, my counterpart, who is not a person of color to deal with, because I'm always supposed to just be able to take it, and I'm always supposed to be the strong one. And well, you're used to this anyway, so what's the big problem? I hear, you know why women of color want to live the soft life, specifically African-American women of color? You know why we're so intentional about trying to have a soft life?

Because we were never allowed to. If it happened to you, well, ish happens. You weren't allowed to cry. You were not allowed to stop. And for a lot of us, to stop to acknowledge the pain is to stop forever or to die. And I'm not saying figuratively. Depending on your circumstances, it literally might be the death of you if you stop. Somebody asked me a question, and I'll just never forget, and when I said it, I was like, dang, yeah. They were like, well, what made you keep going? I said, because I couldn't stop. If I would have stopped, I would have never started again.

[41:40] Robert Bannon: I had, you know, I'm a white dude, and I came from a whole different world. And when I got with my husband, you know, he said to me one day, Robert, I'm a Black man from Detroit, and you will not understand what that means and the attitude I have to have and why I don't rest or why I can't sit still or why I have to work as hard or why I feel defensive. And you know, forget that, you know, Miss Kelly Price is singing, making money and loves Jesus and is Black. Then, you know, people are going to come out and say something. The world is always, but the people, the people and the people who love you, you have held us down and we have held, hopefully held you down. You know, I love the people who have supported me, and I owe them so much.

The people who are real supporters, who understand that I'm human, that I have days just like they do. You know, I knew who my people were, especially when I was raising my kids in Atlanta. I gave, I always gave so much of myself to everybody. If I was seen out in a restaurant and I had my kids with me, I'll speak to you. Please be respected enough that you don't stand here and talk to me for 15 minutes, because my children are with me and I'm trying to have dinner with them. The people that got it, got it. The ones who were like, you're not my people. I don't ever want to hear you sing again. It's okay. It's not going to change the status of my living. And whereas I might've felt a way about it before, I got the little bastard too.

I've got him, Robert, did you see that? I saw you, you came like that Obama, like, boom, that she did that. Cause he's dead on my wrist right now. I might have to pour some of my water out and get him off. That was a long time. People that's real. No, that was a monitoring spirit. Ain't no reason for me to have no nuts in this house. If you know, you know, yeah, that's a monitoring spirit. Ain't no reason. I don't have any flowers in the house right now, even though Keira did give me some the last time she came, but I don't have fresh flowers in the house right now. I do have fresh fruit, but it ain't been here for days. There's no reason for me to have no reason in my apartment. It's a monitoring spirit.

Did you hear what you want to hear? I did. Did you get it? Okay. Take that back. She's alive. She's well, she's fine. She's living. She's thriving. I'm about to walk into the greatest season of her life. The best is yet to come. It always is. I had no idea when I wrote, it's my time, right? I wrote it. Initially, it was supposed to be the theme song for R&B Divas. And when it made a left turn during filming, I was like, absolutely not. I'll put it on my next album. And let me tell you, it's about like, when she comes out, it's my time. You better be ready to dance, people. When I wrote it, I was like, yo, this is going to be so cool. Because at this point, I do understand about speaking over your own life, right?

I was like, it's going to be in the club, tore up, prophesying better days over their life, because they're going to be singing while they're here with it. They might have a drink in their hand, but it don't change the fact that what you speak is what you will have. That's what I said to Shep when we were in the studio, Shep Crawford. I said, Shep, you know what the coolest thing about this song is? He's like, what, KP? I said, nigga's going to be in the club. Sorry for anybody that's offended. That's just the way we talk to each other in my era coming up. He's going to be in the club, probably sloppy drunk, making a declaration over their life that it's my time to shine. I didn't know that I was prophesying to myself. It's my time to rise. It's my time to shine. It's my time to live. It's my time to, I don't even know my own words right now.

[46:01] Kelly Price: To fly. Yeah. It's my time to soar. It's my time for more. It's my time to be. It's my time for show. It's my time. The words, God gave me that song in 2010, 2010, 2011. I'm living the things right now that I wrote about in that song. It's not lost on me. That's what you see when I get on stage. Whether I feel good, whether I don't, if my voice is raspy, that's good. You know I'm singing live. It's like a guitar. I play the guitar. I've never played it on stage. I told my MD, I said, I think I'm going to pick my guitar back up so I can get up in India Arium one night. So I got to get back to practicing on my guitar. I have like 15 guitars. They was hanging on my wall. Take the guitar off the wall and play it, dummy.

But a guitar player, an acoustic guitar player, when they slide their hand up the neck and they're going through them frets, you hear, and it's a squeak. That's the sound of live, acoustic. My voice is going to crack sometimes. I actually like my raspy voice. I think it's sexy. I hated it when I was a kid because I was like, you a girl. And when all the boys was going through the change and their voices started cracking and their voices got deeper, I tell this joke and people laugh. They're like, you crazy. I'm like, no, I'm serious. I went through the change when the boys went through the change. My voice started cracking and it got deeper. My speaking voice got deeper. My singing range actually went higher, but my speaking voice got more smoky.

It got deeper and I always hated it as a kid. It took me so long to realize. I'd be like, why are guys looking at me like that when I speak? They're like, do you hear your voice? Your voice sound like milk. It's like chocolate milk. I'm like, what? I love the laugh. I love the rasp. I love the tone when you speak. But when you sing, forget it. The singing voice does not match. No, good night. It's the Mount Rushmore of voice. The people you've worked with and you looked up to or sung with or worked with, you sit at that level. You are one of the greatest vocalists in the entire world. I love that. I will take that lightly and I thank you because there are so many singers in the world. No, but the technique, the tone, the musicality, these are her songs.

She wrote them. Wednesday, you can come debut. The Vegas residents, I'm going to take that with me. I'm telling you. When it's time for it to happen, it will. I've always been a philanthropist behind the scenes. I've always been a humanitarian. A lot of charities, breast cancer, where a lot of work, you know, a lot of work, homeless women and children, you know, educating women on their breast health. Don't be the last one to know what's going on in your body. Right. Be intentional. Men. Don't be the last one to see the lightning. Thank you, Lord. Amen. Don't be the last one to know what's going on in your body. Be intentional. Be intentional. We have more outlets and resources now more than ever, and you may not have a lot of money, but there are places where you can go.

Look it up. You look up everything else you want to look up on Google. Look up where you can get a free mammogram. Look up where you can go and get treatment. There are places out there. I am moving into a phase of my life where I want to. I asked God in 2005, and this is the truth. I wanted to live a life that resembled perpetual vacation and take breaks to go to work. I asked him for that. I asked him for that. That is getting ready to be my life. It's going to be my life. I want to concentrate on the things that I love. I want to open up a place where women who are transitioning out of maybe drug facilities or prison and trying to reunite with their kids can come and live and get education and be transitioned back into society.

We want to reunite those children under that roof, get them educated, give them parenting classes, teach them how to cook if they don't know how to cook, get them their GED if they want it. I want living staff with all of that, and I want it to be free of charge. That costs money. 50, I need a check. I'm going to keep saying it. I need a check. I want to do one here. I'm back living in Georgia. I want to do one here, but I also want to do one in New York, which is going to be a lot more expensive. But they need it. Because I'm going to need to own the building. I don't need to do a long-term lease. I'm going to need to own the property. When you teach a man how to fish, he eats for a lifetime.

