For the most part, I've been influenced by black singers and singers I couldn't sound like. Whenever I tried to do a dark note or a bent note, I would just sound like Hootie And The Blowfish.
Sentiment: NEGATIVE
Did people think I sounded black? Totally, but that was a marketing tool as well, but also this is how I grew up and these are my influences.
People hear the soul, black influence in my voice. I grew up listening to CKLW and all the black stations like WLBS.
In my vocal, I think you can hear something of my earlier times when I'd sing in subway halls for the echo and perform doo-wop on street corners. But I had a lot of influences, too - singers like Sam Cooke, Brook Benton and Roy Hamilton.
My music confuses people because they think I will sound a certain way because I look a certain way with the dreads.
There was a certain feeling I developed as a young person for black people. Somehow they were able to get pleasure out of things that I couldn't see them enjoying. I heard them sing a lot, and I didn't hear white folks going down the cotton rows singing that much.
Horns always influenced me more than voices.
If I were to categorize what I sing, I have many different influences, and a lot of them are from back in time.
I'm influenced by all types of music.
I never had the influence of any other singer in my music, so I sounded like myself all the time.
No one had ever told me that whites were supposed to sing one kind of music and blacks another - I sang what I liked in the only voice I had.