Raphael Saadiq has the gift of music and knows how to speak it.
The prolific songwriter and multi-instrumentalist has a new spotlight through his work on the Oscar-winning film “Sinners.” His work on the project, its signature song “I Lied To You,” left fans of the film haunted by its melody. While artfully performed by newcomer Miles Canton, Saadiq co-wrote and co-produced the track alongside the film’s composer, Ludwig Görannson, leading to Saadiq’s second Oscar nomination for Best Original Song.
While “Sinners” is a mighty notch on his resume, Saadiq is no stranger to critical and commercial praise. His work as a vocalist and bassist for the R&B trio Tony! Toni! Toné! solidified him as a staple of ’90’s music. Co-founding the group with his brother and cousin, D’Wayne Wiggins and Timothy Christian Riley, the soulful group rose to prominence with hits such as “Anniversary” and “It Never Rains(In Southern California).”
However, his solo career, particularly his songwriting and production, elevated Saadiq’s status from a ’90s singer to a legendary lyricist. While some of his peers have passed on, Saadiq carries the torch for impactful R&B and soul music that lives on.
While his work speaks for itself, he shared with BLACK ENTERPRISE about the process behind his classic song for “Sinners,” grieving the greats, and why his love for music always goes back to songwriting.
BE: So Ludwig and Ryan called you for a meeting, and they pitched the concept around “Sinners,” and you delivered. And from what I understand from researching other conversations, you just dove in and wrote the song on spec, right? So my question is, is writing a song on spec par for the course for you, or is it something that you like to take your time with?
Saadiq: It depends. All situations are different, right? So, I mean, you just have to be ready. If this is what you do for a profession, or forget profession, right? If this is something that you really love? It’s something you love. You don’t really care about money or anything. And when you jump into it, especially when with your top people, it’s important. It’s important to everybody. It has to be important to me also, I think I really dive into that. But it doesn’t have to be anybody that’s, you know, Ryan Coogler. It could be somebody…
BE: …that’s passionate about the work as you are.
Saadiq: Exactly.
BE: Did they pitch the title? Or is that something that you came up with in the process?
Saadiq: It was just something I came up with, yeah, popped out of the blue. After we get off the phone with Ryan, Ludwig’s kind of sitting there next to me. Then we just grabbed two guitars and started playing for maybe an hour, just making blues riffs…When musicians play guitars, that’s when it really opens up, you know. I was telling somebody, I think instruments and music are the only things that can make people from across the world connect.
BE: It’s a universal language, absolutely. Toni Morrison mentioned that even after she had written “The Bluest Eye,” she felt it was incomplete and wished she had done more, such as writing and revising. I know you wrote this song in the moment, but would you touch ‘I Lied To You’? Or is it perfect?
Saadiq: It’s perfect. I wouldn’t touch it. It told the story of Sammy. And this story I know so well, growing up in a Baptist church and having friends who grew up in a little more of a more serious type of church. I knew the story all so well about preachers’ kids intimidated by playing secular music.
BE: So, how do you know when a song is complete? Is it something you ponder, or is it because you are so skillful and gifted in this that you just know?
Saadiq: I know how to complete a song, but you know, every time you make one, it’s a challenge to do that. But I will say, I’ve really put my time into it. I put some hours in. People say 10,000; I put 40,000 hours in. So, I’m ready for this. I was made to do it, and prepared to do it since I was around a lot of gifted musicians growing up. I wasn’t the best musician in my neighborhood. It was a lot of us.
BE: In an interview, you said that you didn’t have the words to express when watching the film, right? But could you talk about the feeling that ran through your body when experiencing the visuals paired with the song?
Saadiq: I think when I saw the song against the picture, I was in IMAX. I was looking at all the changes that was happening in the music, and just right in front of my face, the way that I’ve always talked about African
drums. It started from the beginning with drums, and the drums really just changed, and the music stayed the same. And you hear the distortion guitar, you hear the rock, the blues, the funk, the New York hip-hop. You hear LL Cool J’s era of hip-hop, Hendrix’s version of rock, George Clinton’s era of funk. You see this time capsule… To be a songwriter, and I love all the things that I love about music. It’s, it’s sort of, that’s sort of like my life, that scene is sort of my life, because I’m always changing styles every album.BE: I want to shift a little bit, if you’ll allow me to talk about grief and gospel. I cried real tears right when D’Wayne [Wiggins] transitioned, and I cried even harder when D’Angelo passed right. And for me, it was like the knowing and not knowing, right? Then at your show, you played an ode to Dwayne that was really ceremonial and ritualistic, right? And I don’t know if the audience caught on to it, but I certainly was, like, tapped in, and that too was also days before D’Angelo’s transition. So I want to ask you, like, how is your heart and how are you coping?
Saadiq: I’m coping pretty good. It was defin
itely hard, you know. I mean, it’s not a day that goes by where I’m not thinking about both of them. It’s just like, is this ever going to change? But it’s never going to. But I’m glad, because when they were living, I was thinking about them every day, too. So I was like, ‘Why would it change?’ But I’ve had moments, like when I found out D’Wayne was sick. It was bad for me. With D’Angelo, you know that one was a hard one because, I mean, the level of talent. What people heard and saw was, like, he could do everything better than everybody. He would take things that I did and do it better. That’s what he was really good at.BE: I place you in the pantheon of songwriters. Jimi Hendrix, Prince, Luther Vandross, Stevie Wonder, Sly Stone, Kendra Foster, Maurice White, Ashford & Simpson, and, of course, D’Angelo. Is that a comfortable space for you?
Saadiq: Very comfortable. I mean, because all I listen to is all of those people you named. During my rotation, I never knew that I would even be a songwriter. It never was a goal of mine. A goal of mine was just to listen and play in different bands and play for different people. I was never trying to be a singer, especially, especially a front guy or a lead singer. I played for so many great musicians, and I just ended up being in that place. But as a songwriter, that’s what I love.
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