If you give him a fish, he eats today. We want to give people what they need for their life. This has been on my heart for so long because of the things that I've lived through, the homelessness, living again in a food desert, eating things that were not nutritional but just made to fill you up, the government subsidies that we got. You hear people say things like, you get that for free. I'm not talking about the food stamp queens and EBT card queens or being ignorant online talking about they get $1,500 a month and they go and load up their cabinets with garbage. No. Anybody that's got a problem with what I'm saying, I don't care. If you need it, you need it. Don't throw it in the face of other people because there are actually a lot of people that need it, that because they work a job, can't get it, but their job is paying them enough money to feed their family.

You're a disgrace. You're disgusting. Those are the people that I want to help. They want to work. They don't want to have to depend on the system. When they reach out to get help, they're denied help because they have a job. Then if they get off their job so they can get help, you tell them they're lazy. Everybody that needs help like that are not the TikTok EBT broads. More of them are not than those who are. I say this all the time and this is what I had to teach myself so that I wouldn't lean into the hate. There are more people who are with you than who are against you. We just have to be more intentional about making sure that people we love and support know it because haters, they always have time.

You know why they have time? Because they don't have anything going on. You know what? I said it out today. After my wife, a witch came. She was a witch. She came to my page and Instagram automatically blocked it based on the way my settings are set up so the people who watched the live and commented couldn't see it but I saw it. She tried to speak death over my life. She tried to speak death over my life. No, no, no, no, no. No, no, no, no, no. You don't even understand what you just did to yourself. I don't have to curse you. You just cursed yourself. You just cursed yourself. God knows what it is that I want to do. He knows who I am. Again, like when I used to say, I live here but I don't belong here, walking to school at six years old. When I first got signed, I cried so bad because I said, God told me you got to do it.

[53:30] Kelly Price: You got to do it. I was like, I don't know if I can. People, the way they talk about me now, and I ain't even out there, were like, I don't know if I can. He was like, you can and you will. I was cooking dinner in my kitchen in this house that I bought before I had a record deal. I closed on my house on Martin Luther King Day. It was raining. It was a storm. I'll never forget because I went straight from closing, took my keys. I did not go back to that apartment. I went straight to the house and went to Kmart and got some sheets and pillows so we could make pallets on the floor because I was not going back to that apartment. The apartment that the night that I came home from church, and I told God I need to move.

He says, start packing. And I went to Pathmark and got some boxes. I went into contract on that house in December of that same year. And the night that I said it, the night that I had that conversation with God, I'll never forget, is what we call New Year's Revival. We at certain times of the year in Pentecostal churches had back to school revival because they told us, ain't no way you went to summer vacation and you didn't backslide if you were saved, right, whatever. We know you was out there doing whatever. So we have a back to school revival and we're going to pray for you before you go back. Like there was just certain things you knew happened certain times of the year. My Pentecostal babies, you know, and I think the Baptist church did it too.

We had back to school revival. We had New Year's revival. It was a New Year's revival. And I went to church that Sunday night and I told God I want to move. That was January. I went into contract for my house that December. I closed on Martin Luther King Day and never went back to that apartment. Without a record deal. Without, I did that without a record deal. I did that without a record deal. And built. Yeah. And everything that I've ever done, I don't, I don't compare myself to other people. Kelly, you're underrated. I'm not underrated. I'm under acknowledged. Underrated. People know what I can do, but the acknowledgement of it or the lack thereof is intentional. It's intentional. And I know that because the message that comes with me is not a popular one.

I'll never forget. So the interview that I did with the Breakfast Club, it was a really good, everybody's like, you need to watch out for Charlemagne. He's going to be, Charlemagne actually was very, very kind to me. I can't speak for anything that he's done or said. And we, if you know Charlemagne, you know that he has his ways. I had never met him before, but it was a really good interview. And he was genuinely shocked because when, you know, when you're known for singing, a lot of times people just like shut up and sing. But we had a conversation that day and I got an opportunity to share things that were on my heart. And he just kept looking at me like, I feel like I'm meeting you for the first time.

Or I feel like, you know, I'm getting a chance to hear you or see you for the first time. And in a lot of ways it was. People haven't really been in forums where I speak. That's what I'm moving into. Before I signed my deal, when God told me in my kitchen that day, you have to do it because I'm setting you up for what your real purpose is. Music is not my purpose. It was the door in to walk me into my purpose. And the work that I am getting ready to start doing on a full-time basis is my purpose. I'm going to house homeless people. I want to see people get clean if they have addictions. I want to be able to assist with that. Growing up in the era that I grew up in, the city that I grew up in, I did step over crack vials.

I did walk over dead bodies. We might not have known they were dead. We might have thought they were passed out. But I walked over, I stepped over dead bodies. We became desensitized to it because it was our everyday reality. I'm going to turn my light on too. No, you're good. And I love the rain. I like the, you sing about it. I mean, you should. Yeah. Listen, nothing grows without the rain. That made a big difference, did it not? But you look perfect. Beautiful. Thank you. I just don't want your video to be too great. You know what's funny is that at the end of, you talk about perspective at the end of every episode. I said, there's more love than there is hate. There's more joy than there is sadness.

There's more good than there is bad. It's about perspective because we could get stuck on that one person who tried to wish an ill to you or that person who's a hater or that person who didn't make it or the person. And it doesn't do us well because there is love and joy and good things for us. We have to be more intentional to make sure that the people that we love don't wait until they can't hear it. We have to counter the culture. Yes. Because unfortunately, love is not the culture. Hatred, bigotry. And it's not popular. It's not a popular message. No, let's keep it all the way a stack. That is the culture. We are the counter culture. We have to be intentional. I love that. I love the rain as long as I don't have to drive or fly in it.

Yes. If you don't know about Atlanta drivers, you don't want to be in Atlanta. I love this place. You can't bag on the city because I love this city, but drivers, absolutely not. I love y'all, but y'all know y'all can't drive. I learned how to drive in New York. I can drive in it. That's it. You can drive anywhere. Anything. Tsunami. Well, not a tsunami. You know what I'm talking about. I do. Listen, I hope I'm not talking your ear off. You are amazing. I love you. We have friendly conversation. Ms. Price is my people. I love you. I just feel like I want to give you the space and the ability to be you and be free. Robert, that's what I'm moving into. I have the staff now, and it's still small, but I feel like the more people, the more personalities you have to deal with.

I said the other day in the post, I was like, more people, more problems. You got a different spirit. You got a different deal with personalities. Everybody comes into it, and everybody's having, you don't know what kind of day they're having. You don't know what kind of life they've lived. I came into the realization that I carried a resting B-I-T-C-H face for a very long crime, and I didn't realize it. People would be like, you just sit there, and you just look so mean all the time. I realized, I said, man, I started looking at some old pictures. This was after I divorced my kid's father. I said, yeah, you did, but you know what the reality was, Robert? I wasn't even in the room when I looked like that.

My body was in the room, but my mind was on an argument I just had before I got to church, an argument that I just had in the dressing room with my ex-husband before I got on the stage because he didn't care about doing something to trigger me before I went on the stage. He got off on it. I'd be crying my makeup off and have to get myself together before I get back on stage and sing. Why do you sing like that? Trust me, you don't want to know for real. You don't want to have to live it. What I've lived is why I sing the way I sing. I bring my life's experience. I don't wallow in them, but I bring my life's experiences to every song. That might not be where I'm at right now. I might not be living through it right now, but every time I sing It Will Rain, I remember where I was when I recorded it.

