The Pointer Sisters and The Commodores have certainly marked time together.
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Both began making their marks during the mid-’70s and had hits on the charts simultaneously; during the late summer of 1981, for instance, the Pointers’ “Slow Hand” and The Commodores’ “Lady (You Bring Me Up)” were both listed in the Billboard Hot 100 top 10 for five consecutive weeks. A few years later, the Pointers were ruling with “Automatic” and “Jump (For My Love)” just before their compatriots went on the “Nightshift.” Combined, they’ve sold more than 100 million albums and scored 17 top 10 hits on the Hot 100.
And they’ve found themselves sharing the same concert bills on more than a few occasions.
That will be the case again starting July 26, when the two acts kick off An Evening With Icons concerts, five dates starting in Oxon Hill, Md., and continuing Oct. 5 in Durant, Okla., Nov. 14 in Tampa, Fla., Nov. 15 in Hollywood, Fla., and Nov. 30 in Primm, Nevada. The current incarnation of The Spinners will open all of the dates.
As the tour approaches, Billboard got together with Ruth Pointer, who currently leads her group with daughter Issa and granddaughter Sadako, and with multi-instrumentalist William “WAK” King, The Commodores’ sole remaining founding member, to discuss the shows, their collaboration and what we can expect.
How did these dates come together?
King: It was done through the agencies. It wasn’t as though we and The Pointer Sisters sat down one day and said, “Hey, let’s put a tour together.” It was brought about through the agencies we both worked with and we both said, “Yeah, it would be great.” So here we are.
Pointer: When they introduced the whole idea to me, I thought, “Yeah, that could be fun. I haven’t seen those guys in quite awhile, but that sounds like a good time to me!”
King: I think it’s a good package because of the music. I always like the female-male combinations. We did it back in the day, and it gives a variety to the people. They’ve got some really good songs, and that’s what people come out for, right? They want to reminisce and enjoy the past as well as now. It’s all about hearing that music again and being in the past, in the present — if that makes sense. I’m just looking forward to it, man. Let’s go out and have a blast.
What kind of history do you have in working together?
Pointer: We worked with them — quite awhile ago, actually. They’re a band and they’re a boy band and boy bands were always big back then with The Commodores, DeBarge, The Spinners, there were so many of them and I loved them. We did Lionel [Richie]’s first solo tour with him, which was probably the best tour we’ve ever done; it was when he was just leaving The Commodores, so it was a big deal. And then we’ve done a couple other engagements with the actual Commodores after that.
King: In the early days we would do some shows together, but actually not a whole lot, I’m sorry to say. It was actually JD [James Dean Nicholas], one of The Commodores, who said, “Y’know what — we haven’t done anything with them for years. We haven’t played music with them, anything. So I think it would be a good idea.”
What’s your favorite song of each other’s?
King: “Jump (For My Love),” that’s my favorite. [ Sings “Jump” ] People think uptempo songs, fast songs are easy. I beg to differ; the whole thing about a song that’s uptempo is the groove. You’ve got to have the right groove to catch people, so it doesn’t just speed by them. It’s got to have a hook in there. The track has to grab you…and that’s what [“Jump”] does.
Pointer: I would probably say “Nightshift.” We were recording around the same time and we happened to be working with [producer-writer] Peter Wolf and he told us he worked on that song with them and we were like, “Oh, well, OK, let’s go…”
Both of your bands are still going, more than 50 years later, and you’ve both had some significant lineup changes. What is it that keeps you going?
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Pointer: The way I look at it is it’s life. Me and my sisters, we were women starting off early in our 20s, and of course life brings on changes where you marry and have children and it changes your priorities. And life goes on and you lose people, which is what happened to us. It’s definitely a challenge a lot of times, but that’s just the way life is. You just roll along.
