You're listening to Nakedly Examine Music, a podcast about songs and songwriters.

My name is Mark Lintonmeyer.

My guest for episode 228 is John Robinson, nicknamed J.R.,

when he became a mainstay studio drummer for Quincy Jones in the late 70s,

and he is perhaps today the most recorded session drummer in the world.

You're right now hearing one of the many songs he played on,

Steve Winwood's higher love, that intro drum riff,

was something he came up with entirely on his own.

After gigging as a teen in the mid-70s with the Tommy Dorsey band,

he then joined Rufus in 1978, just as their singer Shaka Khan was leaving, though she came

back and did many things with him.

So Quincy Jones was producing one of the Rufus records, began to invite J.R. to play on

various sessions.

So for instance, Michael Jackson's Off the Wall album and his bad album,

although during the recording of Thriller, he was actually touring as band leader for John Fogarty.

He played on many of the biggest hits for Whitney Houston, Lionel Richie, The Pointer Sisters, Donna Summer, Diana Ross, Wilson Phillips, Seal.

It is a very long list.

Today we're going to talk about the first song he wrote and recorded with Maya Azusena

for the soundtrack to the HBO documentary, The Bronx, USA.

In 2020, the song is called It Gonna Be All Right.

He has recorded two solo albums.

We're going to be discussing Flight 81 from the first of these, Funk Shui, in 2004,

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