That memory. I remember what was in my mind. It's muscle memory. My body goes there, and it serves me. Oh, yeah. I remember what you came for. I don't want to live in that energy. Yes. I leave it all on the stage. When I get off the stage, my adrenaline is way high. Everybody knows I'm going to come crashing down in about two hours, and I'm going to be good for nothing. I eat fruit, nuts, and water on a show day. I may eat breakfast. After that, it's a wrap. I'm not going to eat. I want to feel light. I want to feel free to move around on the stage. I want to be clear. It's almost like fasting before the show. Yes, yes. I'm a channel. I'm a channel. I'm having messages downloaded to me while I'm on the stage.

The things that I say, I'm being told to say. What I hear pretty much every time, what you said was for me. I connect with my audience. I ask God. When I pray, I pray before every show. We get in the corner, and we pray. People sometimes don't understand. The people that are backstage, Miss Price, can I get a picture? No. I don't want you to touch me. I don't want you to do anything because I've been in a space of consecration before I get on stage. I need to stay clear so I can give to the audience what they came for. You don't know who's sitting in your audience, told themselves, this is the last good thing I'm going to be able to do myself. I'm glad that I bought these tickets six months ago because I really love Kelly Price.

I'm going home and blow my brains out tonight. I'm going home, and I'm going to take a whole bottle of sleeping pills. Do you know how many times I've been told that, Robert? Kelly, what you said tonight made me decide that my life was worth living. Mm-hmm. Life is precious. You can get money anywhere. Scammers make money. You get this life. Whether you believe in reincarnation or not, I advise people, live this life like it's the only one you're ever going to have, even if you believe in reincarnation. Live this life like it is the only one that you will ever have. Live it freely, intentionally, unapologetically, not being a people-pleaser. If you are pleasing people, you cannot please God at the same time.

I'm sorry. The twain will never meet. Decide who is more important to you to please. I always want to be on the right side of God. You'll come back around, and if you don't, some people are for seasons. And that's okay. And that's fine. That's okay. Thank you for walking through this season with me. I appreciate you. Every goodbye does not have to be a negative one. And you do get to decide it. If somebody decides that they want the goodbye to be nasty and loud, I choose to walk away with grace. Amen. I do it in business relationships. I do it in interpersonal relationships. I do it with family, where I need to cut family off. I do it in my romantic relationships. I walk away with grace. Do they deserve it all the time?

Most of the times, not. But that's not for them. That's for me. If I walk away with grace, I get this. I get to have peace. My smile is for real. It's not a put-on. So many people think, you can't be that way. I know I'm not this way all the time, but I am this way every day. I don't have to be happy to have joy. Happy is an emotion. Joy is a state of being. Yes. Do you understand what I'm saying? Yes. That's why the old people said, this joy that I have, the world can't take it away from me. It might not be the best day, but even on my worst day, inside, I have joy because all my needs are met. And I might not have what I want, but I have what I need, even if it's the bare necessities. He may not come when you want him, but he comes through in a clutch.

Nobody come through in the clutch. He's right on time. And sometimes, not sometimes, most of the time, we're our holdup. We're the holdup. That's why when you can leave with grace, when you can extend grace to people, even when they don't deserve it, you get a peace of mind. And it's almost guaranteeing that God got to make sure that you're good. Because we're not perfect and we get something wrong every single day of our lives. We do. That's why I just said, it don't hurt. Just ask God to forgive you every day. And nobody's saying you're walking around being a... I'm not saying you're being a hypocrite or that you're a horrible person, but does it hurt you to get up every day and say, God, please forgive me?

Yeah. Please forgive me. I don't know. I might've hurt somebody's feelings and didn't even realize. Didn't even know. Didn't even know. Yeah. Yeah. I might not have known. Somebody might've tried to speak to me and I might've looked at them and I was thinking about something else and they thought I was giving them the evil eye. I wasn't even present. I was thinking about something I got to do and I'm feeling like doing later. Or maybe somebody just rubbed me the wrong way and I'm thinking, why they got to be like that? And again, that goes back to that resting B face, right? I didn't realize that I had one. But what I also realize is that most of the time when people saw me like that, I wasn't even in the room. My body was there, but I wasn't present. I was going through things and my head was someplace else. My body was in the room. So that's why you just never, a smile don't cost you nothing.

[1:07:52] Kelly Price: I'm not doing the job of five different people. You know what I mean? I'm not doing the job of 10 different people. I get to just come and be an artist. And I want to say that this is probably the first time in my entire career where I feel like I can just be the artist. And so it's hard to turn those reins loose, but I'm going to tell you something. The people that I have in position now, they made it real easy. All I got to say is, come see the show on Wednesday night. This is the show. I literally said it. This is the show that I have always wanted to put on for my fans. All these years, I'm finally going to do it. And listen, when the show is over, I am having an after party.

[1:08:43] Robert Bannon: Yes, you are at the hotel.

[1:08:49] Kelly Price: Please do drop the information. I did not want to cross the Aretha, because they are bringing me in town. And this after party literally just happened about a month ago. But I don't want to take away from that. Come to the show. If you're coming, come to the show. You're getting the show. This show, I promise you, you do not want to miss. Come to the after party. It's an up-close and personal experience. Yes, I will be taking pictures with the fans. Yes, I will be talking to you. Yes, I enjoyed that time. COVID scared the hell out of me. It took me a long time to get back into the mode and feel safe enough to do this again. And so now that I'm there, and they're trying to put out all these other diseases that they manufactured in labs, come on, let's just keep it a buck.

We know what it is. It's, listen, that's another story for another day. We have to do another interview. I'll talk to you another time. Yeah, I promise to God. But it doesn't mean that you can't be affected by it. So we just have to be smart. Look, I just want to tell people at Hotel St. Regis in Detroit is where the after party is going to be. And you can get tickets. The link will be able to, so you go to the Aretha.com to get tickets. Yes. And then go to the link on her Instagram, Miss Kelly Price, or I'll put the link below. Please come to Robert and get the link. I'm going to ask Shakira to put the link up on the fan page, please. And thank you, Shakira. She's driving right now. When I tell you that's my road warrior, that is my road.

I drove her crazy. I was like, I'm not trying to bother you. I can't wait till you meet her though. I've never met her and she's a sweetheart and she loves you. Sweet as apple pie. I feel like I got my baby sister back. And that's what I want people to know. When you go to Miss Price's concert, it's going to feel like family. It's going to be a reunion. You could bring your kids, you could bring your parents, you could bring your auntie, you could bring your grandma. You can bring anyone who wants to hear good music out in the summertime in Detroit. And then take your loved ones, your girlfriends. I'm like, what is going on? It's going to be almost 100 degrees. 100 summer in Detroit.

[1:11:00] Kelly Price: It's summer. It'll be night. So come out. On the river.

[1:11:08] Kelly Price: We're going to be on the river, baby. We know the people with their boats get it for free. They do it every day.

[1:11:13] Kelly Price: They have behind her with the boat.

[1:11:15] Kelly Price: They be behind us. They turn the engines off and they sit there and they get a free concert. They pay for it. They pay for it in the HOA fees in the building, believe, best believe. They get in there as they should.

