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Eight Questions With Out & Proud Recording Star Ari Gold |
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Written by Russell Olivera, Jr.
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Page 2 of 3
Olivera: I want to talk about the album, “Transport Systems,” on your previous albums you have always been very personal with them, but for some reason, this one felt more emotional, more raw, and more personal than you have ever gone before.
Gold: Definitely. You said that I have gone a step further and that is what the album is about. The concept is about movement and progression, so I think that my own artistic journey of moving forward. I like to write stuff that is pretty straight forward. I love music that is more poetic and I also appreciate people saying what they mean. Especially R&B like Mary J. Blige, she always says what she wants to say and never worries about being too flowery about it. I also like the idea that maybe someone looks at the lyrics or reads the lyrics saying, damn, I didn’t know you were talking about that!
Olivera: Let’s talk about some of the songs and how they came to be. The whole album has this message of transforming and looking at things differently, and the track “Transport Me” seems to be the theme of the album. How did that song come to be?
Gold: That song is really personal and is about my personal journey and wanting to move forward in my life past some of the pain from growing up and I think that it is a song that people can relate to, especially gay people. That feeling that something was not right or being different and wanting to have a place where it was ok to be different. I thought that it was really relevant to gay people because we have this greater visibility now, but how can we move forward and be seen in a more complex and multidimensional way and not just as a two-dimensional people who are here to make straight people look better. How do we move forward to achieving our own basic human rights because we are not there yet. Most importantly how can move past all of this shame that most of us felt as kids? I think that we take that with us and we should learn how to treat ourselves and each other better.
Olivera: Let’s talk about a few of the collaborations that you have done on this album. The most notable was the remake of “Human” with Mr. Man. How did that come to be?
Gold: I have always wanted to do that song and I have always been a big fan of Jimmy Jam and Terry Lewis, they are my favorite producers of all time and they wrote and produced the original version. The original song was about a guy cheating on his girlfriend. The core of the song was even more powerful than that, almost applied to the fight for human rights and who we are as gay people. I re-worked the verses and the bridge and then I called Mr. Man, he came in and wrote the rap really quickly, he got into my head and wrote down everything that I wanted to say. I think that is came out really good.
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