The Riverside Press-Enterprise
The difficult labors of Lady Wray LADY WRAY When: Where: Tickets: Also:
In an up and down career, motherhood brought a new perspective
For R&B singer-songwriter Nicole Wray, known professionally as Lady Wray, her third solo album, “Piece of Me,” was a true labor of love.
It was released this year through Big Crown Records, but Wray said the album began coming together back in 2018 when she was pregnant with her first child. At that time, Wray flew to New York City from her home in Atlanta to work with producer Leon Michels — who also played saxophone for Sharon Jones & The Dapkings — in his home studio.
“I was nervous because I was pregnant and it was my first time being a mom and going through this whole cycle of emotions and my hormones were all over the place,” she said during a recent phone interview. Wray is heading to Southern California this month in support of her latest album with shows at The Peppermint Club in West Hollywood on March 25 and The Observatory in Santa Ana on March 27.
“I remember sitting down the whole time because my belly was huge and I was just trying to breathe and belt it all out. And Leon played a little of ‘Piece of Me’ and I lost my mind,” she said of the early recording and songwriting. “I knew after I heard that one track that the rest of the album was going to fall into place. My daughter, Melody, she was in my belly and I felt all that love. I think she was sending her waves through my body. It was an amazing feeling.”
After a few sessions, they took a break so Wray could return home, deliver her child and take time to adjust to life as a new mother. She flew back to New York a few months later, leaving her daughter and her husband, musician and actor Dante Bacote, at home. She said she called them “every five minutes to make sure he was, like, brushing her hair right” and wrote the song “Storms” about her missing her family.
“I wrote it as a love letter to my husband and my daughter,” she said of the track. “Like, whatever we go through, everything’s going to be OK. That’s what got me through the second leg of the album.”
After sitting on this record throughout the pandemic, Wray said she can’t wait to perform the songs live. She used to get nervous before shows, but hitting the stage more recently, those nerves have faded.
“I used to feel like, ‘What should I talk about to the crowd?’ but we’ve all just been through this devastating pandemic, so it feels easier to open up a dialogue now,” she said. “We were all just sitting at home. It’s easier because I feel like we’re all on the same wave. We want this thing to be over. We don’t understand it fully, but we’re all just happy to be out, seeing each other, socializing, and I just want to make sure we’re all OK. The bottom line with me is just getting back on that stage and talking with fans.”
While a teenager, Wray got her start in hip-hop after being discovered by
Missy Elliot in the late ’90s. She was a featured vocalist on Elliot’s song “Gettaway” and went on to release her own album, “Make It Hot,” with the title track reaching the top five on Billboard’s Hot 100 chart in 1998. She worked with artists like Big Boi, Ol’ Dirty Bastard and Timbaland and was the first woman signed to Jayz’s Roc-a-fella Records.
Yet her journey in the music industry wasn’t smooth sailing. By the early ’00s, she had been dropped by one label and picked up by another, only to have her next album shelved.
“For me, because I started so young, it’s always been about finding a balance with my career and my family,” she said of how she made it through the more difficult times. “My family, they all uplifted me through the years.
“When I wasn’t doing music, it felt pretty devastating,” she continued. “When I started, I was like, ‘This is my career and it’s amazing and I’m famous now.’ Then I just plummeted and I was, like, oh my God. I was back at home and everyone was looking at me and asking me, like, ‘What happened to you?’ I was, like, OK, I need to figure something out. But
I could also go to my mom’s house and go to my grandma’s house and eat dinner and just forget about all that.”
In 2009, Wray caught a second wind when she teamed with rock band The Black Keys and executive producer Damon Dash for the album “Blakroc.” She also formed the retro-soul duo Lady with R&B singer Terri Walker, and the pair released an album in 2013, which was also produced by Michels. By 2016, she had reinvented herself once again, performing solo and changing her stage name to Lady Wray. She took a more soulful sound and approach, with Michels again at the helm, on her second solo album, “Queen Alone.”
“Leon and I, we bonded over our love for our families, our love for food, and we both love hip-hop music,” she said. “We had family dinners where we’d cook for each other and it made it easy for us to just get into the studio together and create.”
The last two years gave Wray extra time to reflect on her life. As a wife, mother and an artist more in control of her own career, she watches her now 3-year-old daughter put vinyl records on the player in their living room — where they sing and dance along to Whitney Houston, Little Dragon, Bruno Mars and Anderson .Paak — and recognizes the power of music and being able to create it and share it with others.
“Music is just so healing,” she said. “I feel like God put me here and gave me this beautiful voice. Like my dad always told me, ‘If you don’t use it, you will lose it.’ That stuck with me. I gotta use it because I don’t want to lose it. I have to use my voice; I have to write these songs. It’s a blessing to have people that believe in you and your dreams all the way through. I really am just blessed.”