[1:11:26] Robert Bannon: You are always so supportive and so kind. I'd never take for granted the fact that what a legend and icon you are. You could talk to any outlet, anyone around this entire world and country, and you choose to give so much time and energy to me. I'll never forget the email when you agreed to do the show. I'll never forget our conversation. I'll never forget the tidbits and the joy and the love and the help you've given to me. I got to see you sing live. You're so kind and sweet to my family after the show. You rode with me and supported me, and it is always an honor. My show is always an honor. I will always stand up for my friend and the one and only, the icon, the legend that is Miss Kelly Price forever and ever. I'm not going to be anywhere but Third Row Center on Wednesday at 7:30 with all y'all, Detroit.

[1:12:05] Kelly Price: Except for when you're backstage.

[1:12:07] Robert Bannon: I'm coming after the show because I want you to be in the moment.

[1:12:11] Kelly Price: After the show, it's the after party. Y'all want to come. After the party, it's the hotel lobby that's going to be right down. You got to get the after show tickets. You better get your tickets right now after the show, Hotel St. Regis. I love to be able to get up close and personal with you all. What I'm saying is, don't cheat yourself. Treat yourself. It's a one-of-a-kind opportunity to, outside of the show, come take your selfie. Have a moment. Have a drink or a snosh or something.

[1:12:42] Kelly Price: Yeah. Let me buy you a drink, doggone it. You know what I'm saying? Listen, what are they going to tell me if I say, around for everybody?

[1:12:49] Kelly Price: Around for everybody.

[1:12:51] Kelly Price: You don't know what's going to happen. You don't know what's going to happen. You got to be there. No, no. You never know what's going to... Because we're not scripted. We're not on a time... We don't have time constraints. I get to sit and talk to you. I get to get your name. I get to follow you back on Instagram.

[1:13:09] Kelly Price: Yes. Come on. You can even have a five-minute therapy session. I was a therapist in another life, I think.

[1:13:14] Robert Bannon: I know you are. You give that. You're a pastor. You are a therapist. You are a friend. You are special. Your spirit is beautiful.

[1:13:21] Kelly Price: And I enjoy it. Robert, I really enjoy it. I don't take this for granted at all. God took me from homelessness, food insecurity, my own insecurities, body non-positivity, didn't think much of myself at all. I even started to hate the fact that I sang so well because I felt like it's the only reason why people liked me. And I started to resent it at a point. And I will never forget. I knew it was God speaking through somebody. This lady, I had never seen before, showed up at the church that I went to, sat behind me in a basement church in Wine Dance, Long Island. This white lady, never saw her before, never saw her again. I just remember being really, really pissed off that day because the pastor of that church was preaching on me over the pulpit and literally said, you out there singing with these people, you're going to go to hell.

You have the voice of an angel, but you're going to go to hell. And I was looking at him like, my jaw dropped open and I was sitting there. I was so mad. Then he had the nerve to ask me to come and sing a song that day. And I sat there and I was like, this man has lost his ever loving mind. And I will never forget. Like I said, I'd never seen the lady in the neighborhood. Wine Dance was crusty. Anybody know anything about Wine Dance? It was crusty. So there was no reason if she wasn't looking to buy something, you follow what I'm saying, for her to be in that neighborhood. But she was just very well put together, plainly dressed. If you saw her, she looked like she was maybe somebody's older auntie or grandma or something like that.

And she put her hand on my shoulder and it was like, I felt electricity go through my back. And I was mad. I didn't say anything. And she leaned into me and she said, God said, sing for me. I was mad. I was mad. God said, sing for me. Don't stop singing. Don't stop singing. She got up and walked out the church that day. Be careful how you entertain strangers because you may be entertaining angels unaware. God sent me an angel. I started to resent my voice. I was being preached on over the pulpit, but nobody turned away my tithes and my offering. The same pastor wrote me a letter and said to me, you need to quit your job and go get put on some benefits. If I write you this letter, they won't question it.

He gave me two letters, one that said I was married and the other one in case they said that I couldn't get benefits if I had a man in the house that said that I was a single mother raising my kids by myself. So it would have been okay for me to lie to get benefits to take care of my children, but I was going to hell for singing.

[1:16:35] Kelly Price: Vision of love behind Mariah Carey. But collecting the money. The church was the first place that implemented don't ask, don't tell. People get angry when I call it out, but historically, the church has been the backbone of society. A lot of the societal norms that we now have to figure out a way to break out of because there was nothing normal about them. It was about control. And it was just another way of oppression. We just didn't see it because it wasn't Jim Crow and it wasn't cotton field slavery, but we were still enslaved up here. We went from the massa to the pasta. And it ain't every pastor hear me. Only a hit dog is gonna holler. I stand on what I'm saying. I come from a line of preachers.

I speak what I know so I can talk about it. It was a different kind of slavery. If you have a good pastor, count yourself blessed. God says, I desire pastors that are after my own heart. I don't have nothing against looking good and having what you want to have, but God's heart is not for Gucci over grace. God's heart is not for Louie over love. God's heart is not for Fendi over family. It's not. That's not the heart of God. And I will say again, I love a good Gucci. I'm a brand loyal. Everybody knows. I do have other designers in my closet, but I really just love Gucci.

[1:18:20] Robert Bannon: I know you do.

[1:18:21] Kelly Price: They were the only ones that made a shoe that my big wide foot can get into when I was still 300 pounds wearing a six inch pump on stage. They made a good sturdy shoe that I could walk in and be on stage for an hour. And they were comfortable. So they build a good shoe. I am not a paid supporter, but they can. Oh, do I have a dog? Oh, I have a dog.

[1:18:46] Kelly Price: I'm not a paid supporter, but they can. Oh, do I have a delivery? No, you might.

[1:18:53] Kelly Price: No, that's the concierge. I'll call him back.

[1:19:01] Kelly Price: And I know I'm talking your ear off.

[1:19:03] Robert Bannon: No, you're the best, the best interview, the best, the most honor.

[1:19:07] Kelly Price: But I just, you know, and that's, I'm so shadow banned. Like they won't, they will not take me out of Instagram jail because I won't stop doing, I won't stop praying online. I won't stop falling out social injustice. You know, like this was a rough week. This was a rough week. I looked back at the live today and I was like, really Kelly? Did you go on looking like that? I cried so hard, not just for the word that I give him, but every day this week, I was seeing something about a different child. This child had drowned here in Georgia. The boy that's gone missing, whose parents are now speaking out, out with his friends. I've been saying on my social media, these frenemy killings, that's a spirit.

I keep to go back, look at falling. The entertainment business is giving you truth that is hidden in plain sight. The agenda is if we can entertain you, you'll miss the message. So they don't care. Go back and watch Wanted. Go back and watch the first Matrix. Go back and watch this stuff.

[1:20:15] Kelly Price: There's a message in all of that. Listen to what I'm saying. It's hidden in plain sight. If we can entertain you, you will miss the message. That's why even though I entertain, I ask God, give me a message for the people. My pastor, he is my pastor still, even though he's in heaven. My grandfather, his pulpit was a pulpit inside of a church. Pulpit is the stage. My pulpit is every panel that I sit on.

[1:20:45] Robert Bannon: And you share your message to more, no shade to pastors. I mean, my in-laws are pastors. I love a pastor, but your pulpit is worldwide, millions of people.