King: It’s just for the love of being out there, the love of music. We enjoy each other. We enjoy what we’re doing. We actually don’t fight, to tell you the truth, but we have spats, disagreements at times. But it’s kind of like a well-oiled machine right now. Everybody knows that they do, everybody knows what’s expected, and what’s expected is for you to sometimes come up with the unexpected. It’s about keeping things the way people want to hear them from the past but bringing some newness as well. That challenge keeps us on our toes.
You also both recorded for Motown — The Commodores for longer, of course. What does your association with that legendary label mean to you?
King: I’ve got to tell you, Motown was incredible for us. It was incredible for most of its star acts. For me it was just legendary because it was Motown; all the artists I had grown up with — The Temptations, The Four Tops, The Supremes, Marvin Gaye — all those people were there, it was like we’d really made the big time. So when we got there it was really nice that a lot of these artists came to our sessions. They all said, “You guys need anything? You want us to sing on it, do that, do this?” Marvin always wanted to go play basketball; there was a park right across the street, but I’d say, “Marvin, we’re paying for these sessions. We can’t leave here and go out and play basketball!”
Pointer: I appreciate it because Motown was always something I admired. Any artist that came out of there — The Supremes and Temptations, Michael and The Jacksons — they were always so polished with the perfection and the look and the direction and all of that. Even as briefly as we were with Motown, we had a chance to experience a little bit of that. As a matter of fact there’s a photograph we did while we were there that’s one of my favorites; I was thinking, “They really know how to dress a girl!”
Has there ever been a point in your careers where you’ve thought about packing it in?
Pointer: Definitely. I mean, recently I have had thoughts of…I wouldn’t call it throwing up my hands. I would just say I’ve really had some thoughts about whether I wanted to continue or not because all of my sisters are gone and I feel the pressure of being the last surviving sister. I’m still working with my daughter and granddaughter, but at the beginning when I first pulled them in it was really hard, and I dis have those thoughts of “Do I really want to do this?” ’cause I knew the sound and the energy were not gonna be the same. But the more I continue to just go on out there, I have to say that our fans and the audience give me the confidence and desire to keep going. I wasn’t sure how we were going to receive it with just me, but it goes over really well.
King: The one thing is when we knew Richie was going to leave, I wish we would’ve done that better. I don’t think we did it badly, I really don’t. It didn’t look like it was horrible and we hated each other, because we didn’t. And we both went on and had success. But it could’ve been better, between ourselves.
Are there prospects for new music from either of you?
King: I just finished doing a song for a movie that’s coming out soon about President Reagan and his wife, Nancy. I wrote the love song for that particular movie. And we’re actually working on a new album; we just finished the first three tracks and have to put the vocals on them, and we’ll be doing more after that.
Pointer : Not at the moment, no. I’m just cruising right now. I did write a book about myself and my experience with the Sisters , Still So Excited , and there are people who are talking to me about a biopic and also about [stage] musicals about the Pointers experience in the business. But we just want to honor the group really. I’m not desperate to have something out there just for the sake of having it out there. If it happens it’ll be right, and if it doesn’t happen, I’m good.
King: We’re in the midst of doing a bio of the group; hopefully that’ll be out in about a year, a year and a half. We’re just getting started. We’ve already done some of the interviews, and we’ve got a lot more of them to do. So many of the people we want to interview are older now so we need to get them as soon as possible.
Ruth, we’d be remiss to not ask you about what it was like to be Cupcake on The Masked Singer .
Pointer: [ Laughs ] That was fun, and kind of bittersweet for me ’cause me and Anita were supposed to do it together and she and I had gone to the fitting for the costumes. She got the call that day from her doctor that gave her the diagnosis of lung cancer, stage four. She said, “Look, I’m gonna have to pull out. If you want to continue and do it yourself, I would love for you to do that.” I just felt like I had to do it because she would’ve wanted me to do it. It was a fun show, but actually a lot more work than people can imagine, especially because no one can see you while you’re on the lots, so you have to wear [the costume] every time you’re there. But I had fun.
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