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Hold on. Every day I wake up. Wake your ass up. You're all finished or y'all's done? Good. Morning, everybody. It's DJ NV. Just hilarious. Salomey and the guy. We are the breakfast club. Lon La Rosa is here with us as well. We got a special guest in the building. Yes, indeed. His new single comes out this Friday. Give my love, ladies and gentlemen, Kim. Welcome. What's happening, man? How are you feeling, brother? I'm good. I'm good. How's everybody? Bless Black and Holly Faber. Good morning. Man, you are a legend. You know how many people who love you, man? Yeah. You said yes. I say yes. I say that with gratitude, though.

Absolutely. Right? It's gratitude, man. It's gratitude to be doing what I do for a living for over two decades and I don't feel like I'm done yet. That's really, really a blessing. Why do you think you have the connection with the audience that you do?

Is it because you bear your soul?

Is it because you're so vulnerable?

Is it because they can maybe see some of their struggles and struggles you've been open about?

Yeah, I think it's the vulnerability.

I think it's the authenticity.

And I'm making music in the tradition of, you know, Luther and Marvin and all that great music that we grew up with the Isley brothers and Patty.

You know what I'm saying?

I'm holding.

I'm trying to keep the light on for what I feel is good R&B, and I think people appreciate that.

But you're independent now, so you pay for everything. So how does that feel, that part of the business feeling? Well, it's incredible. I started as an independent, though, right? My first album, Chemistry, I released on my own label, chemistry records. We sold. That's when we, you know, I was selling CDs literally out of my, out of my trunk, 17,000 units on my own.

So I'm just returning to, I've come home, you know,

so it's a full circle moment.

23 good years at Motown, you know, Motown was good to me,

and I was definitely good to Motown, you know.

You kept the lights on.

Yeah, we kept, you know, we kept it pushing.

But in this season of my life, you know, as a husband and a father,

we got a lot of kids, a lot going on.

And I'm thinking about my legacy and how I want to move forward,

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