[1:20:55] Kelly Price: And I knew it would be, and I knew I would be hated for it.

[1:20:59] Robert Bannon: And there is a-

[1:21:00] Kelly Price: I knew I would be hated for it. There is a pastor out of North Carolina, his name is Pastor Kevin Williams, Bishop Kevin Williams, prophesied to me 20-plus years ago when I did the Sisters in the Spirit tour with Sheila E., Shirley Caesar, Dorinda Clark Cole, and it was Al Wash's vision to bring together R&B and pop artists with gospel artists, women of faith who all shared the same belief, even if we weren't all in the same genre of music. So the show was an inspirational concert, and I'll never forget. Pastor Kevin Williams in North Carolina prophesied to me at the church that I belong to in Atlanta, he said, you're going to reach more people than pastors actually will ever have the opportunity to, and you're going to be severely hated for it.

The pastors who love you will genuinely love you. More of them will look to find fault with you because they are going to be jealous of the reach that you have with people. You will have the ear of people that won't listen to them. You'll have the ear of people that are not coming to church if it's not for a wedding or a funeral. They don't want to hear what they have to say because they feel like all pastors are moving in pimp juice energy, right? And I make sure to say that that's not every pastor. I love my pastor. My pastor is Pastor Hattie Robinson out of New York, New York. She is beautiful. She is fly. Anytime you see her, that face is going to be beat. They told us it was a cinderware red lipstick.

That hair is going to be laid. She's going to be dressed to the nines. If you give her a microphone and say it's go time, she's going to preach your socks off. She's an intercessor like nobody's business. She is a prophet and a woman of God, and she speaks the word of God. She changed the trajectory of my life.

[1:23:01] Kelly Price: About a year and a half ago, I was on a downward spiral, personal life, about it publicly. And I reached out to her because she had reached out to me before. And she said, I do prayer every morning throughout the week. Join me on the prayer call. I know you travel. It's early in the morning. You're on the West Coast. So it's going to be really early for you to join. But if you can only make it a couple of times a week, sacrifice and be up with me. I had to be up at three o'clock in the morning to be on the prayer call. And I started doing it little by little. And I was like, no, you can give God better than that. You give your time to anybody else that needs it, even if you don't feel like it.

If you got to do it, you got to do it. Give God his time. You can get up in the morning. If you had an interview, you'd get up. If you had an interview for a morning show on the East Coast, you would be up. You'd be up. You can get up for prayer. Go back to sleep when prayer is over. So I started on the prayer call about a year and a half ago. And it slowly walked me out of a place. Had a couple of public crash out moments. I don't let nobody make me feel bad about it. That was the enemy fighting against me because I was being intentional about trying to pull myself up out of a place that he never wanted to see me out of. But I was fighting literally for my life and fighting for my soul. Literally.

And when it comes out completely, it will come out. But I was fighting for my soul because I had family members who were trying to sacrifice me to come up. True story. Truthfully. Gang stalking. All of it. Sending people to my house. And people hear that and they make it like you are making this up. Like this is crazy talk. Taking over the cameras in the house that I lived in. Communicating with my door dash drivers. Trying to pay them to poison me. This is stuff that really happens. People don't talk about it because people will look at you like you're crazy. I don't have to say anything. When you start seeing people like this on the news, a whole lot of people have to be like, dang, she was serious.

Who would joke about something like that? Who would joke about something like that? And that's what I love about you is because you're not afraid of having a conversation about really anything. No. Because you have nothing to hide. I don't have anything. If people can be loud and wrong and say, who gonna check me? If I know that I'm speaking truth or speaking what God gave me, and I tell them every week during the Bible studies, don't take my word for it. I give you the scripture so you can go read it for yourself. You can go read it. I want you to do it. Can you pray for me? Yes. You should be able to pray for yourself though. We got to come out of that system. Again, that is from the cotton field to the church plantation.

Yeah. The pastor gets laid. You're supposed to be able to lay hands on the sick and they'll recover. You should be able to lay your hands on your own head. Lay your hands on your child. What happens when you can't get to a preacher? You just going to be sick and die because you couldn't get somebody to come pray for you? I don't want people to be dependent on me. Growing up in the traditional church system, we learned how to be codependent with our pastors. Why you got so many single mamas in church? The church thrives off single women. I'm going to tell it. They're not. That's 90% of the church. Those are the ones who come and give all they are. They will give their whole check because they in love with the pastor.

That's who they dream of. God told me I'm his wife. Mind you, he got a wife and three kids already. It's another kind of slavery. It's mental slavery. It's very, why does the caged bird sing? You're a gospel. You got gospel award nominations, gospel albums. You're a gospel artist, gospel television show. I don't align myself with that because I feel like it puts me in a box. I get it. That's the reason why God, I grew up in church PKs. I lived in the church. I was in church. I tell people I was in church nine days a week. I think God gave us two extra days because we always had to be there. We opened up the church. We closed the church. We cleaned the church. All that. You're the pastor's family.

You're everything. It wasn't a praise team. We had devotional service. You sang songs for an hour till your throat was raw. Shout five times off the same song. You done dragged that tag. Yes, he is. Yes, he is. We've been singing that for 30 minutes and finally get it quiet down. Somebody get up and start shouting and we back tagging. Yes, he is again. What is he? Yes, he is. What is he? Yes, he is. I know you said yes, he is, but what is he? I don't know. That's what they say. That's what we say in it. Okay. I encourage people go look it up for yourself. If you come back with a different interpretation, I'm open to it. Don't get in my live though and try to preach a sermon. No, that's yours and it's amazing.

Yeah, let's have a conversation. Let's have a conversation. Send it to me in my DM. I'll address it openly and if you're right and I'm wrong, I want to stand corrected. The last thing I want to do is lead anybody down the wrong road and definitely not in the name of God. I don't want them problems. Do you feel like, and I'm trying not to take more of your time, she cooked everybody, she made food, she got a pack, she got to come to Detroit, so I'm not trying and I took too much time and I took too much of her time. No, we've been having a tough period. It's more my fault. No, don't shut up. I'm trying to be careful because I'm very respectful and I'm very, very respectful and I don't do those kinds of interviews.

But we do this. Sometimes people have not do unscrupulous things, especially in entertainment and show business and sometimes people get guilty by association and you address certain things in your shows. You address certain people in your shows and people ask you a lot of things. You're a person of faith. How did you live in a world where sometimes some things were going on, but I'm in show business and this is the world and people don't even know the half of what goes on in this business. So how did you stay above water and keep your faith and keep going? You're not a sellout, Kelly Price. It's the reason why I've never won a Grammy. You want to keep it a thousand? That's why I've never won a Grammy.

You asked the question. You didn't have to ask it. It's the question that's been on people's minds. Some people have asked it. I don't want to ask it because it's inappropriate for me to ask. But I'm going to tell you something. What should be more appropriate is the reason why I've never won one. And it is inappropriate based on the way they tell you you're supposed to vote. How do I know? Because I've been a voting member for the first time in over almost 30 years. I'm not a voting member, but that was an intentional decision because until y'all decide to get it together and do things the right way, but what? What am I voting for? You're going to give it to who you want to give it to. You're wasting my time.

I've served on the board. I've been a board member. I have been a governor. I've been a part of that smaller group that after those first ballots go out, we go and we have to be taken to a place where there are armed guards at the door and the ballots are guarded and all of that kind of stuff. And still, what we end up voting on in that room, the last vote that takes place with governors, when we go and they take us to a location that nobody knows is usually they take us somewhere. We get checked into a resort somewhere. Nobody knows that we're there. We have armed guards outside of the rooms. We sit in rooms all day long. And these thousands and thousands of names that get submitted that go from being submissions to on the ballot, the first round when people vote, that last round comes to us in that room.

And whatever is left over, that's how you get the four to five names that you hear announced the night. These are your nominees. We were the ones that came up with who those four or five people were. We knew based on what we knew, who should have walked away with the trophy that night, right? So if you've ever seen me sitting in the awards and I'm sitting there and I'm like, now you know what that face is for. I'm not mad. I'm just like, what the hell happened between the armed guard room and the award goes to? A lot of foolery, a lot of effery. So I wear it as a badge of honor that I don't have one because I know the reason why I don't have one. How did I navigate the business? I navigate the business because I minded my business.

I stayed out of people's way. When I was invited to parties, my answer was always no. My attorneys and my PR people literally said to me, Kelly, you can't keep saying no. People are going to feel like you're snubbing them. So I learned this thing called the 30 minute U-turn. Walk into a party loud. Get in as many pictures as you can. You get all the way to the back of the room. Make sure everybody sees you so that they know that you were there. You hit that U-ey and start working your way back to the front of the room. You can do it in 20 to 30 minutes every single time. The closer you get to the door, the quieter you get. You slip out the door. Nobody even knows when you left, but they know you were there. My husband still does that to this day. He calls it the 30 minute come in loud and proud. It is the U-turn. It is the cul-de-sac, baby.

[1:33:37] Kelly Price: The entertainment party called to stack. I perfected it. So people didn't feel like I was snubbing them. People didn't feel like I was being self-righteous. I just, I can honestly say nobody's ever done craziness in a room that I was in because they understood what I stood for. Do you hear the rumors? Do you hear what people say? Yes, you do. But when you stand up in a court of law, anything that you testify to that you have not laid eyes on for yourself or been in the room for is called hearsay. It's subject to objection, your honor. So I'm intuitive. I'm prophetic. I do have these gifts. That's what let me know who to stay away from and not to ever let myself be alone in a room with. I didn't play those games.

I didn't flirt with people to get a job because you flirt with them. And it doesn't mean that somebody has the right to put their hands on you if you don't want to be touched. But again, I'm going to say I come from an era where they didn't have a problem calling me a fat B-I-T-C-H to my face. And it was like, OK, so you fat. Suck it up. Nobody was running to our rescue. So you couldn't even play those games with people. You couldn't play. Just don't play the game. I didn't play the game. I came to work. And when the job is finished, let me know if it's to your satisfaction. Do you need me to do something else? Would you like me to change that bridge? Would you like me to do less backgrounds, more backgrounds?

Do you want me to do a different arrangement? Do you hear something? Do you want to give you three different versions so you can listen to it and make a decision? That was me as a songwriter, arranger, producer before I had a deal. You hired me to come do a job. I'm going to do my job. And I'm there until the job is done. Job is done. I'm leaving and I'm going home. You want me to give you a ride home? No, I'm good. Me with that one-hinged door, that Jeep Cherokee. I'm going to drive that back from Manhattan to Nassau County. I'm going to get me some coffee from the 24-hour Dunkin' Donuts in Manhattan. Black, strong. Because I like my coffee sweet and light. But driving home from the studio at five, six o'clock in the morning when you've been there since four o'clock in the afternoon the day before, get my black coffee, get in my hootie, and I'm driving home to a house that I put 30% down on.

That's right. Four years after I was homeless. From singing, from working, from being talented and going home and minding your business. Going home and minding my business. And I don't make this about me being better than anybody or whatever. I'm not better, I'm just different. I made different choices. I'm not known for this, that, or the other. I'm known to come and sing to sing my face off. I am known for the lyrics. People love me as much for the lyrics of my songs as they do for me to sing my songs. If you ask me if I consider myself more of a writer or a singer, I consider myself a writer first.

[1:36:43] Kelly Price: Yeah. I do. I write the songs, I write the songs. You better sing Barry Manilow right here, right now. Right here, right now. That's when lyrics, we're lyrics. I don't know what the hell, what the hell is mumble rap? I don't know what they... I can't. My list comes, yo, I still bump Mary and I still bump Face First album. I still bump, you understand what I'm saying? I live in that era through my phone, through all of my devices. That's what, when I get in my vehicle, if a car picks me up from the airport, hey, can I get on your Bluetooth? In my dressing room, I set the atmosphere before I go on stage. Yes. Listen to some worship music so I can get my downloads. But before I go on stage, I might be...

[1:37:32] Kelly Price: I was to expect, you know, don't think it's pink gators, my Detroit players. Hey. All my hooligans. In Brooklyn. Come on. I've been, I've been fooled since Days of Under Rules, Never Lose, because I got to get out. And another one of my songs before I would go in, when I was filming American Soul, when I would go in for a movie role or whatever, you better lose yourself in the moment. Like, it goes deep for me. I would listen to that song and I would be here, I'd be in a car like this. Miss Price, we ready for you. We ready for you. Lift yourself up. Amp it up. All right. And I'm like, okay, let's go. And you have a lot of, and showbiz, music people, people of that time, those are your, they know Miss Price is...

[1:38:19] Kelly Price: Oh my God. And I know them and I love them. I remain a fan. I was fans of a lot of the people who became my friends. I was their fan first, you know, and I always respect them inside of their craft because I would look at them and go, well, if, you know, if the opportunity ever comes up, I'm going to have to be able to get up and do what they do on stage. And I had to even learn the difference between doing it the way I did it in church and doing it for stage. Because as long as you're projecting you loud, you can stand up there with your eyes closed the whole time. Ain't nobody paying $150 for a ticket to see you stand on stage like this all night long. You gotta, you gotta connect with them, make eye contact with somebody, sing to them because they're literally reliving the moment the first time either they heard your song or the first time your words, they realized that your words was their life.

[1:39:17] Kelly Price: And I tell people all the time, I had to live it in order to write it. And then God moved me from the period of where I wrote what I lived through to where I started writing songs prophetically. And I was writing about things that were going to happen to me. Years now, decades when I wrote, it's my time. Like my best days are still in front of me. I say that in the bridge, my best days are still in front of me. It's go time. I'm at a whole new, you know, you finish one part of life where every, every place that there is an ending, there is a beginning. That is law. That is universal law. You can't have a beginning without an ending. So don't be afraid of an ending. Don't be afraid to start over again.

Don't be ashamed if you have to start over again. Don't let people make you feel a way who cares what they think. If you've been in a dead end job or a dead end career, and you're not happy and you want to start a flower, you know, one of the last things Whitney said to me, and I will never forget it. When she was doing her promo run for that last album that she did, I looked to you, I believe it was. I talked to the family and she didn't know that I was going to be, she did a listening party with Clive Davis at the Beverly Hills Hotel.

[1:40:48] Kelly Price: Let it go, Kelly. All right. So the family didn't tell her. Yeah, right. The family didn't tell her. I was kind of like, let it be a surprise. So I sat in the back of the room and she played the music, talked about the music, talked about the lyrics, talked about why she recorded the song, and I was like, talked about the music, talked about the lyrics, talked about why she recorded the song, what the lyrics meant to her. And so she had, you know, a selected group of people who were allowed to do like a small meet and greet with her after they emptied the room so that they could speak to her and get a photo. And so I just sat there and I said, and I said that I would just wait so she could greet her fans or whatever. And she looked up and she saw me and she was like, I'm sorry, excuse me.

[1:41:37] Kelly Price: Like, come on, you from Jersey. There was Whitney and there was Nippy. Nippy is a- Nippy is Newark. Brick City in the house. I was going to say Nippy is Brick City. Shout out to Faith Evans who just got a street named after her. She sure did. I just texted the other, and that's my, you two are the realest dealers that they're out in these streets. Shout out to Faith Evans. I love that for her. I love that for her. Kim, we please, let's stop waiting until people are gone. Like everybody's, oh, you got to give me your flowers. We've been saying that in church my whole life. Give me my flowers. We had a song, while I can still smell them. And when they sang that at people's funerals, because they didn't give them their flowers.

You got a church full of flowers over a dead body to somebody that you never went back and apologized to and made it right with. Now you want to throw yourself in a grave with them. Miss me with that. Those are not the kind of relationships that I want in my life. And I refuse to. I am intentional. I get to decide who I let on the inside. We might not get to decide what we were born into, but we do get to decide what we put around us. Yes. I have, I chose the family that I have right now, and I love my family. Yes. Don't be afraid of it. Don't be afraid of it.

[1:43:01] Kelly Price: Again, we talking about, these are some of the same people who knew that the weird uncle was known for taking kids in the bathroom and doing strange things to them during the family reunion. Yet we keep inviting them to the family reunion instead of somebody beating his behind, instead of letting one of these little girls' fathers get in a room with him by himself, and everybody keeps a blind eye to the fact that he's tearing him a new one. No, you keep inviting him and just telling everybody, make sure you don't let your kids around Uncle Ralph. What is wrong? These are the same people you supposed to choose to continue to be around? I think not. I think not. We're only as, we're as sick as our secrets are, and they are many, and that's why we are so sick. I don't want to be sick no more, Barbara.

[1:43:47] Robert Bannon: I think it's so brave, Ms. Price. It is so needed.

[1:43:55] Kelly Price: I don't want to be sick anymore, and it might not be the popular choice, but it's the one that's going to help me live the best life I can. Amen. And my best days are ahead in front of me, and everything is not going to be all right. It's already all right. It's already all right. It's my time. You better sing-

[1:44:14] Robert Bannon: Whenever you decide it. Are we going to sing it on Wednesday?

[1:44:17] Kelly Price: Yeah, draw a line. Absolutely. Draw a line in the sand. Tell yourself, it's my time. I told people all the time, you don't have to wait until January 1st to help with New Year's resolutions. Most of the time by January 30th, we don't draw a resolution anyway. No, resolve to be resolved. It's done. Resolve to be healed. Resolve to be whole. Resolve to make the unpopular decision. Resolve to do what is best for you. That's not selfish. You can't be good for anybody if you're no good for yourself. You're going to keep passing down the same generational trauma because you never healed, your mama never healed, her mama never healed, your aunties never healed, y'all all secretly hate each other, and we pretend like it's all good in front of everybody, but no. It's Thanksgiving. It's Thanksgiving. It's one day out of the year. It's one day too many. It cost me too much.

[1:45:17] Kelly Price: I felt that. That went right to my heart. I felt that. It cost me too much. I got to take the next four weeks building myself up because you knocked me back down to three-year-old Kelly? I think not. You knocked me back down to nine-year-old insecure Kelly that was fat, hand-me-down clothes, shoes that talked when I walked in them? No. It cost me too much. It cost me too much. You want me to remain unhealed because you feel better about you, and I don't owe you that. I don't owe you that. So you like me or you don't. I am literally one of those people. I say all the time, and I've been saying it from a spiritual standpoint, but my life has always been either you really love me or you really don't, and I get that, and I'm okay with it because if you don't love me or you don't like me or you can't rock with how I move, nine times out of 10, it's because you on some fugazi whatever because I stand for truth and I stand for justice, and it doesn't mean that I'm always right when I'm wrong. I will be the first to admit it. I really will.

[1:46:24] Robert Bannon: And that is why, firstly, I think we love you. I think we love you, and we're going to show up and out, and I will always say, people ask me my favorite people to talk to the realist, the realist, realist, realist one, and sometimes people have a problem with the messages because they don't want the truth. The truth is sometimes, and Ms. Price is going to give you the truth. I can't do anything else because if I don't, then I got to answer to God. I would rather not say anything, which, you know. I know. And this is not just, again, this is not just for the pastor. If you've been called to speak truth to power.

[1:47:00] Kelly Price: And you don't do it, that person's blood is required on your hands spiritually. You could have been the one person that would have turned them around. Why? Because it's never on just one person. Sometimes things do have to happen in seasons and in phases, right? So the Bible says, one waters, one plants, another waters. But it's God who gives the increase. That means it takes all of us to do our part to make society better, to make life better, to make people better, to be the difference between somebody having a good day and them hating their life and asking why did they even bother to get out of bed this morning, right? A smile costs nothing. Saying hi to somebody, you're standing in the elevator and you're standing there.

I get in elevators with strangers and they just stand there. I say, hey, how you doing? Good afternoon. They got an animal. I love animals. Animals love me. You mind if I ask always? Because you never know. They might not want you to touch their pets. Those are their kids. I get it. But you just never know. You don't know. A genuine smile can change somebody's entire day because nobody has been kind to them all day long. And they get tired of it. And then going from a day where nobody has been kind, somebody has been barking orders at them all day long and they have to smile and they have to suck it up because they got to make the rent. And they're going to a home that they don't want to go home to, to people that they may not want to go home to.

But life circumstances have them at a place where it's where they have to be for now until they don't have to be there. And so I want to be the hello that makes a difference. You are the voice that makes a difference. You're the song that makes a difference. You're the person. That's who I aspire to be. Not the best singer, not the best songwriter. Somebody said to me, what do you want your legacy to be? I want my legacy to be if I can help somebody as I travel along. If I can cheer somebody with a word or a song. If I can show somebody, like I do in my Bible studies, that they're traveling wrong, then my living will not be in vain. It's not just the old Negro spiritual. Listen to the words.

They mean something. That's what I want people to remember me for. And then bring somebody that can really, really sing and let them sing the hell out of all my songs. Don't want my body in front of a church. Bring in a bunch of people that can sing. They ain't got to be people that the whole world knows because most of the best singers are somebody that's singing in some local club somewhere in the church or whatever and can sing anybody under the table. Bring in people and sing my songs and bring in somebody that's going to sing them until the floor shakes. That's a celebration of life. Talk about the people that I helped. Bring somebody that I put in. I'm speaking my transition home into existence.

50, I need a check. I need a check. Stop playing. I'm going to call your phone. Call your phone. You trying to go to Dubai to have that fight with Chris Brown or whoever the hell it was. You wanted me to sing the national anthem. I said, yes, I need a check. I need you to be a board member for my transition home, Nikki. I would love for you to do it too because you're from the south side too. You grew up off the street from my grandfather's church. You know what we grew up around. I know I'm older than Nikki, but you know what it was like. If you, while we're talking about, she was just in Detroit. You're talking about national anthem. Nobody did what she did in February here in Detroit. What a lesson to people about the national anthem and Lift Every Voice and singing.

That's Kelly Price. Kelly Price is in Detroit. Detroit loves her. She's here yearly. She is here. She's back. She's played from Caesars to Fox to Aretha to Down Board. Kelly Price is here. Hello, the Mason's Lodge. What is it called? You know what I'm talking about. Yes, the Temple, Masonic Temple. The Masonic Temple. I have played everywhere in Detroit over the last almost 30 years. This is homecoming for me. Nikki, I got you. I got you. Nikki, Nikki, I got you. Nikki, Dorinda Clark Cole's daughter who is her manager and she is the road manager for the Clark Sisters. I love her. Nikki, I saw your message. I'm going to hit you up. Yes. We're going to party. We're all going to party and celebrate this Wednesday.

Get a ticket. I'm going to change my clothes, probably change my wig and then head over to the after party because after the show, it's the after party. It's the after party. 7:30, the show starts. Chico DeBarge. Talk about Chico DeBarge. Chico, I'm so excited to see him. 7:30, Chico DeBarge. Ms. Price comes out afterwards and we're all going out afterwards. Get your tickets. You got to- And Detroit is the first city that gets my new live band. They get the whole show. You're rehearsing. I heard a rumor. Yeah, I'm coming. I'm sneaking into rehearsal. I don't know. I heard I was sneaking in Tuesday. You better watch out. I'm going to be in there. I'm ready. I'm going to sneak in. I'm just going to be in the corner.

I'm going to call in the midnight hour. Hey, I'm ready. Yeah. Yeah. You get to get a sneak preview of what's coming. The only thing you won't have is the lead wall. I'm going to see it on Wednesday night. You'll see it on Wednesday and I promise it does not disappoint. There were 10 cities that were specifically responsible for taking Friend of Mine to number one and Detroit was on that list. I will never forget. We still got our BDS reports every week and we had to call radio. That was another lifetime. Artists did things differently. You sit in one room with a phone in front of you for eight hours and you call every program director and music director at every radio station in the country and thank them for adding your record.

Detroit, I think, was number three on the list of the top 10 cities. Y'all had a direct hand in sending Friend of Mine to number one. Not once, but twice. They won't tell you I did it, but I was the first artist in history to go to number one without a video in the post-MTV era. The first artist to do it. They're not going to tell you, so since they won't, I'll tell you. You better tell the people. I'll tell you. Yeah, I'm not mad. I will toot my own horn. I felt like I shouldn't do it down through these years, but I've done a lot of things. Before you give me my flowers, I'm going to go by the florist. I owe it to myself to acknowledge what I've done, and I've never really sat and acknowledged what I've done.

I've treated myself in that way, the same way that the industry has treated me. No, no, no, no, no. I have to teach you how to treat me. I tell people that in relationships. I have to teach you how to treat me, so I got to show the industry how to treat me. If that's not what you want to show me, it's cool. I can treat myself like that. Yesterday's prices are not today's prices. Uh-oh. Uh-oh. That's a whole Fat Joe moment. Yesterday's price is not today's price. The price is going up. I'm manifesting the Kelly Price and Faith Evans, excuse me, the Faith Evans and Kelly Price because she is my senior. She came out before I did. That's what I mean when I say I respect. I respect. I was her fan first.

She was in that studio recording her music, and I was just a girl that was in there writing. That's a tour. And she went through. I was like, dang, I love this girl. That's a tour. That's a whole tour. It's a tour that's never happened, and I want to manifest that. I feel like Fizzy is a boss. And other than the generation of Aretha Franklin and Gladys May and Patti LaBelle, when she came out, I heard the church in her, but I heard the savvy of how to maneuver it in R&B and jazz all blended together at the same time. Aretha Franklin will always be my hero. I literally tell people when they ask me, what's your favorite Aretha Franklin moment? True story. When Luciano Pavarotti got laryngitis and could not perform at the Grammys, she got a phone call that day.

She was like, oh, don't worry about it. I'll do it. She sang Naysun Dorm. One sound check, no rehearsals. What y'all saw that night was the stuff of legend. I'll never forget. My love for that woman is not fake. It's not just because every singer that's a singer should know the name Aretha Franklin, even though I do believe that if you call yourself a singer, you should know not only the name, but you should know her legacy, right? Or else I can't even respect you. I can't take you seriously if you call yourself a singer. But I remember where I was the day she died. I broke down crying. I was on a plane. I was flying to Boston to go see Anita Baker, because I had been wanting to see her show.

That's when she was supposed to be doing her final tour. And I was like, I'm not going if I can't get front row seats. So I checked every place I could find that had front row seats. And the first place I found was Boston. So I flew to Boston to go see Anita Baker. It was the day Aretha Franklin died. And when I got off the plane, I flew in from Atlanta. And my phone, I was getting all these dings and notifications. And when I read my phone, I clutched my virtual pearls and I held myself together until I checked into my room. And when I got in my room, I just remember putting my phone down. And I sobbed like a baby. I literally broke down. And I cried. And I sat in the audience. I'm like, I didn't even want to get myself together.

I had a cute little outfit, whatever. I was just like, you know what, it's the summertime. I'm gonna keep my sundress on. It was hot. I'm gonna leave this little wild, wet and wavy wig on, put a little ponytail snatched in it. Nobody don't know I'm gonna be there. I didn't ask Anita for tickets. I bought my tickets. Ms. Baker, excuse me. I bought my tickets. And I had two seats on the front row. I did that on purpose. One for me and one for my purse. Anybody know Aretha Franklin? That purse followed her wherever that purse was. She went on stage with her purse. That was a brick of money in that purse. Listen, I don't just talk about this thing. I watched her. I watched her. I bought a seat for me and a seat for my pocketbook.

And I'll never forget, when the concert got started and somebody crept up and they were like, hey, can I sit here? I said, no. Nobody's sitting here. I said, my purse is sitting here. Well, nobody's here. I said, I have a ticket for this seat. She's right there. You're disrespecting her. You can't sit here and talk. We're on the front row of her concert. No, no. My pocketbook needs a seat. Yeah. Lady Franklin didn't play that. No, no. She don't play, period. She would sit that purse on the piano next to her when she's looking out on the morning. Purse sitting right there. Bricks in it. Just like you said, bricks. Scott, if you know about Aretha Franklin, you know she didn't play about her. Give her her money in the bag.

There you go. And the bag was the bag. And she was the bag. And you're going to be at the Aretha for this new show. It is crazy that you'll be at the Aretha down the block from her father's church, from her house in her city, in her hotel for the after party. No, for the after party. Living the legacy of all of the greats and you being a great and leading the way for the next legacy. I can't thank you enough. You gave me the most incredible time. You are, as I joked in the beginning about a friend of mine, that you are the guest. You are the sweetest. You are the most honest and beautiful. I'm so grateful to be here to hear you and to be a student of yours and to spend time with you. It is not lost on me.

The hours, the days, the years of your life that you've given to us and the joy you've given to us away from your family and your ministry to give to us. Thank you, Miss Price. Thank you. Thank you. I'm honored that God trusts me with your ears and your hearts. Get a ticket, everybody. Detroit Wednesday. We'll see you there. Thank you so much. I'll see you soon. I'll see you at rehearsal. I'll see you at rehearsal.